Page 6 of Tainted Saints

Fucking hell.

“Good?” I rasp out, and her eyes snap open, her jaw working as she chews, waiting until she’s finished before she speaks. A proper lady then.

“Oh my god, Blaine. This is amazing,” she gushes, and the words go straight to my dick, which starts to harden in my scruffy jeans. I desperately try to think of old Mrs. Nichols who used to live two doors down from us and would eye us like a snack anytime we passed. “I can’t remember the last time I ate bread, and the chicken and bacon? I will definitely need to see where she got this from and come back.”

“Diana’s, it’s across the street and you won’t find a better sandwich in Fairview,” I tell her, my own half forgotten as I watch her take another bite and her eyes practically roll again. It’s going to be a long night if she keeps that up.

I watch her eat every last bite, ignoring my own in favour of observing my golden princesa. Coño, she's beautiful. Eventually, she sighs, her eyes catching my stare, and another blush colouring her cheeks.

“Better?” I ask, that note of teasing back in my tone. She gives me a wide grin, and once again, the cells fill with a light and warmth that I’ve not known in a long time.

“So much better,” she answers, then she looks down at my hand, her brows dipping. “Are you not hungry? Did you have dinner before you…arrived?” she winces at the last word, and a bark of laughter escapes my throat.

“Nice way to put being locked up in here,princesa,” I tease, and her cheeks turn a deeper colour, my face softening. “I’m only teasing, and no, I didn’t eat before I was arrested.”

Anger flares hot and bright inside me when I recall what led to my incarceration. Finding that scum trying to force a woman to her knees. She may be a sex worker, but no one should be made to do something they clearly don’t want to.

“W–what happened?” she asks, stepping closer, and I look to see the paper bag on the floor and the cup in her hand. She’s taken the lid off, and hot steam floats around her face, making her seem almost otherworldly in her beauty. “Oh, I’m sorry, that was rude. You don’t have to answer.” She looks down away from me, not meeting my eyes.

Her lip disappears under her teeth again, the skin cracking while a bead of crimson wells up from the broken skin. Without conscious thought, my free hand reaches through the bars and my thumb tugs her lip free, swiping across the blood, that mesmerising gaze snapping back to me. She doesn’t say anything, doesn’t pull away. Just watches as I bring my thumb up to my mouth and slip it inside, the tangy copper making my jaw ache as if I want more of her. A shiver runs through her, and the idea that she’s not disgusted with what I’ve just done, with the dark desires I might have, makes my dick strain against my pants.

“I caught a pimp trying to force a prostitute to her knees when she was begging him to stop.” She’s unblinking as she focuses her attention entirely on me, and damn if it isn’t like looking into the rays of the sun. Warm yet blinding and almost too much. “So I beat the shit out of him to teach him a lesson about consent.”

She goes to suck in her lip again, stops halfway, and then releases it.Good girl.

“I think that’s very gallant of you,” she breathes out, her pupils large and a soft expression on her face that I don’t often see directed at me. Correction, that Ineversee directed at me. “To defend someone who is unable to help themselves. You shouldn’t be punished for it.”

I chuckle darkly. “I’m no white knight,mi princesa linda,” I tell her, self-deprecation coating my tongue with bitterness. I wasn’t able to save the one person who needed it the most, and no matter how many I try to help now, it doesn’t change that fact. My uneaten sandwich lies forgotten as I stare at it, my eyes seeing only the lifeless body of my mother before me.

“Maybe not, perhaps a black knight of mediaeval legend then,” she suggests, and blinking out of the nightmarish memory, I raise a brow at her, asking without words what she means. “It is believed that there were knights who dressed in black armour that would save cities from unjust rulers and do many good deeds, but the church banned such legends from being spoken of, and any texts that made reference to them were censored. Perhaps you are one of those knights then.”

This woman. My body tingles as if I’ve been seen for the first time in my life. As if my soul has just been laid bare for all to gaze on and a part of me doesn’t mind, couldn’t give a fuck that she is the one to have stripped me.

ChapterThree

“Desert Rose” by Lolo Zouaï

ASPEN

Blaine looksat me with eyes that are bright and a little glossy, like chocolate that is being tempered on marble. I wonder if anyone has ever truly appreciated this giant of a man, and he is huge, towering over me. I have to crane my neck back just to maintain eye contact. His shoulders are so broad, twice the width of me, and he has powerful arms covered in tattoos that disappear under his fitted, black T-shirt which creeps up to the edge of his strong jawline.

As I shift, his scent wafts up from the leather jacket that he lent me, and it takes all of my self-control not to snuggle into it, breathing in the heady scents of ambrox, rum, and tonka bean. It’s sweet, woody, and musky, addicting and comforting, and I know that it will forever remind me of Blaine Garcia.

“Why were you bought in?” he asks out of the blue, and I feel all the colour drain from my face. Though, fair is fair, and all of a sudden, I can’t wait to get this burden off my chest. For one person to know my dark secret.

I take a deep, shuddering inhale. “I stole some things from the mall.” I watch for his reaction, but he doesn't even raise a single brow, just waits for me to continue. “I–I get the urge to take things, and it’s like I can’t control myself. Like, if I don’t steal, I will cease to function. Do you ever feel that way? Like your body is totally beyond your control?” He gives me a slow nod, and something loosens inside me, something that makes me feel that I’m not quite as alone as I was before. “The Ambassador told me this morning that I would be dating a guy I’ve never met, but who goes to my new school, all because his family comes from good stock.” My tone is bitter, and my eyes dart to Blaine when a small growl rumbles in his chest. At least, I think that’s what I heard. “Anyway, it sent me into a spiral. I've been so good lately and have managed to avoid any situations where I might be tempted. And things have been easier at home.” I’ve no idea why I’m telling him this, he’s a complete stranger, but I can’t seem to stop now that I’ve started. “But today it was like I was possessed. It was the only thing my mind could focus on, nothing else existed. Before I really knew what was happening, I got our driver to take me to the mall…oh god, Bobby!” My hand flies to my mouth. Poor Bobby might still be waiting for me, having no idea what’s happened. I made him wait in the car, even though he wanted to come in with me as I’d refused to bring security, but I couldn’t have anyone there to witness my shame. Joke’s on me I guess.

“And you got caught,” Blaine adds, and the sandwich is gone, presumably he ate it while I was talking.

“And I got caught,” I confirm softly, hanging my head as tears fill my eyes. Fingers brush down the side of my cheek before a strong thumb and forefinger grips my chin and lifts it up. Then his warm eyes fill my vision, wavering a little as the tears blur my vision.

“You don’t need to be ashamed of the things you can’t control,mi princesa linda,” he tells me gently, his voice like a soothing balm over wounds that are festering and won’t stop bleeding. “Has it been a problem for you for a while?”

“Yes,” I confess, staring into his eyes as if they will save me. “Even when I was a young teenager, I had urges to steal. It started with taking things from my mother and then things from shops in London. I never keep the stuff, usually giving it away to homeless people or charity shops, but I wish I knew how to make the urges stop.”

I’m not stupid, I was able to self-diagnose my anxiety and this is no different. Kleptomania. The urge to steal like it’s a compulsion. The way I feel a heady rush of pleasure after I’ve taken something, followed by intense guilt and shame. It’s never anything of great value, never pre-planned and I can go for months without taking something. Again, another useless diagnosis, because what’s the point in knowing if I can’t get the help I need to sort the problem? “We mustn’t have anything less than perfection in the Buckingham household.” My mother’s words, again, come to haunt me.

“Have you told anyone about the urges?” he asks gently, his thumb stroking my chin in soothing circles, calming my frantic heartbeat and relaxing my tight muscles. My mind tells me that I shouldn’t be okay with him touching me this way, that he’s a practical stranger, but the tension leaves my body all the same and I don’t stop him.

---