“Or maybe you could come over to my place and watch it with me. We’ll order takeout, and you could give me feedback. You know how much I value your opinion, Dawn.”
He took another step forward and touched my wrist. In a way that could have been friendly but felt way too intimate.
Victor and I were pretending, just pretending. But my stomach rolled at Asher’s touch, and I snatched my arm away. “You know, I am so behind on this project that I’m a little scared I won’t be ready for the soft presentation if I don’t jam on it. I’ve gotta go.”
The intimate look fell off of Asher’s face.
“Dawn…” he started to say. Then suddenly, he stopped, his eyes refocusing on something over my shoulder.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. And I almost wasn’t surprised to see who he was looking at when I turned to follow the direction of his gaze.
Victor. Victor stood at the place where the paths to our grad building and the one that led to the parking lot intersected.
Without another word to Asher, I rushed away from him and towards Victor.
“Hey, Victor!” I called out, waving at him happily as I approached. He was dressed in the same suit as this morning. Black-on-black. It made me feel like a raven had just set down on our arty campus.
A very serious raven.
“What were you talking to that guy about?” he asked without smiling or waving back.
“I’m hosting the Group B soft thesis presentations this Sunday,” I answered, the lie seamlessly flowing from my hands and mouth. “He needed the address since he’s never been over to the house.”
Victor paused, looking somewhat mollified. “He’s never been to the house?”
“No, never,” I answered quickly, so happy to be able to tell him the truth for once. “I was actually planning to ask you about Sunday. I don’t know what your situation is with big groups. And I didn’t want to surprise you with everyone from my grad program suddenly showing up on Sunday at 1 PM., for like, six hours’ worth of presentations.”
He considered my words, then signed. “I will remain upstairs while your group is at the house. I have a few things I can do for my import/export business.”
I laughed at his reference to his fake career and started us walking. In the opposite direction of Asher, thank goodness. But then it occurred to me to ask, “Wait, what are you doing here?”
“I want to take you somewhere,” he said.
“Where?” I asked. “Grocery shopping?”
“No,” he answered with a smug smile. “It’s a surprise.”
27
VICTOR
“Does this surprise include bathroom breaks?” Dawn asked Victor after the third hour of driving.
A fair request. They had been on the road a while, and he needed gas anyway. He pulled into a station. However, Dawn didn’t immediately get out.
“So I know we’re going south. The highway signs told me that much,” she said, turning to face him in her seat. “But how close are we to our final destination?”
“Another couple of hours of driving,” he answered.
Dawn squirmed, and he didn’t think it was because of her need to use the facilities.
“What?” he asked.
“It’s just…that soft presentation I mentioned earlier is, like I said, on Sunday. And this surprise of yours is really far away. I just want to make sure this isn’t….”
She cut her eyes to the side and trailed off, not finishing. And Victor suddenly understood why she was acting so wary and hesitant.
She thought he was sabotaging her. That this surprise was actually another punishment in disguise.
Guilt hit him like a gut punch. Hard and without warning. So it felt like he was choking a little when he rushed to assure her, “I’ll have you back home by tomorrow. You won’t miss anything. I promise.”
The word promise brought up an old memory. And without thinking about it, he added, “no cheat.”
Her eyes widened, and she let out a surprised laugh. But then a suspicious look came over her face as she signed-asked, “Is the surprise fruit?”
He’d forgotten this about her. How much she made him laugh.
“It’s not fruit,” he vowed, his shoulders shaking.
“It had better not be,” she mock-threatened before finally getting out of the car and heading into the station to use the restroom.
As soon as she left, the smile disappeared from Victor’s face, however. And his eyes went to the oversized tote she’d dumped in the backseat. It had a cartoon red panda on it. And she’d used it over the last few months as most would a school backpack.
He made a big show of getting out of the car, grabbing the gas nozzle, and jamming it into the Audi’s tank. But as soon as she was out of eyesight, he opened the car’s back door and rummaged through her tote.
The item he was looking for didn’t take long to find. After just a few seconds of searching, he found a burner smartphone in the tote’s inside pocket, the kind that required cards with minutes as opposed to a formal plan. It was so cheaply made, it looked like a toy.
But it wasn’t a toy. It was just as he’d suspected. She had a secret phone. That was how she’d been in contact with her brother, whose number hadn’t appeared in the history of the iPhone X he’d had Wayne give her.
Who else had she been calling on it? Her father? And perhaps someone else…
The memory of how close Asher Peretz had been standing to Dawn before he saw Victor came back to him in a rush. And it made his chest burn.
Nonetheless, he returned the phone to the tote. He’d do the necessary work to unlock the cheap device later. But for now, he’d have to trust Dawn enough not to let this discovery derail his surprise.
He was just putting away the nozzle when Dawn returned to the car.
“When’s the last time you actually had to fill up your own tank with gas?” she asked with a teasing tone.
“It has been a while,” he admitted. “But I remembered how to, don’t worry. There will be no Z-O-O-L-A-N-D-E-R accidents.”
She burst out laughing after he spelled out Zoolander. That had been her brother’s all-time favorite movie for some reason. And Byron had somehow convinced Victor to watch it during one of their coverup hangouts at his place. The movie had been in English, but the comedy had been so baffling. It had taken Dawn and Byron more time for them to explain to him why it was supposed to be funny than to watch it.
“So you’re really not going to tell me where we’re going,” Dawn asked, still laughing as I got back into the Audi.
He paused in restarting the car to remind her, “It’s a surprise.”
“Is it vegetables?” she demanded. “Because the only thing worse than fruit would be vegetables.”
“It’s not vegetables,” he answered, his shoulders once again shaking with laughter.
Many of The Silent Triad members had never seen Victor smile. But he’d laughed more with Dawn over the last few weeks than he had over the previous ten years.
Really, over the last fifteen years.
And he was beginning to get used to it.
That realization gave him pause as he waited for her to finish buckling up her seatbelt. They were only pretending. But somehow, she was doing it again. Making him laugh. Making him happy. Making him feel more alive than he had since…
Well, since her.
“At least tell me where we’re going?” she bargained as he pulled out of the station.
He raised one hand from the wheel to once again say, “It’s a—”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Dawn cut him off with the roll of her eyes. “It’s a surprise.”
He was saved from answering any more questions when he got back onto the highway and needed both hands to drive.
They sank into a companionable silence as they listened to a Jack FM station dedicated to playing a random mix of music from the 90s to the current decade. Dawn tried to posit a few more guesses about what his surprise
might be, but she didn’t get anywhere close.
Which made it even better when she saw their destination.
“Oh, my God….” Dawn clapped her hands together, and her entire face lit up with wonder when she saw all of the cherry blossom trees surrounding Washington DC’s famous Tidal Basin. “It’s cherry blossom season! Just like in Japan!”
Deflecting all of her questions…the long drive…taking the chance that he’d be at least seven hours out-of-pocket if Kuang decided to ask for one of his last-second meetings...
The look on her face alone made it all worth it.
It was a bit of a line to get into the parking lot along Maine Drive. And he barely got the car stopped before she jumped out and ran toward the trees.
This was something else he’d forgotten about her. Her unabashed enthusiasm for all the things she thought were beautiful. Like anime. Cherry blossom trees. And him.
He caught up with her at the top of the trailhead path after he finished paying for parking.
“It’s so beautiful!” she called out to him. “I can’t believe you brought me here!”
He couldn’t believe he’d brought her here either. It was one thing to run Operation Good as New 2.0 back in Rhode Island. It was another to do something like this. Something that reminded him of the fool he used to be. Specifically when it came to her.
It was raining now. Cherry blossoms, not droplets of water. The petals floated down, catching in Dawn’s braids.
She was so beautiful. He stopped in his footsteps, then feet away, because suddenly it hurt to look at her.
The cherry blossoms showering down on her were delicate and fragile. Yet, they could only grow after a winter’s frost. In Japan, the pretty pink petals served as a symbol of many powerful things: life-and-death, beauty and violence, and the ephemeral-yet-cyclical nature of all four.
His relationship with Dawn was like these cherry blossoms. It had come around once again after a cold winter. But it would soon be over in just a matter of weeks. It would disappear just like the cherry blossoms. This…whatever this was…would be done on May 25th when they’d both go their separate ways. Her to an animation job in Pittsburgh. Him to a loveless marriage.
He hadn’t minded that his marriage to Nora Kuang would be little more than a business matter before these two months. But now….
“I know, it’s overwhelming, right?” she said, coming back to where he stood frozen. Her voice was soft and quiet as she took him by the hand and guided him north on the Tidal Basin’s looped trail path. “I feel the same way I did in Japan.”
Japan was fifteen years ago. Yet, the memory of when they’d gone to the Ueno Park Cherry Blossom Festival in Tokyo hit him as if it had just happened yesterday.
“I don’t know whether to stare at everyone and everything or draw everyone and everything!” she’d lamented with a ridiculous, tragic tone and an overdramatic sigh. “This is so hard for me!”
“Or,” he’d signed. “You could just enjoy the festival with me. Be here with me.”
How pleased he’d been when she chose him, laying her head on his arms as they walked through the park.
He didn’t offer her that option this time, but he didn’t have to. That was simply what they did. They visited several national memorials on the way to the Japanese Lantern Festival, where they ate street food and enjoyed performances. The food didn’t taste the same, and the performances were nothing like the ones in Ueno Park.
Still, it took him back to a time when he and Dawn were happy together. When he knew with certainty that he wanted nothing more in life than to be with her forever.
“Do you want to dance too?” she asked when a bunch of Western kids and their parents started twirling along to the Japanese classical folk band closing out the night’s festivities.
“I don’t dance,” he answered.
“Why not?” she asked, the look on her face both baffled and taken aback.
“I don’t know how,” he admitted.
“Oh, it’s easy. Especially the slow kind. It’s like a swaying hug.”
A swaying hug.
No, they weren’t kids anymore. But when she looped her arms around his waist, he swaying hugged her back. He’d gotten good at hugs when they were in Japan, and an old urge came over him.
He cupped the back of her head and pressed it into his chest. Holding her close. As close as two people could get while hug dancing.
And when it came time to leave, he took her by the hand as he had in Tokyo, not letting go until they reached the car.
This trip…this night…it had been a terrible idea. It was blurring the lines between the present and the past.
But he couldn’t bring himself to regret it, even though they had no future.
28
They finally made it to the Four Seasons.
Dawn gasped when he pulled up in front of the D.C. version of the hotel. And kept giggling all the way from dropping the keys off with the valet to checking in at the front desk.
She ooohed and awwed over the view of historic Georgetown in their capital suite. And she dropped several “oh my God” s when he presented her with the trip outfits he’d had a Boston-based personal shopper pick out for her that morning.
“Why are you doing all of this for me?” she asked, her face softening when she saw the yellow cocktail dress she’d be wearing down to dinner.
He knew what she meant. And inside his head, he answered, Because I only have a few weeks left with you. And I want us—you especially—to enjoy them.
But outside of his head, he merely signed, “You needed something other than jeans to wear to dinner.”
After freshening up in their room, they both changed into nicer clothes. He’d forgotten her toiletries bag, which had all of her makeup. But she still looked stunning in the yellow dress. It complemented her tawny brown skin and hugged her curves in a way that made his mouth water for something more than the meal they would enjoy downstairs.
This was why a couple of their anniversaries hadn’t included food.
Luckily for Dawn, he managed to keep his hands off of her, and they were able to make it downstairs for their reservation.
“Thank you!” Dawn said, signing in CSL over their late dinner at The Bourbon Steak, The Four Season D.C.’s signature restaurant. “Thank you for bringing me here. Thank you for this amazing night.”
He was more pleased than he should’ve been that she was once again attempting his native sign language. “You’re welcome,” he signed back, also in CSL.
“You should wear that dress for your thesis presentation,” he suggested after they gave the waiter their dessert orders.
She looked down at herself then back up at him. “You think so? I was planning to wear my Aggretsuko tee shirt with a denim skirt or something. This is a little fancy for a presentation, but I suppose I could dress it down with my pink cardigan.”
She peeped across the table at him with a sheepish grin. “Maybe it’s time for me to start dressing like a grown-up. And I kind of like the idea of wearing something just for you.”
Her confession caused him to miss a few breaths. She was pretending, just pretending. They were both playing a role until May 25th. But when she said that, it made him want things. Things he couldn’t have.
May 25th was still a few weeks away, but it felt like tomorrow.
Usually, he ensured he was on top when they made love. This was his way of dominating her even in missionary. But that night, after stripping her naked in their well-appointed hotel suite, he invited her to climb on top.
He drank in the sight of her curvy body as she sank down onto him, the lips of her cunt parting around his raging cock.
But she’d been a little too quick to take him up on his invitation. She let out a little cry of pain, clawing at his chest as she squirmed to adjust to the size of him in her tight but not quite wet enough yet heat.
She was so tight and hot. Victor had to grit his teeth to keep from unleashing inside
of her as she made her adjustments. He cupped one hand around her cheek and one hand around her waist, guiding her until she moistened around his cock and began moving effortlessly on top of him.
Then he caressed her breasts as she rode him with a sensual confidence she did not possess fifteen years ago. She looked nothing like she did in Japan. Yet, tonight, she was everything she’d been back then. But even better.
She liked taking control. Until she didn’t. She lost the thread when he tweaked her nipples, adding more pressure until they were extended pebbles between his fingers and thumbs.
“Victor,” she panted, her strokes getting sloppy. “Oh, God, Victor. I can’t…please…”
She’d become incoherent. But that was okay. Victor knew what she wanted, what she needed. It was the same thing as him.
He relinquished her breasts and grabbed onto her hips. Then he tilted her at an angle so that her clit could grind against his shaft as they moved faster and faster together.
It didn’t take long after that. A painful ache rose inside of him, letting him know he was close. But he held on…held on until she shattered above him, calling out his name as the powerful orgasm swept over her.
He watched her come with a warm feeling in his chest, wishing he could do this with her forever. But her tight pussy mercilessly milked him as it spasmed, and soon, he could no longer hold back.
His hands instinctively found her ass, and he threw back his head. Yelling out with his release as he pulled her hips tight against his spurting cock.
Not for the first time since they’d made their new agreement, he wondered how he’d managed to pull out all those years. Whatever exceptional pride had allowed him to do that was long gone now.
They let out sighs disguised as laughs as they came down together, looking at each other helplessly. And Dawn seemed to be speaking for the both of them when she wondered out loud, “Ten years…how is that still so intense?”
Victor: Her Ruthless Owner: The VICTOR Trilogy Book 2 [50 Loving States, Rhode Island] (Ruthless Triad) Page 19