The shadows didn't speak to her. She couldn't hear secrets on the whispered breath of their language. She couldn't see across distances of any length through their foggy eyes.

The shadows didn't speak to her because they were no more her natural habitat than the moon.

But that didn't mean she was afraid of them. Didn't mean that she didn't find comfort in them. Didn't mean she didn't feel the need to dance in their domain from time to time.

And it definitely didn't mean she was immune to their pull against her.

For as bright and cheery as she was, the redneck had her own secrets. Her own pockets and pools where few dipped their toes, that fewer still were even aware of. As honest as she was in damn near everything, if something never came up in conversation, she didn't think to share it.

So it was that so few knew the depths of those darker caverns. So very few knew how far she'd go to protect what she held dear, what she cherished. So few understood just how much of herself she'd give when asked in just the right way for it. How much of herself she bound back and away for some semblance of control.

Or how hard it was to stay always in the warm and bright when the urge, the oft times need to dive into the cold and dark grabbed her by the nape of the neck and shook her a hound shook a rat. The need that drove her half mad and further from the path in an effort to touch it again. To have it reach out and wrap around her.

To bring her in tight and close, clamping down around her like a fist with pressure that was more pain than pleasure. And still the pain wasn't enough to overthrow the pleasure. With wicked teeth nipping at her throat and breast to shove her head back so it could feast on her throat, exult in her surrender. Grasping, pinching hands filled with brutality constantly slipping its leash yanking and tugging. Gripping and owning. Taking every bit of what she offered and more with never a thought to giving back willingly.

Heat to heat, wedged and melding. Quivering and throbbing while plunging in wild, utterly mindless desperation. Always there even in that moment of biting and clawing completion built again. Was always there, waiting to be given free rein again.

'Til shadow and light met and bled together once more.