Chapter 7
SEVEN
Simon
The screams were tearing the room apart.
They weren't human. They were the jagged, high-frequency sounds of a machine stripping its gears, of a biological system hitting the red line and disintegrating.
Tessa wasn't just fighting us; she was fighting the very air in her lungs, her body arching off the cold concrete like a drawn bowstring about to snap.
"Hold her down!" Anders shouted, his voice cracking.
The perfect, polished agent was gone, replaced by a terrified man in a ruined suit, trying to hold a gel pad against the thrashing stomach of a woman who was slowly cooking herself alive.
"Goddamnit, Daniel, immobile! She’s dislodging the sensors! "
"I'm trying!" Daniel grunted. He was using his weight, his massive frame straddling her thighs, pinning her legs to the floor, but sweat was pouring off him. The scent of yeast and warm spice that usually rolled off him in comforting waves had turned sour, curdled by panic.
I was at her head, my knees bruising against the hard floor, my hands wrapped around her slender wrists. I had her pinned, her arms stretched above her head in a crucifix of surrender, leaving her utterly exposed to the room, to the lights, to us.
It was wrong. It was all wrong.
Whatever Anders thought he was doing, whatever protocol he was following from some dusty medical textbook, wasn’t working. The cooling pads were sliding uselessly across her skin, skating on a layer of sweat and slick fluids that smelled of the ocean and rotting fruit.
"It’s not working," I choked out, the air in the room thick and unbreathable, heavy with the metallic tang of pheromones. "Anders, look at her stomach. Look at the muscles."
Her abdomen was rippling, hard knots of cramping muscle twisting beneath the pale skin.
Her abdomen was contracting violently, trying to expel an emptiness that didn't exist, a phantom heat that the suppressants had held back for who knew how long.
The cold pads weren't stopping it; they were shocking the nerves, sending her nervous system into a riot.
"We have to lower the core temperature," Anders argued, though his hands were shaking as he tried to reapply the adhesive. "If we don't, she strokes out. It’s physics, Simon. Heat exchange."
"It's not physics, it's biology!" I snarled, looking down at her.
Tessa wasn't looking at me. Her eyes were squeezed shut, tears leaking from the corners, mixing with the sweat in her hairline. Her lips were pulled back in a rictus of agony, her teeth grinding together.
So empty, she had sobbed. Fill it.
I looked at my hands. Long fingers. Calloused tips.
Stained permanently with the India ink and charcoal I used to capture shadows.
I had spent my entire life watching people, studying the way light hit a curve, the way a muscle bunched under tension.
I was the observer. The guy in the back of the class with the sketchbook.
The guy in the bleachers who watched the tragedy unfold through a lens, documenting the fall but never catching the girl.
I hate you, she had hissed at us. You just watch.
The accusation hit me harder than her boot had. It dug into my chest, hooking into the soft, rot-filled center of my guilt and pulling.
I looked at the way her hips were jerking, a staccato rhythm of desperate, frictional need.
She was grinding against the nothingness, against the air, against Daniel’s arm.
She didn't need ice. She needed a crash.
She needed a dopamine release massive enough to short-circuit the feedback loop of pain and panic her brain was trapped in.
She needed to come.
The realization was clinical, cold, and absolutely terrifying.
"Get the pads off her," I said. My voice sounded strange to my own ears, hollow and distant, like I was speaking from underwater.
"What?" Anders looked up, his blue eyes wild. "Are you insane? She’s burning."
"She's cramping to death," I snapped, releasing her wrists. "The pain is spiking her heart rate. The cold is making the muscles seize harder. We need to break the cycle."
"Simon, don't," Daniel warned, his voice a low rumble from where he held her legs. He saw where I was looking. He saw the intention shifting in my posture. "We can't. It’s… it’s assault."
"She’s dying, Daniel!" I roared, the anger finally breaking through the paralysis. "Look at the monitor! She’s at 180 beats per minute! If we don't drop her cortisol levels right now, her heart stops!"
I didn't wait for permission. I didn't wait for the committee to vote. The artist in me took over, the part of me that knew you couldn't hesitate when the ink hit the paper, or you’d ruin the line.
I moved.
I slid down between her shoulder and her waist, ignoring Anders’ shocked intake of breath. I shoved his hand away from her stomach, ripping the cold, slimy gel pad off her skin and throwing it across the room. It slapped wetly against the stainless steel fridge.
"Simon!" Anders grabbed my shoulder, his grip hard. "Stop!"
"Watch the monitor," I ordered, shaking him off with a violent jerk. "Just watch the goddamn numbers, Svinton."
I looked down at her. She was writhing, incoherent, lost in the fever dream.
Her skin was flushed a dangerous, mottled red, hot enough to radiate heat against my face.
The scent of her, blackberries and salt, was overpowering.
It triggered a rush of saliva in my mouth, a dark, predatory spike of arousal that made me hate myself instantly.
I was a monster. I was taking advantage of a sick, hallucinating woman who thought I was a security guard.
Do it, the darker part of my brain whispered. Save her.
I placed my hand on her lower belly, right over the cramping knot of her womb. My hand looked dark against her pale skin, the ink stains on my knuckles standing out like bruises.
She gasped, her back arching off the floor. Not a scream this time, but a sharp, startled intake of air. The heavy, warm weight of my hand was grounding where the ice had been agonizing.
"It hurts," she whined, her head thrashing side to side. "Please."
"I know," I whispered, my voice rough. "I’ve got you."
I moved my hand lower.
I passed the curve of her hip bone, the skin slick with sweat.
I moved between where Daniel had her legs pinned.
I could see everything, the swollen, flushed reality of her heat, the undeniable biology that she had been hiding from the world.
She was soaked, the slickness coating her inner thighs, weeping from her in a desperate attempt to facilitate a mating that wasn't happening.
I didn't let myself hesitate. If I hesitated, I would stop. If I stopped, she would break.
I slid my fingers into the slickness. It was incredibly hot, almost scalding, like dipping my hand into bathwater that was too deep. I found her center, the swollen nub of nerves that was currently misfiring panic signals to her brain.
I touched her.
Tessa’s entire body went rigid. Her eyes flew open, unseeing, staring blindly at the ceiling. A sound tore out of her throat, a long, ragged cry that wasn't pain.
"Ah! Oh, god!"
"Check the rate," I barked at Anders, not looking at him. My eyes were locked on her face, watching the micro-expressions, the way the tension lines around her eyes were shifting.
"It… it held," Anders stammered, his voice sounding stunned. "It stopped climbing. 182... 181."
"Good," I muttered.
I pushed inside.
Two fingers. My middle and index finger, the ones I used to smudge charcoal, the ones that had developed a sensitivity to texture over years of drawing. I slipped past the tight, cramping ring of muscle and sank into her.
She was so tight it was difficult to navigate, her internal muscles clamping down on my fingers like a vice. It was desperate. It was hungry. She was starved, hollowed out by the suppressants, and her body was trying to devour the intrusion.
"Simon," she gasped, her hips snapping up, chasing the pressure. She didn't know it was me. She just knew the hollowness was being filled.
"Breathe," I commanded, curling my fingers, pressing up against the anterior wall, seeking the spot that would trigger the release. "Tessa, you have to breathe."
I began to move. It was clinical at first, check the depth, check the angle, find the rhythm. I was a mechanic trying to jumpstart an engine. In, curl, stroke, pull out. A steady, metronomic beat designed to override the chaos in her nervous system.
Squelch. Slick. Drag.
The sound was obscene in the quiet kitchen. It mixed with the sound of her ragged breathing and the rain hammering against the glass.
But then, she changed.
Her hands, which had been clawing at the air, fell back to the floor. Her fingers curled, scraping uselessly against the concrete. Her head rolled toward me, her eyes fluttering.
"More," she whispered, the word broken. "Don't... don't go."
Something in my chest fractured.
I wasn't just fixing a machine. I was touching her.
I was inside the ghost I had been chasing for ten years.
The girl I had drawn in the margins of my notebooks, the mystery I had tried to solve with graphite and ink.
She felt incredible. The heat of her, the velvety texture of her interior, the way her body milked my fingers, it was the most addictive tactile sensation I had ever experienced.
I hated how good it felt. I hated that my own body was responding, my jeans suddenly too tight, my Alpha instincts roaring at me to shove my fingers deeper, to replace my hand with something more permanent, to bite, to claim.
You spectator, I thought viciously, watching her face flush darker. You voyeur. You're enjoying this.
I pushed the self-loathing down, focusing it into energy. I let the rhythm shift. It wasn't clinical anymore. It became something else. Something heavy. Something... worshipful.
I used my thumb to work her clit, dragging it through the slick heat in circles while my fingers thrust inside her.
I watched her face intently, memorizing the way her lips parted, the way the pulse jumped in her throat.
I needed to capture this. Not on paper, but in the dark, permanent gallery of my mind.
"That's it," I murmured, leaning closer, my face inches from her thigh. The scent of burnt sugar and dark chocolate poured off me, mixing with her brine and berries, creating a new, heady compound. "Let go. You have to crash."
"I can't," she whimpered, her hips bucking against Daniel's restraint. "It's too much. The eyes. Everyone is watching."
"No one is watching," I lied, my voice rough with the lie. "Just me. Just Simon. Look at me, Tessa."
She didn't focus on me, but she turned toward the sound of my voice.
"Simon?" she breathed, the name a question.
"Yeah. I'm right here." I pumped my fingers faster now, twisting my wrist to hit the nerve again and again. "I'm not in the bleachers. I'm right here in the mess with you."
Daniel shifted his weight, his large hand coming up to stroke her hair back from her sweaty forehead. "170," he murmured, his voice sounding relieved. "It's dropping. Keep going, Si."
I didn't need the encouragement. I couldn't have stopped if I wanted to.
Her body was taking over. The cramps were transforming, the pain signals transmuting into pleasure signals as the dopamine began to flood her brain. She clamped down on my hand, hard, her inner muscles shuddering.
"Oh," she gasped, her back arching, her ribcage expanding as she finally took a full breath. "Oh, please."
"Come on," I urged, scissoring my fingers inside her, feeling the ridge of her cervix, feeling the wet heat drenching my hand. "Give it to me. Break."
I watched the flush spread up her neck. It was beautiful. It was a masterpiece of biological art. The way the blood rushed to the surface, turning her pale skin to rose, then to crimson. The way the veins in her neck stood out.
I increased the pressure, my thumb moving in a blur against her clit.
She shattered.
It wasn't a gentle release. It was a detonation.
She screamed, a high, keen sound that shattered the tension in the room.
Her body convulsed, violently bowing off the floor, lifting my hand with her.
She clamped down on my fingers so hard I thought she might break them, pulsating around me in wave after wave of crushing heat.
"Yes," I hissed, watching her eyes roll back in her head. "That's it. Scream. Let it out."
I kept moving through the pulses, riding out the aftershocks, refusing to let her come down too fast. I held her through the peak, letting her wring every ounce of release from the contact.
Slowly, agonizingly, the tension left her frame.
Her back completely relaxed, melting onto the cold concrete. Her legs, which had been fighting Daniel’s grip, went boneless. Her hands uncurled.
The room fell silent, save for the sound of her ragged, wet breathing and the persistent drum of the rain.
I didn't pull out. Not yet. I stayed inside her, feeling the final, fluttering spasms of her muscles against my fingers, feeling the heat slowly begin to ebb from "critical" to merely "high.
" I rested my forehead against her knee, breathing hard, the smell of her release, sweet, salty, absolute, filling my lungs.
"Heart rate," I croaked, not lifting my head.
There was a pause, the silence heavy with the things we weren't saying.
"120," Anders said. His voice was quiet. Shaken. "115. She’s stabilizing."
I closed my eyes, a wave of exhaustion hitting me. My hand was cramping. My fingers were slick with her fluids and smeared with the ink from my own skin, marking her inside and out. I had crossed a line that couldn't be uncrossed. I had put my hands on the client.
Carefully, I withdrew my hand. A wet, suctioning sound echoed in the quiet, obscene and intimate. Her fluids coated my fingers, glistening in the dim emergency light.
I sat back on my heels, holding my hand up, staring at it. I felt dirty. I felt exhilarated.
Tessa let out a long, shuddering sigh and turned her head to the side, slipping from consciousness into a deep, chemical sleep. The crisis had broken. The fever had snapped.
"Cover her," I whispered, my voice trembling.
I stood up, my legs shaking, and walked to the sink. I turned on the faucet, but nothing happened. The power was out. No water.
I stared at my hand, at the mix of her biology and my art, stained together on my skin. I grabbed a rag from the counter and scrubbed at it, watching the spectator die and something else, something dangerous and possessive, take his place.