Silas

by Tilly Delane

  The tears want to come back even now and I’m almost glad he isn’t here. I need to gather myself, find myself, before I can face him again. Because it’ll be just me who’ll be getting on that plane in a few days. And who knows what’ll happen to him after that? The thought is hardly bearable.

  Silas

  I had to leave her and go for a swim. It hurt too much. I couldn’t keep looking at this gorgeous, funny, smart woman in my bed, my saviour who’s slowly but surely lifting the curse without so much as trying and know that she will be gone from my life in just over a week. I want her to stay, want to go with her, want to keep her. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like this about anything or anybody. Not even Niamh. Not even before.

  I take a deep breath and dive under the waves.

  Grace

  The next week goes so quickly it may as well be a dream. The closer we get to my departure date the tighter we hold on to each other at night, the more desperate we fuck, the less we sleep.

  We spend every second of every day together. We finish my list as much as possible, even go to see a random show at the Theatre Royal that neither of us pays too much attention to. Another day, he takes me to Oxted, the little village in Surrey, where my grandparents were from and where Mum grew up. I never got to meet either of them and they were cremated, so there isn’t a grave to visit, but we have a picnic in the churchyard of the little church adjacent to my mum’s primary school, which still exists, anyway.

  I’ve learned that Silas is big on picnics. He loves putting random stuff together from whatever he can find in the fridge and then feeding me titbits and letting me guess what I’m eating. It’s a game I’d happily play until the day I die. One thing I never do get to do is stay at the Palais, although Sheena keeps an eye out for any cancellations for me. Some things are maybe just not meant to be.

  But we don’t only do what I came for. More than once, Silas makes up our agenda. A cathedral here, a day in the forest that’s home to Winnie-the-Pooh there, a day on the beach in between. And finally I get to find out why he smells of ocean all the time. I even get to come to the gym with him to watch him train every day.

  Watching Silas train is a sight to behold. He’s fast. Incredibly fast. And beautiful. But it doesn’t change that what he is preparing for is nothing like what happens in the gym. I’m scared for him and more than once I think about changing my flight, but when I mention it, the look in his eyes says it all. He doesn’t want me here when it goes down. ‘I don’t want you to see the real me. I want you far, far away, safe’ he says. I want to call it melodramatic bullshit, want to ask him who the fuck he thinks I’m sleeping with if not the real him and tell him I can handle it ─ that I can handle anything after watching my mum die ─ but I don’t.

  I get it.

  More than he realizes.

  For no other reason than that I get him.

  I’d be a distraction, a weakness. I’d be a reminder on the sidelines that actually the fighter is not all he is. And he can’t afford that. This isn’t just your standard, ordinary, highly illegal bare knuckle fight the winner of which stands to get a small fortune. I got that memo. I’m not stupid. It’s a showdown between stepbrothers that’s been long in the making. How long and why, I have no idea. But I have a gut feeling it’s tied to his darkness, his inhibitions. The whole thing has the scent of something primeval and base and somehow sexual. And, yes, of course, I wonder. I wonder in directions I really don’t want to think in and that makes me sick to the core, so I don’t ask but I keep my lips away from his dick.

  And love him all the harder with everything else I got.

  Silas

  I wish I could stop time. We have one last full day left and then, tomorrow morning, I’m taking her to Heathrow. She’ll get on her plane, go back to America and hopefully forget about me. In time.

  I’m not stupid.

  I know she’s fallen for me as hard as I have fallen for her.

  It’s there in her laugh when we’re out and about, there in her every touch, there in the way she clings to me when she comes apart in my arms, in the way she caresses me at night after she thinks I’ve fallen asleep. I’ve never been loved like that and I know I never will again, but that doesn’t mean I can let her stay. She’s asked, has offered to change her flight. But I don’t want her to.

  I don’t want her to watch me kill.

  I don’t want her to watch me die.

  And no matter what security measures the Bensons put in place, between Rowan and me there can’t be another outcome.

  One of us is leaving old man Benson’s party next week in a body bag. Or a rolled-up carpet. Whatever.

  And I want somebody in the world to remember the person who is lying here right now, holding a beautiful woman in his arms, about to wake her with kisses all over and promises of a picnic breakfast in the garden.

  I want somebody to remember me.

  Grace

  There is nothing quite like being half asleep still and having a sexy, muscled man with incredibly silky skin and a beard, just the right side of not scratchy any longer, kissing himself all the way down your body. Until he lands on your sex, gently parts your legs, insinuates himself between them and pulls you fully into consciousness with one long lick of a flat, soft tongue from your perineum all the way to the top of your mound. So that you buck awake seeking more of his mouth on you and, of course, he obliges, lapping at you leisurely and with so much adoration that for a long time you don’t know whether to have an orgasm or die from feeling loved.

  Until he makes the decision for you, suddenly seriously turning up the heat by suckling your clit in earnest, bringing you just to the brink, letting you hover there until you already start clenching around nothing, only to slither up your body, swift like a snake, and fill you up with his cock in one fast, sure stroke. So you come around him, the first time that morning, just as he enters, each of your spasms drawing him in deeper.

  That’s how Silas wakes me on my last day. A sweaty half an hour and another orgasm later, we are hugging, nose to nose, sticking together and laughing.

  “Morning,” he says, kissing the tip of my nose.

  “Morning,” I respond.

  “So, what do you want to do today?” he asks.

  He’s careful not to say it but the on your last day hangs heavily between us, although he kind of goes and addresses the elephant in the room easily enough with the next part.

  “I’ve been told to have you back here by seven tonight. Mum wants to cook you a goodbye dinner, God help us.“

  He brushes his lips against mine.

  “But Kalina is making some Polish dessert, so we won’t starve,” he reassures me.

  “I’m kind of looking forward to tasting your mum’s food after all I’ve heard about it,” I say, grinning at him.

  Apparently Kalina and I got lucky the day Sheena made us pasta and pesto because allegedly her inability to cook a decent meal is legendary. According to Silas, I’m yet to find out.

  “I’m not gonna have food poisoning on the plane, am I?”

  “Nah, there won’t be an organism left alive on whatever she makes. Her speciality is charcoaling things.”

  “Yum.”

  “So, what do you want to do today?”

  He hugs me a little tighter. I think about it for a moment while I nuzzle his chest.

  “I want a normal day. With you. Here. In Shoreham. Have a shower. Go to the beach, watch you swim. Take a walk along the houseboats. Spend my last English currency in thrift shops. Go have lunch in a café. Then a bit more of this.”

  I kiss him, with a little tongue, to illustrate what ‘this’ is.

  “And a bath. And then maybe we could help your mum with dinner? ‘Cause as much as I’m looking forward to experiencing one of the famed Sheena O’Brien kitchen fiascos, I think I’d rather not regret my last meal here.”

  He looks into my eyes for a long time after that, not saying a word. Then he smirks.

  “L
et it not be said that my woman doesn’t like having a plan.”

  There is a moment when he says ‘my woman’ where we both know that in a parallel universe that’s exactly what I am. And there we live in the same country, have normal jobs and are very, very happy. But not in this one. He kisses the tip of my nose again.

  “Let’s get this show on the road.”

  Silas

  I try not to think about her leaving because each time I do, there is a caveman inside of me who wants to chain her up in our non-existent basement and never let her go. The thought that by this time tomorrow she’ll be gone pulls all my insides into one tight ball of pain. So I do my best to stay in the moment.

  We do pretty much everything on her list and by the time we get to the little café I’ve chosen for lunch, we have a whole charity shop bag full of nonsense that she’ll be taking home to the States.

  “I have no idea where I’m going to put all this stuff,” she laughs, looking at the bulging bag next to the chair she flops into. “I don’t even have a flat to go to.”

  I remain standing because this is a go and order at the counter kind of place and frown down at her. We’ve talked a lot in the last three weeks about all sorts of stuff, but we never once discussed the future. ‘Cause we knew we didn’t have one, I suppose. But it never occurred to me that she didn’t have a place to go back to.

  “What do you mean?” I ask while she peruses the menu.

  She shrugs absentmindedly without taking her eye off the blackboard hanging above the counter.

  “We were living in the manager’s quarters at the Atlantis until Mum got too sick to work, and then we had this shitty little apartment together, but after she died, I gave it up. I didn’t want to be there anymore. It was never our home just the place we waited for her to die. So the last year, I’ve been rooming with people. But I gave up my last room before I came here. It seemed silly to pay rent on a room when I’m not there. And I really hated my roommates.”

  She stops talking to study the board properly and smiles at me.

  “Can I get a latte and a slice of goat cheese and caramelized onion quiche, please?”

  I smile back at her.

  “Sure. What are you going to do?”

  She shrugs.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll find something.”

  I don’t like it, I don’t like it one bit. But there is nothing I can do about it. The only thing I can do is get her a latte and a goat cheese quiche. So I head to the counter.

  Grace

  I watch Silas go and order our food, and then he half turns to me and holds up a hand, signaling he’ll be right back. He disappears down a short corridor by the side of the counter, towards the singular restroom. I watch his back, the grace with which he moves, and I’m so absorbed in what I see, I miss the person approach who suddenly sits down in the chair next to me. I turn, a ‘sorry but that seat is taken’ on my lips, and freeze.

  The guy who is looking at me with an insolent smile instantly gives me the creeps. It’s not that he’s ugly. On the contrary, he’s actually extremely good-looking, handsome even, in a dark sort of way.

  He’s tall, built, filling out the white tee and cargo pants he is wearing to bursting point with muscle. His eyes are a deep chocolate brown, big but with a vaguely Asian slant. His short, unruly but dead straight hair also speaks of some heritage from far, far away and he has that extremely chiseled look many women swoon over. Not my thing. I always think those guys look too much like cartoon heroes. Not that this guy would wear a cape of righteousness, if the menacing vibe I’m picking up here is anything to go by.

  Even though it’s not really possible, I instantly know who this is. Maybe I caught his scent that night he came to the house, or maybe it’s because he’s blatantly transmitting it, but there is no doubt in my mind that this is Silas’ nemesis.

  Rowan.

  We just stare at each other for a long time in the most unwanted intimate way. I want to push my chair back, away from him, but I suppress the impulse. Because something tells me that’s exactly what he wants.

  “Hey, pretty woman,” he finally says in a deep timbre, and I can’t help but laugh at him.

  And I mean at him. It’s the cheapest line ever. Yeah, Julia Roberts and I might both use the same color number for our hair but that’s pretty much where the similarities end. I ain’t no Vivian and he sure as hell ain’t no Edward Lewis. My Edward Lewis is leaner and meaner than him ─ and just coming back from the restroom, wiping his wet hands on his jeans.

  “You stalking us, you perverted fuck?” Silas growls down at him as soon he arrives at the table.

  He appears deceptively calm, but I can see behind his stoic mask that he’d have no problem putting his hands around this guy’s neck and squeeze until he’s dead. That’s a revelation I’m not sure how to deal with. And I don’t get the time because the next thing I know, Rowan’s hand comes up to my face and he starts running an index finger along my jawline.

  “You told her how much you like to share yet?”

  I flinch back from his touch.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Silas making a move towards Rowan. It doesn’t take a genius to work out what’s about to go down and that at the end of it there won’t be much left of this bijou little café. But before anything else can actually happen, I get out of my chair, hustle myself into the space between them, push Silas back with my ass, and slap Rowan full force in the face.

  “You might like to share, but I don’t,” I spit down at him. “Now fuck off and leave us alone.”

  Rowan looks at me surprised then laughs.

  “Oh, I like her. She’s got spunk.”

  He gets up and looks over my shoulder at Silas.

  “See you on the sixth, little bro.”

  I can feel Silas wanting to go after him, but I reach behind me, grab his arms and wrap them around me, holding him to me as fast as I can. I can feel the tension in his body, the coiledness of his muscles and though it’s highly inappropriate, it’s also hot.

  We watch Rowan retreat through the door and Silas relaxes against me. I smile to myself because he could have been angry at me for stepping in but he’s not. No, he gathers me up against him even tighter, kisses my neck and whispers in my ear.

  “I love you, Grace Turner.”

  Silas

  I tell her I love her and catch myself by surprise.

  The thing is, it’s true.

  I might only have known her a month, not even that, but when she is around, life is not a chore. It’s light, a gift. Even with everything hanging over me, having her with me makes the moment worth living.

  She spins around in my arms and looks at me wide-eyed, but before she can say anything, the waitress, who’s missed all of the shenanigans, appears with our food and drinks and a smile. Like the polite people we are, we sit down and let ourselves be served.

  Until the tender moment is gone and what remains is the burning question in her eyes, the one that reads what the fuck was he talking about? Because she isn’t stupid, my Grace. She heard what Rowan said and she knows he wasn’t just teasing. The thought makes me feel sick and I put my half-eaten sandwich down.

  I take the hand she slapped him with in mine, turn it up and stroke her reddened palm.

  “Does it hurt?” I ask her, and she giggles around the mouthful of quiche she is chewing.

  She swallows.

  “A little,” she answers truthfully. “I’ve never slapped somebody before. It stings.”

  I kiss her palm and it’s then that I make the decision.

  She deserves the truth about me.

  “I will tell you,” I promise. “But not here.”

  Grace

  In the middle of Shoreham, there is a church with a little cemetery and that’s where he takes me. Seems to be almost a regular thing with us, cemeteries. I’m half tempted to play my new ‘Grace’ spotting game, but the air he gives off is too heavy to allow for any delay in proceedings.
<
br />   I feel like if I procrastinate with tombstone gazing first, he might not tell me what he’s come here to tell me. So I let him lead me over to a massive tree and we sit in the shade, opposite one another, legs crossed. He picks up a small stick and starts peeling the bark off it with nervous fingers while he talks.

  “That was Rowan,” he begins, and I nod.

  “I figured.”

  He frowns at me.

  We’ve never spoken about his family much, and I can see in his eyes that he’s confused as to how much I know already, so I go on to explain.

  “The guy you’re fighting next week. Your stepbrother. You talked about it with Diego at the greyhound track.”

  “Right. Yes.”

  I’ve thrown him off track.

  “I pay attention,” I say with a wry smile. “Bartenders’ affliction. He’s also the guy who your mum claims didn’t push her head into the wall.”

  He narrows his eyes at me, and I shrug.

  “I may also eavesdrop on occasion. Also bartenders’ affliction. But that’s as much as I know. Tell me about Rowan.”

  He takes a deep breath and rotates the skinned wood stick in his hand.

  “Mum’s never been great at picking blokes. Understatement of the century that. She used to be a model when she was younger, and she was in demand.”

  “She must have been, otherwise she’d hardly have worked with Newton.”

  He smiles at that.

  “Yeah, she was pretty high up there but the problem with modelling is, it attracts arseholes and Mum really does pick ‘em. So when she was at the height of her career, some arsehole in the industry got her knocked up. We’re not overly religious or anything, like not at all in my case, but Mum was raised Catholic and the idea of an abortion went completely against her grain.”

  “I’m glad about that,” I joke, but he shakes his head.

  “Thanks, but no, that particular baby wasn’t me. Anyway, when she found out she was pregnant, she took a break from modelling, came back home to Brighton and promptly hooked up with another cunt. This cunt couldn’t stand her sassy mouth. So one night, he beat her. Badly. She had a miscarriage.”