“That’s what’s left of Temple Greene,” I mutter. “Your turn now.”
He doesn’t get a minute to breathe, let alone retaliate, as I move into him. It’s all noise and action and undisclosed pain pouring from me. I can’t even see what I’m hitting or punching after a while. It’s just him and those men and her fear filled eyes.
Blood covers my knuckles when I’m done. I stare at it, and then at him. He lurches about on the floor, fingers trying to drag him out somehow. I don’t know how I feel about that. Temple is dead. The rest of them in the apartment – dead. And yet this fucker, this son of a bitch who dared help to instigate the trauma and suffering, is still alive.
Wiping my hands on my shirt, I back away from him for now and leave him to wallow in his own self-pity. The door locks behind me again, and I consider the amount of times I’m going to need to do that to appease my own self-loathing, as I reach the opulence of the main rooms again. I need to shower this shit off me, or drink and let that take me under until I can see light again because it’s dark everywhere now. Not like it used to be in my melancholy. This is different.
It’s her and my guilt now.
At least these damn hands have stopped shaking now.
She’s perched at the bottom of the staircase when I reach it, her sheet still wrapped around her and her hands clinging to the bannister.
“Why are you awake?” I ask, frowning.
“You weren’t there,” she says, looking around nervously. “I woke up and you weren’t there and I needed …. to get out.”
“You don’t need to get out of here. You’re safe here.”
“Where is here?” she asks, looking everywhere.
“Manhattan.”
“Why here?”
“We’re alone here. No one else but you and me and the staff.”
I sit down next to her and wait for more until she looks at me. She picks up my hand, gingerly, and looks at the knuckles, runs her fingers lightly over the blood. “Needs bandaging.” She turns my hand over, looks at the still unhealed wrist under the bracelets. “This, too.”
A small smile comes over my lips. Even in her despair, and after everything she’s been through, she’s still in there somewhere – searching for herself again.
“Are you still trying to look after me, little Alice?”
“I don’t know anymore.” Her fingers thread into mine, though. It’s the first time she’s made contact with me, and it ripples through me like a wave to brighten my mood. It does a little, but the sound of the doorbell sours it immediately. “Who’s that?” she spits, jumping up.
“That’s someone you need to see.” She lurches left, then right. Shakes her head. I grab her before she gets a chance to run, pulling her into my hold, as I watch a member of staff walk for the door. “This way, Alice.”
She shakes the entire way back up the stairs, looks fearful as I take her to the bedroom and drop her in a seat. “No one’s going to hurt you.” The door knocks behind me at that moment, and I call for her to come in. “Alice, this is Dr Taylor Prince. She’s here to help.”
“I don’t want her near me. I don’t want anyone near me.”
“Yes, you do. Think. I can stay if you want me to.”
Taylor walks over and sets her bag down on the side, smiles and tries her best to make things comfortable. There isn’t anything fucking comfortable about what my little Alice has been through, but I’m damn sure she might need to talk about it, or make decisions about the possibility of STDs.
The passing thought of pregnancy crosses my thoughts. Not something I usually, or have ever, considered in my castle. Everyone’s covered there. Injected. I didn’t even ask her when I took her, nor did I care for the answer in my haze of pills and lacking reality.
“I’m sure we’ll be alright, Mr Jones.” My gaze twists to look at Taylor, then back at Alice. “Won’t we, Alice?” She nods lightly, turns away from me.
I leave and head for the main bathroom, part ready to shower the blood off me and part wanting to let it build some more. I’m a vacant shell of lost thoughts as I clean and then grab a towel. I wrap it around me then stare at my reflection, imaging her in my suite now. She’ll be being probed. Bloodwork. Discussions about disease and what those fuckers could have given her.
It’s all too much, so much so that every surface gets swept of objects and bottles. They crash and smash to the floor around me, broken shards and liquids spilling in my chaos. I don’t understand any of it, don’t understand this feeling or this energy that will not subside.
Eventually, I walk bright halls and corridors listlessly in some self-induced morbidity. That I do understand. Everything continues to be dulled by the effect of her misery regardless of the well-lit rooms and the gilded accents decorating the vastness of the height around me. I feel confined, caged. As if I’m locked in a room I can’t leave no matter the endless steps I’m pacing.
“Malachi?”
I turn sharply, look at her as she finds me in the breakfast room. She’s in one of my black Ts, a pair of my underwear on. She shrugs and looks round the room, taking in where she is – who she’s with.
