SLMO (Girl X Girl - Actually? Intersex :))

The Betrayal

Alexis's POV

Hearing those words coming from Kim herself, panic clawed its way up my throat, a cold serpent coiling tighter with each passing second. Kim was leaving. Back to London. Away from me. The air seemed to thin, the sterile walls of the hallway closing in. But I forced myself to breathe, to quell the rising hysteria. Kim needed me now, a shattered mess clinging to the wreckage of her self-control.

Taking her hand gently, I led her towards the living room, the harsh fluorescent lights switched off for the dim glow of the city lights seeping through the windows. The whiskey bottle found a home, its amber contents a silent testament to the storm she'd weathered.

I gently ushered her onto the plush couch. Stepping towards the floor-to-ceiling windows, I sought solace in the distant twinkling lights, a million points of light offering no warmth to the desolate landscape of my heart.

Suddenly, the warmth of a body slowly pressed against my back sent a jolt through me. Kim's arms wrapped around me, her touch a desperate plea for connection. "Alexis..." Her voice, a ragged whisper, sent shivers down my spine. Her face, nestled against my shoulder, was hot with unspoken emotions.

"You'll leave me, Kim," I whispered, the words thick with despair that tasted ash in my mouth.

The truth, the ugly, heartbreaking truth, was this: I'd been a coward. A week after my resignation, after the night at the club with Selene, I'd seen the cracks in the facade, the chilling glimpse of a stranger beneath the familiar surface. The violence, the impulsiveness, the raw, desperate edge to her affections—it all terrified me. So I retreated, built a wall of distance, a silent plea for her to pull away.

But with each passing day, the ache in my chest had intensified. A longing so fierce it threatened to consume me. And now, the thought of her leaving was a physical blow, a gaping wound in the fragile peace I'd constructed. I craved her, ached for her touch, with a desperate intensity that both terrified and exhilarated me.

Two weeks of silence had carved a canyon of introspection within me. The enforced distance had offered a semblance of clarity, a chance to sift through the wreckage of emotions and memories. Doubt, a serpent with a thousand voices, began to whisper its insidious truths. In the quiet solitude, a horrifying thoughts began to take shape. Was this woman clinging to me, this woman reeking of desperation and a stranger's violence, truly Kim?

Granny's cryptic words echoed in my mind: "The gentle one and the wild one." The Kim I knew loathed the specific street food, yet this one devoured it with gusto. The argument with her father, overheard by Rachel and me, felt off, laced with a chilling dissonance. The blue hyacinths, with those damning initials—KCG—that weren't Kim's, as she'd claimed. The opulent villa, a mirror image of the one I knew, branded with the same initials.

Then, a memory surfaced from over a year ago. A persistent woman with Kim's face, encountered before a tense interview. The same face, the same arresting features that had left me flustered and confused. A face that had inquired about my favorite flower—a detail only that mysterious woman would possess. This Kim, the one wrapped around me now, was apparently obsessed with blue hyacinths.

And the most troubling realization: this new Kim, this woman radiating a steely professionalism, worlds apart from the playful soul I knew, had once uttered a chilling statement—"There's nothing to remember." Amnesia... Probably a secret her family kept hidden? I doubt it.

The puzzle pieces slammed into place, a horrifying picture emerging. The woman who held me now, possessive and passionate, was not Kim. This Kim, a steely businesswoman consumed by a past she couldn't recall, was a stranger wearing a familiar face.