The Strings That Hold Us Together

by Kendra Mase

  “Don’t worry. I won’t tell anyone, darling dearest. Not even Jack, though I’m sure he’d be thrilled.”

  Katherine narrowed her eyes at her friend, sliding her cup back and forth. “Be thrilled about what?”

  Avril raised an eyebrow. “I’m hoping you’re kidding because even right now I know you know. I can see it in your eyes. You may be intrigued if nothing else, but then my kink-dar is way off.”

  Kink-dar?

  “Your one of us. I don’t sense a sliver of vanilla on you. Not even vanilla bean. Nope. No matter how good you think you are at hiding it. You like it here and not just for the phantom of the opera-esque décor.”

  Oh. Katherine felt heat rush to her face, thinking about how openly she looked at everyone. She didn’t realize it was so obvious. “Avril—”

  “I love how you say my name, you know. Never Queen,” Avril said. “It’s like you know exactly who I am. I feel like I am getting to know you too. Seriously, don’t look so ashamed. Be ashamed if you weren’t a little kinky. The world is a lot more fun this way. Or at least being in bed is.”

  Glancing back toward the other side of the bar, Jack stood with the same tumbler of whatever it was he was drinking between his hands. His loud guffaw of laughter was easily recognized no matter where Katherine could’ve been in the club. The corner of her mouth twitched at the noise.

  “Ah, I see now.” Avril narrowed her eyes, a look of satisfaction taking them over at the sudden change of subject. “You really want to fuck him, don’t you?”

  “What? I—no!” Katherine didn’t say that. She didn’t say anything like that. Of course, she didn’t just want… to… fuck him.

  She absolutely did.

  “He must’ve made quite the impression on you today. You wouldn’t be the first girl, you know.”

  The thought made her mind spin with different images of him she had in her head before she even met him. Them, kissing, his breath on her neck, on that stage she would never actually have the courage to step one toe on. Katherine shook her head, hoping the images would fall from either ear, especially now they were all confirmed to be uncreative when it came to wanting him.

  Looking around, she saw how other perusing eyes, women and men alike, caught on him, wondering if he’d look back.

  He didn’t.

  “You can, you know,” Avril murmured. She brought the rim of her glass back to her lips, almost finished with her second—or was it more? Katherine looked down to notice her own drink at some point refreshed. “Want to fuck him, that is. Or you could play. I’m not sure if you are actually ready to fuck him.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Jack. I thought we already went over this?”

  They did, but, since when were Katherine and Jack up for discussion? Did Avril not notice how he looked at her? Like Avril was the brightest thing in any room.

  Katherine shook her head side to side, coming up with a better excuse.

  “He has Pen.” Even if it was complicated, whatever that meant.

  “And what do you know about Penelope?” Avril cringed as if her name had a nasty flavor. Luckily, I was easily wiped away with liquor.

  “I know that she and Jack are a thing.”

  To that, Avril tipped her glass in agreement.

  “And that they have been, apparently, for a long time, which must mean something. They want each other, so they have each other…”

  “Penelope can eat my ass. He does not have her, and she will never ever have him whether or not I have anything to say about that trollop.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Avril looked at her. “Why don’t you think Jack can’t go home?”

  Katherine only waited. She knew if she did long enough, Avril would come out and say it.

  She rarely disappointed. “Little Pen, though the two never complained about exclusivity, saw Jack out with another girl, a guy, who knows, a few years back before he was supposed to make the trip home after five years. He’d been so freaked out to go home and basically tell his parents that he was a dropout. ‘Course, Pen did him one better.”

  “She outed him to his family.”

  Avril’s eyes widened a millimeter in confirmation.

  “That…”

  “Bitch.” Avril raised her glass. She clinked it against Katherine’s though she didn’t raise hers with her. “Perfect choice of words, Kit.”

  “How is he still with her?”

  She shrugged. “Our poor Jack has always been a little disillusioned about himself, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  Katherine didn’t, or at least, she didn’t think that she noticed, not until right then. She thought about him smiling with his camera and hesitating as he talked about him and his family. Looking at him across the bar, it was suddenly clear that maybe Jack, who looked like he had it all—the looks, the friends, the talent and joy—really didn’t see himself as much at all.

  But that couldn’t be right.

  “Then again, I was surprised when he told me that he was going to go home and not tell his family about his life to begin with,” Avril went on. “Because though we all know Jack is charismatic, has a great smile and an even better cock that can get him out of almost any sticky situation, it doesn’t mean much in the long run.”

  “Because he’s awful at keeping secrets.” Katherine already knew that.

  “You could give Jack a hundred pussies and he would let them all out of the bag.” Avril nodded, slouching back into her seat.

  “Of course, I don’t want to say he’s not good at keeping things to himself, you know? I am saying that he doesn’t shut up,” Avril clarified. “And that, I’m warning you, can sometimes end up being a very dangerous thing. One way or the other.”

  Katherine opened her mouth again to ask something, but not before Avril cut her off.

  “So, are you going to celebrate the Queen vacating her throne or not?” She raised her glass again. “What a great day for everyone. Must mean something.”

  With a short laugh, Katherine raised her glass as well. The top edges clanged together. “Cheers, Queen. Thank you.”

  Avril rolled her eyes. “For what?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” Katherine said simply, nose already in her cup.

  Maybe there really was a drink she enjoyed.

  Looking around, her eyes catching Jack on the other side of the bar to make sure he hadn’t heard anything, though he didn’t look again, a few others glanced toward Katherine this time. Maybe Avril was also right about her being more comfortable. She was in her dress and hair dolled up, just how Avril said she should always look.

  How she imagined herself to be.

  Right now, Katherine imagined herself as Kit, on the edge of a bar, smiling with Avril on a Saturday out before Avril took whatever vacation she was likely already plotting for her time off.

  She didn’t think anyone was wondering what the hell she was doing here.

  Not even her.

  Though that might’ve been the gin talking, she drank the rest back in a single long gulp.

  Running her tongue over her teeth, Katherine smiled. “I’m sure it’s something.”

  After another drink and laughing so hard, the couple next to them joined in on the conversation. Avril rubbed her lips together before she stood up from the bar. Her red French-tipped talons gripped Katherine’s forearm for balance.

  “Be right back, darling,” Avril sang quickly as she swayed toward the bathroom.

  This time when Katherine looked, she caught Jack on the other side of the tiny crowd they’d created, incorporating himself into them with easy conversation. His eyes trailed Avril before finding Katherine.

  She mouthed the words, I’ll follow her.

  Twisting past a throng of bodies, Katherine saw her bright hair slip through the backstage doors toward the bathroom.

  If anything, in the past hour or so they’d been here, the club only became more excited, people laughing and black-striped
whips snapping through the air over the bass of the music each of her own steps pounded to. The stage caught her attention more than anything else, more than Avril, who fully disappeared.

  On stage, a man pushed a woman in a strappy leather harness down, dragging the tip of what looked to be a horse’s riding crop down the length of her already welting spine. As he lifted it again, Katherine expected a gasp, a flinch from the woman, but nothing came, not even the crop as the man smothered her back with his own chest in a passionate embrace as he held her. The hiss from the woman’s lips only escaped then, in a sort of wheeze. Of pain?

  Pleasure.

  “Like what you see?”

  Flicking her chin high up to the man standing right beside her in a loose-fitting button-down already half open, Katherine couldn’t help herself from staggering toward the wall.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “You—you didn’t,” Katherine managed to say, taking in the blond monster of a man. “Sorry, I was just—”

  He gave a small smile. “Distracted? How about I get you a drink and we can have a chat?”

  “She’s already well-handled in that department, thanks.”

  A steady hand settled on the top of Katherine’s spine, just below her neck. She almost flinched at the sudden intrusion. Her body prepared, ready to leap away like a frightened house cat, but not when she caught the edge of startling eyes burrowing into the man in front of them before she did.

  In the past few weeks, she had seen Jack in passing. Never had she not seen some form of smile or smirk gracing the corners of his face. Perhaps this was the reason. Without it, standing just a bit taller behind her, he looked like he could create enemies as quick as he did admirers.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “I apologize.” The man, towering over Jack, took a step back. “I just saw her with Queen. Didn’t think she was yours.”

  “You thought wrong.”

  Katherine blinked at the two of them, remaining still. All she could feel was the heat somehow emanating from the three fingers Jack still had holding on to the back of her neck, touching her.

  “Jack. Jack.”

  His eyes flicked down to her face, the strange and sudden fury waning to a sudden flush. The man across from them took it as his moment to slowly slink away from the two of them, wandering around the tables back to where his friends were, including a girl who happily wrapped her arms around his shoulders.

  “Jack.”

  Did no one respond to their names anymore?

  Maybe they all just had too many of them.

  Eyes, usually full of bashfulness, now were just frozen. He stood there until his hand finally fell away. Cold air swept over where the imprint was when Avril pushed between them.

  He turned toward his friend, loosening his wide-set shoulders.

  “Come on, I’ll take you home.”

  “Who said I was ready to go?”

  Though Avril did seem light enough on her feet to hold each heel tight to the floor, there was no mistaking the way the top of her head slightly tilted to the side. It was as if gravity was beginning to take over on her petite form, dragging her down by her scorching curls.

  “We’ll go back to the townhouse then, but we are going home,” Jack repeated. He began to walk away.

  “Ain’t no rest for the wicked,” Avril muttered. “Is there, Kit?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Had she seen Jack and her a minute ago? Had she planned it? How he put his hand on the back of her neck like—like…

  Katherine put a hand to her head, sure to feel pounding against her skull as the wheels turned but was met with nothing.

  “You met the Ripper and the Queen and now the Devil. My, you have a way of drawing them in. And, well, you certainly started to make a name for yourself already,” Avril lifted her head sloppily as she made her way toward the front curtained door.

  Ripper?

  Katherine followed without getting to question what Avril meant. At least a dozen heads turned, noting Katherine in her vintage pink and frilly dress she hadn’t changed from the wedding. They looked her up and down like she was a new prized cow.

  Of course, Katherine glanced farther back to see Jack on the other side of the bar. Jack did say that one time he was a big fan of cows.

  Avril draped over Katherine’s arm and pulled them both toward the Jeep in the parking lot outside. Her high-heeled boots cracked over gravel.

  Rushing up behind the two of them, Jack opened the passenger door, helping each of them haul themselves up into it. He helped Avril in with a gentle push. Slamming the door shut while Jack rounded the front, Katherine leaned toward Avril’s ear. “What were you talking about, inside?”

  A laugh burst through Avril’s lips. The sound must have been loud enough for Jack’s head turned before he made it the full way around the Jeep.

  “Your knight in shining armor there is the dungeon master, darling.” Avril shook her head. Katherine was moving much slower than normal. “And it appears you are a very shiny new toy to dungeon masters.”

  That made no sense.

  “Jack?”

  Jack swung himself into the driver’s seat just as his name escaped Katherine’s lips. “Yeah?”

  Say something.

  Avril’s eyes flicked between the two. Katherine held on to the shoulder of Avril’s seat.

  She said nothing.

  Jack shook his head and turned the key. Soon they were back on the road, heading right across the bridge.

  Katherine almost spoke up again and told Jack to drop her off at home, but instead, she stayed silent, still in the back seat. She watched the lights bounce off the water all the way to the upper side bridge she and Jack visited that morning.

  “So much for a wild night to remember, huh, Queen?” Jack said.

  Avril shrugged. “I’ll have to remember the ones that matter.”

  By the time they pulled in front of the townhouse, Avril’s eyes were half closed. She didn’t protest as Jack gathered her in his arms and carried her past the front door and up the flight of stairs to her bedroom.

  Katherine shut the door behind her as she slowly followed.

  The townhouse seemed quiet, so much so she heard the click when she turned the dead bolt. Then she felt the weight slide around her shoulders, so heavy that she considered leaning up against the door and sliding down it right then and there. Instead, Katherine forced herself to take a step forward, and then another, into the house.

  Katherine kept walking, listening to the steady cadence of her shoes wherever there wasn’t a rug. The stone countertop was chilled under her shaky fingers when she finally paused to take her turn to close her eyes, leaving them like that to soothe the sudden burn making its way up her throat.

  Jack loved Avril.

  Her mind about it all was suddenly as clear as the liquor she drank. Crystal.

  It made sense. Out of all the options she’d thought through, it made the most sense out of everything. Jack and Avril. Not him and Pen, not—how could she have ever thought that Jack would have liked her anyway?

  They were friends. Avril’s friend that turned into his friend. They were just a couple of lost things that loved people they shouldn’t.

  She took a deep breath.

  Another.

  Slowly, she let herself drift down onto the kitchen floor, skirts flaring out to either side of her hips before kicking off her heels. Though comfortable, she noticed the dark red at the back of her ankle where they bit.

  “Are those...” Standing in the archway to the hall, Jack’s eyes were intent as he stared down toward where her skirt had snaked far up.

  Looking down, Katherine stared at her simple garter belt, which was more than just peeking out through the tulle. Holding one stocking up while the other pooled below her right knee, the image was a stark contrast to the three brooches that dug into her hip when she didn’t stand straight. Much like now.

  He had to ha
ve noticed them when they were dancing earlier at the wedding. The feeling of their bodies so close, closer than Katherine may have ever let herself get to someone before sent a wave through her again, settling low in her stomach.

  Or maybe he didn’t notice every place they met like she did.

  There was no question, however; at some point, Jack had seen Avril’s crown jewels before.

  “I’ve been keeping them safe,” Katherine explained softly.

  After another moment, without a word, Jack nodded. She wondered if he too had come to understand that something wasn’t quite right with the Queen. At least not tonight, or the past week. Her sitting here might’ve been another clue.

  She shivered at the air that snuck through the vent under her feet. Crossing her arms over one another.

  “You’re cold.”

  Katherine shrugged.

  “Then why do you sit there on the kitchen floor?” He asked, a hand lifting to the side as if to point out all the more appropriate seating Katherine did consider before passing by. The throw blanket over the back of the couch did look all the more inviting.

  “I don’t know,” Katherine replied. “Sometimes I think the best thinking is done on kitchen floors. Dancing too.”

  “I thought you said you didn’t dance.”

  “I said I never liked to dance alone.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Jack tipped his head, a hand going up to run a hand through the darkness. “You’re a little tipsy tonight too.”

  “She just kept ordering more.”

  “Yeah, I think she has a lot on her mind too,” Jack said with a sigh, his eyes catching once more on the glimmering antique pins. “Do you know what is up with her?”

  Katherine bit her lip, finally looking up at him through heavy lashes. He looked good even now, with his hair mussed and shirt untucked. Of course he would. “She says she is taking a break.”

  “From performing?”

  Her head bobbed.

  A perplexed look passed over his face. “You want some company?”

  “I should probably get back…” Home. “To Emilie’s.”