Page 68 of Torn

Merry sighs.This is a magical morning-after for two lovers.

Then she frowns. No, this feels more vulnerable than that. It feels more authentic.

She slides out of the bed and prances from the room. She hops down the garret stairs and tiptoes across the hall, a trickle of enchanted light dashing through the windows. The corridor is a mezzanine overlooking the foyer and its swinging pendulum crater.

She floats on cloud nine to the bathroom. Two inlaid spaces comprise the area, separated by an open doorway. Merry bypasses the tub and enters the second room, with a square glass shower at the center, beneath another mural of stars.

Water rains and begins to steam. Beneath the deluge, Merry opens her arms to the onslaught, the downpour racing across her skin. She hums and does a little hip dance. Recalling what she and Anger have achieved together, her flesh stains the same color as her hair.

Part of her wishes that she’d had lovers in the past, that she’d educated herself in the manner of a worldly goddess. It isn’t for lack of wanting or interest. The misfit gods who’d caught her attention simply hadn’t fancied her in return.

Another part of Merry doesn’t care. She’s officially on her way to becoming a love ninja.

The water glides down her belly and sinks lower. Merry sighs—then gulps at the flash of a sterling hoop, the broad expanse of olive skin.

Anger’s in the room.

Her heart vaults. He’s leaning against the door, staring at her. He’s thrown on his shirt, but he’s barefooted and tousled, the cyclone of his hair undone.

Those eyes punch through the fog, through the glass. They sketch her drenched form, the swells of her breasts, the imprint of her navel, the taper of her legs, and the wiggle of her toes. She’s not a vixen. Hers is a gangly height, with knobby ankles and fine strands of hair. For this reason, she’s tempted to retreat into the opaque enclave of the shower.

Yet he absorbs her nudity like a sponge, like those flaws are immaterial. And she feels the magnitude of his glance elsewhere, in the intimate place where his tongue had stroked through her. That spot drones and throbs merely from his gaze, deliciously terrifying.

Oh, this is getting good.

Merry changes her mind. The shower hisses as she steps closer to the door, the better for him to see every inch of her. Feeling bold, she picks up the pace.

Lifting her finger, she writes on the misted door,Get in here.

His pupils fatten, the irises blazing. It’s like watching a caged hurricane.

He stalks to the shower, halting in front of her. A vaporous plate of glass separates them, thin and smashable.

On the opposite side, he writes a counter offer.Get out here.

Merry shakes her head, sidling backward, waiting for him. The intermission doesn’t last long.

The door whips open.

Anger’s inside. He saunters toward her, water gushing, spraying everywhere. He’s fully clothed, and she’s fully naked, and it doesn’t matter. His expression is barer than she is.

Retrieving a tube of shampoo, he says, “Turn around.”

The pulse of his voice hits Merry’s knees. She turns, revealing her backside and drenched tresses, and she feels the wall of his body align with hers.

His breath curves around her nape. “May I?”

“Yes,” she replies, drunk on the sound of him.

Silk pours over her skull, followed by his fingers lathering her roots. Merry’s head lolls onto him, her ass resting against the coarse, sodden jeans. Her lower spine fits into the rails of his abdomen as he washes her hair, massaging the locks. His grip tugs gingerly, his fingernails lightly scratching her scalp while suds build, glistening down her stomach.

Condensation swirls around them. Occasionally, he leans in to kiss her cheek. She smells the zest of ambition, along with a caramel satisfaction, the piercing reverberation of fear, the cotton of tranquility, and the glistening texture of arousal.

But that can’t be so. Deities can’t sense each other that way.

There’s a simpler sign. It’s explicit in the solid length pressed to her buttocks and the shaking of his digits as he rinses her hair.

Beneath the tide, their movements slow. Merry circles to face him. He glances at her like she’s an artifact and an innovation, like she’s a rarity, like he wants to know more, more details about what she’s feeling.

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