Fragile Truths (25 page)

He snarled at me and spun me round swiftly, my back slamming on the hard mattress as he drove his cock deep inside me, stretching me wide and tight with every hard ridge of him. My back arched as explosions of ecstasy surged through every nerve in my body.

“You want fucking, you dirty little slut?” he rasped as he pulled out and rammed back in so hard he shoved me up the bed, the wooden box squeaking in protest as the thin mattress tore straight up the middle. “Always insatiable, always so damn ravenous. Your exquisite tight pussy makes my cock scream.”

He was slamming into me so hard he eventually grabbed onto my shoulders to stop me from ramming my head through the wall. “Fuck yes. That’s what I need. Harder Tate, fucking crucify me.”

I’d lost all coherent thought. My body was strumming with energy and ecstasy, my mind whirling with passion and hunger as my nerves sizzled and screeched with the pleasure coursing through me. His fingers dug harder providing me with the pain I needed to grasp the harmony.

“Look at me when I fuck you, Frankie. Always keep your eyes on me when my cock’s buried inside you.”

I opened my eyes; my lids heavy as paradise touched my soul and battered my pussy. He was staring at me, his eyes a perfect calm to the storm he was taking me with. His teeth were bared, his face tight as tension drummed in his brain and fire swept his spine yet his stunning eyes were clear and rapturous, his eyes making love to me as his body fucked me.

“Tell me,” he whispered into my neck as his tongue brushed over each of my moles, tasting the sweat he drew from me as his body literally vibrated.

I couldn’t make my jaw move as my body tightened in preparation for the exhilaration to hit but he repeated himself every time he sank deeper inside me, each word providing another delicious stretch inside me, another thrilling burn of pain as his unyielding thrusts took me higher.

He lowered a hand from my shoulder and cupped my right breast harshly, the press of his fingertips bruising and cruel. Exactly what I needed; I exploded around him, my pussy sucking him deeper as I used his body to drive me to nirvana. “Fuck YES!” I screamed as he pushed even harder, riding out my climax as his pelvis crushed my clit and jolted shock after shock through my frazzled nerves.

“Fucking tell me, tell me while you drench me in cum, Capella.” He shouted at me as he gripped a fistful of my hair and yanked my face close to his.

My back arced, my spine bending cruelly as an agonising thrill tore through me, the pain fierce and angry as I twisted under his hold. I fucking thrived under him; I felt every single fibre in my body hum with vivacity and dance in the fucking sun as he powered life into me. “I love you, Tate,” I growled.

He roared out, the erotic sound tearing from his throat with so much primitiveness I was soon mixing his orgasm with another of mine as we melded together and sucked each other dry. “I’VE LOVED YOU FOREVER!” I screamed at him as a raw cry ripped from inside me. It had been locked so deep, so securely that its liberation broke something inside me.

I clamped my legs around him, pulling him in deeper as I craved his soul, needing to consume him and make everything better and bright again. “Capella!” he breathed in my ear, his voice tortured but his tone exhilarated. “Say it again… please.”

“I love you, I love you, Tate. I always have, since you linked your little finger around mine under the stars and stole my soul.”

A sob tore from him this time as he buried his face in my neck and choked back seventeen years of need and hope. “Ahh fuck,” he whispered as he shuddered into me, his hands sliding around me as he pulled me further to him, pressing my body firmly to him as though he couldn’t breathe without me there.

My heart shivered as it found the beat of another pressing against it, his chest heaving above me, pushing the pulse of him through my skin and bone until it joined another.

He had taken my soul that night many years ago, guided it through the days and safeguarded it. But what he hadn’t known, what he now felt rippling away inside him was the beat of his heart returning as it found its perfect sync, its seamless rhythm with another as each heart harmonised with the other, driving out the hopelessness, despair and loneliness.

“You’re the constellation that powers my star, Tate. You’ve always been with me, shining inside me. Your little Capella could never shine without its place in the universe, without its family, the bond to its creator.”

He stared at me, tears flowing down his cheeks, the sight of them causing a fierce ache but an immense tranquillity to filter out the chaos. “Without stars a constellation wouldn’t be, Capella. Your light shines through my darkness, soaks each shadow in radiance and drives the blackness away. I’m nothing without you. I’ve fought to keep you shining, my love. Persecuted myself to protect you and done shameful things to keep your heart beating.”

I frowned at him, his truths becoming more and more vulnerable as they seeked liberation. “Tell me.”

He swallowed and rolled off me, instantly turning to his side and stroking a hand down my hair, his fingers linking through the strands as though he needed the touch to stay sane. He closed his eyes and nodded, “Yes, it’s time. It’s time you knew what I did and why I did it.”

My whole body tingled with apprehension when I felt Tate’s surrender, his need for penance but I held my nerves back, swallowed the niggling thoughts that screamed refusal as I also nodded and turned to my side.

“When I saw you in that field….” He began.

Jude

I refused to watch them fuck. I couldn’t do that. I hadn’t caught much of their fight, just her refusal to something he had said. Then their joining had burrowed too far, burnt at the constant ache that was always inside me.  Francesca had surprised me, her selflessness had… fuck, I wasn’t sure what it had done. Only pussies believed in karma or fate, kismet crap was only for shit like books and movies but there was something about the way she had denied herself to protect him that had sent a shiver through my heart.

A small smile lifted my lips when I thought of her, what she was; all the good things in life, all the pure and tender things in life wrapped up into one pretty package.

I sneaked a look, praying I didn’t catch another glimpse of my brother’s arse hammering away but he was now on his side facing Fran, his fingers tickling her hair as she gazed at him.

The lump in my throat increased with the way she looked at him. Jealousy, anger, hurt, hope, it all poured through me, pulling at my gut ruthlessly and piercing my heart callously. “God fucking damn!” I bellowed as I swiped my mug off the desk and launched it across the room, traces of cold coffee splattering the wall with a brown pattern as the cup bounced off and rolled back to me along the shitty green carpet.

The pain inside me was growing each day, the intense ache for… for something… for
her
. Tate didn’t deserve her devotion or her love. He only deserved one thing – death.

“I knew I loved you the moment I saw you tear from your house that day,” Tate’s voice echoed through the tinny speaker on the desk and my ears pricked up. I reached out and turned the dial, increasing the volume when my curiosity peaked. Was he finally opening up to her, telling her the truths she deserved?  Giving her the accurate details that would finally make her see what he was?

She smiled at him, her sweet pink lips curling and making her look even cuter. She nodded for him to carry on and I settled back in my chair.

“There was something about you,” Tate continued. “The way your little legs tore across the driveway, like your ass was on fire, like demons were chasing you.”

“They were.” I managed to capture her whisper. Tate swallowed and cupped her cheek tenderly stroking his thumb over the ridge of her cheekbone.

“I know they were, they came out of the house when you bolted.” Fran frowned but Tate carried on, ignoring her confusion. “I could feel your fear, even from where I sat in the car. So as you know I followed you and found you.”

She smiled and watched him, her eyes bright but tired. Hatred and guilt growled in my gut but I pushed it aside and listened.

“You were like this little pit of sorrow, a deep hole inside you sucking everything from me, as though you needed my life to live yours. And I gave it you, willingly, Frankie. I pushed my whole strength and spirit to you, hoping you’d use it and pick yourself up.”

Frankie sighed and dropped her gaze; the pain in her eyes caused me to take a breath, a shiver of iciness slithering through me with her sadness. “But I didn’t,” she answered softly.

He shook his head sadly, “No, you never took anything from me, Capella. I tried so hard to help you but you were this stubborn ball of energy. Your spirit refused help; your heart had already constructed walls and shields so nothing could touch it, even help or faith. I’m not sure if you remember, but I came back a couple of days later.”

I bolted upright in my chair, my eyes slits as I watched sadness slide across Tate’s face. I vaguely remembered being on the back of Tate’s bike, the wheels skidding on the gravel, Tate careering round the corner of a driveway, Tate banging on a huge white door, banging and hammering, his voice rough from screaming and hollering for someone to open the door.

Oh fucking shit!

My blood rippled as memories assaulted me and I fell backwards, my hands clutching at my throat as nausea burst and I threw myself sideways and vomited in the waste basket.

It was like a light flicked on. Memories and images, pictures of things I had pushed back and refused the light of day were storming my head; flurries of truths and lies, reflections of letters I had found, impressions of rabid arguing in my ears as it all slotted together at once like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, stubbornly connecting the broken pieces and making the picture clearer and honest.

Everything I had suspected in the tiny corners of my mind burst forward and became one huge, giant fucking truth.

Francesca became one colossal truth.

Tate

“I don’t remember,” Frankie whispered as she tilted her head to try and assemble the missing memories.

“I’d… gathered some information about your father… and you, that I needed to talk to him about.” I gulped at the memory, terrified that my honesty would send me to hell when she hated me but she needed to know, she needed it all now.

I took a deep breath and carried on. “Your dad opened the door. His face was furious but when he found Jude and me on your doorstep he exploded. It was like a trigger had switched, his hatred of everything in life when he saw us, came out and overtook him. He went crazy, hitting me, slamming Jude against the wall, screaming things that we couldn’t understand and things about my Pop sending us. But I was only fifteen, Jude was just eleven and your dad terrified me, I actually feared for our lives.”

Frankie was staring at me with her mouth open, confusion etched on every perfect inch of her face. She sat upright, pulling the thin sheet against her breasts to offer herself a scrap of protection. “My dad, he isn’t… he’s not like that Tate, are you sure this happened? It wasn’t a dream?”

I scoffed as a shiver shook my bones, “No, it wasn’t a dream. I wish it were. In a way I wish I had never gone there that day but he needed to know.”

“He needed to know what?” she asked almost hesitantly, like she wanted to know but didn’t. Fear covered her face as she swallowed harshly and I narrowed my eyes.

“You know don’t you?”

Her eyes lifted to mine so slowly I thought time had slowed, but she nodded, a faint choke sliding from her throat as she faced up to the knowledge she had known all along. “If you mean about my dad’s debts, his gambling and coke addiction, then yes, I know. I know he couldn’t pay, I know he offered his own life up before they came for my mom.”

Her skin was so pale I wouldn’t have been surprised if she didn’t flake out in front of me. I came to sit beside her, my hands thrust together as though I was praying, which I very much was. “No Frankie, not about your dad.”

She twisted her head and looked at me, “Then what? Stop being so damn cryptic and tell me.”

“I can’t do this here,” I breathed in her ear as I leant into her. I took her hand and pulled her from the bed, dragging the small sheet with me as I tugged her into the bathroom. She was stumbling behind me, her feet scurrying along the floor as she attempted to get some footing before I slammed the door shut.

She gasped when I stood on the toilet seat and took hold of the camera in my hands, wrenching it from the wall in one almighty pull. I dropped it and myself back to the floor and took both her hands in mine, rubbing at the cold clamminess, “We don’t have long now, so I need to say this before someone comes in and hears this.”

She trembled and sat on the edge of the bath, tears pricking her eyes as the turmoil I was stirring frightened her. I tried to calm myself down so I wouldn’t blurt it out but we didn’t have the time to appreciate such things like tact and sensitivity, so I knelt before her and took another hold of her hand firmly. “Tate, please” she rasped, “you’re scaring me.”

I nodded, swallowing the fear at the same time. “They weren’t after your mother, Frankie. They were after you.”

Her eyes widened and I wanted nothing more than to pull her to my chest and squeeze all the fear and pain out of her, hold her until time passed and it was our turn to accept paradise above. “And they still wanted you, Capella.”

She slid down the bath until her backside thumped against the harsh cold floor tiles and her lip trembled. “They… they killed my mom because of me?”

“Shit, No!” I shook my head at her, burying that train of thought before she went too far with it. “No, Frankie. They killed your momma because of your father’s debts. But they didn’t feel that her death was full price, like she was just a down payment on what he owed.”

A choked sob flew from her and I cursed my insensitivity. “I didn’t mean it to sound so harsh on your mom’s value of life. What I am saying is, your mother locked you in the cellar, no one could find the key and then somehow or other, something or someone disturbed them and they had to leave.” I stared at her, running the tip on my finger around the palm of her hand to try and soothe her. “But they were coming back, for you.”