Silence fills the wake of Aaron’s departure and Emily sits on her bed in the half-dark. She looks around.

The room is spare. She gives it a mental dressing-down and its utilitarian feeling leaks through such grace-notes as the four-poster bed and fringed cream-colored throws and two-tone walls; it is a tool, loosening the grip of her mind, letting it slide back down into swirling water where seaweed breathes on the back of her neck and tickles the backs of her knees. Inside her imagination she lies on the rocks, looking up into lances of floodlight through an interlaced drift of hair, a broad floating skirt. The woman’s sprawled pale limbs trace a star-shaped shadow. All of Emily’s agitated thoughts rise like tiny bubbles and scream at the surface.

She closes her eyes and draws in a deep breath. It tastes like dust. The harsh sound of it echoes in the empty room, startling her. Her eyes open. A wind gusts against the window and shadows of branches climb the walls, bending and swooping. Moisture clings in fat drops to the panes.

Will he change his mind?

She sits cross-legged and faces the door and meditates on the shapes of the words:

Will he change his mind?

She sees his shape moving through the courtyards and the tree trunks and the arbors heavy with roses, footlights throwing thin shadows up his ankles, the determination in his body propped up by something softer. The corners of his mouth are unlaced somehow, his face en déshabillé, loosened with surrender.

How long to wait? How long?

The images swoop around inside of her like panicked birds. Emily turns, stretching across the bed, and grabs her cell phone off the nightstand. She holds it in her palm. Her mind floats around inside her head, flotsam buoyant on her slow rise of oxygen. Her heart kicks out a line of slow, hard beats, underlining the force of her breath. She scrolls down the log of received calls, listening to the electronic trill until an unfamiliar number lights up. She checks the details, notes the time it came in. She glances at the door and holds her breath.

Silence.

Her lips tighten and she hits the green button. She lifts the phone to her ear. Her eyes slide toward the window. Each ring vibrates with a tiny rush of adrenaline. At the fifth ring there is a click. Her whole body flashes cold. Signal-processed air hums. Her fingers tighten, slippery on a thin layer of sweat. Heat creeps through her. She breathes hard.

A faint rustling breaks the white noise. “Hi.”

Emily grabs her mouth. She angles the phone, lifting up her nose away so he won’t hear her panting.

“Did you like her?”

Her heart struggles inside her rib cage like a wild thing.

“I’m surprised.” George chuckles. “I didn’t think you’d keep this number.”

She reins in her breath. “W-Where are you?”

He breathes into the phone and the soft even cadence crawls up the inside of her skin. Sharp curls of heat scatter up her spine.

“Where are you?” Her voice trembles. “A-Are…are you here?”

“Emily?”

Her pulse throbs in her ears. “Yeah?”

“Is your heart beating really, really fast?”

Her face flushes. “Yes.”

His chin scrapes the phone. “Where are you?”

“I’m in a hotel room.” Her fingers gather up the bedspread and twist it. “I’m at the Nantucket Inn.”

“Are you alone?”

Her mouth goes dry. She nods. “Yes.”

His voice turns husky. “Now why haven’t you answered my question?”

“You won’t answer mine.”

“Did you like her?”

“You did…” Emily swallows. “You did a nice job.” Her stomach clenches. “You mimicked Francesca’s crime scene…you did it almost perfectly.”

There’s a pause. “Almost?”

“H-Her wound.” She inhales. “In her chest.” Her eyes squeeze shut. “It wasn’t as straight as yours,” she whispers. “It wasn’t as clean.”

“Are you horny?” The timbre of his voice scrapes gravel. “You are, aren’t you?”

“Are you here?” Heat crawls down her neck and flares in the hollow of her throat. “Are you still on island?”

“How did seeing her make you feel?” His breath wells up through the words. “How do you feel right now? What’s it like in your mind? Tell me, Emily. I want to know.”

“I don’t…I d-don’t know. I don’t know. There was so much, there is…there is so much going on in my head. I-I’m shocked…and angry...and…” The last word slides out in a high thin whisper. “Confused.”

“And wet. I hear it in your voice. It does funny little things when you’re wet. It cracks up…it cracks down.” A breathless chuckle. “Put your hand down there. Stick your fingers in. See if I’m right.”

Emily looks at her jeans. She moves her legs. Her breath trembles in her throat.

“Are you doing it?”

She reaches down and unfastens her zipper. “No.”

“You want know what I’m thinking about right now?”

“Yes.” She shoves her hand beneath the tightness of the denim, scrapes her knuckles against the zipper’s teeth, pulls it out again. “I want to know.”

“I’m thinking about you. Imagining your fingers in that wound, sliding under those nice straight edges.” His breath grows heavy. “The fat. It’s so soft but I bet you didn’t know that. It yields, like it wants to slick your way to the bone.”

Her eyes close and her mouth trembles open, exhaling hard.

“That cut goes all the way down into her heart.”

She looks down at her hand, watches it curl around a breast. “George where are you?”

He breathes the words: “I carved it special.”

“Where are you, goddammit?” Her breath catches on her teeth. “Where are you?”

He crawls into her need. “I’m right here.” The words, wrapped up in honeyed gravel, padding on soft feet along the underside of her skin. “Put your fingers inside your cunt.” The hard shoal of his breath pulls them down. “Wait until it starts to twitch.”

She twists and turns on the tight bedspread, shoving the denim down to her knees. She pins the phone to her shoulder with her chin.

“Are you doing it?”

She takes down her knickers. “No.”

“What’s that noise?”

Emily kicks off her jeans. “It’s the blankets moving.”

“You’re in bed?”

Her hand rests half-curled on the rise and fall of her belly. “Yes. I’m in bed.”

“You naked?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.”

“I would very much like to know.”

Emily slides her palm along the crest of her pubic bone, pushing down, feeling the slide of her lips and the thick moisture surrounding her erect clit. “Are you here? Where are you? Can I come to you? A-Are you on the other side of one of these walls?” The words are agonized, caught up on a tide of air. “Are you in the parking lot?” she pants. “Are you…a-are you…on the other side of…my door?”

“Do you still smell like you’ve been fucked?”

Her fingers make soft wet sounds. “Yes,” she sighs. “Yes.”

“Put your fingers inside.”

Emily tilts her hips and slips them in. Her eyebrows knot.

“How does it feel?”

“Good.” She swallows. “It feels good.”

“Are you twitching?”

“If you’re here, on this fucking goddamned island, I want you. I want your fingers. I want your hands. I want your cock.”

“Are you naked, Emily?”

“O-Only from the waist down.”

“What’s your room number?”

Her lips pull back from her teeth. “S-Seventeen.”

The phone clicks.

The phone drops from her fingers and she rolls onto her side, arms curling up around her head. Her fingers work faster as her eyes burn. She smears the snot off her nose with the inside of her wrist. Her breath jigs and jags. Her restlessness pushes her onto her back and she pants at the ceiling. Streaks of salt dry onto her face. She lets out a frustrated humming sigh and her legs move apart. Her hips rock up into her busy palm.

The knock on her door is soft. She scrambles off the bed and runs to the peephole. Her damp hands cup around her face. She presses her mouth to the crack.
“Who is it?”

“Let me in.”

Emily flips the safety bolt, turns the lock, opens the door just enough to look out and George pushes through it, wriggling into the room, taking hold of her waist and pulling her into him as he closes the door with the small of his back. Her arms draw tight around his neck, holding on to him through the force of an inhaled kiss. The bolt engages with a solid thump. He wrestles her around until her spine flattens into the door and with trembling hands she unfastens his pants. He lifts her up, scalp scraping against the framed details of Massachusetts state hospitality taxes, and plunges into her. Emily locks her legs around him, sliding her tongue up the side of his neck. He squeezes her buttocks. She grunts. The door rattles in its frame.

His face mashes into the hollow space behind her ear, panting, teeth flattened into her skin. He bites down and the pain shocks her, boils in her blood like a flash. She cries out and he bites harder. He grips the undersides of her thighs and slams her over and over again. The pain sizzles in her skin. A drop of sweat rolls off his nose and lands in the hollow of her throat. Emily growls, tightening her fists in his hair. She yanks him up and their mouths collide in a misaligned kiss. He moves into her tight and hard, his bottom lip splitting open in the clash of their teeth. The metallic tang of his blood floods her mouth. He moans, swallowing her breath, licking her soft palate. She weaves her fingers tight into the crown of his hair. He starts to shudder. Blood mingles with spit, runs in a hot ribbon down his chin.

He grunts, leaning her into the door. Emily slides a hand up the back of his neck, tightens her fingers on his damp skin. His legs wobble. He slides down until he’s on his knees. He lets her fall onto his lap, bracing his arms on either side of her shoulders, head hanging, pulling in great harsh breaths. She leans her mouth into his cheek, her hand rubbing her clit, her breath fluttering and breaking. It catches in her throat and breaks free. His breath starts to slow. She pants into his hairline, hand tight on his nape. Her eyebrows furrow and she starts to whimper. Her hips twitch. He pulls back and looks into her face. He moves his forehead against hers as she tightens through the spasms. He holds her face, thumbs tracing the trembling corners of her open mouth. She strains upward for a handful of seconds and goes limp, head rolling against the door.

George runs his forearm across his mouth. He looks down at the streaks on his wrist, glances at the blood smeared on her chin. Emily pants, her eyes closed. She tries to get up, her legs shaking. He backs away on his hands and knees. Her eyes flutter open as she slides back down. She runs her tongue into the corner of her mouth, tastes metal. He stands up, staggering back. She wipes her lips with her thumb and brings it to her eye level, rubbing the thin stickiness between her fingers.

His balance wavers. He plants a foot on her hip and tries to push her aside. Startled, Emily shoves his ankle away. He grabs her by the hair. She digs her nails into his wrist and he growls, hauling his arm back. Emily turns onto one hip and kicks his feet out from under him. He collapses into a gangly tangle, ripping strands of hair out of her scalp. She grunts and slaps her hair out of his loosening fingers. Emily stands, hands on the wall, watching him unfold himself and rise to his feet. He turns in a circle and she moves behind him, feet overlapping in a tight perimeter. George looks over his shoulder and meets the raw consciousness in her gaze. He grabs the doorknob, twists it, yanks the door open. Hallway light rushes in, spills across her feet. Her long dark hairs hang trapped in his knuckles. They drift in the unsettled air like spider’s silk.

The world within Emily’s mind turns sideways, tipping her into the bottom of her voice. “You’re running away from me.” Her eyes widen. “I don’t believe this.”

He shoulders through the door. She smells the sweat on his skin for a moment and then it’s gone, eddied out into the scent of clean carpet, smothered in the sharpness of her own sweat. She walks to the jamb and stands there. She looks down the blank hallway, mesmerized by the storm of his footfalls.