Page 11 of Isle of Pain

She turns and startles when she sees me, a hand going to her chest, the other clutching the glass.

“Gosh, you scared me. What are you doing here?”

I shrug.

Truthfully, I don’t know.

Marie shuffles from one foot to the other, biting her plush bottom lip. Her eyes are everywhere but on me. I want them on me.

“Care to share?” I signal to her glass with my chin.

She turns her back to me and takes another crystal glass, pouring a generous amount of Scotch before she hands it over to me.

Her lips wrap around her glass and she swallows the amber liquid, drinking half the glass in one gulp. Her deep green eyes remind me of the forest behind my house.

I’ve had enough alcohol for the night but I want to prolong this peaceful moment with her. Away from the loud crowd that is her family, she led me to a place of respite and quiet, even without knowing it, and I appreciate the silence between us.

I allow my eyes to drop down her body leisurely. We’re so close I can see the goosebumps rising on her flawless olive skin. It’s all mesmerising. Her heart beats a wild rhythm at her neck. “Why are you nervous?” I ask, genuinely curious.

She swallows thickly and I can almost hear the sound of her throat working over her dry mouth.

“I don’t know you. I'm not in the habit of being alone with strangers,” she offers.

Her honesty satisfies me. It’s hard to find real answers in people. Most want to portray themselves the best way to get you to give them what they want. She just answered truthfully because I asked. That’s precious.

I take a step back to let her breathe, then sit on the sofa, watching her intently as she towers over me from my new position. She’s even more perfect from this new vantage point.

Her shoulders immediately drop and her eyes darken. Since social cues can be hard for me, I’ve made it my mission to study body language and become a master at it. Marie likes this new situation where she’s the one on top.

For someone who’s had a whole bottle of wine and is drinking whiskey right after, she seems in full possession of her mind. She approaches me slowly, as though I’m the wild creature and she the one who’s trying to domesticate it. Maybe that’s true enough.

Her head tilts to the side and she regards me behind lowered thick lashes. Her tongue picks through her lips to wet them. All I can do is follow the sight.

She lifts a hand, tentatively bringing it to my face and I tense, but she doesn’t touch me. At least not at first.

Like controlled by a puppeteer, she slowly traces the contours of my face, a breath away from my skin. It sets me alight, but contrary to all the times before, it’s a warm fire, a good fire that smells like whiskey and something deeply feminine, like peaches. It makes me want to inhale deeply but I hold my breath, waiting for Marie to decide what she’ll do next.

I have enough time to back out, yet I don’t. Her thumb lightly presses on the ring on the middle of my lower lip, flipping it gently side to side. A shiver rakes down my spine. She’s still towering over me, standing in between my spread thighs, ready to take away her warmth when she decides, leaving me to patiently await a sign or a command. It’s exhilarating and she has no idea. Her eyes shine under the low light of the room, her skin flushed with the alcohol.

She swallows thickly but doesn’t remove her hand.

I do something I’ve never dreamt of doing before. I press my tongue piercing against her thumb and guide it inside my mouth.

Her sharp intake of breath makes me want to groan but I hold it in, eyes riveted to where hers devour the sight of my mouth parting open for her.

With a tremble, she glides her thumb deeper into my mouth, feeling the metal under the digit.

I close my lips around her finger and suck. Marie’s lips part on a gasp but she doesn’t move. I don’t want her too. Her eyes finally meet mine, confusion reflected at me in the dark green depths.

I grip my own thighs tightly with one hand and the whiskey glass with the other. I can’t touch her. But how I wish I could. I’d lazily discover if her skin is as soft as it looks, if a particular spot makes her heart thump harder at her pulse point. I’d be bold and use my mouth, my tongue. I’d spend days mapping out all the ridges and hills of her luscious curves. I’d?—

A glass shatters in the background, followed by both applause and reprimands from the matriarch to whoever was clumsy enough to break the crystal and Marie jumps back.

“I’m… I’m sorry.” She stumbles over her words before she turns on her heels and disappears into the corridors without another word, abandoning her glass on the coffee table.

My fingers flex against my glass, the tattooed letters forming the word ‘death’ on each of them shifting, knuckles white with the exertion and control not to break it. I shake my head to dispel the strange event and discard the whiskey, abandoning it next to hers.

Before I can walk and make it over the threshold of the library, I turn around and pick up her half-drunk glass, downing the liquid, my lips lining over the stain of her maroon lipstick.

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