Pieces Of One, Part 2 (The Dark Life Collection)

by Ricketts, SVC

  “OH MY GODDDD, Brys! That was so good, but I’m so full!” I moan rolling my bloated ass into the car.

  He unbuttons his jacket with a similar groan. “You ate too many Quindins and Petit Gateaux.”

  “What was I supposed to do? Mrs. Saltanos kept putting more on my plate!”

  “I warned you,” he grunts.

  “You’re one to talk. That Churra thing you got was huge!”

  “It’s called Churrasco with Farofa and Vinagrete. You ate half of it. Portuguese tradition is to feed your guests well. Mrs. Saltanos was born and raised in Brazil. It would have shamed her heritage if she served us in a lesser manner.”

  “Dude, that was bomb! I think I need a food-coma nap.”

  “Good thing you didn’t have any her tea or coffee. Close your eyes for a bit. Traffic is starting to build, so it’ll take us another hour before we get home.”

  “Mmmm…that’s nice,” I murmur.

  “I told you, O Segredo has been rated the best dive in the city for ten years in a row. The name speaks for itself. In Portuguese it means, The Secret. I can’t believe you’ve never had Brazilian food.”

  My eyes are closed, but I wrinkle my forehead confused. “Why? I’m not Brazilian.”

  “WAKE UP TRISTA, we’re home.”

  My shoulder shakes, coinciding with the voice and I slowly open my heavy eyes. I’m curled up against a nice warm, but hard body. Still a bit groggy, I sigh contently and stretch, not realizing I’ve nested up in Bryson’s lap.

  “Oh, sorry!” I say now fully awake and scramble off him.

  You idiot!

  Bryson snickers at my reaction. “Don’t be. I had a great view of your boobs.”

  “Shut up, you did not!” My ears flame and he laughs harder. “Stop being an ass, Brys.”

  He rubs his lower lip considering me with a side look. “I have a surprise for you,” he says loosening his tie.

  “You do?”

  Removing his tie over his head, my eyes widen. “Get your mind out of the gutter. I’m just going to make sure you don’t peek,” he says and uses the tie to blindfold me knotting it in the back.

  The corner of my lips pull up in a smirk as my imagination goes wild. “This could be kinky in the back of the limo too.”

  My door opens and a hand takes mine leading me out of the car. The ocean air fills my senses, but I can’t see it, only hear it. I also hear a car door slam from behind me.

  An arm goes around me and again, I feel a warm body push against my side. “Watch your step,” Bryson says as he pulls me along.

  “Is this where you throw me off the bluff?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t I get a final request?”

  “No.”

  “You’re such a dick,” I razz blindly trying to not fall on my ass.

  “Shut it and be surprised.”

  I snort. “That would be a surprise.”

  “Relax. If I was going to kill you, there are more creative ways to do it. Tossing you off the bluff lacks style. It’s so blasé.”

  “Meh, that’s true.”

  The key pad tones of the security system let me know we’re in the house now and I strain to hear whatever is going on. There is some shuffling so I know we’re not alone. I’m hesitant to take another step and try to retreat, but Bryson’s body is pushing me forward. My heart starts to race not knowing if his surprise is good or deadly.

  A pressure behind my head tells me the knot in the tie is loosening and allows the restoring of my vision. Light spills in through blurry images for a moment. I can make out dancing colorful orbs and paper streamers twisted around the windows.

  What in the world?

  My eyes regain their focus and I see the kitchen table has been decorated with a pink and blue paper table cloth with matching paper plates. A ridiculously hideous paper centerpiece sits in the middle and in front of that is a cake with, ‘Happy 18th Birthday, Trista!’ written on it.

  I turn to Bryson completely baffled. He gleams wide and says, “Surprise! Bet you didn’t know I knew it was your birthday! How does it feel to finally be an adult?”

  “It’s not…,” I start, but my voice trails off.

  Oh wait a minute, it’s not my birthday—it’s hers.

  Ad-libbing and changing course, I finish with a new thought, “Um, is it today? I guess I’ve lost track of time since I’ve been here.”

  “That’s understandable, plus we’ve had a lot going on.”

  “How did you know?”

  He pulls out a tablet. “This,” he says opening a document attached to an email.

  The strain from my widening eyes hurts, but I keep reading the biographical document. My life on paper—or hers rather.

  Background Investigation

  Name: Tristiana “Trista” Brigida Dividir – 17 year old female

  Birth Records: May 12th, 1998 – Dover, Kentucky

  Social Security Number: 824-01-9999

  Current Location: 174 Serenity Avenue, Immokalee, Florida

  Parents: (Mother) SavannahVae Cristiana Dividir – 38 years old

  (Father) Sami Tadeas Dividir (deceased)

  Siblings: (Brother – fraternal) Thyssen “Tyson” Benedito Dividir (deceased)

  (Brother) Yochanan “Jones” Renato Dividir – 16 years old

  Education: Lake Trafford Elementary, Immokalee High School, currently enrolled at Metro Community College

  Medical History:

  Hospitalizations: Multiple for various minor injuries *see note

  Surgeries: None

  Allergies: None

  Known medical conditions/diagnosis: None

  Other: None

  *Note: From ages 3 – 6 both Tristiana and her brother, Thyssen, were admitted multiple times and treated for suspicious injuries. Social Services and Child Protective Services were called in to consult, however no further action was taken due to lack of substantiating evidence of abuse.

  Criminal History: None

  Not quite sure what I should do at this point, I’m some kind of busted by the way Bryson is staring at me expectantly.

  “So…” he opens with and then pauses for a beat, “Marvy, why are you here?”

  What?!

  My eyes clash with his and I suck in a breath to keep my heart from exploding. “Where did you get this? When?”

  Taking the tablet from me before it falls from my hand, he crosses his arms and continues, “Personal information is easy to access and I received this file a few hours ago. So, I’ll ask again, why are you here? I know you’re not Trista.”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask completely floored.

  “Trista told me you were her twin, but as you can see, she doesn’t have a sister—never did. You are her disjointed personality, her alter. She has D.I.D. How many are there? There’s never just one. Are you the alpha? The controlling alter?”

  My mouth goes dry as air passes through my gaping mouth. “H…H…How did you know?”

  Bryson walks over to the table and pulls out a chair, motioning me to sit. Every step feels heavy, but I comply. Blood rushes through my ears like I’m drowning and I can barely hear Bryson’s words.

  Sitting a corner shot away from me, he pulls out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket before disposing of his suit jacket. The beautiful pack of little paper wrapped killers taunt me and immediately my mouth waters. Bryson lights two and hands one to me, soliciting a disgusted look to torque my face. But I am jonseing so hard for a smoke I take it and risk Bryson-cooties.

  Oh my gaawwd! The first smoke in weeks is the best!

  “Back at the club, when I was talking to Trista, I told her my parents died when I was very young. What I didn’t tell her was that my father had mental issues, manic depression with psychotic symptoms. I always knew something was wrong. His mood would go from zero to a sixty in a nanosecond: from mania to a deep depression. My mother would hide me in the pantry when he refused to take his meds and things got ugly. Of course I
didn’t know the extent of his illness till my nonna told me years after their deaths. They were coming back from a party and he had a violent episode. He murdered my mother by driving them through a highway barrier and off an overpass.”

  The big man before me shrinks a bit, but recovers quickly and slides a glass bowl toward me after tapping his ash into it. I take a long drag from the cancer stick and let the poison fill my lungs, then do the same as I exhale slowly through the heavy air between us.

  Taking a stiff breath, he stays on subject. “Guilt consumed me for years thinking if I had known, I could have saved my mother. I researched everything I could get my hands on about mental illness. Everything I read revealed triggers I could have picked up on…if I had known. I ran across a section about Multiple Personality Disorder, M.P.D. or as it is now called, Dissociative Identity Disorder, D.I.D. Many confuse the disorders with schizophrenia, but they are worlds apart in symptoms and treatment.”

  “How do you know I’m not a schizo?”

  He shrinks me with a reprovingly chiding scowl. “Schizophrenia is not a personality. Neither you nor Trista see or hear things that aren’t true. You don’t live in a false world with irrational beliefs. You aren’t Chris Christie.”

  Tilting my head confused, “Who?” I ask through an outbreath of smoke.

  “Never mind, Trista would have known who that was,” he retorts with eyes rolling and extinguishes his smoke.

  Ouch.

  “Fuck you, dick head!” I react, flicking my smoking cigarette butt at him, which misses by a mile.

  He stands and retrieves the cigarette and puts it out in the bowl then sits back down. Leaning back in his chair, his arms are still folded across his massive chest until he points a finger at me. “See? That right there is how I know you aren’t Trista. You have a hair-trigger temper.”

  I don’t do shame—till this moment. Softly, I try to snipe, “Still, fuck you,” but it comes out as a castrated whisper.

  “You talk faster too, and your behavior is very aggressive toward me. Hell, even her walk is more feminine than yours! Trista is a lady and you’re…well,” he shrugs, “you’re not.”

  Flames burst up my neck and push a tear out from my eyes. “GAWD! I’m not some ignorant cum dumpster! Kiss my ass, you old-ass, dried up shit stain!”

  “Oh come on! You know Trista’s a smart girl. She would have known O Segredo meant The Secret, since it’s a similar pronunciation in Italian. She’d have been so excited about a secret Brazilian restaurant knowing it was Portuguese food. You know you’re half-Portuguese.”

  I’d rather be naked in a galley full of lost pirates than suffer this humiliation. Everyone loves fucking Trista. They think she’s so sweet and smart and kind and perfect. This is total bullshit! She’s not that smart. That’s Star, but I’m not telling him. I’m not telling this pubic-eater anything he doesn’t already know.

  Leaning on his massive forearms, he cocks an eyebrow. “Does she know about the others?”

  With a shake of my head, I deny, “There aren’t any others.”

  “Bull shit. Someone kicked Supak’s ass, and it sure as shit wasn’t you.”

  I let out an exasperated sigh. “All right already, she only knows about me and Valeria. Valeria came out to protect me that night,” I admit and then pause. “From the situation YOU put me in, I might add.”

  “You don’t know shit, Marvy. I told her and I’m going to tell you. I thought he was just going to fuck you, not rape you!”

  Well, isn’t that just lovely.

  “Tomato, potato. It was against my will either way, and you thought I’d be okay with it? Thanks for the ego boost, dick head.”

  He ignores my jibe and asks, “Does Rush know?”

  My brow lowers. “Xander? What do you care? Jealous?”

  Bryson grimaces as if to say, “Oh, please.”

  I roll my eyes. “I think she told him about me and they found out about Valeria later.”

  “You trust him?”

  Smirking, I try to get under his skin again. “Enough to pound his ground a few times. I don’t see why not.”

  Bryson doesn’t take the bait and rolls off another question. “You have no idea who his father is then?”

  Frustrated, I cross my arms over my boobs mimicking his body language. Shrugging a shoulder, I bat my lashes and say coquettishly, “Sorry, we don’t have lengthy conversation when he’s fucking my ass.”

  “Nice. A veeerryyy nice example for how a lady should talk.”

  “Whatever. According to you, I’m Lady Whoreabellum.”

  His laughter, rich and fluid, fills the room, “If the title fits…,” he says with a hand flare and bows his head. With seriousness settling him, he probes again, “So, there’s you and this Valeria, who else? Is she the alpha? I’m hard-pressed to believe it’s you.”

  Silence falls throughout the kitchen as I debate my answer. I don’t know why, but I feel compelled to protect Mercy. Amongst ourselves, we don’t talk about her role or why we do as she says—we just do. She is the original alter despite her young frame. Mercy may look six years old, but she operates and delegates us like a forty year old matriarch. An old, bossy, controlling bitty if you ask me, but I’d never say that to her face. Not sure why she never emerges, just masks herself in the background. She is the puppeteer in the shadows orchestrating the mockery that is Trista’s life.

  “Mercy.” As if hearing my internal thoughts, Bryson brings her name up.

  Oh fuck.

  “TRISTA SAID HER name a few days ago, but she played it off. She’s the one who controls all of you, isn’t she?”

  “Trista doesn’t know about Mercy, so please don’t tell her! Mercy protects her from…,” I blurt, but swallow my next words. Instead, I beg, “She can’t know. Please Bryson, if you care at all for Trista, don’t say anything.”

  Trista can never find out what fractured her to pieces. The vile and sullied reasons that broke her apart, sectioning her psyche forming me, Star—the brain, Valeria—the defender, and Mercy—the shield. The memories she’s suppressed are the very ones Mercy guards her against.

  His fingers scrape over the very light five o’clock shadow covering his jaw as he considers request. “What will you do for me so that I don’t mention this to Trista?”

  My right eye crimps with suspicion and confusion. “What do you mean?”

  “What lengths are you willing to take to keep your secrets, Marvy?” he says with a crooked eyebrow.

  Oh. I chew on the corner of my lower lip. I can do this.

  My lip is released from my teeth and curls up. “Nice double entendre, Brys,” I tease and push away from the table.

  Letting my hips do the talking, I move toward him. I’ve played the part of seductress to distract many times in the past, this should be no different. This is what I was made for. I haven’t used my “talent” for a long time, but it’s like riding a bike. It can’t be that hard to switch back on.

  Using one of my trade moves, I straddle only half of Bryson’s lap; one of my legs pushing against the inside of his thigh, the other on the outside. Flipping my hair over my shoulder, I give him my best eye flutter.

  “What did you have in mind, Mr. Seviride?” My question suggestively couples with a circular hip grind against his thigh.

  His closed-mouthed smile expands when I arch my back, defining my tightening nipples through my white tank top. The warmth of his hands travel up my stomach under my tank and his eyes darken to cobalt when they reach my bare breasts. Bryson coddles them with expertise, brushing his thumbs along the tips.

  “Mmm…” I throw my head back loving this feeling regardless of who is doing it. His hands knead my tits as they grow weighted and begin to tingle. The action sends a lightning strike to my vag, which in turn makes me tighten my leg’s grip and grind down on him harder and faster.

  One of Bryson’s hands abandons a breast and moves down my ribcage. He travels to my navel and marks a hot path farther south. I
lean back and stilt my arms on his knee to support myself knowing where X marks the spot. When I spread my legs to grant entry, my knee brushes against his cock and I shiver a little based on the size.

  In a few motions, my shorts are unbuttoned and unzipped with his hand finding my sodden treasure. He dips a middle finger just past my pussy lips to gauge my readiness, but stops at the first knuckle. Gently he strokes the partial finger against my walls making sure to run the tip over my pulsing clit. I simper a quiet begging sound to encourage him. To get that finger deeper inside me, I do a stripper wave with my body. He’s edging me and he fucking knows it.

  Sitting up slightly, I snatch the bottom of my tank with one hand and hastily pull it over my head—two can play at this game.

  My tits, unavoidably level with his glistening eyes, are painfully heavy and my nipples could pop the balloons in the room. The points excruciatingly tighten more when a cool breeze from an open balcony window skims over my skin, leaving a dance of goosebumps in its wake.

  The warmth of his tongue on the nubs sends a shudder careening down my body. Bryson’s lick and suck combination are in magnificent cadence. The masterful nips of his teeth are the perfect pressure and swirls of his tongue on my flesh extricate any thought.

  “Oh God, Bryson! Yes, yes, yes!”

  Though it’s only been a few sex-less weeks, I can’t remember a time when I was this revved up. My blood tingles through my veins, sensitizing every cell, and burns through my body.

  “I am very curious,” he hums when those scorching lips ignite a path to my ear. “I want to know what stressors cause the switch. Mercy can connect the dots to all of you. And she’s the only one that can allow any kind of integration therapy. Let me talk to her.”