9. Isolde
Isolde
My racing heart wakes me up. I’m cocooned in blankets, my cheek pressed against my pillow, my body unmoving.
My bedroom is silent. The apartment still in the night. Yet, I am a livewire. My pulse races. The thoughts rush in my head, one of which circles around and around, dictating I give it valid consideration.
I have sixteen guns situated throughout my flat. Eight of which are in the bedrooms; I wonder if Tristan noticed the four in his room yet. That leaves a remaining eight spread out throughout the living room, kitchen, and bathroom.
Cade likes to fuck with people. It makes complete sense if he somehow found his way inside my apartment and stripped me of these valuable weapons.
If he attacked me in my own apartment, I’d be grasping for a weapon already taken away. Laughter echoes in my head, my heart hammering, as I picture it. I’d dive toward my coffee table, my fingers scraping the wood.
In response to this nightmare, my fingers spasm, feeling the brush of cold gunmetal.
It makes complete sense, this idea that he somehow got into my apartment and removed my guns.
A current of truth runs down the coursing nerves. There’s no way this actually occurred. But the intrusive thought has already wormed its way in.
I must check.
Flinging the covers off, my bare feet first meet the rug before padding over the hardwood floor. The four guns strategically placed in my room are all there.
My bedroom door opens with a slight crack. Nothing stirs behind Tristan’s closed door. Creeping into the bathroom, I don’t bother turning on the light.
My fingers touch the two guns stashed there—one in the ceiling and the other underneath the cabinet, tucked in between towels.
Silently, I climb off the toilet I’ve used as a step stool. I go to the kitchen first, working my way back to the living room.
The gun strapped under my coffee table—the one I’d seen in my vision—is indeed still there. Just like I knew it would be.
I remain crouched in between the sofa and table, my toes digging into the rug as I try to calm my breathing.
You’re being so stupid.
I can’t shake my nerves, though.
You knew this would happen, Hadrian had said to me tonight. Just hours ago when we got dinner at Fujimori’s.
There’s a reason you’re keeping sixteen guns in your flat.
Ren’s advice haunts me. How I should open up more. Perhaps I should tell somebody I have so many firearms in my flat. That the reason I have them isn’t just for professional use.
I’ve staged my flat in a particular manner, knowing this whole time the threat of Cade wasn’t empty.
Pushing hair off my face, I stand up on shaky, tired legs. The wall of windows illuminates my living room in shades of gray shadows, the place never pitch black.
I thought Hadrian was taking the piss when he offered me this place. It’s way too fucking grand for me. I’d never thought myself boho, or whatever interior style this is, but I like the natural light, the green potted plants I’ve collected, and the one exposed brick wall in my living room.
The hour is late, the residential neighborhood quiet by the city’s standards.
A man looks up at me from the street outside. Blonde hair, classically handsome. Dressed just like I saw him last. A button-down and black trousers.
Ivan, Lennie’s former bodyguard, smiles up at me. He leans casually against the bus stop, hands in his pockets.
Goose bumps flush my skin.
Ren had opened the window and yelled down at him. Lennie had liked him. I knew him a little bit because I’d seen him around, unaware Elijah would send him in search of information.
Ivan smiles even wider, as if he knows I’m thinking of all the quick blips of time we came into contact.
Dead. Shot in the street.
A current runs between me and Ivan, the ghost acknowledging this ugly death, but he’s content with standing outside my flat.
I’m not so far gone that I wave at him, but I place my palm on the window, my fingers splayed in greeting.
I don’t think I was a suspicious kid. I had my quirks. Abe told me he thinks I’m neurodivergent.
Lately, all I ever see are ghosts.
“Perhaps, you’re a clairvoyant,” Sammie’s ghost jokes. I’m not in the mood for her pestering and turn away from the window.
Tristan stands in the living room. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
His shirt is off again, his face worn. I didn’t mean to wake him.
“What are you doing?” he asks again.
I shrug, like a kid who doesn’t confirm or deny if they’ve been caught doing something bad.
Walking around the sofa, he brushes past me. It’s the slightest hint of skin contact, but my head swivels, following his every move. He checks out the window. I guess he can’t see Ivan’s ghost.
I think that’ll be the end of it. He’ll usher me off to bed.
He walks back around me, again brushing against the baggy shirt I’m wearing. I’m suddenly too aware I’m only wearing the oversized shirt. At least I’m wearing underwear.
“What did Hadrian say to you?”
I rub a dry eye. “What?”
“What did Hadrian Hallow say to you tonight? What did he do to upset you?”
Luis drove us back from Fujimori’s. Tristan said a few words to his cousin in Spanish but remained mostly quiet. The late hour meant we skipped the latest episode of Love Island.
“Nothing,” I tell Tristan.
“Matheson, I sat there and watched that asshole upset you.” Tristan’s jaw is so tight I think his face will break.
He’s upset.
The realization hits me with a zap. I’m left freefalling for a second because I don’t understand why he would care.
“Tell me what he said,” Tristan demands, and I recognize the look in his eyes. They’re the same stormy but focused orbs he used to hide beneath the mask of the Ghost.
“He didn’t say anything,” I lie. It’s not worth it to get into it. Hadrian might be a stuck-up arsehole, but I guess I’m also dealing with some misguided loyalty myself. “I’ve got to go to bed.”
I try to step around him, but he reaches out before I can stop him.
The last time he touched me, he’d been picking me up off the floor after someone tried to shoot me.
That’s the only other time he’s ever touched me.
“Are you forgetting last night?” Sammie’s ghost asks, reminding me of when he told me to behave.
The shock is just as acute as I’d expect. I’m not a touchy-feely person. It just doesn’t come naturally to me.
But this isn’t the unease or surprise of the actual act.
It’s electrical. Warming my insides, the pins and needles taking on a different tone to the haywire nerves I usually feel.
I want him to touch me.
There’s always been a curiosity inside me. From the moment I met the Ghost. I wanted to know him.
Eyes blazing, he forces me to stop moving, to look him in the face.
“You know at some point you are going to have to let someone in.”
A defensive mechanism rises in me. “Says the guy who hid behind a mask for how long?”
“Masks aren’t always made out of latex,” he replies, unruffled by the dig. “You’re hiding from something.”
“No, I’m not.”
“I never once took you for a liar.”
I recoil at his disappointment.
He catches my hesitation, taking a deep breath. “Tell me what’s going on in that mind of yours, Matheson.”
I shake my head.
“One thing, Matheson,” he says.
He’s so close, but he’s not lurking in the dark. He’s not towering over a victim. There’s a subtle, powerful wave of. . . meditation? That doesn’t make sense. He’s upset with me, but for some reason I want to tuck myself into his side and let him anchor me.
“Tell me one real, honest thought in your mind.” He gently squeezes my arm, pulling me toward him.
I laugh, thanks to the confusion and sense of irony. “I didn’t think you liked my monologue on slime.”
He brushes a strand of my hair back, my heart leaping into my throat.
“I didn’t,” he admits, but before my chest fully crushes, he continues. “I’ll listen to you prattle on all day in that accent of yours. But you’re stronger than a string of babbled words.”
“It’s not babbled words.”
Sammie and my mom used to tell me I could be annoying because I went on too many tangents. Talked about too many things without letting others talk about themselves.
My friends must think I’m ridiculous. That I send too many texts in the group chat.
“Then what is it?” Tristan asks.
“They’re my thoughts. My feelings.”
“Summarizing Love Island is not feelings.”
I try to tug my arm away, but he merely squeezes harder. It’s not painful, but he won’t let up.
All-consuming. That’s what he is.
“Ask me about the Ghost.”
“What?”
“Ask me.”
“W-what’s the deal with the Ghost?”
“The Ghost is a silly mask I put on to conceal my identity when I went around killing anyone who ever belonged to Marissa’s operation.
” He lifts my arm slightly, and for a second I stupidly think he’s pulling my wrist toward his lips, like he might kiss me.
“See? It’s not so hard, answering questions. ”
“Fuck off,” I scoff, deciding his calming presence is all a lie. His smirk is too damn smug for that.
“How long have you been in this city?” he asks. “Close to four years and your friends don’t know a damn thing about you, do they?”
“That’s not fucking true!” Embarrassment flushes my skin. For the first time in my life, I have friends. They threw me a birthday party and everything. What right does he have to say they don’t know me?
“Be honest, Isolde. You’re too scared to speak.”
“Fuck you.”
“Hide behind some curse words if that’s what you want.”
“I’m not hiding. I’m telling you to fuck off.”
His words are mere murmurs, but I hear the challenge. “I’ll fuck off if you give me one honest thought from inside that mind of yours.”
My lips part. My mouth unmoving.
And then, the words tumble out. “I want you to shut up and fuck me.”
He drops my arm, stepping back.
I preemptively prepare for embarrassment. For his rejection.
Tristan cups my cheek, brown eyes fierce as he lifts my chin, inspecting every inch of my face.
“You want me to fuck you?”
I almost flinch, hearing the words repeated back to me.
“You want me to spread your legs open?” Brown eyes run over my body, his gaze scalding me. “Is that what you want, baby? For me to open your legs wide and fuck you up.”
His hand may as well be around my throat. I’m breathless.
“I ask you for one real thing, and you ask me to fuck you?”
I step away from him, but he pulls me back.
“Answer me, Izzy baby.”
“Yes!” I refuse to waver, to show any fear.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Fuck me.” The words are clear, my voice strong. I’m tired of standing here, scared and lonely. “If you think you can do that?”
He smirks at the challenge. “Put your hand around my cock, baby.”
The demand stuns me.
“Now.” His hand still cups my cheek, his eyes never leaving mine.
My hand easily glides down the waistband of his sweatpants. I scoot closer, his face frozen in a strict expression.
When my hand wraps around his cock, I’m aware I don’t hide my surprise.
“Y-you have piercings.”
It never once occurred to me the Ghost might have a Jacob’s ladder.
“Is that going to be a problem?”
I shake my head.
“Use your words, baby.”
“No.”
I carefully wrap my hand around his cock, feeling the velvet skin and the metal piercings. He rapidly thickens, my mouth drying.
He’s still holding my cheek, his touch almost tender as he asks, “You think you can handle my cock? I won’t take it slow, Izzy baby. I’ll fuck you raw.”
“I, yes.” My breath comes in shallow waves, but it’s not from fear. Anticipation and hope eat me alive. Shit, this really is the city where dreams come true.
He pushes me back, my calves knocking into the coffee table. My shirt comes off before I can even understand. I’m standing in just my panties.
His eyes narrow with the hunger of a predator.
“Underwear off.” His sweatpants hit the floor, kicking out of them.
I don’t act fast enough for him because he takes a step forward, peeling my panties off. They’re still around my ankles when he turns and bends me over the sofa.
One of my arms braces itself using the back of the sofa; the other sinks into the cushion.
“Legs wide open, baby.” He kicks my feet apart and trails a hand up my thigh, his fingers skimming closely to the exact spot I want him. “Just like that.”
Noise rattles in my throat when he presses a finger inside my cunt.
“You were ready for me.” His thumb traces around my clit, my mouth dropping open. “Goddamn, Isolde.”
He sinks another finger inside, his touch firmer as he teases me. His other finger runs up my ribcage, wrapping around to find my breast. He squeezes, pinching my nipple.
“What was that?” he asks when I make a sound. I don’t need to turn around to know he’s smirking. “Are you trying to ask me for something?”
“Plea—” The word dies on a breathy moan. It’s not cute. It’s not sensual. It’s a desperate breath of air.
“You think you’re ready for my cock?” He digs his erection into my back, the threat a welcome pleasure. “Remember what I said, I’m not going slow.”
To prove his point, he rams inside of me. My head hits the back of the sofa.
His fingers grip my waist, and he thrusts in and out, his piercings rubbing my insides.
A strangled cry dies on my lips when he wrenches my head back, tugging my hair. The blip of pain and fear sails away the moment his lips crash against mine. Even with the awkward angle and his cock stretching me open, I fall into him.
Wanting more and needing more, it all combines. My body is a doll in his hands, positioned and moved by his directions.
He grinds his hips against me, shoving forward, hitting a spot.
I’m mumbling against his lips, which only brings a wicked smirk to them. He knows I can’t do anything.
“Just like that, baby,” he whispers in my ear. “You’re doing so good, opening your legs and letting me fuck whatever hole I want.”
I tense, a sharp thrill running down my back when his finger glides through my arousal, teasing my ass.
“Easy,” he warns, the message wrapped in a growl. “Let me have it, Iz baby.”
My muscles relax as much as they can, my body falling slightly into the sofa. I’m pounded from behind, his fingers working the tight ring.
“Oh, God,” I cry, making him laugh.
“Want to try that again?”
My fingers dig into the velvet fabric of the sofa.
“Say. My. Fucking. Name.” He slams his hips into me.
“Tristan!”
He grabs my hair again, pulling me up until my back arches. “Are you on the pill?”
I slap his hand away in a panic. He grabs onto my shoulder instead, pinning me in place as his hips surge at an unstoppable pace.
“Are you on the pill?”
“Yes!”
He shoves me back down, my breasts smushed against the sofa.
“Good, because I’m coming inside you.”
The declaration heats my skin, fire engulfing me as stars flash behind my eyes. I’m crying at the euphoria, the overstimulating experience draining me.
Hot cum spurts inside me. Lips falling apart and face screwed up, I’m glad I can hide against the sofa as shivers ripple down my spine.