Page 68 of Ruin

There is no light, apart from the small blue flashing of an alarm panel by the door, which must not be on, for Charlie doesn’t even spare it a glance. My eyes strain, attempting to see, the space feels large, open, despite not being able to really see anything. It has that feeling, like maybe there’s a cliff edge somewhere and we’re about to topple right over the lip.

Charlie walks us forward, lifting a hand towards the wall and light suddenly bursts into the room, my eyes slamming closed, face instantly burying in the crook of his neck. His fingers flex tighter, one hand wrapped around me, placed on my hip, the other threaded up my spine, supporting my head. He sways gently on his feet. Like he, too, is a little blinded by the sudden flare of brightness, his shoulder brushing the wall to his left.

My lashes flutter, attempting to open, but it has been so very long since I have left my cage, seen something so luminescent, my eyes just aren’t ready. I feel overwhelmed, by the light, by the air, the smells, the space. And I wish so hard for my cage, the one we left behind. If only to have something familiar. Something mine.

The absence of intense pressure on the back of my neck, the heavy chain now gone from my shackle, placed on me by my last owner. Something that has been weighing me down for months, maybe years. My head feels too light for my body, as though it might pop off at any second, take flight like a weightless balloon.

“Open your eyes, Baby Bird,” Charlie rasps quietly.

His breath a gentle wave over my face, his scent strong like the mint he popped into his mouth in the car. Offering one up to me in the open palm of his hand, a natural thing, it felt, for him to do. To share with me like it meant nothing. But to me, to me, it felt like everything. I can still feel the evidence of it on my teeth. But the burning inside my tummy is a sign that I shall regret taking his offering. Sugar, clearly, being something I absolutely should not have indulged in.

I flutter my lashes, face buried in the cool flesh of his neck, he is always cold to the touch, his skin something that never seems to heat, but holding me, I still feel a semblance of warmth. The light is dimmed now, less glaring, and I squint hard, my eyes filling with water at the burn.

The walls splashed a deep, dark forest green, with beautiful slate grey wood panelling along the walls. The same colour coving along the top of the walls morphing into a ceiling of the same dark grey. Set so high above our heads, I struggle to see where it ends. It almost feels like the night’s sky as I stare up and up and up, arching my neck back as far as the steel around my throat will allow.

The lights are sconce fixtures on the walls, little dimmable bulbs inside glass lanterns. Candelabra-esque, in the way they twist up on long, intricately designed arms.

The floors along the wide length of the hall, leading to a larger open space, are the same colour as the walls. Tiny cube tiles, no more than about two inches in size, are set in what feels like a hundred changing shades of forest and emerald green. They create a sea of colour, like dancing fingers of kelp beneath the English Channel waves.

It is unlike any house I have ever seen.

It feels like it should be too much, too rich, opulent, indulgent, but it doesn’t really feel that way at all.

It is beautiful.

And this is only the entrance hall.

Charlie shifts me a little higher in his arms before he starts walking, his boots almost silent swooshes along the glass like tiling. The hall does indeed open up, the room is the size of a ballroom, with open archways and closed doors leading off of the space. The largest fixture of them all is the stairs.

Dark grey wooden steps with a runner carpet up the centre of them, the same dark green as the floor and walls. Black twisted iron railings, curl and warp up the side of them, the stairs climbing along an angled circular wall, windows lining it the entire way to the top.

I’m still staring up at it as Charlie turns us away, taking us in the opposite direction. Walking us through the large space, an array of plush velvet chairs and intricately designed side tables. Unusual trinkets, and vases, unlit candles in various sized glass jars. All things we pass until we’re stepping through an open archway, the room in darkness which Charlie corrects with a twist of a light switch. Raising the brightness so it’s no more than a warm yellow glow.

It’s a small space, deep grey bookcases lining the walls, a large desk of the same colour facing into the room, and a couple of oversized lilac-grey armchairs angled towards each other, sitting before it.

“I’m going to get Dillon,” Charlie tells me roughly, placing me carefully down into one of the large armchairs.

I startle as my bottom sinks into the thick cushions, jerking forward, clawing my nails into his arms before he can fully let me go. I’m staring down at the chair, half lifting myself out of it as I pull myself up with my clawing grip on his arms. I feel like I shouldn’t sit here. I would rather he put me on the floor, propped me against it at the most. I feel uncertain, elevated from the ground and, I don’t want him to leave me alone in this big house alone.

Charlie grips my chin, whipping my head towards him, the shackle cutting into the base of my skull where he tilts me back too far.

“Enough. Settle,” he tells me sharply, my feet and shins already dragging over the cold floor.

He lifts me easily with his big hands wrapped around my waist, fingers flexing aggressively into my rib bones. I clutch him so tightly my fingers blanch, knuckles aching with the intensity and he eyes me, his pinch on my chin absent, but the pain is thudding through my teeth.

“Ava,” he rasps, pulling me up higher, drawing me back into his chest, the tip of his nose against mine. “Be a good girl for me, I’m coming back,” I tremble, my entire body vibrating.

I believe him, but I don’t want to be-

“Do you want to sit on the floor?” he rasps over my lips, his own plucking at my mouth. “Is it the chair? You want to go on the ground, Baby Bird?”

He is intoxicating, his mouth on mine, his hands around my body, holding me tenderly even though I have seen these same hands disembowel someone and fuck me in the blood.

Withit.

Gaze dropping, I nod, keeping my eyes lowered, submissive.

“Look at me,” he whispers tersely, and my attention is snapping back to him, his pretty green eyes speared with shadows capture me and I’m nodding more. “I’m coming back with Dillon and our bag,” his sight flickers over my face. “Then I am locking the door, setting the alarm, and coming straight back to you.” I swallow, wincing, uncertain. “There is no one else here but you and I, nothing is going to distract me.”

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