Page 94 of Penance

“We did a walking safari. The sun was so, so hot, you’d have hated it,” he tells me, and I laugh knowing he’s absolutely right. I’m not good in the heat. “Nox got chased by a Bushpig and ended up in a tree. Kacey laughed so hard he nearly cried, we had two weeks of our trip left and Nox just refused to leave the house for anything but the safety of a vehicle and a trip back to the airport after that.”

He chuckles wickedly and I feel my lips pull into a wide grin.

“Max is a pussy,” I rasp, making him laugh harder.

“He is, Darlin’, he is,” he hums.

We fall into comfortable silence, his hand in mine, skin like the finest silk. My eyes slip closed, a smile on my lips, until he speaks again.

“Can I tell you somethin’, Darlin’?” he asks me softly, his voice unsteady.

I crack my eyes open, my head resting on the pillow. I nod at him sleepily.

“Anything.”

He swallows, his dark eyes dropping to our joint hands. His thumb tracing soothing circles over my knuckles. His dark curls wild and untamed. His thick lashes brushing his cheekbones, he looks up at me. Something uncertain in his eyes. I swallow the pain in my chest, something about the look in his eyes making my heart constrict.

“When I was young, my mum and dad worked a lot. Ya know, Mum’s a politician, Dad’s her bitch,” he shrugs casually. “I had nannies,” he swallows, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. “When I got Phoebe. She was young, only fifteen years older than me. She was fun and smart, always helping me with my schoolwork and projects,” he laughs awkwardly. His eyes glassy, something akin to sadness in his onyx gaze.

“I was thirteen, all my friends would comment on how she was a MILF, and I should screw the help. Ribbing me, teasing me, always asking me if I was fucking her,” he shakes his head. “Typical pubescent teenage boy bullshit, ya know, the peer pressure was real. I was in a private school full of rich white boys, all these blue eyes and blonde-haired heirs to their families’ thrones. And I was just trying to fit in. I just wanted to be cool.” Huxley sucks in a shuddery breath, one that makes even my lungs ache, he drops his gaze.

“So, one day when I went home from school. Some dick in my class had stuck gum in the back of my hair, and I knew it’d have to be cut out, and I was just miserable. Phoebe and I were home alone, much like every day, and I told her about the shit that was happening at school. Not the comments about her, just the bullying stuff, and it wasn’t really bullying. I think, maybe I was soft. I dunno. Anyway, she put an arm around me, pulled me into her side and told me to ignore them. She managed to get the glob of gum out of my hair with ice and a fine comb, she just made me feel better, ya know.”

His eyes draw back up to mine and I nod, unsure where exactly this is going.

“That night we ate dinner together at the kitchen counter, like we always did. I was telling her a story about something I’d read in a magazine, wondering what she thought about it, and her hand-” he pauses, taking a deep breath, tears spring to my eyes.

“Huxley-”

“No, let me, I’m okay,” he promises, his eyes glistening. “She put her hand on my thigh, high up. Her little finger was near me, and I froze, I just froze, and I let her, and I didn’t hate it. So I just fuckinglether,” he shakes his head, grinding his teeth. “And that just escalated, every week something more, something new. I turned fourteen and she said I was a man now,” he laughs bitterly, the sound grating. “It was time for us to make our relationship real, and I was so scared, but I didn’t want to let her down. She kept telling me how much of a man I was and how good I felt. After that night she convinced me we were in a relationship, but that we had to keep it a secret or she’d be made to leave and by this point I just wanted her. I didn’t have anybody else, and she was mine. And even if no one else knew, I knew how cool I was. How grown up and how much of a man I really was. It gave me the confidence to tell everyone else to go fuck themselves.”

He looks at me then, his dark eyes filled with shame, a tear slides down my cheek, a matching one on his.

“I never told anyone. She left when I was almost sixteen. I never saw her again, but the things she’d made me do by then, it was just, I dunno. I thought it was okay. Then I thought even if it wasn’t, it was my fault anyway, it was me who let her. I asked for it, Ienjoyedit. Do you think I’m- do you find me-”

“Huxley,” I whisper.

Cutting him off, he swallows hard. My fingers squeezing his, my stomach churning.

“She raped you, baby. It wasn’t you, it wasn’t your fault. You were achild.” I blink back tears as he just stares at me, so vulnerable and unsure, he bites into his lip. “You didn’t know, baby.”

I shuffle over to the left, my arm in a stupid box, propped on a pillow. I shove it all out the way.

“Come up here with me, Hux,” I say quietly, his dark gaze boring into mine. “Please.”

He shifts from the chair, collapsing the bed bar down, he climbs up beside me. Curling up under my arm, his face buried in my neck.

“I love you more than anything, Huxley. You are the bravest, most fearless, loving, caring, amazing man I know,” I tell him honestly. Even as tears sluice down his face, he’s beautiful. “I don’t know where I would be if I didn’t have you by my side, protecting me and loving me. You do it so, so well. Let me take care of you now,” I whisper against the top of his head, his tears soaking through my thin gown.

I run my fingers through his soft curls, lightly massaging his scalp with my fingertips. I press my lips to his head, over and over until I feel him finally go still, his breathing heavy. I let my eyes fall closed, succumbing to the darkness. I let it drag me under.

* * *

A clicking noise in my ear pulls me from my slumber, my eyes heavy. I try to blink through the fuzziness inside my head. The brass band from earlier are at it again, only this time they’re all out of tune and extra loud. I groan, bringing the heel of my hand to my forehead, pressing against it as if that’ll make the pain vanish.

“Get up,” an unfamiliar voice barks.

My eyes snap open instantly, my vision blurred, my head spinning as I shoot upright.

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