by Elena Monroe
I was drunk on theories by my third cocktail as I sat at the bar with Jus by my side. Her chair was swiveled away from me as some handsome guy chatted her up. He was her type, and that wasn’t easy to find. He screamed rock and roll, long hair, and a bad boy with a pretty face and an ugly past.
Toxic city.
Every ex she had that I knew about was flaky and pretentious, and a downright bum—the kind where their “art” mattered more than paying their rent.
It was certainly a very specific type.
Ordering another cocktail, I decided this was controlled damage; the way Khaos had taught me. This drink was the bat and gulping it down was the shattering that my body craved without the spiraling.
My body was buzzing right along with my mind when my mind drifted back to what had me running from home full speed the second I turned 18.
The smothering of religion down my throat from a young age only ramped up when my dad owed money to the wrong people. He thought God would pity him and somehow make money appear, but I knew better. No pity came without a price, and we didn’t have two pennies to rub together for that kind of payment.
One day, a strange man with the same malicious energy came to my school to pick me up in middle school, and I thought my parents were busy or caught up at the restaurant. It wasn’t until later that I learned my life was being used as a threat.
That was the moment in my life I learned what a mask was, how to wear it, how to hide all the feelings, and how important control truly was. To survive that kind of trauma, you had to grow some bad habits—ones that erased the uncomfortable feeling, because now you were armed with defenses.
The memory bounced around in my head and turned my smile upside down, even with the drink in my hand. I knew the ins and outs of that time of my life. I knew exactly how I ended up a control freak. The only thing in my life bullying me for answers was all the secrecy hanging in the air around Grimm.
I never had this kind of desperate need for answers when I worked for Vic. He was just as controlling as I was, and maybe I found some kind of comfort in that, enough to not ask questions. With Grimm, I was taken captive and had nothing but time to sort out how much I didn’t know.
Truly.
This wasn’t amnesia or some kind of trauma blocking out bad memories because it was what was best for me.
I needed answers. Feeling motivated, I dropped two twenties on the bar top and whispered into Jus’s ear, “I’m gonna get out of here. You good to get home?”
Knowing the answer already, I hugged her from behind, and she held onto my arm. “You okay to drive?” Her grip was tight and serious, just like her words, and I steadied myself, trying to look as sober as I could when I knew I wasn’t.
Holding my keys, I practically felt itchy to leave and make Grimm give me answers. My loafers stuck to the sticky floor, and the guy interested in Jus was pawing at her like I might be competition he didn’t notice until now.
“Don’t take the highway. Drive slow and straight.” Her eyes were practically glowing, and I had to hold a laugh in my chest with so much effort it felt like a pocket of air was sitting wrong in my lungs. She finally let go, but her eyes still followed me out the door.
The fresh air felt like relief I didn’t know I needed for my warm skin. There was no valet at the dive bars. I preferred making my getaway quick and less judgmental than waiting on the sidewalk for my car in a group of equal-minded individuals. Everything was a production with the elite of the world, even getting their car.
Staying off the highways, I headed straight towards Grimm’s place. He wasn’t social or the type to have guests this late. He was controlled, but still vastly different from me. My control was to keep from spilling into the dark parts of my mind. Grimm’s control was to keep people away. I knew that much; personality traits like his aren’t exactly inviting. I wanted to know why, I wanted Jus’s crazy idea shot down, and I wanted my control back over my life.
I missed the days I felt safe in my routine. I knew what to expect. I knew how to handle almost everything.
How do you handle being in the dark with no flashlight and a lost sense of direction?
I was so buzzed off top shelf tequila I couldn’t even tell you how I got to Grimm’s. I felt half drowsy and half fired up to demand answers, all less impactful with the drive under my belt. Remembering Jus was pregaming on the way to the bar, I leaned over, searching without my eyes for her bottle of Ciroc probably under the seat by now.
It wasn’t enough to be only buzzed and in the same space as Grimm after he ignored me all day, like a child. I wanted to explode all over him and let him taste the sour anger I had been chewing on all day.
With a big gulp from the bottle, I puckered and winced at the tart bite of the alcohol. The straight liquor without a chaser to ease into had me feeling warm all the way down my spine spilling into the pit of my stomach.
Who knew bravery felt like a hug from the sun?
Climbing out of my car, I stopped to tug off my heels, and I took the bottle of peach flavored Ciroc with me in case this whole thing was a bust. I could drown out my sorrows of failing instead of rising to the challenge like I was meaning to.
Walking up to his doorway, everything kind of danced in a way that threw my perception off enough to make me stumble my way there. My finger pushed into the doorbell a few times as my hips swayed to the chime that was trying so hard to sound uninviting. For anyone else, it might have worked, not for the drunk girl sipping out of a Ciroc bottle, with heels hanging from my fingers.
No, this girl was ready to argue and demand answers the same way he demanded me to come on his fingers.
The door opened in a gust, and my attention grabbed his energy first, tearing through the swaying and foggy senses. “Abigail? What are you doing here?”
“Shhh…” I put my hand across his face, pushing it away from me, as I barged into his place on my mission for honesty. “You’re gonna listen to me for once, mister.” I could hear the words getting lost and confused in my head. I was probably stuttering and slurring each one with a kind of precision only top shelf liquid does.
Rounding the corner that poured out into his open floor plan kitchen, I stopped short like I hit a brick wall when I saw a girl sitting on her knees, constrained with ropes, blindfolded, and a ball gag in her mouth.
My eyes went as wide as possible, like this couldn’t be real. There was a fucking girl in the middle of his kitchen, on the floor, dripping with sex vibes so hard I heard Rihanna singing in my mind on cue.
So much for not being social.
I twisted too quickly to find Grimm behind me, head down, and his fingers on his lips. I hoped they betrayed him when I had to find the center of gravity again. Holding onto the bottle of Ciroc, my new lifeline, I expected him to explain, but the room was all dried up with no verbs or vowels in the air.
Trying to whisper the best a drunk person could, I walked straight over to him, too close when my chest collided with his. “Is she okay? What is she doing? Is this what you meant by ‘safeword’?”
“She can still hear you, Abigail.” His finger pointed to the girl on the floor, making me look again, even though she was hard to forget.
“And?! Is she okay? Forget it, I know telling the truth is hard for you.” I closed the space between me and the girl. Bending at the waist, I whispered so only she felt safe hearing an exit plan if she needed one. My mask fell off a few drinks ago, and now I was almost animated with every word I spoke. “Are you okay? Do you need help?”
“She has a gag in her mouth, Abigail.”
“You don’t have to say my name like that every time. It’s pretentious. How are you supposed to know if she needs to say her safeword if she can’t talk or blink twice?”
“We haven’t started anything… I know her limits, Abigail. I’m her dominant.”
I couldn’t help the disgusted look that flooded my features. The duplicate version of him swaying slightly threw off my focus when he ri
pped the Ciroc bottle from my fingers. “So like you own her or something? What’s her safeword?”
“How did you get here, Abigail?” He walked over to the fridge, and his chest stole all the warmth I was currently bathing in. Such a gentleman, he’ll make you come on his fingers and put your alcohol in his fridge, but don’t expect to talk about it later.
“Drove, duh. I’m a great driver. I taught driver’s ed in school.”
I could tell he wanted to laugh, yet he didn’t. I was being serious, and he was taking me as a joke.
“Are you in the Illuminati or not?” I threw out my words like the vomit I knew I would definitely throw up later.
He coughed with his eyes peeling back in shock as he stood safely on the other side of the island. “For a drunk, you’re pretty demanding.”
He walked over to the girl still frozen into her uncomfortable position and tapped her shoulder three times before squatting behind her. His hand closed around her throat, and he whispered something in her ear that I couldn’t make out this far away or this buzzed.
I watched the ropes fall off in this beautifully dramatic way, and the interested parts of me were satisfied by the action. The warmth I was chasing with the alcohol felt hotter being a witness to this kind of kink they shared.
She took the blindfold off and got up with no complaints. So that’s why my complaining went over like a lead balloon. He hasn’t ever had to deal with complaints, back talk, conflict or resolution, until me. She was quiet and poised in the moments she walked over to her jacket and tied it tightly around her waist. Walking over to him, she kissed him on the cheek and gracefully told him to call her. Everything seemed delicate and fragile in a way you wouldn’t expect BDSM to be.
I was a fucking bull in a china shop compared to the girl, who was basically kissing his ring for the fucking seat in his kitchen. I didn’t miss the side eye she gave me when she breezed by with so much possessiveness it could have knocked me over.
No one could own Grimm.
“Someone should fill her in…” I didn’t mean to speak out loud the last part I was saying in my head. Damn alcohol was an anti-filter, breaking and letting every thought tumble into the world.
“Fill her in?” Following a drunk girl should be a language all in itself. It was messy, abrupt, and barely made sense unless you were drunk too. Grimm was stone cold sober. His sobriety was intimidating.
“No… nothing. Are you in the Illuminati or not? We said full transparency, and I haven’t gotten that.” Walking away from the bad energy she dumped next to the exit, I leaned over the island, trying to find a new center of gravity, while I waited for how he would avoid this one.
“Yes. Satisfied?”
Every part of me wilted along the table, hit with the truth with no warning, and my head rested on my outstretched arm. He didn’t avoid it. He didn’t cover it up, and he was honest in a way I didn’t expect. Transparency was actually pretty fucking transparent.
“And…? Want to elaborate? Who the fuck let Khaos in? He’s not stable enough for a cult.”
He moved around the kitchen from what I saw sideways, still blown over, when he slid the glass jar of Oreos my direction and snapped, “Eat. You’re drunk.”
“I want answers, Grimm. Transparency.”
I wasn’t going to reject Oreos, though, not in my current state. The alcohol had dried up every ounce of fuel I had, and I was running on hangry.
“You smell like a fucking bar. Never mind the fact that you drove here drunk as fuck. Do you know how stupid that is?!” His voice started calm, but ended up feeling like a lash as I pulled apart the two halves of the cookie to scrape the frosting off into my mouth.
Grimm angry was a new one, and honestly, I didn’t love it.
“I’m finnnne. Made it in one piece.”
“This time. Let’s use our brain next time we make bad decisions, Abigail. Clearly, one day with Khaos and you’ve fucking lost it.” I didn’t expect his balled up fist to hit the countertop with so much force when my shoulders shot up to my ears as the sound flooded between us in the quiet.
“Are you going to explain or berate me like a child?”
For the first time since I got there, he made eye contact—a scary kind of focus with his lips in a thin disapproving line across his face. “Don’t act like one then. You aren’t ready for the truth if this is how quickly you fucking crumble.”
I felt stupid and insecure all in one sentence. That is how much power I gave this man over me.
“I’m never going to be ready to be told you’re a monster with no heart. Nope. Unwilling to accept it. Everyone is worthy of love.” My TedTalk came out of nowhere, well, not nowhere. That was the kind of drunk I was: fun, flirty, sassy… and then an emotional crasher. Guess I moved through those pretty quickly to land here, at his kitchen island with Oreos, demanding answers, when the only question I wanted to ask I didn’t.
Why didn’t you want me too?
“Just ask me what you need to ask me, Abigail.”
“Why did you save my job that one day? Why didn’t you let Vic fire me? Does it have to do with the cult you're in?”
“I’m not talking about this. It’s in the past. You got to keep your job, congrats.” He bolted from the kitchen and headed for the stairs, thinking I wouldn’t follow him.
Wrong.
“That isn’t transparent. You said boundaries, which we clearly broke in case you have amnesia, or transparency. We agreed.” I sounded like a teenager trying to make my curfew later and laying out all the reasons that truly didn’t matter at all. The decision wasn’t mine. It was Grimm’s.
He stopped in his doorway, and if I was paying attention to anything but these Oreos in my hand, I would have stopped before colliding into him. “You want full transparency? All the details? Why, so I can watch you run away? I’ve watched enough shit run out of my life.”
Suddenly, Oreos and figuring out how her sitting on his kitchen floor was enjoyable became background noise to the very vulnerable Grimm standing in front of me. Jarring my chin up to make eye contact, I wanted to reassure him I could be submissive too, but I couldn’t find the words.
Whatever he was hiding was scary enough to make his life vacant, leaving only the four guys he grew up with.
“Just tell me. I won’t run away…” After a long pause, the words fell out of my open mouth, still reeling from his confession.
“I’m in the fucking Illuminati, cult… whatever the fuck you wanna call it. I kill people for a living, whoever they want, with zero questions. My family is all psycho in the way you would think cult members are, and Xanax is pretty much the only relief from this bullshit. Does that paint the ugly picture in your head now?”
I watched him stalk over to his bed and slump down like every ounce of cruel he had left in him was expelled the minute he responded truthfully.
I could sympathize. He had just told me more than I bargained for to probably the first person in a long time. Maybe ever. “Am I the only person you’ve said that to?” I took a seat next to him on his bed, and I felt our legs touch, sending my attention right to our laps.
“The door is that way. Why are you still here, Abigail? Glutton for punishment?”
“Maybe we both like punishment in different ways…” It wasn’t a lie.
I preferred my punishments to look like Grimm, by embodying exactly what I couldn’t have. Emotional torture over what I couldn’t fix, have, control…
He preferred his punishments to be more physical than emotional.
“I just told you I’m in a cult. One willing to sacrifice your life over not being sneaky enough in my house.”
Leaning closer to him, I let my hand rest on his thigh. “Exactly how I like my punishments. A cruel twist...”
Without warning, his lips crashed into mine with so much hunger it took my breath away. It almost hurt the way he didn’t care what collided between us, but I didn’t dare let him know it, not after telling him he was the best p
unishment I’ve ever endured. His greedy hands grabbed at my hips pulling me closer, and our lips finally fell in sync with each other, opening and letting each other explore even more.
His tongue was soft, gentle even, when he found the inside of my mouth. I wasn’t sure if he was being gentle because he was vulnerable or because he thought I was so fragile I couldn’t take him as he was.
Gasping at his lips pecking mine, we both needed to catch our breath, when I choked out the words. “You don’t need to be gentle with me. I can take it.”
His body pushed me back until I felt the safety of the soft blankets break my tumble backwards. “One truth at a time, Abigail.” His shirt came off, exposing all the ink underneath, causing my skin to bloom into goosebumps. The pit of my stomach and my tailbone blazed, starting the fire inside me.
Unbuttoning his jeans and leaving them open, he looked down at me. “How drunk are you?”
Drunk enough to think fucking my very attractive boss is a good move?
Drunk enough to not run the other way when you admitted you’re in a cult?
Drunk enough to want more?
But not drunk enough to say no. All the words I wanted to say resembled yes.
“I’m fine.” I had to say the words slowly so my out of breath lungs and still buzzed body didn’t slur them together.
His tongue crept down my neck, with his body hovering over mine and his hands working quickly to get my snug skirt off. Not being much help, I cranked my hips around from the pure ache that took over my senses. All I felt was the overwhelming urge to let Grimm have me, in any way he wanted, if it meant coming like that again.
The man was a fucking magician with his hands. I could only imagine his skills when it came to his own dick.
Wrangling out of my shirt was easy enough, albeit the room was spinning slightly, but I managed to giggle my way through it. His hands smoothed up my thighs, and I actually felt them quiver under his touch. My arms were outstretched above my head, like I put myself on display for him to get kinky with.
“Grimm...”
“Abigail,” he countered my plea, except he sounded stable and less desperate.