by Aya De León
“Quit stalling,” she said. “What’s your real name?”
“Melvyn,” he said. “Don’t tell nobody.”
“Can I call you Mel?”
“You can call me Woof,” he said, an edge of irritation creeping into his voice.
“Okay, Woof,” Tyesha said.
He nodded. She looked out at the midtown traffic, watching a car nearly run into the side of a pickup truck.
“So, what’s up with your friends?” he asked. “They graduate students, too?”
“No,” Tyesha said, the lie slipping out easily. “Just working on their taxes.”
“Y’all pay taxes?” Woof asked.
“Of course,” Tyesha said. “They came with me because at home they’d procrastinate.”
“They roommates?” Woof asked. “Aw, hell naw!” he said, and Tyesha could see realization dawning. He laughed uproariously. “Brandon and Mike was fucking some dykes.”
“Please don’t tell them—” Tyesha said.
“Plenty dudes would pay for two girls,” Woof said. “Or just watch.”
“It’s not like that,” Tyesha said. “There’s work and pleasure. They don’t mix it.”
“You gay, too?” Woof asked. “That why you turned me down?”
“It’s not that,” Tyesha said. “I’m just turned off by men who act like the world is just one big pussy waiting to fuck them.”
Woof laughed, and a taxi beeped behind him.
“Gotta go,” Tyesha said.
Woof handed her his card. “Text me your info for the plane ticket to LA.”
Tyesha nodded and waved good-bye as he crossed the street to his SUV.
She got into the cab.
“What the hell?” Jody asked as the taxi pulled away from the curb.
“He invited me to the Oscars and I said yes!” Tyesha blurted.
“Fuck, yeah!” Kim said.
“Marisol’s gonna kill you for dating a client,” Jody said, her jaw tight.
“Aww, he gave you roses.” Kim gestured to the bouquet in Tyesha’s lap.
“Are you two fucking kidding me?” Jody said. “We need to focus.”
* * *
Twenty minutes later, the cab dropped them a couple of blocks from a nondescript gray cargo van. Marisol had rented it under a false name with cash, splattered mud on the plates, and parked on a side street. The three women opened the back door and climbed in.
Kim unzipped the bag. “Okay, ladies,” she said. “Time to get manly.”
* * *
“Sorry to keep you waiting,” VanDyke said. He stepped through the doorway in a blue oxford shirt with an open neck and a pair of navy slacks.
Marisol smiled and shrugged.
“You look gorgeous,” he said, looking her up and down. “Let me take that.” He reached for her coat and led her into the hall. “I hope you’ve brought an appetite.”
“I’ve brought more than one,” she said.
She looked him over. He kept his body in shape. His face was a little pale and narrow-featured. Involuntarily, she thought of Raul.
VanDyke put a hand on her back, as if to steer her down the hallway, his cool palm against her warm flesh.
The entire apartment was characterized by separation. You could wait in the front hall and only see the Ming vase. The central hallway was nothing but doors. She asked to use the restroom and VanDyke opened one of the doors for her.
“I hope you like Burmese food,” he said, after she came back out. He opened a door on the opposite wall that led to a cozy dining nook with a view of the East River. The table was set for two with a pair of stemmed glasses, a bottle of wine, and candles.
“My personal chef does great South and Southeast Asian cuisine,” he said.
“Is all the help next door in the kitchen or something?” Marisol asked as she sat down.
He laughed. “I gave everyone the night off. The chef left it warming.” He opened the cabinet in the wall beside the table, and spicy-smelling steam rushed out. A large platter held portions of food in bright yellows and reds. Even the rice was multicolored. White, red, and black.
“I hope you’re not a vegetarian,” he said.
“Not at all. I love meat.” She smiled and followed his lead as he reached for the chicken dish. Other than the unusually colored rice, the food looked like a combination of Indian and Thai.
In some ways, Marisol hated this most. Pretending it was a dinner date. Like he wasn’t paying and the sex wasn’t a sure thing. Part of her wanted them to fuck first and get it over with so she could enjoy the meal.
“Would you like some more wine?” he asked.
“Yes, please.” She lifted her glass.
She drank. Relax, Marisol, she encouraged herself. Swirl the wine on your tongue. Take it slow, and give the team time to prepare.
“I must tell you,” he said, as he finished a bite of Khow suey, a spicy meat and noodle dish. “Your business concept is brilliant.”
“Thank you,” Marisol said. “I’ve always believed that inclusion of the nonprofit industry can create a value added bonus to services that private-sector investors consume.” She drank. “The nonprofit provides the services that protect my workforce, and the tax write-off protects wealth for the consumer. It’s win-win.”
“About the workforce,” he said. “What’s the long-term incentive? Not everyone can move into management. What’s the retirement plan?”
“Most girls want personal benefactors in permanent arrangements.”
“What?” VanDyke asked. “You mean, as in some kind of mistress arrangement?”
“No,” Marisol said. “Permanent—as in marriage.”
“You consider marriage a personal benefactor arrangement?” he asked.
“Happens all the time.” Marisol shrugged. “Let me take you away from all this. In the movies, it’s almost cliché.”
“A retirement plan that the corporation doesn’t pay for,” VanDyke said. “You have the mind of a Wharton MBA inside the body of a fifties pin-up.”
“They’re not supposed to go together?”
“It just seems that women who look like you become actresses or singers, or trophy wives.”
“I tried the trophy part,” Marisol said. “The guy would have married me, but it was boring.”
“That’s what I mean,” VanDyke said. “Other women would have settled for that, but not you. Why not?”
“For the same reason you wouldn’t,” Marisol said.
“I couldn’t find a woman to keep me in the style to which I’m accustomed.”
“Oh, come on, Jeremy. You’re good-looking. And the billionaire thing could be a big turn-on for some wealthy older woman.”
He laughed.
“What if I could find you a buyer?” Marisol asked. “Would you settle? Would you settle for Pilates every day and shopping and charity luncheons? You wouldn’t last an hour. You’d be bored out of your mind. And insulted. You’d feel like your genius was being wasted. Then, what’s the difference between you and me except gender? And that I’m better-looking.”
“I thought you said I was good-looking,” Jeremy said.
“You are,” Marisol said. “You’re a very sexy guy, Jeremy. I noticed it when I met you. There’s this pull toward you. Part charisma. Part power. There you are in the suit, and suddenly I want to be alone with you.”
“Then why didn’t you want to come tonight?” he asked. “You hesitated at first.”
Marisol leaned back and crossed her arms. “If you had asked me out on a date, you know I would have said yes. But you made me a business proposition. I know what the product is worth, and I don’t undervalue my assets. If I get to have a luxurious, erotic evening with you, that’s just a fringe benefit.”
“So we could have had this same evening without the donation to your clinic?”
“Absolutely not,” she said. “You’re paying for expediency. You’re paying to get an asset in one night that otherwise would have taken mont
hs to acquire.”
“I once waited over a decade to acquire a company,” VanDyke said. “Laid the groundwork step by step.”
“I checked your portfolio,” Marisol said. “Both business and . . . domestic. You like a quick merger, sudden turnover, and to let the asset go before it’s clear what the long-term prognosis is. If it crashes and burns, you don’t take the blame, but if it soars, it becomes part of the VanDyke mystique. How. Does. He. Do. It?”
“A strategy that works,” VanDyke said.
“It works better in business than in your domestic affairs,” Marisol said. “And I have certain liabilities that starlets and socialites don’t have. Liabilities that you wouldn’t want in the tabloids. I know why you sent the staff home.”
“You do understand my portfolio,” he said.
“You wanted to ask me out at the gala, but I hadn’t been vetted yet,” she said. “You got some background on me and found out I wasn’t a contender for a longer-term, more visible arrangement, but you couldn’t resist the write-off. You knew we could come to an agreement.”
“I’m not used to women who can decode me,” VanDyke said, his brow furrowed.
“I raised the price to protect my own interests,” Marisol said, pleased and validated by her effect on him, a Puerto Rican girl from the hood, talking finance and business with a billionaire. “When you took the date off the table, I lost out on a massive secondary gain.”
“Which was what?” he asked.
“Disclosure,” she said. “If we meet as escort and client, I’ll never disclose that fact. On the other hand, if we were to meet on a date, no gag order. So I might let it slip in a strategic moment that I had dinner with you. You know exactly what that’s worth for a businesswoman. Any personal connection with you puts my stock through the roof.”
“You’re charging me for the monetary value of bragging rights?” he asked.
“ ‘Everything has value,’” she said. “ ‘The wise entrepreneur gives nothing away for free without a strategy.’”
“Now I’m the one who thinks I’m dreaming,” he said. “I’m sitting here with the hottest woman on the planet, and she’s quoting my words back to me about how she used my theories to get me to triple my offer.”
“Quintuple,” Marisol said.
He reached across the table and took her hand. It brought back the dream in which Raul had taken her hand on the beach. Inside the dream, that had felt so right, so perfect.
VanDyke’s hand felt wrong. She dropped her eyes, attempting to look coy, steeling herself against the rising sense of repulsion.
She took a breath and retracted her attention from the contact points of his palm on the back of her hand. She pulled some part of herself deep inside, curled it up safely, and met his eyes.
“It’s sort of like a mind fuck,” he said, his lips parting into a slow grin.
“More than just mind,” she said.
She needed to get things moving to keep the plan on time. She reached forward, grabbed his tie, and tugged it.
VanDyke leaned across the table and kissed her. Softly, his tongue gently touched hers. He put a finger on her jawline and slid his hand around to the back of her neck.
When the kiss ended, she pushed back her chair and walked around the table to him, wrapped her arms around his neck, and kissed him more insistently, pressing against him, tousling his hair with her gloved fingers.
Chapter 20
How similar men’s bodies were under their clothes, under their titles and their salaries. Some tiny part of her was surprised to find that Jeremy VanDyke was no different, billions and all. The only difference was the possibility of the heist, bigger than anything she had ever imagined.
The power of it made her skin flush with heat, her pulse race. More than strangers from uptown bars, where she could call the shots. She was every bit as much in control, but the money was a delicious secret, and the combination was thoroughly intoxicating.
“Let’s go to bed,” he murmured into her neck.
“Yes,” Marisol said. On the way out of the kitchen, she grabbed her clutch purse.
The enormous bedroom, done in decidedly masculine colors—slate blue with chrome furniture—looked out on the river. Nestled in the corner was a king-size bed with gray bedding.
He accelerated. His tongue in her mouth, his hands feeling up her breasts through the dress. She moaned to feign pleasure, and peeled off the elbow-length gloves so she could work. She wrapped one arm around his neck while she unsnapped her purse behind his back. She tossed the gloves onto the table.
He unzipped the upper half of her dress, and she let the purse drop to the floor, palming a couple of accessories in her hand.
She had selected the turquoise dress for the waft of the satin and the drama of the unveiling as much as for the way she looked while wearing it. The dress coming off should look like a wave washing down along her body, sweeping her clothing out to sea.
She stood in front of VanDyke: her body in profile, the upper half twisted toward him, full face, cleavage visible. A little snatch, a little ass, a little hip. Perfect.
She reached and undid the rest of the zipper of the dress. She held the bodice up in the front, revealing a slice of her bra strap, and the skin of her shoulder. Finger by finger, she released her hold on the garment, let the fabric fall in a wave to her feet, the remains of the dress crumpled around her ankles like sea foam. Marisol rose up out of the ocean in her deep violet demi-bra and matching thong panties like a bikini.
He looked in awe at her full breasts and narrow waist, her wide hips and round ass.
Marisol tucked a condom and tiny tube of lubricant into the back of her thong. She dropped her hands to her sides, palms up, soft inner arms forward. Head back; neck exposed.
Slowly, without taking his eyes off her, he unbuttoned his shirt and peeled it off, along with his undershirt. The tan was more pronounced on his face, but he wasn’t pale like she’d expected. He unbuckled his slacks and let them drop, revealing long, muscled legs with pale blond hair on the calves. He stepped out of his shoes and socks and walked toward her.
She slipped one hand behind her back and pulled out her accessories. He slid both arms around her waist and ran his hands down over her ass. She wrapped one brown leg around his waist and thrust her hips against his. He had a raging erection. He unhooked her bra and slid both hands under it to cup her breasts.
He backed her up toward the bed and she fell onto it, undoing the French twist and splaying her dark wavy hair below her. He climbed up onto her and groped her breasts, kissed her neck, tangled his fingers in her hair.
With her left hand, she popped open the lubricant. As he pressed his tongue into her mouth, she used her index finger to push aside her thong panties and squirted the lube inside her. Let him think she was this wet for him. She tucked the lube beneath the corner of the bed to retrieve it later. Then she opened the condom packet and tucked it beneath the pillow where she could easily get to it.
With both hands free, she slid them down into his underwear, caressing his erection. He moaned and his tongue went slack in her mouth. She rolled on top of him and pressed her tongue into his mouth.
She reached up and pulled the condom out of the packet, dropping the wrapper onto the floor and slipping the condom into her mouth.
She straddled him and pulled off his underwear, checking out his penis at close range. Nuzzling it, to camouflage her inspection.
She leaned in and put the condom on with her mouth. He moaned as she took him deep into her throat, just to the point before she gagged, then pulled out. With one hand, she kept massaging his erection, shielding the condom from his view. With the other hand, she pulled off her thong, and tossed it so it would fall onto the bed within his reach.
He picked it up and saw the telltale sign of fresh moisture on the crotch.
“Oh, you make me so wet!” she moaned. “I just can’t wait!” And with that, she thrust him inside her, riding him hard.
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It took him a minute to rally. He wasn’t willing to be topped the whole time. He rolled her over and finished up in the missionary position. She hated the feeling of him on top of her, but she tuned out from the sensations in her body. Instead, she focused on reaching under the pillows and checking around the edges of the bed to make sure he didn’t have any weapons handy. After a while, she began moaning, faking a massive orgasm and wrapping her thighs around him as if her life depended on it.
After their breathing returned to normal, she wiped the moisture from her forehead. “That was amazing,” she said.
He smiled.
A moment later, she reached down between her legs. “We should—”
“Of course,” he said, and began to pull out. She held the condom expertly, pulling it first out of herself without leaking, and then off of him, all in less than a second. If he even knew she used one, he didn’t say anything.
“I’ll be right back,” she said. She managed to scoop up the lube and wrapper, and held them with the used condom in her hand as she walked toward a pair of doors.
“Door on the left,” he said.
In the bathroom, she tied the condom and flushed it with the other stuff. Cleaned up some of the lube and washed her hands.
She ran her fingers through her hair. She wanted to look tousled, but not disheveled. Now came the more awkward part. If they were lovers, they would cuddle. If he were a cheap client, she would collect her money and leave. But he was something in between. The sexual tension and fantasy that had held them together was now gone. Would he be a talker? Or the I’ve-got-to-get-back-to-work type of businessman? Or, God forbid, the I-could-really-fall-for-you-under-other-circumstances type of guy?
The team was due any minute. She needed to keep him in the bedroom for when they arrived.
She opened the bathroom door. He was lying back on the bed, covers up to his waist, arms folded behind his head, a portrait of satisfaction. She scanned the bed area carefully, still checking to make sure he didn’t have a gun within reach.
“Looks like someone satisfied more than just my curiosity.” She smirked and sat on the edge of the bed, naked. She didn’t want to take liberties—get back into the bed like a lover—but she wanted to continue to be available, interested. She reached over and ran her hand across his chest.