Fae
It’s been two days and I can still feel her blood all over me.
I turn the heat up higher on the shower and let the burn try to cleanse my skin.
The steam is thick enough to blur the edges of the bathroom but it still doesn’t matter.
No matter how long I stand here or how hard I scrub, the blood won’t come off.
My skin burns beneath my hands, already tender from where I’ve gone over the same places repeatedly, and I tilt my head back into the stream of water to try and drown out the noises in my brain.
I drag the flannel across my arms before moving to my shoulders and then between my fingers like if I press hard enough, if I just keep going, eventually I’ll finally be clean.
I scrub harder.
The flannel drags over my forearm until the sting sharpens into something that feels almost like relief.
The harshness of it feels like a deserved punishment rather than this suffocating numbness.
I cling to that, to the burn, to the ache, to anything that feels like it matches what’s sitting inside my chest.
She’s gone.
I grit my teeth and scrub harder. If I keep moving, keep focusing, I won’t have to think about it.
“No,” I whisper under my breath, shaking my head. “No, she’s not—” My voice breaks and I swallow it down hard.
This is my fault.
My hand falters and the flannel drops. Fuck. The guilt claws at me as I drop my forehead to the cool tiles. I’m trying to be strong and be there for Roman, but I can barely even look at him. How do you look at the man whose mum you murdered?
You can’t.
My stomach flutters and tears spring into my eyes as I gently splay my fingers across my bump. It’s like they know. Every time I start to get out of control, they move and remind me why we’re here. The issue is everything I touch gets ruined. Everyone I love dies or gets hurt.
I’m cursed.
My throat tightens painfully as I bend down to pick up the cloth and slowly drag it across my belly.
It’s the only place I feel clean; the only place blood didn’t touch me.
Most people would say the fabric protected it, but I know…
I know Fiona did. She wanted to keep my baby pure because that’s who Fiona is.
Was.
Fuck.
I should have stopped him. I should have done something. I should have—
“Tinkerbell.”
Roman’s voice cuts through the noise of the shower, rougher than it should be. I haven’t heard it sound normal in days.
I don’t answer. I don’t stop. The shower is the one place I break down. The one time I allow myself this. If I don’t, everything else will crumble around me.
“Tink,” he says softer this time, and I grit my teeth as I keep scrubbing.
I hear the shower door open. The soft click as it shuts behind him, but I keep my back to him, keep moving, dragging the cloth over my skin like it’s the only thing that matters.
“Stop,” he says quietly.
His body presses against mine, and the heat of him cuts through the water that’s been burning my skin for the last hour.
His chest slides against my back, damp skin on damp skin, and the contact is so real that it pulls me out of my own head just enough to feel it properly.
The water runs over both of us, tracing the lines where we meet.
“Stop.” His breath against my neck sends shivers down my spine.
“I can’t,” I whisper as my hand keeps moving and my grip tightens around the cloth.
“Little one, it has gone,” he says, and there’s something tight about his voice, like he’s holding whatever he really wants to say back with force. “There’s nothing there.”
“There is,” I whisper as I shake my head. “I can feel it.”
Silence stretches behind me before his hands reach gently around my wrists. I flinch and my body tenses in panic as the rhythm of my scrubbing breaks free. Roman’s grip remains steady on mine as he softly squeezes my hand.
“Stop.”
My fingers loosen. The cloth slips from my grip and hits the floor, and I stare at my hands, at the redness of them and the way they still don’t look clean enough no matter what I do.
“My hands are still red,” I croak.
“That’s because you’re scrubbing too hard. I promise you, it’s gone.”
“I can still feel her.”
He sighs as his hands shift. They slide down my arms, slower this time, like he’s mapping where I am.
“I know,” he murmurs.
How can he be like this? I killed his mum and he’s not arguing with me or shouting at me or telling me I repulse him. It doesn’t make sense.
“I should have…” My voice splinters, breaking apart as the words force their way out. “I should’ve stopped it. I should’ve done something. I should’ve—”
“Fae.”
His hands move to my face, turning me towards him, and when I look at him properly, it steals the remaining breath I had left because he looks just as broken as I feel.
“I let her die.”
“No,” he immediately says. His grip tightens on my face as he forces me to look into his eyes. “You didn’t.”
“I did,” I push back as my chest heaves. “I let us go unarmed, I didn’t stop him, I didn’t—”
“You didn’t kill her, Fae. My father did.” He grits his teeth and I shake my head as tears blur my vision and finally spill over my cheeks.
“I can still feel her,” I choke. “I can still feel the blood, and I can’t get it off, I can’t…”
My words dissolve completely as the sob tears through me and my body folds in on itself. Roman catches me, his arms wrap around me, pulling me tightly against him, and I cling to him.
“I’ve got you,” he murmurs against my hair, as his own voice cracks. “I’ve got you.”
“I don’t want to feel like this,” I gasp into him as my body shakes. “I don’t want—”
“I know,” he cuts me off quietly as his hand presses against the back of my neck, grounding me.
“I can’t breathe—”
Roman cuts me off as he bends down and kisses me gently.
My body instantly softens under his touch.
His lips caress mine before he licks at the seam, begging for entry.
My eyes fall shut as I open my mouth without thinking.
I run my palm up his body, feeling the ridge of his six-pack before sliding around his neck and pulling him down.
Roman growls into my mouth as his hands travel down, caressing my stomach before finding purchase on my hips and lifting me up.
My legs automatically wrap around him as he presses me into the cool tiles.
The contrast against my overheated skin sends a shiver through me and he groans.
My body reacts instantly as the kiss turns hungrier and messier before he separates and starts nibbling down my neck.
He bites hard and something in me snaps.
A broken sound slips from my throat as my body reacts.
Heat pools in my pussy and I press closer without thinking.
I feel him shift against me, his cock growing hard and more insistent against my stomach.
My hands grip tighter, my mouth moves against his like I’m starving, like I’ve lost every ounce of control I had left, and I let myself fall into it completely, into him, into the sharp, overwhelming rush of his body against mine.
Roman angles his cock, the tip of it breaching my cunt, and the sting of his size pulls a gasp straight from my lungs as I rock against him, chasing it, needing more of it, needing anything that isn’t the weight of everything else we are going through.
Our reality crashes over me and I pull back.
“Wait,” I gasp into his mouth. “Roman…”
“I don’t want to talk, Tink.” He bites my shoulder. “I don’t want to think.” He kisses the sting away. “I just want to fuck the woman I love.”
I swallow hard.
Because I don’t want to talk either, not properly.
“Okay,” I breathe.
He punches in, in one deep thrust, and we groan in unison as I feel the burn of his dick stretching me wide. My head tilts back, leaving my neck completely open, and Roman sucks so hard that my pussy ripples around him.
“Yes,” he hisses. “Clench on my dick, little one.”
He drives back into me. The force of his cock tears a broken sound from my throat as my body struggles to take all of him. My head falls back and my spine arches as he keeps moving, each thrust deeper and harder than the last.
“Fuck, Ro,” I moan before biting his shoulder.
“Don’t you fucking hide that noise,” he growls with another deep push, and my head falls back as I scream out in pleasure.
Roman moves one hand from my arse and squeezes my exposed neck.
My pussy clenches around him in response and he moans, long and drawn out, before bending down and biting my lip.
The lack of oxygen makes my head spin. I can feel every vein of his cock as it slides in and out of me with ease, mixing with my own desire.
My hands clutch at him and my nails dig in as he loses whatever control he had left.
The rhythm of his thrusts turns rough and relentless as he breathes into my mouth like he’s trying to replace grief with something he can actually feel.
My body answers him as my pussy gushes around him, pulling him deeper as if my own body knows it needs to be consumed by this rather than what we’ve lost.
“You’re going to cum for me, Tink,” he says, adding more pressure to my neck, and I try to nod but his large hand restricts the movement.
I can feel my lower body tightening as his pace falters.
He lets go of my neck and I breathe in greedy gulps of air as his hand drops down to my clit, making firm circles over my sensitive bud.
I explode at the sensation. My thighs clench him tighter as my head rolls and he cries out as I feel his cock send spurts of warm cum deep inside me.
I shiver as his forehead drops to mine. Our breaths mingle together in short, sharp pants as we try to come back down to reality.
“Tink…” My name leaves him, and it causes tears to spring to my eyes. I pull his head to my shoulder as I cling to him with his cock still buried deep inside me as we heave together. The only sound is the shower water hitting the floor.
“I’m here,” I breathe as my voice shakes.
He presses his face into my neck. His breathing becomes deeper and slower, and I feel the shift in him as the intensity fades away.
“Don’t let go,” he murmurs.
My grip tightens and I press my cheek against his temple as I close my eyes.
“I’m not,” I whisper.
And for the first time since the church, it almost feels true.