Isla
The silence hit harder than the applause ever did. I left the gallery hours ago. The echo of it still clung to my skin the scent of white wine and perfume, the distant ghost of Damien's gaze.
My studio apartment greeted me like a wound that hadn't scabbed. Bare floors. A mattress on the ground. A half-finished canvas in the corner I couldn't bring myself to destroy. This space had become my rebellion all peeling walls and brutal honesty. Nothing like his penthouse, where desire came wrapped in cruelty and silk sheets.
I stripped out of the clothes I wore to the gallery. The shirt stuck to the sweat on my back like a second skin. My lipstick was smudged. My ribs ached from holding my breath. I walked to the sink. Poured a glass of water with shaking hands. Drank like it might rinse the night out of me. It didn't.
Damien was still there in every breath, every shallow inhale. He haunted the edges of this place like he'd built it too. I sat on the mattress. The envelope with the contract was still on the floor. Unread. Unneeded. But not untouched.
I picked it up, flipped it over in my hands like it might tell me what the fuck I was still doing here. One week. That's all that was left. Seven days before I disappeared from his world completely. Seven days before he let me go or didn't.
I should have burned it. Instead, I opened my laptop. My finger hovered over his name in my inbox. Damien Valerius. I didn't click it. I couldn't. I closed the laptop. Laid back. Stared at the ceiling like it might have answers. My feet still ached from standing in those heels. My chest still burned from the way he looked at "Red Mouth."
Like he saw the exact version of himself I had painted without mercy and he didn't look away. He fucking touched it. That canvas wasn't a painting. It was a scream. And he reached for it like it could save him or maybe he wanted to drown in it.
Maybe that was all either of us ever did drown in things we were never meant to survive. I turned over. Faced the wall and tried to convince myself that what I needed now was peace. Not pain. Not him.
The knock didn't come. The door didn't creak. He didn't text. Didn't call. Didn't give me a second to prepare. The door opened like it belonged to him and maybe it did. Damien stepped inside like he'd never left like he still owned the silence between these walls. Still owned me.
He was in a dark wool coat, suit beneath it, rain slicking the shoulders. His tie was loosened. His jaw was tight. His eyes were wrecked but cold. God, still so fucking cold.
"Are you going to ask me to leave?" His voice was low. Controlled. Dangerous.
I didn't answer. I didn't move. I sat on the mattress in nothing but an oversized tee, my legs bare, hair damp from a too-hot shower that failed to burn him out of me. He closed the door behind him. The lock clicked into place like a final breath.
"You shouldn't be here," I said, my voice quieter than I meant it to be.
"But I am."
His shoes were soaked. His coat dripped a small puddle onto the worn floorboards. But he didn't seem to notice. His entire focus was on me. Centred. Unyielding.
"Say it," he added, voice dark. "Tell me to go."
"I should."
"But you won't."
I hated how he knew me. How he tasted the words I didn't say before I even thought them. He moved slowly. Not towards me. Not yet. His hands went to his coat. He peeled it off. The shirt underneath was tight against his chest, soaked and clinging. The wet fabric made him look brutal. Raw. Stripped.
He dropped the coat on the floor. Walked toward me with that deliberate kind of control that made every muscle in my body go alert.
"What are you doing here?" I asked.
He stood in front of me. Not touching. Just watching.
"I needed to see it again."
"What?"
His hand lifted. Hovered near my face. "The woman who painted me like a god and a monster in the same stroke."
I stood. Slowly. We were eye to eye now, and I hated the way my breath hitched. Hated how every inch of distance felt like a lie. He didn't touch me yet. But when he finally did... His fingers grazed the side of my neck, tracing the pulse he could feel under my skin.
"You want me gone, Isla?" he asked again.
I didn't answer because I didn't know anymore because wanting him was a kind of violence I'd stopped resisting. I stepped forward first Just one inch. It was enough.
He pulled me in like gravity mouth crashing down on mine with a hunger that was pure annihilation. No softness. No apology. His tongue claimed mine like a war cry. His hands gripped my waist like he meant to bruise it. He kissed me like he needed it to breathe. I moaned into his mouth, my fingers tangled in his wet shirt, clawing at him like I could tear through to whatever heart he kept buried beneath all that power and control.
He pulled away only long enough to rip the shirt over his head buttons flying. My tee followed fast. We weren't making love. We were falling apart. Together.
"Tell me you hate me," he whispered against my skin.
"I do," I breathed.
He slammed me back against the wall with a thud, my legs wrapping around his waist instinctively.
"Lie better."
His hand slid down between us, fingers pressing against the damp heat between my thighs through my panties. I gasped hips bucking, breath stolen.
"You're soaked," he growled. "From hating me?"
His fingers pushed the fabric aside.
"Or from this?"
Two fingers slid into me and my spine arched, mouth open in a silent scream.
"You think I don't know your body by now?" he whispered in my ear. "You think I don't feel how tight you get when I'm inside you, how you pulse around me when I talk like this?"
"Damien—"
He pushed deeper. Harder. Curling his fingers inside me while his thumb circled my clit like he was tuning an instrument only he knew how to play.
"You walked away tonight. But you didn't walk far."
He kissed my neck. My collarbone. Bit down hard enough to leave a mark.
"I could fuck you right here against this wall until you forget how to spell your own name."
I whimpered. Bucked. He dropped to his knees. Yanked my panties all the way off. His mouth replaced his fingers. Tongue ruthless. Lips merciless. I collapsed against the wall, thighs trembling, one hand braced above me, the other tangled in his hair as he devoured me like he was starving and I was his last goddamn meal. His tongue circled, teased, then plunged deep inside me, moaning into my heat like the taste of me was an addiction he'd never kicked. I came with a cry that shook the room.
He didn't stop. Didn't pause. He stood again, dragging me to the mattress like a man possessed. Condom. Wallet. Ripped open. Rolled on. He positioned himself at my entrance and looked at me. Eyes wild. Voice low.
"You still want me gone?"
I grabbed his face.
"No."
He thrust into me with one brutal, perfect stroke, burying himself to the hilt. My scream caught in his mouth as he kissed me again and again. Our bodies moved like they were made for this kind of madness. Skin to skin. Breath to breath. Flesh and fire. He fucked me like he was furious at the fact that I ever left. Like he wanted to carve himself into me and I let him because at that moment I was done pretending.
Damien's grip tightened on my hips as he drove into me, over and over, like he was trying to anchor himself inside my body. Like every thrust was an argument he refused to lose. The mattress groaned beneath us. I was clawing at his back, thighs wrapped tight around his waist, lost in a rhythm that didn't care about grace only domination. Every movement a message. You're mine. You're not done. You never will be.
My moans turned to gasps as he shifted slightly, hitting deeper, harder, angling with the kind of precision that felt like punishment.
"Fuck—" I choked out, nails sinking into his skin.
He grunted, low and primal. "Say it."
"What?"
"That you're mine."
He pulled almost all the way out, holding just at the edge. "Say it or I stop."
I glared at him, panting. "You wouldn't."
"Try me."
The stillness was torture. My body clenched around nothing, aching for him, aching with him.
"Yours," I spat. "I'm yours. Happy?"
He slammed back into me so hard I saw stars. "Ecstatic." He flipped me over in one brutal motion, dragging my hips up and slamming into me from behind, one hand fisting in my hair, the other wrapped around my throat just tight enough to make my breath catch.
"Look at yourself," he growled.
He dragged the bedside mirror closer, angling it just so. "Look at how you fall apart on my cock."
I met my reflection flushed cheeks, swollen lips, eyes glazed with lust and rage and the unholy truth that he was right. I didn't look in control. I looked wrecked. Still, I pushed back into him. I didn't want gentle. I wanted this.
The slap came without warning. A sharp smack to my ass that echoed through the room and made me gasp.
"You like that," he muttered, almost to himself. "You like being ruined."
"Keep talking," I dared him, voice hoarse.
He leaned forward, lips at my ear. "You like being used."
I clenched around him so hard he groaned.
"You want me to fuck you until you cry. Until your legs stop working. Until the only thing you remember is my name."
His pace turned feral. No more rhythm. No more restraint. Just chaos. I was shaking, the pleasure building again too fast, too violent. He felt it.
"Come again for me, Isla. Now."
His hand moved between my legs, rubbing fast, rough circles on my clit, and the orgasm slammed into me like a freight train. I screamed his name, shaking under him, thighs convulsing. He followed a second later with a growl torn from deep in his chest, his whole body tensing above mine as he came. We collapsed.
He didn't pull out right away. Didn't speak. Just breathed heavy into the crook of my neck, both of us shaking, drenched in sweat and something far more dangerous. Silence poured back in like a cold tide and this time… it didn't feel comforting. It felt final.
The silence was sharp now. Not just the kind that stretches after sex not heavy with comfort, not even with awkwardness. This was something else.
Damien stayed inside me like he could delay the inevitable. But even with his body still flush against mine, the distance between us had never felt wider. His breath warmed the side of my face. His hand lingered on my waist like he was trying to memorize it.
I didn't close my eyes. I waited. One breath. Two. Three and then he moved. Slowly, as if undoing a spell, he pulled out of me and rolled to his side. The absence hit like a blade I could still feel the imprint of him everywhere, but he wasn't touching me now. Not anymore. No words.
I sat up and swung my legs off the mattress. My knees nearly buckled, but I forced myself up and padded toward the tiny bathroom. I didn't want to see his face. Not now. Not after that. The moment I turned on the tap and splashed cold water over my face, I felt it coming. Not tears. Not regret. Resolve.
I stared at myself in the mirror the same one he'd dragged to show me just how easily I unravelled. And now? Now I looked like someone who'd just lost the last illusion she had left. I was never going to be safe with Damien.
I towelled off, avoided my reflection this time, and stepped back into the room. He was sitting on the edge of the mattress, elbows on his knees, face in his hands. When he looked up, there was something unreadable in his eyes. Something almost... hollow.
"Don't," I said.
His brows twitched.
"Don't give me that look. Like you're about to say something meaningful. You came here to fuck me, and you did. We both knew what this was."
That lie left my mouth smoother than I expected. Cleaner than it felt.
He stood slowly. "Isla—"
"No." I held up a hand. "You don't get to call me that right now."
A flicker of frustration crossed his face. "Then what the fuck do I get?"
"Out."
He inhaled sharply, but I beat him to the next move. I went to the closet, grabbed my duffel bag, and yanked it open.
"Wait—what are you doing?"
I ignored him. I pulled clothes from hangers, folding them with sharp, robotic precision. My body moved while my mind just… screamed.
"You're packing?"
"You don't miss a damn thing, do you?" I muttered, folding my favorite coat and shoving it in next. "I'm done, Damien. Done pretending this thing between us isn't costing me pieces of myself."
His voice was quieter now. "You're overreacting."
"Overreacting?" I turned to him, fire licking up my throat. "You walked in here like you owned me. Fucked me like you wanted to destroy whatever self-control I had left. And now you think I'm going to just go back to pretending none of it means anything?"
He took a step forward. "It means everything."
"Then why does it feel like nothing?" I asked, bitter. "Why does it feel like I have to beg to be seen as more than your obsession?"
The muscles in his jaw twitched. "You think that's all you are to me?"
"I think it's all you know how to give."
He didn't respond.
Good. Because I wasn't finished.
"Whatever this is whatever this was it's killing me, Damien. Slowly. Quietly. Beautifully. But I'm bleeding out all the same."
He looked like he wanted to reach for me. I stepped back.
"If you want control, go find someone who doesn't mind being your pawn," I whispered. "I'm not built to survive under your thumb."
The room felt too small. Too heavy with sex and silence and unsaid things. Damien stood there, unmoving, watching as I zipped up the bag and threw on the first dress I could reach. I didn't care how I looked. I didn't care what he thought. I just needed space.
When I reached the door, I hesitated not because I wanted to stay. But because I wanted to say one last thing. I turned my head, eyes meeting his. "Don't follow me this time."
He opened his mouth like he might ignore it. Like he might still try to win but I closed the door before he could.
The hallway outside my apartment felt colder than it should've. Maybe because I was still barefoot or maybe because I was still trembling. Maybe because I'd just walked away from the only man who ever made me feel like fire and ruin at the same time. I didn't even lock the door. What would've been the point?
He wasn't going to chase me. Not this time. Wasn't that the cruellest confirmation of all? I kept walking past the peeling paint of my building's stairwell, down two flights, out into the night. The city met me like a slap: sirens in the distance, wind that tasted like smoke, the buzz of neon too bright for how numb I felt.
I didn't know where I was going. I just needed out of the space where his fingerprints were still warm on my skin. Where his voice still echoed in the walls. Where I knew if I turned around, I'd crumble. I thought maybe I'd make it to the end of the block before losing it but I made it halfway.
I ducked into the shadow of a boarded-up shop, leaned against the brick, and let myself breathe. Shallow. Shaky. Each inhale dragging a little more of him out of me or trying to.
The truth was, he wasn't something I could just walk away from. He'd been in my blood too long. I could choose this moment. Choose to stop letting him devour me one kiss at a time. Choose to save whatever fragments I had left before I turned into someone I didn't recognize.
I pulled out my phone, thumb hovering over my sister's contact. I hadn't talked to her in weeks. She'd warned me, back when Damien first got his hooks in me. Said he'd either break me or brand me. Turns out, he did both.
My hand was shaking as I hit "Call." It rang. Once. Twice.
"Isla?" she answered, voice laced with concern and surprise. "It's late, is everything—"
"I need to crash at your place," I said quickly. "Just for a few days."
A pause.
"Are you okay?"
I closed my eyes, leaning my head back against the wall. "No. But I will be."
She didn't ask anything else. Just gave me the code to her door and told me to come now. When I hung up, I didn't move right away. I let the city breathe around me chaotic and indifferent while I stood there in the dark, a woman half-put together in a wrinkled dress and no shoes, holding her own heart in trembling hands.
I didn't know what came next but I knew what I wasn't going back to and for now, that was enough.