Chapter Fifteen - Vivienne #2
Finally I find my voice again, low and sharp. “You let me believe I was hunting you. Do you understand how many nights I lay awake dreaming of driving a knife into your throat? Do you understand what it means to hate someone so deeply, only to find the truth stolen from you?”
His expression does not shift, yet I see something flicker in his eyes: pain, regret, something close to loss. “Yes.”
The word echoes in me, stark and hollow. I turn away, unable to hold his gaze any longer. My reflection in the darkened window looks strange, pale and weary, a woman who no longer knows where her vengeance belongs.
Behind me, his breath catches faintly, then steadies. I picture him there by the door, massive frame anchored like a sentinel, yet uncertain of his place in this room.
“I don’t know what you want from me,” I murmur.
His voice comes low, almost a rasp. “Nothing.”
That unsettles me more than any demand could. My fists tighten at my sides, nails carving crescents into my palms. I wanted him to want control, to want me under his hand, to want something I could fight against. “Nothing” leaves me with no foothold. “Nothing” leaves me adrift.
The ache in my chest grows sharper. I close my eyes, fighting back the sting of tears. When I speak, my voice shakes. “Then why are you here?”
The pause stretches, long enough I almost think he won’t answer. Then, soft and ragged, “Because I should have known.”
I turn sharply, breath catching, eyes locking on to him. The crack in his voice is faint but unmistakable, a fracture running through the armor of the man I built into a monster. It is wrong that it hurts me more than his threats ever did.
I do not move closer, though every nerve in me strains with the pull of it. Instead I stand frozen, arms wrapped tight across my chest, the storm of hatred and doubt tearing through me.
His gaze stays fixed on me, unwavering, as if he will not allow himself the mercy of looking away.
I whisper, raw and broken, “Get out.”
For a long moment he does not move. Then he inclines his head, slow and deliberate, and turns toward the door. His footsteps are steady, his back straight, yet I see the weight in his shoulders.
When the door closes behind him, the silence rushes in hard and suffocating. I sink onto the edge of the bed, trembling, hands pressed to my mouth to smother the sob clawing its way out.
His words linger, carved into me deeper than the ink on those pages. I didn’t know.
No matter how fiercely I want to hate him, the sound of his voice when he said it won’t let me go.
The room feels cavernous after he leaves, shadows stretching long across the floor, silence pulsing in the corners. I sit still for a long while, spine bent, palms pressed hard against my thighs.
My lungs ache with the force of holding everything in. No tears. I refuse to give him that. He has stolen enough without taking my grief as well.
I force myself to stand, crossing to the desk where the drawer hides the file. My fingers hover over the handle before pulling back. I cannot look again tonight. The words are etched into me already, every letter burned into memory. His father. Not him. My chest squeezes painfully at the thought.
I switch off the lamp, sink into the bed, and drag the blanket around me. Sleep should come; exhaustion gnaws at my bones, heavy and relentless.
Yet my mind refuses quiet. Every time I close my eyes I see him framed in the doorway, his body filling the space, his voice rough with something too close to regret. I hear again the tremor in those three words—I didn’t know—and it slices through the armor I have built.
Hatred is easier. Hatred has always been my fuel, clean and sharp. Now it frays under something I cannot name. Something dangerous.
I roll onto my side, pressing my face into the pillow, determined to shut him out. My body betrays me. The heat lingers where his eyes touched me, as if his gaze alone could leave a mark. I remember his hands, the breadth of them, the way they stayed at his sides instead of reaching for me.
He’s grabbed me before, pushed me against walls, made me feel cornered by his presence. Tonight he didn’t touch me. The restraint unsettles me more than violence ever could.
Minutes stretch into hours. My body grows restless under the blanket, heat pooling low in my belly, shame curling sharp around it. I tell myself it’s anger, that it’s fury making me tremble, but the ache spreading through me knows the lie.
When sleep finally drags me under, it carries me into him. Not the monster I built in my mind, but the man as he stood tonight: silent, fractured, a shadow carrying weight he could not lay down.
In the dream his hands finally touch me, rough palms sliding over my arms, pulling me close. His mouth is on mine, harsh at first, then lingering, coaxing me into a kiss that steals air from my lungs.
I jolt awake, heart pounding. My skin burns as if his lips still press against it. I lie motionless in the dark, waiting for the shame to smother the feeling. Instead the ache only grows sharper, need winding tight in my chest and low in my belly.
I bite down on the edge of the blanket, teeth clenching hard, as my hand drifts beneath the sheets.
My body arches at the first touch, breath catching in my throat.
I picture his mouth on my neck, his breath hot against my ear, his voice rough as he whispers those words again—I didn’t know.
The sound of it vibrates through me, pulling me deeper into the haze.
My fingers move faster, chasing the heat blooming inside me.
The dream spills over reality: his weight pressing me into the mattress, his hands spreading across my hips, his eyes burning into mine.
I hear the growl in his throat, feel the scrape of stubble along my jaw as his lips claim me again and again.
Pleasure crests sharp and sudden, ripping a broken gasp from my lips. I clutch the pillow to my face, muffling the sound, body trembling as the wave crashes through me.
When it fades, I collapse against the sheets, chest heaving, shame coiling hard in my gut. My hand drifts away, damp with sweat, trembling. The reality sinks in heavy and merciless. I touched myself to him. The man I swore to destroy. The man I swore had stolen everything from me.
Guilt scorches through me, fierce enough to leave me shaking. I curl tight on my side, fists pressed to my mouth, choking down the sob that threatens. I promised myself I would not cry, and I hold to that vow. Yet tears burn behind my eyelids, begging release.
I stare into the darkness until my eyes blur, until exhaustion takes me again. Even then, I can’t shake the feeling of him—the heat of his hands, the scrape of his mouth, the tremor in his voice when he said those words that now haunt me.
When sleep finally returns, it is shallow and restless, every dream tangled in the ghost of his touch.
Morning light creeps through the curtains, pale and cold. I wake with guilt still burning in my chest, hot as acid. My stomach knots when I remember the sound I made, muffled against the pillow, the way I writhed beneath sheets that no longer feel like mine.
I sit up slowly, the blanket slipping to my waist, my body sore with tension. The guilt does not fade. It grows heavier with each breath. Yet beneath it, tangled in the shame, is something else I can’t shake: the memory of pleasure, sharp and vivid, leaving me raw with hunger I cannot name.
I drag myself to the bathroom, splash water on my face until my skin stings, trying to scrub away the evidence of what I did. The woman staring back at me in the mirror looks pale, eyes dark with secrets, mouth pressed into a hard line. I don’t recognize her.
Hatred should come easy. Hatred should devour what I felt in the night, burn it to ash. Instead the guilt entwines with something far more dangerous: longing.
I lean both hands against the sink, head bowed, breath ragged. My reflection waits silent above me, accusing. I whisper through clenched teeth, “Never again.”
The words sound weak even to me.
The file is still in the drawer. His father’s name still binds me to a truth I cannot deny. Alexei’s voice still echoes in my chest, rough and fractured, refusing to leave.
I step back into the room, body tense, resolve brittle as glass. My mind screams that he is still the enemy, still dangerous, still everything I should loathe. Yet the memory of his voice, his eyes, his phantom touch follows me like a shadow I cannot outrun.
I will not cry. I will not forgive. I will not forget what he has done.
Still, when I close my eyes, I feel his mouth against mine, and the guilt burns hotter for how much I crave it again.