Page 158 of Gates of Tartarus

Jonah just reaches around to lightly, ever so lightly, caress the outline of one of my breasts, before he and Walker exchange predatory looks. I reach out to grab a blanket to pull up and over myself, but Jonah grabs my wrists in a stronghold, flexing me back slightly and bending my body so I’m bowed out toward Walker. Walker raises both of his calloused hands and wraps them gently around my throat before slowly, painfully slowly, tracing them down my neck, hovering over my breasts, and he grins suddenly, a fierce grin flashing in the dark. Static, like the air before a storm, sets the hairs on my arms on end, flickers of crackling lightning shimmering along my skin. Something is being born in this nowhere between dusk and dawn, and I feel an unknown abandon clawing its way out from inside me. Every step I have ever taken has been cautious and careful, but in the dark, narrow room, locked between Walker and Jonah, their calloused hands tracing fire paths on my skin, their naked bodies pressed against mine so there is no space for breath between us, I am becoming someone new.

Walker leans forward and takes the very tip of my breast in his mouth, teeth biting teasingly, and the strange pleasure-pain of the moment yanks me firmly back in my body, the sensation blanking my brain completely. Like he can feel me return, he looks up with heavy, lust-drunk eyes, and he reaches a hand up to turn my jaw toward Jonah, commanding my movements with ferocious intensity. Jonah answers his silent demand and takes my mouth with his own, so thoroughly and eagerly that I can no longer remember where I am. His lips are soft, but his hands are tight on my hips, fingers wrapped around me, locking me into place. One of Walker’s hands is still flexed out on my jaw, thumb running along the line of mychin, fingers wrapped around my neck. The other has dropped to my other breast, mimicking the movements of his mouth as he devours me.

The silence of the moment is full of stuttering half-breaths and the swished sliding of naked skin on naked skin. Walker inhales against my skin, and the sound catches as he lets it out carefully on a shaky sigh, staring up at me, eyes wide and wild, his lips parted as though he is about to speak, but he says nothing. I tip my head up to see an answering expression on Jonah’s face, dangerous and focused. Their legs are intertwined with mine, their arms wrapped completely around me, and it feels like there isn’t an inch of me that isn’t covered by one or the other of them. Walker slowly, and without breaking eye contact, drops his hands down the path of my torso, along the sides, then over the curve of my back, and ends by gripping my ass with strong, confident fingers. Jonah’s hands are still wrapped below my waist, his own fingers curlingjuston the inside of my hip bones, tightly enough I think I’ll see light bruising there tomorrow, but I never,neverwant him to let go. The feel of Jonah’s naked body locking Walker’s hands against me in the back, and Walker’s body pressing Jonah’s against me in the front, is overwhelming, and sends a violent shiver through me, forcing a low, feral moan from my mouth. The noise unlocks something in the men, and suddenly, out of nowhere,the force of their combined arousal crashes into me and blows thefuckout of my shields.

I reach for my walls, scrambling to get them back in place, but Walker’s and Jonah’s emotions flood me before I can, taking me wildly towards an unexpected orgasm, like falling into churning white waters, frantically fighting to keep my head above water, to breathe, but the wild and wicked waves submerge me and pull me under, and I’m lost to the sensation of their addictive emotion. Throwing my head back, the cords on my neck taut, eyes rolled back, light fireworks across my vision, a symphony of colors exploding before blackness eats away the edges. Vaguely I’m aware of Walker’s hand covering my mouth as I ride out the feeling, grasping for any solid thing as I’m washed away, but finally give up and let the river take me to the sweet, unending darkness.

Touchdown

Sunday, 9 December – Kailani

The plane touching down roughly wakes me. No one is with me, making the bed that had seemed so small just a short while ago now enormous in its emptiness. There’s no note, no sign that either of the guys was ever even in the room, and a cold shiver runs over my body.Why aren’t they here? What was I thinking? Christ. Clearly, they regret everything. Or else they would have stayed. Or said something. I made a fucking fool of myself. And I couldn’t keep my shields up…The thought makes me nauseous, and I swallow convulsively, trying not to spiral. Taking a deep breath, I try to remember that they weren’t manipulating me with that emotion, that it was pure and real, and that it came directly from them… it wasn’t an echo meant to trick me or influence me. There was no doubt that what they were feeling wastrue. We just…Ijust have to figure out how to block it, or this would never work.Maybe this will never work.Icy fingers of anxiety trail along my spine.You couldn’t shield. They didn’t stay. Everyone leaves.

Throwing on my robe, I grab my bag and peek out of the curtain, down the quiet plane aisle, andrunto the back to shower and get dressed. As I wash my hair, I run through my options: 1) completely ignore everyone and everything and pretend like nothing happened; 2) talk things out with the guys; 3) jump off the plane and hope for a hard landing. Option three sounds the best, but I’m shit out of luck because we just landed, and the best that would happen is my leg would break or something. Groaning, I press my forehead against the side of the shower, let the water run over me, and come to a decision.Lock that shit up deep in the dark parts of my brain and deal with it later. Things just got vastly more complicated.

After showering, I look at myself carefully in the mirror and decide I need battle armor to face the morning. I’m not sure how much time I have left before we have our team meeting, but the plane still has to refuel and reload supplies, so I’m guessing I have long enough to put on war paint. Riffling through my clothes, I pull out my favorite black jeans, my ass-kicking black boots, a tight, black tee-shirt with part of my favorite quote, and a large, shapeless, knee-length cardigan that I wrap around me like a blanket when I’m anxious. Braiding my hair in two long, loose fishtails, I riffle through my paltry make-up bag, wishing for a second I could pull Gemma in for help. The thought makes me feel sick with sorrow and loneliness, and I shove it to the side.Into the dark part with the other thoughts. Deal with it later. Wondering idly how many thoughts I can shove in that area of my brain before they avalanche out, I carefully apply a smoky eye makeup, darker than I normally wear, and some nude lipstick. Studying my appearance, I groan to myself. I missed the mark by half. Somehow I managed to make myself look both dangerousandvulnerable, a far cry from the kick-ass woman I wanted to present, and I move to start over, but Maddox’s booming voice rings through the plane.

“Everyone up and at ‘em. Breakfast and then team meeting.”

The mumbled sounds of everyone waking and moving has me grabbing my stuff and running back down the hall before I can come face to face with anyone, and I hide in my room until the very last minute, running through my meditations to try and shore up my shields before breakfast. I stay there until a kind stewardess knocks on the wall outside my room, saying, “Ma’am? Breakfast is ready.”

In a fit of panic, I do a quick read on her and am crazy relieved to find nothing deeper than concern for breakfast and scrambled emotions about the upcoming day drifting off her. Nocome on, Harlot, get your ass to breakfast, no embarrassment of borrowed emotion. Cautiously, I extend to the other flight attendants in the hallway when I emerge, and none have anything further than polite interest as I pass them.

Thank God, I think to myself a moment too soon, because the weight of the eyes on me as I enter the front area have me ready to scurry back and hide in the bedroom again. Walker and Jonah are near each other, heads bent together, speaking in low, serious tones, and both of their heads pivot to me the moment I walk in, fire bright in their twin gazes.Why did they leave? It was a mistake. Why did I trust... It’s all a mistake. Maddox looks pissed off, exhausted, confused, twitchy, and defensive – so I don’t even try to read him. Hideo though, Hideo is blank. He’s moving jerkily, like an automaton, every movement exaggerated precision, like the very marrow in his bones hurts. There’s nothing overtly wrong with him, but his face is deathly still, eyes completely empty, as though he’s on autopilot. The pain radiating off of him, the self-loathing and self-recrimination, brings tears to my eyes, as his gaze slides over me and off me, unable to focus through his anguish.

I don’t know what to do, how to walk forward, surrounded by the cheerfully oblivious flight attendants chirping in my ears about the day’s offering for breakfast and what I’d like to drink. Gemma looks up in the same hesitant way she’s been doing for over a week, eyes darting like fish to some point over my shoulder before dropping immediately down to her lap again. She freezes as soon as her eyes drop, though, barely breathing, before clearly coming to some decision, pulling back her shoulders and looking over the scene playing out in front of her more carefully. She takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly, noting the way the men are behaving, I’m sure, but also, I suddenly remember, my outfit. Whenever I pull out my snuggle cardigan, she immediately goes to the freezer and grabs a pint of ice cream for us to split, no questions asked. My boots are for days I feel threatened – they give me extra confidence. Make-up I only wear when I’m going out or need a mask. And my favorite jeans and shirt are for days when I need comfort.Crap. It sucks when someone knows you so well that even your choice of dress for the day is a diary entry.

The silence is becoming almost unbearable, even the stewardesses noting the awkwardness at this point, and I know I have to go sit. I fuckingknowit, but I can’t make my feet move. I don’t know why Jonah and Walker left, but neither says anything; Hideo is a paper doll, pale and empty; Maddox is a volcano of confusion and so many emotions it’s white noise in my head, that it’s pressing against my temples and on the edge of pain... Suddenly I feel a small hand on my arm, and I look frantically into Gemma’s calm face, her soothing voice pulling me forward.

“Come on, Kai... lani. There’s a nice breakfast today. You must have been really asleep... you’re taking a minute to wake up. I mean, youalways… ah… anyways... Those beds were really comfortable, right? Not like the ones when we first moved to Lac… Um... I didn’t think airplane beds would be comfortable. There are fruit crepes, which is nice, and the coffee is really good…” Gemma keeps talking, running her sentences together nervously, trying to avoid any reference to our history together, but also, very clearly, trying to help me through whatever is going on right now. It’s obvious she hasnoidea what is happening, and I’m pretty sure, judging by her face when she first came up to me, that she thought I was going to hit her, but she’s trying anyway, because she took one look at me and could tell I was in trouble.

“... you can ask for berries or maybe they have Nutella or something... shoot, no hazelnuts for you, forgot, so... I mean, the berries have whipped cream, so that’s... and maybe a mocha? They have a cappuccino machine; can you believe it?”

All of a sudden, everything is just. Too. much. My hands start trembling and then flat out shaking, and I can feel myself unraveling, desperately wrapping my cardigan tightly around myself, trying to block out the world. Gemma grows visibly anxious, trying to guide me gently toward the pod of chairs where I sat last night, still chatting away, voice strained with the effort of maintaining a calm tone while she watches me very quietly and very completely fall apart.

“Oh Gemma!’ I wail, shocking the fuck out of the guys and the flight crew and I’m pretty sure Gemma herself, and I turn into her, full-out crying, sadness crushing me.

Gemma immediately throws her arms around me and bursts into tears, mumbling under her breath, “I’m so sorry, Kai. I’m so, so sorry.”

I’m just so fucking lonely, and sad, and scared. I don’t know who to depend on; I miss Lachy; my head hurts; too much has changed; and I feel lost. Like a dead leaf on the winter wind, dried up and cracking, pieces of me falling away until there’s nothing but thin, fragmenting veins holding together the outline of something that used to be alive and bright and vital. Two of my three iron anchors have proven to be clouds instead, and I feel tossed on seas I never agreed to sail, panic like a storm rising within me.

The guys are silent, then Maddox says quietly, “Kailani–” and Gemmaroundson him, like a tiny manic pixie and yells, “FuckOFF,Maddox!” before turning back to me and wiping her eyes. “You okay?” she asks, concerned, eyes red and face blotchy. Gemma was never a pretty crier.

I shrug, tears still running down my face, and she nods decisively. “Right. Ma’am?” she addresses the flight attendant nearest us, who looks scared as hell to be addressed by the ferocious, purple-headed woman in front of her. “We need two mochas – no, both are for her – and crepes with chocolate,nohazelnuts, and whipped cream, fruit, and water.” She looks at me consideringly, then says, “And orange juice. Please.”

Turning me around like a child, she sits me in the chair nearest me, then looks questioningly at the one next to it. I nod, and she sits immediately, pulling the sherpa blanket over both of us, then looks at Maddox challengingly. “So.What?”she asks viciously. “What?”

Maddox sighs from a place so deep inside him you can almost see the weight of it and says softly, “In an effort not to repeat mistakes of the past, I have, I think, made some almost unforgivable ones, despite my best intentions.” He rubs his face tiredly and stretches his neck before continuing. “Kailani, I owe you an apology.”

Of all the things I was expecting, that was not one of them. Maddox looks somewhere just beyond exhausted, like he’s been living in the place where your bones hurt, where your eyes are deserts, where the minutes of the day turn into tiny pinpricks of pain. I’ve been to that place. Where humanity is stripped from you piece by piece, skin flayed off, leaving you bloody and raw. Where the only way to avoid the pain is to lose yourself so you don’t have to look at yourself. I built a home there, for a long time, and I know that it’s almost impossible to leave it if you don’t have someone to guide you out. Blindly, I reach out and grab Gemma’s hand and grip it, her return grip so tight it hurts, fresh tears streaming silently down her face.

Maddox continues. “I understand that you’re in a bad place, and that you feel, rightly, betrayed by certain members of the team. I’m in a position to offer an explanation, though not an excuse, and you can judge where you want to go with this, because we need to be able to work together or it’s all going to fall apart. I am willing,” he says heavily, “to resign from my position as team lead if it will make it easier for you to stay mission focused.”

I frown and stay silent, which he takes as tacit acceptance and continues. “First, and most importantly, what your colleague there –” he nods towards Hideo, “won’t tell you is that he was strong-armed into keeping faith with Gomez.” Hideo makes a small sound of protest but falls silent under the weight of Maddox’s glare. “From what I’ve been told, yes, initially you were a mark. Which shouldn’t bother you because he was doing his job and didn’t know you.” I sigh. That much is true at least. He was an agent given an assignment, and however distasteful it feels to me thatIwas the assignment, I have to grudgingly admit that portion wasn’t his fault. Maddox continues. “By the time you began to develop a partnership, Tanaka’s mother was failing.”

“It doesn’t matter, Smith,” Hideo says flatly, clearly not liking where this line of explanation is going.

“It fucking does,” Maddox replies tightly. “You can be a martyr all you want, and think you deserve what you’re getting, and sure, in some ways maybe you do. But we both know the way things went, Tanaka. Gomez told me about it when she let me know she had an operative on the team.”

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