28. 28

28

Ember

I woke up alone, because of course Ethan was too stubborn, or tortured, to just sleep in the same room with me, even though he really seemed to need some kind of help or support.

When I’d showered and dressed, throwing on another t-shirt and sweatpants I’d found in the drawers here, like somehow someone was set up for an emergency living situation or something, I headed downstairs, but Ethan was nowhere to be found. Had he found a way out after all? Oh my god, did he try to escape and my dads killed him?

I ran back upstairs, and headed for his room, and there he was; not on the bed, but curled up in the furthest corner of the room, a blanket around him, fast asleep in the most uncomfortable position possible. I took a moment to study him while he slept, seeing him truly peaceful for probably the first time ever.

His dark hair was scruffed up, and there was a red mark on his cheek where he’d probably had his face resting against the wall. His cheeks looked a little darker with stubble, and while I studied him, he suddenly moved, jolting awake with a gasp, and I couldn’t hold back a squeak of surprise.

“Jesus, Ember. Why are you here? Go to your room!” Whoa, so many things to unpick there, right?

“First off, that’s not my fucking name! Secondly, I live here, and thirdly, you don’t tell me to go to my damn room, okay? You’re not my parent, and you’re not my teacher anymore.”

He struggled free of that blanket as he shoved up from his awkward position, wincing as he moved.

“The hell I’m not. Things are going back to the way they were, Ember. You are my student, and I’m your teacher, and that’s how it’ll stay.”

What was he going on about? I stepped further into the room, and he practically hissed at me as he lifted his hands. He was still bare chested, but he’d put on a pair of these generic sweatpants after he’d been in my room too.

“Teacher, huh? What will you teach me though? I finished my exams, can’t teach me more there. I don’t need art lessons, so what does that leave?”

“Ember,” he warned, dragging his forearm over his eyes, fighting a yawn that he ended up defeated by.

“What? I’m just saying, if you’re planning to teach me things, I think I want that too.”

Ethan stalked in my direction, and my heart started thudding faster at his approach. Would he kiss me? Touch me? Would he throw me down on the bed?

“Wait downstairs for me. I need to freshen up, then we’ll eat and discuss a lesson plan.”

Lesson plan? What the fuck? Completely bemused, I headed back downstairs to wait for him, firing up the coffee pot, because I fucking needed it.

He appeared about twenty minutes later, completely composed, freshly showered and shaved, and looking more like the man who truly had been my teacher for so long. He looked like he’d made decisions while he was away from me, and I feared what they might be. I felt like he’d put so much distance between us that he was practically a stranger.

“Ethan?”

“Mr E,” he corrected, pouring coffee with his back aimed firmly at me. I flipped him off, knowing he couldn’t see, but he turned just as I was retracting my finger weapons, and rolled his eyes.

“Very mature. Okay, here’s how it’s going to be. You have art stuff here, and a room to paint in. We’ll come up with a theme for each day, and you’ll paint or draw, or however you want to create it.”

“And?”

He shrugged. “We’ll make the best of this, until your dads see fit to release us, and we can get back to our separate lives.” His words hit hard, like the biggest dismissal from the one person I wanted to belong to, and with, and he was brushing me off like I didn’t matter at all.

“But-”

“Failure to follow each day’s lesson, will be punishable by… well, I haven’t worked that part out yet, but there will be rewards for achieving the goals I set for you.”

I carried my empty mug back to the machine, noting that Ethan instantly backed around the counter, putting that distance back between us, digging another piece of my heart out and throwing it away. Would I ever be enough for someone? Would I ever just be what they wanted, rather than something to use and abuse, and discard?

“Rewards?” I barked finally, turning to glare at him again, praying he couldn’t see the way my hands trembled, the way my heart was turning to dust under his cold attention.

Again he shrugged. “I’ll think of something. There must be something you’d want, that you like.”

I opened my mouth, and he shook his head, lifting a finger in the air.

“Nothing sexual, Ember.”

“Why are you calling me that?” It felt like a bigger betrayal than it probably was, because he was acting like we hadn’t spent so much time together, like we didn’t know each other better than we fucking knew anyone else. He was acting like I didn’t matter to him at all.

Is this just how men act once they’ve got what they want from a woman? Did I misjudge the person I thought he was, did I see him through rose-tinted lenses or something?

“Ethan-”

“ Mr E . We’re moving back to a safer relationship between us, Ember. That means no more crossing lines, and no more stepping over boundaries. This is for the best, I promise. I won’t hurt you again.”

I almost threw my coffee in his face, but I knew it’d burn him, and even though I was heartbroken, and so furious, I couldn’t do that to him. Instead I slammed it down, and stalked away from him.

“Ember!”

“Fuck you, Ethan. You can’t promise you won’t hurt me again, because you already are!”

Ethan

I AGONISED FOR MOST of the fucking night after I made it back to my room, and this was the only thing that made sense in my newly fucked up mind. Reverting back to a time when we were both safe from each other, before we’d lost anything to each other, was the only way to survive this entrapment situation. Ember needed boundaries again, because she functioned better that way, because it gave her stability and comfort, and I needed them there to keep her safe from me.

When I woke with her in my room this morning, it was from another sadistic dream about her. This time I was suffocating her with a pillow as I fucked her. What the hell had gone wrong in my brain? This isn’t stuff I find sexy or arousing. It’s terrifying. Horrific. Soul-destroying. Had everything that happened forced some kind of mental break, or a break from reality? Was I fantasising about this sick shit, or was it my mind just warning me of what could happen, if I didn’t put safeguards in place to protect her?

I never expected her to take it well, but I did expect her to understand that it was the only way we could proceed. She’s highly intelligent, just like her older brother, the one with the IQ that makes him probably the deadliest person I’ve ever met.

I let her run to her room like a child, while I checked out her art room. It was basically just an empty room, but there were stacks of easels, note pads, paint, pens, pencils, the works.

A theme of some sort was the best idea, but I was drawing a blank. What the fuck should I set as her first challenge, and what’s to stop her just throwing this stuff at me, and telling me to go to hell? Without known penalties or rewards, what’s her incentive to even try?

Anything I could threaten her with would either get me a response of ‘fuck you’, or would turn sexual. Hell, anything I imagined with her made me think of fucking sex, but there had to be something. And what about rewards? Again, the same issues applied. Either it wouldn’t be enough of an incentive, or it put her at risk.

Fuck .

“I have some demands,” Ember said from behind me, shocking me out of my thoughts, and making me drop the tube of paint I’d picked up.

“Shit.”

“No, I’m not painting that. If that’s the best idea you have, then I fear for your mind.” Cheeky little minx.

“Tell me your demands.”

She placed her hands on her hips, sassing me with her posture, as much as the look on her face. Oh, and I haven’t even heard what sassy words are going to come from those pouty lips yet.

“You have to be in the room when I work. I can’t… I can’t be isolated like that. It’s not good for me, emotionally.” I nodded, because that was fair, right?

“Understood. This is all about helping your mental health, so of course. Is that everything?”

She walked around, inspecting the kit that her dads had had delivered, I’m assuming from her own supplies, although there were multiple items still in their packaging.

“I get to choose the form my art takes. Sometimes I prefer pen and ink, sometimes something looks better in watercolour, and so on.” Again, like I have a clue about this stuff.

“Agreed. I’m absolutely on board with both of these ‘demands’. Is that it?”

She crouched, and rummaged through the boxes of brushes and bottles of whatever the hell it is that artists use to clean brushes, or whatever. She fussed with her t-shirt, tying it in a knot at her waist.

“I have to wear what’s comfortable while I work, because I might need to sit for long periods of time, or do a lot of stretching to get to the canvas, so you’re not going to dictate anything to me about that stuff. I wear what I wear. Agreed?”

Like I’d fuck about with her sense of style. The sweatpants and t-shirt were unusual for her, but I’d noticed them in the drawers in my room too. I had no idea why this house was fucking equipped like this, but I wasn’t about to ask.

“Yeah. Okay. Rewards and punishments, since we’re locked in here, I’m struggling a bit with that. You have the replacement phone your dads gave you?” She nodded warily, reaching into her pocket to show me. I reached for it.

“You get it back when you’re done with your art goal for the day.” She rolled her eyes, but handed it to me.

“Remember when my dads call that they expect to talk to me alone.” Not a problem.

I shoved it in my pocket, after checking the time on it. Mid-morning and my stomach was growling, so I headed for the door.

“We’ll eat, and then we can discuss your subject for today.”

“What about the naked form?” She asked sassily, like my little student thought that thought hadn’t crossed my fucking mind already.

“We’ll see.” And by that I meant, not a chance in hell.