Page 22 of Liar's Heart
But we also talk. A lot. Casually, comfortably. Words flowfreely between us as we slake our curiosity for each other, both inside and out.
Tucked into my side, Merrick is lazily tracing the sphinx tattoo opposite the one her cheek is resting on. I gently stroke her hair while I bask in the comfort of her casual touch. Merrick doesn’t lift her head or slow her fingers when she says, “Tell me about your tattoos.”
I don’t open my eyes from where they’ve drifted closed. “What do you want to know?” The peace we've found today might break, depending on her answer, and I'm trying to hold onto it for as long as I can.
I feel her shoulder shrug a little under the arm I have draped around her. “When you got them. What they mean to you. You know, those kinds of things.”
I hum, enjoying the way her weight on my chest changes and how it reverberates through me. “Okay. Which one?”
She scoffs. “All of them.”
I open my eyes to look down at her, and she shifts to return my gaze. “Gotta start somewhere, vix. Pick one.”
Tucking her head back down into my shoulder, she’s quiet for a moment before she says, “The bird on your back.”
I exhale in relief. “It’s a black vulture. I got it about a decade ago, I think. Vultures are death eaters. They feed on carrion—literally consume the dead and thrive on it. They’re survivors. They can eat things and live in conditions most other animals can’t. When those animals die, they become food, and the vulture becomes stronger because of it.”
“That's… dramatic.”
“We're Society. Our wedding involved blood play and hallucinogens. Dramatic is what we do.”
She hums in agreement, her lips pressing together like they’re trying to wrestle each other into behaving. I’m not sure if she wins or loses with herself when she says, “I thought it was a really ugly eagle,” before slamming her lips back together.
My mouth is hanging wide open. A solid five seconds of silence passes between us before I shake off my stupor and ask, “Was that… Did you just make a joke?”
Merrick’s avoiding eye contact with me, but I can still see the glitter of mischief in her eyes. It comes through loud and clear in how theppops when she responds with, “Nope.”
I’m fucking gobsmacked, and it’s enough to send Merrick into a fit of giggles, which is doing absolutely nothing to improve my situation. “Who are you, and what have you done with my wife?” I ask in feigned horror. “Jokesandgiggling? I fucked you silly, didn’t I? It’s the only explanation.”
She gives my ribs a gentle shove in reproach. “I've got jokes. I'm fucking hilarious when I want to be. Now, tell me about this one.”
Her fingers move to the snake skeleton wrapped around the forearm cradling her, following the path of its spine until it disappears between our bodies before reversing her path. “That one’s three or four years old. I wanted to add to my arm. Thought it’d look cool and fit with everything else.”
Merrick sighs. “Boring. I thought for sure this one would have some overly dramatic story too.”
I pull her in tighter to me. “Sorry. Sometimes, people get tattoos just because they look cool. I can lie and make up something more exciting.”
The casual teasing from a few seconds ago is gone, replaced with quiet, tight words. “I would rather not be lied to.”
Rolling us so I’m hovering over top of her, filling her vision, I brace myself on one forearm next to her head and cup her cheek with the other. Merrick tries to avoid looking at me but relents after a few seconds and gives me her eyes.
I love how responsive she is to me, whether she wants to be or not. Whatever binds our souls together affects her just as much as it does me. I can feel it like a tether between us,constantly pulling us back toward one another, just like it's pulling her eyes back to mine right now.
“I don’t lie to you, Merrick,” I say. She parts her lips, her protest on the tip of her tongue, but I cut her off. “I don’t. You and I both know this life comes with its fair share of secrets. We both have things in our pasts we’d rather forget, secrets that are too dangerous to ever see the light of day. I’d be stupid to think you’ve survived the Society this long with clean hands. I want to know every fucking mark that’s ever been left on you, body and soul. I want to know what taught you to build those walls of yours so fucking high and what they’re protecting. And if you want the same from me, I want to show you that too. You can ask me anything, and I won’t lie to you. I might have to tell you that I can’t answer, maybe not yet—maybe not ever—but I won’t lie. Not to you. Never to you.”
Her eyes bounce back and forth between mine, weighing the sincerity in them. It’s all she’ll find. I meant every fucking word. But my wife came to me thinking I was the enemy, or close enough to it, and it’s going to take time to prove to her I’m on her side. I’ve always been on her side. Even when she belonged to another.
Her body slowly begins to relax under mine, moving with me again as her heart eases its way back to mine. She doesn’t say anything, but her body speaks well enough for her. It says,I believe you, when she runs her hand through my hair.I want that too, when she kisses me, pushing on my shoulder until we roll and land with her on top of me.Things have changed between us,when she guides my cock to her entrance and takes me inside her, drawing gasps from us both as she bottoms out. And when she moves above me, fingers digging into my chest as she chases her release, it says something that goes deeper than words ever could.
It’spossible that I’ve been sitting in the corner of this sofa watching the wings of Ender’s sphinx tattoos gently flap for an hour now. Or maybe it’s been five minutes. Time’s really weird right now, and I have no idea how long we’ve been locked in this room.
Sphinxes are an interesting choice, right? The Society symbol, sure. Easy. The death theme we’ve got going on everywhere else? I get it. We’re a macabre bunch. Lots of blood and all that. The whole Ferryman thing.
Also, his name’s Ender, so, like, he ends things.
That’s kind of a weird name for a baby.
Someone looked at him as a baby and thought, Yeah, okay, he looks like an Ender.
