She hesitated. Then hesitated some more. Then she finally lifted her hands to ask and sign, “You mean, like, pretend my father never arrested you?”
“Yes, pretend that I went to Tufts and you went to RhIDS at the same time, as I planned. We got married when we were eighteen, but we’ve had a long-distance relationship up until now. Let’s pretend that I’m now working in Rhode Island for a few months. For four months. Until May 25th. You said you had a big presentation on that day. I could make you a new promise. We don’t have to meet until 8 pm for our last anniversary. We could both get what we want.”
She shook her head at Victor. Like he was signing a version of ASL she didn’t understand. But then she asked, “What kind of work do you do? What would I tell my classmates who have a lot of questions about you after today, by the way?”
“Import/export,” he signed. Then he spelled both words when she clearly didn’t understand the signs.
She raised her eyebrows at him. “Import/export. Is that the classic Chinese mafia cover story?”
“No,” he signed back, giving her a stern look. Then he let himself grin a little to admit, “It is all mafias cover story. Not only Chinese. Don’t be racist.”
Her eyes widened, but then she burst out laughing. And he did too, shoulders shaking as they used to all the time when he was with her. Before.
But then, she sobered to ask, “And how about after our anniversary? What would happen then?”
“The same as before,” he answered. “Your time would be up, and your punishment would be done.”
“So this would be like Operation Good as New 2.0.” She bit her bottom lip, so many emotions swirling in her eyes. “But it feels like a trick. I don’t understand why you’re asking me to do this. Why you’re letting me do my thesis presentation? I mean, everything’s a command with you. If you wanted to, you could just tell me that this was how it was going to be, and I would have to play along, even if I didn’t get to present my thesis.”
“I don’t want you to play along. If we do this, I want you to want it too. It would be like… what do Westerners call it at the end of the relationship when two people who shouldn’t be together do something to be psychologically okay with never seeing each other again?”
She blinked a few times, then she guessed, “Closure? Are you talking about closure?”
His heart shivered at the word. At the thought of never seeing her again after their anniversary, when she would be free, and he would be required to marry Kuang’s daughter. But he nodded, nonetheless.
“Yes, closure. That is the word. Do you want closure, Dawn?” He used her original name sign, not D-Liar this time. “Do you want closure with me?”
They stared at each other after he asked this. The question vibrating between them as intense and bright as the past.
Part V
“It’s a surprise.”
26
DAWN
I woke up that morning with a delicious feeling below my waist. No, not a feeling, a hand. Victor’s fingers were inside my pussy.
Am I dreaming? That had happened a few super-disturbing times over the years since Victor had made me his prisoner by marriage.
It was only April. Not yet the days of the year when you could assume heat in Rhode Island. In fact, some mornings were quite chilly. Not this one. The hand rubbing into my core was warming me right on up.
No, not a dream, I decided.
There was never any foreplay in my dreams about Victor. Usually, it was only punishment. Or even worse, sweet memories of how we’d been in Tokyo before everything fell apart.
But this morning, Victor worked me expertly, in a way only he would in real life. His fingers moved in little circles, getting close to but not quite touching my special spot.
Then he moved in closer, his hard length pressing into my back as he slid his index and middle finger inside, rubbing me deeper. Opening me up to…
I gasped when he slid two more fingers in, filling me in a different way. But my innocent shock didn’t last too long. My legs soon fell open, my breaths becoming shorter as he pumped his hand into me.
I opened my eyes to the sight of us in the mirror and nearly gasped again at the sight.
Victor loomed over me, a tattooed demon with a merciless agenda. He had one sleeved arm wrapped around my neck, and the other one flexed and rolled as he worked my pussy. As for me, I looked like something fallen with my legs spread so wide to accommodate his hand pumping into my sex.
Thick waves of lust rippled through me, and soon, I was glistening with need.
“Victor…” I started to whine.
His hand became rougher between my legs, fingers plunging as the ball of his palm pressed into my clit. My pussy was heavy and aching now. So slick, his fingers easily moved inside me, deeper and deeper, as I humped my hips into his hand.
Victor eased away from my clit and nipped at my ear. It was a warning. He didn’t like when I came too quick.
But his warning sent electric bolts of pleasure straight down to my pussy, making the building fire even worse. The feel of his cock against my ass…so close to the back of my pussy, but still too far, was killing me. My nipples were tight, painful buds now. And though what he was doing to my pussy had felt good—so good—when I woke up. It soon began to fill me with a deep, aching hurt.
“Victor,” I pleaded. I squirmed against his hand, wanting…needing more.
My husband…he could be a monster sometimes. But not that morning.
He rolled me over. He held my gaze in his as he…
I moaned when he thrust into me with one hard stroke. That brought a smile to his face. No more mirror. He looked me deep in the eye as he started moving inside of me. Soon, I was moaning again. So loud, he nipped my shoulder.
Not yet, not yet….
No, this wasn’t a dream. But Victor did the thing that he used to only do in my dreams. The disturbing ones that made me cry for what we’d lost. Even though we’d only been eighteen. Like that Khalid song. Young and dumb for sure, even though only one of us was broke.
Not yet…
But it was his kiss that broke me. It was entirely to blame for me gasping against his mouth as an orgasm overtook me, sudden as a tsunami without any warning sirens.
Forget not yet. The orgasm that crashed over me swept Victor up too. His lips fell away, and he banged his fists into the pillow beside my head. In the next moment, his body went rigid, and he emptied inside of me.
Victor, let out a little chuff when he was done. Like the intense climax had taken him by surprise, as well, even though he was the one who had kick-started it in the first place.
We fell back on our separate pillows. Looked at each other. Then laughed.
He rarely vocalized, but this morning was different. Our laughter filled up the room.
Until Victor reached into my nightstand.
“What are you….” I started to ask.
Then trailed off when he brought out the back massager I hadn’t bothered to use in over two months.
My throat dried. Okay, new question: “What are you going to do with that, Victor?”
He answered that question in his usual fashion…silent and ruthless.
A couple of orgasms later, we once again hit our separate pillows. My body was still trembling from way more stimulation than I was used to in the morning.
But Victor just grinned and signed, “Breakfast after my workout and shower?”
“Yep!” I signed and said back.
He pressed his mouth to mine for a hard parting kiss before rising from the bed.
A weird but vaguely familiar feeling stole over me as I watched him leave the room after pulling on a pair of gym shorts. It had been so long since I felt this way, it took me a few more heavy breaths to label it.
Happy. I felt happy, lying in bed after getting thoroughly morning sexed by the silent beast. I’d only agreed to Victor’s version of Operation Good As New so that I could present my thesis on May
25th and earn my MFA. But I had to admit….
I didn’t hate this. Just the opposite. I was glad that I took the deal.
“This is a reminder. Take your pill,” the Alexa device chimed on the nightstand. “This is a reminder. Take your pill.”
“Thanks, Alexa,” I said, meaning it.
Taking my birth control every morning at the same time was more important than ever these days. I padded to the bathroom to pull this month’s vacuum pack of pills out of my toiletries bag.
No matter how happy I felt, this was an illusion. One that couldn’t go on past May 25th. I popped today’s pill with a handful of tap water. Vowing to remember that.
Victor and I went through our usual school day morning routine, after that bout of morning sex. He jogged down to the never-used-by-me basement to do his morning exercises. He’d cleared a spot out and ordered a bunch of weights, martial arts weapons, and workout equipment that had come the very next day. So now it looked like a state-of-the-art gym down there.
Meanwhile, I took my pill and a leisurely shower. Then I read the latest translated volume of the Toilet-bound Hanako-Ku manga on the couch in the room, I had started to think of as ours over the last two months.
When Victor came back through to use the shower after his workout, I put my manga down and went downstairs to reheat the last of the Korean porridge I’d made Wednesday night on top of the stove. Sometimes I tried to squeeze some last-minute homework in during this part of the routine. But Jacoby had canceled the second half of our Monday, Wednesday, and Friday Thesis Production seminars for the rest of the semester so that we’d have more time to prepare our final projects. That meant I didn’t have anything to present or turn in today.
Maybe I’ll make us something special tonight, I decided as I added a packet of some protein powder Victor swore by into his bowl of porridge. I’d been cooking more healthy again now that I had a fitness nut living with me. But since I had a little extra time on my hands, maybe I could make a three-course meal, with soup and dessert.
Oooh… I excitedly began looking up ideas for three-course meals.
“What are you doing?” Victor asked when he came downstairs dressed in his usual suit. No tie today, though.
“You’ll see,” I sing-songed in answer to his question, delighted with my secret plan. But then I had to ask, “Can you make Wayne take me to the grocery store after school?”
I knew the day guard’s name now. Another benefit of this game of pretend. Victor had told me all about the grizzled day guard, including his history as a Red Diamond and his semi-retirement as my driver/guard. “I promise not to buy any alcohol, but I really want to shop for myself today.”
Victor considered the request, tilting his head slightly to the side. He seemed to be making a decision when he signed, “You can have alcohol if you want. I won’t stop you.”
Excitement bloomed inside of me at the thought of being able to drink for the first time in nine years.
But then I remembered the sight of my mother in that hospital bed. Of taking out the trash after dinner and finding the recycling filled with empty bottles—both the trashcan in the kitchen and the big blue one she kept outside for pickup. Of how she tried to day drink right before the surgery. Just like I used to before Victor cut me off.
More memories piled up on top of those. My mom had been a consummate mother in the afternoons and early evenings, but it had been on us to get ourselves to school every morning. She always slept in, even though she’d often disappear into her room soon after my father left for the night in Japan. I also recalled how my grandpa’s face had always been flushed red when we visited him in the evening. Of how he died of the same cancer that was now threatening my mother.
Now that Victor had offered to lift his alcohol ban, I sensed a ticking genetic bomb that I hadn’t before in my unspoken family history. And I found myself realizing out loud, “No, I think cutting alcohol might have been one of the best things that ever happened to me. I’m good with sparkling water, how about you?”
He considered my words for a thoughtful moment, then signed, “I think that is wise. And I’m good with water too.”
After that, we chatted about way more boring things. Like the weather, my school projects, and who each of us thought would win the latest season of American SuperStar, the singing competition I’d convinced him to watch with me a few times.
Eventually, we got to the part of our new routine where he drove me to school and dropped me off before he went wherever he went every day.
He was like my father in that regard. He never talked about his job. And I never asked. I guess I had more in common with my mom than I thought. Or maybe I just understood things now that I didn’t understand back then. It had felt safer to wonder when I was a teenager. Now I knew the consequences that too much curiosity could bring.
The day dragged by at school. I still loved studying the history and evolution of animation. But we were so close to presenting our thesis productions that class had begun to seem like a waste of time. Who wanted to discuss the merits of Cheburashka, this obscure animated Russian film from the 70s, when we all still had so much more work to do on our own films? You know, the ones that would decide our grades and score us jobs when our expensive education was done.
Which reminded me that I had agreed to host Group B’s soft presentations this weekend. Good thing I was making Victor dinner tonight. I could let him know people would be coming over.
With that thought in mind, I rushed out of class like a goat freed from its pen as soon as Jacoby said we could go.
“Hey, Dawn! Dawn, hold up!” a voice called out behind me as I headed straight toward the pickup circle to meet Wayne.
The voice belonged to Asher. With a smidge of guilt, I sped up, trying to pretend I didn’t hear him.
I had been full-on avoiding Asher ever since Victor and I came to our agreement. I mean, our marriage wasn’t real in the emotional sense. And we hadn’t made each other any promises that extended beyond May 25th. But I still felt bad about talking to another guy behind Victor’s back, even if he was only my husband on paper.
Besides, what would I say to Asher, even if I wasn’t having these weird grey-area guilt issues around my marriage? What good way was there to explain that Victor and I had decided to act as if we were really a couple until we quite permanently weren’t?
The answer was zero. There was no good way to explain this crazy thing I was doing with Victor. So I’d been going out of my way for the last few weeks not to.
I’d hoped to go on not explaining myself for a few weeks more. Like, at least until May 25th. But no dice. Quick running steps sounded behind me. Then there was Asher, tapping me on the shoulder so that I couldn’t possibly pretend I didn’t hear or see him.
“Oh, hey, Asher,” I said, trying to keep all the dread out of my voice. “Can we talk later? I’m in a huge rush.”
Maybe he’d pick up on my cue and just pretend we were friends. Just friends. Who could talk later? Like, say after May 25th.
“So you’ve been avoiding me ever since your husband showed up and kissed you in front of the whole class,” he said, without any serious conversation lube whatsoever.
Wow, no dice again. I’m beginning to understand why they call that Vegas game craps.
“Um, yeah…yeah, I guess I have,” I admitted. “I just didn’t know what to say.”
“So, are you guys back together now?”
“Sort of…at least for a little while. It’s complicated.”
“So you were just leading me on?” Asher shook his head, irritation and disappointment flashing across his face. “When were you planning on telling me about this?”
I inwardly grimaced with the feeling that he probably wouldn’t love my true answer. Which was, Never. It hadn’t even occurred to me to have this conversation with you, dude. Only avoid it.
Instead, I went with, “I can see how this must look from your side of things. But I wasn’t trying to le
ad you on. Seriously.”
Asher considered my words, his expression becoming even more anxious and confused. “So you’re not getting a divorce?”
“Oh, no, I’m going to get a divorce. I’m definitely going to get a divorce…”
I paused when instead of the usual glee I felt when I thought about no longer being handcuffed to Victor, a wave of sadness passed over me. Wait, what was that? Did I really want to be with Victor any longer than I had to be?
“So, can I still ask you out in June?” Asher asked before I could answer that question.
The technical answer was yes. But for some reason, I couldn’t get the word out. My stomach rolled when I tried, and my throat clogged up like I was trying to spit out a rock. So I just kind of vaguely nodded.
My queasiness must not have translated to my expression because Asher grinned like he just won the lottery. “Okay, I’ll wait until you’re free and ask you out in June like we said. I mean, that’s cool, since we’ll both be in Pittsburgh after graduation now.”
What Victor and I had wasn’t real. I knew that more than anyone, no matter how well we’d done over the last few weeks at pretending. But guilt churned in my stomach at the thought of actively planning to get together with another guy while I was still married to Victor.
It didn’t matter if what Victor and I had was real. This felt wrong, just plain wrong. “Asher, you shouldn’t do that. Don’t wait for—”.
“Don’t worry. It’s cool, seriously.” Asher stepped closer and lowered his voice. “By the way, I missed you at Group A’s soft presentations on Sunday.”
Another wave of guilt cycled through me. I was hosting Group B’s presentations this upcoming Sunday, but I had skipped out on the Group A ones at the beginning of the week.
Mainly to hang out with Victor. But also because I hadn’t wanted to put myself in a situation where Asher could corner me and ask me what was up with Victor. You know, a situation like this one.
Shifting uncomfortably, I answered, “I was planning on watching the recorded Group A presentations this afternoon. I’ll send you and everyone else my notes this weekend, okay?”
Victor: Her Ruthless Owner: The VICTOR Trilogy Book 2 [50 Loving States, Rhode Island] (Ruthless Triad) Page 18