Fifty Shades Trilogy 50 Shades and Blurred Lines 4

Chapter 43

_Oh, __**shit**_.

Later, sitting across the dinner table from her ex - or, current -

_(I'm not sure what we are to each other anymore, _she thought)

- and it was a long dinner table, so he was a _long_ ways away - she made him aware of a possible..._visitor_...soon.

He just smiled at her as the household staff scurried around removing their dinner plates, his giant brown eyes twinkling mischievously. "I'm not particularly worried", he said, laughing.

_You should be_.

Chapter 44

A couple more days went by. Even though at this point the condo was clearly unoccupied, Christian made nightly trips there anyway after work and family-time at home; a somewhat masochistic routine.

Sometimes he'd bring extra work in, new proposals, new investments, and work himself to the point of exhaustion before stopping in the kitchen for a late-night snack, then wandering aimlessly through the rooms, torturing himself with old memories.

At other times he'd turn on her laptop, sifting randomly through the contents, clicking on silly memes or gifs she'd saved, or odd little doodles she'd drawn, but his favorite part was the music; he'd sift through her iTunes collection, clicking on random songs here and there until he found something he liked, drifting off to sleep haphazardly on the couch as the melodies wafted out to him from the tinny speakers.

The next night, the dreams started.

They were innocuous enough at first; with each passing night they became more sexual, then more sinister, angrier; darker. Reunions, making love outside in tall grass during a heavy downpour eventually degenerated into the smell of freshly polished wood, the now long-gone red room; handcuffs, blindfolds, and Christian approaching the wide-eyed object of his obsession and his pain, with a cane.

In waking life his emotions would jackhammer from one extreme to another, love to hate, back to love, before finally interwining and settling into some unhealthy... coagulation.

Two days later, it'd been two weeks since he'd last seen - or heard from - Hope.

Dr. Flynn looked at Christian with concern. He still looked the same, but there were certain things off if you were perceptive enough, or had known Grey long enough to notice.

He looked at the doc with dull eyes. "Two weeks."

Flynn sometimes had a way of stating the obvious. "I think your heart is broken".

Christian said nothing; he just shifted his gaze to some point off to the side of Flynn's head; now avoiding eye contact, his jawline tense, working.

"I'm flying out there tomorrow".

Flynn had been spending the last few appointments trying to talk Christian out of it but he knew ultimately that it was useless; Grey would do what he wanted to do. As always. This announcement wasn't a surprise to him by a longshot.

Christian never told him about the dreams.

Chapter 45

He came rushing into Hope's room without knocking - as usual. He kept his own enormous sleeping quarters heavily locked and you damn near had to book an appointment a day in advance to see him, but strangely that strict sense of boundaries clearly didn't extend to Hope.

He came over to her and grabbed her by the shoulders excitedly. "Hey, get ready, we have a guest", he told her, chuckling wildly, his enormous brown eyes dancing.

Hope came wobbling out of the room, teetering on the giant heels that she didn't even know how to walk in, that weren't even her style, but that he'd insisted on buying her anyway. She got to the top of the steep, winding staircase finally, and froze momentarily before starting down _very_ slowly.

Both men watched her hesitant, timid steps.

Christian's breath caught in his throat and then he felt a jolt in his chest, like his heart was shattering.

She was beautiful.

Chapter 46

A few minutes before, Christian had involuntarily come racing over to the staircase frantic like a terrified mother trying to keep her child from tumbling down the stairs; helping her down gingerly.

Now all three of them sat at the dining room table; the supposedly happy-couple each sitting at opposite ends, the heads of the table; Christian occupying one of the chairs running along each side.

The energy was stilted, awkward, but the ex seemed oblivious, happily chattering away, very polite and cordial, as though the the heated exchange the first time he met Christian, had never happened.

_Hollywood bullshit_, Christian thought. _Pretend to love everybody you hate._

Hope focused her attention primarily on the table itself; her hands; out the giant window at the breathtaking scenery; and periodically, at the ex, smiling good-naturedly at some of his jokes. Looking everywhere, but at Christian. _As usual_, he thought wryly. The only time she'd had the balls to look at him was when she came hobbling from the room - _their bedroom_, he assumed bitterly - looking like a child dressed in her mother's fancy shit.

She hadn't looked at him since, after she saw the astonished, stricken look on his face. Not even when he helped her down the stairs, and she didn't even thank him.

They hadn't said anything to one another at all.

_...Yet_, Christian mused. He kept burning her with his eyes.

Suddenly there was a clamoring, a bit of a ruckus, and the other two exes and the two women - _the entire gang_, Christian thought ruefully - came ambling in the room, entering behind Hope's seat, and when she shifted to see who was behind her, it looked like her eyes might pop out of her head.

_Clearly, this wasn't planned_, Christian thought. _Or maybe they left her out of it_.

The two women seemed to be exchanging looks with one another, like they were up to no good and about to pull some sort of stunt. Sharks smelling blood in the water, perhaps.

The short man assessed Hope approvingly, his expression only slightly short of a leer. The fat guy seemed hostile, and determined to act as though he didn't see her there at all, or didn't give a shit about it.

Christian was sophisticated and a bit world-weary in some respects; he'd seen too much and been around too many people. He knew a bullshit set-up when he saw one. A bit of fun was about to be had - probably at his and Hope's expense. Everybody, now all seated at the table, had a shit-eating grin on their faces except the two of them.

_Alright, you motherfuckers_...

Lunch itself went by well - the food was delicious, although Christian found himself thinking that the wine was bad, and Hope wouldn't touch hers. She didn't drink. She watched the household staff pour it into a glass near her as though they were pouring poison, and asked for soda instead, which led to a round of laughter at her expense, barring Christian, who sat there silently taking it in, still burning her with his eyes; _You made your bed now lie in it_.

Other than that it was uneventful, but Christian wasn't fooled, he knew that some people liked a bit of foreplay before the fucking commenced.

It was around the time the dessert got to the table that the vibes at the table started to change and the masks started coming off.

The woman who'd sent him the instant messages, suddenly turned to Christian and asked him, in a too-innocent voice, how business was going; at which point the short man burst into a loud snicker.

Christian looked at her silently, his face totally expressionless, his eyes impassive, and that seemed to derail her totally and she flinched as though she'd been slapped.

Hope's - ex/current/_whateverthefuckheis_, Christian thought bitterly - just watched the exchange quietly, but with rapt attention, his eyes glowing brightly. _You silly sad fuck, you did this on purpose you set this up like a catty fourteen year old girl because you wanted to see a fight you wanted to watch people squirm you sick freak_, Christian stewed inside himself.

But the woman's first swing was apparently some kind of 'go' signal because then the short one piped up animatedly, "Watch it now, he might tie you up and beat you for that", and then a collective gasp went up before silence then an instant later, an explosion of laughter, the two fat bitches at the table, going red-faced with it.

It was at this point that, Hope looked at him finally and their eyes met briefly, hers tinged with a bit of sadness, no trace of amusement on her face whatsoever. _Now the reason for all this bullshit becomes clear_, he thought.

Christian took a slow sip of water, nonplussed, then leaned back in his chair and volunteered calmly, "No actually, I was just thinking about how Hope tastes like warm maple syrup".

Their laughter died off in an awkward gurgle. All eyes went to Hope and she fidgeted awkwardly in her seat. A second later she glanced at Christian quickly and he lifted his eyebrows at her in response, his grey eyes twinkling mischievously.

The short guy seemed to be eyeing Hope with renewed interest at this point, and the women noticed; then the energy in the room made a marked, noticeable shift and became downright malevolent.

Chapter 47

It started off with a backhanded compliment about how good Hope looked in red, which led to some kind of comment about how the outfit could've used a bit of purple, then cryptic references to the Whore of Babylon; and Hope was up like a shot, teetering toward the staircase, moving too fast and then fell off her center of balance, twisting her ankle slightly before quickly rebounding, gaining her balance back, kicking off the shoes, picking them up and then hauling ass up the staircase.

Christian was up and after her a second later, striding out of the room with purpose, ignoring the women when they called his name, shouting at them to shut up, following Hope up the staircase and then bursting into the room, locking the door behind him.

She was pacing like a rat who wanted to gnaw her way out of a cage.

"Why are we here?" Christian asked in exasperation.

"I don't know", Hope said after a long time.

"Let's go".

Hope went around the room methodically collecting all her things - which wasn't much, just her schoolbags. She went to put on the heels again and Christian went, "Leave 'em, leave 'em", and grabbed her hand, rushing out of the room.

By the time they were making their way across the front hall, the group had congregated there waiting for them and Christian shouted a final "Fuck you!" as he pulled her out the door behind him.

Chapter 48

"Just until I can arrange for the plane to come out here and get us tomorrow", Christian said, looking at her as he passed his credit card over to the receptionist in the hotel lobby.

An hour later, Hope was sitting on the bed, the face mask on, inhaling deeply. Christian was lying in bed beside her, fully dressed; so was she. He looked up at her, listening to the whirr of the nebulizer machine, and the hiss as she inhaled. Somewhere along the way, he realized that he'd started breathing in time with her, exhaling as she inhaled, inhaling as she exhaled.

Hiss.

_Exhale_.

Whoosh.

_Inhale_.

Other than that, they were silent.

Chapter 49


End file.
