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“I feel safe when I’m here,” she whispers, the rough words drawing me back to the present. Her eyes never leave mine, like a tight cord of tension readying to snap, my spine straightens, my breath held, waiting, “With you.”
It’s as though something inside of me implodes and then explodes, little, itty bitty, gory pieces of me splattering all across the room. I sit so still I’m not sure I’m even breathing as I hold her gaze, wanting to hold her face in my hands, cover her mouth with my own, use my knife on her inner thighs, slice down her shins, curl my blade around her ankle bone.
Her chest inflates, not going back down, the tight ribbed, black fabric of her floor length dress clinging to her tits. I lick my lips, staring at her. Her cheeks are red, her throat, and I’m sure the color spreads further, down beneath the high neckline of her dress. I want to uncover it, feast on it, sink my teeth into her, take her collarbone between my canines and suck at her skin.
I suck in a breath through my teeth, cold air fills the office like a window is thrown open at my back, a chill of ice racing up my spine.
“Poppy,” I say lowly, watching her watch me.
This is the first time she’s really said anything about me, and it’s already fucking with my head.
Lynx keeps calling her a whore, it’s all I hear, the words wreaking havoc inside my skull, rattling around, picking away ateach lobe of my brain, day in, day out. Poppy’s only a whore in his eyes because he treated her like one, and it makes me want to shove my fist through my best friend’s face.
Why couldn’t I have found her first? Why did it have to be them? I wouldn’t have let Bennett take her away from me. I could have done something else, hidden her from him. From them. She could have been my little secret.
Perhaps she still can.
I’m standing from the chair, rounding my desk, perching on the lip of the wood. Hands sliding down my thighs, resting on my knees. I lean in towards her, her own upper body moving in to meet mine, our chests almost brushing as she looks up at me, wide eyes, parted lips.
There is silence between us, and it’s anything but uncomfortable.
“Tell me about your father, Poppy,” I say quietly, needing to dig, needing to gather something on the man we’re set to ruin her for, she has to give me something.
“I don’t want to talk about him,” she informs me quietly, but I don’t have time for this.
“I do.”
She gasps a little at my firm tone, the way I broker no argument, her eyes widening just a fraction as she tilts her chin up towards me.
“We aren’t close,” she half shrugs, lifting one shoulder, letting it drop heavily.
Our lips are so close I could devour her whole in less than point-two of a second, but I don’t, holding her gaze.
“Why not?”
She squirms, dropping her gaze to her lap, her fingernails clawing at the thin skin of her inner wrists.
“Is it because he wanted a son?” I ask her, lots of rich men are only interested in a male heir, daughters are redundant spawn.
“What? No… I don’t think so, he- I don’t think he cares about stuff like that,” she shakes her head, frowning down at her hands.
“He didn’t want kids? Your mother was his mistress? You were a mistake?” I’m rapid firing questions here when I know I shouldn’t be, desperation gripping my neck like a hand to the throat. “Is it because you went a little mad?”
She sucks in a sharp breath, her eyes finally snapping up to meet mine, shining and red, and not from the drugs she so often loves to take.
“Briarmoor, correct?”I know it is, don’t lie to me, baby girl.
“How do you know about that?” she whispers, shame filling her eyes as quickly as the tears.
“I know a lot about you, Poppy. Even the stuff you tried to hide.” I let that register before I confess, “I can find out most things about a person if I really want to.”
Poppy says nothing, the air thick with tension, unease, her eyes flicker quickly between my own.
“But what I can’t understand, Angel, is, why you were sent there in the first place, why not just rehab?” she flinches, but I keep talking, low and deep, slow, making sure my words penetrate. “You and I both know you’ve got more than a small problem with pills, Poppy, so why didn’t he send you to rehab? Why didn’t he get you help there? Why a high security psychiatric hospital?” Poppy eyes me, tears gathering heavier at her lash line, I lean closer, “What did you do, Angel?” I whisper over her mouth, sharing breath.
She swallows, her gaze never leaving mine, “I attacked a girl at my school,” she breathes as though she were unprepared for the secret to spill out of her so easily, her lips brushing mine with every semi-relieved word. “She set me up, got a-” she glances away, pulling in a shuddery breath, her gaze reconnecting with mine, and I feel excitement bolt up my spine. “She got a guyto trick me into thinking he liked me, and after he took my virginity, he laughed in my face, told me it was all for some bet with this girl. So I found her, and hit her and hit her and I didn’t stop, until the guy came and pulled me off of her,protecting her,and then I hit him too,” she whispers the final words, shame swallowing her whole. She looks at me, unblinking, “And I didn’t want to stop,” she confesses, “I wish I hadn’t,” she shivers. “That’s why he sent me there.” She swallows, “I hate them all.” Her last words are said with such bitterness that even I tremble. “So, that’s why I don’t want to talk about myfather, there’s nothing else to say.”
I lick my lips as she looks away, turning her head to the side. I reach up, fingers splaying over her cheek, thumb pressing to her bottom lip, I turn her back to face me. Dropping my forehead against hers, breathing her in. Her breaths are heavy, her chest heaving, but she doesn’t pull away from me, doesn’t shrink back like she has so many times before.
