Love and Other Wicked Games (A Wicked Game Novel)

by Olivia Fuller

  After one more, deep kiss, with deep massaging of tongues, he righted himself and put his hands underneath her knees. Pulling her against him with a quick jerk, she squealed softly as their bare flesh touched. And then he waited for just a moment, looking into her longing eyes, feeling the wetness of her arousal increase as her softness throbbed against him.

  He leaned over her, kissing her once more as she circled her hips beneath him, begging.

  “Do you want this?” he breathed over her skin.

  She exhaled, shivering, and nodded her head.

  “No. You must say it. You must tell me.” He flicked his tongue against her nipple and gave it a quick draw.

  “Yes. Yes, I want you—I need you—” Her voice shook. “But…”

  “But what?” he nibbled at her breast again, his hand jutting between their bodies, grasping himself as he prepared to finally enter her.

  “Cal,” she whispered against him, placing her hands on either side of his face. “Cal. Tell me your name. Please. I want to call you by your real name.”

  It was like a direct blow to the chest. His body stiffened against her and he sat bolt upright, knowing at once that he’d made a horrible mistake. The severity of the moment came crashing through him as he looked down to her and realized what he’d nearly done. Beautiful, compassionate, trusting Ellie. He’d betrayed her trust once more and he’d still managed to avoid telling her his name. He was immensely ashamed. And unsure what that said about him and this feeling he thought was love.

  With wide eyes he backed away from a baffled Ellie and rose from the bed, collecting his trousers. He put them on with measured swiftness and fastened the ties. His heart was pounding and he was having trouble breathing. By the time he found his shirt his head was spinning and he had to sit down to keep from falling over. As he pulled the shirt over his head he looked to Ellie, who was now sitting up in the bed, the sheet pulled up around her body as if for protection. A mix of confusion and hurt was smeared on her face.

  “I—I don’t understand. What hap—” she gulped and shook her head. “Did I—”

  “No,” Cal said firmly as he finished up with his shirt and put his palms flat on his knees. “Nothing about this is your fault. You understand me?”

  She slowly shook her head up and down but it was clear she was still very confused, as she should be.

  “I need to tell you something.”

  “But I told you I don’t need—”

  “No,” he said, holding up his hand to silence her. “I’m sorry but this is too important for you not to know. I should have told you so long ago but I was afraid. I admit it. And so I lied to you and lied to you and lied to you… and then now, I almost…” He motioned his hand in front of his body unable to even say the shameful thing he had almost done. “All without telling you the truth…”

  She crossed her arms, hugging the sheet closer to her body. “I know you have secrets. All people do. And secrets are secret for a reason. What’s it about this particular secret that’s so important you feel you must tell me, even though you’re afraid it will make me want to leave you?”

  “Because… because…” His voice and his body were shaking and so he paused with closed eyes, taking deep breaths in an effort to calm himself down. It didn’t work. But he couldn’t keep this secret from her any longer. He had to tell her. Now or never. “Because it’s the truth about who I really am. You need to know who I really am. You deserve to.”

  She pulled her corset back around her body, her expression level. “But I do know who you are.”

  “Maybe. Perhaps. But there’s still something very important that you must know.”

  “Fine then.” She finished fastening her corset and pulled the bodice of her dress back up, slipping her shoulders inside. “Who are you Cal?”

  He was afraid to see her face once he said the words but he forced himself to look at her. “I am the—that’s to say that my full nam—”

  From somewhere outside of the room an indiscernible yell cut through the air. Cal’s head shot in the direction of the door and then back to Ellie, whose face shifted with confusion.

  “What was that?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure.” Cal stood up and walked towards the door but before he even reached it the single indiscernible yell became a multitude of shouts and commotion. Loud thumps and crashes rang through the air as if heavy objects were being thrown around somewhere down in the courtyard. Then there was more yelling, louder now, and the sound of the building upheaval was soon overlaid with the sharp echo of shattering glass. A succession of rapid knocks struck at his door just as Cal reached for the handle.

  “Fight! Fight!” someone yelled from the other side. “Hurry up! Downstairs!”

  Cal looked back to Ellie who now stood upright with fear. “Oh, no. What do we do? Who’s fighting?”

  “I’m not sure,” Cal said, answering both questions. His hand hesitated on the door handle as he decided what to do.

  Hell. It seemed the universe was against him after all but he didn’t have time to curse it now, as much as he wanted to. First he needed to figure out what to do with Ellie to keep her safe. He cracked the door open just a sliver and peered outside into the twilight. Several people ran past him on the balcony heading in the direction of the staircase on the right, bidding those behind them to come along.

  From this spot he could see a large portion of the courtyard below and see the cause of all the commotion. There was a crowd of at least fifty people, maybe more, just left of the center pushing and punching. A clear divide separated the two groups down the middle but that line was becoming less distinct by the second as people from either side lunged at one another, throwing fists. Voices were calling out in the crowd and Cal strained his ears to hear.

  “Black Sheep! Knobsticks! Traitors! Bloody bastards!”

  “I’m just trying to feed my family!”

  “You’re all traitors! Bloody, bastard traitors!”

  “Oh, hell.” Cal shut the door and pressed his forehead against the worn wood.

  “What is it?” Ellie came up behind him and placed her hand on his shoulder with careful judgment.

  He turned around to face her, not even flinching from her touch and said, “Strike breakers.”

  “Strike breakers?”

  “They’re the ones that break ties with the unions and work during the strikes. It keeps the factories and mills going and essentially invalidates the usefulness of a strike.”

  “Why would someone do that?”

  “Why does anyone do anything? All our choices are judgment calls in the end and sometimes decisions aren’t so clear cut. It can be hard. But that’s just life. The strike breakers are just doing what they think is best for their families but the other union members don’t see it that way.”

  “Oh.” Ellie crossed her arms. “So what? We just wait it out?”

  Cal shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”

  “But they’re just fighting with each other. We have no part in this fight so why should we be worried?

  “A fight like this can easily turn into an unruly mob. Soon everyone is so caught up in the fighting and the yelling that they forget what it was all about to begin with… One person loses their senses and before you know it, everyone has and then we’re all in danger whether we have anything to do with it or not…”

  “Oh…”

  “Yes… Oh…”

  “So, what are we going to do?”

  “I guess I’m going to have to get you out of here. The last thing we want is to be trapped upstairs with nowhere to go should this whole fight go south.”

  “Alright.” Ellie set her shoulders. “Just tell me what to do.”

  “The people are fighting off towards the back of the courtyard, to the left of our room and away from the stairs. So we’ll leave the room and make for the stairs… and then we’ll do what we do so well.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Run.”

&
nbsp; Cal smiled softly remembering their first meetings and just how much she had made his heart flutter. She returned his nervous smile and he knew that she was remembering the exact same thing. He wanted to wrap his arms around her now, holding her to him and never let her go. The best memories of his life started when he met her, but that was probably because his life started when he met her. He prayed to everything in the universe that he’d still have a chance to salvage this even after today’s betrayal. It was probably impossible. But first he had to see her safe.

  “Now give me your hand,” he said holding his out. She reached to him and took hold, braiding her fingers into his. “And whatever you do, don’t let go.”

  ***

  Ellie’s eyes flickered open and she sat up, rubbing her head.

  “What happened?” she asked with a low dazed voice.

  From the other side of his room Cal spun around to see her frowning and massaging her temples. Relief rippled through him in warm currents. Thank God. Cal desperately wanted to go to Ellie and hug her, never letting her go but he held back that dangerous urge and instead motioned to Caitlin, the mother Ellie had met at the first rally, to go back to Ellie and look her over.

  “What do you remember, dear?” Caitlin asked as she sat down next to Ellie. She dabbed a rag back into the bowl of warm water and then patted it at Ellie’s forehead.

  Ellie sucked her teeth in at the sting, then put her hand to her forehead where her fingers discovered the wound.

  “You’re lucky. It’s just a small cut, dear. But you did hit your head hard enough to black out for a bit.”

  Ellie’s eyes opened wide as she began to put the pieces together. “Black out? What happened? The last thing I remember—” she furrowed her brow and then looked to Cal for help. “—we were upstairs in your room and there was a fight and you were going to help me get downstairs and outside and you said something to me. Told me not to do…something…”

  Cal nodded his head once, curtly, but he didn’t say anything. He hated everything about himself right now. He couldn’t even stand the sound of his own voice so there was no way on this earth that he was going to subject her to it. He’d thought that once she woke up he might feel better but that was just another lie he’d told himself to hide from the truth. Now that she actually was awake and he could see the fear and confusion and pain in her eyes he felt even worse.

  He’d hurt her. Again. And he felt like a monster.

  The last thing he ever wanted to do was to hurt her and now he’d hurt her in every way possible. He’d lied to her, he’d betrayed her trust, and now he’d led her straight into the lion’s den where she’d nearly been eaten alive. Yes. She was very lucky that a bump on the head was all that she’d suffered.

  And if it wasn’t bad enough that he’d put her in danger from the very beginning and that he’d lied to her about everything, he’d done it all for the very selfish reason that he wanted to see her again. He’d been using her from the moment he kissed her that day in the market and he’d never stopped. And what sort of man did that to a woman he cared about? To someone he loved?

  One who didn’t care about her as much as he thought, one who didn’t actually love her, and one that wasn’t bloody good enough for anyone, that’s who. Especially not good enough for someone like her. He’d told Ellie quite a few massive lies but this lie that he’d told himself—that he was good enough—was the biggest, and the most ridiculous. He was a fool to have ever let himself believe there was good in him. A bloody, horrible fool.

  And now Cal wasn’t the only one who thought that Ellie would be better off without him. His uncle had told him much the same. And, so it turned out, he was right. All Cal was good for was hurting Ellie but the real dagger was that he couldn’t even blame it on the situations he’d put her in. Yes, they were dangerous situations, he couldn’t dispute that, but she had come willing. Even today she was here by choice. But the reason she had come willingly and made these choices was because he’d lied to her.

  If only he’d done the right thing and told her the truth from the beginning, she would have made another choice. She would have chosen the sensible option and stayed the hell away from him. So no matter how he looked at it, all the danger could be traced back to him. It was just him. Everything that happened to her was his fault.

  “Cal?” Ellie’s concerned voice broke through his thoughts.

  “Hmm?” he managed without looking at her.

  “I don’t remember what happened.”

  When Cal didn’t answer, Caitlin gave him a stern look. When he still said nothing, she exhaled deeply and went back to work bandaging Ellie’s head as she tried to answer the question herself. “Well, dear. There was a fight down stairs in the courtyard, Union members and the Knobsticks—strike breaks,” she clarified. “And Cal here was trying to get you to safety…”

  “I remember that part. But I don’t remember getting hurt or how it happened.”

  Ellie looked back to him wanting answers but Cal shook his head and turned away. He didn’t want to tell her because he didn’t want to remember any of it. He didn’t want to remember the panic in her eyes when she was pulled away from him, or the deep sickening pit in his stomach as he let her hand slip away and she disappeared into the crowd.

  “Cal. Please—”

  “I told you not to let go of my hand,” he said.

  “What?”

  “That’s what I told you not to do before we left the room.”

  “Oh. Oh yes. That was it…” She frowned and furrowed her brow. “Did I?”

  “No.” His throat moved up and down several times and he swallowed down the sob that threatened to break free. “I let go of yours.”

  “Ohhh.” She waved her hand dismissively as if that would make everything alright.

  It wouldn’t.

  He was sure that she sensed the tension in the room and she probably thought that it was because of what he’d just told her. It was, partially, but that moment had only confirmed to him what he should have already known all along. He was no good for her. He couldn’t even hold onto her hand in the middle of a bloody mob. He couldn’t even protect her when it mattered the most. He hugged his chest and nearly laughed in misery. How would a hug from him make anything better, even for himself?

  “Cal, it’s alright—”

  He pointed at her and shook his finger. “No. No, Ellie. It’s not alright.”

  “Honestly, it’s just a small bump. I’ll be fine.”

  “Nothing about this is fine.”

  “What’s wrong?” she asked, her voice tinged with worry. She patted the bed next her and smiled. “Come. Sit next to me and we’ll talk about it.”

  “No.”

  “Fine then. I’ll come to you.” Ellie tried to stand up but her legs wobbled underneath her forcing her to sit back down on the bed. “Or maybe I won’t… I guess I’ll have to call for a carriage again when I’m ready to go home because I certainly won’t be walking…”

  “I’ve already sent for your mother to come retrieve you.”

  “What?” She tilted her head, thinking. “Why?”

  “So you don’t have to ride home alone.”

  “And why would I be riding home alone?” Ellie exhaled as a crease notched between her eyes. She looked at her hand and picked at her fingers. “I thought that perhaps you’d accompany me, seeing as I’m hurt…”

  “No. I won’t.”

  “And why ever not?” Her voice raised both an octave and a decibel. She was obviously tired of the games.

  “Because this is goodbye.” There. He’d said it. It was over with. At least that part was anyway. But now he thought his heart might explode. No. He was wrong. The weight of those words were not enough to destroy him, but the expression on Ellie’s face was enough to kill him one thousand times over.

  “I’ll just leave you be for now,” Caitlin mumbled as she set aside her water basin and quickly excused herself from the room.

  Ellie shook
her head, her eyes the size of dinner plates, as her mouth opened and closed searching for words. “What?” she said at last, the word a mix of confusion, anger, and pain. “What do you mean this is goodbye? I may not remember what happened to my head but I do clearly remember establishing that you were not saying goodbye. You thought I was going to say it. And since I haven’t said it, nor have I any reason to do so, I ask again: what?”

  “I’m not who you think I am, Ellie.” Even saying her name caught in his throat like a shard of glass. “I’m not a good man...”

  “Of course you are!”

  “No. I’m not. And now look what’s happened—”

  “I told you, I’m fine. It’s just a small bump—”

  “This isn’t about your head! Not only your head anyway. This is about everything. Everything I’ve done do to you, everything I’ve put you though. All the lies and all the dangers…”

  “Cal.” Ellie paused and steadied her voice. “What changed between earlier and now?”

  “Nothing.” A shiver shook him. He wished to God those earlier moments had never happened, but he’d be forever grateful that he’d stopped himself in time. He wished he could say the same about telling her he loved her. He’d never forgive himself for doing that. “Nothing, except that I’m finally thinking clearly for the first time since we met. Which is why this is over. It has to be. I’m not good enough for you.”

  “But—”

  “I’m telling you: we can’t do this anymore.” Cal said through gritted teeth as he folded his arms at his chest. “I won’t allow it. I won’t hurt you anymore.”

  “I don’t need your protection!”

  “No. What you need is to just stay the hell away from me and everything will be fine.”

  Ellie held up her hands. “Just stop. Stop right there. You haven’t done anything to me. This?” She pointed to her head “This is nothing. And it’s not your fault. If my hand slipped out of yours it was as much my fault as anything. And I chose to be here.”

  “Because I lie—”