Chapter 7: Caught in the act
The water in the old clawfoot tub was scalding, just shy of painful. Nomi sank into it, letting the heat sear away the sticky residue, the soreness, the phantom feeling of being filled. She scrubbed at her skin with a rough washcloth until it pinkened, but the scent of them – a mix of Ant’s spicy cologne and Jazzy’s vanilla lotion and sex – seemed baked into her pores. The purple bruise on her collarbone glared back at her from the steam-fogged mirror like a brand.
She could hear them in the kitchen, the low murmur of their voices, the clatter of pans. A domestic sound. It felt more intimate than what they’d just done.
Wrapped in a towel, she padded back to her room – her room, though it now felt like a provisional space, an annex to their domain. She dressed mechanically in soft, high-waisted jeans and an oversized sweatshirt, armor for the day. When she emerged, the aroma of frying eggs and garlic filled the eclectic space.
“Coffee’s on,” Jazzy said without turning, tending to a skillet. They wore Ant’s button-down shirt from the night before, the sleeves rolled up. It swam on them, and the sight sent a weird, possessive pang through Nomi that she didn’t understand.
Ant was at the small table, a sketchbook open, his hand moving in quick, aggressive strokes. He glanced up as she approached. His eyes were dark, assessing. They traveled from her damp hair to the neckline of her sweatshirt, hunting for the mark he’d left. A faint smirk touched his lips when he saw it was hidden.
“Sit,” he said, nodding to the chair beside him.
She sat. He pushed a mug of black coffee toward her. Jazzy slid a plate in front of her heaped with scrambled eggs, toast, and sliced avocado. The care in the gesture, so at odds with the raw use of her body an hour before, twisted her stomach.
“Eat,” Jazzy said, finally turning. Their gaze was soft, motherly. “You need your strength.”
Nomi picked up a fork. The eggs were perfect. “Thanks,” she mumbled.
For a few minutes, there was only the sound of eating and the scratch of Ant’s charcoal. Then he spoke, his voice casual. “You got a video to film today, ghost? Your adoring public waiting?”
She nodded, swallowing. “A sponsored segment. Eco-friendly laundry detergent.” It sounded absurd, a chirpy YouTube life existing parallel to this reality.
“Cute,” he said, not looking up from his sketch. “Do it here. The light’s good by the fire escape in the afternoon.”
It wasn’t a suggestion. Nomi felt a flutter of panic. Her filming setup was her controlled, pristine world. “I usually do it in my room. It’s quieter, I have my backdrop–”
“Here,” he repeated, finally meeting her eyes. The command in them was absolute. “I want to watch you work.”
Jazzy sipped their coffee, observing the exchange silently, a faint smile on their lips.
The day stretched, taut and strange. Nomi set up her ring light and microphone by the large window, conscious of Ant lounging on the couch, a silent, brooding audience. Jazzy typed away on a laptop, working on their screenplay. Nomi fumbled through her takes, her usually bubbly delivery flat. She’d hold up the detergent bottle, talk about stain removal, and all she could think about was the come drying in her hair last night, Ant’s hand fisted in it.
“Cut,” Ant said during her fifth botched take. “You sound like a hostage. Smile, for fuck’s sake. It’s soap, not a death sentence.”
Heat flooded her cheeks. “I’m trying.”
“Try harder,” he said, but his voice had lost its edge. He got up and walked over to her, adjusting the ring light himself, his fingers brushing hers. “Look here, not at the fucking ceiling. Pretend you’re talking to someone who actually gives a shit.”
His proximity, the scent of him, the memory of his hands on her body, short-circuited her nerves. But somehow, the frustration grounded her. She took a breath, imagined she was explaining the injustice of microplastics in rivers, and did the take in one clean flow.
“Better,” he grunted, returning to the couch.
She finished, packed her equipment away. The silence that followed was heavy, charged. Jazzy closed their laptop. “I’m gonna run to the bodega. We need wine.” They grabbed their jacket, pausing to drop a kiss on Ant’s forehead, then on Nomi’s cheek—a soft, lingering press. “Be good.”
The door clicked shut. The apartment seemed to shrink.
Ant continued sketching. Nomi busied herself wiping down counters that were already clean. The air grew thick, humming with unspoken words. She could feel his gaze on her back.
“Come here,” he said.
She turned. He hadn’t looked up.
“Ant, I should really edit that footage–”
“Now.”
The word was a low vibration in the quiet room. She walked over, stopping a few feet from the couch. He finally closed his sketchbook and set it aside. He looked at her, his eyes traveling over her body in the bulky sweatshirt and jeans with a predatory slowness.
“Take those off.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Take off the jeans and the sweatshirt. Keep the rest on.”
Her heart hammered against her ribs. This was different from the heat of the night, the blur of the morning. This was deliberate, a cold examination. Her hands trembled as she pulled the sweatshirt over her head, revealing a simple cotton camisole beneath. She unbuttoned her jeans, pushed them down her legs, stepped out of them. She stood before him in her camisole and plain cotton panties, feeling more exposed than she had naked.
“Turn around,” he instructed.
She did, facing the window, the fading afternoon light painting the rooftops gold.
“Pull your panties down. Just to your thighs. Bend over. Put your hands on the windowsill.”
Each command was a bullet, precise and devastating. A sob caught in her throat, but she obeyed. The cool air kissed the skin of her ass and the backs of her thighs. The rough brick of the windowsill dug into her palms. She heard him stand, the rustle of his jeans, the sound of his zipper.
“You watched us, didn’t you?” His voice was close behind her. A finger traced the seam of her, over the dampening cotton of her panties where they strained against her thighs. “Before you ever touched us. You hid and you watched. You little voyeur.”
She whimpered, ashamed. “Yes.”
“You liked it. Seeing me fuck Jazzy. Seeing me make them scream.” It wasn’t a question.
“Yes.”
His finger hooked into the waistband of her panties, pulling them tighter, cutting into her skin. “You wanted this. You wanted to be this. Our good little ghost. Taking whatever we give you.”
He didn’t wait for an answer. He spat into his hand, a crude, wet sound. He rubbed it over the head of his cock, then pressed the thick, blunt tip against her. She was still tender, sensitive from the morning, and she gasped as he pushed inside, a slow, inexorable invasion that burned. There was no preparation, no gentleness, just the brutal, stretching truth of him.
“Fuck,” he hissed, sinking deeper. “Still so fucking tight. Always so tight for me.”
He set a punishing rhythm immediately, each thrust jarring her forward, her forehead pressing against the cool glass of the window. One hand clamped on her hip, holding her in place, the other fisted in the hair at the nape of her neck, pulling her head back. She could see their reflection, a fractured image in the glass: his powerful body driving into hers, her face contorted in a mix of pain and overwhelming pleasure.
“Look at you,” he growled, his breath hot on her ear. “Bent over my windowsill. Anyone could see. The whole fucking city could see what you are.”
The degradation, the utter exposure, should have shattered her. Instead, it fed the dark, hungry thing uncoiling in her gut. She was object, she was owned, she was his. The clarity of it was terrifying and electric.
“You’re mine, Nomi,” he grunted, his pace becoming frantic, sloppy. “Say it.”
“I’m yours,” she choked out, the words ripped from her.
“Whose?”
“Yours! Ant, I’m yours!” The admission broke something open, a floodgate. Her orgasm crashed over her, violent and silent, a series of internal spasms that milked his cock.
He roared, a raw, animal sound, and shoved into her one last time, holding deep as he pulsed inside her, hot and endless. He collapsed over her back, his weight pinning her to the sill, his face buried in her neck. They stayed like that, joined, panting, as the room darkened around them.
Slowly, he softened, slipped out of her. A warm trickle traced down her inner thigh. He righted himself, tucked himself away. With a tenderness that felt like a violation all its own, he pulled her panties back up over the mess.
He turned her around. Her legs were jelly. He held her up, his hands on her arms, studying her face. Her eyes were glazed, her lips parted.
“Go clean up,” he said, his voice rough but quiet. “Then finish your editing.”
He returned to the couch, picked up his sketchbook. As she gathered her clothes and shuffled toward the bathroom, she glanced at the page he’d been working on. It wasn’t abstract shapes or cityscapes.
It was her. Bent over. Captured in stark, beautiful, shameful lines.
The chapter ended with the sound of the front door unlocking, Jazzy’s cheerful call of “I got Malbec!”, and Nomi standing frozen in the hallway, caught between the sacred solitude of her old life and the terrifying, all-consuming gravity of this new one.