Mari: A dark Game Series

Three

So now the real games were beginning. I discovered the universe was f*****g with me.

The itch wasn’t just back. It was louder, sharper, like it had tasted blood again and remembered how sweet it was. Every morning I woke up with that familiar ache, the same one I’d felt after Peaches all those years ago. The same one that made me grin at crime scenes like a madwoman. The withdrawal had been bad, but this new hunger was worse. It wanted feeding.

And the universe, the cruel b***h, kept giving me opportunities.

The morning after I first laid eyes on Marks properly, I walked into the station already buzzing. O’Malley was at his desk, tie loosened, sleeves rolled up, looking like he’d been there since dawn. When he saw me, that warm Irish lilt cut through the noise of the office.

“Morning, Mari. You look like you’ve barely slept, love. Everything alright?”

There it was again. That voice. That casual “love” that made something low in my belly tighten. I pictured him saying it while he had me pressed against the wall in the evidence room, hands rough but controlled, f*****g me slow and deep until I couldn’t think straight. His accent wrapping around my name as I came undone.

I blinked the image away and gave him a small smile. “Just thinking about the case, Sarge. Got some new leads on that Dalston stabbing.”

He raised an eyebrow, studying me a beat too long. “You’re properly obsessed with this one, aren’t you? Alright. Tell me what you’ve got.”

I laid it out for him. The burner phone. The debt. The timeline that didn’t quite add up. He listened, nodding, that faint Irish charm making it hard to focus. Every time he leaned in to look at my notes, I caught the scent of his aftershave and had to fight not to let my mind wander again.

“Fair play,” he said when I finished. “It’s thin, but it’s something. Bring Marks in for a voluntary chat. I’ll sit in with you.”

My pulse jumped. “Perfect.”

Marks arrived at the station later that afternoon like he was walking into a business meeting, not an interrogation room. Tall, broad-shouldered, calm in that way dangerous men often are. He wore a black tracksuit that somehow looked expensive. When his eyes met mine across the table, something electric passed between us. Recognition. Respect. Hunger.

“Detective Peters,” he said, voice low and rough, almost intimate. “Heard a lot about you.”

O’Malley sat beside me, protective energy rolling off him. The contrast between the two men was dizzying. One warm and steady, the other cold and sharp. Both of them made the itch sing.

We went through the questions. Marks denied everything smoothly, but his eyes never left my face. When O’Malley stepped out briefly to take a call, Marks leaned forward, voice dropping.

“You’re not like the rest of them,” he murmured. “You understand it, don’t you? The quiet after the noise. The control.”

My breath caught. For a second I saw myself with him — his hands around my throat, f*****g me hard and merciless while I whispered how beautiful it had been when the victim stopped moving. The fantasy hit so strong I had to dig my nails into my thigh under the table.

O’Malley came back in before I could reply. The rest of the interview was tense, professional, and completely useless on paper. But something had shifted. Marks knew I was different. And I knew he was like me.

That evening I stayed late at the station, poring over files. O’Malley brought me coffee without asking. He lingered by my desk, watching me.

“You’ve been different lately, Mari,” he said softly. “Half the time I think you’re the best detective I’ve got. The other half… I worry about you.”

I looked up at him. That Irish accent, those concerned eyes. I wanted to pull him into the empty interview room and let him f**k the itch out of me. Instead I gave him a tired smile.

“Just the job getting to me, Sarge. You know how it is.”

He squeezed my shoulder gently. The touch lingered. “Go home and get some rest, love. That’s an order.”

I went home, but rest was the last thing on my mind.

Alone in my flat, the fantasies came flooding back stronger than ever. I imagined O’Malley first — gentle at the start, then rough, his voice in my ear as he took me from behind, calling me “good girl” in that lilting accent while I fell apart. Then Marks joined the scene in my mind. Cold, brutal, choking me while he f****d me mercilessly, the two of them using me together until pleasure and violence blurred into one perfect, quiet moment.

The case moved slowly over the next few days. We brought in more associates of Marks. Dug deeper into the victim’s debts. Every new piece of information pointed back to him, but nothing stuck. Not yet.

O’Malley kept checking on me. Small things. Coffee. A hand on my back. Once, when we were alone in the car after interviewing a witness, he turned to me.

“You’re a puzzle, Mari Peters,” he said quietly. “Half the time I think you’re the best detective I’ve got. The other half… I worry about you.”

The tension between us was building. I could feel it every time our eyes met. Every time his hand brushed mine. Every time he said my name with that accent.

Meanwhile, Marks kept appearing in my periphery. I saw him twice more on surveillance runs. Each time our eyes met and held. He knew I was watching. He liked it.

One night I followed him to a quiet pub in Hackney. I sat at the bar, nursing a drink, when he slid onto the stool beside me.

“Detective,” he said, almost amused. “You’re not very subtle.”

“Neither are you,” I replied.

We talked. Not about the case. About control. About power. About how good it felt when everything finally went still. The conversation was dangerous. Seductive. By the end of it I was wet and the itch was screaming.

I didn’t sleep with him. Not yet. But the fantasy that night was filthy. Marks choking me while O’Malley watched, then both of them taking turns until I couldn’t think anymore. Just sensation. Just quiet in my head.

The case was building to something. I could feel it.

O’Malley was getting closer to me emotionally. Marks was pulling me toward the darkness. And I was standing in the middle, grinning, letting both of them feed the monster inside me.

Some fascinations don’t just fade.

They multiply.

And I was starting to like the company.