Page 65 of Swallow Your Sorries

She’s my tether between the video and the accident. Between the dance studio and now Beaulieu. Between my past and my present.

Why does that matter so much to me? And why have I wrapped her, that tether, around my forearm before gripping it for dear life?

I can’t let it go.

I can’t let her go.

“Mmm,” she moans in between gasps of air.

“Don’t move,” I tell her, as she tries to sit, as she tries to dislodge me, but I cling to her, keeping our foreheads pressed together. “Just wait.”

And we both wait until our breathing calms and synchronises.

I watch her beneath my lashes, studying her delicate features. I swear I count each little freckle that dots her cheeks and nose bridge. On her left cheek, I follow the formation of the tiny heart I’d memorised from our first encounter. Then I study each lash that surrounds her unfocused emerald green eyes before tracing the curves of her slightly parted lips. Suddenly, I’m tempted to press my lips against hers and breathe for us both.

I don’t know what possesses me, but I place my hand over her heart as if I need confirmation that it’s actually beating. And when I’ve confirmed it, I massage her soft skin, urging the organ beneath it to ease its erratic rhythm. As the minutes tick by, my coaxing seems to work, because her heartbeat slows to a soft tempo. Her nipple catches between my index and middle finger and I can’t help but roll it between them. I can’t help but lower my head, and press three butterfly kisses between her breasts, then a fourth directly over her heart in thanks.

Slowly, Elle looks up at me, her eyes hazy. But slowly, ever so slowly, realisation slips into them and her gaze goes from confused to remembrance to pure fury.

She slaps my hand away and bolts upright, only to fall back. I catch her head before it can slam into the ground and I swear I can see the dancing orbs bouncing in front of her vision right along with her, given the way her eyes cross. When they focus again, she shoves me away, and I let her.

“You...you tried to kill me!”

“You can’t swim?” I sit back on my heels, but it isn’t a question. “Why can’t you swim?”

She gapes at me for several moments. “Are you purposefully slow or just willfully ignorant? Millions of people can’t swim. People like me, who can’t afford lessons, and who don’t have summer houses by the lake with hot tubs and infinity pools to wade in.”

That’s profoundly sad.

“The pond,” I say as another memory surfaces. “When I tossed your phone into the pond, you didn’t follow me. You didn’t do anything. You were afraid of the water?”

She bites her lip, saying nothing.

“We’ll have to change that,” I say. “It’s a crucial life skill.”

“We?We?” she asks, outraged, but there’s confusion swirling in her irises.

What’s there to be confused about?

Yes,we.Didn’t I just tell her she was mine?

I hate repeating myself. Instead, I drink her in. A pure vision if ever I’d seen one.

I’d only seen her defiant, nervous or stoic, undoubtedly trying to hold in her tears, her perceived weakness from our peers. But I’d yet to see pure fury on her angelic face. I don’t care that it’s sheer hatred for me. I care that she’s able to emote anything at all. That she’s simply my living doll again, alive with all the signs to prove it.

Her pale skin is flushed pink, her breasts heaving, her nipples that I want to lean over and suck on, pointing straight at me accusatorily. I follow the shallow indentation line that runs down the centre of her core from her sternum to her navel and then to the cute little roll beneath it that disappears into her saggy panties.

Seriously. Why the fuck is she wearing them? They’re useless.

“There is noweand don’t pretend like you give a damn about mycrucial life skills.You wanted to prove a point, and you did. You want vengeance, not an explanation. You crave it so much that you’d put my life in danger. I got it. You hate me and guess what? I fucking hate you too. You don’t want to hear my apology? Good, because I don’t have one to give. Not anymore.”

As if I want it in the first place.

“I felt sorry for you. Sorry that you’ve lost your mum. Sorry that I was the one who leaked that email and you were blamed. Sorry that Madame was so upset she lost control of her vehicle, with you in it, no less. I never wanted anything to happen to you or Madame. I didn’t even know that something had happened until I got here. Until I saw the crash video. It was…I can’t describe how horrible it was. Just seeing you like that…”

That snaps my eyes to hers. Since when has she given a damn about me? She didn’t even know me back then. She doesn’t know me now. Clearly.

“Because in the short time I knew you, you helped me when no one else would. You gave me a crumb of attention. A piece of your time, and the best critique I’d ever gotten at that dance studio in weeks,” she says as if hearing my unasked question. “I was truly, genuinely sorry for everything. Even after all the disgusting things you did to me, I could see, understand, why you’re so furious with me.”

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