The Art of Control

Chapter 5

Dylan

“Shush, Isa. I’m fine. It’s just a flesh wound. Let’s get the f*ck out of here,” I tell her, grabbing her hand and pulling her towards the street.

“How do you know it’s just a flesh wound? We need to call an ambulance,” Isa stutters and cries out.

“F*ck that. We’re not getting the police involved, especially in a foreign country. It’ll be a nightmare. Let’s just get back to the hotel room,” I state emphatically, tugging her.

We walk half a block before we finally see a cab. Isa flags it down and helps me into the car. I’m shaking from my adrenalin rush and Isa is, too. I pull her close, trying to soothe her anxiety.

“I’m fine, baby girl,” I say unconvincingly.

Isa keeps her eyes on me the entire drive back and she looks mortified. She keeps repeatedly touching me and kissing the top of my hand. It’s touching but distressing to see her to frantic and worried.

Back at the hotel, we make a beeline straight to the room as to avoid anyone seeing my bloodied state. I peel my shirt off as soon as we hit the door and I dig out the first aid kit in the bathroom cupboard. I inspect the damage in the mirror while Isa readies some wet washcloths.

“Sit down, Dylan,” she orders and points to the toilet.

I lower the lid and sit, and Isa kneels in front of me to inspect my chest. The cut is only mildly deep and about five inches long. It’s just under my left pectoral muscle and over my heart. When Isa sees that it’s just a flesh wound, she immediately relaxes.

She cleans my laceration well, first with the cloth and then dabs antiseptic on it. It hurts like a motherf*cker and I wince and hiss through my teeth. My eyes remain tightly closed when she cleans it once more just for good measure. Next, Isa gingerly applies the butterfly bandages that are in the kit and places two larger gauze pads over it and tapes it down. She’s very good at this sort of thing and it makes me wonder how she knows how to bandage a wound so well.

“You’re very adept at taking care of injuries,” I tell her.

She shrugs her shoulders but remains silent. Somehow, I suspect the reason she’s good at it is because of her father. She sits back on her haunches and keeps her eyes on my chest. She’s withdrawing again.

“I’m fine,” I try to reassure her.

She nods, but she still says nothing and won’t look at me.

“Isabel, please look at me.”

She knots her hands in her lap and looks down at them.

“Talk to me,” I repeat.

She shakes her head and shrugs again.

“Isabel Young,” I say more sternly and she looks up at me dazed. She blinks rapidly and comes out of her shell.

“Where did you learn to fight like that?” she asks softly. “The NSA?”

“Yes.”

“What other sorts of ninja skills did you learn from them?” she asks seriously.

I chuckle and she cocks her head to the side as if surprised by my amusement at her question.

“Just the usual sorts of survival stuff,” I answer.

“Like how to kill a person?”

“Yes, that too,” I answer in all honesty.

“Because you were a spy?”

Oh, Isa. “I really wasn’t a spy; I was just a field agent.”

“If you were a spy, you couldn’t tell me, though, right?”

“At this point in our relationship, I would tell you if I had been spy,” I say.

She smiles, stands up and sits on my knee. She kisses my cheek and runs her fingers through my hair.

“Did you ever have to use those skills to kill someone?”

Ah, hell. Why does she ask this sort of stuff? I want to lie to her, but I promised I wouldn’t so… “Yes.”

She looks shocked at my candidness.

“You shouldn’t ask what you don’t really want to know,” I chastise her.

“I do want to know. I just didn’t think that…” she takes a deep breath and shakes her head.

“I only did it once if it makes you feel any better.”

“It does make me feel better. Was he a bad man?” she asks with furrowed eyebrows.

“He was a very bad man.” I’ll never figure out why people feel they need to make excuses to justify their actions or the actions of their loved ones.

“Did he have a family?” she asks sadly.

Isa stuns me yet again with her odd question. Shit. I promised I wouldn’t lie to her, but telling her the truth at this moment would do no good. In fact, it might do harm. So this once, I’ll tell Isa what she needs to hear so that her mind and heart will be at peace. “No, he didn’t have a family.”

She sighs with relief. “What did he do that was so bad?”

“I’m done talking about this. I’m tired and sore, and that memory isn’t a particularly fond one I’d care to rehash,” I huff.

“Yes, of course, sugar. I’m sorry. Let’s get you tucked in. Are you hungry? I’ll order us something to eat, okay?” she asks sweetly helping me up and walking me to the bed.

This is caretaker Isa. She comes out on the rarest of occasions, but only because I don’t allow it. However, when I do, I quite enjoy being pampered at the hands of my beautiful, submissive wife. I really should allow her to do this more often as I can see she enjoys taking care of me.

She pulls my pants off, turns the bedding down and tucks me in. She grabs the in-house menu and picks out something for us to eat and calls the order in. I sit up on one elbow and watch her move fluidly and gracefully around the room as she cleans up and puts our clothes away.

While she’s putting away our toiletries my mind goes back to the man who attacked me. What the hell was that about anyway? I knew we were being followed. But for how long were we being followed? Shit. Did he see us at the club? Do we look like vulnerable tourists?

Isa comes out of the bathroom and reads my mind.

“What was that about anyway? Was that man trying to mug us?” she asks.

It’s a plausible explanation except he didn’t ask for any money. In fact, he didn’t ask for anything which is what’s upsetting me about this whole situation. I need to call Sawyer and let him know what happened.

“Yeah, sure,” I answer, not wanting to worry Isa.

“You really whooped him good. I had no idea I was married to such a bad ass. You’re full of surprises, you know that?” she asks, smiling adorably at me.

“Yes, I know it. Speaking of surprises, I want to talk about what happened at the club,” I tell her, wiggling my eyebrows up and down at her lasciviously.

True to form, Isa blushes.

“Why on earth do you want to talk about it? It happened. Wasn’t that enough?”

“God only knows when the next time you’ll let something like that happen again, so I want to relive it over and over, that’s why. Now come and sit next to me. See what I did there? Come?”

Isa rolls her eyes and plops herself on the bed and folds her arms, annoyed with me.

“Well?” I ask.

“Well, what? You boinked me in the presence of a dozen people and they all got a good look at my hairy vag. What else is there to say?” she snorts, giving me the evil eye.

“Boinked you? What the f*ck? What are we in junior high? And your vag isn’t exactly hairy. It’s well groomed,” I laugh loudly. My sudden movement sends a jolt of pain through my chest and I cringe from the pain.

“See? Now just stop, you need to rest,” Isa scolds in her motherly tone.

“Boinked…” I repeat.

Isa raises her eyebrows at me and shakes her head.

“Boinked…” I say one last time, chuckling at her terminology.

“Okay, Dylan, I said boinked. You really are juvenile sometimes.”

“Me? You’re the one who referred to our glorious public coupling as boinked.”

“You think it was glorious?” she asks surprised.

“Hell yes, it was glorious. You looked f*cking magnificent and everyone that was watching will have the image of your gorgeous p-ssy being f*cked forever burned into their memories.”

Isa’s expression is horrified, “God, Dylan, I don’t want my p-ssy etched in anyone’s memory but yours.”

“Too late now,” I kid.

“Well, if I had known I had a choice…”

“You, what? You would’ve said no?”

“Maybe,” she says defiantly.

“Like hell you would’ve. You enjoyed it just as much as I did so don’t try and pretend like you didn’t.”

Looking away from me, she folds her arms again and snorts stubbornly.

“There’s nothing wrong with liking what we did. Honestly, are you really embarrassed about it?” I ask.

Isa turns to look at me and her cheeks are bright pink.

“A little.”

“We’ve been scening at the Dark Asylum for the last two months. How is what we did at the bar any different?”

“Because we’ve never actually had penile penetration during those scenes,” she reminds me.

“Penile penetration…” I chuckle.

“Oh, you’re impossible,” she grumbles and stands.

“I’m sorry. Sit back down, please. You’re right, it is different. It’s just something I really wanted to do with you and it’s not like we can do it back in the States.”

Isa nods her head in agreement and smiles a little.

“You are right, I did enjoy it. Not as much as you, but yes, I did enjoy it. That man standing behind you was creepy, though. He kept stroking… Oh my God. That’s the same man who attacked you!” Isa squeals.

“What? Are you sure?” I ask, sitting up.

“Yes, I’m positive. Gross, Dylan. He saw us have sex and then he followed us. What did he want?”

F*cking hell. I knew we were being followed. Why do I ever doubt my instincts?

***

Isabel

What a repulsing thought. Seriously, what a major creepoid. Dylan looks genuinely stressed about it and proceeds to call Sawyer. What for? It’s not like he can do anything about it 3,000 miles away. I swear those two are like a couple of little teenage girls with their bromance. They can’t go without speaking or texting each other at least once a day.

I leave him to his conversation and go into the bathroom to clean up the mess we made cleaning Dylan’s wound. I see the bloody washcloth and I’m reminded of my mother again. Yes, I am adept at taking care of injuries. On more than one occasion I had to help my mother patch herself up after my father took out his anger on her.

My poor mother. Why did she stay with him for so long? I sit on the toilet and stare at the bloody cloth, thinking of all the times my mother was battered and crying. I hardly remember a time when she wasn’t bloodied or bruised and crying. I roll the rag through my fingers and bring it to my nose and the smell of blood hits me like a ton of bricks. Good God. It’s so bizarre how a smell can bring back such a specific memory. I’m suddenly not hungry anymore. In fact, I’m nauseous. I almost lost Dylan tonight. First my mother, then Dylan. What would I have done if he had been taken from me? Where would I go? Who would take care of me? What if…

Dylan comes into the bathroom and kneels in front of me.

“Room service has already brought our food. You’ve been in here for 30 minutes. I thought maybe you were showering. What are you doing?”

Thirty minutes? Has it been that long?

“Why are you holding this?” he asks, taking the dirty cloth out of my hands.

I can’t answer him. I have no answer for him. I have nothing to say.

“What are you thinking about?”

All I can do is shake my head. I can’t talk about it. It’s too painful to think about let alone put in to words.

“Come back to me, Isa.”

I look up into Dylan’s eyes and they reflect love. Hiding my face in his neck, I inhale his perfect manly scent. What would I have done if I had lost him? If I could never smell him again?

Dylan pulls me back and he looks fierce.

“I’m calling Maggie tonight,”

“No,” I whisper. “Not on our honeymoon. I’ll see her as soon as I get back,” I say, feeling myself floating back down to reality.

“Come eat. You’ll feel better after you eat a little,” he says, touching my mouth.

“Yes, Sir.”

I follow Dylan to the small dining area where he starts to serve me food, and I gradually come back to my senses.

“Let me do this for you. Sit, Dylan. You should be resting,” I tell him and take over his duties.

He doesn’t argue and I ready our plates. Dylan watches me warily and I smile at him, hoping it will put his mind at ease. I don’t want him to worry about me. We eat in silence and I mostly just pick at my food, still feeling put off by the memories of my mother. I’m staring at my food when I hear Dylan put his silverware down.

“Eat, Isabel,” he says austerely.

After picking some more, I force myself to take a bite, chewing the braised beef at a snail's pace. It tastes heavenly. I’m starving and when the food hits my stomach, it grumbles loudly. I eat another bite and my appetite slowly but surely comes back. I finish my vegetables and when I finally look up, Dylan is watching me closely.

“I feel better,” I assure him, but my voice betrays me.

“Now we’re going to talk about what’s on your mind,” he states.

“Do we really have to?” I plead.

“Yes, we do. It’s obvious that you’re shutting down. I’ve told you that I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s wrong. Now get changed into something pretty for me and come lie with me on the bed. I’ll pour us some wine and we can go slowly, okay?”

“Yes, Sir.”

I dig out the sexy lace gown that Dylan packed for me and put it on, slipping off my underwear. Dylan is propped up on one elbow and lying in bed with a glass of wine waiting for me. I join him, sitting against the back of the headboard and sipping the fruity white blend that room service brought up. Setting the glass down on the night stand, I turn to face Dylan. He’s waiting patiently to hear what’s bothering me, but I can’t put into words what exactly is going through my mind.

“I can’t lose you, too,” I blurt out.

Dylan looks stunned at my statement and I have to admit, I’m surprised at my own admission, too.

“You’re not losing me.” Dylan rubs my arm and squeezes it, trying to soothe me.

“I almost lost you tonight.”

“But you didn’t. I’m still here. Is that what you were thinking about in the bathroom?” he asks.

“Yes. That and my mother. You said I was very adept at taking care of injuries and you were right. I was. I mean, I am. I had to take care of my mother when she was injured. The smell of blood brought back memories of taking care of her and cleaning her up after my father would… Why did she stay with him for so long? Why would someone stay in a situation like that? I don’t understand. He was so cruel to her. She deserved better than that. She was so kind and loving,” I say, trying to stifle my tears.

“Yes, I’m sure she was. I wish I knew the answer to that question. I wish I could answer all of your questions. Sometimes there are no explanations for the things people do. She loved you and that’s all that matters. You need to try and focus on that love and not the bad things that happened. I can’t imagine how difficult that is for you to do and I won’t even pretend to know what you’re going through, but I’m here to listen. I love you, baby girl.”

His voice is relaxing and calm, and warms my insides.

“I must be stupid to love my father.”

“What do you mean?” he asks dazed.

“I mean, after everything he’s done, there’s still a part of me that loves him. He’s my father, Dylan. I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for him. Even after everything he’s put me through, I just want him to apologize. I just want him to say he’s sorry for what he did to me and more importantly, what he did to my mother. If he would just do that… I don’t know. I’m so wishy-washy sometimes. I sometimes think I would forgive him completely and other times I think, no, I could never forgive him.”

I reach over, dim the lights and snuggle up to Dylan. After my statement about my father, he remains silent and I can only imagine what he must be thinking about what I’ve said.

“I’m exhausted. I just want to sleep now,” I say, fighting the urge to cry.

“Of course. Sleep my beautiful angel. We can talk more tomorrow,” Dylan coos in my ear.

Several hours later, I wake frightened and feeling like I want to escape from the room, but I can’t remember why. I sit up on the edge of the bed and flick on the side lamp. I must’ve had a bad dream though I don’t recall what it was about. I’m glad I don’t remember it. I look over at Dylan and he’s resting peacefully. I lean down and kiss him and he stirs and kicks off the covers. God, he’s beautiful.

The view outside the large window is stunning. We have a perfect view of Paris and the Eiffel Tower. I slip on my robe and venture out onto the balcony and into the cold night air. The brisk breeze wakes me fully and I tie my robe tightly around my waist. The air smells different here than it does in Denver. It smells dingy and polluted at this height.

I miss Denver already; it’s home to me. It’s where I found independence and distance from my father. It’s where I found Dylan. It’s where I found happiness and love.

I move closer to the railing and peer over the edge. It’s a long way down and vertigo makes my head spin. I move back, feeling dizzy from the view. Near the railing, there’s a small patio table and two chairs. I step up onto one of the chairs that sits precariously close to the barrier. I lean forward and gaze down the side of the tall hotel. Wow, that’s a really long way down.

If I leaned forward ever so slightly and tumbled over, I wonder if I could fly. Maybe I could just close my eyes and fly far away from here and away from all the bad memories and bad dreams; away from my pathetic weakness and pain. I could see my mother again. Yes, that would be nice. Dylan would be fine without me. He’s strong. He wouldn’t even miss me that much. If I just lean forward like this, I wonder if I could fly…

“What are you doing?”

Dylan’s loud voice startles me and my body stiffens.

“Isabel, don’t move,” he says strictly with an undertone of panic.

I turn my head to look at him and the fear on his face abruptly jolts me back to reality. Looking forward again, the view over the ledge makes me nauseous. I hate heights. What the hell am I doing up here? My body sways and I start to shake, and Dylan’s strong hands brusquely grab me and yank me off the chair and into his arms, hugging me so tightly I can barely breathe. He angrily pulls me back and leans down to face me.

“What the hell were you doing?” he barks.

“I was just wondering if I could fly,” I whisper, knowing how ridiculous it sounds.

“Don’t you ever think about it again, Isa. Don’t you ever think about doing that to me,” he says forcefully as he shakes me by my shoulders.

“I wasn’t thinking about doing that, Dylan,” I cry, feeling ashamed and chastened by Dylan’s harsh words and tear-filled eyes.

“You better not because I swear to God if you ever leave me like that, I’ll follow you right over the ledge.”