Forbidden: A Standalone (7 page)

Thinking of him in my Westonwood bed, my clit felt like a hot, throbbing marble. I crossed my legs under the covers, listening to the rain in the palm trees outside. I played the memory over again and again. The pain all over my body, the sweat in the wounds as I danced at Dabney’s with who-even-knows. Earl’s fingers digging in them as he fucked me from behind. I took his friend Tammy’s pussy in my mouth, the sting of flake hot on my tongue. I knew he’d punish me when he got back.

When Master Deacon came home three days later, the beating had been relentless, and joyful in its way. He’d tugged and twisted on my nipple rings until I came, then made me come again and again. It was the beginning, and a game. Our hearts hadn’t dropped out of us yet.

Yet.

I pressed my thighs together, rotating my hips slightly. It would take forever to come, but I wasn’t going anywhere. My lips parted, and heat washed over my hips, my heart beat between my legs, and I felt that relief, that joy, that release.

L
unch.

I felt as though I was being fattened for the Easter feast. It was Asian today. Dumpling soup, fried rice, Korean beef, some lightly sautéed green leafy vegetable with a name I couldn’t recall.

“It’s low-sodium soy sauce,” said Karen from the seat across from me. She’d had her face buried in her journal while her soup got cold. “I guess they figure you’re on so many meds the sodium might spike your pressure?” She dumped a stream of soy sauce on her fried rice. Her hair was twisted up in a quick knot, and her swan-length neck had a fresh hickey blossoming on its base.

“You wanna cover up the suck stain?” I touched my neck.

She looked shocked then tried to look at her own neck, as if that was possible.

“There’s a mirror right over there,” I suggested.

“No, I got it.” She took her hair down.

Seeing her hair against her face and her forearms up, I realized how thin she was. Jesus, I must have been stoned on scrips yesterday. She fiddled with her fork and glanced at Mark, the orderly who moonlit as a nose-ring-wearing punk. I noticed from that he had a tattoo creeping onto his neck from under his collar. He looked at her and spun his finger as if telling her to get to it. She picked up her fork. I knew from the way she handled it that no food was landing in her mouth. I’d seen that particular twirl before.

“I’m sorry I didn’t make Amanda’s funeral,” she said. “There was so much going on. My sister was there. Tanya. She went. Said it rained. Like a movie.” She rolled her eyes.

“It’s all right. Nothing really happened. You know. Closed casket from the accident. She didn’t zombie.” I raised my arm and curled it at the wrist, making an ugly zombie face, because what better way to pretend I didn’t give a shit?

“I heard about the party after,” Karen said.

“Yeah.” I cleared my throat. “Wow. Days. It was the best sendoff I could have given her.” I felt bad scooping food into my face in front of someone who was obviously anorexic, but I was hungry. “We had a line of limos up the hill. Man, there was so much flake.”

I stopped chewing and pushed my tray away. The flake had been the problem. At that point, Deacon didn’t care that I’d had multiple partners. He cared that he didn’t know them. He cared that there had been drugs on Maundy Street, where he wanted things quiet and unimpeachable, and he cared that I’d taken them. He wouldn’t knot me until it was out of my system and then some. That week had been torture. Amanda’s death had weighed on me fully, and Deacon withheld every coping mechanism I had.

“I spent a week in the corner drooling after that,” I said as if it was a joke.

But it hadn’t been. I’d felt like the bottom was going to fall out of me until Deacon picked me up and knotted me from the ceiling. Things had changed after Amanda died. It was as if we needed each other, he and I. As if it pained him to see me take such poor care of myself. It wasn’t too long after that we decided to own each other.

“Hey,” Warren said, sitting across from me. “Rain just stopped. Creek’s flooding up to the bench.”

“There’s a creek?”

Warren and Karen glanced at each other.

She pushed her tray forward and shot a look at Mark before standing. “Let’s give Fiona a tour. Our tour.”

Warren looked me up and down, as if seeing my body through the light blue cotton uniform. “Can I trust you?”

“You can take your tour and stick it.”

“You want this tour,” Karen said. “It’s worth it. Almost as good as freedom.”

“I don’t need to prove I’m trustworthy. I ate you out in Ojai, and you”—I turned to Warren—“licked flake off my tits. That was my coke, and you never gave me shit in return but numb nipples.”

“Point taken,” Warren said as he guided me out the door.

The outside had been designed, manicured, and planted to the teeth. The verdant garden was dotted with wood benches—places to reflect on your mental sickness, eat yourself with regret, and chew on your shortcomings. Jack crouched over a bed of wildflowers, rubbing the yellow petals.

“Hey, Jack,” Warren said as he slapped the not totally unfuckable nerd so hard on the ass he nearly fell over.

“Ow!”

“Not cool, Warren,” I said, helping Jack up. “You all right?”

“I’m fine.” He glared at Warren.

I brushed Jack’s shoulders even though there was nothing there.

“Sorry, man.” Warren made a fist as if to punch Jack in the arm.

Jack flinched. I liked Warren less and less with each passing second.

“We’re checking out the holes. You coming?” Warren asked.

“Nah. I’m good.”

“Can we go?” Karen asked, walking backward toward the gardens. “I have a session in fifteen minutes.” She indicated the clock on the highest part of the common building.

Our personal effects had been taken, including watches. The clocks dotting the facility were the only way we had to keep time.

“Me too,” I said.

Warren jogged ahead of us and spread his arms. He looked handsome in the deep foliage, like a Greek god of abundance. “There are cameras everywhere.” He pointed upward.

I didn’t look directly, but with a sidelong glance, I saw the shiny glass at the crook of a tree branch.

“But there are some corners they don’t get to. Holes in their vision matrix.” Even in his silly mental ward uniform, Warren carried himself as if he was entitled to the known universe. He stood with his back to an old oak. “Like here. Hole. Right here. They might find you if they’re walking around, but the cameras can’t see shit until they prune this shit back. Follow me.” Like the docent of sneaky spaces, he pointed out three more places where a patient couldn’t be seen by the cameras.

“But they know where the holes are, too,” Karen interjected. “If they see you go out of range, and don’t see you come out, they come and check.”

“If they’re paying attention,” Warren said. “Which is a crap shoot. Let’s go to the creek.”

We walked down a winding path. I heard cars speeding somewhere past a hedge, but it didn’t sound like a major road. The sound of moving water added to the white noise, and past a line of trees, we came to a swelling creek. A chain-link fence separated us from it.

“Is that PCH?” I asked, referring to the water. I followed them along the fence to a hole cut into it.

“Not even close.” Warren pulled the cut fence open. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

We crept through. Karen put her journal on a fallen tree trunk and kicked off her shoes. She rolled up her pants.

“Go on, sweetheart,” Warren said as Karen stepped into the water. “I’m sitting this out.”

“Why?” I followed Karen’s lead, rolling up my pants.

“The thing with my kid brother.”

“What thing?” I put my toe in. The water was ice cold, even in the sun, and the bed was made up of small, rounded rocks.

“I waterboarded him.” He said it as if he’d helped the kid color or taught him how to play a video game. “They catch me in water, and my dad’s gonna kill me.”

“If it’s morning, they can’t see much once you’re in the water. The lenses get condensation on them, and the cameras get wet. If it’s just rained, the leaves are heavy and block the cameras.” Karen held her hands out and put her face to the sky. “I love the holes.”

“If you’re ever looking for Karen,” Warren called from the edge, “check the holes.”

There was something freeing about not being seen by the hospital staff, but with Warren’s eyes on me, I didn’t feel safe.

“What are you looking at?” I said.

“You got Chapman?”

“Yeah.”

Warren craned his neck to see the clock at the top of the common building. “Next set of sessions starts in five.”

Fuck.
I hopped out of the water and got my cold feet back into my shoes.

“You know how to get back?” Karen shouted, but I was already past the chain link.

D
octor Chapman looked tired as he closed the blinds against the sun.

“Why did you stop me last time?” My feet ached from the cold water, and I was trying to hide that I was winded from the run over. “There was a good part coming up.”

“The session was over.” He glanced out the window and back at me so quickly, I might have missed it if the Adderall hadn’t made me hyper vigilant.

“Really?”

“Why do you ask?”

“Because we had five minutes of small talk after that. So, you know, I kind of left thinking about what happened after. In Deacon’s car.”

“You can tell me.” He rubbed his upper lip again.

I saw his watch peek past his cuff, hanging on his wrist. He had nice wrists, angled and wide. Masculine. I narrowed my eyes, willing his cuff back so I could see more.

“I don’t want to tell you now. Your loss,” I said.

“Your parents came to visit last night. How did that go?”

I shrugged.

“Your father’s an interesting guy.”

“How so?”

“He married your mother quite young.”

I sat ramrod straight, and I felt my hand want to go up, as if fending him off. That was sacred territory. He could psychoanalyze me all he wanted, but my family was off limits. “They’re still married eight children later. I don’t see the problem.”

He said nothing. As much as I wanted to scrape his pretty little face off for it, I wanted to prove myself even more.

“You going to hypnotize me again?” I asked.

“If you found it helpful last time.”

“You ever going to take a stand on something you want, Doctor?”

He stood. “Not in this room, no. In this room, you’re the boss.”

Well, if that was how it was going to be, I would take it. I could be the boss of this tiny, half-lit room. I threw myself on the couch. Elliot followed and sat behind me. I heard the rustle of him crossing his legs.

“Counting backward from five,” he said.

“Okay.”

“Five.”

***

His car is huge, and he smells like peppermint. He doesn’t say anything, and my chest winds up with tension. Is this a mistake? He doesn’t look like a serial killer, but maybe he’s not interested in me. Earl is a good enough fuck in a pinch; that would be better than nothing.

“Got a name?” I ask, trying to get my shirt buttoned.

“Yes.”

“My name’s Fiona.”

“I figured that out.” He turns his head a little. “I’m Deacon.” His eyes drift down to my exposed tits then back to the road.

“Should I bother buttoning up?”

“Yes.”

I shake as I finger the buttons. That wasn’t the answer I expected, and I’m suddenly ashamed. But when he flattens his hand on the wheel and turns it with pressure on the heel, my nipples harden through the white shirt, and the rings piercing them stretch the fabric.

“So,” I say, “where we going?”

“Away from a crowd of paparazzi.” He stops at a light and turns toward me. “How do you live like that? All these people around all the time?”

I shrug. “At first, I got upset when they misunderstood something or printed me kissing a Brent Ogilve when I was dating Gerald. That sucked. But then, Gerald was kind of a dick, so they did me a favor.”

I don’t want to talk about paparazzi. I want this guy. I put my hand on his thigh and slide it between his legs. He’s all muscle. He puts his hand on mine and moves it back to my lap.

“Are you gay?” I ask.

“No.”

“Look, if you don’t want to do it, that’s fine. Just drop me off.”

“Take it easy,” he says, squeezing my hand before he lets it go.

But I’m uncomfortable, unhappy. The car feels too small, and this man expands like a balloon, as if his psychic space crowds me. Suddenly, I don’t want to have sex at all. Not with him, not with anyone. I just want to feel like I have everything under control again.

I open the door enough for the hood light to go on. We’re not going fast, and I know he’ll slow down. But he doesn’t. He stretches over me and pulls the seat belt across my body. His peppermint smell is layered with sandalwood, and I want to fall inside it at the same time as I want out of this fucking car.

Snap.
He clicks the belt. “You’re in the arts district. It’s late, and everyone’s drunk. There’s no need to take unnecessary risks.”

I’m pissed. Really pissed. Because he’s right.

I look at him as he drives a few blocks. I hate him, and I’m attracted to him, and in my rage, I want to fuck again. I feel the swell between my legs as I remember shit I’m trying to forget—that windshield kiss, and me in the passenger seat inches from a dead girl’s pussy, and it smells like sex.

I’m not thinking about that.

I am
not
thinking about that.

Fiona, do you want to stop? You’re crying.

I say something. Something about Pinkerton never failing when Amanda drove. And no, I don’t want to fucking stop. I want to remember Deacon with this level of clarity and beauty. Something about the way he smells and the texture of his jacket in the lamplight. Something about his hands. The way they’re completely still when he isn’t using them. I’d forgotten that.

I feel Elliot’s fingers on my wrist and hear the soft curtain of his voice.

All right. You’re mixing things up. Amanda Westin died after you met Deacon. You don’t have to think about the accident if you don’t want to. You’re in control.