Thirteen ◑ The Bedroom

The investigations passed by like a breeze, so much so that Lucille only remembered fragments of it. The investigators showing up early, the employees being patted down and asked to leave the premises. . . .

It was all a blur, but she did remember questioning the procedure of getting patted down. She found it pointless; it should've been done yesterday. Cade would've had a better chance of finding who'd done it. She remembered wanting to point this out to him when he'd joined her outside the office. But it also occurred to her that she was the culprit, and the last thing she wanted was to get caught.

Yeah, she was that confused. She was just floating around, basically.

She was still out of it by the time she drove home. Her body was on autopilot. Agnes noticed, but as usual, she knew better than to ask. She just fixed up Lucille's bed and prepared for a meal for when she'd wake up.

Little did Lucille know that waking up wouldn't be as smooth as falling asleep.

Tired. Lucille was tired. It was in her bones, the exhaustion. She barely closed over the silk robe over herself before sinking onto the mattress, the cotton sheets as soft as clouds beneath her. The covers settled over her body like an embrace as she closed her eyes and waited for the day to end.

And it didn't take long. Only a few seconds passed, and now she was lost in a dark and dreamless sleep.

She was glad for the absence of scenes and sounds, but the pitch black wasn't comforting either. If anything, it felt empty, sinister. It gave her the sensation of falling down an abyss, rapid and intense and endless. Her stomach was constricting inside her body. She opened her mouth to scream, but she found that she was as hollow as the place she was in—

Lucille woke with a gasp.

Her head was still spinning, throbbing at the temples. And by God, her throat was dry. Her lips were chapped as well, a feat she hadn't achieved since lip balm was invented.

Okay, this should be sorted out. Immediately. She didn't want to go to work tomorrow looking like she smeared ground cereal on her mouth.

Turning on the lamp on her nightstand, Lucille swept her feet off the bed and got up.

Apart from the muffled hum of cars in the restless streets of the night, the suite was completely silent. Lucille figured that Agnes was already in bed, so she tried to move as quietly as she could. She treaded on the carpet barefoot and let her eyes adjust to the limited light to avoid bumping into anything. But weirdly enough, there was a glare filtering through the cracks of the door.

Maybe Agnes was awake. Or maybe she'd forgotten to turn off the lights in the hallway.

With a frown, Lucille opened the door.

And what met her wasn't the hallway. She was in a place that didn't belong to her suite at all.

She found herself standing in another bedroom. Not just any bedroom too. This one had pristine marble walls decorated with frescoes. The floor was a giant tile mosaic, depicting humanoid figures arranged in a strange banquet scene. Black jars with orange paintings were set on stone tables. Even the bed in the center of the room was made of stone, carved with intricate symbols and faces, and surrounded by white gossamer-thin curtains.

A jarring kind of familiarity tugged at Lucille's mind. However, she wasn't able to process it, because she just realized she wasn't alone.

Standing behind the curtains at the side of the bed was a man, tall and lithe, naked apart from the strip of white fabric draped precariously around his hips.

Lucille froze mid-step. The man turned around.

And she nearly shrieked when she saw that it was Dimitri.

Really? Again? And he just had to be barely dressed this time too, with his wavy hair wet and his body glistening with droplets of water.

Was she tripping? Was she hallucinating? Because it was bad enough that she was in a strange bedroom inside her own home. She didn't want to be alone with this know-it-all too, no matter how delicious he looked right now.

Lucille wheeled around to open her bedroom door, but it was no longer there. A solid marble wall had taken its place, leaving her trapped in her own version of Narnia.

And Dimitri was watching her now, doing nothing to cover himself up.

The light from the lamps around the room casted some of his features in shadow, but it emphasized a lot of things too. Especially from his neck down. The dude wasn't seriously ripped, but it didn't matter. He was toned and tanned and firm, just strong-looking in every way. Veins were protruding along his arms, his chest and stomach rippling with muscles. There was something graceful about him too. Beautiful, even. The fabric around his hips didn't do much to hide what was underneath either, and it was just begging to be yanked off—

Okay, no. Lucille shouldn't be thinking of stripping him naked. She shouldn't be mesmerized right now. She shouldn't be feeling like she wanted him.

But she did want him.

It wasn't just a spark of lust, not a mere uncontrollable, normal instinct. It was more than that. She could feel the heat of it in her veins. A sense of longing, desperation, and hopelessness. Like he was someone she yearned for but never had. Like the very presence of him was a sign of rejection.

The weird thing was, it didn't even seem to be directed at Dimitri himself. At least not at the version of him that she knew well. It was as though they were assuming the roles of two different people. They were actors at this point, both begging to be heard.

"You're here," Lucille said in a voice not quite her own. "You're finally home."

"Yes, I couldn't wait to see you," he said, but he made no move to approach her.

"You'll run away again this time, won't you?" She meant to say that as an accusation, but it came out as a plea instead. "You'll avoid me. You won't tell me what's going on."

"There's nothing going on," Dimitri assured her, but his tone had a bite of impatience in it. For some reason, hearing that hint of annoyance pinched her heart, even though the real Dimitri had snapped at her a thousand times in their thousand years of knowing each other. "There's really nothing, my love."

My love. Oh, this wasn't the real Dimitri, alright.

However, Lucille couldn't dismiss the version of him in front of her. She was forcibly following a script. "Then prove it. If there's nothing, prove it."

"How?" He walked around the bed, but he didn't come any closer. "How do I prove it to someone who doesn't believe me?"

To her horror, tears started to flow down her cheeks. "And how can I not doubt someone who doesn't bother to explain?"

More tears. Her chest was tight. She didn't want to cry; it made her feel weak and pathetic. Overcome with genuine shame, she hid her face in her palms and turned to go.

Dimitri crossed the room in long strides, taking her by the wrists and keeping her in place.

Without saying a word, he tenderly pried her hands off her face. She wanted to bury her face on his chest to avoid meeting his eyes, but he cupped her cheeks with both of his hands and brushed her tears away with his thumbs. His fingers were warm against her ears, and the heat of it spread all over her skin. Slowly, he lifted her chin and placed a soft, almost tentative kiss on her parted lips.

Her eyes fluttered shut. Resonating in her body, deep into her bones, was a fiery emotion that she didn't want to name.

Lucille closed the remaining distance between them, pressing her body against his. She put her palms on his chest, feeling his heart pick up its pace as his tongue swept inside her mouth. She writhed against him, and he responded by playfully biting her lower lip. This alone was enough to melt her, but he didn't do anything to support her weight.

Instead, Dimitri lowered his head and trailed kisses down her neck.

A sigh escaped Lucille. She knew that this was wrong, for her to take pleasure in this, but every time his lips touched her skin, she lost a bit of her reason. She was losing her mind, losing herself in him—his mouth and his scent and his touch.

Her eyes fluttered shut. She threw her arms around his neck and pulled him urgently. Greedily. Desire was pooling at the pit of her stomach, and it was taking over. She felt the familiar ache in her core, the pull that he alone was able to create.

But Dimitri was as patient as ever.

His touch was feathery light, his kisses sweet and lingering. His hands roamed around her waist, up her back, and into her hair, shifting his focus from her neck to her collarbones and back again. He didn't seem to have any intentions of taking it any further. It seemed that he knew how eager she was being, and then he decided to make her wait. To let her feel.

And feel she did. Her blood swam like hot liquor. He was barely doing anything yet he was making her head spin.

God, it had been years. Years since she'd been with a man. And the one in front of her was unlike any other. He alone could stir her up with a look and have her begging for more. She wanted his hands all over her, his lips all over her. She wanted to him to fill her up. She wanted him and him alone.

Wild and fast and hard. Right now, again and again.

And maybe this time, he wouldn't choose to leave.

Now, she thought resolutely, reaching to tug the fabric off his hips, but he stepped back.

Then, he began to ease the edges of her robe down her shoulders, staring at her like he was daring her to protest. When she didn't, he resumed his slow torture.

"You know you're the only one," he murmured, nuzzling his way down her chest, between her breasts. "It's just you. It's always been just you."

He tugged the strap of her robe and parted the silk that closed over her stomach. Gracefully, he knelt before her as though to worship, grabbing the back of her thighs to pull her close.

Lucille reached down, raked through his hair, and caressed his face. "I love you."

Dimitri stopped and smirked. "I know."

He pulled away once more, and that was when Lucille noticed the gaping wound in her abdomen. Blood trickled from the deep cut in rivulets, thick and hot.

And in his hand was one of her knives, covered in her own blood.