Infatuation

by Forever without him

Doctor Alison DiLaurentis is sharp, a charming seductress. She is also a killer. Behind her eyes there is a darkness. Beneath her smile there are untold secrets. She thought she had everything figured out. But then Detective Emily Fields came into her life. Emily is hunting Rosewood's most notorious serial killer. She never expected to fall in love with her. DARK AU. M

10. Anatomy

A/N: Alison is a lot like a Sour Patch Kid. First she's sour. Then she's sweet. Then she murders people and shit.

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Chapter 10:

Anatomy

Not much frightened Alison DiLaurentis. Having survived a tumultuous childhood, she had already conquered her deepest fears. She thought she'd faced the worst of it. She thought she could face anything. But opening herself up to Emily had proved to be a challenge.

It was easy to fight physical manifestations of fears.

A scary person could be punched. A venomous creature could be squashed. Even fears of the dark could be cured by simply turning on the lights.

But emotionally, it wasn't that simple.

Fear manifested in ways that left people helpless to their own minds.

The blonde didn't know how to let herself be vulnerable, though she could sense that's what Emily wanted. She was afraid of letting her walls down for many reasons. Not only because she feared that Emily might discover who she was, but also because it meant facing her past in ways that she never had before.

Growing up she learned exactly what to say, what to do, and how to act to get by...to blend in. She spouted out everything her therapists wanted to hear. She acted exactly like society expected a girl her age to act.

She had been pretending her whole life. She'd lived in the darkness for so long that she had adjusted to seeing in it…to navigating through it.

But now she was sitting on a powder keg, and she was one tiny spark away from igniting it and blowing up her entire past. She felt like she was spinning out of control.

She wasn't sure she was ready to face her demons.

Ironic, the devil being afraid of her own monsters.

After sharing bits and pieces of herself with Emily, Alison was worried that she'd chase her away, though the brunette didn't seem to frighten easily.

Alison was absolutely terrified of what she might do if her emotions backed her into a corner. Would she do to Emily what she'd done to her family?

I killed them.

She couldn't remember it, but their blood was all over her hands. She had the knife, her little heart pounding in her chest. She should have been frightened, but she'd felt empowered having complete control.

The doors to her past were opening up, and it was making her antsy. She wasn't focused. She was having bad dreams. She didn't feel like herself.

She didn't have typical coping mechanisms, so she had to fall back on what she was really good at.

Anatomy.

Whether it was a body on her surgical table in the hospital or a body being chopped to pieces, the only time she could maintain a sense of control was doing what she did best.

Cutting into human flesh.

She should have waited for her next kill, planned like she normally did, but there was a driving hunger in her that was making her feel insane. Her surgeries weren't enough.

She needed to kill someone.

Unfortunately, the impulsiveness of that urge caused her to miscalculate something that would lead to a deadly mistake.

She found the perfect target lounging outside a bar, pandering to younger girls walking by, offering to buy them alcohol with the intent of getting them so drunk he could take them somewhere more secluded.

She wasn't his type. She wasn't young enough. But she stopped outside the bar and flirted with him, giggling like a high school bimbo and acting like she was already tipsy.

She only had to get him as far as the alley by the bar before he was reaching for his zipper.

How is this for a prick? She jabbed his neck with a needle full of tranquilizer. He had slapped the side of his neck like he'd been stung by something. When he looked up his vision was swimming.

Alison already had a warehouse half a mile away set up for him. She knew she had to work quickly, so she got him strapped down to an industrial table and pulled out her equipment.

She leaned over the semi-conscious man. He was in a stasis of twilight between awake and asleep. For several glorious moments the only sound she heard was the buzzing of the lights overhead.

She was getting ready to get to work when the power started to flicker.

Shit.

In her haste, she'd forgotten to check the electrical panel.

There was a crack and then total darkness.

She needed lights to work, though the thought did cross her mind that perhaps it could be a challenge in the dark. It added an extra layer of intensity to it. The idea of killing someone in the dark made the thrill more compelling.

It would be easy to miscalculate cuts, which would be perfect. Toby and Emily were hunting someone who didn't have perfect surgical precision.

A sloppy killer.

But if she killed him in the dark she wouldn't be able to see the life drain from his eyes. She needed that…to see the evil within extinguished.

A grunt came from the table as the man struggled in the dark. Alison felt around for the gag she'd laid out. She pushed her hand against his forehead and carefully shoved it in his mouth to avoid getting bitten, effectively silencing him.

She was reaching for her phone to use as a light when she heard it.

The scuff of a shoe moving in the darkness.

Definitely not a noise the man could have made.

Alison's breath hitched in her throat.

Someone saw me. Someone followed me.

She'd spent years being careful, and one fucking mistake because she was hot and bothered about Emily was going to ruin her.

She carefully slid her gloved hand over the instrument table until she found the largest knife she had. Her fingers tightened around the handle.

The lights flickered and buzzed for several seconds, and Alison found herself hoping that they would stay off so she could work in the cover of the night.

Normally she didn't like the dark. It reminded her too much of the nights she'd slept in a closet behind a locked door, fears of someone creeping into her room in the middle of the night to hurt her.

One night she forgot to lock her door and a large shadow crept into her room, standing in the glow of her little pink night light.

The shadow moved towards her bed, where a mound of blankets and pillows resembled a little body beneath them. The shadow stood next to her bed for the longest time, staring at what they assumed to be her.

She never saw his face, but she knew it was her father. She wanted to scream for Jason, but instead she curled into a ball, never moving from her spot, hoping her dad wouldn't look in her closet.

It was only after he drunkenly sauntered out of the room that she let herself breathe again.

She never forgot to lock her door after that.

The darkness in the warehouse started to play tricks on her mind. She heard the whimpers of a sad broken child. She saw a shadow of movement, an impossible feat given there was no light.

Her body trembled the way it had when she was little.

She tried to stymie the sound of her harsh breaths so she could hear the surrounding sounds.

She heard another squeak, a shoe…a footstep directly behind her. The lights flickered long enough to illuminate the table and her kill.

"What the hell…" The voice was distorted because of the whooshing sound in Alison's ears.

Another flicker and then a gun being aimed at her.

Alison's heart was beating against her chest so hard that she couldn't hear anything except the sound of her own pulse.

She refused to be caught. Not like this.

She spun around, clutching the knife, but a large blocky shoulder caught her directly on the collar bone.

The knife and the gun both clamored to the floor. Alison's body clashed with another as they both struggled to find one or both of the weapons.

The lights flashed, creating a strobe effect. Hands were frantically scrambling against the floor.

Then darkness again.

Alison found the blade at the exact moment the attacker found it. They both scrambled to their feet, struggling over control of it.

This is not how this was supposed to go.

She should have been afraid, but she was angry. She didn't like her routine being interrupted.

Alison felt the blade being flipped towards her. Instead of fighting it she let the momentum from the thrust move forward as she side-stepped the knife.

When their bodies were nearly flush she grabbed the other person and used the close proximity to her advantage. She used the attacker's grip to help her flip the knife around and aimed it center mass, driving it into them.

It slid in easily, like slicing through butter.

The abdomen.

There was an audible gasp and a cry. An exhale against Alison's face.

There was a strange hint of familiarity to the scent, but she was running on pure raw adrenaline.

Fight or flight.

She jerked the knife up at an angle, intending to gut the stalker. Warm blood gushed through her gloved fingers and the feel of it…the smell of it…made her body shudder.

A tiny ripple of arousal pulsed through her. She reached up with one hand and put it over her heart.

She felt alive, the beating in her chest like the strange drum of life.

She yanked the knife back. She heard a guttural grunt and then heard a body collapsing to the floor.

She scrambled to her knees to search for the gun. Her bloody gloved hands landed against the cool steel barrel of it a few seconds later.

She heard the gasping wheezing breaths of a desperate person holding on to life.

She shuffled towards the attacker, gun aimed blindly, ready to finish them off.

She heard a moan and a whimper.

Just as she was readying the gun the power stabilized and light flooded the room.

She let her eyes adjust and aimed the gun at the body hunched over sideways on the floor. Blood was pooling around a dark haired woman. Alison cocked the gun as the woman flipped on to her back, exposing her gaping wound, her intestines spilling out of her.

A set of familiar brown eyes, wide and full of fear, fixed on her.

"No..." Alison's insides felt like they were floating, then falling, a sinking feeling as vomit curdled in her stomach. "Emily…"

What the fuck is she doing here?

She dropped the gun and fell to the floor next to Emily as the detective's body convulsed. Alison's knees were instantly soaked in the brunette's blood.

Covered in blood.

Like my family.

Like so many before her.

Emily is innocent.

Emily doesn't deserve this.

"Emily." This time it came out as a cry.

No no no no no no…

The soft brown eyes that Alison had come to admire…to trust…flashed with a flood of emotions.

Pain. Fear. Confusion.

"What…" Emily tried to look around, her eyes landing on the bottom of the table where the man was restrained.

Alison crawled close to her, cradling her head in her lap.

"Don't look there. Look at me." Alison felt a wave of regret for all of the times she had avoided eye contact.

Emily blinked, and Alison noticed the tinge of her skin becoming extremely pale.

She's bleeding out.

"Call came in…you were…in trouble."

"Oh, Em…" Frantic hands tried to stop the bleeding, but Alison was an expert in what she did.

Maybe if she'd left the knife in to impede the flow of the blood…

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Emily stared at her, through her.

"Hey, look at me."

But the detective's eyes were fluttering shut. Moments later her body stilled in Alison's arms.

The blonde choked out an anguished cry as she pushed her forehead against Emily's.

The lights flickered again and they were in darkness. She could feel the warm wet flow of her blood all around her. Blood that she'd once fought so hard to keep inside her body.

The darkness consumed her.

She never wanted to see the light of day again.

When the lights finally came back on she was in an entirely different place.

Emily was gone.

The warehouse had transformed.

The sounds of the hospital slowly drew her out of her trance.

She blinked and stared at the ceiling of the on-call room.

It was daylight outside, though there was no way for her to know that, because the outside was shuttered off so doctors could sleep there in peace.

She couldn't move. She was paralyzed by the scene that had just unfolded before her in her mind.

Fuck you very much, brain.

She threw her forearm up against her sweaty forehead and inhaled a deep breath. Her cheeks fluttered as she blew it out. She watched her chest rise and fall. She could see her heartbeat through her scrubs.

The nightmare had unnerved her, and Emily wasn't there this time to keep the darkness at bay.

What does this mean?

She had been having wild fantasies about Emily dying at her hand. Sometimes she was aware of what she was doing, other times she wasn't. It was happening more frequently now that they were getting closer.

Alison wondered if it was her body's reaction to sexual frustration. She'd been holding out for far too long. Her hope was that once they finally started having sex it would alleviate some of the pressure that was building.

The young doctor slipped her fingers into her scrub bottoms and immediately found the wet spot on her panties.

She knew she needed to get herself under control, lest the next time she was dreaming of Emily a fucking river of come would drown her and everyone around her. A wet floor sign wouldn't do it. They'd need a scuba diver to find them under all her bodily fluids.

Well, that's poetic.

Shakespeare she was not. Her version of romance was A Midsummer Night's Cream.

Only…what she was having couldn't be classified as dreams, so much as nightmares, so it would be more like A Midsummer Night's Screams and Creams.

She had never been sexually frustrated before. She'd always had Taylor…and her right hand and her favorite toy. But Taylor was out of the picture and her toy wasn't cutting it anymore. She needed the real thing.

Alison knew a lot of what she felt was due to her impulsive urges. She felt the same way when she needed to kill.

She'd had serious debates with herself over whether she'd choose sex with Emily or killing someone, and she was convinced if she was forced to make that decision that she would give up her bloody habit and get lost in her girlfriend's cave of wonders for the rest of her life.

Cave. Of. Wonders.

Really, Alison?

"Cave of Wonders," she said aloud with a scoff.

What the hell is wrong with me?

She had to satisfy her urges. It had been long enough. Over a month. They'd kissed. They'd made out. They'd given each other multiple orgasms, fully clothed. They'd done everything shy of sleeping together.

They were trying to be discreet about their relationship, but a few people with keen eyes noticed.

Aria had noticed that Alison was spending a lot of time behind closed doors with the detective. The bubbly young pathologist had cornered her in the break room nearly an hour ago, begging to hear the details of what they were doing.

When Alison answered, "Getting to know each other" Aria had looked at her skeptically.

"It's been a month. You expect me to believe you haven't rocked her world yet?"

"Aria!" Alison had half gasped and half laughed in surprise.

It shouldn't have come as a surprise to her. Aria had been raised in a household where everyone was free to speak their opinions. Her mother was a hippie into yoga and patchouli oils. Her father was a very respected liberal professor. Her little brother was a bit of a mess, but he was finding his way into adulthood.

"I'm just teasing you." Aria had tossed a bundled up paper towel at her. It was damp from where she'd dried her hands after washing them. "I'm glad you're happy."

"We're talking. A lot." Her face was hot, which made Aria laugh.

"And?" Aria pressed for more.

It was really cute the way Aria was so interested in her life. Was that what friendship was supposed to be like? It was nothing like she'd had with Riley, Nick, and Naomi. Their company had been a shallow attempt at maintaining a normal life. Aria was…different. Alison looked forward to her company.

"No sex yet, but you'll be the first to know. I promise." A hint of sarcasm in her tone. "But if she's as skilled at sex as she is at kissing and touching…" And making out and dry humping… "…then I'm in for a wild ride."

God, let it be a wild ride.

Aria snickered.

"So, besides her rockin' bod…" Alison couldn't believe she had a friend who said things like 'rockin bod', "What do you like about her?"

"Everything." Alison blurted out without thinking. She started gushing. "She's funny and nice and she listens." Sometimes so well that it scared her. The detective was thoughtful, and she seemed to understand Alison in a way that the blonde didn't even understand herself. "I love how attentive she is. And she's adventurous. I like that she's fearless."

Every time they spent time together Alison felt a surge of adrenaline, though she wasn't sure how much was hormone related and how much was related to her feelings.

"Even though that fearlessness got her shot?" Aria asked, a hint of fragility that Alison had never seen in the spunky brunette before.

"That's the reason we met." Though she couldn't say she approved of Emily putting her life in danger every day.

Alison was sure she would have met her eventually. But fate didn't want them to wait.

Emily had been flirting with her the minute she was wheeled into the hospital.

Now they were getting to know every part of one another.

Including a soul Alison was faking.

Though, she couldn't tell if she was faking or not. Real feelings seemed to be mixing with the pretend ones. It was getting harder to tell the difference.

Their make-out sessions were getting increasingly hot and heavy. The pace of their physical intimacy was killing both of them. It was literally killing Emily in Alison's nightmares.

Emily's dreams were a bit different. She dreamed about taking the blonde with a strap. Of making slow methodical love to her.

Alison had lost count of the number of times she'd shoved a toy into herself pretending that it was Emily. She knew Emily did the same. She'd seen the brunette at her house one night. The curtains were drawn, but Alison could see the shadows. She could see Emily bucking her pelvis against something...could hear the detective saying her name like it was gospel.

I want you, too, Emily. God I want you.

That had been two nights ago. If Alison closed her eyes she could picture Emily in her bed, shoving a toy inside of herself and envisioning Alison on top of her with a strap, giving her the pleasure she deserved.

It was a curious thing to wonder about…who would be on top their first time. Alison couldn't give up control. She liked to dominate. But Emily was obstinate and stubborn in her own way. She'd probably do everything she could to switch their positions so that she was in control.

Lack of control breeds chaos. We can't have that. We have to have order. We have to have control.

Yet, at the same time…if it made Emily happy, she'd share that control.

Alison toyed with the idea of toying with herself. She bit her lip and pulled her hand out of her pants as she sat up against the edge of the mattress.

She grabbed the TV remote and turned it on as a distraction. She pushed up off the mattress and flipped on the light, drowning out the soft lamps in the room.

She walked over to the small refrigerator next to the counter. She'd bought fresh fruit for Emily's lunch time visit. She wanted to feed it to her while sitting on top of her.

The on-call room was like a tiny little apartment complete with a small kitchen set-up, a couch, and three small cots that had been fashioned into beds. She used it all the time. None of the other doctors really cared to use it. They all had couches and comfortable chairs in their offices. Alison liked to think of it as her home away from home.

She reached for an orange and grabbed a knife.

"…assure you that every measure is being taken into account as we assess this case." Emily's voice drew Alison out of her thoughts, "As it is ongoing, I'm afraid I can't comment publicly about anything else at this time."

Alison stared at the TV monitor as she moved around the room. Emily was giving one of the most riveting speeches of all time. It was the same song and dance that all law enforcement officers used when they were working on a case. Basically "no comment" but fancier.

A lot of things had changed over the years, but the way the police handled the press wasn't one of them. Alison knew it was usually a combination of not wanting to reveal too much so they could weed out false tips and not knowing as much as they needed to in order to follow a certain path.

She'd never much paid attention to the news when she was a kid. Her aunt protected her from the brunt of what had happened the night her family died by making sure the news was never on at her house.

It was a bit harder to keep her away from the news when she got older, but by the time she was a teenager rumblings of her family's death was washed away by the blood of other crimes that had occurred since then.

The DiLaurentis murders were just another statistic by then, though every so often she'd get accosted by some hack journalist.

Alison had never been interested in the news...until she started killing. She was fourteen the first time a press junket had caught her eye. It was right after she'd killed Darren Wilden.

o ~ O ~ o

~ Then ~

News of the murder at the Airbnb had spread fast. It had sent the entire town into a tailspin. Alison was certain that the news anchors were sporting chubbies underneath their desks as they put on fake serious faces to discuss the horrors of the world.

News reporters were just glorified narcissistic sociopaths who got off on crimes committed by others. They faked their empathy, but underneath it they were enthralled by it. She knew when people were wearing masks. She wore one every day.

She knew excitement buzzed through everyone's veins at the news station when a big story broke. It meant they got to be in the spotlight, a gross addiction to attention. It was so barbaric. Not even the meteorologists were immune to it. The way they cut into regular TV programming with their weather woodies about some minuscule little weather pattern that may or may not happen was kind of sad.

She usually ignored the news, but her friends weren't making it easy.

She was sitting in her bed doing her homework, Pepe snoring at her feet. Naomi and Riley were sharing the large Papasan chair next to Alison's bed, hovering over Naomi's iPad watching the news about the dead body that was the talk of the town.

"We're here at the sight of the gruesome…" their favorite fucking word, "…scene where a man was discovered brutally murdered." Deservedly so. "Police have identified the victim as Cape May resident, Darren Wilden."

Hearing his name was like getting a shock to her chest.

From "What's your name, sweetheart?" to "You look a little young to be here."

Any regular adult would have kicked her out of the frat party or tried to figure out who her legal guardian was. But not Darren. He'd used it as an opportunity to mold her impressionable mind into believing that he was a good guy.

She felt sick to her stomach when she thought about that summer.

"Relax, baby…"

She dug the tip of her pen into the graph paper on her little portable bed desk. The ink darkened as she circled her diagram of a nucleus of a cell. She pressed so hard she nearly ripped the paper.

She breathed hard through her nose.

One beer.

Two.

A flash.

A hand on her thigh.

But whose hand was it?

Was it Jason's hand being placed there the day he flew into a rage at his parents? Was it Darren in the restaurant? Was it someone else?

A little kiss, so innocent…

Was she smiling for the camera at home? Or out at Cape May with Darren?

The boathouse.

The anticipation.

It didn't feel right. Being there. Alone. Secluded.

Confusion.

"You're so beautiful."

Darren? Her mom? It was all running together. She couldn't separate her memories anymore. All she wanted to do was shut them out.

Two little squiggly lines.

Thirteen and pregnant.

Scared.

In over her head.

"I'm in trouble."

A black hole sucking her into an unending abyss.

A flash.

Her mom and dad smiling at her, telling her she was beautiful. Jason's reaction to the way they looked at her…to the way her parents' friends wanted to look at her.

The way Darren had looked at her.

Jason wasn't around to protect her then.

I should have known what he was.

Jason had protected her from men like Darren Wilden during their childhood. And after he was gone her aunt had drilled it into her head about the dangers of predators.

I should have known.

"It's not your fault." She stared at a picture of her brother she kept on her nightstand.

He was still there, in her head. He was still protecting her...or at least trying to.

She tried to get herself under control so her friends wouldn't notice. She stared at her homework, re-reading the same sentence in her book over and over again.

"When a cell divides into two identical daughter cells it is called mitosis…"

She often wondered if she was one cell divided into two. On the outside she was Alison DiLaurentis, friend, niece, and good student. She was "happy and adjusted." Inside she felt like a feral animal. Following the rules of nature. Stalking, hunting, killing.

"I heard that he was like…chopped up into little pieces." Naomi made a face, scrunching her nose in disgust.

"Ewwww." Riley replied, knocking into Naomi for saying it. But then she added, "I heard that he was into some weird kink shit and they found him all tied up in like…sex clothes and leather."

Partial truths.

There was no harm in letting them believe partial truths. If anything, it helped her separate herself from the animal within.

He deserved it. He deserved to die like that.

The reporter continued,

"The police have called the scene thoroughly disturbing. We got the exclusive when a representative spoke to the press just hours ago. Take a look."

She listened as reporters fired off questions to the police representative, who stood there with a stoic look on his face. She noticed Marco Furey in the background, hands folded together and down in front of him.

A sudden wave…a riptide…of her memories pulled her under.

Sitting in her kitchen, knife in hand, staring at her inner thigh as she sliced into it.

She had cried out, but no one was around to hear it.

The cut had hurt, but it had been necessary.

I was a bad girl.

She'd watched the blood flowing out of it, staring at it in wonder. The color was so beautiful and vibrant against her milky white skin. The way it started as a slow trickle and then flowing into a river. The warmth of it against her skin.

But it hadn't stayed warm. She remembered the chill she felt sitting in her closet when the police first arrived. The blood had seeped into the carpet. Another stain her father would be furious about…if he was still alive.

She remembered heavy thunderous footsteps. She remembered Marco Furey bursting into her room.

She had been in that dark closet, head buried in her knees, blood running cold.

When the light hit her face after he opened the closet door she felt her retinas burning. It was too bright. And her head hurt. It made her dizzy. His shadow had fallen over her.

To the detective's credit he'd had kind eyes and a soft voice. But all she could hear was her brother in her head.

"Don't let anyone touch you. If they do, you fight like hell."

Marco had been a stranger in her bedroom, a stranger in her house. When he'd reached out to her she had cried out.

The memory rushed through her mind.

"Please don't hurt me…"

"It's okay. I'm here to help."

Marco, catching her in his arms as she stumbled out of the closet.

"Hang in there, kid."

Being laid on her bed.

His hand against the injury on her leg.

Jason had always told her to never let anyone touch her. But he wasn't trying to hurt her. He was trying to stop the bleeding…something that she'd been able to comprehend at her tender seven years of age.

Alison breathed heavily through her nose as her room came back into focus around her.

Her friends were too self-involved to even notice she'd disappeared in her head. Another reason she'd picked them. They never asked questions about her weird habits.

She blinked and stared at the picture of her brother to center herself.

A large hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. She almost slammed her pen into the intruder before she remembered it was just Nick.

Pepe felt the jerk of the motion and heard the tiny little gasp come out of her mouth and he shot up out of a deep sleep, his eyes searching the scene.

"You okay, DiLaurentis?" Nick popped up from the beanbag chair beside her bed.

Alison saw Pepe curl his lip and she nudged the dog with her foot, stroking him with her sock, letting him know she was okay. He would rip someone's face off if he thought Alison was being threatened. He'd snapped at Marco for getting too close when she was a child. He'd been protective of her ever since.

He'd once bitten a reporter who accosted her while she was trying to walk him. The reporter had threatened to sue, but her aunt put an immediate stop to it. Alison remembered her screaming on the phone,

"Shame on him for stalking a little girl and trying to drag out her trauma! You're lucky all he got was a nip. I would have let the leash go and let my dog bite off his nuts! She's a MINOR. If anyone from your station ever comes near her again I will sue YOU."

Pepe laid his head back down between his paws, his eyes still on Nick.

Nick cocked his head like a puppy. He was okay-looking in a cute hobo looking way. His unkempt brown bangs hung over his olive-hazel eyes. He'd always been nice to her. She knew he had a major crush on her. She should have just asked him out instead of going hunting for a creep like Darren Wilden. Nick would have made her feel normal, not like she was broken and tainted.

"Just frustrated with this assignment." She always had the perfect lie ready.

"I'd help you," he said as he dropped her wrist, "but I flunked my intro to science class, so…"

He was cute, but he wasn't the smartest guy in the world.

"What was the victim doing in town?" A reporter shouted from Naomi's iPad.

"We can confirm that he was here for a job interview." As the policeman spoke, a picture of Darren popped up in a split screen.

Alison felt like she was going to vomit. She never wanted to see his face again.

"He's kind of hot." Riley lifted her brows curiously.

"I'd totally do him." Naomi agreed.

Alison stiffened, her fingers clutching her pen tightly. She wanted to scream at her friends that he was a pedophile…that it wasn't normal for a grown man to be interested in thirteen and fourteen-year-old girls.

No. No, that's WRONG! He was a despicable man!

Nick scoffed,

"That's totally messed up. He looks like he's thirty…" Twenty-three, Alison corrected Nick in thought. "Any man that age has no business with people our age. It's creepy."

Thank you, Nick.

At least one of her friends was sensible, though it probably had more to do with budding jealousy that the girls were more interested in a dead pervert than him.

"Oh, whatever. I've seen that tent in your pants in Mrs. Sorenson's class. She's in her late twenties. It's okay to fantasize, Nicky-boy." Riley threw a pillow over the bed, striking him in the arm.

"What do you think, Alison? Hot or not?" Naomi asked.

Alison had to concentrate on not snapping her pen in half.

"Eh." She shrugged, barely able to look at his ugly mug on the screen. "I could take him or leave him…" Or cut him into tiny pieces…

"How are you not more obsessed with this case? There is some sick deranged killer in our town." Naomi frowned.

"There are sick deranged killers everywhere." She blinked, barely fazed.

She'd never understood why people got so obsessed over crimes. They happened all over the world. What made this one so special?

Naomi was not happy with her non-response.

"I just thought that you, of all people…"

"Naomi…" Nick said with a warning tone at the same time that Riley cut her off with a,

"Leave her alone, Nae…" Riley pushed her, frowning.

Alison saw the look of pity on her friends' faces, a reminder that they knew about her family's murder.

For all their faults, none one of them ever brought it up or asked her about it. They tried to tread carefully when it came to her sensitivities, which defeated the purpose of Alison trying to feel normal.

Naomi quickly veered and changed the subject. She pushed herself to her feet, looking at the blonde apologetically.

"What are you working on?" She plopped down next to Alison on the bed.

"My Biology homework." Alison stared at the paper again.

"Isn't that a high school course?"

"It's my AP course. I'm on a fast track. I want to be ahead of the game." Alison started jotting down notes.

"Girl, I wish I was as smart as you." Naomi played with her hair.

Naomi was pretty in a natural way. She didn't have to try. She had platinum blonde hair and icy-blue eyes. She had soft pink lips and a slanted nose that worked for models everywhere. Alison had always wondered what her lips might feel like. Probably nothing like Darren's gross scraggly lips…all dry and chapped and tasting of beer and sweat.

Naomi was funny and brave, which is why Alison had plucked her out of oblivion to be her friend.

She was glad she had friends as a cover. No one suspected a thing.

"Oh, check it out!" Riley waved for Naomi to join her in the chair again. "They're walking the reporters through a virtual re-enactment of the crime scene!"

Naomi walked back over to her and watched as the cops talked about the Airbnb.

"I know that place. That's like five miles from my house. It's on a bus route that comes right by my place. We should totally go." Naomi's eyes sparkled in delight.

Alison dropped her pen, her mouth going dry at the thought of going back there. She was proud of her work. She had done what needed to be done. But she didn't want to think about him anymore. She didn't want him to exist in her world anymore.

"Alison, do you want to…"

Before Riley could finish talking Alison was pushing her homework aside and reaching for a leash on her end table. Pepe shot up into a standing position on the bed.

"I have to walk my dog. Be back in a few." As soon as she was off the bed Pepe was right behind her, his eyes on the leash.

As Alison walked out into the hallway she heard her friends mumbling.

"Jesus, read the room, Riley." Nick snapped. "What were you guys thinking?"

"What?" Riley seemed completely oblivious.

"You were literally just all over me for talking about this shit in front of her." Naomi grumbled at Riley. "The girl was practically born in a crime scene…"

If her friends only knew how true that was…

She was born differently that day. She'd never been the same since she'd bathed in her family's blood.

Alison hustled out the front door, clipping Pepe's leash on as she walked down the driveway.

She scratched the dog between the ears and he let out a noise between a grunt and a sigh.

"Good boy." She loved her dog. He never judged her. He never felt pity for her. He was just her friend, through good times and bad times.

She walked down the street, keeping to the side with the shade of the trees. Pepe got hot too easily with all of his fur. He was getting older, but he still had a little bounce in his step, especially when he saw a squirrel.

She felt the pressure of her past slowly releasing the death grip it had on her as she walked along the private narrow path.

There weren't many people out. The murder had scared a lot of families and sent them retreating to the safety of their homes. But Alison knew from experience that you weren't even safe in your own home. Sometimes the dangers behind closed doors were scarier than the dangers out in the world.

She clutched her hand around the looped handle of the leash.

"There are bad people out there, Ali. People who would do way worse things to you than dad," her brother had warned her.

Sometimes Alison fantasized about finding every last pervert in the NAT club, the twisted and sick fucks in the world…

She pushed out a breath, trying to calm herself down. She had to stay in control.

As she rounded the corner she stopped walking. She noticed a girl sitting on the porch steps of a house across the street. Her head was down, buried in her phone. She had a notepad in her hand.

Alison recognized her from around the neighborhood, but she never spoke to her. Truth be told, the girl gave her the creeps.

She looked at the name scrawled across the mailbox.

The Plunketts.

Alexis Plunkett, who would later become Alexis Roslyn Drake, had her earbuds in and was focused on the screen intently.

A small digital camera was sitting next to her. She was scribbling notes in her notepad. Something told Alison it wasn't school work. Something also told her to stay away from the girl, so she turned and walked the other way.

But as she was leaving she saw Alex pull the jack out of her phone and she heard the press junket that Naomi and Riley had been listening to.

"One thing is for certain." The volume was at top level. "The person responsible for this clearly knew what they were doing. It's hard to say if they will ever be caught. This could be a name synonymous with the likes of Ted Bundy and Jack the Ripper."

Alison both loathed and appreciated the media. She hated that they were using his death as a way to generate views and scare people. Only criminals needed to worry about facing her knife.

On the other hand, she appreciated the media, because in a sick twisted way it reminded her that she was famous.

"It's not a matter of if, but a matter of when…this killer will strike again." The news anchor had a gloomy sounding voice.

Alex lifted her eyebrows, but Alison was too far away to get a read on her emotions. The girl looked around, her gaze landing directly where Alison was hidden in the shade of the trees, as if she sensed her. But she didn't indicate she'd seen anything as she turned around and walked into the house, leaving Alison hiding in the darkness.

o ~ O ~ o

The years had passed, but reporters and journalists had remained the same. This time, the person in the hot seat was the very woman that Alison just so happened to be falling in love with. A woman who was kind and brought her lunch every day. A woman who carved out time to call and check on her when she had a long day in surgery.

She watched Emily command the entire press junket, answering some questions and shutting down others. She was in control. It was invigorating.

I can't wait to get her into my bed.

Any bed.

Hell…even the floor.

She glanced at the on-call bed. It was covered in paperwork that she still had to finish, but Emily was more important.

She paused the press conference video on an image of Emily glaring directly into the camera. Her woman looked so fierce. So determined. So unafraid, as if she hadn't taken a slug to the chest two months ago.

You bury yourself in your work because you can't afford to slow down…to be alone with your thoughts. What has been in your mind these past eight weeks, my dear?

Eight weeks.

Had it really been eight weeks?

Alison unpaused the video and watched as Emily fielded questions.

She looked at the swarm of press digging their claws in, searching for an answer that they were too clueless to figure out.

Alex Drake was front and center, her eyes sparkling in excitement. It was strange just how obsessed the woman was with her work. Alex still gave her the creeps.

"Is it true that the police have reason to believe that the Scarlet Letter Killer predates the first murder this year and that it goes back nearly a decade a half?"

A decade and a half. Alison scoffed.

Who spoke like that?

What a snooty crusty whore.

"I can't comment on that at this time."

Alison caught Emily's right eye twitching. She was annoyed. And a bit angry. She'd clearly clashed with the reporter recently.

Alison's eyes narrowed at Alexis Rose.

How dare that woman harass her Emily? How dare she try to make a public spectacle out of the kills in her own false words?

Maybe I can find a reason to get rid of that nosey little reporter. Alison filed the thought away.

"What can you comment on, Detective?" Alex's sharp tone indicated her annoyance. "I understand that this may be personal for you…"

Alex knew about Emily's connection to Maya. And she was trying to use it against her.

You fucking bitch.

Alison picked up a knife, playing with it in her hands. It would feel so good to slice Alex's throat.

She was fresh out of surgery, but eager and willing to cut again, especially if it meant protecting her favorite brunette.

But Emily was ready with her response.

"Of course it's personal. We all have connections in this town. We all have friends and family here. We are a community. When someone is brutally murdered it affects everyone. Believe me, we are working to apprehend this suspect."

"Do you have any leads?"

"I'm not at liberty to answer that at this time." Her frustration was boiling over.

That boded well for Alison, because when Emily came by for lunch she would have a lot of pent up energy. And she'd need to get it out somehow.

Alison lowered the knife in her hand and slid it through an orange. Slicing through fruit was a lot like slicing through skin. And it was delicious no matter which one she was cutting in to.

She stared at the fruit as she cut it into bite-sized pieces. Her hand felt detached from her body, like it did things without consulting her. Sometimes she felt like she was just an illusion, a dream watching herself. An outsider.

She saw others in pain. She understood it. But she never felt it.

Not until Emily. With Emily, she felt everything.

"Can you give us any details on the latest victim?" Alex again.

I hate her fucking voice. I wish I could cut her larynx out of her throat. Make a necklace out of it. Make her wear it around town to remind her to keep her fucking mouth shut.

She ripped the peel off of a slice of an orange and popped the fruit in her mouth.

"The family members of the victim have been notified and we do have a confirmed identity. Twenty-two year old Jackie Molena…"

The latest victim, victim number five, had been found in a very public manner. Splayed out on the hood of her own car in the middle of the street. Alison had pinned her to the cement wall in her garage, slowly crushing her.

Before she'd driven the car into her she'd positioned her upright and went to work on her moniker. Her signature. It had been interesting trying to carve it while the girl was standing upright. Different. A new angle.

When Jackie woke up and realized her fate she had fought and screamed and beat the hood as the capillaries in her eyes started bursting, vessels blowing, painting the whites of her eyes in blood.

But Alison felt no sympathy.

"You could have helped her." Alison had read the old woman's autopsy report.

Had Jackie stopped and rendered aid and called for help the woman could have survived. Instead, Jackie left her there like roadkill, suffering for hours.

"You tried to hide it."

Once Jackie was dead Alison carefully wrapped her up in a blanket and drove her towards the same place where Jackie had hit Esther Potter and left her to die.

"Our heartfelt condolences go out to the Molena family…"

"Any details on how she was killed?" Alex was relentless, but Emily never once lost her cool.

"Evidence has been gathered and is being analyzed as we speak. An autopsy report will be done soon."

A warm familiar hand reached around Alison's shoulders and covered her eyes.

"Guess who?"

She hadn't even heard the brunette approaching. Was she that entranced?

No one had been able to sneak up on her before. She was usually the one who did the sneaking.

Emily was lucky she knew it was her or else the knife might be buried in her gut, just like in her nightmare.

The difference was, she'd known it was Emily in real life.

She put the knife down and fell back against the brunette, melting into her body.

"Thinking dirty thoughts about me?" Emily lowered her hand.

Her fingers curled around a take-out bag sporting the name Jonny's on it. She dropped the bag on to the table.

Alison turned around and her lips found Emily's.

"Does this answer your question?" She nipped at her bottom lip as she placed her palm against Emily's hip. Her fingers brushed her gun holster.

Danger. So close.

Emily cupped her cheeks and pushed into the kiss for a few seconds before glancing over her shoulder and seeing herself on the screen.

"Are they re-running that again?" She was annoyed at seeing her likeness on the television. She grabbed the remote and shut it off. "That was three days ago. I am so sick of hearing my own voice."

Channel those emotions, Emily. You know you want to.

The doctor loved it when the detective was gruff and tense. She wanted to see what the woman was really capable of.

"I happen to like your voice." Alison smiled sweetly at her.

The brunette's hands slid away from Alison's cheek and down to the sides of her neck. She lowered her forehead to meet Alison's.

"I have been waiting to hold you all day." Emily lifted her head and smiled. "How has your morning been?"

She looked into Alison's eyes, which forced the blonde to find something else to focus on.

I can't let her see me. I can't let her in.

She closed her eyes and focused on Emily's touch.

"It's been crazy. They've had me booked solid since seven this morning." She opened her eyes and slowly batted them at the detective. Emily trailed her hands down until they were against Alison's waist. "I'm exhausted."

"You still look beautiful." Emily tugged on her hips, pulling her closer.

Alison saw a small burst of light when her pelvis bumped Emily's.

She twirled a finger into a strand of Emily's hair, her eyes landing on the healing cut on her head she'd gotten at the station earlier in the week. The bruising was gone. The cut was nothing more than a little blemish, but seeing it still made Alison's blood boil.

It also made her feel something different. Something softer.

She ran the pad of her finger over the cut.

"Looks like your war wound is healing well." I do impressive work. "How does it feel?"

Emily grinned slyly.

"Think I need a little more medicine, Doc."

Alison didn't hesitate. She stood on her tiptoes and pushed a kiss against the cut before moving to peck the detective's lips.

"Always such a flirt." Alison pressed a fingertip to Emily's lip. The brunette kissed her finger gently.

"Since the day we met." Emily winked.

"She has a way of getting what she wants," Toby had once said.

"Is that how you got past security? Your charm?" Alison pecked the tip of her nose.

"I outrank them." Emily tapped the badge on her hip. "And of course, they know me by now."

"How'd you pull rank with Kathleen?" Alison picked up the plate with the orange slices and nodded towards the table where she'd set up a little tray of fruit.

"I didn't have to pull rank with her. I'm a sweet talker." Emily smiled.

"You waited until her back was turned and slipped by her?" Alison guessed.

Emily grinned, acknowledging that Alison was right.

"You little rebel." Alison chuckled.

She added the freshly sliced oranges to the pile of blueberries and strawberries…

Sensual. An aphrodisiac.

Emily pulled two wrapped Italian sandwiches out of the take-out bag. Jonny's made some of the best Italian sandwiches she'd ever had. Alison had called it in and paid for it, still trying to make up for their very fancy first date.

Emily spun the chair in front of the table around and spread her legs to straddle it. She leaned her arms across the back of it.

God, she's hot. Alison could picture Emily straddling over her face in that stance.

"I like to live a little dangerously." Emily licked her lips.

The blonde felt heat pooling between her legs. She wanted to swipe away every last bit of food that was on the table and fuck her right there. Her eyes darted to the cots.

"You should be more careful, Detective." Alison picked up an orange slice and popped it in her mouth. "There are a lot of dangerous things out there."

And in here.

"Yeah, well, with Kathleen out there at least I know you're safe in here."

Oh, Emily, if you only knew that I'm the thing that monsters fear.

"She's got a mean scowl. I don't scare easy, but she scares me." The big bad detective shuddered, though it seemed more playful than serious.

"I'm surprised she didn't catch you."

"She was talking to that poor dead flower of hers."

Alison had to fight back a smirk. All the buds had fallen off. All that was left was bare stems and wilting leaves.

Soon it won't just be the flower that's dead.

Alison had switched out all of Kathleen's heart medications with placebos. It would be a matter of weeks. The woman had been very naughty with some of the hospital's funds that were allocated for pediatric patients. She had stolen from sick children. That couldn't go unpunished.

Emily unwrapped her sandwich and took a bite. She closed her eyes in bliss.

So that's what you'll look like when I'm burying my tongue inside of you.

"Doctor Montgomery is doing the autopsy today on Jackie Molena if you're interested." Alison slid the freshly cut orange slices over to Emily and reached for her sandwich, neatly unwrapping it. She took a dainty little bite.

I'm smaller than she is. She's protective. She'll see me as a girly girl who needs her.

She was planning ahead. She was setting up a narrative. It's something she'd been doing her entire life.

"Are her autopsies as educational as yours?" Emily seemed intrigued.

"Even more-so. She's a flighty little thing, especially when she's jacked up on coffee." Alison chuckled.

Aria was so diligent about what she put into her body. She wouldn't eat meat. She refused all processed foods. Yet she ingested her weight in caffeine.

Emily took another bite of her sandwich, not even bothering to finish chewing before she responded,

"What does the Senior Hastings have to say about me infiltrating her hospital?"

"I spoke with her personally. She's fine with it."

Veronica Hastings had a soft spot for Alison. She knew what she'd been through as a child. She knew that she shared a biological component with Spencer. And most importantly, she knew what an excellent and skilled surgeon she had in the young doctor.

Alison could practically get away with murder when it came to Chief Hastings...which was a good thing since she enjoyed murdering so much.

"I might skip it." Emily made a face at her sandwich, like it had offended her.

Alison glared at the sandwich for whatever offense it had committed, ready to shove it in a garbage disposal. It took her a moment to realize Emily wasn't really mad at her food.

"This one really bothers me," Emily said softly.

"The Ham and Provolone?" Alison asked in confusion.

Emily laughed like Alison was a child who'd told an amusing joke.

"No…" The smile slowly faded from the detective's face. "Jackie. She was so young. Only 22. She was an aspiring teacher and she volunteered at an animal shelter."

Ironic that she left a woman to die like a dog hit by a car. Bet she would have stopped for Fido.

"That is sad." Alison's mouth felt sour saying the words.

"I'm just struggling to make sense of it." Emily sighed. "She doesn't really fit the profile."

Because you don't know her atrocities.

"What about the killer?" The blonde lifted her brows in intrigue. The one who is picturing you naked right now slathered in blueberry juice with a strawberry dangling over your lips?

"Clean getaway." The way Emily clenched her teeth invigorated Alison's senses. She wanted to feel those teeth grazing her nipples.

God, I have GOT to get her in bed.

The more Emily talked about the case the more Alison's loins burned. She wanted to pull her on top of the table and hump her right there, but she played the role of sympathetic girlfriend, nodding along as Emily spoke.

"No prints. Nothing on the traffic cams. Not a trace."

"This particular killer seems incredibly intelligent." Alison patted herself on the back. And beautiful. And fucking awesome in bed. "But you're smarter." Girlfriends tell little white lies all the time. This is fine. "The devil is in the details." And in your arms most nights. "You'll get this person, Em."

She reached across the tiny table and curled her fingers on top of Emily's knuckles, hoping her pep-talk would put her more in the mood for sex.

"This is all so morbid." Emily shook her head.

"Where else can you talk about morbid if not in a hospital?"

"Let's try to lighten it up a bit. You read any good books lately?" Emily took a bite of her sandwich.

Alison smirked, having the perfect response ready.

"The Kama Sutra." She gave Emily a devilish grin.

The brunette nearly choked on a piece of ham. She had to gulp down a bunch of water before she could properly laugh.

They ate their sandwiches as they chatted about things that didn't involve crime scenes and dead bodies. When Alison was finished eating she slid her chair around the table, next to Emily.

"Hi." She smiled, moving closer to the brunette.

Emily smiled back.

"Hi."

"How was your sandwich?" Alison touched her hand.

Emily swallowed the last bite and licked her fingers. Alison imagined her doing it after she'd been inside of her.

"Delicious."

Not as half as delicious as dessert is going to be.

"Have I told you…" Alison looked down at her hand, watching as she traced her fingers around Emily's knuckles, "…just how much I enjoy our time together?"

Emily flipped her hand over, weaving her fingers into Alison's. The doctor slowly looked up to find Emily looking back at her with a hunger behind her gaze.

"Me too." She squeezed Alison's hand.

Alison forced herself to look into Emily's eyes, forced herself to feel something she knew was real. When she looked at the detective she could see the exhaustion in her expression. Emily carried herself well, but she was functioning without sleep. Her world had been thrown into a whirlwind when the killings started up, and in addition to that she was still dealing with the aftermath of being shot.

"How have the nightmares been?" Alison brushed Emily's hair aside.

Emily had been honest with Alison about her nightmares after being shot, especially after witnessing Alison having one of her own.

"I had one a few nights ago." Her voice was soft. Alison tightened her grip on Emily's hand. "I could see his eyes. He was looking right through me." Her eyes glossed over. "Looking at me as if I was just…a thing."

Not a person. A thing.

That's how Alison saw her kills. But her kills were warranted. She didn't shoot innocent women. She had standards.

"What's his name?" Alison questioned, no emotion in her voice whatsoever.

"Who?"

"The man who shot you. Who is he?" She'd never asked Emily the question before, but she sure as hell didn't want the man who had nearly killed her to get away with it.

He was behind bars. Alison knew that. But that didn't mean he was untouchable. She had money. She had dirty connections. She could make sure he would never hurt her Emily again.

Emily hesitated before answering, like saying his name might summon something evil.

"Zach." Her hand started to shake. "Zach Talley."

Zach Talley, you are dead fucking meat.

"Before getting into meth he had a penchant for older women. He liked luring them in for their experience. But on the side he was sleeping with girls half his age. Some underage."

What the fuck is with this town and pedophiles?

"They hide in plain sight, you know," Emily said.

What I know is that this Zach asshole is a dead man walking. He's an Ian. A Garrett. A Wilden. He's perverted. He needs to die.

"Men are such shit." Alison grumbled under her breath.

"Which is exactly why I prefer women." Emily smiled at her.

"Have you always known?" Alison put her hand against Emily's outer thigh. "About…about what you want?"

"Always." Emily locked eyes with her. "Ever since I remember it's been girls. But I waited too long to come out."

"I never got to come out to my parents." Alison wasn't sure why she'd blurted it out. "I'm sorry. This isn't about me."

She'd told Emily they were terrible people, but had never told her why.

Emily laid her palm against Alison's thigh. She didn't realize it, but her fingers were touching Alison's scar. Emily peered at her with soft loving eyes.

"You can talk about you, too."

When Emily said things like that it made Alison want to kiss her. She wanted to kiss her practically every second of every day. If it was possible to live with her lips glued to Emily's lips she would do it.

"Did you ever tell your aunt?" Emily rubbed Alison's thigh, "That you liked girls?"

Alison nodded.

"I was thirteen."

It was the spring before she met Wilden when she told her aunt she was bi. Sometimes she wondered how different things would have been had she met a nice girl on the trip instead of that asshole.

Would she be who she was today? Would she still do the things she'd done? She hadn't killed anyone for nearly seven years after she'd killed her parents. She'd wanted to, but she didn't. But then she met him.

"Was she supportive?" Emily questioned.

Alison smiled. Her Aunt Mary had taken her face in her hands and kissed her forehead and replied,

"You love whoever you want to love, darling."

She had her mother's face, but she had something her mother didn't. Kindness. Love.

Her mother and father would not have been so kind. They were dead set on making her some kind of prize for a man.

The same memory that always replayed in her mind flashed through her head. Her dad grabbing her by the arm, flipping her over on to his lap. A large calloused hand…

"Ali, are you okay?"

Emily's hand that had been on her thigh was now against her arm. Her touch sent a burning pain into Alison's groin. She wanted…needed her so badly.

"Have you still been having nightmares?" A worried crease formed in the brunette's brow.

Alison wasn't sure how to respond.

"Yes, I murder you in my dreams and then wake up with a fucking river flowing from my vagina while I finger myself" would kill the mood.

"Sometimes. But I'm okay. I'm just tense from my busy morning." Alison glanced back at all the paperwork she still needed to do spread out on the bed.

She tilted her head slowly from side to side, exposing her neck.

"You work so hard." The brunette was impressed. "Why don't you let me clean up here?" She pecked Alison's lips and reached for the paper wrappings from their sandwiches. She grabbed her empty drink cup and stood up.

She walked over to toss the garbage in the trash can next to the door.

Alison followed. She smiled when Emily turned around to face her.

The doctor wordlessly reached around her to lock the door.

"My next surgery isn't for another hour." Alison twirled a strand of her jet black hair around her fingers.

"What is it that you're suggesting?" Emily's smirk indicated she knew the answer.

Alison took a deep breath, bathing in her scent.

"I'm tired of waiting. Tired of closing my eyes and wishing I had more of you…"

She slowly looked up to meet the brunette's eyes. Emily leaned forward. Alison tilted her chin up and her lips ghosted over Emily's.

Emily's palm landed delicately against the blonde's cheek. She breathed a heavy breath through her nose. She hadn't felt anything since Maya, but Alison did things to her body…to her mind. She craved her. She had fantasized about her in bed.

"Tell me, Detective…" Alison's breath came out hot. "Since you're on duty and I'm on call…" Her tongue inched out of her mouth. "Would this be considered unethical?" She picked up Emily's hand, observing it, lightly kissing her knuckles before gently guiding it towards her right breast.

The brunette sucked in a breath. She answered by surging forward and capturing her lips in a bruising kiss. Alison could feel all of Emily's pent up frustration and aggression from her investigation turning into sexual energy. Alison cupped her cheeks and moaned into the embrace.

When they broke away to breathe Alison smiled at her.

"I can think of something that might relax the both of us." The blonde's voice came out a whisper as she slowly dropped her hands from Emily's face. "If you'll have me…"

Emily's eyes practically screamed "oh, I'll have you…" as she moved her against the wall.

Alison's palms only made it as far as the brunette's neck. She could feel Emily's pulse jump in her throat underneath her fingertips.

Emily's blood. Her life force. The reason she breathes. The reason I breathe.

"Can I?" Emily moved in to take in her aroma, kissing the side of her neck as she touched the waistband of her scrubs.

"Please."

Emily slipped her fingers underneath her scrubs. She rubbed her hand against Alison's inner thigh. Her fingers hit something rough against her smooth skin.

It was jagged, misshapen. Emily touched it inquisitively.

"Is that…" Emily traced the rigid line.

The scar she'd read about in Alison's file. The one she'd gotten the night her family was killed.

Alison turned away. She couldn't look her in the eyes.

"Hey…" Emily softly put her palm against the side of Alison's neck. "We all have scars, Ali. It's nothing to be ashamed of."

Emily pushed her lips against Alison's again. Her tongue pried for permission to go further, and Alison was more than happy to oblige. Emily made her feel beautiful.

Of course, she knew she was beautiful. But Emily made even the darkest parts of her soul feel lighter.

She wasn't sure what she was feeling. She had never felt it before. Certainly not when she'd fucked other people.

Emily's fingers landed on a damp spot on her underwear. The blonde whimpered.

"Are you okay with this?" Emily put pressure against her core.

Alison blinked, her mind echoing a similar sentiment in Darren Wilden's voice.

"Is this okay?"

He had asked her, too, but it was a lie he was telling her. He was going to do whatever he wanted. He'd made her think she was the one making the calls, but he had been pulling her strings the whole time.

But this was different. She wanted Emily. She needed her. Craved her. She could feel her hot breath against her neck and it almost made her come undone.

She leaned close to brunette's ear,

"I need you. Please..."

Emily pushed her underwear aside and rubbed her fingers against her wetness. Alison shuddered, pushing her forehead against Emily's shoulder as the brunette rubbed slow gentle circles against her clit.

Oh, shit. Shit-shit-shit. I'm not even going to last ten seconds…

She grunted out a breath and then moaned when she felt Emily slip a finger inside of her. She gripped Emily's hips as the brunette's finger moved in long smooth strides inside of her, exploring her.

She had wondered so long how Emily would feel. It was better than all of the fantasies she'd had combined.

Emily added a second finger and Alison grunted, sweat forming on her brow from the fire she felt in her belly.

Is this real? Is this really happening?

Alison cried softly with each thrust.

A third finger.

God, she's going to kill me.

She buried her face in the crook of Emily's neck, planting soft kisses against her exposed skin, trying not to look up, trying not to see…

She felt the brunette's free hand against the nape of her neck.

"Hey," Emily whispered as she pumped rhythmically. "Alison, look at me."

But Alison was frozen.

What if Emily saw her? What if she looked into her eyes and saw who she really was?

I wanted this.

She had wanted the intimacy with Emily, but she didn't realize she would feel so vulnerable when it happened.

A bolt of fear shot through her. She had been ready for the physical contact. But the emotional rush that was washing over her paralyzed her.

She felt it.

Oh God, oh God…I can't lose control.

If she lost control she'd be at the mercy of her newfound emotions.

Emily's palm was against her jaw now, slowly pushing her head up.

Alison frantically searched for anywhere else to look, but Emily's gaze was like a magnet.

Please don't see me. Please don't hate me.

Her eyes met Emily's passionate expression.

What if she sees who I really am?

A soft hand on her cheek.

A delicate look into her eyes.

I can't let her see the real me…

Her stomach fluttered, a flurry of panic.

"You're not letting me in." Emily's lips brushed hers.

"You…f…feel in. Ohhh…" Alison almost doubled over when a shockwave of pleasure jolted her pelvis.

"Not what I meant." Her hand stroked Alison's face.

What Emily saw wasn't the darkness in her soul. It was the pain of her childhood.

"What is it that you're so afraid of?" Emily pecked her lips and peered into her eyes.

That I'm a monster.

"I'm sorry." It came out breathless.

"For what?" Emily's brows narrowed in confusion, slowing her motions. Alison could tell that she was trying to figure out if she needed to stop.

"I don't…I don't know how to do this." Alison touched Emily's neck.

"Do what?" Emily's eyes never strayed from hers.

How to love.

"I'm sorry." Alison repeated, nearly weeping. "I'm so sorry."

"Do you want to stop?" Emily stopped moving, and Alison thought she might die.

She never wanted Emily to stop. She never wanted her to pull out. She wanted to stay like that in that pleasure forever.

"No. I'm just…" Overjoyed. Overwhelmed. "I've never…" She pushed her forehead against Emily's. "I've never felt…"

Anything.

She'd never felt anything…until now.

She clamped down on Emily's fingers and moaned,

"I'm just sorry…"

I have done so many terrible things.

Do I deserve to feel THIS good?

"You have nothing to be sorry for." Emily kissed her as she curled her fingers.

Alison gasped into her mouth when she felt Emily's fingertips hit a spot inside of her that made her vision burst in fields of colors. She saw beyond the rage and fear and anger stored inside of her, bundled up like a tight bunch of kindling. She saw something bright and beautiful.

"I would never hurt you, Alison." Emily leaned forward and whispered against her ear. "Never."

"I know." She was breathing heavily. She saw Emily's eyes searching hers, and she hoped the brunette didn't see how empty she was inside.

But when Emily looked at her Alison didn't feel empty. She felt more than the physical pleasure. There was something more.

A piece of her heart…her soul…the piece of her that was missing…felt…there. She felt alive. She existed. Emily held the key to a lock deep inside of her.

You're my unanswered prayer.

Alison pushed her palm against Emily's chest, feeling her heart racing. Then she moved her other hand to her own chest and realized her heart was beating, too.

"Emily…I…"

She wanted to tell her she loved her but it was way too soon. It was hilariously ironic. They were fucking before the I love you moment.

"You…you make me feel…"

That was it. Emily made her feel something.

I'm scared.

I'm so fucking scared.

What is this?

Why do I feel this way?

"I've never felt this way before." Alison hummed under her breath as her body quietly fell out of her control.

"Me neither." Emily cupped her neck.

Emily understood. She knew what it was like to shut down.

You understand my pain. My fears. You understand me.

"You're safe with me, honey." Emily curled her fingers again and Alison groaned, her knees nearly buckling.

Alison felt a surge of energy burst through her. Her eyes widened as she felt herself spasm around Emily's fingers. Hot liquid seeped down between her sweaty thighs. She couldn't breathe. Red hot bolts of fire were shooting through her veins. She gripped Emily's shoulders for support.

"God." Alison huffed.

"You can call me Emily." The brunette winked at her.

So fucking cocky.

"What if I told you I dreamed about this while I was in surgery?" Emily's tongue was against her ear. Her hot wet tongue.

That was all it took for Alison to clamp down on Emily's fingers again and moan her name. Her body shuddered again. An overpowering sensation needled her.

Something different came over her when she looked into Emily's eyes. They were soft. Commanding. But there was also a darkness there that Alison was attracted to.

The loss. The anger. The grief. She recognized it all.

She ran her hand down Emily's arm until her fingers were on top of her hand. She guided Emily's motions, showing her how she wanted her to move.

"Let me show you something." The gentle voice of a woman.

But it was anything but comforting.

"Let me teach you."

"Harder." Alison growled, biting at Emily's ear.

Emily obliged. Alison groaned loudly and Emily pressed her lips against Alison's to silence her, swallowing her pleasure.

A flash of her past flickered in her mind.

Her father.

"If Jason won't do what needs to be done, I will." Fear. Terror. "You and your brother are going learn to listen to us one way or another..."

Then everything went black.

When the lights in her mind came back on she saw a series of broken memories.

Jason punching their father.

The feel of wet carpet.

The stench of urine.

"Hey, where did you go just now?" Emily stroked her cheek.

Alison buried it, refusing to answer. She twisted around, Emily's fingers still pumping inside of her relentlessly.

She pushed Emily back against the wall and pressed a hard kiss against her lips as she grasped at Emily's belt, searching for the clasp to undo it. Emily used her free hand to help her as their lips mashed together in a fit of heated moans.

Alison used her free hand to pop the button of Emily's work slacks. It was hard to maneuver around where her badge and gun hung, but she managed to get her hand inside.

Her eyes darted down to her gun. She could take it. She could take it right now and use it on her if she wanted to.

But she didn't want to.

Instead she ripped Emily's zipper down. The weight of her gun and badge pulled down against her pants. They slid down her hips.

Alison lowered her panties and slipped her palm between her legs. She had been dying to feel her, dying to taste her.

She was soft. Soaked. Her lips were already engorged, slick and aroused. Alison felt the desire to plunge into her with no warning.

Instead she slowly stroked her. Emily shuddered and broke their kiss, throwing her head back against the wall. The feeling of elation caused her to momentarily still her fingers in the blonde.

Alison grinned wickedly as she coated herself in the uniqueness that was Emily Fields. She drew her fingers away from the brunette's heat and sniffed her fingers. She smelled sweet. Clean.

She probably tasted even better.

"You have no idea how long I've wanted to do this."

Emily watched as Alison dragged her fingers across her lips and slowly put them in her mouth.

"My God, Emily," she said as she rolled her tongue around her fingers. "You taste incredible."

Her hand was against Emily's core again. She circled her clit, toying with her, teasing a moan out of her. She slipped the tip of her finger inside of her and leaned close to her, feeling Emily's jagged breaths against her face.

"Do you want me?" Alison whispered as she wiggled the tip of her finger inside of her and pressed her palm against the brunette's sensitive bud.

Emily bucked against her motions, writhing in pleasure.

"God, yes," she panted.

Alison pulled her finger out and coated three fingers in Emily's slick moisture. She pushed forward at an agonizingly slow pace. She felt Emily start to move in her again. The brunette curled her fingers and Alison shuddered.

Their lips met again.

Alison moved in the opposite motion as the detective, thrusting forward as Emily pulled back in her. She could feel the brunette's orgasm approaching. She slid her palm underneath Emily's shirt and touched her abs, her fingertips rolling over them. She touched the scar on her chest and then slowly moved up to grope her breast, her hand squeezing roughly against her bra.

She felt hot wet liquid seeping down her wrist as Emily spasmed against her.

Emily whimpered into their kiss. It was a vulnerability that Alison hadn't foreseen. The cry drew her eyes to Emily's.

Her eyes locked on the detective's. Emily laid her palm against Alison's cheek as they continued to thrust into one another.

Emily's gaze kept her grounded in the moment. It was so sweet. So full of passion.

It shifted something in Alison's heart, and she did something she'd never done before.

She let her in.

Emily's eyes were beautifully stunning in the throes of passion. The way they widened when Alison hit a spot inside of her. The way they briefly fluttered shut as the heated wave of her ecstasy washed over her.

Alison continued her motions, watching what her fingers were doing to Emily.

Emily mirrored her strokes. Alison could feel herself getting close, but she forced herself to wait on Emily.

Emily sucked in a breath as Alison curled her fingers in her. She gave her a slight nod to let her know she was ready.

They came together. Alison had never felt more connected to anyone in her life.

Emily slumped back against the wall, her legs trembling, her muscles taut. Alison collapsed against her, resting her cheek against the detective's chest.

The room was hot and muggy and smelled of sweat and sex. The only sound was that of their heavy panting.

After several moments of silence Emily looked at Alison with a smile.

"You relaxed now?" Emily raked her fingers through her hair.

Alison slowly lifted her head, a smile on her face.

"Is that all you've got in you?" She teased. "I could go for round two."

Something about the cockiness in her voice charged through the brunette. She effortlessly picked the doctor up, pants sliding down as she paced across the floor. Alison wrapped her legs around Emily's body as they moved towards the bed.

Emily swept all the paperwork aside before dropping Alison against the mattress. She yanked Alison's scrub bottoms down, along with her panties. Alison scrambled to get her scrub top off, flinging it over her head.

Emily pressed a kiss against her collar bone as Alison started unbuttoning her blouse. Emily wiggled her hips, letting her pants fall completely off of her.

The brunette kissed her way down to the divot in Alison's chest. She unclasped her bra and her breasts sprang free. She kissed one and then the other. She rubbed her thumb against one of Alison's hardened nipples and grazed the other one with her teeth.

Alison leaned back on the palms of her hands as Emily worked her way down to her stomach. Then her thighs.

The blonde held her breath as she watched Emily moving towards the scar on her thigh.

She swallowed her nerves.

"Daddy, no!"

She could hear screams. She could see blood. Her tiny little fingers covered in it.

The detective observed the blemish. She rubbed her fingertip over the jagged white cut, then looked up at Alison as she pressed a gentle kiss against it.

She loves even the worst parts of me.

Alison fell back, a warm puddle of goo for Emily to play with.

Emily parted her legs and pushed her knees up. She kissed her left knee, letting her eyes linger on Alison's for a few seconds as she lowered her head and started pressing kisses against her inner thigh.

This is real. She's real. This is actually happening.

Emily peppered kisses against Alison's still-sensitive clit and used two fingers to pry her opening wide enough to slip her tongue inside of her. Emily stared at her through the gap in her legs.

You crave the closeness of intimacy. You want to watch me. You want to see me when I come.

Emily flipped her tongue into the craziest shapes, covering her inside and out. She alternated between her fingers and her mouth. Alison started gently thrusting back against the motions. Her fingers curled into the sheets as she felt a heat flowing through her body. It started in her stomach. She trembled as it slowly traveled down, getting hotter and hotter…

She was on fire. It was rushing down to her pelvis. She threw her head back and moaned Emily's name as she thrashed around.

Bliss. Heaven. All the colors existing at once.

Happiness.

She had never really been happy.

She tangled her fingers into Emily's hair as she hit her peak. Her orgasm was intense, and it felt never-ending. Every time she thought it was over a little aftershock would hit her.

She relaxed as Emily slowly brought her down from it, gently lapping at her, carefully holding her fingers inside.

She let out a deep breath and felt her body relax. She felt like she was sinking into the mattress. She closed her eyes and something jostled the bed.

Emily slowly crawled up her body.

Alison tensed up. She hadn't let anyone on top of her since Wilden. But Emily wasn't heavy. She didn't bear down. She wasn't like Wilden. She let her breathe.

Even so, Alison still felt the need to be on top. She curled her arms around Emily and flipped her over on her back. Before Emily had a chance to fight her for control Alison leaned down and captured her lips. When she pulled back she smiled at her.

"It's my turn." Alison put a finger against her bruised lips, as if shushing her.

She dragged her fingers down Emily's body, leaving the brunette a trembling mess beneath her.

She'd seen her naked before, but this was very different. It had been about her well-being before. It had been about saving her life. This…this was about a hunger. A need to have her.

She traced a finger against the scar on Emily's chest. She'd done her best not to mar her beautiful skin. Her work was impeccable.

I'm a piece of you, Emily. Forever. Even if you find out what I am and decide you don't love me, I'm part of you.

She would never mark Emily. She would never hurt her. It had been fate that left Emily with the scar.

The scar was the first place Alison kissed her, letting Emily know what she'd felt when the brunette kissed her scar.

You're perfectly imperfect. And that's okay.

She hesitated before her next move. She didn't know how to do this. She didn't know how to make love to someone. She'd fucked other people. But this was different. This wasn't slamming into some random hook up. This wasn't fucking. This was making love.

She thought about Emily's actions. The way she'd taken her time getting to know her body. The way she loved every inch of her. So that's what Alison did. She traced her fingers around her curves. She pressed light airy kisses against her abdomen. She worked her way up to her chest.

Emily made a soft mewling noise and placed her hand against the back of Alison's neck.

The blonde teased her nipple with her tongue before she took it into her mouth. She could feel the rise and fall of Emily's chest.

She stayed there for a moment, watching her heart pounding her ribcage.

She traced the bumps of Emily's abs. She observed her taut muscles.

You like to stay in control. You don't exercise to stay fit. You exercise to stay in control so you don't lose it.

She glanced at Emily's arm and picked up her hand, kissing her knuckles. There were scars littered around her hands, mostly her knuckles. She recognized the shapes of the scars. Abrasions.

You lost it when Maya died. You hit things. Walls. Maybe people.

She kissed her fingertips and then turned her hand over and kissed her palm. She gently lowered her hand and kissed her chest again. She dipped down to her stomach, licking a trail down towards her pubic bone.

She pushed Emily's legs apart and Emily automatically drew her knees up, exposing herself to Alison.

Alison's eyes landed not on her core, but on the scar on the right side of her right knee. It was an inch thick and two inches long. Alison traced her finger against it. Something had cut her. Sharp. Metal.

Did someone hurt you? That asshole ex-boyfriend of yours?

As if Emily could read her thoughts, the brunette quietly said,

"I cut it on the lockers when…" Emily faltered.

Baby, you don't have to explain.

But she did,

"…after I fought him off. It was the same time I bashed my shoulder."

He screwed up your swimming career. He tried to destroy you. But you, my sweet warrior, wouldn't let him. I would kill him for you, Emily. I would carve him in to tiny little pieces…

She found herself angrily kissing the blemish. Then she slowly kissed her way up Emily's firm tone thigh. She blew a gentle breath against her center.

She saw Emily shiver and arch her head back against the pillow.

She was swollen and wet and ready for round two. Alison leaned forward and blew a cool breath against her, watching as Emily's long fingers dug into the sheets. She was pulsing already, dying for Alison's touch.

The blonde gently slipped her tongue through her folds, taking her time like she had with her fingers earlier.

Emily gripped the sheets harder and bucked forward.

So eager.

Alison flattened her tongue against her and pressed against her clit.

I want to taste you. All of you.

"Oh God, Alison." Emily huffed as Alison flicked her tongue against her, teasing her entrance, pressing in, licking, tasting, sucking. "Oh, God. Oh my God."

Alison added a finger along with her tongue, moving her tongue up and pressing into her with her finger so she could reach deeper. She could already taste it building.

Emily put her hand on the back of Alison's head and gently threaded her fingers into her hair, tugging, then pushing forward.

You're telling me what you want.

She followed the motions, and seconds later she felt Emily's walls clamp down around her as she grunted and dug her other hand into the sheet.

Emily's warm juices flowed on to her tongue and Alison's taste buds started dancing thrills of delight. Alison couldn't get enough.

She was aware of Emily's moans of satisfaction. She was aware of Emily's fingers tightening in her hair. She was aware that the brunette almost leaped up off of the bed before falling slack against the mattress.

When she was finally able to tear herself away from between Emily's legs she looked up to see the sweaty exhausted brunette wiping her palm against her forehead and weaving her fingers backwards through her hair.

Their eyes met, and when they did Alison instinctively knew what to do. She'd never done it with any of her other partners, but her body ached to be closer to Emily's. She moved up the bed and laid her body against Emily's. The heat from their embrace was like a boiling sauna. She touched Emily's face, holding eye contact. Emily did the same as they moved their thighs together. Their bodies...their souls intertwined.

When she looked into the brunette's eyes everything about the world made sense. There was no pain. No fear. No doubt. It was just love. It was something that was so transcendent, so cosmic, so...

...beautiful.

Is this what it feels like to love?

When they finished it wasn't loud and messy. It was quiet, a sweet natural calmness that was for them, and only them. Alison couldn't help herself as she slowly peppered kisses down against Emily's body again.

Alison hadn't imagined that their first time would be in the on-call room. Emily certainly hadn't either.

Alison couldn't help but wonder what would have happened if they'd had lunch in her office instead. Would she have bent Emily over a chair and fucked her from behind? Would they have swiped everything off of her desk for their moment of bliss?

Alison snaked up Emily's body, pulling the covers up with her. She molded herself against Emily's hot flesh, laying her chin against Emily's shoulder.

Emily turned to kiss her forehead. Alison could see the sweat dribbling down her skin. She could feel the perspiration on her own skin.

Emily wrapped her arms around her. Alison felt safe. She always felt safe with the brunette.

It's just us. It's just me and her.

Nothing else in the world mattered.

Emily stroked her bare back and kissed the top of her head.

"How relaxed are you now, Doctor DiLaurentis?" The name rolled off her tongue in such an enticing way.

More relaxed than I've been my entire life.

What was she feeling? How was she feeling? How was it possible to feel anything? She was broken. She was sociopathic. Psychopathic. One of the two. Or at least she thought she was.

So how was it that she could feel her heart beating for this woman? How could it be that she had something worth living for? Worth dying for?

Her mind was constantly running with thoughts, but at that very moment she wasn't thinking anything. She was only feeling.

What did it mean?

"You are quite the tension reliever, Detective Fields." She nuzzled against the brunette.

The room was quiet except for their ragged breathing slowly returning to normal. It was a comfortable silence.

"I have a surgery in ten minutes." Alison glanced at the clock on the wall. They had literally fucked fifty minutes away. "They'll be looking for me soon."

"How soon is soon?" Emily tightened her grip on the blonde. Alison smiled. "Just let me hold you for a few more minutes."

It echoed Alison's sentiment. She never wanted to leave Emily's embrace.

As the seconds ticked by Alison realized she really had to get going lest someone come looking for her.

"I wish I could stay, but I have to go." Alison pushed her bruised lips out into a pout. "I don't want to, but I have to."

"Yeah." Emily nodded. "Toby is probably wondering where the hell I am. We're working multiple cases. I should get back to it."

It was Emily who braved pulling away first. She left the sheet covering Alison, giving the good doctor the modesty she deserved.

Alison grasped her greedily, pulling her back towards her. She kissed her and looked directly in her eyes.

"Come over to my place tonight." Alison whispered as she kissed Emily's jaw.

Emily smiled.

"Can't get enough of the insatiable Emily Fields?"

Alison's body quivered. Her heart was still pounding hard in her chest. Her thoughts were racing.

You have no fucking idea.

Emily Fields was the only thing in her life she could make sense of, but she still didn't understand why. She only understood logic and science. She didn't understand feelings and emotions. But she knew with certainty that she needed the detective in her life. She knew that the brunette was the only thing that could keep her nightmares at bay.

---

A/N: I couldn't stop thinking about how a reader (shoutout to gaylor for the laughs) on twitter said that Alison only had two speeds: Horny and Homicidal. That's literally this entire chapter.