Chapter 14 - mixing and mingling (Ladd x Lua)

A/N: Knifeplay and bloodplay in this chapter

“There’s so much blood!” Ladd says, his tone wavering between delight and concern. Though the blood is his own, he’s more concerned for Lua, and asks her, “Have I gotten any on you? Do you mind?”

He isn’t hurt too bad, but the last fight almost didn’t work out in his favor and he’s got a few wounds to show for it. Even though he’s healing rather nicely, he isn’t taking it as easy as he should be, and one of these wounds has reopened, and he’s bleeding all over everything, his lover included. She gives him a half of a smile, letting out a soft breath as she does so.

“I don’t mind,” she murmurs, lowering her lashes almost coquettishly. “I like it.”

Of course he knew that was what her answer would be, but he still gives a shudder of delight to hear her say it out loud. “Aw, baby,” he says, touched, “you’re perfect, you know that?"

Her smile grows ever so slightly at his words, and she trails a finger along his face, smearing a line of blood before bringing her finger back to her lips. Ladd makes a sound almost like a growl, and has her pinned in half a second. She gasps so softly, and he just keeps bleeding, the cut on his cheek closing back up rather slowly.

When he leans down to kiss her, she takes him by surprise, dodging his kiss and instead directly licking along his cut. His breath hitches in his throat at the sheer intimacy of that, and he's suddenly very, very aware of why she likes when he does that so much. And it's something he does for her, not incredibly often but sometimes, as a special sort of treat.

He'll trail a knife along her otherwise flawless skin, showing her just how easily he can hurt her, how close he can come to ending her life, and then he likes to slowly lick her cuts and taste her while she's barely able to breathe. She's always beautiful, no matter what, but she reaches a whole new level of beauty when she thinks she's close to death, when he teases at killing her. He can only imagine how beautiful she will be when the day actually comes, but that's still a long way off yet and there's no point in building up too much anticipation.

“You like that, doll?” he breathes. “Oh, you do, Lua, you do, because you understand, don't you? That's why I love you so much, you know, because you understand things, and that's so rare!” He realizes that he's rambling, but he's getting more and more excited to realize how much alike they really are, despite being complete and total opposites. She compliments him by contrasting him where it counts and matching him where contrast doesn't, and he knows he's never going to find anyone in the world more perfectly suited for him.

“Can you...?” she starts, and she doesn't need to finish her sentence for him to know exactly what she's asking for. His eyes light up, he knows they do, and he grins so big that it feels like he's splitting his face.

“Of course, my little angel!” he says, his tone brightening with each word. “You know, I normally save that for special occasions, but I think this is definitely, definitely, definitely a special occasion! Don't you think so?”

She shakes her head and he laughs. “You don't? Oh well, I can still make it a special occasion, and I know you can't argue with that !” He's always got a knife in his pocket, but when he lets go of one of her wrists to reach for it, he remembers that he isn't wearing anything, and he laughs at himself before letting her go to sift through the pile of clothes on the floor until he produces the knife from his pocket.

When he's standing over the bed again, she's laying out flat for him, just the way she always does when they play this game. He flips open the blade and moves it along in front of her, watching the way her eyes follow the glinting metal. She looks so blank during her every day life, but there's so much in her eyes in moments like these that he's simultaneously happy and sad that this is the only time she does it. Sad, because no one will ever understand what it is that he sees in her, and happy, because he will never have to share it with anyone.

“You want a cut just like mine, doncha?” he asks, his grin never faltering, and she nods. “Right on your cheek, right? That's gonna look better on you than it does on me, I bet. Everything always does, even if I can hardly stand to see you hurt when it's too soon for me to kill you!” He keeps going on like this, stalling as he plays with his knife, and he takes great delight in the desperate, impatient look that starts to grow in her eyes. So subtle, but so obvious to him, and only meant for him to see. She loves his possessiveness, and he loves that he has something like that he can pretend to posses, even though he knows better than anyone that it's the other way around.

Finally, after drawing things out long enough to get that sort of reaction out of her, he presses the blade to her cheek and quickly- so quickly she could blink and miss it- nicks her pale skin. It's nowhere near as deep or bad as the one on his cheek actually is, but he knows it's enough to sting her and it's enough to cause her to bleed. He likes the way he can feel her shallow breath on him when he leans down to lick it up before capturing her lips in a quick kiss, letting her have a taste.

Of course, he knows that she wants him to do more to her, and the sight of her blood has excited him, excited him just the way his own blood excited her, and he thinks about the possibility of someday letting her hold the knife. For now, he instead puts on a show for her, and drag the knife lightly down his own chest, wincing at the sting.

“Look at that,” he murmurs, and he's never before thought of himself as a masochist, but for a moment, he thinks that he shouldn't be so quick to rule out the possibility. “Now I'm bleeding again, aren't I? But it's just like I said, cuts look prettier on you. All that pretty, pretty red stands out so much...you know that's my favorite color, right?”

Lua's eyes are as bright as they ever get, and he lets himself bleed for her before he places the tip of his knife on her chest, just like he did to himself. He makes the cut on her even more shallow than his own, just barely piercing the skin, just barely doing enough to draw blood, but it's enough, and her eyes close and she tips her head back, whispering, breathing his name. He hopes that his name is on her breath in the moment that he takes it away forever.

“Now we're both bleeding all over everything,” he says matter-of-factly, before throwing his knife to the side and climbing on top of her so suddenly that she hardly has time to react before he's inside of her, fucking her hard and ignoring the pain of his open wound. Their chests touch and he knows, he just knows, that their blood must be mixing. It's a beautiful mess, and he thinks about mixing and mingling with her, about having her truly inside of him and being truly inside of her, about just plain having her, where no one else can. He doesn't ever want to be alone again.

It doesn't take either of them long after that, but once they've laid back to recover and really see the mess they've made, the blood still drying, smeared all over their skin, the stained sheets, he's rolled over and pulled her on top of him so that he can look at the pattern of his and her blood on her torso while she rides him. 


