Inhaling deep breaths, I finally manage to calm myself. “Do you work for Rhea or Beryl?”
“No. Listen, I’m going to leave you for a minute, but don’t worry. I won’t be far.”
I swivel in my seat to follow her progress toward the door. “Who do you work for then?”
She turns her head, winks at me, and goes through the door. It swings shut behind her.
What the hell?
The ladies’ room starts filling up with other women, so I rise to my feet and straighten out my dress. I can’t hide in here forever. Rhea is not answering my texts—I’ve just sent her three of them. That is not good news. Now I’m not sure what to do—leave or stay longer.
I push open the door and walk out into the hallway. Glancing to the right, I wonder where the long hall leads as it goes about fifteen feet and then winds to the left. To my left, the hallway leads back to the ballroom just a few steps away with another quick left turn. I’m about to head that way to return to the table when I spot the woman who protected me in the restroom. She sees me too and nods to a man next to her. What happens next happens so fast that my brain can’t make coherent sense of it.
All I know is that someone very large grabs me and propels me down the hallway toward the right—the opposite way I was heading. I try to scream, but a large hand claps over my mouth. Other people fall in line behind us, and when it hooks to the left, I see there’s an emergency exit.
Oh shit. I think Rico’s got me.
Am I going to die?
46
Marley Jacobs
They push me right past the exit door, but there’s no relief because they blindfold me, and then I’m dragged up two flights of stairs. I’m pulled along again, a door opens and closes, and I’m tossed on what feels like a bed.
Fuck, I’m in deep trouble. Why do I do this to myself? I could be home now with Fletcher, safe and sound and trying to win his never-ending love and devotion.
No one is speaking, but I can hear heavy breathing. I can’t tell if it’s one person or more. The bed dips with someone’s weight, and then I feel hands grab me and flip me over like a rag doll until I’m lying across someone’s lap. I know that because I feel the body heat and the texture of hard thighs under my hips, and the rest of me is on the bed. It feels like an elbow is pinning me down. What the hell is he doing to me? Is he going to kill me right now? Gut and fillet me like a trout?
But that’s not what happens.
No. Instead, I feel my dress being lifted up as cool air kisses my exposed skin. The skirt is lifted to my back, exposing my posterior—and I’m wearing thong panties. I’m flailing and beating, trying to reach someone to hit, when my arms are pulled behind me, and my wrists are held together by one large hand. Then whoever it is starts whaling on my naked backside with the other.
Spanking. Me.
The word spanking is so harmless and not suitable at all for what it actually entails. It sounds like something you do to a naughty child—a few gentle swats on a backside padded with clothing or maybe even a bulky diaper on a toddler. No pain, just humiliation.
But this spanking that I’m currently receiving should be called something else. Whaling. Beating. Vicious slapping. I don’t know.
By the third swat, my rear end is in burning agony, and still the hand keeps raining down on me. My only consolation is that whoever is beating me will have a very sore hand tomorrow.
Yeah, but what will I have? I won’t be able to sit down. I shriek loudly with each strike and on the fourth one, I hear a chuckle coming from a different part of the room.
An audience?
This son of a bitch who’s beating me—I assume Rico—has an audience. He always was an exhibitionist, one of the major reasons I ran from him. This fucking bastard—I’m definitely going to kill him if he doesn’t kill me first.
I lose count of how many strikes I’ve taken when it abruptly stops. I can hear panting, which makes me happy that he’s out of breath. So am I, of course, from screaming. My throat is raw, my backside is red-hot sore, my shoulders ache from having my arms twisted behind me.
In other words, I’m not happy. I’m the opposite of happy.
My tormentor turns me over and places me on the bed. The pain from my inflamed skin touching the bedding is instant, provoking another scream from me. The response is more laughter, which infuriates me. What’s worse than people laughing at your pain? Nothing.
Then I hear the door close.
Did he leave me here alone? That was a mistake. My hands move up to yank off the blindfold but someone stops me.
I’m not alone.
Hands pull at me, arranging my body on the bed. Push my dress up again. Part my legs. Oh no.
“Please… I’m married. Please don’t do this.” I go to pull off the blindfold again, and again I’m stopped. This time he doesn’t let go of my wrists, tightly gripping them in one hand.
Then I feel warm breath on my upper thighs. There’s nothing between his mouth and me except a tiny pair of lacy panties.
I try pleading one more time. “Listen. I’m married, and I take my vows seriously. Please… just talk to me.”
The crotch of my panties is pulled over and a hot, wet mouth closes on my clit, his tongue circling it before dipping lower and inside me. I squeeze my eyes shut behind the blindfold as tears leak out and begin to soak the dark cloth. He is taking his time, licking me, nipping me, and maintaining his iron grip on both my wrists and my thighs.
I’m too scared to have any response. Thank God. I wouldn’t want to get aroused from a sexual assault. That’s disgusting and just not possible.
But it doesn’t feel like an assault. It feels tender. Like he cares about me. It doesn’t feel violent at all. Not like the spanking certainly. He’s kissing me, stroking me, gently arousing me.
I cannot orgasm. No. I just cannot. That would be terrible. To be subjected to a nonconsensual encounter and then to enjoy it? What kind of person does that?
But I feel my stupid body responding, damn it, so I start to think of yucky things. Cat vomit, dog poop, sweaty people on a crowded bus or train… grrr… it’s no use. He’s too good with his tongue. I’m going to come. It’s barreling forward like a weighted freight train going downhill, and there’s no stopping it. Can I prevent him from knowing?
Yes. Yes, I can. I just need to be as quiet as a mouse and try not to move. Let it all happen in my head and nowhere else. It’s right there, just out of reach, and then it slams into me.
The tiny whimper I make is inaudible—I’m sure of it. I keep it captive in my throat. Not easy, but I manage it. Good going, Marley. You did it, girl.
But the figurative back-slapping stops as a giant shudder sweeps through my entire body, and when he licks me again, I convulse.
Game over. Fuuuuuck. He knows. Shame overwhelms me.
My shame simmers, boils, and starts to change form. I feel my anger rising. I try to free my legs so I can kick him away from me with everything I have, but he has them pinned down too well. “Let me go,” I growl out from between gritted teeth. He still holds my wrists. The fury is building from my gut outward, blossoming out like an exploding bomb. I feel ready to kill.
Finally, when I can bear my helplessness no longer and am about to start wailing, he must sense the change in me, and so he pulls off the blindfold.
My eyes flip open immediately, and I blink. I can’t believe what I’m seeing.
Kneeling between my spread legs is Dean Moriarty, the strange, unfriendly man who was sitting next to me at the table earlier.
He is just staring at me as I gape at him, my mouth literally hanging open. When I finally manage to marshal my resources enough to draw breath, all I can say is “You!”
He releases my wrists and holds up his left hand, wiggling his ring finger, showing me his wedding band.
It’s Fletcher’s ring.
On Fletcher’s hand.
I look at his face, and my shrieking gasp is so high-pitched tha
t dogs everywhere are probably heading my way. I waste no time in pummeling him, my fists raining down on his chest as savagely as I could manage. Then I pull off those silly little glasses and fling them, but it’s not Fletcher’s blue eyes that greet me.
They’re muddy brown. Contact lenses.
I go for the hair next and rip at it. The wig—a very good wig, I must admit—comes off after much effort, and his own much-darker hair, recently slicked back, is now sticking up in every direction. I can’t hold back the hysterical giggle that bursts out of my throat at the sight of perfect Fletcher looking a hot mess. Hot being the operative word since he’s still despicably handsome.
I look down at the thing in my hands. Now’s not the time, but I’m impressed by the craftsmanship. “Wow, that is one great wig,” I mutter. “If I ever start speaking to you again, you have to tell me where you got it.”
“No way. Your days of wearing wigs are over.”
Finally. His voice. No wonder he wouldn’t say much of anything at the table.
He leans in… to kiss me?
Oh no.
I’m not done. My fingers reach for his beard, but he snatches my wrists. “No. The beard is glued on. I have to use a solution to get it off.”
As if I care. He deserves to have it ripped off painfully. “You fucker! How dare you do this to me?” Then I remember the chuckles I heard in the room earlier. “Who was in the room with us? When you were hitting me?”
His teeth come down on his lower lip in a grimace that almost resembles a smile. Is he trying not to laugh? I’ll kill him.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Don’t lie to me, Fletcher. I know what I heard.”
“Okay, fine. I let the men who had to put their own safety at risk” —he slowly and clearly enunciates the last five words— “to protect you while you indulged in gross stupidity watch as I delivered your punishment. It was their idea.”
I hike my brows to the point of pain. “I’m sure it was. Whose? Tristan’s? Was it Tristan’s? I’ll kill the motherfucker.”
“You might be angry now, but imagine how I felt when you tried to give our security the slip to come here and do this asinine thing you did, endangering yourself immensely and also putting our staff in danger. What if Rico Holland and his men were armed? These are not nice people, Marley. What is it going to take to convince you of the very real dangers out there?”
“So to teach me a lesson, you kidnap me, let our whole security staff see you beating my naked behind, and then assault me. Is that it?”
“That’s not how I see it.”
I just now remember Rhea, and my hand flies to my mouth. “I have to text Rhea.”
“It’s taken care of. She went home.”
“I’m glad she got to go home.” I have a question. “Dean Moriarty. Why does that name sound familiar?”
He hitches his shoulder. “Jack Kerouac. On the Road.”
“Damn it. I knew I knew it,” I spit out, furious with myself for not figuring it out. I read that book twice in high school. So did Tara.
“Allow me to tell you how I see it,” he continues. “You did something incredibly foolish after I’ve told you countless times—countless times—about the danger you’re in as my wife. Plus, you had some serious danger coming at you of your own. So what do you do?
“Oh, well you seek revenge with a half-baked scheme dreamed up not even by you but by some woman who felt wronged by a common enemy. All without any backup. Correct me if I’m mistaken, Marley, but wasn’t it you who took all the risks? All of them.
“Don’t you see that?” He reaches over and caresses my face. “What good would it do for me to repeat yet again the same warnings? I had to do something you’d remember. So I took a page right out of your book and disguised myself. The spanking was a last-minute thing, but you so deserved it. So did my men. As for this?” He gestures between us. “Maybe it went beyond the pale. I’m sorry. Maybe I went a bit too far. But I was just that mad at you for endangering yourself.
“And you looked… so… delicious.” He lowers his face to mine so that our noses are just about touching. “You must know by now that I care about you.”
“It brought back terrible reminders. Rico used to show me off to his friends and colleagues.”
His eyes flare open. “You see, this is why I told you to tell me everything, which obviously you didn’t do. I don’t want to trip any triggers for you. I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known.”
I pull back as far as possible—I’m still on the bed with him leaning over me, hands supporting his weight. “Public spanking is not something people plan for. It doesn’t matter now, does it? Obviously, I can never go back home with you.”
“What are you talking about?”
I observe him closely, marveling at his utter cluelessness. “They saw you spanking my bare ass. What part of that don’t you understand? I’m never going back to your house. From this moment on, I am a separated, soon-to-be-divorced woman.”
He growls—I’m not kidding, he literally growls. “Did you not just hear me? I said I care about you.”
“That’s nice. I care about Tara’s puppy.”
He stands up, turns around as if to leave, spins back toward me, grabs his hair with both fists—his hair looks even funnier now. “You are such an exasperating woman,” he says from between gritted teeth. “What do you want me to say? That I’m in love with you?”
Actually, that would be nice, but obviously I don’t tell him that. Instead, I just glare back at him, crossing my arms and legs.
He closes the distance between us again. “I’m in love with you, Marley. Please don’t leave me.”
I narrow my eyes. I’m suspicious that he’s just saying that to mollify me, and he doesn’t really mean it. I wonder if I could get it written in blood? A permanent tattoo maybe?
“I love you.” He grasps my shoulders and gives them a hearty shake. “I really do.”
“You do?” I ask him, needing reassurance desperately.
“Marley, yes. I think I have right from the beginning. I’d be devastated if anything bad happened to you. You’re my wife, and I aim to keep you as such. If you’ll have me.”
“I’d like to… but how can I ever face those men again?”
“Do you want me to fire them? I will for you.”
“No, of course not.” I tug at my lip. “Could you kill them instead?”
He knits his brows together. “You’re kidding, right?”
I roll my eyes. Of course I’m kidding… I think. I don’t want them to get fired—that would be so mean of me to demand. I jump up off the bed and start to pace the room, chewing on my thumb nail, while he watches me warily. Should I forgive him? I mean, he does raise some fair points. Other than the public spanking and making me believe I was being assaulted, what he did wasn’t so bad, I guess. And he gave me a spectacular orgasm even if I had no idea whose mouth it was on me.
He’s standing there, looking so handsome, that gorgeous, toned body covered by a beautiful suit, the shirt stretching across his wide shoulders in the yummiest of ways. I want to kiss him right now.
So I do.
I quickly stride over to him, raise my arms, and encircle his neck. “I don’t like the beard,” I whisper just before my lips brush his. His tongue teases at the seam of my lips, and I open to him. I’ve never enjoyed kissing a man more than I do right now. Fletcher is delicious, and his mouth is warm and wet and bears my scent, and I love him too. I hug him tighter to me until our kiss lightens. Rearing his head back to look at me, he gives me a small smile.
He drops to his knees to remove my shoes. His hands travel up my legs, hips, and waist, following the curves of my body until they reach the zipper under my right arm. He grasps the tab and slides it down smoothly until the gown sags and then falls into a glossy puddle around my ankles. I step out of it, all the while my eyes never leaving his. He reaches around me and undoes my bra clasps, and my breasts spill out of th
e lacy cups. Slowly and deliberately, he unrolls the thigh-high stockings I wore under my gown to have some fabric to protect my feet from the killer stilettos I wore tonight. He lifts my foot to remove the shoe and stocking, kissing it before moving to the other.
Once I’m naked, he starts stripping himself. I lie down again on the bed and put my arms under my head to watch the show.
“Will you take out those ugly contacts?”
“You don’t like me with brown eyes?”
“No, and they don’t look like real brown eyes. They’re too murky.”
He turns around and quickly takes them out, tossing them into the nearest garbage can. He’s stripped down to his boxer briefs, and when he turns back around, they’re massively tented by his giant erection, and he has a wicked gleam in his eyes. His pretty eyes, the color of water, are back with me.
I curl my index finger at him and smile.
He climbs onto the bed and crawls over my body, kissing every inch of it till he reaches my breasts, and then he spends a lot of time there. He sucks each one, twirling the other nipple in his fingers, twisting it just to the point of pain and retreating, nipping them, licking them—in general, driving me crazy with need. My nipples are red and swollen by the time he’s done with them, and he admires his handiwork.
“These are so beautiful that they deserve jewels.”
“Jewels?”
“Yes. Either on clamps or piercings.”
“Ouch.”
“Would you do it if I asked?”
“I guess I could try.”
He smiles and tucks a wayward lock of my hair behind my ear. “You’re such a good girl sometimes.”
“Sometimes I’m not?”
His eyes become heavy-lidded—bedroom eyes. “Oh baby, most times you’re not. Most of the time, you’re a bad, bad girl. Lucky for you, I like bad girls.” His mouth descends on mine, and his tongue pushes between my lips, invading my mouth. The kiss is fierce, and he kicks open my legs, pulls my knees all the way up, and enters me with an almost savage need.
I love it. I love everything he does, everything about my husband.
Faker: A Fake Relationship Romance Page 31