by Elena Monroe
She thrived on experiences, getting her way, collecting firsts.
This was death for someone like Eve.
Letting the water pound down on top of my bowed head, I realized I wasn’t only mourning the dead girl from last night, but Eve too.
Letting my forehead grind into the shower wall, my forearms pressed into the warm surface above my head. I felt my breathing get jagged, knowing what came next. Lifting my head, I dragged the blade across the skin right above my elbow. I had repeated lines from my armpits down to my elbows. I was chalk full of trauma worth marking.
The red line bloomed along my arm, and I clamped my eyes closed, holding my breath against the dull sting that quieted the pain inside my chest long enough for me to exhale. The dizziness followed like it always did, and I stumbled to sit down while my arm bled out enough to leave another thick scar behind.
Looking up through the slits in my eyes, I saw Eve standing there with tears filling her big blue ones, matching the look of horror painted all over her face. “What are you doing, Bowey?”
Swallowing down the exhale, I felt the wall I normally had up crumble when it should have gone up higher just at the sight of her. My defenses were down and I was exhaling. No part of me was guarded right now.
Kneeling in the shower with me, her lingerie got wet, making it easier to see her body under the strategically placed flowers and butterflies. Her hands cupped my face, forcing me to look at her with tears in my eyes to match hers. “I didn’t survive Denmark for you to kill yourself when our happiness is supposed to start.”
Searching for the words, I fumbled before the truth came out. “I’m not cutting to kill. It’s to get by another fucking day and to dull the ache that has my soul in a chokehold.”
A single tear rolled down her cheek as she knelt before me, soaking wet on the shower floor, ready to fight for my soul’s redemption. Her hand holding my face seemed to be temporarily holding my innocence hostage—one that was ripped away when we were way too young.
“You don’t think I’ve gotten so sad I’ve wanted to hurt myself? When you hurt, I hurt, Bowey.” Her words were whispered through her trembling lips against the sound of the shower.
I didn’t even care that I was naked, but I cared that I was weak.
Lifting my arm, she could see the white skin where older marks had healed, crawling up the inside of my arm. Rubbing my thumb against her cheek, I tried to catch her tears. “Then I’m sorry for the lifetime of hurt you’re signing up for.”
Standing to my feet, I covered myself with my hands, making sure not even the veins that dragged down my hips were on display. I wanted her to see the ugly and only the ugly because no one else seemed to take it at face value. It’s hard when my ugly is quieter than everyone else's.
My demons don’t give a damn who takes me as a warning sign.
Grabbing a towel, I wrapped it around my waist, still soaking in the sting of the cut. “Show’s over. I have to go to work.”
Her face went from being sad to angry in seconds, standing there, letting her wetness drip all over my bathroom floor. “What are you talking about? You can’t go to work like this.”
Bracing my hands against the smooth, black marble countertop, I twisted my head in her direction. “Like what exactly? How I’ve been since you left? I’ll survive.”
Eve needed to understand that her Bowey didn’t exist and all that was in his place was a sharp end of a blade. All I knew was pain and it was as much a part of my day as she was at this point.
When she’s weak, I’m strong, and when I’m weak, she’s strong. We would be perfectly balanced if she could just kick Pretty Princess to the curb for good instead of waiting until I pissed her off enough to bite back.
Closing the space between us, she delicately moved my arm so she could stare at the marks again. I considered them to be as private as the details of having a holy man shove his relic in places I’d rather ignore existed altogether. “What are you doing?”
The act of her looking at my scars felt more painful than the pinch where the skin was trying to heal. Letting my head drop to the other side, I forced myself to look away when all the dried-up moisture in my eyes came back, full force.
“Why did you do this?” her voice whimpered and pleaded for answers. She wanted to hear anything that would explain it away.
“One for each trauma I’ve survived. Don’t worry; you weren’t the first scar…” I was a heartless asshole when my walls went up. They might as well reach to the sky and resemble Fort Knox; nothing penetrates enough to make me stop being an asshole.
Pulling my arm out of her hands, I left her in the bathroom without remorse. I will replay that scenario in my head just to pile on the pain; my brain chalks it up to being dessert. It’s just another way to get me through another day.
Grimm was hit or miss at work. Some days he came in, while other days you begged to see him just to break up the dynamics of Khaos and Vic.
I hated asking for anything, but he did all our Clave tattoos when we all got bored and drunk in the mountains one night at Patmos. I also trusted him to have zero interest in Eve, unlike the rest of the population that I don’t trust.
Before Grimm was Death, he toyed with tattoo guns and gave everyone free tattoos like he was going to purpose the art form as a career. We all have matching snakes in various locations on our
bodies—it’s required as Horsemen. Mine is on my inner thigh, Vic’s crawls from his waistband, Khaos’s climbs the back of his neck, and Grimm’s is lost in his sea of other ink.
Making my way to his office, I saw him lying on the couch with his forearm over his eyes even though his office bore zero sunlight. “I need you to tattoo Eve.” The words fell from my mouth while I leaned against the door frame.
We had a strained relationship at best. He was my brother’s confidante, and we both resented what that felt like now. Blame, guilt, harsh realities—all too much between us to work out into conversations.
A deep groan came from his still body. “Why? She’s only Clave by proxy. None of the girls have the snake.”
Everything we exchanged was some form of sparing with underhanded insults instead of fists. “Because I don’t ask you for shit, and Eve isn’t the other girls. It’s my blood oath. Tattoo ink and blood.”
Sitting up, Grimm’s elbows dug into his thighs and his hands scrubbed his face. “Your blood oath is our blood mixed into the ink? Why make it more complicated?”
“It’s already complicated. I’m just making sure she never belongs to anyone else. In or out? If you can’t do it, I’ll find someone else.” I was done wasting any more of my morning on the reaper.
Dropping his head to one side, he analyzed my face and muttered a one word response of, “Fine, my place later.”
Smirking the way I never did, I was already seeing the dynamics shift and Eve wasn’t even present yet.
She was the monster under their beds, the one person who remembered us before the Clave corruption, and the one that could forgive all our sins—but forgetting? Eve didn’t do that.
Trust me, this shit would be easier if she just forgot who I was before.
BOWEN
Eve was thrilled to finally be inked. It was a form of freedom she didn’t have once her mother married royalty.
She wore a see-through sleeveless dress that flowed around her body with a leather band caging her tits. Underneath, my eyes trailed down to a pair of shorts that were barely there, and to her boots that landed mid-thigh. The sweater she brought with her wasn’t going to help matters. I felt my reserve crack, and that ache in my dick returned that I couldn’t keep ignoring.
Walking into Grimm’s, I didn’t bother ringing the bell or waiting for permission. They were Clave, and now they were parents; whatever I was going to walk in on would have zero effect on me.
Leading the wall, I let Eve trail behind me when I stopped dead in my tracks to see Abigail sitting on her knees on the kitchen floor: her hands bound behind her, clamps cl
osed around her nipples, a gag between her lips, and a blindfold keeping her from seeing me. There was a thick layer of tension and PTSD that had my body reacting quickly to the scene when Grimm shouted, “Fucking Christ, Bo! There’s a doorbell for a reason.”
Eve walked right into me, suddenly interested in what I was blocking her from seeing before I twisted around and dared her to go around me.
“Are we doing this or not?” I shouted to him, but my eyes didn’t leave Eve’s. Her cheeks blushed, and she spun around, letting her back hit the wall that divided the front entrance from the rest of the house.
In a hushed whisper she spoke, “Is that what you’ll do to me, Bowen? Is that why you won’t touch me? I’m not so fragile I can’t withstand your cruelty…” Her fingers danced down her chest, and I couldn’t help my eyes from following them.
Closing the gap between us, I snatched her wrists in a brutal grip, anything to stop the teasing, and pinned them above her head. I could feel her chest heaving in a quick pace when I let my lips get so close to her neck, I almost gave in and handed over my virginity in his hallway. “You’ve never been fragile. Even now, you bend but don’t break. Who says I’ll touch you at all, Princess?”
Her voice was wrapped up in gasps and wicked little moans that went straight to my dick when she decided to be a glutton for punishment. Her knee bent, rising to my crotch, creating a soft friction against my hard-on. “You’ll have to touch me eventually, Bowen. For the record... I don’t care how, as long as you touch me.”
Pinning her against the wall with my hips, my hands squeezed her wrists tighter, trying to hold her in place even more. My mouth collided with her neck, and she moaned my name under her breath like it was never supposed to make it past her lips.
I wanted her without having to explain my past or present predicament.
I wanted her only after she explained her life from the past ten years.
I wanted her in ways I couldn’t give into without embarrassing myself.
She deserves someone who knows exactly how to make her feel good and that isn’t me.
Not on any level.
My lips dragged against her neck, across her collarbones and down to her chest, taking her in with a strong inhale. Her skin was burning up as I whispered against the swell of her breasts, “Behave… don’t embarrass yourself.”
I was about to be the only one embarrassed when Grimm notices my hard-on, and she conceals herself with a coy smile.
Still trying to breath normally, she shot back, “What if I don’t behave? Will you punish me?”
It took every ounce of determination to let go of her hands and take a step back when Grimm leaned against the wall next to us with a shit-eating grin taking over his face. He was amused, which wasn’t often, by the sight of me weakened by her the same way their women made them all weak.
Letting her head drop to take him in, she ran her eyes up and down his tattooed body. “Looking good, Jason.”
His grin faded into a contempt I knew this night was going to bring. Our past consisted of Eve and I on one side with everyone else on the other. Eve definitely aided in keeping the line thick.
“It’s just Grimm now,” he bit out the words through a tense jaw.
Her hand slapped his chest like their frenemies relationship just pushed the past to the present. “Oh, like that nickname Reaper I gave you?”
“Go, Eve. Behave. He knows what he’s doing. I need some air.” I barely finished speaking when I rushed towards the door like it was safety. Around Eve? Distance was the only safety.
Starvation wasn’t even a safe route anymore. It only made me famished enough to consider the ideas I had labeled crazy.
The cold ocean breeze hit my face, and I choked trying to swallow the kind of drowning this felt like. With my hands on the hood of my car, I tried to steady my breath enough to ignore how badly my dick ached for her.
We were only days away from the wedding and I was held together by fucking tape and glue. I had already told myself she was simply mine. Not mine to touch, boss around, or anything else I wanted to do.
Just mine.
My hand dipped down to my jeans to give myself a squeeze, trying to provide the smallest amount of relief I could without breaking. A groan sat against my tongue when my head fell back and my eyes clamped shut.
All the reserve I had was blinded by the light of her fucking halo, and my demons found it funny.
My hand snuck inside, repositioning myself to make it less obvious than it already was. I lit up a joint, taking big inhales as I headed back inside to where Grimm was preparing to brand her in a way that made it impossible to be anyone else’s.
Not that she would ever not be mine, but if one day she opens those legs for anyone else because I refuse to give into her, she’ll be overwhelmed with the collision of me against the trespasser.
No better way to ward off unwanted company.
Sucking in the high on the end of the joint, I walked over to the chair Eve was sitting on. There was no sign of Abigail, thank god, I couldn’t keep my cool if she was in the vicinity after seeing her nipples pinched by the clamps.
We both had similar backgrounds, yet she was comfortable with her pleasure being doused with pain. Meanwhile, I had no idea what I liked and I wasn’t willing to try anything to figure it out.
“Where is this going boss?” Grimm had a pair of black gloves on, and the vile of our blood poured into a small cup mixed with a few droplets of red ink.
Standing behind Eve, I leaned down, forcing her legs apart with my hands, only further tempting my cock to turn to stone again. “Inner thigh. Don’t forget half the butterfly is blue. Like her eyes. Don’t fuck it up.”
Eve kept her legs apart, but by the red scorching her cheeks, I could feel the discomfort climb into my throat before Grimm shifted his eyes up to mine with clear annoyance.
“Why do I always end up putting these tattoos in some fucked up places I shouldn’t be, Bo? Riddle me that. Between you, Vic, and now Eve, I’m feeling a sense of closeness I don’t want to be familiar with.” Taking a cleansing cloth, he looked at Eve like he felt sorry for her before waiting for permission to touch her.
I watched his fingers swipe over the area, cleaning her already pure skin. Eve still looked uncomfortable in a way I couldn’t place when her throat bobbed on a hard swallow. She was dropping clues, and I couldn’t figure out what they meant.
“His Clave tattoo is in an odd place?” Eve knew better than to ask me when I gave her ambiguous answers instead of ones that were actually responses.
Grimm laid the stencil down over her skin and smoothed out the design with his fingers. I wanted to be the asshole who told her to soak up the last time she’ll be touched just to drive home how much she should give up on me fulfilling that need. I didn’t as I rounded the island, watching from a distance.
“It’s about the same area… Why the butterfly?” Grimm never makes an effort to encourage small talk. He must truly feel bad for her soul being bound to mine.
Crossing my arms, I watched her try to make sense of it—the butterfly that haunted my existence in things around me during her absence.
“It’s personal,” she muttered quietly while Grimm kick started the gun. I didn’t need to hover over them like a jealous boyfriend, albeit I did feel a sting of jealousy hit my chest knowing her legs were open for another man. It didn’t matter how unavailable he was.
Wandering around his open concept house, I managed to find a back set of stairs and decided to waste time by impeding on his personal space that same way he did to others when he was pissed off. Upstairs, I looked into doorways and around corners before taking any more steps. Abigail was sitting on the edge of their bed, where I pronounced them married and she gave birth simultaneously, with a robe covering her chest, but I could tell there was nothing underneath. The same way I saw her in the kitchen, only now all the torture devices were absent.
Standing in the doorway, I examined her for clues
to see if she liked it or simply did it for Grimm’s sake.
Startling her, I watched her jump, catching a glimpse into the mirror and tying her robe shut. “Jesus. You scared me.”
“Not sure I’ve ever been called Jesus. Normally, I’m further south.” Still not taking any liberties with stepping any closer, I waited for her nerves to flatten before I asked, “That shit downstairs, you like that?”
I could tell I was creeping into territory that wasn’t for me to question when she blushed and her gaze dropped to the floor. “Grimm is a flavor I can’t get enough of… I didn’t think I’d like it at first.”
Dragging the joint from my lips, I offered her the stub of it when to my shock she pinched the end and inhaled expertly before coughing, showing how inexperienced she truly was. I pondered her use of the word flavor without the suppressed memories of the taste of a guy’s come causing my mouth to salivate.
Grimm probably tasted sweeter than he looks; spiked with a kind of contempt that makes all the effort seem worth it to see him unravel.
Crossing my arms, she took another inhale before speaking, “We’ve never talked about it, you know. Our pasts… how similar they are…”
Shifting from one foot to the other, I leaned into my other arm, clearly uncomfortable. I wanted to forget, not trot down memory lane with Abigail. “I would rather not talk about it. Eve doesn’t even know the details. Not that they matter… We got thrown into the deep end a little early, doesn’t change that it was going to happen sooner or later.”
“But Grimm said you haven’t dated or tried to be with anyone… You can’t suppress it without it growing into little invisible monsters, Bowen.”
Sympathy was one of the worst emotions in the array of insignificant ones. Her eyebrows wrinkled, and her eyes filled with sorrow as she looked to me to pour out every fucking wound right there on her bedroom floor while sharing a joint.
“Invisible monsters? No, I have full grown, very much there, demons. Far worse, sweetheart.”