Ivan Press

Hilary

Stupefied, Hilary falls quickly to sleep once more in the bed at the rear of the jet. Ivan, of course, is expected to help her out of her robe, turn down the covers, and help her into bed, but then he is permitted to join her. Permitted, as though she were the true dominant in this relationship, to come close to her, to wrap his lean but well-muscled arms around her waist and hold her as she sleeps.

Perhaps he does as well, napping near the woman who for all intents and purposes is his mate, has been his mate for a very long time now, is the mother of what may be his only heir.

--

She wakes when they stop in Greenland, and deplane for a short while: to take in a meal, to stretch their legs. Hilary looks outside the car window at the sky. Even on a fast, agile jet like Ivan's (father's), the trip from Nuuk to Nice is not a short one. Hilary is bored, and often when Hilary is bored it means she simply takes pills and checks out of reality.

During this leg of the trip, however, she -- without demanding help from Ivan, in fact -- looks for something on the tablet. On the internet. She frowns at the screen and taps it, then taps another button: takes her back to the home screen. Searches, frowning ever deeper, til she finds the icon she wants. Taps it.

Ivan, perhaps reading or lounging elsewhere or even sitting near Hilary just to be near her, hears the chiming noise that greets Hilary when she connects, of her own volition and under her own power, to a video call with Miron, who by now knows not to answer calls from that tablet without Anton nearby unless the child is asleep. Anton is eating, holding a piece of fruit and chewing on it with infantile focus, considering each bite and smacking the flavor around in his mouth thoughtfully.

And so Hilary passes the time for a while, talking in French to Anton while he has his snack, occasionally asking questions -- still in French -- of the boy's caregiver, cook, French tutor, what-have-you. Once or twice, she asks Miron how to say something properly in Russian, and he helps her translate.

But sooner or later, Anton has to be let down to play, and Hilary is getting bored, so they end the rather prolonged chat, and she slides the tablet aside, going to Ivan and crawling on top of his body, stretching her own out over his. Her thighs part over one of his thighs; her hand rucks up the bottom of his shirt as she kisses him, whimpering a plea for him to touch her, to put his hand under her dress and pleasure her. She is rarely, if ever, so aggressive. So assertive. So aware of what she wants, and so willing to ask for it.

She used to be. At the very beginning, before he realized what she was. Before she was willing to show him just what she was. Before everything with Dion, and the pregnancy, and the birth and separation and reunion and everything with Grey. Before all these things that would dismantle even a much stronger, saner woman.

Perhaps Ivan is pleased to see this faint return to the woman he initially met. Or dismayed. Or bewildered. Regardless: she comes gaspingly, wetly on his hand, clutching at his arms. She comes again later when he turns her under him and fucks her, biting her arms, her shoulders, her neck, her breasts after he yanks down her dress to bare them, fucking her quickly and roughly where the pilot or copilot could walk through anytime. Her slick gets all over the front of his slacks. His cum gets on her dress.

And thus they pass a bit more time.

--

Somewhere in there: another meal, or two. A nap. Ivan or someone making suggestions about how to prepare their internal clocks for a new country, another continent. And then it is mid-morning, and it is France, and they are landing, and Hilary is walking off the plane wearing large sunglasses and high heels and tossing her hair off her shoulder.

"I need a salon," she is informing Ivan, mid-conversation about whatever plans they are making for the day, the week, the stay. "Since you've had me abandon my girl." Darya. The wide-eyed blonde Russian girl who does her hair, who dresses her, who takes care of her. Who is not with them on this multi-continent journey. She flicks the ends of her hair. Eyes him with judgement, too.

"You could do with a trim, as well."

Having stood (or sat, or lounged, or sprawled) awake for the first leg of the trip, Ivan actually sleeps through a good deal of the second. Indeed, he is asleep when Hilary retrieves her tablet; when she trial-and-errors her way into Skype, and to Anton.

He wakes at the characteristic sound of the dial. Comes out of the bedroom while she's talking to their son -- in French, of course. Rumpled and elegant at once, the Ragabash wears only his pajama bottoms and a blanket; folds his arms across his chest in the relative coolness of the main cabin. His hair is mussed. He squints in the light. Drops down across from her, yawning, and if she thinks to turn the camera at him, waves halfheartedly at the boy.

It is entirely possible she doesn't turn the camera toward him at all.

--

A little later on she wants to fuck. He is a little surprised by her agency; though certainly not dismayed. He knows better than to laugh or to ask what's gotten into her. Such sins would be punished with anger, withdrawal, or worst of all, confusion and regression. He doesn't ask. He slips his hand under her dress, slips his talented fingers between her legs, and brings her off

so quickly, so delicately, so fucking obligingly

that a different woman might think unhappily of his past and his experience, all those panting little misses he must have fucked. Likely Hilary does not think of them. Sometimes her utter, cold self-absorption is a shield.

--

The fuck, after, is less delicate.

--

Mid-morning in France. It is not quite yet spring, but here on the coast of the Mediterranean it feels like it. The sun is bright and warm and the air, after that protracted flight, feels pleasantly humid. Ivan is smoking a very expensive cigarette, which he moves to put out as Hilary steps off the plane.

"I've been thinking about growing my hair out," he says, which is abjectly false. Sometimes he likes to say things to rile her a little. Sometimes he likes it when she scathes him with her words. "A tumble of golden curls, what do you think?"

She doesn't.

Turn the camera toward him, that is. She does want Ivan to love Anton, or pretend to. She needs that; she needs to have him validate what she loves so very much. She needs him there with her to protect Anton from her. But Hilary is not terribly self aware, or thoughtful. She doesn't think to turn the camera so that Anton can see his father; she is delighted by the pale, fair-haired, dark-eyed child to the extent that she can, for a time, forget Ivan is even present.

For a time.

--

Hilary does not think of all the women he's fucked when she comes. She is in no mood to argue. She is, for some reason perhaps related to whatever willed her to call Anton, thoroughly focused right now on fucking Ivan.

He does not complain. He gives it to her. He strokes her and she gasps, she cries out, she comes as beautifully as she does anything else.

One could see the way he fucks her after as punishment for her agency, but one would be terribly wrong: this woman thinks she is being rewarded when he pushes her to her knees, wraps her hair tenderly around his fist, and permits her to suck his cock. Those are times when he makes her beatific, when tears come to her eyes out of gratitude; she looks up at him as he uses her, and she knows that she is loved. She is good enough. This is a woman whose worst sin against him -- against what they have together -- was done only because there was another male who was willing to treat her as roughly as Ivan himself does.

Only: that male's selfishness was real. Ivan's, with Hilary, is a farce.

He is not punishing her, when he holds her down like that and fucks her the way he does. He is answering her. He is welcoming her. He is showing her that yes, it was all right, what she did on the couches after her little phone call. It was all right. He is not angry with her, he still thinks she is lovely, wonderful, good, and he still wants her as his own.

She sleeps soundly when he's done with her, heavy and limp and replete. She sleeps like an animal that knows it is safe.

--

Hilary is wearing a light cashmere sweater with cropped sleeves and a boat neck, revealing bite marks, hickeys along her neck, her clavicles. They will, like most marks against her, heal more rapidly than is natural. But they are there, and she does not hide them any more than the faint friction burns on her wrists are hidden beneath bracelets and bangles. He tied her up the last time they slept together in the jet. Tied her with his neckties and fucked her over the quaint writing desk in the little sleeping area, using the ties as a sort of leash when he wanted her to shut up and take it.

She holds out her hand for his cigarette that he is about to put out, and takes a drag if he is not a fuss bucket about it. She exhales smoke and rolls her eyes at him, though it's hard to make out behind the shades.

"Fine," she says archly, "if you don't mind that I vomit on sight of you."

Ivan does not object; he passes over the cigarette, and she smokes. Well, they are in France, after all. While she drags, he squints one eye shut in the dazzling light and looks for their bags, their people. The small jet is being unloaded, both from the cargo compartment and from the passenger's. Ivan snaps his fingers at one of the attendants, requests his sunglasses.

They are brought to him. He slips them on. "Well," he responds, "I suppose I stomach a trim and a shave."

A car is waiting for them. It is an Alfa Romeo convertible, obscenely red. Ivan, a gentleman, opens the passenger's door for Hilary. For a moment he confers with one of their people on the ground here. Recommendations are given, directions are input into phones. He climbs into the small, low-to-the-ground roadster and shuts the door.

"Don't have them straighten your hair," he says as he adjusts mirrors, wheel. "You know I love it natural."

It's been a very long time since she's been in France. She keeps his cigarette and smokes, disgusted by his grotesque Russian roll-ups. She goes on carrying it, though, smoking it, as he escorts her to the car. Hilary takes his hand and lowers herself into the car, checking her lipstick in the mirror after she puts the cigarette out.

Because she knows her lover, she removes a silk scarf from her handbag while he's conferring, tying it over her hair and beneath her chin. He's going to drive off with the top down like a grotesque American, she just knows it.

"As though I care what you love," she mutters, when they both know that's not true. She peers at him for a moment. "Why do you love it when I'm a mess?"

They both know it's not true. But it is part of the polite fiction they maintain, just like the fiction that he cares nothing for her, uses her, degrades her. Just like the fiction that she doesn't sometimes want to be used, fucked, taken so roughly she bears the marks of it the next day.

They're Silver Fangs. They know the value of a good little lie.

And yet: she requests the truth now. And it takes him a little off guard. His eyes flicker behind his sunglasses. He stops toying with the mirror and looks at her frankly -- or as frankly as one might when two sets of darkened lenses separate them.

"I don't rightly know," he says. "I've never thought about it before. I suppose it reminds me of all the times you've felt most like you were mine. All the times I've felt closest to having you to myself."

"What times were those?" she murmurs, her head tipping softly to one side.

"Mexico comes to mind," he replies. It's a deep, dark subject, tender as a bruise: and so he keeps his tone light. Speaks of it in broad daylight, with the air full of light and salt sea. "Lausanne. Novgorod. These past days on Maui. Even that time you came to me, when Dion was driving you crazy -- perhaps I misremember, but those are the times that come to mind.

"All the times it was just us. You and I, stealing time away from the world."

The mention of Mexico does not appear to perturb Hilary; does not appear to touch on a bruise. Perhaps whatever poison was in that wound was excised recently: the memory of feeling that he would not love her, would no longer want her, and the acceptance that these things did not happen. That she was carrying a child he didn't even know yet was his did not seem to dampen his ardor at all.

Hilary is still looking at him though, their gazes separated by those layers of glass, of darkness. But she is looking at him, and not out the window. She is silent for a while after he tells her the times when he felt like she was his, like she was really his. She thinks. Perhaps he begins to drive, taking her silence as an end to the conversation.

But not so long after those long moments of silence, she does say:

"I like my hair both ways."

There she goes again, openly saying she likes something. Before she looks out the window, and it's possible he loses some of the following words:

"I will try to be with you as you like, even with straight hair."

Absurd little thing to say. Absurd little promise, that she gives so seriously.

Of course he starts driving. Impatient boy; unknowable woman: ten seconds go by before he decides the conversation must be over. They are, indeed, on their way out of that small private airport before she answers.

He looks at her. They are passing hangars, a tiny terminal where a recreational pilot might grab a cup of coffee. The wind is in his hair, and even through the sunglasses she can see a hint of his eyes.

He smiles. "I like it both ways too," he says,

and there is something significant going on here, some subtle and seismic shift, but it is anyone's guess if either of them even feel it:

"I know. And you should, of course, wear your hair however you like."

--

There's a gated booth. They have to show their IDs to get in or out. This is a post-9/11 world, after all. Can't simply stroll onto a tarmac anymore. Then they're out on the airport boulevard, broad but quite empty at this hour. Ivan drives toward town, eastward, but turns off before they quite reach city center.

The place they have procured is, as he described, all arches and stucco and terracotta floors. The house is not large, but it sits by the water and it has a private cobblestoned path. No garage, but a covered area where they can park. Palms and flat-topped stone pines; a curious open architecture where the entryway is not so much a room as an open passageway into the atrium; where various rooms open directly into that middle space, or into the exterior, or onto the balcony that rings the entirety of the atrium; where most windows are shuttered rather than shut. There is a garden in the atrium, warm-climate flowers gathered around a stone fountain.

The rooms are cool and rather dim. There is no reason to turn on the lights with the sun spilling down just outside. Behind the villa, a small scrubby hill spills down into pale sands, turquoise ocean.

She scoffs; makes some noise at him when he tells her she should wear her hair however she likes. She always does. She's known that the undone waves please him for a very long time now. This is just the first time she's bothered to ask. To care.

--

After that she is silent though, watching the countryside, her thoughts anyone's guess. The scarf over her hair keeps her from growing well and truly infuriated with Ivan and his stupid, childish convertibles. Her shades keep her hidden, which seems to be what she returns to, wants again.

He takes her to a place he -- not they -- have procured. She never makes these plans, these decisions. Often she does not even have input into them, because oftentimes Ivan forgets to ask her what she might prefer. Though to be fair, Ivan forgets to ask because oftentimes Hilary has no opinion, and gets distressed when it is put to her to formulate one.

The car pulls to a stop in shade, under a covered port. Hilary waits where she is until he comes around, opening her door for her. She rises, looking around and not at him, her face an impassive mask as it often is, as though she has forgotten to make her features form normal human reactions, investment, emotion.

Looks around, unimpressed or displeased or simply unaware that he might wonder what she thinks, and then tells him as she slides her scarf from her hair: "What about the salon?"

"Ah -- shit." She can see it on his face at once: he's forgotten. "I even asked for recommendations. Well; back in the car then. I'll drive you there now."

"Idiot," she mutters, but it's empty; pale even as it leaves her lips, thoughtless and cruel and meaningless, ultimately. She steps back nearer to him: just one step, or two. Not much. "Not now," she tells him. "We can go tomorrow, unless you want them to send someone here."

Hilary turns away, winding her silk scarf in her hands, walking further, going into the atrium, looking at the fountain in the center. She is very quiet. She seems almost thoughtful. Perhaps distracted.

A smile flits over Ivan's mobile, well-shaped mouth. She drifts. He follows: lean, dapper thing, hands in the pockets of his light linen slacks.

"Tomorrow then. Or perhaps we'll summon them to us."

The fountain is tiered; a stone fish spouts at the top. There are brass flowers floating in the moving water. Benches circle the fountain, and between the benches, plants. The back of the atrium is open to the beach beyond, though covered by a second-floor walkway.

"What are you thinking?" he asks.

Hilary turns slowly to observe him over her shoulder. Here in the shade of trees and stucco she has no need of her sunglasses; she reaches up and touches a rim, slides them down somewhat to look at him past the dark glass.

Says nothing. Then straightens her head, lifting her chin, and takes the shades completely off, folding them idly and gracefully in her hand, wrapping long pale fingers around them, the tips of her manicured nails touching the heel of her hand.

"Anton would like this garden," she says, stiffly, and immediately but unhurriedly turns away again, looking at the fish, the brass flowers.

Ivan is, for a beat, taken aback.

He recovers his footing quickly, though, and smoothly. Again he follows her as she wanders, his tread ever light.

"Well, that is the idea, isn't it?" he replies. "We're looking for a place where he can grow up. At least for a few years."

Hilary just stands by the fountain, scarf and sunglasses in her fair hands, her hair mostly loose but tied back, half up, held there by an ornate silver barrette that gleams against her dark, dark hair. She does not see him lose his guard for a moment. She thinks, looking in the water, listening to it, of --

Ivan's voice, nearer than it was a moment ago, interrupts that thought. But only a moment.

She regains her footing just as quickly.

"You would rather it be just the two of us," she murmurs.

Now a frown, flitting just as quick. He is silent a beat.

"I didn't say that," soft.

Her eyes flick to him, sharply. "Are you sure?" she asks, quietly.

He comes toward her. Reaches out to her; takes her lovely face between his lovely hands. It is just a moment's contact.

"Now what am I to say to that?" -- gently.

She pulls her face away, when his fingertips brush her cheeks. "Don't be coy. I do not lie to you. I've never hid the truth."

Ivan sighs. His hands slip back into his pockets. He looks away from her, toward the ocean, face turned to the warm breeze sweeping from that southern sea.

"Of course I'd rather it were just the two of us," he says. "I would always rather it were just the two of us. You must know that already. I've never made any pretense otherwise. But I can tolerate the boy, even like him now and then. And I do love him, in my way. That is more than I can say for most.

"What I don't understand is why you must drag all these unpleasant details out into the light of day when you know it'll only make you angry and sad."

"I'm not angry and sad," she says. Glances away, briefly, eyes hooded by her thick, dark lashes for a moment before flicking up again. She meets his eyes. Or watches his profile, as he looks at the ocean. "I ask because... I think it would nice, here. Warm, and near the sea. With good food, and beauty, and all the best things in life." She grows bold. She cares about this, says these things almost with distress, as though she has to say them aloud, and clearly, or they'll go away somehow. Like clapping to keep a fairy from dying (louder, louder).

"He could grow up in France with me, here. Visit Russia, when he wishes," she goes on. "I would like it if... he learned there, with you. How to... be a wolf. If he is." Her throat flashes, moves visibly as she swallows. "But... I am no good at deciding these things, for him," Hilary admits, her voice faltering. "I am not good, and I love him too much. I want to be here, and I love him, so I want him here, and I don't know if it would be good for him. I have no way of knowing if it would be okay. If he would be okay."

This: this upsets her. She sounds distressed, unsteady, but soldiering on. She sounds

sad.

But soldiers on, anyway.

"I don't want you to say yes only because I like it. I want you to tell the truth. Because he is very small," she says, talking a little faster with these last words, on the verge of open tears, her voice wavering with agitation, "and it is your duty to protect him."

Hilary exhales. She steadies herself; she does not fly apart. She looks at him, very very firmly, very seriously, and it is absurd again how hard she tries to be serious, to be an adult, to be a mother, to be a partner, when she isn't really entirely capable of any of these things. Not with Ivan, at least, who knows well enough to see beyond the farce. Not with Ivan, with whom she stopped pretending a long time ago.

She looks directly at him. Or at his profile. "And if you would resent him if we brought him here, and want another place for him, and this place just for us, then you still have to tell me the truth."

God, but he's vulnerable when it comes to her. Sometimes she says things -- sometimes the most absurd, childish, ridiculous things -- and his ribs curve in, his heart implodes. She denies that she is angry, that she is sad. She tells him: she likes it here. She tells him it is nice, and warm, and near the sea, and -- all these little details, all these things he wasn't even quite sure she was thoroughly aware of, let alone appreciative of. He did try. He does try, he always does, to do the right thing for her, to please her, to bring her places she will like. All the best things in life: oh yes, he understands what it is to want that for someone else.

Just not his son.

Just her.

--

He is looking at her by the time she tells him what it is she would like. He -- lovely, sharp, falcon-born creature -- watches her. Lovely, dark, falcon-born creature. His eyebrows spasm together when she says it, not good, too much, no way of knowing. She is distressed and he reaches out to her,

but not her face, merely her hand. His fingers threading through hers, tightening as she presses on. By the time she looks at him again, he is looking at their hands. Yet his eyes rise to meet hers, as though drawn, as though irresistible.

He has to think. But perhaps that is good: it means he isn't coming up with a lie. Ivan lies so effortlessly, so glibly. It is the truth that takes effort. Even with her.

"I think Anton would be happy here," he says softly. "I think he would grow up well. Better than he would in that Russian backwater, anyway. With every luxury that he could imagine, and perhaps with less callousness and cynicism and hardness than he would if he were to grow up in New York, London, something along those lines. He can learn those things when he is older, just as he can learn to be a wolf if and when the time comes.

"This can be your place. And his place. And our place. But perhaps I will buy another place. Maybe downtown. For us."

Oh, she's terrible: he reaches for her hand and she wriggles them away, shakes him off, and she doesn't even mean it as rejection. She doesn't want to be touched; she doesn't want to drop her sunglasses or her pretty scarf. She doesn't even think about how she could hurt him. She knows. She just forgets it so easily.

Ivan speaks. Tells her what he thinks. The truth.

Hilary takes it in stride.

"Or the other way around," she murmurs. "This place... could be for us. It's... away. You like it when we're away from people." See, Ivan: she knows what it is like to want good things for you, too. Sometimes.

Perhaps it stings -- but not badly. He is used to it; her selfishness, which is curiously unself-absorbed. She doesn't do it out of spite or arrogance or contempt. She does it because she quite literally doesn't know better. Doesn't know any other way.

His hand goes back into his pocket. He looks about the atrium, the golden light filtering through the greenery. Lush, lovely; a little retreat from the brilliance outside.

"The boy would appreciate this garden more than I would. Besides, no child should grow up downtown." He smirks a little: "It makes them faithless hedonists.

"At any rate," he adds, "I've always liked fucking you in skyscrapers."

Hilary gives him an exasperated little look, head to one side, when he talks of hedonists. She won't argue, though: one of them grew up in the country with the best tutors and one of them grew up in the city and she doesn't need to tell him which one of them turned out to be more well-heeled.

So she just gives him that look. It softens after a moment, though.

"It isn't the same," she insists. "All the places you said you loved. Where you felt like I was yours. They were not in cities. Not one of them. It was always away somewhere. Apart." Her brow wrinkles. "I want you to have that, too."

"Hm." It's a thoughtful sound. "I hadn't thought of it that way. Strange; I've always thought of myself as a city wolf." A small pause. "Curious that you saw it before I did.

"Well. Perhaps I'll build another cabin over the water. Or maybe I'll buy a little house on an island. That'd be nice, don't you think?"

"You are," she says, of his city-wolfness. Not that she hasn't seen him in the dark, naked, fresh from fucking her, staring out the high window of his house in Novgorod, looking over ancestral lands. Not that she hasn't seen it in him: the way he stands, the look in his eyes. But she has no words for it. No words to tell him that there is a part of him that is wild, and vicious, and thoroughly set apart from the city. "That is why you shall have a place in the city. Where I will go and visit. Where you can escape us."

She says this without rancor. She says it without pain.

"And near here, a place for you and I, alone. So I can walk there. And come back here. All by myself," she says firmly, "whenever I like. For however long I like. So I can be there. Alone, or with you. And be here with Anton, too."

It is quite possible this is the most decisive Hilary has been in -- months. Years? Who knows. Ivan isn't merely humoring her. He's listening.

"All right. I'll look around." On the tail of that assent, a small breath -- shoulders rising a little, falling. He steps closer to her; doesn't reach for her again this time. Simply stands there a while, relaxed, a slight and elegant slouch to his spine.

"I adore you quite utterly, you know." His mouth quirks; he is aware, at least, of his own ridiculousness. "If you don't come here and touch me soon, I might howl for you like those silly boys used to do."

Hilary wrinkles her nose. "Don't," she tells him, of howling like those silly boys. She looks away; there's a flicker of dismay to her brow. Somehow she doesn't enjoy the reminder.

But she looks out over the water, through archways, the blue faintly visible but always audible. "I want a house like the one I had before," she murmurs. "Like we had." Lifts her eyes, looking around. "But I want it like this."

Her eyes lower. She looks at him, having thoroughly ignored his adoration, his longing to be touched. "It feels old. Everything you like is always new and cold and gauche. You may have those things in the city. But I want something that feels like this place."

She doesn't say it to get his assent: she assumes his assent. And then she sighs. "Come," she says, and steps away. "I want a bath. Show me where the bath is."

Fine; so he is not touched. And he, to his credit, does not howl. He simply follows, keeping close even as she steps away.

"With a dance studio; is that what you mean?"

He has come abreast of her; guides her from the atrium into the interior of the house. It is entirely possible he is no more aware of the floorplan than she is, but then: he would not be a scout of the nation if he weren't good at deducing, figuring things out. They pass through a large open room; could serve as a game room, the like. They discover the kitchen, which feels old as well, lived-in and warm: the cabinetry dark wood, an impressive collection of pans hanging from the ceiling. Of course there is a gas stove, fit for a master chef.

They discover stairs. The second floor is airy, brighter than the first -- out of the shadow of the trees. Still those open windows, that salt-touched air. Curtains here though, light and gauzy. They pass several bedrooms, a study, a small library. They find the master suite.

She walks and he follows. She doesn't know where she is going. So she goes for a door, and she begins looking, wandering, trying to find the bath, a tub. She wonders if there is a window. She thinks of taking a bath while looking at the ocean. She feels him beside her, and then ahead of her, and then leading her.

This is when she catches his hand. This is when she moves shades and scarf to a single hand and reaches out, taking his hand in her own, following him with obedience. It happens so naturally. Her decisiveness, her firmity, her passion for these things, does not seem to have changed her nature whatsoever.

Hilary glances in the kitchen, watchful, but does no linger.

They find the master suite. She turns her head in the doorway and looks at him.

"Run me a bath," she says. "Run me a bath, and you can touch me."

Of course his eyes flare.

Of course he has that look on his face, dark and amused and hungry at once.

Of course he tries to kiss her, immediately, impatient greedy thing: tries to catch her mouth when she turns to look at him over her shoulder.

Hilary

Hilary jerks back, rearing her head away from him. Her hand twitches before her, as though she would attempt to slap him.

"Run me," she says again, levelly, "a bath."

There's a look on his face: alert and lazy, perceptive, scenting. His eyes flick between her mouth, her eyes. Down to her hand.

He draws back, then. Smirks. Brushes past her into the bathroom: stone and brass and dark muted woods, a very large tub, clawed feet. She was right: it feels old here; a sense of antiquity, ages and centuries. The towels are new, though, fresh and thick and folded. The basket of toiletries, bath salts, is new.

There's a window over the tub. Looks out over the ocean. There's no one around who can see in. The line of sight just isn't there. Ivan doesn't bother closing it. He cranks open the faucet, plugs the drain. His fingertips hover over the salts.

"Flowers or spices, devushka?"

The sound of rushing water hitting the stone fills the room, echoes off the tile and soaks its reverberations into the stucco walls. Hilary stands in the doorway still, watching Ivan as he slides past her, enters the room to serve her.

Usually this comes later: bathing her. Attending to her. Treating her like a good, sweet, soft pet. Usually this is how he comforts her, and himself, and brings the two of them together after whatever shattering thing they've done this time.

The last time a man ran her a bath, it wasn't Ivan. She does think of it: of Oliver, of how similar and dissimilar he is from Ivan in shape and form and attitude. She thinks of how he sat on the edge, testing the very hot water, eyeing her the way he did as she entered. She thinks of fucking him; remembers. Her head tips to the side.

She watches Ivan this time. His hair is getting too long. He is golden from their time in Maui.

He asks her a question, and she answers:

"Take off your shirt."

Softly her hair moves when she tips her head like that. Lets a little more light touch her face. Shifts the shadows under her jaw.

He sees all these things. He watches her as keenly as she watches him. Notes the details, the little things.

He doesn't smirk again. Doesn't scoff at her, say something witty and biting. He blinks once, slowly, like an animal. His lashes are long and they are the color of honey; a shade darker than his hair, but not so dark as his eyebrows. He reaches up to his open collar and starts to undo the buttons. The shirt is light, both in color and fabric; there are subtle stripes there, but otherwise the color is that of undyed cotton. His skin beneath is darker, richer, golden.

Still the water thunders.

There is a small table nearby, or counter: Hilary watches him for a moment, then -- as his fingers flick through his buttons -- she turns, setting scarf and sunglasses on that table. She reaches behind herself and undoes the barrette in her hair, setting it beside her shades. She shakes her hair out a little, fluffs it idly with a hand, turning to look at him again.

He is shrugging out of it now. She watches that: his bared shoulders, his toned arms. She leans in the doorframe, blindly and thoughtlessly removing her bracelets. They go with her hair clip, her shades, her silk scarf.

This reminds her of the first time, in a way: demanding that he undress himself for her. Staring at him, still clothed. She remembers the flash of his irritation at her ordering him around; she remembers how hard he was nonetheless, how he felt when she first took him in her mouth. How he breathed then, how he surrendered.

How she longed to surrender to him in kind. How she baited him and antagonized him and how in the end all she was doing was begging him: harder. harder.

Hilary's pulse is jumping beneath the friction-burnt flesh of her wrists. Her eyes are liquid, her gaze heavy and dark. She nods at Ivan as he is shedding his shirt, indicating his slacks. Off.

Hilary is not the only one to think of that first time. Ivan struggles to remember another time she's told him so bluntly: shirt. Slacks. Take it off. Surely it's happened, and yet nothing comes to mind. Little can come to mind; he's too fascinated by the movement of her fingers, her bracelets sliding off.

They undress for each other, little by little. It is excruciatingly slow. It is deeply erotic. Ivan can feel his pulse: in his ears, in his throat, straight down the center of his body to his cock. He licks his lips, and then he undoes his slacks. Slides them down, lets them fall. His body is as agile and smooth as it ever was. There's a thin line of hair beginning somewhere below his navel, running past the waistband of his ever-stylish boxer briefs. Today, they're a satiny white, trimmed in stark black. He isn't wearing socks. He kicks off his boat shoes.

And comes a little closer to her. Stands there in the middle of the spacious bathroom, the breeze warm on his back; his left hand wet where he'd tested the water.

She has never been stupid, or insensate, or oblivious. She is sometimes daft, distracted, disengaged, but these are at least in part decisive moves on her part: she does not pay attention or retain information because she does not wish to. It bores her. But she has as sharp a mind -- in some ways -- as any other paragon of their clan.

Since the first time he undressed in front of her, wearing those flashy undergarments he likes, she has known he likes to be looked at. His gaudy cars. His penthouse. The whores he used to surround himself with. His swimming briefs, with a shocking line of orange piping right up his cock. The night he came into a club, some time before he ever fucked her, and bought everyone there a round of drinks.

Hilary is far more demure, at least in public. At least when she is not wearing a mask at a party full of strangers. At least, too, right this moment: standing in her soft little sweater, her dove-gray pencil skirt, her heels. She takes off small pieces, one at a time, while demanding that he strip for her.

And he does. She crosses her arms lightly over her middle, leaning in the doorframe and watching him. Slacks. Shoes. He steps closer; she gives him a vague flicker of a look, a warning. But he is stopping; stands in the middle of the room.

Her eyes drop to his briefs, his cock. She wants to see it. She wants to see it hard and hot. She wants to see him touching it. She has never once indicated she would like to see this, never once had the fantasy cross her twisted mind, but there it is now, almost written across her face.

So she straightens. Her arms fall to her sides. She steps across the floor to him, comes to stand perhaps a foot away from his body, but she does not touch him.

Glances down again at his boxer-briefs. Looks into his eyes after that. "I want to watch you touch yourself," she says, her voice low, battered by the falling, falling water.

Ivan's eyebrow deflect upward. Ever so slightly.

There's a deliberation to the way he moves. Brings his right hand forward; pads of his fingers sliding along low waistband of his boxer briefs. Then down; strokes himself through the fabric. He hooks his thumb into the band. Tugs, easily, forward and down, frees his cock and pushes the undergarment lower. Not all the way off. Just to his thighs. Just far enough.

Ivan is quite ambidextrous when it comes to knifework; when it comes to fondling her, stroking her, getting her off. He can use a fork with both hands. He can even write with both hands.

He strokes off with his right, though. She can see that now. All these years and this is when she discovers this small, ridiculous tidbit of trivia about her lover. First a few backhanded tugs; then reversing his grip. His stance widens a little. He settles into it, nostrils flaring, a strip of musculature standing out from forearm to bicep to chest.

His eyes are on her. He has very little shame. He nods at her clothing:

"Take your sweater off."

Her lips part. When he touches himself through his clothes. Perhaps she means to speak, to protest, insist that she wants to see it. Perhaps it's merely a gasp, that little intake of breath. But she says nothing, either way. He bares himself, just enough. And she is staring at him now, staring at his cock, at his hand, at the tension in his arm.

Her tongue slips out, wetting her upper lip, then lower, before disappearing again. Her instincts tell her to get on her knees. To feel the hard floor on her joints, to put her hands on his hips, to worship him. But something stops her. She could not tell you if you asked.

He speaks, breaking her reverie for a moment. Hilary looks at him. "I will," she says, caught between this game she is playing, these things she wants, and the submission that is so much more familiar, comfortable, natural to her. She takes a breath and looks at his cock again. "Don't stop," and this sounds like a command,

but it is really a plea.

Hilary licks her lips again.

--

A few more strokes, then, unless he stops. Unless her torments her, unless he refuses to please her if she won't obey him. Unless he reaches over, rips that fine cashmere right off of her. A few more strokes of his hand, and Hillary can barely keep herself standing. She moves her hands to her side, arms crossed, and lifts her sweater up, up over her flat belly, her full breasts, past her thick, dark hair. She drops it on the ground between them.

Her bra is a pale pink balconette, a tiny white ribbon between her breasts. Hillary does not immediately reach for the zipper of her skirt. She stands there before him, letting him look at her. Wanting him to look at her, look at her tits, while he jerks off.

She almost can't stand it.

It's not as though he's just putting on a show, unaffected. The cadence of his breath changes when her hands go to the hem of her sweater. His eyes flash when she tugs it off. Her hair comes loose. She drops the sweater.

He is staring at her breasts. He's stroking himself a little faster now, an unconscious and instinctive acceleration. Licks his lips. Rubs the head of his cock in his hand for a moment, a rolling, rippling motion. His breath catches a moment, then releases.

Soft: "Are you going to take your skirt off?"

"I will," she murmurs, again, this time without hesitation, but no louder or firmer than before. Promise; submission. Denial.

Hilary takes a step closer to him. The toe of her heels crushes the edge of her cashmere. He can see the lift of her breasts when she breathes. He can hear her breath, close to panting.

Her hands lift, moving to the back of her skirt, folding back the way they do when he ties her up sometimes. She pinches the tab of a hidden zipper, but does not draw it down yet.

"Will you come on me?" she whispers back to him.

She's never --

but she wants it now. Asks for it, now.

She's never.

They've never. Any of this. Not like this, anyway. Not after everything, after he knows her, knows the truth of her, knows how much she craves submission, surrender, punishment -- and yes -- to be taken care of. The seaside air is humid, but it feels electric. His lips part when she reaches for her zipper.

She has terms. She has demands; or perhaps it is a pretty form of begging. Ivan closes his eyes, muffles a groan. Opens his eyes.

"Where do you want it?"

Well: she doesn't seem to know how to answer that. He can see the flicker in her eyes, not quite uncertainty and a little closer to surprise. Perhaps she didn't think that far. Her breath catches. She doesn't answer, looking down, keeping her eyes on his hands, his cock, as she pulls on her zipper. It whispers apart behind her, and she tugs the narrow skirt off her hips, til it passes her thighs and can fall from her legs, pooling around her feet. Her panties match her bra; of course they do. Pink and lace, high-cut, the back not quite entirely covering that tiny ass of hers. Little white bow in front.

Hilary lifts her eyes to look at him then, his face, which she loves.

"Stay," she whispers, and steps out of her skirt. Kicks it aside. Walks past him, barely brushing his left arm, her heels clicking on the terracotta. She goes to the tub and leans over its edge, cranking off the faucet. The rush of water comes to an abrupt end, followed by a faint and brief dripping.

Rising, Hilary turns again, looking at him from behind for a moment. Walks back in front of him, closer than she was before. Her heels are nearly between his feet; her body is nearly against his. She can feel his hot exhalations against her breasts, and every time his hand strokes upward she sways forward, almost close enough for his knuckles to brush against her belly.

She puts her hands on him: smooth palms on his shoulders, and then his chest, as she steps forward again, closer, where now he can't keep going without rubbing against her. She can feel his half-off boxer-briefs against her thighs; his heartbeat under her palm. When she feels his hand on her stomach, or the tip of his cock, she gasps.

Hasn't answered his question. Maybe doesn't know the answer. Just: on her. Please. Use her like this. Show her how pretty she is.

Hilary's lips are open now, her breathing shallow. She leans forward, closing her eyes as though she were a romantic, tilting her head to kiss him.

Ivan's skin is hot to the touch. He inhales when she puts her hands on him; exhales sharp when her palms smooth over his chest. She's closer now. And then closer yet. His knuckles brush her skin. She raises her face to be kissed, and

of course he kisses her. Closes that small gap between them with hungry intensity. He eats at her mouth while he strokes himself, furiously; moans into that kiss. One might expect him to grab her, put his hands on her, take her by the throat even -- but he doesn't. He kisses her, and all other touch is incidental; the back of his hand rubbing against her belly; his cock brushing her skin.

That kiss slips apart when he comes. When he, quite frankly, jerks himself off onto her body. His teeth part, his mouth opens -- he pants and groans into that small humid space between their mouths; eyes closed, brow knit. Beneath her hands, his body shudders, instinctive and uncontrolled.

Hilary has her eyes closed when he kisses her. She kisses him back tastingly, saturating herself in the errant, overwhelmed sounds he's making. She's never quite heard him like this -- or has never quite listened to him like this, too far gone in her own right. Has he ever come for her, when she hasn't been so far gone she was not sure where she was?

He has never come on her like this. It's possible, even likely, that no one ever has. When he does, his lips leaving hers, Hilary opens her eyes. She feels it hot and wet on her skin, flicking upwards toward her breasts, soon dripping down toward her pantyline. Her lips are parted, too. She looks down, watching the very end of his orgasm.

It is possible she has never even seen this, like this. Has Hilary ever watched pornography? She was a virgin when she was first mated, sheltered and unknown, unknowing, unknowable. She looks at him with a sort of captivated curiosity, fascination, open lust.

He makes a filthy mess of her, and she feels... worshiped. She looks at herself as he's coming down, catching his breath, stroking the last waves of pleasure out of his own body. And still looking down, still touching him, Hilary lowers herself to her knees,

opens her mouth,

and wraps her lips around his head, softly licking him clean in broad, slow swipes of her tongue.

They've never done this before.

He's never done this before: not like this. Not with her; not with anyone. Not so surrenderingly; giving himself over utterly to pleasure while his lover watched. Afterward, while she is looking at him, looking at her, his eyes are closed. He is only holding his cock in his hand, almost protectively; unable to let go, unable to touch himself further. His brow rests against hers. He is sweating and panting, out of breath, his control reduced to ribbons.

She goes to her knees. His eyes snap open. His brow contorts; he starts to murmur -- "No," he manages, and then: "Oh. God."

His hands fall away -- held away a few inches from his sides, as though levitated by the very sensation she gives him. His head falls back. He bucks against her mouth, gasps, wants to take her head in his hands, doesn't. They're so filthy, after all, and she is so pure.

--

Eventually, if she doesn't draw back herself, he does stop her. Touches her cheek with the relatively cleaner back of his hand; eases her away gently but firmly.

A long slow breath raises his chest and lowers it. He takes a half-dazed step back, looks about. Washes his hands in the sink; takes a washcloth from the stack of folded towels and wets it. Comes back to her, drawing her up by the hand.

Maybe it means something that even now, wrecked as he is, Ivan thinks to see to his lover first. He wipes up the mess he left carefully. He cleans her.

Another woman would pull away when her lover said no. It's a clear enough signal. It means stop. It means he doesn't want what she's about to do. She should know better, but Hilary has never known better. 'No' doesn't mean much between them, most times. Not when they're like this. She doesn't strictly ignore him, though; her eyes look up at him as he murmurs it, then as he moans, groaning out to a god he doesn't believe in.

Hilary watches him as she licks him. He fucks her mouth a little, and she is so overcome with love and arousal at once that she wants to cry. She starts to suck him off in earnest, perhaps not realizing how sensitive he is, how much he can't stand it, but he shows her soon enough: the back of his hand to her cheek, a reminder of the sort of way he doesn't usually hit her, easing her off of him.

She licks her lips again, looking up at him. Kneeling where she is. He steps away and she watches, hands on her knees, cum on her belly, having rolled down to the edge of her panties. She turns her head to look at him, wandering around in his half-down boxer briefs. Silently, she wonders why he washes his hands. Is watching him as he comes back with the wet cloth, gives him her hand obediently, and rises to her feet.

Hilary says nothing to him as he, breath still shaking somewhat, eyes glassy, begins to wipe her clean. Her belly twitches under his ministrations; she thinks of stopping him, telling him no, leave it, as though it wouldn't come off in the bath they're supposedly going to take together. But she doesn't stop him. She reaches for him, and she strokes his hair while he cleans her off.

"I love you," she whispers, and it comes awkwardly to her. She isn't screaming it. Isn't begging him. Isn't overcome. She just... has a feeling. And for once, it is spurred -- not dampened -- by his softness, those moments of helplessness when he came against her, that loss of control that in so many other instances left her cold toward him.

"And you love me," she also whispers, like this is a good thing. Like it is somehow, after all this time, new to her. Still strikes her as strange: a new discovery, every time she finds herself knowing, and believing it.

He is folding the wet washcloth over in his hand when she touches him. He is wiping her again, a second time to make sure she's clean, when she whispers what she does.

Ivan stops, then. He looks at her, surprised; a beat after, rather overcome. He cradles her head in his hand. Presses his brow to hers, and then tilts his head; kisses her mouth. It is a very gentle kiss. It is almost chaste.

"Yes," he affirms, "I do. And you do too."

The washcloth is tossed in the vague direction of the hamper. And then Ivan wraps his arms around his strange, haunting lover; embraces her rather tightly.

It is almost too much for her, all this tenderness and gentleness and softness. She has her limits; they come quickly sometimes. She takes a breath as he grips her, holds her, and he can feel the first flickers of resistance... but not rejection. It's not that. She's uncertain. She's wary. She doesn't know how to be like this, or behave. Instinct only takes her so far, and her instincts are a rope bridge across a chasm.

It isn't that anyone else is faring better: everyone is over a chasm. Everyone's instincts are shaky. But Hilary's chasm does not seem to have an end; and she is always trying to make these crossings in the dark of night, in sky-shattering storms. And her instincts have failed her too many times for her to trust them.

So she trembles a little, uneasy, not quite wanting this embrace, this tightness in his arms. And not knowing why. Only knowing it scares her.

Ivan knows she's uneasy. Self-centered, entitled, overprivileged he: nonetheless so attuned to her; so aware of every fiber and molecule of her now that he could sense her distress in the darkness, blindfolded, across a crowded room.

He holds her just another moment. Squeezes a little; kisses her wherever his mouth finds her. On an inhale, he releases her, his hands rubbing gently over her shoulders before falling away.

He gets rid of his boxer briefs, finally. And leaning over the bath, swiping his fingertips through the water to make certain it's still warm enough, he murmurs: "Shall I take care of you now?"

Strange, this answer. She knows it as he draws away and her breath comes easier. She tips her head, watching him.

"I just... want a bath. You can share, if you want."

As much as anything, this surprises him. Ivan straightens; he's almost taken aback. "You don't need me to -- "

There he trails off. Tilts his head, watching her. Nods, eventually, holding his hand out to her.

"We'll share."

When surprise writes itself across his face, Hilary's eyes flash. She looks ready to lash out, defend herself, prove that she knows her own mind, no she doesn't need him --

They stare at each other, like animals, wary and strange. She does not know how to do this, is not yet good at this. She is trying, little by little. Swallows, and crosses over to him, still in her lingerie, her earrings, her heavy red diamond, even her high heels.

But she doesn't take his hand. She nods at the water, reaching up to unclasp her earrings. "Get in. I'll follow."

So Ivan gets it. Steps into the large tub, the deep water. Gripping the sides of the tub, he lowers himself in. Excess water drains. He looks up, waiting for Hilary to join him.

So Hilary removes her earrings. Sets them aside. She removes her ring, too. She puts her hand on the edge of the tub and bends slightly, reaching behind her, leg bent at the knee, to unclasp her left heel. Removes that, then lifts her other foot, removing her right heel.

She straightens, folding her arms behind her back to unclasp her bra, watching Ivan as she takes it off. Proves to him, perhaps, that she can do things like dress herself, undress herself, do her own hair, even without her girl.

The breeze through the room and her arousal is enough to make her nipples stand on end. She drops her bra on the floor near his underwear, his shirt. Slips her manicured fingers under her panties and pushes them down, rolls them off her thighs, steps out of them. She leans over, reaching for her barrette again, twisting her hair up clasping it in place to keep it out of the way.

Then she gets into the bath. Steps over the side and between his legs, turning her back to him. Lowers herself in front of him, slowly into the steaming water, sighing. There is no tub on the jet, just a shower cubicle. Of course she wanted a bath: luxuriant, decadent. Stretches her legs out before she leans back, settling her back against his chest. She makes a low, relaxing sound, closing her eyes.

It's a little while before she speaks, but when she does, she murmurs:

"I liked that."

Her breasts lift slightly from the surface of the water as she breathes; descend again, covered in water again.

"I would like it if you would do that sometimes to me," she goes on, softly, opening her eyes and looking at the fixtures on the tub. "Perhaps while I'm tied."

She licks her lips, taking another shallow, heady breath.

"When I've been bad," she whispers. It's almost lost in the sound of water lapping against the sides of the tub. "And don't deserve to be fucked."

They are such elegant creatures. Ivan lounges in the tub like a prince on his throne: leaning back, arms rested on the rims. A bead of water hangs from his fingertip. Rivulets glisten on his chest as he breathes, slow and even, his eyes watching her every move.

As she sets aside her jewelry.

As she undoes her bra.

As she slips off her lingerie and steps into the bath.

He's aroused again at the very sight of her: the diffuse seaside light striking off her skin. The shape of her body, her unconscious grace engrained by years of ballet; eons of breeding. His hand follows her leg as she turns; drifts up to her thigh, her hip, as she sinks down.

She settles. The heel of his hand rubs idly, thoughtlessly over her thigh. She speaks and it is an effort to breathe evenly, lightly. She tells him what she would like. How she would like it.

Ivan is silent. But his hand drifts slowly, gently, purposefully inward, following her curve of her thigh, skimming toward her cunt.

He touches her thigh as she gets in. As she settles. He touches her under the water as she speaks, idly conversing about some future erotic encounter that hasn't yet begun, isn't yet considered except in the abstract. They don't quite plan these things. It just happens.

Is happening now, except --

Hilary turns her head, not quite looking at him past her shoulder. "I am taking a bath," she says evenly, warningly, "to relax."

So he withdraws his hand.

So he pulls his hand from underwater, altogether; hangs it over the side of the tub again. Ivan leans his head back too. Exhales, a rush.

"As you say, devushka," he murmurs.

What she feels is a flicker of disappointment. A desire, even a longing, for Ivan to ignore her, to grip her arm with his left hand and force her thighs apart with his right, teeth beside her ear, snarling that she'll shut up and take it if it pleases him. Even this thought, errant as it is, makes her almost arch with sudden lust.

Outwardly, Hilary breathes in, her eyelids flickering as she turns her head away again, leaning her head on his chest, his shoulder. Entirely possible his arousal presses his newly hardened cock against her. Just as possible that the warmth and comfort of orgasm, of the bath, of having her near, keeps Ivan calm.

And somehow, despite her wavering disappointment at not being abused, Hilary calms, too. She settles against him and closes her eyes, feeling his heart beating through her chest, against her back, suffusing her with his warmth. Her breathing slows as she listens to the ocean just a short walk from this house, this villa with its courtyard garden that they agree their small son would enjoy. She thinks of him living here, with redhaired Elodie and sour Polina and faithful Miron. She thinks of leaving her room here to see him splashing his hands in the fountain with the fish. Thinks of his strange Russian-French upbringing, of him turning golden like his father as he spends his early life on an isolated but beautiful shore, always sun-touched. Near enough a city to keep him from becoming a yokel. Thinks of trips to Novgorod and his house there, of playing in snow, learning to row the little boat on his little pond long before he realizes it all belongs to him.

She thinks of a little retreat nearby, perhaps at the end of a half-hidden path, where she can go to be away from redhaired Elodie and sour Polina and faithful Miron and beautiful Anton. Where she can go, when she cannot stand the weight of her own heart and soul or thinks she might claw the boy's face if he makes another sound, or when she wants to dance and not be looked at or spoken to; when she wants to disappear. A very small place, not even as large as the lake house Ivan built her, but large enough for her to dance, to cook, to sleep, bathe, invite her lover or reject him, to be alone in her own skin, to own her own skin.

Her eyes open and turn to the window, unshuttered, where she can see the smear of pale blue that indicates the sun-drenched ocean. She thinks of Ivan in the city. He would still travel; she knows by now he would not stay. He never did. Never will. But he could live here, as he lived in Chicago. Could easily go to Marseilles or Rome or even Paris he gets bored; she likes the idea of him living in Europe. Neither of them are, at least in Hilary's mind, American Fangs. Her son certainly isn't. He will grow up speaking three languages at least. He'll learn a smattering of Italian, Spanish, German. They'll take him skiing in the Alps. He will learn to hunt in Russia with his father. How to kill.

He will love her. She does not even doubt this, question it, worry for it, though perhaps she should. He is her soul; how could he not love her as she loves him? As she loved and loves her mother and father, her brother, all so long gone, all so twisted.

Hilary closes her eyes again, resting in the warm bath with her beloved. He will be near to her. She can go to him when the seaside bores her, and enjoy whatever sleek penthouse he chooses for himself. She likes that idea: to have her own little place where she can push him away. To go to him, his place, his domain. She needs him to have his own place, to make his control complete, to make her submission total. To escape this fantasy that they are parents, that they are a family. To go to the theater, to go to dinner. To fly away.

Her chest moves as she breathes in, deeply, sighs an exhale.

"Here," she whispers to him. "Let's stay here. All of us."