42. Lucy
Lucy
S omeone knocks softly at my apartment door, and I know before I even get out of my chair who it is.
It’s been ten days since we resurrected Calyx.
Ten days and no Midnight. She hasn’t come to my classes. We haven’t studied at night. She must be worried about the finals. She came to Finis to win the Demonic Favour, and she won’t if she doesn’t study relentlessly.
If she’s not concerned about it, I certainly am. I’ve tried her apartment every day, left messages with Lex and Bastien and shoved letters under her door.
Nothing.
It also means I am no closer to deciphering my contract, and she knows that.
I don’t want her to put the favour at risk because she’s pissed at me, or worse, use me as an excuse to self-sabotage.
Which is why I pull the door open and I’m instantly cross. Her shoulders are drawn in and tight while furrowed lines darken her blue eyes into swirling pools of rage.
She’s more than mad at me.
How dare she. What exactly does she expect from me? To give up everything? Make myself completely at her whims and in need of her protection?
“Hi,” I say, and have to force myself not to sound shitty. To at least give her a chance to explain why she’s here.
She won’t look at me when she speaks. “Could we please continue our study? Finals are imminent, and I would like to continue with our deal, should you see fit to want that.”
“Is that meant to be an apology?”
This makes her head snap up, her expression thinning. “And what exactly am I supposed to be apologising for?”
I huff. “Oh, I don’t know, maybe the fact you know I can’t read that contract without you. So you punished me by withholding the one thing I need.”
She shoves past me into my apartment. “Well, don’t worry, I put my favour in jeopardy, too. So I guess we’re both fucked now.”
“Mature, real fucking mature. A bit like your demands, your expectations. You want more from me than I can give. And when I didn’t give it you, you went dark. Walked away like a child instead of talking this through.”
“What the hell have I demanded from you? Other than meeting your half of our deal?”
I close the door and stride into the living room area after her. She’s pacing. Wearing lines into my carpet where her boots grind into the floor.
“You don’t have to use words to make demands, Midnight,” I say.
She stops still. “You fucking hypocrite.”
“I beg your pardon.”
She sniffs, wipes her forehead and glares at me. “And you don’t have to use words to tell me you have feelings for me.”
I baulk. How are we here again?
“This was supposed to be a deal. I help you win the favour, and you help me break my contract. You agreed to that.”
She flings her hands up. “Neither of us knew that fucking you brought the runes out. Things change, Lucy. That’s part of being human.”
“I’m no?—”
“Don’t you fucking dare pull that shit with me. You feel, therefore, you have human experience.”
I shake my head. “Your feelings won’t leave you powerless, vulnerable.”
She scoffs at me. “How can you know so little about mortals? Don’t you get it? Don’t you understand what happens to us when we fall in love?”
I fall silent, her words sinking in. Finally, after what feels like an aeon, I speak.
“You’re in love with me?” My eyes sting hot and watery.
“You think you’re so different.” She’s snarling. Furious with me because she loves me. She resumes pacing and ranting. “Humans don’t have crystalline hearts, no, and our power doesn’t rest inside them, but fuck, it might as well.”
“What do you mean?” I say and step closer. Her bright blue eyes are all flames and passion.
She shakes her head at me. “You set yourselves apart like you’re so fucking different.
But when a mortal truly falls in love, they may as well rip out their beating heart and hand it to their loved one.
That’s the power another holds over us. Love is making yourself wholly vulnerable.
It’s giving yourself to another. There’s no one more capable of hurting you than the one you’re in love with.
It’s why Aurelia broke me… and it’s why having you in my life remade me. ”
Her words cut me so deep, my crystalline heart shivers. How is it she can penetrate my defences without me noticing? I stiffen as my chest squeezes; I swear hairline fractures form on the surface of my heart.
She is danger.
She is my ending.
My undoing.
And I can’t seem to walk away. My feet lead me towards my demise. My heart trembles but my body holds firm in the face of the passion oozing from her every pore, every clenching and unclenching of her fists.
She makes me feel wanted, and yet there’s an ache in the back of my throat that reminds me we’re doomed.
This is where she seems so young, so innocent. She can’t see that love isn’t enough. No matter how much we might yearn for each other, we won’t make it through this.
“Tell me you see it?” she says, fury coiling in her expression. “Answer me, dammit.”
She’s shouting. I know better, though. And I want to save her from this pain, but I am as fallible as she is. I’m inches from her now. Heat swirls between us, barbed and serrated it hooks beneath my ribs and draws me closer, closer.
“Say something…” She’s pleading now, and I know what she needs.
Words aren’t going to help because I can’t tell her what she wants. Not without sacrificing myself. I’ve come too far, I’m too close to being free of my father to lose it all now.
But I can give her my body.
My fingers find my shirt buttons and slowly undo them. I take the shirt off and drop it in front of her. My trousers follow. Until I’m stood in my underwear. I unclasp my bra, my nipples already erect by the time it falls to the floor.
She swallows as she holds my gaze, her eyes never dropping from mine, even though her breathing increases.
Maybe it’s wrong, toxic even. But I don’t know what else I can give her. What I can do is surrender my body to her. I just have to keep hold of my heart. But is it enough?
I slip my hands against my hips and drag my underwear down my thighs and step out of them.
I am utterly naked. She is still fully clothed, unmoving. A fact that makes excitement pool between my legs. Wondering what she will do with me, how she might punish me even though I’m giving myself as fully as I can to her.
I lower myself into the Nadu position. Sat on my calves, my hands open, palms rest on my thighs. My head lowered.
“Use me,” I whisper. “Take your frustration out on me. Hurt me, Midnight. Hurt me the way I’m hurting you.”
She inhales a sharp breath. “Fuck.” The rigidity in her face loosens a fraction. I’m winning, getting through to her, easing the pain in the only way I’m capable of.
Shucking her jacket off, she throws it on the armchair. She cracks her neck, darkness swims in her eyes and it makes gooseflesh spill down my spine.
Tonight will be rough, exactly the way I like it.
Midnight moves to the dining room table and swipes everything off it in one movement with her arm.
“Who’s your Daddy, Lucy?” She’s furious and it makes my entire body electric. My skin breaks out in a cool sweat, my nipples form hard buds. One touch and I’ll melt.
“You are,” I breathe.
She nods, satisfied.
“Get on the table.”
I stand up and make my way to the edge and hop up.
“Open,” she says in a rumble coming from her chest. “Wider, Lucy.” She says my name sing-song, as if she’s exhausted by me and I’m an inconvenience. I see the game she’s playing, the role she’s taking on.
“Don’t fuck about with me tonight,” she says, her tone low and heady.
I suck my bottom lip in and push my knees as wide as I can, putting my pussy on display for her. Her lips twitch as she rakes her hand through her hair. I’m getting to her.
“Who do you belong to?” she says.
“You, Daddy,” I say, and I swear my pussy must be glistening by now.
“That’s right. Now tell Daddy where your toys are.”
My grin deepens, knowing that even though I shouldn’t use sex as a distraction, this is what we both need tonight.
“Top drawer,” I cock my head towards the bedroom.
“Don’t move. That pussy is mine. I want it on display for me when I return.”
She takes a few minutes, but when she strides back in, she’s topless, her breasts round and firm. I am desperate to put my mouth around them and suck one of her pink nipples between my teeth. The thought makes my mouth water with the aching need to taste her.
I drop my gaze lower. She still wears her leather trousers, but now a strap-on is secured in place with a vibe ring for my clit. In her hand, she carries a flogger, a paddle, and knot of rope.
She steps between my legs and places the toys on the table then grips my chin hard, forcing me to look at her. Her posture and movements still hold that simmering heat, the cloying mix of lust and the burn of anger beneath it. It drives me wild, like I hope tonight is going to be.
“Safe word,” she says.
“Satan.”
“You are mine, Lucy, do you understand?”
I hesitate too long.
Her hand rears back and slaps my pussy. I squeal and shunt backwards up the table. She holds my chin tighter, making the sting instantly morph into something silky. The moan that spills from my lips is raw. It affects her. Midnight’s lips part, her eyes flash.
Her fingers clasp my jaw hard enough I’m certain they’re going to leave bruises. It’s wrong; I should tell her to ease up.
But I like it.
I want the marks. I want more of them. Want her to mark my body hard enough that even when this is over and we part ways, I’ll always carry a piece of her.
Which is why I am very careful what I say next, knowing the reaction it will elicit.
“My body is yours, Daddy.”
Her nostrils flare, frustration written in her expression. She slaps my pussy again, and I half scream, half moan as sharp tingles spread from my clit deep into my core.