Chapter 24
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
The weekend came and went with little fanfare.
Rowan had ended up calling her sister—the surviving one, who she didn’t see nearly as often as she should—for lunch.
Maybe it was because the anniversary was coming up, or maybe it was just because Delilah had unlodged some memories, but when they met up, Rowan asked if her sister ever thought of Darcy anymore, if she ever thought of the day they’d found her—it had been almost twenty years ago since Darcy had bled out in Rowan’s arms.
“I mean, shit, Ro,” Em said, scrubbing her hands over her face.
“All the fucking time. I feel like…” She sighed, tears welling up in her eyes before she swallowed and blinked them away, shaking her head.
“Sometimes I feel like it was my fault, you know? Like I wasn’t there to protect her. Either of you.”
Rowan shrugged. “I never needed protection.”
Em huffed a laugh. “No, you didn’t, did you?” They were silent for a moment while Rowan tried to remember Darcy as she was in life and not only how she’d found her in death.
The spunky little kid who’d made it known as soon as she was old enough to have an opinion that she hated her name.
The kid who drew moths so obsessively. Rowan used to let Darcy use her as a canvas sometimes.
She’d break out her red and black sharpies, drawing them on Rowan’s arms, her shoulders, one time on her neck—that had made their mom yell at them.
“Reckon they’ll ever catch who did it?” Em asked after a long pause.
“I mean, Uncle Larry. Not Darcy.” They all knew who’d killed Darcy as soon as the autopsy report had come back and found Uncle Larry’s DNA all over their poor sister.
“Think it was that serial killer you were obsessed with for a while?”
Rowan’s gaze shot to her sister, frowning, but Em just laughed. “Come on, I remember you being glued to the TV when her trials aired. You cancelled plans to watch them. It was… Well, to be honest, it was a little disturbing.”
Rowan rolled her eyes. “No, it wasn’t her.”
“Why’re you so sure? Didn’t she mostly kill creeps and pedos? He fits the bill.”
“Strangulation isn’t her MO.”
Other than reminiscing with her sister, the weekend was boring.
Suspiciously so. Which meant, of course, that Rowan’s anxiety had peaked to new levels by the time she walked through the front doors of Raven Wood on Monday morning.
She hadn’t expected her palms to be so sweaty that the door handle slipped from her grip on the first try.
She hadn’t expected her heart to pound in her chest as she passed through the metal detectors.
It wasn’t like she’d done anything horrible. Wasn’t like she was hiding something or sneaking anything illicit in—not today at least.
But she couldn’t shake the impending feeling that something was wrong.
It was quiet. Too quiet. No one had attempted to contact her over the weekend.
Delilah hadn’t attempted to contact her.
Riley hadn’t texted her—not that Rowan expected it, but she was still on edge. She’d been expecting something.
An eeriness settled in the silence of the hallways, disrupted only by a tech shuffling quickly past with a simple nod in greeting. There was no panic in their movements, no chaos surrounding the lobby, no noise coming from the radio stationed at the currently unmanned front desk.
Rowan went straight to Delilah’s room. Not because she missed her, but because she knew Delilah hadn’t played the good girl this weekend. She knew it in her bones. She’d never trusted the quiet.
Rowan didn’t even bother ordering Delilah against the wall before she entered her room.
She didn’t announce herself at all, just slipped in and closed the door behind her.
When Delilah’s smile landed on her, she shivered as the cold look in Delilah’s eyes slid over her body.
The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end.
“Quiet this weekend,” Rowan observed, leaning back against the door and meeting Delilah’s stare.
Delilah sat up, raising an eyebrow. “Well,” she purred, “I’ve been on my best behavior.”
“Any unsanctioned trips I’m gonna learn about in an hour?” Rowan asked suspiciously. Delilah only smiled at her and shook her head. Rowan narrowed her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest. “Why have you been on your best behavior?”
Flinging her legs over the side, Delilah hopped lightly off the bed, sauntering over, entirely undeterred when instinct caused Rowan to finger her stun gun in preparation for an attack.
Delilah didn’t stop until she’d invaded Rowan’s space so thoroughly that there wasn’t an inch of separation between them.
Rowan swallowed, the atmosphere quickly heating up as Delilah covered Rowan’s hand with her own, stilling her fingers on the stun gun.
“Maybe,” she whispered, wafting that minty breath over Rowan’s cheek as she stared deep into her soul, “I wanted a reward. Is that why you came early? To give it to me?”
No, Rowan wanted to say, I came early because I don’t trust you. Because I know something’s wrong.
But she didn’t. She couldn’t. Delilah had stolen her senses as she always did when they touched.
Rowan’s thoughts, her words, her desires, they belonged to Delilah now.
Delilah trailed one hand down Rowan’s side, sliding it in between them and pressing into her crotch, smirking when she realized that Rowan didn’t have her strap this time.
“Maybe not a reward then,” she said, moving her hand up to wrap around the back of Rowan’s neck, pulling her closer. “So tell me. Why are you here?”
Rowan couldn’t breathe waiting in anticipation for Delilah’s next move, eyes darting down to her plump lips. It wasn’t until, with a jolt, she remembered the camera in this room was still on, watching them, that she forced out a reply.
“To let you know that you get another outing if you behave for Bronwin today.” Her voice was weak, catching in her throat as she watched Delilah’s tongue glide over her bottom lip.
Delilah chuckled softly. “So I’ve heard.” She cocked her head, studying Rowan and hooked her thumb under Rowan’s belt. “Anything else?”
“Get back on the bed,” Rowan ordered shakily, knowing that she needed to get the hell out of that room before she made a mistake. Even though what she was about to do was going to piss Delilah off. An angry Delilah was better than them getting caught.
Delilah looked up at her through thick lashes, enticingly seductive, and sauntered back to her bed, sitting on the edge and spreading her legs. Rowan slipped out of the room before Delilah could register what happened.
Her heart raced as she walked as calmly as she could to the camera room, praying that whoever was on duty hadn’t been watching them.
She relieved Jenkins for her standard shift, her hands twitching as he gave her his report.
Nothing unusual. She let out a sigh of relief after he left, closing and locking the door before sinking into the shitty chair in front of the cameras.
The first view she pulled up was Delilah’s room. Rowan imagined that she’d find the woman glaring into the camera, something to make it obvious that she didn’t appreciate Rowan’s cowardice. She was mentally preparing ahead of time for Delilah to be difficult when Rowan collected her for therapy.
But of course, Delilah was not one to do as expected.
Instead of the anticipated anger, Delilah was giving Rowan a taste of what she desperately wanted again.
A flashback to the first time she’d tried to tempt her on camera.
Except this time she wasn’t naked. On second thought, maybe she was punishing her.
Touching herself, fully clothed, letting Rowan see only the faintest hint of movement in her pants.
Embarrassingly, it was still enough to get Rowan bothered. Enough to make her boxers wet and desire heightened.
This is fucking pathetic. Rowan almost angrily shoved her hand down her own pants. The way Delilah already had her wrapped up tight should have been a clear warning sign. Rowan could hardly look at the woman without needing something to relieve the pressure in her core.
To make it all worse, this time she didn’t have to rely on her imagination of what Delilah might sound like. This time, she had memories of her sound, her smell, her taste. Rowan bit her lip, letting her eyes fall closed as they surrounded her.
Until the door handle jiggled and abruptly ripped her fantasy away. She hastily tore away from herself, wiping her hand on her pants while she scrambled to switch the main camera over to focus on the lobby instead—making sure Delilah was nowhere on screen.
“Yo, boss. You in there?” A knock followed the words, and she took a deep breath, her heart pounding as she leaned back to unlock and open the door.
“Everything good?” she asked, immediately turning back to face the cameras so Jenkins didn’t see the flush covering her cheeks.
“Yeah,” he said, peering around her at the screens. “Ah, there it is.” He reached beside her, grabbing a phone that had been shoved into the corner, partially obscured by the large monitor on the left. He waved it at her with a chagrined smile. “Sorry ‘bout that,” he said before turning to leave.
Rowan didn’t say a word, letting out a sigh of relief as the door shut behind him.
There was a strict no personal cell phone policy that she implemented with her guards, but that was the furthest thing from her mind as she tried to remember if she’d been making any noises while she fucked herself to Delilah. Again.