If Echo Burns, I’ll Be Her Ashes

IF ECHO BURNS, I'LL BE HER ASHES

Ian

B lood is such an interesting matter. I find myself very fond of watching it on my nails, smearing it between my thumb and index finger until it dries so I can wear a temporary reminder of my most recent venture.

There's only one disruption from this meditative state I usually accept. My wife knows exactly when to let me drown in my thoughts and when to pull me back to reality. Echo is a constant and the best reminder that the blood of my—no, our —victims doesn't shine brighter than my own. My blood has the color of her eyes and my veins the color of her hair. She's ravishing and deadly, a survivor and a murderer, my angel of death with her wings spread wide and her aura made of pain.

Echo Beckett and our two-month-old son are the sun and the moon that keep my world standing. The reasons I wake up every morning, but also the reasons I need to rid this world of more abusers. And if before Noah came into this world, I felt a primal need to protect Echo from every single thing or person that could harm her, now I'm a beast with a thirst for death that won't settle. The thought of someone hurting her or our son makes me feel like I'm losing my mind, and the only way to temper myself is to find my next victim as soon as I'm done with my last one. And I know Echo feels the same way. She's not only supporting my endeavors, but she's helping me plan them, seducing men in bars and clubs, only for them to give their last breath in the dedicated space we built 50 miles away from our home, in the middle of nowhere.

"How did it feel, Tim?" Echo's heels hit the concrete floor, setting a rhythm that punctuates her words. "How did it feel hearing her scream for help while you were kicking her stomach?"

She delivers a punch to Tim's nose, the blood on her hand only making the platinum of her wedding band shine brighter in the dark room. And I can't help but find that poetic in a way. She's my light in every moonless night and our vows shine brighter than any words ever spoken.

A shiver travels down my spine when she starts walking around the chair Tim is currently tied to. Like a predator analyzing its prey, giving it a false hope of being able to see the sunrise the next day. But both Echo and I know that this man will never see the sun shine again and that he'll offer his last breath in this dark room as an offering for all the evil he brought into this world.

Taking a knife out of her back pocket, she starts dragging it along Tim's arm, then moving it on his stomach as she continues circling him.

"My wife asked you a question." My voice sounds like I'm a step away from losing my sanity, and maybe I am. Maybe I fucking am since all I can see now are images of this man somehow cutting the ropes around him, stealing the knife from Echo, and killing her right in front of me.

Instinctively, I pull out my own knife from the inner pocket of my jacket and stab his heart repeatedly, the warm blood on my hands only fueling me to do it again and again. I wanted to make his death theatric, and I did. I wanted to let Echo have fun with him and I wanted for me to do all the ‘ how does it feel to be on the receiving end of torture?' routine. But I needed to see him dead only to make sure I'll never see my wife fighting for her life again. Maybe I'm not over finding her beaten up in that lobby three years ago, after all.

"Ian." Echo's hands cover mine, applying pressure and trying to stop me. But I can't let her stop me. She doesn't know the type of danger she's in, but I do. And I can't let my son grow up in a world where his mother isn't there to sing him lullabies to sleep. "Ian, he's dead." Is he, Echo? Because he seems pretty fucking alive to me. "Ian!"

"What?"

"Stop, baby, please." She sounds completely different than earlier, like the woman fate brought into my life that night when I was snowed in, in a hotel somewhere in New York. Shy, yet determined. Smart, sharp, witty, yet boiling with rage and a need for vengeance on the world. I read that on her face as soon as I laid eyes on her during my show, yet I could've never imagined that she would become the center of my world. Does she even know she's the center of my world? Because if she does, why would she make me stop saving her from immediate danger?

A sudden pain in my back makes me close my eyes and grunt, shaking my head and trying to clear my thoughts so I can go back to protecting my family as fast as possible.

There's a part of me that believes I'm not anchored to reality at the moment. Because I know I was about to kill Tim, so why am I now seeing Echo holding Noah in her arms, kissing his forehead and threading her fingers through his dark curls? I'm standing in the doorway, and she's sitting in the rocking chair in our son's room.

" And if that mockingbird don't sing, Momma's gonna buy you a diamond ring."

" And if that diamond ring turns brass, Daddy's gonna buy you a looking glass. "

"There you go," she whispers in my ear, her lips touching my skin bringing goosebumps all over it. "It's good to have you back, my Ian."

Letting my head fall back, I feel it hit something hard. I open my eyes, taking in my surroundings, and only now I realize I'm feet away from Tim, pushed by my wife against a wall. And there's blood. So much blood. Dripping from tonight's victim's gaping chest on the floor.

I lift my hand, cocking my head to the side and watching the bloodied blade shine in the light of the bulb hanging above my head. It's beautiful, just like the world is now that it doesn't hold a predator like Tim in it.

"Don't leave me again, pretty boy." Echo kisses my cheek as she wraps her hand around mine, gently taking the knife and letting it fall on the floor. "Just stay with me for a while, okay?"

"I could never leave you, sweet girl." Wrapping my arms around her waist, I pull her closer to me, the need to feel her becoming more and more unbearable. I drag my hands upward, cupping her cheeks and kissing her forcefully, letting her know without words for the thousandth time that without her there's no point for me to keep breathing.

"I know." Echo nods, taking her lips from mine and looking at me with a mixture of fear and understanding. I hate seeing fear in her eyes. "So, why do you keep doing it?"

"What could that possibly mean, baby? I've been here all the ti—"

"Physically." Her words turn sharper, the step she takes back feeling like a punch to the gut. "But mentally…" She hesitates, looking at Tim. "Mentally you keep leaving me, Ian. And I know I used to do that in the past and you always managed to bring me back, but now that the tables have turned, I simply don't know what to do."

She sounds exasperated and fearful. I hate hearing her sound exasperated and fearful even more.

"I have it under control, Echo," I say between clenched teeth while rubbing my stubble, smearing Tim's blood all over my face. Maybe I did it instinctively or maybe I did it to offer my wife proof of what I did for her.

"Do you now?" She claps her hands and lets out a fake laugh. "Is that ," she extends her right hand, pointing at the dead body on the chair, "what you call having it under control? Because it sure doesn't look like that to me, Ian." She says the last sentence louder, biting out the words.

Okay, maybe I don't have it all under control.

"Tell me what to do, Ian." Echo grabs the lapels of my jacket, putting her forehead on mine and letting out a long exhale. "Because we can't keep going until we fix this. Not only because it brings me pain to see you like this, but because it will only get worse and worse and one of us, if not both of us, will get caught. And I won't allow our son to live in a world where he doesn't see one or both of his parents ever again."

"I know, sweet girl. I will never let that happen either. I would rather die than leave you or him to be alone in this world. As a matter of fact, that's the thought that brings me to this…" I pause, trying to find the best word, but settling for, "State."

"What an awful vicious circle." My wife lets out a humorless laugh before putting her hand on my face and making me look at her. I love looking at her. "Do we need to stop?"

"I don't know." I shrug, giving her the most honest answer I'm capable of. "I don't want to, obviously, but I do admit I'm getting sloppy. I let my instincts, my need to protect you, and the vow I made to never allow you to be in danger again after that night guide me. And that's a good motivation, but when I hear them, Echo— God , when I hear them—that's when I start imagining what they could do to you."

"I proved to you time and time again that I'm fine on my own," she says in a low voice. "I killed my ex-husband all by myself. Your brother too. It's not easy for me either, Ian. I saw you getting incredibly close to death too."

I don't have anything else to say because I know she's right. Echo was the one who saved me from my brother on that beach. She killed him in cold blood, yes, but she also saw me bleeding close to death. Not only that, but she saved me yet again when she talked to the police while I was in surgery.

My wife is stronger than me from so many perspectives. I've never doubted that. And the only thing I can do is to let her tell me what she thinks is best for all of us.

"What do you think we need, my precious Echo?" I give her lips a gentle kiss. "Do you think we should stop?"

"Maybe we should take a break. Go somewhere else. A change of scenery might be good for both of us."

She's not wrong. A change of scenery might be the thing that would make me regroup and find the old, calculated me again.

"Where would you want to be right now, Ian?"

"Inside you," I joke, trying to lighten the mood. But judging by how hard she grabs my dick through my pants, I think my wife took me much more seriously than I expected. Not that I'm complaining. Not by far.

"That can most definitely be arranged." I could distinguish her raspy, turned-on voice from all the sounds that have ever haunted this earth. "And I would like to arrange it as fast as possible, if that's okay with you."

"Do you want to feel my cock throbbing inside you while I'm wearing the blood of our enemy on my skin, sweet girl?" My words make Echo's face light up. She burns so bright, my perfect girl. She burns and burns and I'm her ashes, following her on the path of absolution and destruction. Lifting the hem of her shirt, my wife gives me a perfect view of her stomach, which only wakes up a primal need to watch it grow again in me. "If you don't leave this place with a baby in you and your pussy so full of my cum you'll barely be able to walk, I'll consider myself a failure of a husband." I wrap my arm around her waist, dragging her closer to me and pushing myself against her pelvis. "And failing you would be my downfall, baby."

There's something my words awaken in Echo judging by the way her pupils dilate and the crazed grin blooming on her face. Right now, I feel like an insect trapped in her web, but the difference is I would let this woman devour me whole and still find a way to come back and beg for more.

Pushing my shoulder until I'm kneeling in front of her, she swiftly takes off her shirt, allowing me to see the marvel that her breasts are in all their glory. Her lips purse when she places her index finger on them, probably thinking if she wants to be my good girl or if she needs me to be her good boy. And I give her the time she needs, on my knees until she makes up her mind.

Suddenly, my back hits the concrete floor, at the same time I see the buttons of my shirt flying when Echo pulls the edges of it, hard. Licking my chest and unbuckling my belt, she pulls my slacks down, and when I feel her tongue on the letters of her name she carved on my pelvis, I let out a long moan.

"Please, baby."

"Say it again, and I promise I'll fuck you."

"Please, please, please , Echo. I need to be inside you so much." I whimper when I feel her hand wrapping around my cock and stroking me gently. "Don't you want me to show you how much of a good boy I can be for you so you can leave here fucked full of my cum?"

I must have said the right thing because the next thing my wife does is straddle me, lifting her skirt and pushing her panties to the side. I lose all train of thought when I feel her clit rubbing against the tip of my dick, and despite the fact all my instincts tell me to grab her and fuck her like an animal, I force myself to stay still.

"Did you earn this pussy, pretty boy?"

"I think I did." I nod eagerly. "I earned it when I gave Tim to my princess, didn't I?"

Grinding faster against my cock, Echo moans loudly, the sweet sound filling the room bringing me on the verge of insanity.

"That feels really good, Ian. But I think this ," she hisses as she takes me inside her in one swift movement, "feels even better. Don't you agree?"

Panting and letting my head fall on the floor, all I can do is whisper a "Yes."

"Look at me when I'm fucking you, Ian." She adjusts herself until she makes sure I'm hitting her g-spot. "Don't you want to see your wife using your cock until she pulls the cum out of you?"

"I'm sorry," I say, opening my eyes and lifting my head again. "Yes, I would love to see my wife fucking me until I come deep inside her and she comes all over me."

Keeping a fast pace, she starts riding me at the same time she looks into my eyes to make sure I don't stop looking at her. Not that I could ever stop looking at her.

"Just a bit more." She moans. "Just a bit more and I'll come just the way you like it. I'll come so hard for my husband he'll be drenched by the time I'm done."

I apply more pressure on her clit, rubbing it in slow circles, just the way I know it drives her mad. And when she does as she said, and comes, screaming out my name and how much she loves me, I see her in all her raw splendor. I can't help myself. I grab her hips and fuck her hard from the bottom, prolonging her orgasm as much as possible.

"I want you to keep coming when I fill you up and breed you, Echo. Be my best girl and do that for me, will you?" I ask, sitting up and kissing her deeply.

She moans into my mouth, her cunt gripping me so hard I have no choice but to let go. My cock is pulsating inside her while she milks me for every last drop. And I know I could do this for the rest of my life without ever getting tired of it.

As usual, I lose track of time when she's resting in my arms. Minutes or hours may have passed when a thought hits me unexpectedly.

"I think it's time for you to become name partner, Echo Beckett."

"Where did that come from?"

"We agreed on a change of scenery. And I think I know exactly the place to go and the way to finally make your dream come true."

Taking my phone from my pocket, I push call on the number I've managed to get after offering a lot of fake smiles and practicing the art of manipulation on my agent. After a few failed attempts, just when I'm starting to lose my hope and thinking of a plan B, my call finally goes through. And I start putting in motion the plan I've been dying to start ever since I told my wife I'd help her reach the top of the food chain in her world.

"According to my calculations, it's 9:32 p.m. in Romania now, so good evening, Yonathan."