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NOTE:
So, we're doing this. I present to you the very first chapter of HFWG. After chapter three, all other chapters are available on Radish. My username is nakiya_hall or simply type in the book title. If you enjoy please vote, comment, share, and tell me your thoughts.

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0 1 |  How Far We Go

V U L I A  A M O U R

The lights were blinding. Some wicked, colossal radiance twisting vibrantly with the obsidian of the shadows. The same shadows merged blight and ambiguity between the motions of silhouettes. Bodies were dainty and hot, swerving and imbalanced in a room full of intoxicated beings. The ascendance for belonging grew. The desire to feel the same kind of high expanded. The same kind of adrenaline coursing through explosive veins and plush skin. Vessels of prickling sanity intermixed with ethereal youth. Divinity and chaos loomed. But those lights...they were like no other. All kinds of colors, but red was the most shattering. Like blood. Like sin. Like danger. Blinding.

Outstretched in the air loomed clusters of perfume and cologne. Lip gloss. Lipstick. Sweat. Oils. A beautiful disaster of the night. All unraveling at the fingertips of dear Vulia Amour. Nevertheless, the scene cascaded into a bittersweet portrait, one that ripped at her memories for eternities to come. She was drowning in ecstasy for a mere moment. She was drowning in a city of thinning truths that crushed her reality.

Ambrose lingered behind her, clutching her hand rather loosely. His touch was calloused and faint, weak of the fragility that normally tainted their blissful interactions. Something seemed off because he had always been intimate, always yearning to have her closer. Wanting more and being completely selfish. His hand had slipped from hers and she halted out of curiosity, spinning to face him in the center of the floor. The tones flickered, and blinked, crying out warning signs against Ambrose's shadow eyes. Light leaked between them in the most delicate way, but they couldn't have seemed more lost.

That night it was the third time she dragged him onto the dance floor. The glint of elation in his irises sparked fear in her chest. It loomed like a night terror, mooring as their faces opposed. One of her favorite songs was playing and while people around them were submerged in a spectrum of emotional carelessness and liberation, Ambrose and Vulia were no longer aligned. Distraught and distant. They were merely existing while everyone else swam in coexistence.

"Ambrose, what's wrong?" Vulia questioned and swore she heard him sigh before speaking his next words abruptly. His uneasiness fumed passionate aggravation in her motions.

"Can we go somewhere private?" he questioned, which resulted in two things. Sex or a significant conversation. Vulia went with the latter and failed to show that she was bothered in the slightest. Appropriately, she gave a nod and allowed him to lead the way. Vulia had an inquiry that the night would get flipped upside down somehow. Especially when Ambrose led the two of them outside, the large TEMPTATION sign's pink and green tones cast over them like a large blanket. A few feet away was the bodyguard balancing the line of people who either had reservations or sought a different way in.

"Why are we out here?" Vulia questioned, hugging herself as the wind blew. Ambrose tossed his head back and pinched the bridge of his nose, shifting his attitude completely. Complexity sunk into the pit of Vulia's heart and soul. A replay of memories danced in her mind, swaying crazily as her moon-grazed eyes studied Ambrose's. He couldn't meet her eyes, peering in the places where she was absent.

"I can't do this anymore."

The words were like knives jabbing at every edge of her she hid away. Bewilderment distorted her features, but nothing more. Her deliberations were hoarded possessions of wallowing questions. Interrogations swirled at his words, a harsh phrase of bleeding figments.

"What are you talking about, Ambrose? You can't do what?"

"Date you, Vulia! I can't date you," he blurted. A few heads whipped in their direction, curiosity maximizing their interest. Vulia didn't let their piercing stares affect the shock that overwhelmed her body. Instead, she blazed, wreaking havoc from what misunderstandings aligned. He was breaking up with her. He looked back at the staring faces, then back at Vulia, and spoke more softly.

"I can't be in a relationship with you anymore," he whispered, eyes burning her soul.

"Will you tell me why?" she wondered because the gnawing numbness that iced her bones hadn't been familiar. His words were foreign, behavior wavering. None of what was happening seemed real, a fanatic portrait of falsehood. She didn't know how to feel and didn't want to give Ambrose the benefit of the doubt. She didn't want him to know what boiled beneath the surface. The confusion. The hurt. The shock. All balled in one.

"Vulia, you're boring," he huffed. "Non-spontaneous."

"Is this some kind of joke? You and I both know that's a lie," she defended, but Ambrose didn't agree. "What is it really? Tell me."

A beat passed and Ambrose looked off.

"We've been together for four years, Vulia. Don't you want to see other people? Experience new things?"

"I don't think I fully understand what's going on here. You're breaking up with me because I'm...boring?"

Ambrose simply stared back at her to affirm her statement, and Vulia laughed.

"Ambrose, that's fucking ridiculous," Vulia admitted, and truthfully they both knew she was right. It wasn't a valid enough reason for her. Ambrose remained silent, then finally cleared his throat and brushed past her entering the club once more.

"So you're just going to fucking leave?" She yelled after him, but his reaction seemed like her words hadn't existed at all.

The lamppost across the street flickered, creating tones of shadows against Vulia's dark skin. The drumming of the music from the club crashed and drowned and it all was a dreary nightmare. Feverish and itchy with unrealistic actions. None of it seemed real.

Vulia lingered quite literally stunned long after Ambrose had left her there. Everything spun and Vulia became dizzy off that reality. She was dizzy from the false tragedy that withered down before her. And suddenly, she was bare.

Still, the world continued to spin and life resumed in spite. No one cared, specifically Ambrose, so why should she have cared at all? Being called boring was a trait Vulia despised, and maybe that was what truly sparked her ferocity because she knew she was anything but. That night she made it her mission to demise that ungodly lie and tear at it. She made it her mission to remind herself who she was. Vulia fucking Amour.

She entered Temptation, everything else around her secondary, and stalked toward the bar at the back that sat next to an unknown door. She didn't want a drink. No, she wanted to prove Ambrose wrong and prove to herself something, too.

The music had gotten louder and bodies swayed more. Aggression twiddled as everything quickened. It all happened so fast. The next thing Vulia did was reckless and wild. Yet to her, it was so liberating to prove him wrong. A guy had come out the door that had been next to the bar, there were bright lights and Vulia saw blue eyes. Strikingly alluring. She had invaded his space (with some quick consent) and asked the stranger to go somewhere private. He was quick to respond, a low and attractive yes drawling against Vulia's ear.

Vulia hadn't seen his full face, but from his voice, eyes, and the feel of his body Vulia knew he must have been somewhat attractive. Her standards weren't completely low at that point. Her heart was drumming in her chest so quickly as the stranger led her through the room. Although Vulia was unfamiliar with her surroundings, her thoughts held no kind of regret or remorse.

Somehow, through conglomerates of people and unfamiliar rooms, Vulia was led into a room where the door had closed briefly behind them. The stranger must have known the owner to gain as much access as he had. Vulia didn't give the stranger any time to recognize her, and neither had he because in moments hands were exploring and lips connected. Vulia's hands roamed and realized the guy was dressed in a suit—one she was eager to rip off. His lips had moved from hers and trailed lightly down her jaw and back onto her lips.

Her stomach did backflips and she was so giddy with urge and want. Desire. Wildly, they made it onto the king-size bed, and under the red lights, the stranger's eyes looked like splices of heaven. And oddly familiar too.

"Miss me, Amour," the voice said, ringing warning signs in Vulia's head as his lips lowered to her chest. Then his hands were under her shirt, caressing her breasts and fiddling with her erect nipples. His baby blue orbs danced with mirth, his breath a fleet of hurricane mist and mint divinity when he chuckled. Vulia had been astonished by his bravado to release such a dangerous phrase. That voice. Those eyes. There were only a few people who called her that. Her brother. Snake. Her mother. And...

Calix Ace.

It couldn't be. Not him. And how dare he make her feel like this. She hated him. She was supposed to hate him. Always, but now all she could think about was his hands and the way he was making her feel and the way she wasn't proving herself wrong. Because at that moment he had been making her feel good and Ambrose was never truly able to do that.

Suddenly, it was all wrong. She wasn't supposed to be enjoying it as much as she was because it was Calix. Yet her lips couldn't move and truthfully she didn't want to stop despite the original plan. His touch had been so chilling, yet it warmed her body in all the right places. Somehow, he was so gentle yet so rough and it was all so electrifying under the scarlet beams they lingered in.

Calix teased her. Foolishly. He toyed with the band of her skirt, then gripped her thighs, breathing heavily over her tingling skin. Her heart raced out of frustration. It had been years since she saw Calix and she hadn't expected to see him under such circumstances. She hadn't expected to see him at all for that matter. The situation before then was portentous and Vulia couldn't un-see any of it. Why had she been so desperate and clueless that she had ended up with the man she had hated? Why couldn't she pull away?

Damnit. Damnit. Damnit.

Instead of living in her head, she leaned toward him and their lips met. Vulia was determined to prove a point as she kissed him slowly, then full of urge and bitter anger. She knew she had done something somewhat when she felt something growing between the two. And then somehow, she was on top of Calix, which was his doing. Her hips rocked over the hardness of his slacks, over the carvings of a devil in disguise. And throughout the entire exchange, Calix stared back at her comfortably in the eyes. It was one of the only things Vulia could distinguish perfectly under the distorting spectrum of light.

"Fucking Christ," he gritted out, releasing a stifled groan. Then, collected himself.

There was something much too intimate in the way Calix held her against him she thought. There was something much too intimate in the way their bodies danced together as if they were one in the same souls. There was something much too passionate when they were supposed to hate each other as he traced delicate patterns along the tattoo of Vulia's spine. But that night neither of that mattered and maybe she had imagined it all.

In a matter of seconds, they were both completely bare and somehow Vulia had ended up underneath Calix once again. His tattooed hands caressed her naked skin, lowering down toward her willing thighs, over the glistening slip, near her palpitating core. Reality started to fade as he thrust a finger, then two inside of her, conquering the night with his timid, hasty grazes. Vulia was becoming extremely dazed. She was ascending as Calix pumped his fingers inside of her at an unbelievably perfect pace. In response, her pussy hugged his fingers. Then he rubbed her clit and her hips bucked, urging him to rub and touch harder. A whimper escaped and she saw satin and onyx, her breath heaving sighs and lulling pants in the heated air.

The room had transitioned into a sun-scattered sauna, melting her as she averted an intoxicating collapse. Subconsciously, she pulled him closer and ripped at every edge she could find, marking all kinds of signatures down his backside and on his shoulders. Then his lips had stumbled down there, a glisten of stars in his skilled tongue. The way it rolled, and sucked, and he bit and flicked over her clit was too much for her body to handle. Her moans had become a song of the night.

Calix breathed over the madness, spitting and rubbing—wickedness in his sinful hands. Then his lips had caught hold of her throbbing insides, quaking for him; for the guy she was supposed to loath. But her mind had screamed everything but hate. He kissed and sucked and breathed, writing poetic profanities down her stomach, onto her navel, tainting her midnight skin. Vulia was inhumane. The feelings she was experiencing were out of this world. Unconsciously, she gripped his obsidian locks, holding back her screams.

He met her lips again, kissing her like the world had been dissolving around them. Her body yearned for the warmth he produced, a fire blazing all over. He smelled so good. Delicious. Like expensive cologne and sanity--outshining the lack of insanity that scattered around them. His body had been perfect against hers, chiseled and defined. And he had become the perfect ruin of her chaotic turmoil.

Although Vulia despised him, he knew what he was doing. Vulia was so close to climaxing, but she was holding back everything and not letting out the anguished screams of pleasure she wanted to release. And maybe it had been her fear gnawing at her, or the final realization that she was using Calix Ace to orgasm. She was giving him equal satisfaction at seeing her slip into bliss.

While she had been feeling great, she was also feeling remorse. Unfortunately, that was the least of her concerns as she reached an ultimatum of sheer relief. Her body had obeyed every variation he had crafted. And finally, she climaxed, her eyes strung on the ceiling and her body quaked with delirium. She was drunk. And the mere remorse she had experienced beforehand plummeted when Calix slipped on a condom with this lustful look dancing in his eyes. Then the night had become filled with stars and comets.

All Vulia could hear was the constant sound of skin on skin as he finally gave into the lethal twilight, delving deeper and motioning faster. He was fully inside her, pulsating his hips forward. Deeper. Faster. Slower. Harder. My God. He gripped her ass, quickening the pace. Every time Vulia had wanted him to pull her apart at the seams, ripping her open with every pound, he'd shift. Merely, because he found amusement in watching her plead and submerge herself completely into him. Curses flew out his lips like wine, their bodies all clammy and worked up. His lips mounted over her skin once more, plunging into her repeatedly. His hands gripped her neck, then her curls, multiple times with a clenched jaw. Tears of pleasure kissed the corners of Vulia's eyes.

Vulia whimpered out harsh truths. It was all she could do. She was compelled, unhinged as she sunk around his length, clamping onto the way his movements produced ecstasy. Hitched breathing. Calix's galvanized gestures. Raw bodies. Pure euphoria. Everything he had done embodied such passion yet was sketched with antagonistic auras. Vulia didn't want to stop and wanted the moment to carry into the next day. And afterward, she wanted to forget any of it happened at all. The breakup. The one-night-stand slash rebound with Calix. Vulia Amour truthfully didn't want to know how far they'd last in the stranger of the night or the unraveling that'd happen after.

She couldn't recall how many times they went at it, but she was sure by the last time they had done it she couldn't remember what's-his-face. She was sure that the exhilarating encounter would come to an end. She was sure that Calix would leave and attend whatever business he had, date, or group of friends he came with, but it came as a shock that he stayed after getting dressed rather quickly. They were both silent for a while, the serenity of Calix's footsteps and their tired breathing roughing the awkwardness. Finally, after a beat, the silence hindered. She was lying down, the covers covering her bare back, parts of her tattoo on full display. She looked over at him sitting in a chair by the door.

"So, what are you going to tell your little boyfriend?" he mocked as if sleeping with "taken" women were some sort of accomplishment. Vulia was sick to her stomach and everything they had done was suddenly so much worse. Whatever had been occurring in Vulia's personal life had nothing to do with Calix. Especially him of all people. But was almost as if he had known and he was mocking her for it.

"Or are you guys in an open relationship now?"

Silence.

He stared so coldly at Vulia with a glint of something interesting in his night-taunting orbs. They were so hypnotizing and decadent, mirroring all the movements she feared in herself. Red lights and blue eyes were suddenly a foreboding mixture. He didn't tear his gaze away. Cerulean and brown had collided in a brim of cruising red. The intensity was unnatural. She closed her eyes softly, wanting to shrink and disappear. Why was it brought up at all? Why did he have to mock her?

"My personal life doesn't fucking concern you?" she defended, tearing their eye contact to shreds.

"When was the last time he made you feel good? Made you cum?" Calix asked and something in Vulia's stomach twisted at his words when it shouldn't have. Slowly. Softly into the air. The mock was lethal. His mannerisms were horrendous. Vulia's body shuddered in agitation yet bittersweet pleasure.

"Fuck you, Ace, at best you were mediocre," Vulia lied. He chuckled lightly.

"Really?" he questioned with a mocking smile. Vulia wanted with everything in her to tarnish that speckle of confidence he held into a pulp. He stalked toward Vulia and towered over her as she lay in the bed, gazing at her as if he were analyzing every fiber of her being with just one stare. Her heart thundered but she refused to back down.

"Yes," she lied, rising and challenging his gaze. Her breasts spilled out from under the comforter and sheets, displaying them perfectly. He placed a hand on her chin, tilting her head to meet his blue, soulless eyes once more.

"Your eyes say a different thing, Amour."

"What do they say? Go ahead, enlighten me."

"Right now your eyes are begging me to fuck you again."

"Well, looks can be deceiving."

Vulia didn't break eye contact, challenging his sight like the fearless woman she was. Calix brushed his thumb over Vulia's lip and allowed his finger to slip between her lips for a millisecond. An intense and unreadable look unraveled on his face. He didn't say anything for a moment. Silence had become their enemy for a while and it was one thing that had been mutually unspoken between them. Vulia wanted to pry into this man's mind when the silence became too chilling.

"I hope to never see you again, Vulia Amour," he said as he dropped his hand and turned.

"Likewise," Vulia agreed as he left the room without another word. It was the most normal occurrence all night. Calix was leaving and the possibility, almost a certainty, that she wouldn't see him again brought relief to her swirling mind.

If only it had been that simple then. If only Ambrose hadn't called things off. If only Vulia hadn't been reckless. If only it hadn't been Calix Ace she had slept with of all people. But the truth was that no one could prepare Vulia for the later regrets she'd encounter from that simple entanglement.

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TO BE CONTINUED

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