Chapter 2: Awake!
The world swam back into focus through a syrupy haze. Fatima’s eyelids fluttered open to the concerned, furry face of Godfrey, his rough, warm tongue dragging up her cheek from chin to temple. A whimper built in her throat.
“Ugh, Godfrey, no…” she slurred, pushing weakly at his massive head.
Strong hands gripped her shoulders, hauling her upright. Hank. His face was a mask of strained concern, his pupils blown so wide his blue irises were just thin rings. Sweat beaded on his brow, plastering his dark hair to his forehead. The air around him crackled with a heat she could feel from inches away.
“Fatima? Talk to me, baby. Are you okay?” His voice was tight, the words gritted out between clenched teeth.
Memory returned in a sickening lurch. The bar. Dock 7. Jan, laughing, pouring that shimmering fae wine. The taste of sunshine and rebellion. Then a sharp, chemical tang in the back of her throat. A blur of gray uniforms. Jan’s scream. A struggle. Something pricking her neck.
“Jan,” Fatima gasped, her own body feeling heavy, languid. A deep, throbbing heat was uncoiling in her core, spreading through her limbs like liquid fire. She looked at Hank, really looked at him. The drug—it had to be a drug—wasn’t just in her. It was reaching for him, too, a pheromonal lure that bypassed all reason. She could see the battle in the tense line of his jaw, the way his knuckles were white where he gripped her.
“They took her,” Hank growled, his gaze dropping to her lips. “Some fucking Wardens. I tried… fuck, Fatima, I can’t think.”
The compulsion was a physical force, a magnetic pull drawing them together. The intellectual part of her mind, the part that curated Renaissance etchings and could deconstruct complex enchantments, was screaming that this was wrong, a violation. But the animal part, the part the drug had hooked and was reeling in, didn’t care. It only wanted. It only needed.
“Hank,” she breathed, and his name was a surrender.
He crushed his mouth to hers. It wasn’t his usual playful, teasing kiss. It was a claim. Desperate and hungry. His tongue plunged into her mouth, and she met it with a ferocity that shocked her, her hands fisting in his shirt, pulling him down onto the floor with her. The worn carpet scratched against her back, a distant sensation beneath the roaring in her blood.
Godfrey let out a low whine and padded away, his nails clicking on the hardwood floor before settling in the corner with a resigned sigh. Human nonsense.
Hank broke the kiss, his breath coming in ragged pants. “What is this? What did they do to you?”
“I don’t know,” she moaned, arching her back as his hands found her breasts through her blouse, his thumbs rubbing her nipples into hard, aching points. “It’s like… it’s pulling you in. Ya Allah, Hank, just touch me.”
He didn’t need more encouragement. He ripped her blouse open, buttons pinging off the walls. His mouth was on her neck, sucking, biting, marking her as his hands shoved her bra up, his mouth latching onto a nipple. The sensation was electric, a jolt that went straight to her cunt. She cried out, her hips bucking off the floor.
“Fuck, you’re so wet already,” he snarled against her skin, his hand sliding down her stomach, over her skirt, his palm pressing hard against the soaked fabric between her legs.
“I need you inside me. Now,” she demanded, her voice guttural, foreign to her own ears. She was past elegance, past sharp-tongued wit. She was a raw, wanting thing.
He yanked her skirt and underwear down her legs in one brutal motion, his own belt buckle clattering as he freed himself. He was already painfully hard, his cock thick and veined, jutting from his body. He didn’t pause for foreplay, for tenderness. The drug allowed for none of that.
He drove into her in one single, punishing thrust, burying himself to the hilt.
Fatima screamed, a raw, torn sound of pure, unadulterated pleasure-pain. Her nails dug into his back, surely drawing blood. He filled her completely, stretching her, the friction so intense it bordered on agony. It was exactly what the fever in her blood demanded.
“Yes! Like that! Don’t you fucking stop!” she shrieked, her legs wrapping around his waist, locking him to her.
Hank obeyed, his control shattered. He fucked her with a savage, relentless rhythm, his hips pistoning, the sound of their bodies slapping together filthy and loud in the quiet apartment. Each thrust was a hammer blow, driving her higher, chasing the inferno the drug had ignited.
“You feel that, baby? You feel how much I need this?” he grunted, his face buried in her neck. “Can’t think about anything but this fucking pussy. My pussy.”
“It’s yours! God, it’s all yours!” she chanted, her mind dissolving into a white-hot static of sensation. She was close, so close, the coil in her gut winding to a breaking point.
He shifted his angle, grinding his pelvis against her clit with every deep, penetrating stroke. It was too much. It was everything.
“I’m gonna come,” she sobbed, her body seizing. “Hank!”
Her orgasm detonated, a convulsive, shattering wave that ripped through her, milking his cock deep inside her. Her scream was muffled against his shoulder. The feeling of her climax clamping down around him was all it took. With a final, brutal thrust and a guttural roar, he emptied himself into her, his own release a hot, pulsing flood.
He collapsed on top of her, his weight a solid, comforting anchor. For long minutes, the only sounds were their ragged, slowing breaths and the faint traffic noise from the street below. The chemical fire had burned itself out, leaving behind the ashes of reality.
The haze receded, and with it came the cold dread.
Hank rolled off her, lying on his back beside her on the floor. He stared at the ceiling. “What the hell was that?”
“A mop-up job,” Fatima said, her voice hollow. She pulled her torn blouse closed, a futile gesture. “They drugged me with something… aphrodisiacal, contagious. To make us forget. To make us not ask questions.” She sat up, the stickiness between her thighs a cold reminder. “They took Jan. And they tried to make us not care.”
Hank sat up too, his expression hardening from post-coital confusion to grim determination. He looked at the torn clothing, at Godfrey who lifted his head from his paws, sensing the shift in the air. “They took our friend.” He stood, pulling his jeans up. “No one does that.”
Fatima stood on shaky legs, wrapping a discarded afghan around her shoulders. The elegance was back in her posture, but her eyes were sharp, dangerous. “They think we’re just humans. They think we’ll forget.” She walked to the window, looking out at the city. “But I never forget. And you… you remember now.”
She turned to face him. “We need to get Mara.”
Hank was already grabbing his jacket. “The lawyer? Why?”
“Because she’s the best,” Fatima replied, her voice cold as steel. “And because I have a feeling we’re going to need someone who knows how to break systems. And people.”
She looked down at Godfrey, who had come to stand by her side, a solid, warm presence. “And wherever we go, we’re taking the dog. Where we’re going, we’ll need all the immunity we can get. But first, I need to bake."
The silence that followed was heavier than the one they’d shattered. Hank watched, baffled, as Fatima moved past the wreckage of their clothing on the living room floor and into the kitchen with singular purpose. She pulled her phone from her purse, its screen lighting up her determined face.
“What are you doing?” he asked, his voice still rough.
“We need cookies,” she said, not looking up from her search. The phone glowed with images of chocolate chip recipes. Hank stared at her, the torn blouse still draped over her shoulders like a bizarre shawl. Godfrey padded into the kitchen and sat near her feet, a silent sentinel.
“Cookies?” Hank ran a hand through his disheveled hair. “Fatima, we just… and Jan is… since when do you bake cookies?” The question felt absurd, tumbling out into the charged air. A sharp, impatient knock echoed from the front door, cutting off any reply she might have given.
He moved to answer it, his body still humming with residual adrenaline. The door hadn’t even fully opened before a force of nature named Shiv O’Connor pushed her way inside, her fiery red hair a warning flag. “Where is she?” Shiv demanded, her Dublin brogue sharp as a blade. Her eyes, the same fierce green as Jan’s, scanned the apartment, missing nothing. “What have you lot gotten my Jan into?”
Hank stepped back, his gaze traveling past her into the hallway. Brigid stood there, petite and serious, flanked by Will and Sarah, their hands linked. Behind them, looking like he wished the floor would swallow him, was Johnny, his hands shoved deep in his pockets. “He came to get us,” Brigid said softly, her eyes wide with a fear she was trying hard to control. “Johnny said something big happened to Jan, but he wasn’t sure what. He just said we had to get here.”
Hank wordlessly stepped aside, and the O’Connor contingent filed into the already crowded space. Godfrey gave a happy whuff and trotted over to nuzzle Brigid and then Shiv, his tail wagging. Shiv absently scratched the dog’s head, her attention already shifting to the kitchen. “What’s all this, then?” she asked, striding toward the counter where Fatima’s phone still displayed a recipe.
“We’re baking,” Fatima stated, her tone leaving no room for argument.
“Right, so,” Shiv said, taking immediate command. She plucked the phone from Fatima’s hand, glanced at the screen, and began opening cupboards. “Where’s your vanilla? And the baking soda? This butter is too cold, for God’s sake.” She moved through their small kitchen as if she owned it, her presence instantly reorganizing the chaos into a semblance of order.
Hank leaned close to Fatima, his voice a low whisper. “Why are we baking cookies now?”
Fatima watched Shiv begin measuring flour with a ruthless efficiency. She shrugged, a slight, almost imperceptible movement. “Mara needs to remember,” she said, as if that explained everything.
Hank could only stare, the general confusion of the last hour solidifying into a dense, impenetrable knot in his stomach.