Ivan Press

[Hilary] The way that Hilary asked him to tie her down wasn't really a request. The way that she told him she'd stay with him tonight wasn't really a promise. The way she put it was almost like a warning: that tying her down was perhaps the only way to get her to stay here. That if he didn't knot those ties around her wrists again she might just get up and leave him. There's no way of knowing if she would have, or if she just wanted him to tie her up again and use her, but it's probably hard not to hear it like that.

She likes the way he responds. It makes her smile, makes her do something so incongruous with what she just said that it's bizarre: she snuggles herself to his chest as he strokes her back, wrapping her arms around him. She cuddles him, and she's smiling with something like contentment gleaming in her eyes when Ivan rolls her onto her side. Hilary's arms loosen around him, sliding away as he slides his cock out of her. It makes her suck in a breath: they're both sensitive. Too sensitive now to be talking about again, but there it is.

Hilary likes the way he talks to her then. Get a drink. Take a shower. Come back. So she leans over and kisses his knuckles before his hand is out of reach, and then turns away. There are red marks on her where he bit her, here and there. Where his hands slapped or just held on tight. They aren't purplish with bruising, at least not yet, but she's a wreck. She moves slowly, and a little carefully, her whole body sore, and goes into his vast bathroom.

She takes her glass of water with her. The one he brought for her, that she never drank from. It's sweating, slick and cold to her hand. She sips from it while she waits for the water to warm up, looks for a towel. She can hear Ivan in his bedroom, stripping the bed of the blanket they fucked on top of. Hilary holds her hand, cold from her glass, under the stream of water, and closes her eyes as it pelts her palm.


When Ivan joins her, she's in the shower, and she's not just rinsing sweat and cum off of herself. She's washed her hair, run conditioner through it. It rinses out slick, turning her back slippery. He steps in and she turns her head to look at him over her shoulder, not startled, but it's obvious enough that she didn't hear him. She flicks her eyes up at him and smiles, ducking her eyes again as though she's shy, when he knows she's not.

A ripple of tension goes through her when he starts to wash her back. He's done this before. He almost always does this. She never expects it. She never protests, either. She turns her head and lets him sweep her wet hair off her back, exhales slowly and leans forward when he starts to rub the knots out of her back. She puts her forearms on the tiled wall and closes her eyes, water dripping down her face and off her lips and nose and chin, while Ivan tries to restore her.

It's only when he finishes that she reaches for the soap, herself, and starts to clean the rest of her body. Washes off her sweat, and his scent, as though a shower is going to change how many times he came inside of her since they met at his apartment. As though it's going to undo anything at all. But it's like a ritual, indeed, for them. And it's obedience, which seems to relax her: he told her to take a shower, and so she does, and it means she doesn't have to think about why she's doing any of the things she's doing.

A soft sigh, when he pulls her to his body. Soft moans, when he cups her breasts and rubs his thumbs over her nipples til they're tight and hard. Hilary gasps when he runs his flattened palms over her nipples like that, shudders when his hands close and squeeze. She puts her hands on the tiles again, pressing back against against him even though he doesn't try to rub his cock on her skin. She whimpers if he stays out of reach, whimpers if he lets her feel him. It's nothing compared to the wracked, ragged little noise she bites back when he touches her pussy. It pulses deep and she flinches, she can barely stand being touched, but she doesn't ask him to stop. She just whimpers, and she groans when he stops, trembling for him.

It takes Hilary awhile to stop leaning on the tile, after that, several seconds where she's just trying to put herself back together even though he didn't let her come. Didn't come inside of her, or jerk himself off onto her. Didn't give her anything. Which, in a way, is just as good as when he does.


There's no telling if Ivan can understand any of this. If he wants to. If he even tries, at this point, to see beneath the flickers of reaction he sees in Hilary's eyes or skittering across her expression, chaotic as a kaleidoscope. The light goes in; doesn't show you anything coherent.


The water drips from the showerheads when they turn it off. And things start to feel a little mundane. Hilary's married, and has been married for a couple of years now that he knows of. She seems more at ease with this domesticity than he does, moves in the large space with him with a sort of calm intimacy. Brushes her teeth quietly, without self-consciousness. Doesn't talk much, just combing her hair and finding some kind of lotion to put on her face, on her hands and arms and legs and breasts like this, too, is a ritual. Her nightly one, really. She doesn't like going to sleep with damp hair, but she doesn't say anything about it. She hangs her towel and walks with Ivan back to his bed.

Hilary crawls onto it first, on all fours, a new glass of water waiting for her. She takes a sip before she gets under the covers, settling in as though this is her very own bed. A moment later Ivan rolls toward her and puts her wrists over her head. She breathes in but doesn't resist, watching his face while he knots her hands together. Hilary lays back, wriggling a bit to get comfortable, and then he ties her to the bedpost. He can hear her breathing, quickened. He can feel her heat, smell her arousal all over again.

They don't kiss. They don't say goodnight. Hilary turns her face to one side, closing her eyes, and she's asleep soon enough, despite her positioning. They sleep deeply. Ivan knows hers is as dark as his own when dawn is a less than an hour off and he moves sharklike under the blankets to find her body again. She's warm and languid, lying on her back, breathing deeply. She starts to stir a bit when he wraps his arms around her, but when his teeth set in her skin --


Hilary wakes with a start, a sharp breath, her eyes flying open even as Ivan is rolling her over climbing on top of her, his long body brushing her shoulderblades and back, his long legs nudging between her own. The first sound she makes after that initial startled gasp is a gentle moan that sounds uncannily like relief, feeling him rub himself to firmness against her ass, then her cunt. She arches a little, opening her legs wider, wordlessly wanting him. In the growing half-light Ivan can see her head turned to the side, her eyes closed, her lips parted as she breathes in soft little pants for air.

Ivan barely makes a sound when he shoves his cock into her. Hilary moans, louder than before. It's almost too soon. She's wet, she's wet as though there's been no time between his hand on her in the shower and his cock stroking her awake. But he's used her so roughly, so many times, already, and she's only barely conscious. She takes it though, and gladly. She's fucking him right back this time, slow and grinding and yet eager, her gasps turning into hard and fast moans as they fuck under the sheets, sweating under the comforter.

She's so. Fucking. Wet. She's so noisy til he stifles her with his brutal kiss, groaning and even grunting softly as her cunt clenches down on his cock. She comes twice during that slow, deep, firm fuck before dawn, turning her head to hide her moans in his pillows as though to leave them there even after she's gone. She can't help it. She can't stop herself, can't stop herself from coming for him like that no matter how tender she is, no matter how rough he's been with her all this time. This is what she needs. This is how she loves it.

So once, she comes slow and wet and unfurling, writhing under his body with long, loud moans muffled by his pillow. And again, she comes near the end, tight and hard and bucking back against him like she can't stand what he's doing to her. Hilary takes his cum all over again with sharp gasps, opening her legs as wide as he'll let her, groaning deep in her throat and grinding her hips back against him. It's the only time she speaks, whimpering

ivan, ivan, oh god, give it to me. fuck it into me.

oh fuck, oh my god, let me have your cum. come in me.

oh god. oh god, ivan, i love it. give it to me.


If she could clutch at anything she would. She'd hold on for dear life, but as it is she's tied down, unable to do anything but take it now. Take him. Take what he has to give her and like it. Which she does. It leaves her gasping, shuddering, working her pussy on him in slow, wet strokes til he holds her down and makes her stop, christ, stop, which

makes her come again, tight and pulsing all around him, squirming wildly from it.


Hilary doesn't hear him whisper her name. She feels his breath hitting her ear as he withdraws, but can't focus on the syllables. She's shuddering as he takes his cock out of her, arching her back as though even though he's fucked her to an utter wreck of a woman she still wants more. Somehow. There's traces of cum between her thighs all over again, between her this and across her ass as he rolls them onto their sides. The necktie he used to keep her here tonight is twisted and digging into her wrists. Hilary doesn't complain. She sighs as she settles back against Ivan, her eyes still closed, or closing again, whichever.

She's held by him when she sleeps this time, so worn out at this point she can't stay awake. She's warm. He's warm. She feels taken care of, or cared for, but truthfully,

Hilary doesn't know the difference, and doesn't even know to call it either of those things. Just: she feels good. She feels calm, and satisfied, and warm. She feels like the world is somehow going to be All Right, and she's going to be Safe, and she's going to see and feel Good Things. Hilary sleeps happily this time. Her dreams are peaceful. Her wrists are viciously bruised, upon waking. Her fingers are going numb. Her shoulders and neck are stiff as boards.

It's not morning when she wakes. It's closer to afternoon when her eyes open drowsily, the pain in her arms and wrists finally enough to bring her around. She bats her lashes a few times, Ivan a heavy, searing warmth behind her. It's a very different sort of feeling from sleeping with Dion at her back. She breathes deeply, in and out, her ribs expanding against his chest, under his arm. She cranes her neck a little, wincing, and looks at her wrists.

Neckties really aren't that difficult to get out of, especially for someone like Hilary, who has not only experience and practice but a surreal level of flexibility. She nimbly loosens the knots in the necktie, slips one wrist then the other free, and exhales heavily but quietly as she draws her arms back down towards her body. She knows she should rub them, move the blood back through them, go get some more of that cream from Chinatown, any number of treatments to help her feel not-so-sore, look not-so-fucked-up.

Instead she crosses her arms over her breasts, somewhere between self-protective and corpselike, and closes her eyes again,

staying where she is.

[Ivan] Ivan stirs when Hilary does, shifting behind her, drawing in a long breath and sighing it out again. If she were a less graceful woman, he might have woken. If he weren't as utterly exhausted, as wrecked as she was from fucking her over and over and over

until he had to hold her down that last time, pin her down and gasp for her to stop, just stop.

He doesn't wake. Not for a while longer. He shifts when she does, resettles when she does. Another half hour goes by. An hour, maybe, and then it's noon, and the day is bright, and the black night outside has receded to reveal the lake lapping at the shore, the stretch of private sandy beach he has -- surely a premium here, where sand is rare and stone so much more common. There's a terrace back there. A pool. Green grass, tall pines. A small private dock, too small and too shallow for the Krasota; large enough, though, for a small rowboat.

A quiet, pleasant estate, all in all. Not the sort of place where one ties a married woman to a bed all night as though she might run away otherwise; wakes her before dawn to fuck her to three more orgasms, sore as she is. Raw as she is.


When Ivan wakes, it's just a shift in his breathing. A sort of quietness and a stillness, an alertness. It's moments before he draws a deep breath; opens his eyes. He finds she's untied herself. Both ties hang limp from the bedposts now, wrinkled, twisted, possibly ruined. It doesn't matter.

He presses his lips gently to her shoulder; scrapes her skin with his teeth. There's a dull echoing ache in his body. It's likely nothing compared to what she feels like right now.

"You're still here," he whispers. He sounds a little surprised.

It's Labor Day monday. His servants are still away. The house is silent and still -- the joints cracking faintly now and then as it expands and heats in the sunlight.

[Hilary] "Mmm," is all Hilary says, which isn't a word at all. She's barely conscious, only even making that much noise because he moved behind her, kissed her, ran his teeth over her, spoke to her. Hilary's eyes don't open. She doesn't move. It's possible she can't move, right now, without pain.

It's true. But her breathing is steady. She's not shaking or trembling or curled up in a ball to try and keep herself safe. She seems more relaxed, more peace-filled, than he's ever seen her.

Lying in his bed. In the sunlight. Like she belongs there.

[Ivan] It's far from the first time Ivan has woken with a lovely woman in his bed. It's not even the first time he's woken with a lovely married woman in his bed.

If she was any other, he knows what he'd do now. If she's the sort to enjoy the trappings of luxury, he'd call for his servants now. Breakfast in bed. If she's the sort to melt at the little things, the pretense of domesticity and true fucking love, he'd get out of bed. Get someone to make breakfast and carry it in himself. Eggs and toast and fresh-cut fruits; melons and grapes and strawberries with dipping cream on the side; cream and strawberries that'd end up toppling off the bed, messing up the floor, when he rolled her on her back to fuck her again before going on with their respective days.

Unless, of course, he was no longer interested in fucking her. And then it'd be a perfunctory breakfast in the kitchen, the servants more attentive than he is; some excuse only half meant to be believed: oh, sorry baby, I have to see my accountant. I'll call you, and then a rapid departure.

His starved swans. His silly little girls. That's not who Hilary is, though. And he doesn't know what to do. There are no servants to call, anyway, and he's never seen her like this before. He doesn't want to shatter the stillness. His arm is still around her. He settles again, his eyes closed, though he's not asleep.

He holds her a little longer.

[Hilary] If she were any other, Hilary wouldn't even be here right now. She'd be at the penthouse where he's had her just a few times, and she might be in one of the guestrooms after a party or she might be in his own bed, waking up to find him smiling, getting dressed, telling her he's terribly sorry, Yuliya will get her whatever she needs. She wouldn't be at the lake house where he doesn't throw parties, where he doesn't invite silly little girls or married women or long-legged models who never eat breakfast anyway, served in bed or not.

She knows, opening her eyes, that she didn't spend all weekend with him. She didn't even spend a full day with him. It feels like longer, and maybe that's because she's so exhausted, so sore. Maybe that's because it was so long between bouts, or because they fought, and she can't handle emotional conflict very well on her best days. She's slept for god knows how many hours and she can't move now, and she's happier than she's been in weeks.

Months.

Hilary doesn't put much stock by happiness, though. Even so, she holds on. She doesn't want to break this, either. She doesn't want to get up and pull away and


the next thing Ivan knows she's shaking slightly in his arms, her breathing hitching. She's weeping, and it isn't because he's fucked her to some limit he didn't know she had. At least she's trying to be quiet about it.

[Ivan] Hilary cried the morning her mate left, too. That was feigned, though. Crocodile tears in reverse: speeding departure rather than attempting to wheedle another week. Another day. Another hour, love, I love you so -- and if Ivan were more cynical or, more to the point, if Hilary were not Hilary, he might suspect her of feigning these tears as well. Anyone else, and maybe he'd think maybe she wants to be coddled. Maybe she wants him to make an honest woman of her, now that he's wrecked her so utterly. Maybe she wants expensive jewelry, gifts, season tickets to the goddamn opera, who knows. Yuliya will get her whatever she needs.

But: she's not. And she's trying to be quiet about it. And Ivan is drifting sleepward again when she starts to cry, and his eyes are snapping open, and

he moves up on his elbow, frowning. "Hilary?" His voice is sleep-fuzzed. He hasn't spoken for so long. "Hilary, what is it?"

[Hilary] She has that staggered breathing that goes along with trying not to sob aloud, trying not to cry. Her face is turned into the pillow. When Ivan lifts himself up he can see her wrists aginst the bedding, see how raw her skin is, how the bruises and friction burns overlap, coloring her fair forearms. It's an ugly sight, and he might think she saw it and asked herself what the fuck was wrong with her, what the fuck, what did he do, but Hilary just shudders when he asks that question, hiding her face further.

It takes time for her to be able to answer. She shakes her head and cries, childishly fighting the end of her tears even while she wishes for it. It takes time before she can form the words: "I don't want to go. I hate this. I have to go, because I can't do this, and I don't want to go,"

but she does, all the same, because she's going to. It's going to happen. They both know it.

[Ivan] There's nothing he can really say to that; no lie he could tell that she would believe. That he even wants to tell. She cries. He holds her. She comes to the end of it, her breath still hitching and stuttering, unsteady. He kisses her shoulder, kisses her upper arm, reaches his hand to her face and gently,

gently,

wipes her cheeks with the flat of his thumb. He doesn't ask her to stay. She can't. She can't because she has friends that are gossips and servants that are loyal to her husband; she has a lover in her stepson, who's young enough to grow jealous and suspicious; and above all, because she can't do this. He doesn't reassure her, either, or promise her they'll have this again. They'll have this every week, every time she can get away to see him. He certainly doesn't ask her to just run away with him. Anything like that.

He's not even sure he wants that. He's quite sure he doesn't, in fact, want her for himself. He knows she's bad news, bad for him. At this point, it's not a matter of want anymore. It's closer to need.

Ivan does ask this, though: "Will you be back?"

[Hilary] Eventually she does stop crying. Nobody can cry forever. Not even someone as deeply, intrinsically screwed up as she is. Hilary weeps into his pillow, leaves it wet from saltwater, and he holds her. She wants something, and she doesn't know what. There's a gnawing hunger in her that is brother to the endless-seeming rage she feels, and they exist to protect her from sorrow. Or else that sorrow exists to protect everyone from just how pitch-black her core self really is.

Hilary covers her face with her hands, and Ivan covers her with his arm, til she's gasping and shaking like a car left idling too long, and he has to know that the reason she can stop crying

is because she's drifting away. Because it's not like they can just pretend, and have this sweet and light and playful. It's not like they can just stop thinking. They don't really get along. They don't like one another's company all that much, it seems. Maybe they've just never tried. Maybe they're too much alike. It doesn't matter in the end: they aren't going to be anything but subversive, covert lovers with love nowhere in the picture.

Tomas likes to pretend. He talks about the future. His anger grows every time he realizes there's no such thing. Hilary damns him not when she fucks him, but when she strips away whatever is left of his optimism, whatever there might have been of youthful belief that the world is not a wicked, painful place. She's raking her nails down his soul, every time she fucks him. Every time she makes him hope, every time she makes him believe, every time she does so while simultaneously making sure he knows

this can't go anywhere. just enjoy it as it is.

Hilary is a life ruiner. She doesn't even have to try.


No promises, then, given or accepted. They both know better. But her own survival is paramount; Hilary pulls away, not physically but entirely, all the same. She breathes a little deeper. She quiets. And the only reason it happens is because she silently reminds herself that this, like everything else, is hopeless. It's an illusion. And she doesn't care. Hilary slips into this reality like it's a warmth bath. Eventually she'll be cool, distant, smiling, all of it.

Right now she's just numb. Staring at the opposite wall, past the mottled red and purple of her wrists.

"Yes," she whispers, because they both know it's true.

[Ivan] If Ivan were five years younger, or even three, he might pretend too. He might tell himself lies; fool himself into thinking he's so clever, such a devious little mind. He might concoct ideas: Dion's forty-something and still an Adren. That's a terminal rank at that point. Whatever the reason - glory or honor or wisdom or simple sanity - he'll likely never advance past that. Which means Ivan could catch up. Which means Ivan could challenge.

Or: Dion can't live forever. Sooner or later everyone dies, and maybe Dion will die in Paris, or wherever the fuck he is. Maybe Dion will have a little accident. Maybe in the chaos afterward, when the Tribe's trying to figure out what to do with Dion's grieving widow, he could spread some slander, say the right things, make sure no one wants her and have her for himself.

Maybe, maybe. He could dream --

but he doesn't. Because he doesn't pretend anymore. As they say, Ivan is old enough to know better. Young enough, apparently, that he doesn't care.

"Okay," he murmurs, and that's it. He sinks back down behind her. A little farther away now. A little gulf of distance between them, as though he can feel her pulling away already.

[Hilary] She would make him miserable. He knows better than Dion does, he knows that she's not this paragon of wifely virtue. He knows she would not be faithful, and truthfully, he knows he wouldn't be, either. He knows they're not the sort to be okay with that, on top of everything else. It's a knot, tangled and stuck, and there's nothing to do but cut it off

which they've tried, and failed at

or see it through to whatever bitter end awaits them.


Hilary doesn't close her eyes. She stares, for a long time, at nothing. A few times she blinks slowly, tightening in on herself, hunching her shoulders a little. A few times she breathes deeply, but never with the same relaxation she had when she first woke. When she came back to life she felt...

something. It's far away, now. And she knows she won't be able to go on without feeling it again. And again. So she'll be back. If he fights with her. If he starts talking madness about finding a way to have her as his own should Something happen to Dion, if he starts talking about anything real or serious or forever, if he makes her crazy, she'll still come back.

Ivan makes her feel human. He brutalizes her and fucks the life out of her and when she's unable to feel anything else, she feels like a real person. She hates him for it. She can't bear it. And she needs it.


After a very long time, Hilary starts to sit up. She breathes in sharply through her nostrils when she puts her hand down on the bed, the skin over her wrists stretching and searing. She slides away from his warmth, something in her pulling apart like taffy. She moves to the edge of the mattress and puts her feet down, and she goes to take another shower.

She doesn't say anything to him this time. There's nothing to say, really. Nothing that will make this all right. Nothing that will make either of them feel better about it. Nothing that will make the wrenching happiness she finds when he's destroying her last any longer, or make any more sense. Hilary washes herself, and it doesn't matter if he comes with her.

Though if he does: her arms go around his waist, her head to his chest, for a few seconds. It's not much. It's the best she can do.

But if he doesn't. If he stays in bed, then nothing. By the time she steps out and starts to dry herself off, comb her hair, brush her teeth again, she's almost herself again. By the time she puts her lingerie back on and has her dress zipped up and is sitting someplace to wiggle her feet back into her pumps, she's got her phone out and she's contacting Estrella to tell her she'll be home shortly, tell the kitchen to get lunch ready. Something light. Lots of fruits.

Her hair is drying. Her skin is cool and soft and dry to the touch, now, but it's unlikely he touches her.

[Ivan] Ivan doesn't follow her into the shower this time. He stays in bed, and she goes away, and he listens to the water, the tap, the shower, the shift in cadence when she steps in.

And he breathes. He inhales, and he exhales, and he closes his eyes and he waits.

When she comes back, she's changed. Iced over, only it's not even that. Ice burns. Hilary is simply ... calm. Placid. Sterile and flavorless beneath her superficial facade of warmth, elegance, friendliness: as though what she carries beneath, that turmoil and darkness and that urge, that need to be brutalized, is locked beneath an impenetrable polycarbonate shell.

He's sitting up by then. Ivan sits at the corner of his bed, the covers behind him rumpled, reflecting the white light of midday back to the high ceilings. This room is all air and lightness and sunlight in the daytime. He seems to like that, this golden-skinned man-boy-wolf-monster with the mutable eyes, the dappled hair like cut wheat. He seems to like the sun, and light, and glory, and

then he's holding her down like she's a thing, a whore or a slave, and fucking her until there are bruises on her body; until she's almost too sore to touch.


He has something in his hands. It's a little gourd, and she's seen one like it before. He holds it out to her.

"I activated it for you," he says. "Just crush it between your hands to use it."

And no. He doesn't touch her now. She's become untouchable.

[Hilary] Her head turns as she's putting her phone in her clutch. She looks straight at him, not at the gourd in his hands. She stares at his eyes, green-hazel, light-dappled the way he is, and wishes he would stop. Wishes he could. Because she can't do this. It isn't even because her life works that way, because she's Kin and she belongs to another, etcetera. It's because she can't.

Hilary reaches over to him and puts her hand on the back of his, cupped under his hand, his knuckles to her palm, her raw wrist close to his fingertips. She doesn't say anything, and she doesn't take her eyes off of him.

[Ivan]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 4, 5, 5, 6, 8 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Hilary] [She's waiting for him to crush the gourd. There's not a whole lot of deep thought going on for her right now, given the need to be above/away from emotion in general as well as sheer exhaustion, but the fact that he sort of takes care of her (washing her, rubbing her back, holding her, healing her) after the way they fuck makes her ache.]
to Ivan

[Ivan] He doesn't know what this means. This communication is beyond his capability; he stares at her a moment, puzzled. She can see his eyes moving between hers, trying to read sense out of what may as well be a vacuum. A void.

Then he crushes the gourd in his hand. When his wrists turns in hers, his palm closes over her forearm. Over the livid marks left by the twisting tie; by his hand, gripping her so hard while he took her in the dead of night. In the early dawn.

When that's healed away, and her soreness gone, Ivan draws back. He smiles a little; it looks sad.

"Do you want me to call my driver for you?"

[Hilary] The healing is bittersweet. She likes the pain, she likes the soreness and ache. She finds a sort of comfort in looking at her bite marks or her bruises and remembering how she felt after she got them to begin with. How he treated her, and how she liked it, and how he was with her right after. How she could finally be, when she can't get there any other way.

Hilary's not a fetishist; this is the truth. She can get off even if he doesn't hurt her. She just can't get to that place he's been able to take her a few times now unless he pushes himself to the limit of his control and pushes her to the limit of her tolerance. And ultimately, that's what it's about. Not the sex. Not the orgasms. Not the fact that she likes his body and he likes that she's forbidden, though all of that is true, too.

It's just not the whole truth.

She breathes in as he heals her. She watches him, then watches his hands, and her expression is vaguely sad as the marks disappear. She can feel them all over her body tingling into nothingness, smoothing away to nothing. She isn't even sore anymore. She can walk normally. She wants to cry again, but that desire is so deep down she barely senses it. Barely feels it. It's like a coin tossed in a well, glimmering under the surface for a split second before it descends into the dark, falling to the bottom.

She looks back at him.

"No," she says quietly, shaking her head just twice. This is as honest as anything else: she wants to leave him, everything that's his, behind. She wants as clean a break as possible, even if it's just an illusion of cleanliness, and an illusion of breaking anything. "I'm fine with taking a cab."

[Ivan] And she's dressed again; so neatly put back together, even if she's obviously in evening wear. Even if anyone seeing her walking out of someone else's house, calling for a cab, would know what she's been up to.

He's still naked. Faintly tousled, sunlit, sitting at the corner of his bed. His smile was sad. The look on her face as the marks disappear is a little sad, too.

"Okay," he says quietly. "Do you want me to walk you to the door?"

[Hilary] Her hair is still drying, but it will dry to completion before she gets to the house. She'll call a cab and it will pick her up along that long, curving drive. No one will see her until the cab pulls up into her own long, curving drive. She'll go straight inside and yes, the servants will see her but she doesn't look fucked, she doesn't look too tired, she just stayed out all night and probably stuck around someone's house for brunch or whatnot.

Or at least: that's the lie they'll be encouraged to believe. They'll have no evidence otherwise. And without evidence, there is nothing to convince Dion that his mate is a goddamn whore, giving it away to any male with a hard cock and a penchant for rough sex.

She leans over, impulsively, and kisses his mouth, putting her hand on his face. It's more tender than she can bear to feel right now. It's also:

stop. please stop.

Which is insane, that she never begs him to stop when he's holding her down and hammering her cunt, swearing at her, growling at her, biting her when he comes. But he offers her healing, he offers her a ride, he offers to be a gentleman to her and she looks at him -- and kisses him -- like if he doesn't stop she won't be able to breathe anymore.

Hilary draws back, eyes on his, and then takes her hand away and takes a deep breath. She rises smoothly to her feet, strokes her hands over her dress, and shakes her damp hair off her shoulders. Her clutch's strap is looped over one pale, flawless wrist, which just seconds ago was somewhat horrific to look at. She smiles at him.

It's a little tight. She can't help it.

"I remember the way," Hilary says mildly, though she can't quite grasp the tone of gentle amusement she reaches for. "Call me again sometime," she adds, and reaches over to brush her fingertips across his cheek, just before she turns away to walk out of his bedroom.

[Ivan] When Hilary leans down to kiss him, she intends something tender, and warm, but Ivan tips his head up and meets her mouth on his and his brow furrows suddenly, tight and hard, like it hurts to do this.

He kisses her anyway. And it's a sudden, total contact that has him breathing raggedly in through the nose. She draws back first. His eyes are closed for an instant, and he sways toward her in that instant before he catches himself

and leans back, hands on the mattress, body relaxed, unabashedly bare: the playboy prince in all his glory again.

"Okay," he says again. He watches her go, and doesn't bother to follow.


It's hours before he departs this place. When he does, he finds the front door still unlocked from her departure. He locks it on the way out; doesn't come here again for days. By then, the maids have changed the sheets. Changed the bedding. Cleaned out the burnt coffeepot, opened the windows, let in the fresh lake breeze, obliterated all traces of what happened.