‘What do you think that does to me, Amy, hearing you used to love me?’
‘What do you think it does to my heart?’
The problem is, that as good as it feels, as much as I want to lean back and get off on her submission, I can't. Because she looks at me from under her eyelashes. Looks at me with my damned soul in her eyes. She never looks at me when I — no, I never let her look at me when I go over the edge of ecstasy. And now she won't stop looking at me. It knocks me for six.
I clench my teeth, damp down the anger. Pride — that’s my cardinal vice. Not wrath. Pride. The one sin from which all others stem. Yeah, I can be the greedy man and the mean man, the envious and the enraged man, the licentious and the vicious man, but it all spirals down to pride. To the mortal sin of playing God. Of being a complete arse to the only girl I fucking love.
I keep my face neutral and fix my raw eyes at the butchered flowers on the floor.
The ache fades and the pleasure comes back so intense I want to eat her alive. For the first time I have to give chase, like a wolf after prey. I take her to her bed, and her tears are hot and delicious in my mouth.
This ‘thing’ between us, the chemistry, it’s fucking toxic. I know my body is some kind of painkiller, a poisonous addiction, a fix she needs when it hurts too bad. It’s like a knife to my chest but I’ll let her use me. Take whatever I can get. Give whatever she needs. I’ll feed her addiction.
I make her hurt, knowing I’m the one she needs to make the pain go away.
When I'm inside her, she's crying so hard, her sobbing clutches at me so tightly, it feels like a supernova when I come.
I live my life in the Artic. Like a vampire, there’s no place for sunshine in my world.
Sunshine is a fucking killer to dead souls like me. All the same, I’m like a wasp to the biggest flame.
I don’t care if Amy hates me, forever. All I want is for her eyes to stay alive when I’m there. If she loved me again, would the darkness in my soul be converted? Or would the scar her soul has left in me, fade?
17
YOU
MOVIE NIGHT on the following Sunday seems like a costume ball.
Scarlett dresses me up as one of them. Laced into a tight yellow dress, it serves my breasts up like dinner on a platter. Shepherd treats me like a doll, and now, I feel like one, too.
We sit downstairs in the recreational room. Everyone is here, except for Daisy and Max. A few members of staff join us, including Rebecca who passes around popcorn.
Half-way through the horror movie, at the exact moment when the masked serial killer is murdering his first victim, lightning strikes outside Swan Lake and the glittering chandelier above us sparks and dims. It turns the air electric and plunges us all into darkness for a few seconds. In the midst of it, Shepherd’s eyes are moonbeams on shattered glass. He’s leaning against the doorway. The expression on his face sends chills up my spine. The girl in the movie screams.
‘Come here, Amy,’ he says, but his glare is pinned on Jason, a male member of staff who’s watching the film with us.
I hesitantly walk over to Shepherd, feeling everyone’s eyes glued to my back. He steps just outside the recreational room and I follow him out into the foyer.
‘You forgot to tell me we were going to a party, Amy?’ he says, grinning madly. He wears what he always wears, that black shirt, black jeans and heavy boots, and his heavy silver belt. He’s powerfully built and loose-limbed like a cat. Hypnotising to watch. From a distance. He’s too close so I take a step back. His grin drops.
‘Guess my invitation got lost or something,’ he says, and then he is chest to chest with me, breathing in my face. Softly, like a lover's endearment, he whispers, ‘Nice dress. Is this what you're doing when you refuse to come to my sessions, Amy? Showing those lovely tits around?’
‘I’m watching a movie with my friends.’
He’s looking at me with something I’d take as adoration from another man. From Shepherd, it always seems to precede the urge to devour.
‘Did you come here to humiliate me?’
‘What're you saying, Amy? You ashamed to be seen with me?’
‘No, that’s not what I meant . . . ’
‘You look so beautiful. Think I’m suddenly in the mood to watch a film.’
I suddenly feel like I’m the next victim in the horror movie. I hurry back to the sofa where Lilac and Annabeth sit, and kill any chance of Shepherd sitting next to me. He levels me with a hard glare as he drops down into a vacated sofa chair. And I just look at the safe places — walls, corners, the spider webs. Anywhere but him. He’s slumped back like he sits on a throne, watching me so that I can’t watch him. I feel his gaze, too hot.
I pretend I’m fully immersed in the film, but ten minutes later, I take a chance to look at him. All the world. With me to witness it. To witness his boredom. And he is bored, staring at the television screen as blankly as I do. He drums his fingers on the chair, casts a dark look at Jason.
Scarlett rises from her seat and approaches Shepherd. She sits down next to him, crosses her legs, her body an inch away from his.
Why are you jealous? You shouldn’t care.
‘Do you
