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But three weeks in he had yet to touch me and he had yet to spank me. In some ways it was worse than anything else he could do. Because the waiting was distracting.
Three weekends passed. They were not enjoyable. Claude wasn't just a sadist, he was – fucked up - was the best and most deep and introspective term I could give it. I'd come to the conclusion the man I'd thought kind at the dinner party St. Martin gave had been on his best behavior. Possibly his only best behavior.
Because this Claude was a consummate game player. He set impossible tasks and stupid ones, vying us against each other, Chloe and I pitted against each other in Trivial Pursuit or something else, and then the results were stored away on his phone against the day that he – what? Worked up the courage to touch me?
During those times I didn't even like Chloe. She became a dark eyed bitch who would as soon scratch my eyes out.
I was staying because...
Because one addiction had been cured and not the other. I was still trying to find my way back to a sustainable life for myself. I didn't think I was being purposefully stupid about it. I knew this wasn't going to be my real life. I didn't even think the people whose real life it was did it forever. Kind of the way most humans, at least the ones I know, moved in and out of passions. One day they were totally in love with running and the next their running shoes had cobwebs. I didn't mean those people who followed trends. I just meant that new excites a lot of people and the lifestyle had new happening all the time.
To an extent, I was hiding. I knew that. After all the stress in my life with Jesse and the gang, with Jesse's death and my own fet addiction, my father's ill health, when PD started looking to put me back undercover I had a talk with both the department shrink (actually, there were a lot of those) and an uncomfortable and overly personal one with my CO. Both of them had been shocked when I asked to tell Mark that I was going under on assignment. Not because I couldn't.
But because I hadn't before.
He knew what my job was, I said to both of them, and they had the same response. You just left? He must have been out of his mind for you! Do you actually love him?
Of course I did. But that was personal. This was work.
But the shrink had gone one further and asked, Do you always run when the going gets tough?
The answer seemed to be yes. I ran physically. I ran emotionally. I ran into work. I ran into a needle.
Staying with St. Martin had been hiding too, until Kie and Vincent fucked it up and St. Martin changed. I'd been comfortable with him, knowing what to expect. If there were indignities and humiliations and worse yet things I longed for and then was appalled by when they happened, so what? Deep cover had the same things a lot of the time.
Telling myself it wasn't safe to go back to Real Life yet because I was too fragile. Wouldn't want to become addicted again.
St. Martin hadn't said so but I was pretty sure he considered me clean.
That was one reason I was staying, despite feeling physically uncomfortable around Claude and waiting for whatever he'd eventually do.
Another part of it was St. Martin. He'd changed. So much. He was so violent and angry and depressed now and I wanted to be there but he'd sent me away and that snake was still in the basement and that scared me.
And I wanted to see, when he came out of that anger and fury, if he'd ever tell me about his Emily. If he'd ever tell me anything.
If there was anything there. I didn't expect him to change. I'd never gone into any relationship, as a cop or a woman, expecting the person to change.
Except maybe this time – I could?
So - weekday morning. Claude was up and out and the two of us, Chloe and I, were running companionably through the tremendous amount of desert the ultra rich enclave had greedily absorbed.
It was beautiful up in the neighborhood above the valley floor. There was a good view of everything spread out below. Chloe was a good running partner for me. She didn't stop a lot but she didn't run super fast either. I was used to keeping up with St. Martin – who definitely didn't wait for me – but the time off had taken its toll. It was nice to start getting some cardiovascular back without him there to egg me on with threats of beatings or promises of not having fish. In my real life, not having fish wasn't a reward, it was a way of life.
"What are you thinking about?" Chloe asked, sounding amused. "You don't usually smile when you run. In fact, I don't think most sane people do."
I laughed aloud at that. "I'm thinking about not having to eat fish."
She gave me a look. "Whatever makes you happy, I guess."
"Only now you'll tell Claude and there will be fish."
Chloe laughed, a little breathless. "Not hardly. I hate fish. But what you said doesn't make you sound any saner."
"True. I was actually thinking that you're a much nicer running partner than St. Martin. He doesn't wait for me and he's a mile high."
Chloe snorted. "Him and Claude. They don't throw their weight around as much as they throw their height around."
That struck us both as funny and we slowed to a walk. Giggling can take it out of you.
