by Cecilia Tan
“Really?” The thought of James prancing about half-naked while rich men and women paddled his bum when they felt like it was a shocking thought. “Did you like it?”
“Not particularly. I liked that I had found this haven of sexuality that was unlike anything I knew of in the rest of the world, and I was at the age when I was game to try anything to do with sex. However, there’s no getting around the fact that I am essentially dominant by nature. I didn’t get much out of submitting to others or in serving them, except as a kind of acting exercise.
“The one person I was concerned with pleasing, though, was Ferrara, and not merely because she and Huntington were the avenue for a record deal. Her idea of being a loyal wife was that she never had intercourse with anyone except her husband. But that one rule left a lot of leeway. She would blindfold him, put earplugs in his ears and headphones on top of that, and mummify him so the only parts of him that were accessible were his face and his cock. She’d have slave girls fluff him with their mouths. And then to arouse herself enough to ride him, she liked to see me dominate other women.” He didn’t meet my eyes. Rather than blushing he looked bloodless, as if telling me this was draining him. Or maybe he was that tired. “Tell me about the video you saw.”
“Well, there’s a girl lying on top of the covers of a bed, wearing a kind of see-through nightgown.”
“Looking rather ready to be ravished?”
“Yeah, now that you mention it. And you, um…” I closed my eyes, trying to sort out the images, which had turned into a jumble in my head. “First you kind of teased her like you were trying not to wake her up, and then you sort of leaped on her.”
“Was there a struggle?”
“Yes. She fought you, and you choked her and told her to lie still, and then she almost got away, but you pounced on her back and put a gag in her mouth since she was protesting so much. That was all I saw.”
He took my hands in his. “Your hands are shaking.”
“The way she screamed was pretty convincing.”
“If it’s who I think it was, she’s a very good actress. Didn’t you recognize Vanette?”
I blinked and sat up straight. “What?”
“Have you ever seen her without makeup and her hair down?”
“No! Are you sure that was her?”
“If it’s the scene I remember, yes, it’s her. And it took place in one of the bedrooms at the society’s club in London.”
I thought back to what it had looked like. “You know, I was so focused on you and her, I didn’t even look at the room. Or really look at her face.” What I remembered, though, certainly didn’t contradict the idea.
“I’m certain Vanette would confirm the story if you asked her about it,” he said. “We were both trainees then. She was developing a specialty in ravishment.”
“Ravishment?”
“For those members who wanted to playact that they were forcing her. Some of them had elaborate scenarios, with bodices to rip from the lady of the house and that sort of thing, while others were just playing at intruder in the night.” He shrugged. “It was one of her favorite things. She was brilliant. Could cry on cue. I certainly couldn’t have played her part.”
I shifted until I was lying against his chest. “All right. Is that the whole story, then? No more secrets left in the closet?”
“Pretty much. I mean, there are more scenes I could describe, but I think you get the gist. Now, where is that coffee I ordered?” He tightened his arms around me.
“And that was what you were worried about? That I would flip out if I found out how it really was?”
“Well, there is one more thing you should know. The whole reason my recording career has been kept a secret from my mother is because I met Ferrara and did these things for her before she gave me the recording contract.”
“So it really was the ‘casting couch’ but with the genders reversed?”
“Not really, but you can see how someone could interpret it that way. My mother, I feared, would interpret it as extortion, that these people from the entertainment world had corrupted her son and extorted sexual favors from me in exchange for the contract. I feared she’d try to put a stop to it. I most certainly didn’t want that. When you’re young and have stars in your eyes…” He shrugged. “Understand, I didn’t feel taken advantage of. I didn’t feel preyed upon. It merely seemed a part of the world I was entering. I thought, when I bothered to think at all, that it was cool that this kinky, wild woman was into me. In the beginning, of course, she kept me hooked with a continual thread of teasing that one day she might let me fuck her. She might as well have put a ring through my nose and led me around by a chain; that’s how hooked I was.”
“I can imagine.” He had certainly learned how to apply delayed gratification and withholding to his own advantage. Not that I minded. “Are you ever going to tell your mother?”
“I plan to tell her about Lord Lightning someday. But not today.” He nuzzled me. “I imagine I’ll tell her about you long before that.”
“Have you not told her yet?”
“Sweetness, the moment I tell her, she will demand to meet you. Let’s get past the show and put that all behind us, and then we can fly to London to meet her. Or perhaps she’ll be ready for a trip to New York. She does love the city.”
There was a knock at the door. Most likely the coffee. I excused myself to the restroom while James answered the door. I heard the room service cart being wheeled in.
When I came out, the waiter was getting James’s signature. He was an older man and his white tuxedo jacket looked a little too small for him. He was holding a hardcover book and James was signing the check using the book as a surface.
“Thank you, sir,” the waiter said, and I suddenly recognized his voice.
“Phil Betancourt?” The man who had stolen my mother’s engagement ring and who knew what else was standing there, right in front of me.
“Um. My name’s José,” he said, and then broke for the door.
Thirteen
People on the Edge of the Night
Betancourt took off like a sprinter. James lunged for him but missed, and then went tearing off down the hallway after him. I wanted to follow right after, but I was worried that we’d get locked out of the room. I went back through my own room and grabbed my key, then hurried down the hall in the direction they’d gone.
I met James coming out of the door behind the elevator lobby that led to the service elevators and laundry. He was shaking his head. “Lost him. You’re certain that was Betancourt?”
“Sure of it. What did he want, though?” We walked back to the room together and went through my room into his again. “Spying on me? Or you?”
“I’ll call Stefan and hotel security. Meanwhile, you should call your mother to be sure there’s been no more trouble for her at home.”
“All right.” I went into my room and got dressed while waiting for my mother to pick up the phone. She eventually did.
“Karina! How are you, dearest?”
“Fine, Mom. Are you in the bathroom?” I could hear the echo of the tile.
“I have you on speaker. I’m curling my hair. It’s grown out so much and Velvet showed me a great way to do it.”
“Awesome. Hey, has there been any more trouble from your ex?”
“I have not heard a peep, dear. No sign of him. I think you were right. He must have been no more than a common criminal and is certainly not worth my expending any more thought about. Did I tell you I met a nice man at the gym?”
“Um, no.”
“He’s a research librarian at a university in Chicago, but he’s here on sabbatical while he takes care of his aging mother after she had a fall.”
I wondered if the aging mother was real or if this was another one of her ways to work herself into a conversation. “That’s sweet.”
“He is. So smart. We’re going to a book club together tomorrow night, and the Rosemonts are coming over for dinner Frid
ay. His mother’s in bed asleep by seven every night. Can you believe that? So he’s free every night of the week.”
“That sounds great, Mom. Just take it slow, okay?”
“Oh, I’m taking it very slow. Don’t worry. I’ve only let him kiss me so far.”
“Mom!” I really did not want to hear about her sex life.
“Honestly, Karina, you’d think your generation had invented dating.”
“I’m just saying if you’re seeing him every night of the week, that doesn’t sound like going slow to me.”
She was silent a moment, and I heard the clack of the curling iron being put down. She picked up the phone then. “Karina, I know you want the best for me, but let’s get one thing straight. You’ve made it completely clear to me I don’t get to pick your boyfriends. Well, you don’t get to pick mine.”
“Okay! Okay, Mom, yes, I totally agree with that. I wasn’t trying to criticize your choice. He sounds great. It’s just, you know, after what happened, I get worried.”
“Well, now you know how I felt after you and your sister moved to New York City,” she said smugly. “Stop worrying. I admit I may have done some unwise, maybe even nonsensical, things in the past. God forbid you should be alone when you’re older, Karina. I don’t wish this lesson on anyone, even if I do wish you’d understand me better.”
“Okay. I’m sorry, Mom. I guess I just didn’t think. You know, I always think of you as so self-sufficient. You did such a great job raising us as a single mom. We certainly never felt you needed a man around.”
“There’s a big difference between needing a man and wanting a man,” my mother said.
“Yeah. Well, keep me and Jill posted about how it goes.”
“I will, darling. Speaking of Jill, she told me you’re in Las Vegas? I thought you were going to rewrite your thesis.”
“I am, but I have a couple of months to do it and this chance to be in a dance production came up.”
“You didn’t tell me you had started dancing again! Karina, that’s wonderful!”
“Well, I just found out today that I got the part.”
“Even more wonderful! Should I start making plans to come see this show?”
“Oh, maybe! I’ll get the dates and details and send them to you.”
“And what about your own man situation? You haven’t even mentioned him yet. Does that mean you’re quits now, and off to Vegas like a showgirl?”
“Goodness, no, Mom. We’re getting along pretty well now. I mean, it’s not all smooth sailing, and right now he’s got this crazy ex trying to make our lives difficult, but I think it’s going to work out eventually. He’s here, too…” I heard a knock and went to look through the peephole, but I didn’t see anyone in the hallway.
“So glad to hear it. Was there anything else you needed, Karina? My hair’s done and I have to go soon.”
“No, that was it. Bye, Mom. Have fun.”
“Give your fella a kiss on the cheek from me, then, dear. Bye.”
I hung up the phone. My mother had gotten really direct after that blow to the head. I think I liked her this way, but it was going to take some getting used to.
The knock came again and I realized it was coming from the connecting door. I opened it and Stefan came in with two men from hotel security. “We’re checking for spy devices,” he said. His expression was as serious as I’d ever seen it. All trace of his usual baby-faced look was gone.
“Spy devices?”
“Bugs, cameras, that sort of thing. Just in case.” He was trying to sound light, but he failed.
James spoke to him from the doorway. “Have you heard from your contact with the local police?”
“Oh, yes.” Now Stefan cracked a small smile. “They’d be all ears, if we were to involve them.”
One of the two suited men with Stefan spoke up. “We’d prefer to handle it internally, of course.”
“As would we,” James said. “But I like to know where we stand. Good work, Stefan.”
I followed James back into the suite. He shed the robe and slipped back into bed.
I crawled across the bedspread to kiss him on the cheek. “There. That’s from my mother. She says everything’s fine.”
“Excellent,” he said with another yawn. “Stefan told me that in Ohio he suspected you were being tailed.”
“He told me it wasn’t unusual for your car to be followed.”
“No, no. I mean he suspected you were the one being tailed. And it’s too much of a coincidence for Betancourt to show up here right after Ferrara spoke to you. He and Ferrara must be working together.”
“Ohhh. And you think that’s how they met? He was following me while she was following you?”
“Something like that. Perhaps he had your mother’s house staked out. Anyway. If he fled here to report to her, Ferrara probably knows by now that her bid to get you to leave me didn’t work.” He yawned again and closed his eyes.
“Tsk. Here we are in one of the most exciting cities in the world, and you’re falling asleep,” I teased.
“You try getting by on four hours of sleep in the last forty-eight,” he said. “No one’s heard from Ferrara or seen her since her visit to you. And her things are gone from her room downstairs. I wonder if she has withdrawn from the field of battle.” He yawned again. “I’ll have to worry about her later. How about you? Want a nap?”
“I suppose a little rest couldn’t hurt.”
“Excellent. Get undressed and come under the covers.”
I looked behind me at the door connecting to my room. The men were still in there, poking around. I slid under the covers and undressed while under them, flinging my clothes off the bed one item at a time.
James was in satin pajama bottoms and nothing else. He groaned as I pressed myself against him.
“You’d think I’d be completely sated,” he complained.
I slid my hand up his leg to find him hard and needy again. “Here.” I slipped my hand under his waistband and stroked him gently. “Bet I can make you come in under two minutes. And then you can nap in peace.”
“You bet? What do you wager if you fail?”
“That’ll be up to you, but I won’t fail.”
“All right, sweetness. Go to it.”
I licked the palm of my hand and began to stroke him. Two minutes might be ambitious, but I figured whatever penalty he decided to exact if I failed would be as much fun as any reward for success. BDSM was win-win that way.
I’m sure it was longer than two minutes. More like four, before he was straining and groaning in my hand, his own long fingers interlacing with mine in the final seconds before he erupted. He curled away from me, pulling me to spoon with him as he quaked through the aftershocks, and then was asleep before either of us could let go.
The men were gone from next door. Once I was sure James was deeply asleep, I slipped out of the bed to clean up. There wasn’t much, since he hadn’t had time to replenish his supply. Then I got back in and snoozed contentedly with him.
When I woke, he was sitting up in bed with his phone, apparently texting back and forth with someone. He saw I was awake and reached down to stroke my hair.
“Anything going on?” I asked.
“Nothing exciting,” he answered. “Get this. Ferrara told Alicia she was checking into a different hotel because she developed a sudden gluten allergy and the pasta bar in the restaurant here was setting it off.”
“That sounds less than plausible.”
“If she is caught out she will no doubt say she made up the story to protect our sensibilities from a more awful truth.” He shook his head. “Am I terribly cold to her? I’m afraid I’ve grown very hardened to her nonstop attempts to rouse my sympathies, whether fake or genuine.”
“I’m probably not a good judge of that,” I admitted.
“It’s a large reason why I want to get out of the business,” he said. “To get free of her. Her advances after she divorced her husband became relentless.
I don’t think I’ve convinced her that the way I felt when I was a starry-eyed, horny twenty-year-old isn’t how I feel about her now. I thought I had at least convinced her to give it up, but as we know, what I thought was a done deal didn’t stick.”
“What’s she going to do when she finds out her ploy to get me to leave you didn’t work?”
“No idea. I will worry about it once we know.” He turned to me, setting the phone aside and propping his head up on one folded arm. “Let’s go out.”
“Out?”
“Yes. I have an idea.” He slipped from the bed fully naked and retrieved one of his suitcases, which looked like they hadn’t been opened since he’d arrived earlier. He lifted it onto the bed. When he unzipped it, at first all I could see was folded clothes. Then he dug through and took some items out. He tossed something toward me that looked at first glance like a small dog caught in a net.
A wig. I took it out of the net and held it up. Sandy-colored, shoulder length. “Is this for you or for me?”
He took out another one, orange-red and spiky, and twirled it on his finger. “Which one would I look least like myself in?”
“I’ve never seen your hair orange before…”
“All right. Wait, I have another red one for you.” He dug into another pocket and brought out a long wig, gently wavy, in a red auburn color.
I tried to pull it over my head, but he wagged his finger at me. “There’s a way to do it. I’ll show you.”
Next thing I knew, we were in the bathroom, and he was using bobby pins to secure my hair atop my head so that no stray bits hung down. He showed the inside of the wig where tiny combs clipped to my hair.
“Shake your head.”
I shook it gently at first, as if saying “no” to him, then more vigorously, like a go-go dancer. The wig stayed secure. “That’s amazing.”
“Let me make up your face, too.”
“You know how to do makeup?”
He looked at me impatiently. “Do you doubt me?”
“Well, yeah. Most guys—”
“Have I ever struck you as anything like most guys?”
“No…”