The Delicious Torment

by Alison Tyler

  Chapter Twenty–Five:

  Waiting

  I don’t know if it’s true or not for most people, but I do know that pacing around the apartment had a dim effect on my psyche. Had I done the right thing sending Alex off in my place? I was taking a monumental risk. Jack had prepared this intricate sex game for me, with one carefully chosen photo leading to the next. And rather than end at the predestined conclusion—which I was guessing was kinky sex in the back alley behind the sushi restaurant—Alex and I had turned the game upside down.

  Sure, I worried about Alex, too. I’m not a totally cold-hearted bitch. But I worried for myself more. I thought I knew Jack by now, understood a bit of the way he was wired. You could disagree with him, say his opinions were wrong—whatever—but you had to use a respectful tone of voice. Jack commanded respect at all times.

  Had I disregarded that by willingly changing his plans?

  I supposed I would find out soon.

  Darkness fell, and there was no word from either man. And then I heard Jack enter the apartment, and I hurried down the hall from where I was pretending to work. I still had on my fabulous new outfit, and I’d primped for at least an hour in the mirror, recreating the exact way Matteo had styled my hair. But Jack didn’t seem to notice.

  “Where the fuck were you?”

  In a heartbeat, I understood. Still, I tried my best to act natural.

  “Didn’t Alex say?”

  Jack was already in motion, my wrists in his grip, hauling me toward the bedroom. I stumbled along next to him, feeling his fury come off him in waves.

  “Didn’t he, Jack? Didn’t he tell you?”

  This was the angriest I’d ever seen Jack. He didn’t speak. Simply stripped my clothes away. I stood entirely still as he pulled my shirt over my head, and he caught me off balance as he pushed me back onto the bed to undo my boots.

  “He didn’t show up, did he?” I asked stupidly. Why hadn’t I thought of that as a possibility? I was so sure Alex would be drawn to confess, the way I am always drawn to confess, to beg forgiveness, to be absolved.

  Jack remained silent, and in moments I was naked. Deep inside myself, I felt prepared to take whatever Jack had to give. But I wanted my chance to defend my actions.

  “Please,” I started, as he came forward with the cuffs. “Listen, Jack.”

  “I sat there for an hour,” he said, and once more I could feel the heat of his rage. If I believed in auras, Jack’s would have been blood red.

  “He was supposed to meet you,” I told him, speaking quickly now, not sure how long Jack would listen. “He had something to tell you.”

  “A message from you?”

  “No, Jack. It’s not about me this time. Not at all.”

  The cuffs were on. Jack was binding me exactly how he wanted, my arms above my head, ankles spread wide apart and fastened with thick leather straps. I could feel tears in my eyes, but not from fear. This wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. I had to explain. And yet I wanted Alex so badly to be the one to tell. Now, I was doing to him what he’d done to me. I was ratting him out. But really, he’d left me no other choice.

  “Why weren’t you there?” Jack asked, his voice smooth now that I was bound. He seemed to have regained control of himself. And although I sensed the emotions right under the surface, I also saw that this was my opportunity to explain.

  “Jack, look. Just listen for a second.” He’d begun rifling through his wardrobe of toys, and I didn’t want to fight for his attention with the various crops and canes, paddles and slappers, floggers and belts. When he turned to face me, for a moment, I felt relief.

  “Alex told me something today. In confidence. He told me something, and I said that he needed to tell you, too. I wanted him to meet you for dinner to talk to you. I thought that was the best way to handle the situation.”

  “You’re choreographing things now?”

  “No, Jack. Wait. Listen. It was important.” I wished my hands were free so I could hold them up, gesture, show him. As it was, I begged with my eyes and my words.

  “What was so important that you disobeyed a direct command?” A thin black crop danced in his hands. Before I could respond, he’d slashed it through the air once, catching the fullest part of my ass. I cringed and bit down on a moan, and Jack struck again, in the same place, giving me no chance to recover. Again, the crop came down, and I fought within myself to figure out what to do next. I didn’t want to sell out Alex. I wasn’t feeling vindictive toward him, but I also didn’t need to take on his punishment.

  Jack was working faster now. Harder. And the pain flooded through me. I tried to figure out what I should be saying, doing, but the crop made thinking difficult. Jack striped me, and I took each blow. I had disobeyed, after all. Regardless of the fact that I was trying to help, trying to make the right decision, I had gone against Jack’s requests. Then he dropped the crop and I saw him reach for a cane. He set the weapon down by my head, where I could look at it, while he went searching for another tool. When he came toward me again, he had a bright-red ball gag in his hands.

  Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck. My desire to help Alex was fading quickly.

  “He loves me.” I blurted the words out without thoughts now, knowing that if I didn’t make Jack understand quickly, he would render speech impossible, and it might be hours before we could talk normally once more.

  “He what?” Jack didn’t move, and I knew I had a little more time.

  “He asked me if I thought I could love him.”

  “And you said…” I looked back over my shoulder. Jack’s eyes were the darkest blue I’d ever seen. Nearly black, as if the pupils had swallowed up all the light.

  “I didn’t say yes and I didn’t say no. Jack, I told him he had to talk to you. That he had to tell you.”

  Jack leaned against the wooden wardrobe. He seemed taken aback by my news.

  “I’m sorry, Jack,” I said, and now the tears that had threatened to fall spilled free. “I’m sorry I disobeyed you. I shouldn’t have changed your plans. I didn’t know what to do. He said those things, and I was confused…”

  Jack stayed silent, and I felt hopeless, and then, to my total shock, he smiled. It wasn’t an eerie, dark grin; it was a real smile. As if something he’d been planning had come to unexpectedly early fruition.

  “I don’t know why he didn’t meet you,” I said into Jack’s silence.

  “Because the boy was scared.” He spoke the words with some satisfaction.

  “So where do you think he is?”

  “If I know Alex, he’s with Juliette. Taking his punishment before confessing his sins.” Jack seemed to be speaking from experience. But while he seemed at ease, my head was spinning. Why was this good news to Jack? Did he want Alex to be in love with me? Nothing made any sense.

  Jack came forward and petted me, stroking my new haircut, ruffling it up with his hand.

  “You look good,” he said.

  “Yeah?” Confusion left me reeling.

  “I knew that cut would suit you. I was waiting at the restaurant to see, and when you didn’t show up, I thought you were pulling another one of your stunts. It never occurred to me that Alex was pulling one of his. But I should have known. He’d never have let you run off today. He was in charge of your every moment.” His hand moved from the top of my head down my spine toward my ass. His touch was rough, but friendly, the way you’d stroke a big dog. “I’ve been working so hard,” Jack continued, “that I didn’t consider other options for why you weren’t waiting at the restaurant, sake in place.”

  Now, he lifted the gag once more, and fear returned.

  “You did the right thing, Sam,” Jack said softly as he buckled the gag between my lips. “But that doesn’t mean you won’t be punished for disobedience.” He lifted the cane and let the tip follow the route his fingers had taken moments before, tracing down my spine before coming to rest on my ass.

  “I’ll deal with Alex later—we will, together—but now, it’s
you and me…”

  Chapter Twenty–Six:

  The Chain

  Jack hadn’t even raised the cane once when we heard the knock. The sound wasn’t loud, but loud enough. I think we both realized what the low rapping meant at the same time: Alex.

  It was odd that he was knocking. I knew that right away. Alex had a key. And he’d never had any problem barging into the apartment in the past for any reason at all. Jack set down the cane, but left me bound. He didn’t hurry down the hall the way I would have, curiosity driving me onward. He walked at his normal, even pace. I heard the door open, heard the low sound of male voices, and wondered like hell what was going on.

  In moments, Jack was back, and this time he did set me free: the gag, the handcuffs, the ankle restraints.

  “Get dressed,” he said, and his tone was more tender than it had been moments before. “I need your help.”

  I dressed quickly, not in the fancy sex-charged clothes I’d purchased earlier in the day, but in a wrecked pair of old Levi’s and one of my favorite formfitting long-sleeved shirts. This one a lipstick red. Then I hurried after Jack, still wondering what was up. Had it not been Alex at the door? Had it been someone from Jack’s office? A delivery person, a messenger?

  No. It was Alex. Slumped in Jack’s favorite chair. Head in his hands.

  You’d think that a person couldn’t change his appearance that much in a few hours. But Alex had managed. He looked totally disheveled, shirt untucked, slacks rumpled. And it took me a moment to realize that he was drunk. Seriously drunk. I could hear Jack in the kitchen, and from the sounds of water running and beans being ground, I understood he was making a pot of French roast.

  I sat on the edge of the low coffee table looking at Alex. So this was the result of letting loose your emotions after keeping them under wraps for so long. Alex had been the perfect tool. And, the funny thing is, I truly don’t mean that as an insult. I mean it as a compliment. Jack had relied on Alex for years, had trusted him with his most treasured possessions—both monetary, like his cars and his houses, and romantic, like me. And Alex had risen to the challenge every time.

  But now, he was broken.

  I wondered whether I should say something. Or go forward and comfort him. In some respects, I didn’t know Alex well enough to put my arms around him, to draw him close to me. How bizarre was that? Here was a man who had been extremely intimate with me in so many ways, and yet I knew almost nothing about him. Didn’t know his middle name. Or where he went to high school. Or how many siblings he had. Didn’t know him well enough to cuddle next to him on the big chair and surround him with my heat.

  Silence screamed all around us. There was nothing for me to say.

  Jack reemerged with a cup of steaming coffee, and when he looked at me, I saw that for once, he didn’t seem to know what to do. We weren’t acting properly the way characters should. I moved closer to Alex, so that I was right in front of him, and I pulled his hands away from his face.

  “You didn’t make it to dinner,” I said trying my best for a light tone of voice. “So where have you been?”

  He shut his eyes tight, as if trying to remember, and when he opened them again, he looked at me. I could tell that he was trying hard not to look at Jack. “I don’t know,” he said at first, but then he quickly named a place. A bar in Hollywood.

  “You drive here?” Jack asked, his voice rough.

  “No, I walked.” Alex blinked hard and then looked at me. “You told him?”

  And for the first time that evening, I saw a bit of myself in Alex. That time with Byron when I’d gotten drunk at his father’s house, choosing to spend a night on the cold marble floor by the commode rather than face Byron’s wrath. I was surprised to realize this, but Alex hadn’t had the guts to have a man-to-man talk with Jack. And yet, he was here, wasn’t he? He hadn’t chickened out entirely.

  “Yeah,” I said finally. “Yeah, I told him.” I wanted to explain further. I wanted to say to him, What else could I do, you bastard? You left me no fucking choice? But this didn’t seem the time to further harass Alex. Not in his current state.

  Alex swallowed, and then he looked back at the floor. I wondered why Jack wasn’t saying anything. Why he wasn’t forcing his way into the conversation. I gripped Alex’s hands in mine, holding them tight. “Alex, I only told him a little bit. You have to tell him the rest yourself. You have to explain.”

  He pulled his hands free and then reached into his pocket, drawing out a ring of keys. He set them down on the edge of the coffee table, and my heart sank. I saw what he was doing, where he was going, and I ached for him.

  “I came to drop them off,” he said, and when he looked back at me, I wondered if he was as drunk as I’d first thought. Was he putting on an act? His eyes looked clearer now. I reached for the coffee from Jack and handed over the mug. Alex took a sip and then held the cup between both hands.

  “Don’t do this,” I said. “Come on, Alex. Tell him.”

  “Your car is fine,” Alex continued. “It’s in valet. They’ll hold it for you.”

  “Alex—” Why wasn’t Jack stopping him? Why was I the only one who seemed to be feeling any real sort of emotion? I wanted to cry. And then I wanted to scream. To throw things. To shake these two men up. Are all men like this? I wanted to yell at them. Unable to have an honest discussion about things that matter. Not sports or work or cars. But love and emotions and sex.

  “I’ll pick up my things from Malibu tomorrow,” Alex continued. “I’m sure you won’t have any problems finding another…”

  “What?” I demanded, sick to death of this fucked-up scene. “Finding another what? You’re going to say ‘assistant,’ but you know you’re not an assistant. Not only an assistant anyway. You know that.” Why the fuck was Jack just standing there, like something carved from stone? Why was Alex reciting this idiotic resignation speech? Half-slurred, half-mumbled. It was insane. “He’s not going to replace you.”

  “He has to.”

  “But why?”

  “Because I can’t do this anymore.” Alex’s voice was pleading. I heard Jack move behind me, and I was surprised to see him pouring a shot of whiskey. “I can’t.” Alex turned, directing his voice toward Jack. “I’m sorry, Jack—”

  I realized that this didn’t have anything to do with me, did it?

  Jack didn’t turn around. He downed the liquid in a single shot, and then poured another. And I got lost in an image from back in time.

  The first threesome I had was with two guys I knew from college, Jarred and Mark. I’d hung out with Jarred all year long, playing video games in his room, watching movies on his TV. He was a junior and he had an extremely uptight sorority girlfriend, but he liked me to sleep in his bed when she wasn’t around. And one night near the end of the school year, we found ourselves off campus, studying at another friend’s apartment. And we started drinking. Tequila. We even went out and bought more tequila when we killed the first bottle. I remember trying uselessly to match these two boys shot for shot. I remember going to the bathroom at one point during the evening and being unable to redo the buttons on my 501s afterward. I remember being sandwiched between these handsome studs—boys who had been buddies since high school—and there was almost unbelievable pleasure at being the link between them. A necessary link. They couldn’t have done the things they did if I hadn’t been in the room, on the bed. In the morning, along with my first hangover, I woke up with a huge bruise on my chest. Mark had a cast on one hand, and it must have come down on me hard during the night.

  After that, we weren’t friends anymore. I wasn’t upset at them. I didn’t feel guilty. Not really. But things were different. I heard from someone else later on, that the boys were no longer friends either. Had I done that somehow?

  Had I done it again, to Alex and Jack? Was this my fault?

  “Jack—” Alex said. “Jack—”

  And Jack turned around. “Why, Alex? You owe me that.”

  Alex didn
’t look away this time. “I don’t know. It’s different.”

  “From what?”

  “From any of the other times, Jack. It’s different. It’s different with her.”

  No, I was wrong. It was about me. I wanted the whiskey.

  “You love her?” Jack’s voice burned as cold as his eyes.

  “Damn it, Jack. Don’t you fucking get it?” I looked over at Alex, surprised by his tone of voice, yet thinking that I’d guessed correctly. He was playing drunker than he actually was. “Jesus fucking Christ, Jack. I don’t love her.” Oh, god, and I saw it coming. Even if Jack didn’t. I saw it. And I couldn’t look away. I had to watch every second. Alex’s voice softened, but his eyes stayed locked on Jack’s. “I love you.”

  I got up then, and I walked to the bar, snagged a bottle, and headed down the hall.

  You can’t fuck with people’s hearts and not expect fireworks.

  You can’t keep someone on a short leash and not expect to be bitten.

  And I’d been right in my first guess after all. This drama wasn’t about me. What had Alex been going on about at the park? Could I love him? He didn’t want me to. Not really. What he wanted was a place. A place in the mix, a point in the triangle. He wanted what he’d always wanted: a share of Jack’s heart.

  Chapter Twenty–Seven:

  Trust

  Did everything make sense?

  Yeah, finally. Or rather—well, almost.

  Was the confession a relief?

  Hmm. Not sure how to answer that. I’d known there was something more. Some powerful connection between the two men in my life. There couldn’t not be. Not the way they acted. And yes I have an extremely active—I’d even say rampant—imagination. And yes I’d seen Jack interact physically with Alex before. But I hadn’t gone to this place in my head, to this fantasy world featuring Alex in love with Jack, and all that not-so-simple four-letter word might mean.

  The truth was that Jack hadn’t told me any of his secrets. I assumed that he would at some point. I thought he’d sit me down and break open the vault, the way I had once long ago with Byron. And I was planning on doing my part not to let history repeat itself. No matter what Jack told me, I would be supportive. I would give him what he needed.