The slap came from nowhere, sudden and sharp. Her nail caught the boy’s skin, slicing his cheek. He put a hand up, tracing the wet trail of dotted blood that bubbled to the surface of the wound. The boy looked at the magazine held outstretched in her other hand. Its opened pages, vivid in their […]

All she’d been told was to pack a bag of overnight things and something she could wear out to dinner. Other than that, Chloe had no idea where they were going. Scott picked her up at just gone five o’clock after finishing work. Chloe had been off that day; a rare lazy Sunday spent idling […]

I meet them for the first time on a wet and dreary Thursday morning, a relentless downpour pelting the ground so loudly it almost drowns out the sound of my introduction. They are barely visible beneath the black umbrella he holds above them, her head dipped towards his chest to protect her from an onslaught […]

‘Let’s play a game.’ The voice sounded muffled, as though she was hearing it under water. The girl’s ears were still ringing from the blow to the head she had suffered earlier and she felt sick with the pain that coursed through her. She had returned to consciousness to find herself bound to a chair, […]

Afterwards, they sat in silence at the edge of the bed, side by side, their hands resting on the mattress, their fingers not quite touching. His clothes lay on the carpet near the bedroom door, abandoned in haste and a flood of desire; neglected in the insistency of their mutual intent. The heat that had […]