by Cecilia Tan
She lay still then, whimpering, while he humped her, keeping one hand on her neck. He slapped her breasts with his other hand and the whimpering sounds increased.
Then his grip slipped or he got careless, and she escaped off the bed. He tackled her from behind and they landed with her face right up close to the camera.
He got one of her arms twisted behind her, though, and she was trapped again.
“Harder to get at your cunt this way,” he said. “Guess you want it in the rear.”
“No, oh no, no, please no,” she said. He put a ball gag in her mouth then, and using his one free hand, strapped it behind her head.
“There. Now I won’t have to listen to your lies,” he said. “When I know you want it.”
At that point, she started to cry.
And so did I.
Ferrara closed the laptop and sat for a moment in silence, then dabbed at her own eyes with the edge of her sleeve. “That’s enough, I think,” she said. “I know that was difficult to watch. Believe me, I know.”
I tried to catch my breath. “Who was she?”
“Some groupie, one of dozens, maybe hundreds. He was doing this night after night! I was his tour manager, you understand. It was my responsibility to do something about it. Imagine the position I was in. He was legally an adult, and when these women went to his room, at first they were consenting. Of course they were! He was a rock star! They’d have epic, wall-shaking sex! And then he’d wait until they were asleep or helpless and… this would happen. What could I do? I couldn’t go to the police. This was my golden goose, after all, and none of the women I could find—and that was if I could even find them at all—would speak out against him! Or if they did, they wanted money. Money to keep silent about it. At any rate, I had to confront him with irrefutable evidence that I knew what he was doing. So I started leaving a hidden camera in his room. And that’s how I made these tapes.”
“There are more of them?”
She nodded gravely. “Many more.”
I put my head in my hands, trying to think, but I was in turmoil. The sound of the woman screaming echoed in my ears. But this was Ferrara. She wanted me and James to break up. She wanted James for herself! Wait. Did I know that? That was what James had told me, but was it true?
I looked up. “Has he raped you?” I asked.
She froze, and then her face crumbled and her eyes closed. “Yes,” she whispered, with a choked sob. She put her hand to her throat. “Many times.”
And although my heart was doing flip-flops of sympathy, something in the back of my head said it didn’t add up.
“Why do you still work with him, then?” I wanted to ask why she was claiming to be married to him, but I didn’t want to give away that I knew that. “Why stay?”
“I help protect the young ones, the new ones, like you. Except I hope I’m not too late in your case.”
That didn’t add up, either. Annika told me James never, ever got involved with the dancers, and if a dancer made a move on him, they were gone. Was she wrong? Was it that he only liked them when they were illicitly taken, and once they revealed an interest he got rid of them?
I almost, almost could make Ferrara’s story believable. Then I remembered what James himself had sent through video to me earlier that day. Ferrara being the one who got off on crossing boundaries. Ferrara who liked to watch him…
There was only one person who could fill in the missing gaps in the story here, and that was James himself. But I sure as hell didn’t want to talk to him with Ferrara there.
I needed to get rid of her as quickly as possible.
I covered my eyes as if I were crying. “I think… I think I’d like to be alone now. It’s a lot to take in.”
“I know it is, dearie. I know it is. Here is my card. Call me anytime you want to talk further.” She passed me her card and patted me on the hand. I looked at her card instead of at her. I wasn’t sure I could really pull off the act of being distraught. I mean, I was genuinely upset by what she had shown me, but I worried if she got a good look at me she’d be able to tell I wasn’t convinced she was telling the truth.
She stood then and swept the laptop into the bag.
“I’ll just see myself out,” she said, while I pretended to still be so stricken that I couldn’t even raise my head.
The door slammed behind her. I stood up and wished I had something to smash or throw. I didn’t believe she was telling the truth about James. Yet, what was the real story behind that video? That was definitely something James hadn’t told me. And I was getting tired of discovering there were still dark secrets to uncover.
After I washed my face and calmed down a little, I went to the connecting door, which was disguised to look like a paneled section of wall, except for the round lock in it. I unlocked it and discovered that either James or Chandra had thoughtfully unlocked it from the other side already.
The suite was huge, the bed huge to match, and there was James, lying in the middle of it, the sheets wrapped around his middle but his torso exposed. The curtains had only been partly drawn, which meant the late-afternoon sun was streaming in, making his hair look as blond as it had been when we first met and his skin golden. The dark circles of his nipples stood out against his chest and the muscle of his stomach was lean and flat. A gorgeous picture and all for me.
I felt even calmer just looking at him. This was James, my James, a man I knew better than he knew himself sometimes. Or at least I had fewer illusions about him. Didn’t I? Didn’t he say himself that he was afraid he might push me too far one day? Was that a setup, a warning? Was I clinging to an illusion about what our relationship was, about what his desires and needs were?
Or about my own? I hadn’t seen him in a month. It had been so hard to sit there in that auditorium and pretend to be just another dancer when I had wanted desperately to run up to him, kiss him, run my hands through his hair—and then the dancing, partnering with him, I could practically taste the sweat on his skin and I imagined what it would have been like for him to lift me up, carry me backstage, and have his way with me.
I dropped my robe into the pile with the duvet and the pillows he had knocked off the bed. I slipped under one edge of the sheet and settled, naked, next to him. Ferrara was wrong. She had to be. I’d prove it.
I’ll do it when he wakes up, I thought. He’ll want sex and I’ll say no and see what happens.
But when he realized I was there, I think he was still asleep. He rolled over and wrapped an arm around me. Then his hand stroked between my thighs and until he found the wetness. A finger worked its way into the wet cleft, rubbing up and down my clit and my hips shifted wantonly, lust spiking in my belly.
“Karina,” he murmured. “I’ve been dreaming about you.”
“Oh? What kind of dreams?”
“This kind.” He reared up suddenly, quite awake, and pushing my leg aside. I struggled purely instinctively against how rough and brusque he was, not even thinking about anything Ferrara had said, and then quite suddenly he had the head of his cock fitted snugly between my slick lips.
I wanted to remind him that it had been a month since I’d had anything there. I wanted to remind him that once he had caused me so much pain with penetration that it had taken him a week to train me up to taking his size. But all I could do in that moment was make a helpless whimpering sound. All thought of testing his resolve, or my own, was erased. This is James. He knows. He knows.
Wasn’t I the one who had teased him, saying that maybe our reunion would have to be a “fuck first, talk later” one?
He paused only a moment, looking into my eyes, before he began to push into me, and I began to wail. A firm, solid, never-stopping push, more and more of him entering me with each passing second, and my scream rising in pitch. Not because I was in pain, no. Because the moment he breached me like that, I had started to come, and the deeper he went, the more explosive the orgasm got. I’d never come from penetration alone like that before. I beat
on his back with my fists and my heels and my screams broke into desperate gasps as he began to fuck me hard and the pleasure kept going off inside me like fireworks, pow pow pow.
I lost it completely, cursing, screaming, sobbing, and then crying my eyes out as he switched from the punishing, rough thrusts to the gentle, tender rolling of his hips that melted my insides and my heart.
“I’ve missed you,” he said, “and I’ve missed fucking you. And it would seem you’ve missed me, too.”
I couldn’t even answer, I was crying too hard. I managed a nod, and then he pulled out suddenly, causing me to cry “No!” even though what he was doing was sliding down my body to put his head between my legs and pleasure me with his tongue.
I came once more, shuddering against his mouth but feeling empty and bereft of what I needed most. He crawled up my body again and ran the length of his shaft up and down my clit, sending vibrations through me that made me incoherent with need.
“Tell me what you want.”
I writhed against him, trying to answer. “Your cock.”
“It’s right here.” He moved it slickly.
“Your cock inside me.”
“Hmm, in your mouth?”
“No, no!” I struggled against, him, lust-crazed, trying to impale myself on him, but he held me in place.
“Or is your ass ready?” He slid it lower.
“No!”
“I will claim your rear, too, Karina.”
“No, no!” I thrashed helplessly. “Fuck me! James, just fuck me! Fuck me until you come or I don’t know what I’ll do! Please!”
“Ah, there’s the magic word.”
“You mean please?”
“No. Fuck.” He drove into me as he said it. “Ahhhh, yes.”
Oh God, yes. No more teasing. From there he fucked me steadily as he went up the ramp of his own arousal until he couldn’t keep it steady anymore and I knew he was close. Then five or six hard jerks against me and a long growl that ended in a sigh, and he was done.
He collapsed atop me, and I think was drifting to sleep again when I made him roll to the side. “Hey, no sleeping, Jet Lag Boy. I have questions for you.”
“Hmm? Oh, yes, of course, Karina. I wouldn’t dream of skimping on your answers.” He rubbed his eyes. “If you want me to stay awake long enough to answer anything, though, I had better get into the shower.”
We made our sticky, sweaty way across the room to the immense bathroom and he turned on the water, but then sat on the edge of the separate Jacuzzi tub while waiting for it to get hot.
Now that the ecstasy of sex was ebbing away somewhat, I tried to wrap my head around the questions Ferrara’s video had raised. I sat on the edge of the tub next to him.
“You look like you’re about to ask a big question,” James said.
“Yeah, I think I am.” I waved at the shower. “Let’s get clean first while I get my head together.”
“All right.”
He was somber, or perhaps merely subdued from being exhausted, as we washed. He helped me rinse my hair, his long fingers sluicing away the water and lifting it in the spray, and he gently soaped between my legs, kissing my belly reverently when he was done. I scrubbed his back and lathered his balls, remembering my earlier conclusions, that James was fundamentally afraid of the act of intercourse. He certainly hadn’t felt afraid in bed just now, and he hadn’t looked afraid in that video, but…
We got out and toweled dry. He ordered a pot of coffee from room service, put on an undershirt and yoga pants, and then belted a bathrobe over that. I put my robe back on and we settled on the couch together.
“You seem troubled, Karina. You’ve never taken this long to come up with a question.”
“I know. This one might be a doozy, though, so I’m psyching myself up for it.”
“Take all the time you need. May I make a guess, though?”
“Sure.” I turned sideways on the couch so I could look at his face.
He pulled one of my feet into his lap and began massaging my foot. “My guess is that this has something to do with Ferrara.”
“Good guess. What makes you think that?”
“It’s a fact: Ferrara will want to drive a wedge between us any way she can.” His hands were warm and strong. “She’s not blind. I’m sure she saw the rapport between us at the audition. So tell me. What did she say to you?”
I sighed. “It started backstage at the audition. She said all kinds of stupid things to bait me. I managed to block it out. But”—I looked at him, the picture of ease, a demeanor I had almost never seen on him before, except after sex the last few times. He no longer looked like a man who was holding everything in. “She showed me a video.”
“A video?” He frowned. “Of my early work?”
I took deep breaths, trying to stay calm and rational. “You’re much younger in the video. You’re… It’s…” How could I say it? “In what she showed me, you’re—I mean, it’s definitely you, not a fake—”
“Karina, what does the video show?”
“Um. It looks like you’re raping a girl in it.”
A glimmer of suspicion came into his eye. “A video, you say?”
I nodded, took another breath, and let it all spill. “She said you used to do it all the time, to groupies. You’d wait until they didn’t want it, and then force yourself on them, and… and… and…”
“Breathe, Karina.”
I gulped. “And she said she taped it so she could confront you about your behavior instead of going to the police.”
He had stopped massaging my foot, but kept his hands still and warm on my ankles. “Was that the whole story?”
“Pretty much. She only showed me one video, but she made it sound like there are more of them.”
He nodded. “Let me ask you one question. Does me forcing myself on girls seem likely?”
“Well, no. And I told myself she’s a nonstop liar. Still, it was pretty upsetting to see. I told myself there’s surely an explanation. But if there is, that means there’s something more you haven’t told me.”
He nodded. “Remember when I told you my past with Ferrara was sordid?”
“Yes, but you said you never slept with her.”
“I didn’t.” He stretched tiredly. “May I tell you the other thing I’ve been holding back before I tell you the untold secrets about Ferrara?”
“Of course.”
He shifted until he was cross-legged, facing me on the couch, my feet still in his lap. “I haven’t told you yet the thing I fear.”
I swallowed and said nothing, not wanting to derail him.
“You told me two things, you said, a silly fear and a serious one. I can’t tell if mine is silly or serious. I think whether it is or not depends on you.” He ran a hand through his hair. It was growing out longer again now, and his fingers made damp furrows. “I fear you’re in love with Dom James, not Real James.”
“Ah.” I sat up and pulled his hands toward me. “I can see why that might be tricky. However, I have a strong feeling that Dom James is a big part of Real James. That’s just part of who you are. It’s part of how your sex drive works and it’s part of how you love.”
He gave a small nod.
“Remember, I’ve also met Performance Artist James—and Neurotic Artist James, too, come to think of it. Not to mention Boss Whose Staff Loves Him James, and Dancer James. In fact, Dom James is the James who’s the most prone to fits of pique, petulance, and emotional turmoil.” I crawled forward and kissed him on the cheek. “And yet, I love him anyway. I love all the Jameses I’ve met so far.”
“You haven’t met Rock Star James yet,” he pointed out.
“I don’t think Rock Star James exists. Maybe he used to, or maybe he only exists on the stage. I think that’s why you’re leaving him behind. There’s no place for him in your life.” I sat back while he let that sink in.
“I think you’re right about that,” he said. “Rock Star James is a creation of Ferrara’s.
He’s who she wants. He’ll fuck anything that moves, for one thing, and he’s moldable, trainable; he’ll do whatever she says.”
I nodded. “So where does the video come into it?”
“I’m getting there. The reason I ask about how much you care about my dom persona is… well, some women—some people—can get that bubble burst very easily.”
“You told me that. Women who had a perfect fantasy dom, or master, or king in their minds, who couldn’t handle it when you were a real person. You know I’m not like that.”
“I know. It’s one of the reasons I’ve fallen so hard for you, Karina.” He kissed my hand. “But there is still a thing, sometimes, where submissives especially lose all respect for a dom if they find out he ever bottomed or subbed.”
“Did you forget you and I switched in Ohio?”
“I didn’t forget. I’m saying it’s still my instinct to be careful when telling you about my past. Because there are who those who can’t handle the idea of their top bottoming.”
“Hey, but I thought it was kind of normal for tops to get trained by starting at the bottom, isn’t it?”
“It is, in some circles, not others. You know, people still get ideas in their heads, and when a relationship is based on ideas, on fantasies, well—”
“James. I’ll say it as many times as I need to. It’s the real you, not the fantasy, that I want.”
“Thank you.” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “Turn back the clock to the days when I was—as the saying goes—young, dumb, and full of come. Trying to get noticed as an artist and as a performer. I was more of a songwriter than a singer, really, but I had to sing them or no one would ever hear them. And besides, singing in clubs was an excellent way to meet sex partners, something I had a keen interest in at the time. Ferrara and her husband courted me. At the time I made no distinction between them wanting me for the record label and wanting me for anything else. Maybe they didn’t make a distinction either. Anyway. She’s the one who introduced me to the society.”
“Yeah, you told me that.”
“What I didn’t tell you was that she insisted I go through six months as a trainee.”