by Angela Blake
At first the media was a little cautious not only about our relationship but about Adam Rousseau stepping into the spotlight. However, when it came into light how he was now the sole stock broker that managed all of Marjolaine Durand’s former clients the respect he deserved began to pile up in his favor.
Within a few weeks after our wedding I was back at work completing the three mobile apps he initially hired me for. At the same time, my father and his company managed to recover a vast majority of the data they had lost a few months back. The data that was permanently lost no longer mattered now since my new apps compensated for the damages.
Once all of my apps were completed I didn’t necessarily have to work anymore but I still stayed on working for and with Adam as his new Vice-President. It came with a lot of new responsibilities, many of which were not related at all to my programming expertise, but I did undergo some training and quickly caught up. In just a year I was even named the top rising entrepreneur of the nation by Time magazine and was even listed as a crucial cornerstone for Adam’s ongoing success.
With everything that had happened I couldn’t have been any happier. A common joke I liked to tell these days at dinners is that all of our fortunes were my father’s doing. If his company didn’t screw up their job at the Rousseau firm then I wouldn’t have stormed into his office. If I didn’t meet Adam that day then none of this would have ever happened. It just goes to show that one mistake can lead to a domino effect of fortune.
My father, in fact, became even more famous than he already was. His company started getting hired by some of the biggest international companies. Not only did they work on some of the most widely visited websites these days but he even had to branch out and make a subsidiary company to handle SEO, online marketing and more tasks so that he and his crew could focus purely on web designing and infrastructure.
If only my mom was still around to see all this success. Adam did make it a point to visit her grave and I finally got the chance to tell him of our story. Adam, on the other hand, was still a little protective of his childhood history but over the months I got him to peel a little information here and there. I wasn’t in a rush – I now had an entire lifetime to know more about who he was. All that truly mattered, after all, was who he was now.
Aiden, of course, was always lingering in the background. Every now and then we’d run into him during social events but he never dared cross our paths. It was like seeing a ghost – he was always so pale and scared each time he saw us looking his way. In the end, it never really mattered. We were successful billionaires doing legitimate business while he was now declining in his modeling career. As a matter of fact, there were rumors that he had begun filming gay porn videos just to earn more cash. This does come as a big shock given how homophobic he usually is. Other say he really was gay and was just violently denying it for years.
My former company also got in touch with us too. Of course, my old boss didn’t even dare to flirt with me this time around. The moment he saw Adam’s arm wrapped around my waist he knew I was off-limits. Still, it was good to be connected once more with old colleagues and it turned out the company was now offering their stocks to be traded and they wanted Adam’s firm to handle the deal.
By the end of the day, Adam and I finally got the life we wanted. We were always working, sure, but we could spend time every day just to be with each other. We spent as much time as we could with the staff as well. Chip was going to school now while his mom, Mrs. Potts, had hired more kitchen crew workers. Plumette and Lumiere announced they were officially dating – much to our surprise – and Jacques Cogsworth held off from retiring to make sure he’d be around to take care of our kids once we actually had some.
On our free days we tended to just sit back and relax in our room, ecstatically having sex like bunnies or bumming around eating snacks while watching a movie. However, I did rope in Adam to my hobby and every weekend we managed to go out to the hobby shop for more tabletop gaming. A lot of the folks at the shop were really proud to say that they were friends with Adam Rousseau and his wife.
This was exactly what my life should be. I was happy. My father was happy. My husband was happy. Despite everything that came between us and all the trials that we had to face – his past, Aiden and my own disparity between perception of Adam and what was true – we found our happy place.
Although the world still called him a wolf, a beast, those terms no longer carried such a negative essence to them. Adam wore those names with pride now. He should, because he had his own nickname for me – belle, which meant Beauty. He said he derived it from my last name, Verdandi.
Together we were indeed the Beauty and the Beast.
THE END
The Virgin’s Arrangement - Teaser
Chapter One
Claudia Vaughn sighed as she stepped out of her outfit for the night. She undid the straps of her shoes, kicked them off and sighed as she rubbed the soles of her feet. She felt like her feet might just burst because of how much they hurt, but she knew that was just part of the job. No pain, no gain as their boss would say.
Claudia reached behind her back and undid the zipper a little to feel like she was able to breathe because these outfits were just getting tighter, and tighter, and it was getting harder and harder to breathe in them. She supposed she shouldn’t complain. She was after all Madame Sauri’s right hand woman.
Madame Sauri was formidable despite her small stature. She was a Chinese woman who had fled to America to evade her abusive husband, and managed to start a successful business as the owner of one of the finest establishments in China Town. La Chambre de Plaisir.
La Chambre de Plaisir was well known all over the district because of how high end it actually was. It catered to those with very specific needs, and Madame Sauri with her hazel eyes, dark hair pulled into a no nonsense bun, and her ability to haggle like a true New Yorker was legendary in many circles. It was why Claudia had showed up at her doorstep one day, soaked to the bone with little more than the clothes on her back, and a point to prove.
Madame Sauri had eyed her suspiciously before she let her in and listened to her proposal. After Claudia was done, Madame Sauri walked up to her, looked her up and down then smiled.
From then on, they were partners. It was Madame Sauri who started the establishment, but Claudia helped her build it from the ground up. Once upon a time, she had gone to a business school, so she had a keen eye for specific details, and she was able to use what she learned in business school to help the place become successful.
Men came here from all over the world with very specific tastes, and in most cases, they were able to find someone to satisfy him. It wasn’t a whore house as many people thought, rather it was a gentleman’s club that was home to a very specific kind of pleasure.
Before arriving here, Claudia had no idea just how many men were into BDSM, but now that she was right in the middle of it all, she was still surprised every single time. Not that she thought there was anything wrong with it, she just always thought they were much a smaller group.
When she came to Madame Sauri, they agreed that Claudia would handle the clientele and occasionally perform on the stage, but she was not for sale. Claudia was a virgin, and she was part French on her mothers’ side, so that made her very sought after, but she was adamant that she stay behind the scenes, and far away from the greedy eyes of men who devoured her with their eyes. She knew that she could never put herself in that position because of her past, and the way things turned out for her.
Claudia breathed deeply as she began to massage her neck and make her way down the hall to her room. She ran into Madame Sauri on her way down the hall, and they detoured to their office where they shared a drink.
Madame Sauri lifted her leg up on one of the chairs and began to rub them. “Is good night for us, tonight.”
“Yeah, Chastity did really well. I told you she had massive potential.”
“So you did.�
� Madame Sauri tilted her head and acknowledged her. “She seem like silly girl when she come, can you blame me?”
Claudia gave her a rueful smile. “No, I can’t say that I can. I think she more than proved that she is worth it. I saw one or two men with their jaws on the floor, and one of them took out his check book, so they’ll probably be making an offer very soon.”
Madame Sauri knocked back her drink and smacked her lips. “Sooner than you think. They come by today. Very good sum, but I think we wait for a few more days, they become desperate, they offer more money, and Chastity has chance to make up mind.”
Claudia tipped her glass. “I agree completely. We shouldn’t rush into it. What about Lacey? How is she doing?”
Madame Sauri looked like she ate something sour. “Lacey not doing so well today. She look sick this morning, but I think is just nerves. She threw up before show and insisted she go on though I tell her to rest. She not do so well on stage, but you know Lacey. They love her.”
Claudia nodded as she leaned back in her chair and took a huge gulp of her coke and rum. “I’ll check on her on my way out. I’ll see if she needs a doctor as well.”
Madame Sauri clasped her hands in her lap. “Why we get into this business Clo?”
Claudia shrugged as she sloshed the drink around the cup. “I don’t know, Sauri. I guess we each have our reasons. Whether it’s us or one of the other girls. They may not make sense, and if they do, maybe we shouldn’t be here, yet here we are.”
Madame Sauri nodded thoughtfully. “Is true. You wise girl, Clo. Should consider accepting offer for your virginity someday. Is good money. Could get you out of here.”
Claudia laughed. “Why would I want to get out of here, Sauri? I came to you, remember? I sought you out, and I want to be here.”
Madame Sauri cocked her head to the side and examined her as if she were some type of rare bird. “So you say. I no get you, Clo. You are strange girl, but you are hard worker.”
Claudia raised her glass. “I’ll drink to that.”
Madame Sauri eyed her speculatively before she clinked her glass against hers and gulped the whole drink in one swallow.
***
Tw0 hours later, Claudia wandered down the barely lit hallway that smelled strongly of heavy perfume and kept one hand on the walls to keep from toppling over. She was sure she shouldn’t have had so much to drink, but as always with Sauri she couldn’t help herself. The two women had next to nothing common, but somehow they bonded over the fact that life had handed them both a crappy pair of cards.
Sauri with her abusive husband, and his incessant blows that eventually made her unable to carry any children which was the final nail in the coffin that was their marriage, and Claudia because of a past she couldn’t seem to escape, no matter how far she ran.
She had shed her skin so many times, changed locations, she even tried changing her appearance from blonde to brunette, but nothing she did was ever enough to bury the hole inside her heart. A hole that at times felt big enough to house the Titanic.
She knew she wouldn’t be able to outrun her past forever, but for now, she was as far away from it, in theory, as she possibly could be. She was still in her hometown, but she was doing the last thing anybody would ever expect her to be doing. She was sure they wouldn’t come looking for her here, in a gentleman’s club of all places.
With her business degree, and her eloquent French, this was the last place anybody would think to look, and that’s exactly why Claudia picked it. She stumbled towards her room and began snickering to herself at the thought of what 16 year old her would say if she could her right now.
Working at a gentleman’s club, and as co-owner, no less. The idea may not have been hers, but when she showed Madame Sauri all the things she needed to do to attract more customers, and stay within the confines of the law, business took off so fast, Sauri insisted on making her a partner. She was genuinely touched by that.
It wasn’t why she had come here in the first place, but she figured it couldn't hurt. The more distance she put between her and her past self, the better. She groped around for the light switch and flinched as it danced across her field of vision.
With that warm, fuzzy feeling in her stomach, Claudia clumsily lurched forward and began to curse her inability to get the zipper down. Sometimes, she wished she had a roommate, but Sauri insisted that she deserved her own room with a private bathroom, and her own sweet set up.
It was fun at first having all of this to herself, but soon the glitz and the glamor wore off, and all she was left with was the deafening silence of a room that never truly felt like hers because of the over top décor, and the colors that bled into each other causing an angry clash of bright purple and red. Personally, she would’ve preferred softer colors, something that brought out the peaceful energy within her.
“Bloody zipper.” She squinted her eyes and bit down hard on her bottom lip in concentration until she finally heard the tell-tale swoosh of the zipper being pulled down. She grinned triumphantly as the dress fell into a heap on the floor. She stepped out of the dress and sighed as she touched her lip and saw a smear of red splattered across her finger.
She made her way to the bureau and grabbed a tissue and pressed it hard to her lips. The unexpectedly mundane gesture reminded her of her father. An English doctor who had a love for classic novels, cigars and old black and white movies. At first glance, he seemed oddly mismatched with her mum who was a designer in Paris and kept up with all the latest movies. Their eyes met across the room at a party one day, and somehow it didn’t seem to matter that they came from two totally different worlds.
Growing up, Claudia believed in their love, and her little sister used to make fun of her whenever she would say that she wanted a marriage like that. She supposed that at her age, Elizabeth was too young to understand, but she still tried to teach her. That a love like theirs was rare, that them meeting each other like that was meant to happen.
Claudia frowned as she stared at herself in the mirror and watched as she touched her honey blonde hair. She had her mother’s hair, defined cheekbones, and her shapely thighs, but she had dad’s caramel colored eyes, lips, and his forehead. Whenever she looked at herself in the mirror, she was reminded of them in a way that was almost too painful to contemplate.
She shook her head as she turned away from the mirror and headed towards her closet. She smiled for no particular reason thinking that she really did quite enjoy the buzz that came after enjoying one too many drinks. She put her shoes back where they belonged, and managed to fumble into a pair of sweatpants and a shirt.
She huffed as she tried to pull the shirt down only to realize that she was trying to put it on upside down. She began to giggle hysterically, the sounds of her laughter echoing in her empty chambers until her laughter died down, and she seemed to sober up almost instantly.
“I miss you, all of you,” she said under her breath. “It’s not fair what happened, I know, and I know I could’ve dealt with things a lot better, but I can’t change that now. All I know is, I can’t go back. I hope you understand.”
She flopped onto the bed without bothering to fix her shirt, and with one hand splayed across the bed, and the other across her face, she drifted off into a deep nostalgic sleep.
Chapter Two
Claudia tried not to scowl as she made it through the usual morning check up with the girls. They usually spent the morning off, doing whatever their heart desires so long as they were back on time. Usually, Claudia and Sauri would check and make sure that everything was in order before they do. They had to make sure the girls were properly fed, well clothed, and groomed at all times.
They had very few rules at La Chambre De Plaisir, and what rules they did have, were meant to keep them and the women who lived here safe, and to make sure everyone got what they wanted out of the deal. It was, after all, a business, at the end of the day.
Her head felt like it was being nailed
to the wall with a jack hammer while little people rummaged around for diamonds inside her skill, and she tried to ignore that as she focused on the task at hand. She had to make sure the last girl was good to go before she sent them off on the way. She sighed as she realized everything was good, and she dismissed the girls.
At 26, Claudia still kept in shape, and her French genes definitely helped her maintain that willowy figure that she was sure she would lose once she gave up tennis. Somehow, though she hadn’t. She still moved with the grace and finesse of an athlete which often drew the attention of many men in the room, but she never paid attention to them. Not even to flirt.
She was very conscious of the way she acted around men, lest she encouraged them, and in a place like this, you didn’t want to be misunderstood. There were times when she was tempted to break her vow to herself, her parents, and Andrew, but every time she thought about it, she would come down hard on that little voice inside her head and ignore it.
She was cursed, so she knew it was better to just keep her distance rather than risk going through even half of the pain she went through all over again.
Her refusal didn’t make the men ask any less, but it sure did make them more intrigued. They all wondered about the 26-year old beauty who was half French, half English, and seemed not to have the slightest bit of interest in men. What fueled the fire even more was that she was a virgin.
A wry smile made its way to her face as she grabbed a book from her room, and made her way to the roof where she could get some peace and quiet for the next few hours as she lost herself in a book. She knew the rumors that circulated around her. That she was secretly a lesbian.