Auctioned to the A-Lister

by Holloway, Taylor

  There was still a lot against us. There were still too many unanswered questions, and what Tommy really wanted was still a mystery to me. He said he wanted me, but I wasn’t sure. Until we figured out a way out from under our many problems, I needed to be careful and protect my heart. It was still healing from its last high-speed collision with Tommy Prince. I wasn’t sure it would survive another round. But I also wasn’t sure that I could resist it.

  50

  Tommy

  We flew through the quiet, black desert, making the three-and-a-half-hour drive in record time. Above us, the stars twinkled into existence as we made it out of LA’s light pollution. While we drove, we talked. We talked about movies, music, politics, but not about the important stuff. I sensed that it would overwhelm Cindy if I tried to broach the subject of our future. So, I didn’t.

  She was nervous. I could tell by the way she kept looking at me and then out the window and back again like she was afraid I’d vanish. Her concern was totally unnecessary. There was nowhere I’d rather be than right next to her. I’d convince her of that eventually, but there was no reason to rush things. We had time. There was no Oscars race hanging over us now.

  Eventually, out of the darkness, a bright light on the horizon lit the sky up reddish-brown. It looked like an early sunrise, but it wasn’t. We were many hours too early for that. We were coming up on Las Vegas.

  “Have you ever been to Las Vegas before?” I asked Cindy.

  She nodded at me. “We stopped here on the drive from Wisconsin to LA. But only to get lunch and drive around.”

  “So, you came during the day?” I questioned.

  “Yes.”

  I smiled. “It’s much better at night,” I promised her. “Just you wait.”

  As we approached, I watched her face out of the corner of my eye. Las Vegas was weirdly shabby during the day—a confusing, jumbled mixture of styles and colors. And far too hot to enjoy outside, even in the winter. But at night, it was beautiful, temperate, and intoxicating.

  A million multicolored lights lit up the desert at night, glittering like a diamond and reaching high up into the sky. Neon glowed and fountains danced. Every color of the rainbow could be seen in every direction. Planes dipped in from overhead. The casinos that seemed to fight against one another during the day complemented each other at night. It wasn’t hard to imagine the whole thing was a fantastic mirage or something out of a Sci Fi movie. But this jewel box of a city was very real, even if some of its shine was just a dream. Cindy’s wide, hazel eyes reflected it all. It was almost like I was seeing it for the first time, too.

  “What do you think?” I asked her as we crawled up the permanently busy Las Vegas strip. There were people everywhere, even though it was past midnight and pushing into early morning. The party was just getting started on the Strip.

  Cindy looked over at me, ripping her eyes from the sights around us. “It’s beautiful, Tommy.”

  I grinned at her. I felt good. Running away to Napa hadn’t been the greatest idea. This was much better. No one knew I was here this time. “Where do you want to stay?” I asked her.

  She shrugged her shoulders. “I—I have no idea.” She blinked her big eyes in wonder.

  “Me either. How about this one.” I pulled into the Cosmopolitan casino. It looked nice. Fancy. Sexy.

  “Okay,” she stuttered.

  The woman manning the front desk either didn’t know who I was, or she’d seen enough crap today that she didn’t care. She took in the pint-sized blonde in pajamas and the A-list actor in a tuxedo like she saw such things every day. Maybe she did. In record time, Cindy and I were opening the door to a thirty-eighth-floor penthouse. She was holding my hand.

  “If I keep traveling with you, I’m going to get spoiled,” Cindy stuttered, staring around herself in wonder.

  I pulled her closer to me by the lapels of her silly cloud pajamas and aimed us toward the huge, plush bed. “That’s the idea.”

  “Tommy, what are we doing here?” she asked me. Her voice was soft, almost scared.

  “In Vegas? Whatever you want to do,” I said, stepping back.

  “No. I mean here, now.”

  Was I coming on too strong? “I’ll sleep on the couch if you want me to.”

  She stared at me, looking unsure. “That’s not what I meant. I don’t want you to sleep on the couch.” There was heat in her gaze, but also fear.

  “Then what did you mean?” I asked. My sexual desire was making rational thought especially difficult.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I guess we can figure it out tomorrow.”

  She reached for me and I kissed her carefully. I didn’t want to scare her. I knew she was overwhelmed, scared, and pushed to her limit. But I needed to kiss her. I needed to touch her. I’d been separated from her for two weeks. Two endlessly long, sexually frustrated weeks.

  She didn’t resist me, kissing me back with a little desperate moan. I tossed her back on the bed like she weighed nothing. She squeaked in surprise and then reached for me. I loved the little noises she made. Tonight, I was going to learn what they all sounded like. And tomorrow, if things panned out, I was going to marry her.

  51

  Cindy

  Tommy pressed us back into the oblivion of the soft mattress, and just for a little while, I was able to forget everything else. He took my mouth like it belonged to him, holding me close and making my pulse pound in my ear. He smelled good. He tasted good. He was mine.

  He’d taken my virginity. Now he was taking my heart. And I was offering it all up to him without so much as a second thought. I knew I was probably making a mistake, and I didn’t even care. This mistake felt good.

  I’d been much too long without him. Two long, lonely weeks with just my stupid vibrator, alone in my van. Two weeks without his hands on my skin or his low, sweet voice in my ear. Two weeks without feeling his heat against me and inside of me. Too long. Long enough to make me go completely crazy.

  His big hands peeled off my flimsy pajama top, flicking the little buttons open one at a time and staring down at me with a look in his eyes that made me melt. Cooler air rushed in around my chest, tightening my nipples and making my skin crave the warmth of his. He didn’t keep me waiting for very long.

  His hands cupped me, covered me, and I arched up into his touch. I needed this. He spent a long time on my chest, pinching and rolling me under his fingers before licking and sucking each nipple into even harder, needier peaks. When his smooth teeth found me, I whimpered, wanting more. Always more. Even the little pinch of teeth only drove me higher. It ignited a spark in me that grew, tightened, and stoked me higher.

  I felt the stiff length of his cock against my pajama-clad thigh and knew exactly where we were going. Only we weren’t getting there soon enough. My protestations that he go faster were falling on deaf ears. If anything, I think they amused him.

  When he flipped me over and tugged down my bottoms, I was powerless. He eased me up onto my hands and knees. I looked back at him, not sure what to expect from this position, especially when he pulled away, leaving me naked, and cold in this vulnerable pose.

  “What are you—” I started to say.

  “Stay there,” he said, sitting back. He’d lost his jacket somewhere halfway through our drive, and I’m not sure where the bow tie went, but otherwise he was fully dressed, and I was naked on all fours. “You look good like this.”

  I was desperate like this, wet and waiting. He went and sat in a chair near the bed as he undressed, taking off his shoes. He unlaced the dress shoes about as slowly as a person can remove shoes. I arched my back, waiting, and watching. He unfastened the left and then the right pair of cuff links next, taking his time. This waiting game was driving me mad, but he obviously liked it. He started on the buttons of his shirt, unhurried.

  The emptiness between my legs was getting worse, and he seemed to know it. I bit my lip, staring at Tommy’s muscular chest, his arms, his shoulders. Why wasn’t he
touching me?

  “Don’t worry,” he told me, reaching out to rest his hand on my bare ass. When he removed it, I felt cold. Then he moved back and spanked me playfully. Leisurely. “I’m going to fuck you.” He smirked. “Eventually.”

  I tried to be patient and still. I did. But there was nothing I could do to stop my desperation. I waited, helpless, as he pulled off layer upon layer of formal wear. Why did he need so many clothes? Clothes were dumb. I stared hungrily at him. That seemed to make him go even slower.

  “You’re teasing me,” I grumbled as he finally started unbuttoning his pants. My eyes were locked on the buttons. I was panting. Although the air in the hotel room felt cold, I was sweating. My hands were balled up into fists, wrapped in the soft, white coverlet.

  “Me? Never.” His hands moved even more slowly, working the slacks down his hips.

  He was definitely teasing me. He knew just exactly what he was doing to me. He knew all about sex. I only knew what he’d taught me, which was basically just enough to make me his willing slave. It wasn’t fair. I shook my head from side to side and gritted my teeth.

  When he was finally almost naked, I was about to spontaneously combust. When he moved behind me, grabbing my ass to spread me further, I was whimpering again. I leaned forward, twisting my head around to stare at him. He stared back at me possessively. I wanted nothing more in that moment than just to be his.

  Was this what he was trying to impress on me? That I belonged to him? I already knew that. I’d been knowing it from the first time we danced. I hadn’t wanted to fall in love with him. I hadn’t even had a choice. So, when he pressed into me—hard and all at once—it felt like I was finally whole again.

  “I missed you,” he told me, grabbing my hips and easing me all the way onto him until our bodies were fully joined. “I’m going to make sure you know just how much. And if you walk funny for the next couple of days, then I’ll know I did a good job.”

  I stared back at him. That was quite a promise. Then he started to move.

  Our bodies worked eagerly together in the dimly lit hotel room. I hadn’t expected this position to be so intense, but I relished it. I felt like an animal, but in the best way possible. I could lose my mind in this, relinquishing my higher brain function for something much more palatable and far less stressful. When I was busy chasing pleasure on my hands and knees, I didn’t have time or bandwidth to focus on the fact that my life was melting down.

  And he looked just as lost as I was, except for the fact that he was in control. His hands were locked on my hips, pushing me forward and back at his pleasure. I wanted it faster, and harder, but he wasn’t listening. He kept it slow. And after a moment, I was glad he did.

  My body was betraying me. It wasn’t mine anymore. It obeyed Tommy and not me. I could feel my climax approaching, just out of reach. I worked my hips back again and again. Noises were coming out of my mouth that didn’t sound remotely like me.

  Eventually I collapsed forward, still with my ass in the air but with my upper body flush with the bed. Tommy reached forward and grabbed a fistful of my hair, using it like a leash to pull me back up to him. There was a strange, dark thrill in the little jolt of pain. “I need you,” he whispered against the super-sensitive skin on my neck. He pulled me upwards harder and I ended up on my knees, with my hands on the headboard and Tommy’s cock still inside me from behind.

  “I need you too,” I told him. My voice was a breathy, hoarse, panting whisper. My words were true. No matter what else was happening in our lives, I knew this much was true. “Please.”

  The hand in my hair was rough, and I relished it. Every time he pulled my hair, it pushed me higher. I gripped the headboard and pushed back against him as hard as I could, needing to somehow get closer to him. To give him back some of the pleasure that he was giving me.

  My body was totally under his control. Maybe that should have concerned me, but it didn’t. So long as that was true, I didn’t have to think. I felt completely free. When my climax hit a moment later, I sank into it, willing it to go on and on. I was shaking from it when Tommy came, driving hard into me a couple of seconds later. We collapsed together on the bed in the ensuing afterglow, neither knowing quite what to say.

  52

  Cindy

  I woke up satisfied, too warm, and naked. Tommy was wrapped around me in the dark. I wriggled out from under his arm to go to the bathroom. I wrapped a throw blanket around myself into a toga, although there was no real need for modesty. A buzz from my phone distracted me as I walked past it.

  Marigold Wilson [3:34 a.m.]: I never wanted to marry a man with a child. I never wanted you.

  What the fuck? I stared at the text in disbelief. Was she drunk? Did she realize what time it was?

  Rationally, I knew that I shouldn’t return her text. I should throw the phone across the room and ignore it. But I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I had to text her back.

  Cindy Brown [3:37 a.m.]: Thanks. We had this conversation already. Lose my number.

  Marigold Wilson [3:38 a.m.]: I’ve had a lot of wine tonight.

  And now I had my answer.

  Cindy Brown [3:40 a.m.]: Please leave me alone, Marigold. I don’t want to talk to you.

  Marigold Wilson [3:40 a.m.]: You’ve never appreciated what I did for you, Cindy. Neither have my girls, though. And they’re my own flesh and blood. I’ve been chronically unappreciated for my entire life.

  Yuck. Was this going to be a full-on Marigold pity party? She was always such a victim.

  Cindy Brown [3:41 a.m.]: Are you just texting me to complain about how much you hate your kids? Because Quincy and Greenlee are exactly what you made them to be. They’re practically your clones. They’ve never even had their own dreams except the ones you gave them.

  Marigold Wilson [3:41 a.m.]: I wanted to be a movie star when I was your age.

  Cindy Brown [3:42 a.m.]: Okay. Sorry? That’s not my problem.

  Marigold Wilson [3:42 a.m.]: I was okay, but I was never a great actress. Better than Greenlee, but not anything special.

  I giggled. Marigold knew Greenlee’s acting was bad? She’d never admitted it before. Still…

  Cindy Brown [3:43 a.m.]: Why are we even having this conversation?

  Marigold Wilson [3:44 a.m.]: I don’t know. I guess I just always wanted to be special. I wanted my girls to be special too. But it was you who ended up being special. And that’s not fair. Why should you be special?

  There was a desperate edge to Marigold’s texts tonight. She almost never texted me. She must have been having a particularly bad day. I couldn’t say that I cared. But she just kept on typing, despite my requests for her to stop. Like watching a car crash on the highway, I couldn’t do anything but stare as the texts pinged up on my phone.

  Marigold Wilson [3:45 a.m.]: Anyway, I wanted to be a movie star when I was young. But then I met my first husband, Ray. We had a few good years until he ran off with that whore from the strip club. They went on a bender, knocked over a liquor store, and went to jail. I was left with two little girls and no way to support myself. When I met your father, I thought all my dreams were going to come true. He talked a good game. He said he loved me. But it turned out that all he wanted was someone to quietly run his household, take care of his little girl, and occasionally fuck him. It wasn’t enough for me.

  I cringed. Gross. Sad. But mostly gross. So very, very gross. Marigold was sharing so many details I never wanted to hear tonight. I considered blocking her, but this conversation was still too weirdly, morbidly fascinating. I felt myself texting back despite my better judgement.

  Cindy Brown [3:46 a.m.]: Can you please not share the details of your sex life with my father with me? Please?

  Marigold Wilson [3:47 a.m.]: Sorry. It’s the wine. He was very charming when he wasn’t being an asshole. Terrible in bed though.

  It must be the wine. Marigold never apologized or overshared. She must be incredibly drunk. If it was making her apologetic, she
was probably totally trashed.

  Marigold Wilson [3:48 a.m.]: Your father was never good to me after we got married. You know what sort of a man he was. He was never good to you either. Or your mom. I knew her, did you know that?”

  Cindy Brown [3:49 a.m.]: You knew my mom?

  I definitely hadn’t known that. My mom left when I was so young that I never really thought of her as a real person. She was just a force of nature in my mind. Like a tornado.

  Marigold Wilson [3:50 a.m.]: Altoona wasn’t that big. She and I went to the same nail salon. We weren’t friends or anything. I thought she was stuck up. She always thought she was too good for Altoona. Too good for Wisconsin. Definitely too good to be a housewife. No one was really that surprised when she ran off. You’re just like her.

  Cindy Brown [3:51 a.m.]: I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m nothing like her. I don’t even know her. I’m not even sure if she’s still alive.

  Marigold Wilson [3:52 a.m.]: But you’re just like her. You think you’re so pretty, so smart, so much better than everybody else.

  Cindy Brown [3:53 a.m.]: I have no idea what you’re talking about.

  I barely remembered my mother. I did remember how beautiful she was, though. How my dad, a distinctly average looking man with a bad temper, had managed to marry not one but two bombshell blondes in Altoona, Wisconsin was really strange. He must have been very charming when he wasn’t being such a jerk.