Fragile Crystal: Rubies and Rivalries (The Crystal Fragments Trilogy)

by M. J. Lawless

  The doors from the entrance hall were closed, and there was no sign of disturbance. It did occur to Kris momentarily that perhaps she should be afraid if someone was still in the apartment, but with a snort she considered the likelihood of a burglar wearing Hermès perfume to be very remote.

  It was only when she opened the door to her studio that she realised who was there. Her heart stopped for a moment, and her entire body froze over as though a carapace of fragile ice had crystallised along her limbs and torso.

  Maria was dressed in a two piece suit, pencil skirt emphasising the soft curves of her hips and thighs, the waist accentuated where the jacket was drawn in. The dark blue colour of the suit made her skin appear even paler than usual, and the ruby ring on her finger glittered more brilliantly. Her blonde-white hair was neat and meticulous, her lips dark red—a splash against her almost colourless skin—and she was not wearing sunglasses. She did not even look up when Kris entered the room, but instead her green eyes flickered across the surface of the canvas that she held in her hands.

  “What... what are you doing here? How did... how did you get in?”

  Slowly, calmly, Maria lifted her head and stared straight at Kris. There was a hardness in those eyes, or rather a mask that covered them. For a second Kris felt that she was being watched by a cat, one that was considering how best to play with the mouse that she had just caught.

  “These are good. Very good,” Maria replied casually. “You have talent.”

  For a second Kris was frozen in place, then her anger rose, shattering the crystal armour that had rooted her to the spot. She strode forward, hands grasping outwards to take the canvas that Maria held, but the other woman took a step back and lifted it out of her reach.

  “Put that down! How... how fucking dare you break in here!”

  “I didn’t break in.”

  “Then... then how did you get in? What... who... how did you know when I was going to get back?”

  Maria smirked and took a step towards the window, turning her back on Maria for a moment. “Jorge is always a useful source of information. I do fear that someone as private as Daniel should really get rid of him.”

  “Jorge... Jorge is in with you on this?”

  Maria shook her head, still looking out of the window towards the river, the canvas held in her elegant fingers. “No, sweet Jorge is an innocent, but always so eager to gossip and chat—especially when it’s with a beautiful woman young enough to be his daughter. He let slip that you were planning to return alone.”

  “And told you where I live?”

  “Oh, I got that piece of information out of him a long time ago.”

  “Who let you in?”

  Only now did Maria glance back to Kris, her eyes glittering and a self-satisfied smile on her face. “You may own the lease to this apartment, but it was simplicity itself to track down the owners of the block.” She shrugged and turned back to the window.

  Kris felt her fury rising inside. “Get out!” she shouted. She no longer felt safe in her own home—her home. “Get out of here! Leave me alone!”

  Crossing the room, her hands in front of her, she was not entirely sure what she meant to do but she had to make this woman leave. Maria’s movements were silky, swift, and she turned out of Kris’s grasp immediately, the canvas held in front of her like a shield. Kris just managed to hold her hands before they punched through the painted surface.

  “If you force me to go, you’ll have to break something you hold dear,” Maria said, quietly and with an ominous determination.

  “You can’t hurt my paintings,” Kris responded, confused and almost sobbing with frustration. “Just get out,” she said, but already her anger was mixed with something closer to fear.

  “I’m not talking about your precious paintings,” Maria replied, reaching out with the canvas and letting Kris take it from her grasp.

  Kris held the painting in her hands. It was one of the abstracts, an effusion of the sexual emotions she had begun to feel in recent months. Holding the canvas between her fingers, feeling the frame flex slightly, she realised just how delicate and flimsy it now seemed to her.

  Without waiting for permission, Maria went and sat on the chair beside the table where Kris mixed her paints, crossing one stockinged leg and high-heeled foot across her other knee. “You never returned my calls,” she said, her voice somewhat icy.

  “If I remember correctly, in the last one you called me a whore.” Kris was hot and angry, her blood boiling at the thought of all that this woman had done to her.

  “I’ll admit, that was probably a mistake.” Maria’s smirk was infuriating. “Not like me to lose control. Something I share with Daniel, I suspect.”

  “Don’t mention his name.”

  “Why? Do you own him? Does he belong to you? If anything, it’s the other way around isn’t it. He owns you, you just don’t know it yet. I don’t see a ring on your finger—oh, wait, that’s because I have it.” Maria lifted her hand with a triumphant flourish.

  Without thinking, Kris took two steps to cover the space between them and, her painting dangling in one hand, with the other she slapped Maria across the face with all her strength. The other woman gave out a short cry, but then immediately it was followed by a gasp that was almost one of pleasure. Kris’s heart was beating as she looked down, staring at the red mark that was beginning to form on Maria’s face, a lock of blonde hair having fallen along her cheek.

  Maria turned her head back very slowly, not losing control for a moment. “You’ll regret that. Or will you? You and I both know that a blow can have many meanings.” Her eyes were glittering, ice cold as she stared up at Kris, her lips parted a little, a trace of blood on them from where she must have bitten herself in reaction to the slap.

  Kris pulled back her arm again, prepared to hit her once more, but with catlike swiftness Maria leaped from the seat and grabbed her wrist. Holding the painting, Kris was off balance and almost fell, and though she struggled she could not free herself from the other woman’s grip. For a second she had a flashback of Maria naked, those sinewy limbs, the almost impossible strength in her slender arms.

  “That’s it, little one,” Maria whispered into her ear. “Go on, struggle. I like it when you struggle, when you fight.”

  The malevolence with which she spoke made Kris almost incandescent with rage, but she also realised that she could not win like this. She needed to put the picture down before she destroyed it—she needed to get this woman out of her apartment.

  “What do you want?” she asked, trembling as Maria held onto her wrist.

  “The same as I’ve always wanted. You.”

  Maria’s face was only inches away from hers now, higher and looking down on her. The realisation was suddenly frightening to Kris, that the eyes which watched her were shining with a manic intensity.

  “I... I don’t understand,” she whispered. “I thought... I thought you wanted Daniel.”

  The impossibly beautiful face was twisted momentarily with bitterness. “He doesn’t want me, so I want what he wants. I want you.”

  “Why? Why won’t you leave me alone?”

  She had stopped struggling, and realising this Maria released her wrist. Her elegantly manicured nails were painted red, blood talons that could as easily slash Kris’s face as hold her.

  Taking a step backwards, Maria looked around the studio at the drawings on the wall, the canvases propped up in corners. Kris carefully placed the one she had been holding down beside the table. Maria paused by one of the bird men illustrations that more clearly showed Daniel’s face than the others.

  “I can’t have him. He left me... he ruined me. For years I’ve tried to win him back, to find someone else like him. You can buy an awful lot, you know, and God knows the fortune I’ve spent trying to recreate that time together. But you can’t buy it. I’ve chased older men, stronger men, bigger men, even. But it’s not the same. And I’ve purchased young things who will do anything I tell them,
but those passions... they’re always faked. And then you come along.” Her eyes flashed towards Kris.

  “Your passions are never faked, and I can see why even more in this room. If I can’t have him, I can have you.”

  Kris’s heart was beating. “What makes you think you can... have me?”

  “Because of your desire for him. I’ve chased Daniel Stone for nearly seven years now, and with each passing year he draws further away. But through you I can be close to him. I can feel what it’s like to be him.”

  “You’re fucking crazy. Why on earth should I agree?”

  “Because you’ve got more to lose.” The rest of the threat was unspoken, hanging in the air between them. Kris gasped when she realised what Maria meant, and for a moment was prepared to lash out in anger. She held herself, however. What was it that she would lose?

  Slowly, Maria walked towards her, her hips swaying seductively. Beneath her jacket, her blouse was unbuttoned towards her narrow cleavage and Kris could see the sinews of her chest, the hollow of her throat where the collar bones met. The room was spinning a little, and all Kris was aware of as she placed a hand on the table to steady herself was the aroma of Maria’s perfume, mixed with the strong undertones of oil and turpentine. The combination was sickly, the clean, astringent smells of her artist’s materials cloyed by the overpowering exotic florals of this other woman.

  “With me,” Maria said quietly, lifting her hand to Kris’s coat, “you get to keep everything. You can have Daniel—don’t worry, I know that’s a battle I can’t win, but I can win this one.”

  Her nimble fingers undid one, then another of the buttons, moving down until the front of her coat flapped free. Under the coat Kris was in jeans and a sweater, so mundane, no normal and boring compared to this woman and her powers of possession.

  Maria’s face came closer to Kris’s, bending slightly so that she could whisper in her ear. Kris was aware of the heat of the other woman’s body, her fingers sliding beneath the coat and along her waist, her hips. Kris’s breasts were rising and falling, trapped in the narrow space between the two of them.

  “When he takes you, when he fucks you, it will be my lips you feel on you, my fingers. When you cum, your orgasm will be for me.” Kris’s own hand was fumbling outwards, her own fingers brushing against something cold and hard as Maria moved her hands along her waist, pulling her closer so that she could continue to whisper intimately in her ear.

  “And when I fuck you, when I hold you down, when I hurt you and fill you up, then I’ll know what it’s like to be Daniel. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” Kris whispered. And she did. In that moment, she understood everything.

  Maria’s hand moved upwards, cupping Kris’s left breast, squeezing it through her bra. Those red lips, a scab forming on the lower curve, descended, and her hot breath was a breeze on Kris’s mouth. The taller woman bore down gently, persuasively onto the younger until at last their lips brushed together. And still she pushed herself down, forcing Kris’s lips apart, opening her mouth so that the warm, wet tongue could slide in, a predator seeking its submissive prey. Kris lifted up her right hand, gripping Maria’s arm, and her mouth moved of its own accord, accepting the kiss, holding the other woman in place.

  Maria screamed as the jar smashed into the side of her head, and in her sudden motions she almost bit Kris’s mouth. As she pulled away, fragments of glass cascading to the floor, water and turpentine spilling down the lapels of her expensive jacket, smearing it with muddy, brown colours, Kris had the satisfaction of seeing blood trickle down from her brow, red lines running towards her green eyes.

  “You bitch! You fucking slut!” Maria howled, lifting her hand to her face and pulling away her fingers, seeing the blood on her hands. “Salope!”

  Her eyes were blazing now and, having taken several steps backwards she now prepared to launch herself at Kris—who raised the broken shards of the jar in her hand. The edges were sharp and glittering, and in the base a dark sludge remained.

  “Touch me, and I’ll cut your fucking eyes out, so help me God!” Kris snarled, feeling the heat rise inside her, her face flushed with an angry fire.

  For a second, Maria’s eyes shone with genuine fear and she halted in her steps forward, her red taloned nails caught in a rictus of hate. Then the mask descended once more, her eyes assuming a cold stare as she lowered her hands.

  “You fool,” she said. “Don’t think you’ve just lost me. You’ll never keep him. I’ll make sure of that.”

  Then she was gone, pushing past Kris and almost sending her tumbling against the table. She heard footsteps walking away and then the door slamming shut. She was trembling, her hand clenching in a spasm of fear and anger. Looking down, Kris saw that she had cut her own fingers on the fragments of glass, her own blood mingling with that of Maria’s, the streaks of red washing down the smooth walls and mixing with the sludge at the base of the jar.

  She let it fall, watching in horrified fascination as those final pieces of glass shattered into a hundred pieces, a chaos of muck and gruesome colours staining the floor. She was numb and couldn’t even feel the pain in her own fingers.

  “What have I done?” she asked herself again and again. “What have I done?”

  Chapter Twenty

  When Daniel returned to Cascais on Christmas Eve, Kris was already there to meet him. As he entered into the villa, leaving Filipe to park the car, he dropped several bags inside the doorway and opened his arms to greet her.

  “Merry Christmas!” he said warmly, scooping her up and folding her in his embrace, kissing her neck and head. “I’m sorry it took me a little longer to get away, but I’m here—as I promised.”

  “Yes,” said Kris a little meekly. “Just as you promised.”

  He let her fall back to the floor slowly and looked at her carefully. His eyes, the pupil of one so much larger than the other, searched her face, and a tic in his right cheek made the faint scars alongside it move with a life of their own.

  “Are you okay?”

  She nodded and forced what she hoped would be a bright, sunny smile. “Of course! Merry Christmas.” She stood on tiptoe and kissed him on the end of his nose.

  “Did Jorge bring you?” he asked, retrieving his bags and walking towards one of the reception rooms.

  “No,” Kris called after him. “It seemed unfair to get him to come out on Christmas Eve, so I caught the train and got a taxi here.”

  “Jorge wouldn’t mind,” she heard his voice coming from the reception room. “It’s what I pay him for.”

  A thousand responses sprang to mind, but Kris held her tongue and instead followed him through. Some of the bags were paper, and he was looking inside them. As he heard her enter the room, he looked up, grinning.

  “I suppose it’s bad luck to give these to you early, isn’t it?”

  She nodded, unconsciously hugging her arms. “Better wait till tomorrow.”

  “Indeed.” He left off rifling the bags and instead came up and hugged her again, squeezing her enthusiastically. “Anyway,” he told her with a glint in his eye, “there are other presents I can give you.”

  She smiled at this, but it was still a little forced.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, raising one hand to her chin and stroking it softly.

  “Oh, you know. Christmas is always a little difficult. I think of Dad a lot at this time of year,” she lied.

  His face became sombre at this. “Yeah,” he muttered softly. “It’s why I usually avoid Christmas. Well, we’ll both be the life and soul of seasonal cheer, won’t we.”

  Her smile was tender this time and she took hold of his hand, squeezing it. “Don’t worry,” she told him. “We’ll both manage fine. How was the rest of your time in New York?”

  “Dull. Frustrating.” He pulled away from her gently. “If I didn’t know better, I would swear that I could do with a drink. Don’t worry,” he added, looking up at her quickly. “I don’t need it.”


  Her smile was a little wan and he shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said very quietly. “It won’t happen again. Do you forgive me?”

  “There’s nothing to forgive.”

  “Has Anna been looking after you?”

  “Yes, but I told her she should take tomorrow off, to be with her family. I want to look after you for a change.”

  “How domestic!” he smirked. “You don’t need to, you know. You never have to do anything like that ever again.”

  “I know,” she replied. “But I want to.”

  “As you wish.” Without warning, he took a sudden step towards her and, bending slightly, slid one strong arm beneath her legs, the other behind her shoulders. With one powerful motion he lifted her up, her legs flailing slightly in mild panic.

  “Anyway,” he said, kissing her on her brow as he began to move towards the stairs, her arms instinctively sliding around his neck to hold him as he carried her, “I think it’s time to see about that other present.”

  They did not emerge from the bedroom until early on Christmas day. Kris ached but felt more relaxed than she had expected. The foreboding that had haunted her, that Daniel would return with his own terrible knowledge, was fading slightly, and she had even managed to forget all about Maria for a time while they were making love.

  Her relief was only temporary, however. When he takes you, when he fucks you, it will be my lips you feel on you, my fingers. When you cum, your orgasm will be for me. She shook her head as she went into the bathroom to relieve herself. Get out of my mind, you bitch! she screamed silently. Going downstairs, she saw his mobile phone on the table in the hallway where he had left it on his return. Picking it up, she felt guilty as she flicked it on, but she did not know his password and stared at the locked screen in despair. Taking it into one of the reception rooms, she switched it off completely and placed it in a drawer.

  Her nerves had not completely calmed when Daniel came downstairs half an hour later. He wore a loose bathrobe, open at the front so that his muscular chest and abdomen were partially visible, his large cock swaying slightly from side to side as he entered the kitchen.