by Rina Kent
My legs quiver as I cycle through the forest Dad and I call our world.
His world is different from mine.
His world has duct tape and vacant eyes.
And blood. A lot of blood.
The need to puke my guts out assaults me again, and I nearly give in to it. But I don’t.
I drown in the sound of the bike’s tires and the crunching of the dry leaves and the fallen branches.
I don’t look behind as I pedal the fastest I can. No idea what I’ll do now. What if… What if Dad was helping her? What if —
I frantically shake my head at that thought.
The scene was clear. There’s no mistaking that no matter how I flip it.
I halt at the edge of the road, catching my breath. My nails dig into my palms and I bite my lip as more tears soak my cheeks.
Dad is…
No. I can’t say it.
I reach into my back pocket and retrieve my phone. Alicia. I need to call my sister. She’ll tell me what to do.
The phone doesn’t ring.
Damn it.
Wait. Now that I think about it, Alicia mentioned that her son, Aiden, is missing. Did something happen?
My thoughts jump all over the place, unable to stay in focus. The inability to think straight is paralysing. So much is going on in my brain and I couldn’t comb through everything, even if I tried.
All I know is that I need to get in touch with my sister. I need to make sure her family is safe, and I need her to tell me what to do.
My fingers hover over the number titled ‘Jonathan: Emergency Only.’ Alicia said to only call him if it’s a life or death situation and I’m unable to reach her.
This one definitely is.
My toes curl into my shoes as I hit the number and the phone rings. I haven’t met Jonathan even once since the wedding nine years ago. Alicia comes to visit alone and we usually keep up through calls. When I tell her to FaceTime, she says that’s for the younger generation, not her.
“Hello.” A strong voice brings me out of my reverie.
“H-hey…I…I’m…Clarissa…A-Alicia’s sister.”
“I know who you are.”
Oh. He remembers me. I don’t know why I thought I had to explain myself some more.
“I-is Alicia there? I’m trying to reach her and…”
“She’s dead.”
My heart nearly hits the ground for the second time today. “W-what?”
“The funeral is tomorrow. I expect you to be there.”
The line goes dead.
My heart follows soon after.
He…can’t mean what I think he does, right?
I call him again, but there’s no answer.
No, no, no.
I flip open my browser and search Alicia King. That’s what I usually do when I miss her. I study her pictures with Jonathan and their son on the internet from fundraisers and parties.
The results that enumerate in front of me aren’t of those joyful events, though.
‘Breaking News: Alicia King found dead after a tragic accident.’
‘Jonathan King is a widower after the death of his wife, Alicia King.’
‘An accident takes the life of Alicia King, Jonathan King’s wife.’
The first droplets of rain hit my screen and more soon follow.
My legs abandon me and I drop to the ground as I see the pictures of Alicia’s white car, the one she used to take me all over town with as we shopped and ate.
Then the images of a body covered in a white sheet appear.
The rain blurs my vision as I scroll through the articles, all from today.
Alicia is dead. My sister is dead.
No.
No…
Alicia. You can’t leave me.
She promised we’d see each other more often if I chose to study in a university in London once I was eighteen.
I was counting the days, crossing them off my calendar until I got there.
A sob tears from my throat as a sense of grief sneaks up on me quietly and grips me in its clutches. All our moments together play like a distant song at the back of my head, and the fact that I’ve lost her forever engulfs me in a wave of darkness.
A bleak world.
A strangled heart.
This can’t be happening.
Alicia can’t be gone.
It’s a lie. It has to be.
Still, my tears blind my eyes no matter how much I bargain with my head.
I stare up at the sky, at the stormy clouds and the pounding rain. At the howling wind in the trees and the desolate road.
That’s how it feels inside. Barren. Hollow.
Wake me up, please. I can’t breathe. Someone wake me up.
My phone vibrates and I startle as a picture of Dad lifting me in his arms on my sixteenth birthday flashes on the screen.
My Hero.
I named him my hero, but he never wore a superhero cape. Not even close.
I stare behind me, my tears coming to a screeching halt. I hop on my bike, throw my phone in the basket, and pedal down the road the fastest I can. The rain soaks me, my dark hair sticks to my forehead and my mouth, but I don’t stop my high speed.
The phone flashes with a text from Dad.
My Hero: You were here, weren’t you, my little muse?
Muse. That’s what Dad calls me sometimes. When I asked him why he uses that nickname, he said it’s because I inspire him to be a better man.
My breathing catches as I stare behind me. No one is following me, but I feel as if someone is.
The phone flashes again, and this time I do answer, putting it on speaker as I continue my escape.
“Clarissa.” His suave, welcoming tone suffocates the air. The Yorkshire accent is barely there. “You know I don’t like it when you don’t answer my calls.”
“W-why…? Tell me why, Dad.”
“It’s not what it seemed, Muse. Wait for me at home. We’ll talk when I get back.”
“Why, Dad?!” I shriek. “Why?”
“Because I can. I’ll be there in a few.”
The line is cut off. Just like that. It’s completely cut off.
I open my mouth to scream, but it remains slack and nothing comes out. I contemplate pedalling straight off the edge of a cliff.
Maybe if I do, I won’t feel Dad’s betrayal and Alicia’s loss.
Maybe I can erase today from my memories and I can call Alicia and she’ll pick up. I can solve a puzzle with Dad and make him pizza afterwards and we’ll binge-watch true crime on Netflix.
But driving myself over the edge won’t solve anything.
It won’t bring back life to the dead woman he drug across the ground.
I pedal all the way to the town centre, ignoring the screams of my exhausted leg muscles and the funny way people look at me. Some greet me, but I don’t reply. I can’t.
There are only a few words in my mouth, and none of them are meant to be said back as a greeting.
I stop in front of a shabby building, throw my bike aside, and forge in. I hesitate at the threshold, but then I recall Alicia’s soft voice.
‘The silence of an accomplice is similar to committing the crime.’
Alicia, whom I can’t see again. Alicia, who was stolen from my life as if she never existed.
I barge inside and a few officers pause at my entrance. I must look like a mess, soaked in rain, my clothes glued to my skin, and my face must be pale, lips blue from the cold.
A black officer approaches me, his eyes firm but welcoming. “May I help you, Miss?”
“I…I want to report a murder.”
21
Jonathan
Aurora isn’t home when I get back.
She isn’t answering her phone either. And my last email is still without a reply.
I’m not to be ignored. If she’s throwing one of her fits or acting out, I’m going to take it out on her arse.
Only, she’s not the type who throws a fit withou
t a solid reason. This morning, she came all over my fingers after she licked her plate clean.
When I let her go, she smoothed her skirt and grumbled that she needed a change of clothes as she headed back to her room.
There was no need for a fit.
No matter how she feels wronged, Aurora realises how much she needs the touch only I can provide. She knows that she can’t fight herself when it comes to me. The harder she denies it, the faster her body falls under my command.
There’s euphoria in the way she falls, even when she doesn’t want to. I’m slowly shaping her to be my perfect submissive, but at the same time, I don’t want to extinguish her fire. I also don’t want to erase the way she glares up at me every time she comes down from her high.
She hates that she can’t resist of her trance when it comes to me. And because she can’t do anything about it, she directs that hatred towards me.
I’m fine with it. As long as I have her in my grasp.
It started with the need to unravel her and the blasphemy of thinking she could keep a secret from me.
Now, it’s more.
I don’t even understand it myself, but I’m ready to see it until the very end.
Which brings me to her flat.
A quick inquiry with Harris told me all I needed to know. She had a visit from Maxim’s solicitor and she escaped to here.
I hit in the code and go inside. The security came to ask who I am, but after a talk with Harris, who’s now waiting for me in the car, he backed away.
The flat is dark except for the TV which shows a black screen but it’s not turned off. An automatic light flashes at the entrance as I step inside.
Aurora’s flat is medium-sized with countless pictures of watches on the walls. Her taste is mostly in black and white. Her sofas are black. Her walls are white. The hanged watches are black, the carpet is white.
The colour scheme hints at something different than her taste, highlighting her internal chaos.
At first, I don’t see her, but then I make out a body curled into a foetal position on the floor.
I pause, trying to get a better view of the scene before me. Something inside me moves. No idea what it is, but it just moves.
I stride to her and crouch in front of her motionless body. I exhale deeply when I notice the rise and fall of her shoulders.
Her pale hands hold her knees to her chest, fingers twitching involuntarily and limbs spasming. Her black strands block her vision, so I lift them up with two fingers.
Aurora’s eyes are screwed shut so tight, almost as if she’s afraid to open them. Her lips are clamped in a line, her pink lipstick smudged. Mascara and dried tears cover her cheeks.
“Why…” she murmurs. “Why?”
It must be about Maxim. Is she having nightmares about him, or is she perhaps reliving certain memories?
“Aurora.”
She doesn’t even stir, so I shake her shoulder. For some reason, I don’t want her trapped in that place. That place only injected her with suffering and pain.
“Aurora!”
Her eyes flutter open, but she doesn’t see me, not really. It’s almost like she’s looking through me. The deep, dark blue of her irises are caught in a trance she can’t force herself out of.
I run my fingers through her hair. “Come on, wild one. Come back.”
She doesn’t. For a moment, she stares ahead as if enchanted by something on the TV.
My fingers slide to her neck and I squeeze a little, increasing the pressure in small increments until she focuses on me.
She does, but her eyes aren’t quite there. It’s almost like she wants to see me but isn’t able to do so.
“Alicia can’t be gone. Not today.” Her voice is brittle, haunted even. “She can’t, Jonathan.”
I wrap my arm around her back and she bunches my jacket in a lethal grip, her body shaking, breaths trembling.
It comes back to me then.
Aurora received the news of Alicia’s death the day she reported her father’s crimes. No idea why I haven’t thought about that fact before.
All her tragedies happened in one day. One blow after the other. She was only sixteen and didn’t know what life was before it was snatched away from her.
No wonder she needed a rebirth.
Now that a part of her nightmares is back, she’s been shoved back eleven years in the past.
I carry her in my arms and she snuggles into my hold, her body still shaking. Despite being considerably tall, she’s light as a feather.
The way her curves mould into me feels natural and effortless. Like it was always meant to be.
A whimper tears out of her as she nuzzles her nose into my jacket. “Alicia…”
“She’s not here, but I am. I’ll always be here, wild one.”
22
Aurora
“I’ll always be here.”
Those words trickle in and out of my consciousness. Like a shadow you can see, but you can’t touch.
By the time I open my eyes, I don’t know whether what I’m seeing is real or a mere play of my screwed up imagination.
The first thing I notice is that I’m not in my flat lying on the floor, reliving my gruesome memories.
My room in Jonathan’s house comes into view with its huge space and elegant ceiling. When did I get in here?
“You need to eat.”
I startle into a sitting position and that’s when I notice Jonathan seated on a chair opposite my bed.
He’s in a pair of dark blue suit trousers and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows. The top buttons of his shirt are undone, revealing the taut lines of his collarbone and hinting at his chest muscles.
That’s the most skin I’ve ever seen from Jonathan, aside from his veiny arms. It’s like he lives in a suit — or was born in one.
Not that he had to get nude before, all he needs is that firm hand to make me fall all over the place.
He’s been focused on his phone, but now, he slides it in his pocket and lifts a bowl of soup from a tray on the bedside table.
“You brought me here?”
“Why ask a question you already know the answer to?”
Did he listen to Alicia’s voice message? Worse, did he see me at my lowest on the floor?
“How…how did you get access to my flat?”
“I have my ways.” He offers me the bowl. “Now, eat. You haven’t had anything since this morning and it’s nine in the evening.”
How the hell does he know that? I don’t bother asking, because he’ll just say he has his ways again or bluntly ignore me.
My nose scrunches at the scent of food. “I’m not hungry.”
If anything, nausea is about to hit me for no apparent reason.
“Is this part of your rebirth? Skipping meals?”
“So what if it is?”
“You cannot escape Maxim by stopping everything you used to do when you were with him. You do realise you’re only fooling yourself, right?”
My nails sink into the duvet as black rage bubbles in my stomach. “You know nothing about me to say that, okay? Nothing! And I told you not to say his name.”
“There, clear evidence that your rebirth never took off. If you’re a mess after a meeting with his solicitor, how do you intend on facing him when he resurfaces? Because he will resurface, Aurora. If it’s not with parole, then it’ll be with something else. People like Maxim don’t like to be pushed to the shadows. He’ll steal the limelight and he’ll come after you. So instead of running away from the ghost of his name, get your shit together. Flight mode never works, so you might want to start trying the fight mode.”
My lips part as the weight of his words strikes a deep, dark corner in my chest. It’s almost like he was with me during the years I looked over my shoulder, expecting the ghost of my past to catch up to me.
In fact, I still do. It’s a curse without a solution.
Some of my nightmares are about vacant eyes, but mo
st of them are about me pedalling down that road and I always, always get pulled back into the forest’s clutches by a dark hand.
“Now, are you going to eat or would you rather I make you?”
I snatch the bowl from between his fingers and don’t bother with a spoon. I drink it all in one go as if I’m chugging down alcohol.
Once I’m finished, I slam the empty bowl on the bedside table and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. “There. Done, your majesty. Leave me alone.”
“What did I say about that mouth, Aurora?”
“What are you going to do about it? Fuck me? Oh, wait. You only like to spank and finger me.”
His expression shifts from disapproval to what seems like…amusement? “Does that bother you so much?”
My cheeks heat. “It does not.”
“If it didn’t, you wouldn’t have mentioned it in an angry fit.”
“You flatter yourself.”
“Is that so?”
“I absolutely couldn’t give two fucks about that.”
“Fascinating.” He stands up and I expect him to leave, but he unbuttons his shirt, slowly and with utter confidence.
“W-what are you doing?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?” He shrugs off his shirt and the urge to hide under the covers hits me without a warning.
Since I’ve never seen Jonathan naked, I don’t know what to expect, but the firm chest with lean muscles is certainly not it. Who knew the prim and proper suits covered this view? But then again, Jonathan has always had rugged, brutal characteristics. Why would his nudity be any different?
He’s so fit and well-built for his age. His skin is sun-kissed and honed to perfection. Almost as if God took extra care when he was proportioning him.
His fingers undo his belt and while I should look away, I don’t. I’m glued to the unapologetic masculine beauty that is Jonathan King.
He slides his trousers down firm thighs, leaving him in black boxer briefs, and takes his time setting his clothes on the chair. It’s almost like he’s teasing me on purpose.
My spine snaps upright, and my toes curl underneath the sheet in anticipation of what’s coming next. By the time he removes his boxer briefs, I’m ready to hide for real, for a different reason from earlier.