“Yeah, I didn't think so,” he said, with a dark chuckle, even though that hadn't been what she meant. “So, what do you think, Jay? You want to pay off some of your mother's debt to me? I'm actually feeling a little hot and bothered. It must have been the slap.”
“I thought it was going to be a couple days,” Jay said haltingly. “M-maybe two weeks. Not years.”
“That's really not my problem,” said Nicholas.
“I can't stay here for years.” Her chest felt too tight. “I have an apartment.”
“Sell it. Or I'll buy you out. Money's no object. You can have your things shipped here.” He reached out to gently flick her nose. “You're Daddy's little bird now.”
The dig at her apartment made her angry—as if the only reason she wouldn't want to leave was money. It was like him upgrading her to first class without asking. It made her feel cheap.
“I think we need to make something clear,” Jay said, pushing his hand away. “You don't get to order me around if I'm not at work or in bed with you—and I want that in writing,” she added, which wiped the amused smile from his face. “Put it in a contract. I'm not a twenty-four hour convenience and you don't get to dictate my life.”
“Fast learner.” His brows arched. “But then, you've always been such a cute little nerd.”
“What are you doing?” Jay yelped when he slid her back from the edge of the mattress and swung over her hips with an expression that left her feeling hunted.
“I'm fucking you.” He yanked on her sweatshirt zipper. “So let Daddy order you around.”
He bit her ear, her neck. Rough, tugging pinches that made her breathless. She grabbed his wrist, which had settled against her chest. “No,” she said. “I can't. I'm still sore.”
“That's too bad,” he said, kissing her bared shoulder now. “Sore doesn't pay the bills.”
Jay felt an unwelcome lick of heat between her thighs as he exhaled against her collarbone, running his hands over her waist in a way that was too rough to be comforting. She could feel him pressing against her hip and a cold sensation crawled down her nape as memories from last night trickled in. Relax, blue jay. It's just me.
“You sure you aren't up to the task, Jay?” She realized she was still holding onto his wrist only when she felt his fingers spread and gently squeeze her breast. “You're breathing like you want it.”
Another stabbing ache made her thighs clench when she shifted. “Shut up, Nick.”
“Hmm. So we've moved from denial to anger now.”
“What if I suck your dick?” she asked icily. “Does that 'pay the bills'?”
“And thus we come to bargaining.” Nicholas pulled back to look at her. His eyes drifted to her mouth and turned slightly mocking. “It only counts if you swallow.”
Jay wanted to slap him again but didn't quite dare. Hitting him before had been stupid and dangerous. He had never been violent when he was younger—not towards me, anyway, she amended with a shudder—but he could be cruel. Oh God, could he be cruel.
“Fine,” she said, biting off the word. “Anything you—” She caught herself just in time.
Nicholas laughed. “I'll tell you what. Since you're feeling so shy, I'll even let you keep your clothes on.”
She hadn't been planning on taking them off anyway, but now it felt like part of this game. This stupid game. Jay zipped her sweatshirt up again as she slid off the bed to her knees. Nicholas lifted his hips so she could slide down his pants, running his fingers through her hair in idle expectation, gathering up falls of it in his fingers so that it spilled out in tangles that looked like dark copper coils.
“Take me to heaven, blue jay.”
Go to hell, you bastard.
The muscles in his thighs jumped as she took him into her mouth and she felt a yank on her hair as his fingers tightened. “Good girl.” He tipped his head back. “Keep doing that.”
A sudden viciousness took hold of her at those words, good girl, and she wrapped her hand around him, fluttering her tongue over the slit until he began to twist and groan. When she grazed him lightly with her teeth, he shuddered, and she saw goosebumps on his arms. “Fuck,” he said, the word chopped up into multiple syllables, “that feels so fucking good.”
She glanced up and felt an unwilling spear of attraction. Nicholas was leaning back on his arms, having released her hair. The cords in his throat were standing out in relief as he stared unseeingly at the ceiling, his broad chest rising and falling in an erratic rhythm.
Eight years, thought Jay. Her hand slid down his now-slick shaft, cupping the base of him to run her thumb over the soft, wrinkled skin, before following the velvety path of his perineum. She heard him suck in a breath as she tongued the head of his cock again and then she could taste him—hot and bitter. Jay choked, gagging a little as she pulled away, but managed to swallow.
Nicholas collapsed back against the bed, with her still kneeling at his feet. For a moment, he didn't say anything, and then he said, a little hoarsely, “Let's get some lunch.”
▪▫▪▫▪▫▪
Once Jay had gotten out of the shower, scrubbing herself until she felt raw, she hovered over her battered suitcase, staring at her clothes. She didn't want to look prudish but she also didn't want to look like she was trying to impress him, either. Eventually, she just grabbed the two things closest to the top: jeans and a floral blouse with a high neck.
When she made her way down to the hall, clutching a cheap little bag that she'd purchased marked-down at Target, she was alone in the checkered entryway. It was completely still and silent, as if the house absorbed all sound. She looked up at the Chihuly sculpture hanging over the foyer, lit up with glowing blue light. When she'd been a kid, she'd always been secretly afraid that it would fall on her and shatter, but seventeen years later, it was still upright and kicking.
“You never did like my father's art.” Nicholas's voice echoed, making her jump. “I seem to recall you telling me how you thought the Louise Bourgeois was ugly.”
His dark brown hair was curling and damp, almost black in the shadows. The jeans he was wearing looked so distressed that Jay figured they probably cost more than her entire outfit. That kind of calculated destruction didn't come cheap. He'd swapped out the Stanford shirt for a white tee and a cuffed chambray shirt, and around his wrist was an expensive-looking watch. Probably the BVLGARI his father had promised him. She saw the glint of its diamond face as he adjusted his sleeves, a strange look on his too-familiar features.
“So?” she asked, knowing she looked defensive and not caring.
“It is what it is. Some of us like real art. And some of us like sunflowers painted on the walls.” Nicholas had reached her and was looking up at the jellyfish sculpture. She pettishly wished he wasn't, because the way he loomed over her was a reminder of how much bigger he had gotten. When he looked her way again, he seemed relaxed. “Where do you want to go?”
“I'm vegan,” said Jay. “Apart from that, I don't really have a preference.”
She walked out with him to the car, feeling extremely uncomfortable. It occurred to her that she had never actually been in a car with him when he'd driving, except for that one night at Dave Byron's party when she'd been all but passed-out drunk. He'd driven her Honda to take them both home, even though he hadn't had a license. God, he'd hated her Honda. It didn't have enough status. Unlike his father, who'd gotten through several models of Mercedes. Nicholas had opted for a Tesla.
“Nice car,” she said tonelessly.
“You want to drive it?”
“No.”
“Suit yourself.” He opened the passenger door, waiting for her to get in, before sidling around to the driver's side. His hands were loose on the wheel, his expression thoughtful as he piloted the gunmetal-colored car through the twisty roads. There was music playing, she realized, suddenly. One of the metal bands he'd listened to during the college years. He'd used to fuck her in his room with the music turned all the way up so no one woul
d hear her when she screamed.
Nicholas glanced at her and his eyes followed hers to the car stereo. Without saying anything, he reached over and turned the sound off. The silence that followed was deafening.
I can't do this, she thought, squirming. She could still taste him in her mouth.
“Where are we going?”
“I know an Afghan place. It's good. Small.”
Jay seized on that. “I don't remember there being an Afghan place in Hollybrook.”
“It's new. A lot of things are different now.”
Like what? she wondered, leaning back in the seat with her arms folded, feeling tired in a way that she hadn't since she was working and going to school. Different doesn't always mean better.
Nicholas pulled into a shopping center that used to have a dELiA*s when she was young. The restaurant was actually in the space where the tween clothing store had been.
When he helped her out of the car and looped an arm around her waist, Jay couldn't quite suppress a flinch. She knew he felt it, too, because the neutral expression on his face disappeared, becoming—she didn't have a word for that look. Studious seemed too benign.
He kept his arm around her as they talked to the man behind the counter, almost like he thought she might be about to run. Jay looked around the cramped but clean diner. There was no one else inside but them. “Sit anywhere you like,” the man behind the counter said.
Nicholas immediately went to the back, to a table by the window that was secluded by a palm plant. A waiter appeared instantly while Jay stared at some woven rugs that were hanging on the wall. All of them done in the Afghan style, many with price tags. Nicholas ordered cardamom tea for the table and lamb skewers.
Jay quickly scanned the menu. “Is there milk in the kidney bean curry?”
“No,” said the waiter. “No milk.”
“Okay. I'll have that, please, and the pickled vegetable salad.”
Nodding, the waiter gathered both their menus and wandered towards the kitchen.
“I didn't realize you were a vegan now.”
“Your private investigator couldn't tell you that?”
Nicholas took a long sip of water. “When did you start?”
That's not an answer. Eyeing him distrustfully, Jay said, “I started when I moved back to San Francisco. It was easy. I gave it a try for a week and never stopped, and I saved a lot of money by doing my own cooking. Coconut milk in soups, whipping up aquafaba to make ma—”
Realizing she was rambling, Jay quickly fell silent, all too aware of his pressing gaze.
Nicholas set the water glass down, nudging it aside. “What do you put in your coffee?”
“Oat milk. Why?”
“I'm just curious.” He looked down, noticed his watch was crooked, and adjusted it. “What else have you been doing for the last eight years?”
“What are you doing? Is this a job interview?”
“In a manner of speaking. You are technically on my payroll.” He drew his fingers down the same cheek she'd slapped. “We could always review your performance.”
Jay drew herself up and gave him what she hoped was a cold, withering look. “I've been busy. I couldn't afford to go to grad school, so I waitressed to pay for my administrative assistant certification. I brought a copy,” she added pointedly. “In case you want to review it.”
He made a dismissive gesture.
“Fine. So I got that, and while I was working, I was living with a whole group of other people in their late teens and early twenties in what was basically a flophouse for fly-by-night college students going to SF State and other local schools. I was the oldest, even though I was only twenty-three. They called me Mother Goose,” she added, flushing a little when his mouth curled.
“Cute. How much did you make a night waitressing?”
What a weird question. “I don't know. Usually fifty to seventy-five dollars in tips. It wasn't really enough to live on, even with roommates. I sold all my jewelry and used some of the cash from that to pad my income when things got hard. I probably would have eventually taken on another job if I'd stayed there. I liked my roommates, though,” she added abruptly. “They were all really nice. I ended up dating one of them for a while, which wasn't smart, but it worked out for about a year.”
Her eyes had dropped to her plate as she toyed with her fork, so she didn't see Nicholas's face. When she dared look up, his expression didn't appear to have changed.
“How was the sex?” he asked casually.
“Excuse me?”
“How was it,” said Nicholas, emphasizing each syllable, “when he fucked you? I'm assuming it was a he. Tell me all about it. I want to know.”
Jay set her fork down with a ping. “It was fine.”
“Dinner is fine. Cable television is fine. I'm asking if, when he was pounding into you at night with his college boy cock, were you screaming the walls down, or were you just lying there calculating last night's tips?”
Jay sucked in a breath and glanced around the empty restaurant with a wave of panic. He'd kept his voice low, but this was still mortifying. “You are disgusting,” she said, once she'd confirmed nobody had heard. “I'm not discussing my personal life with you.”
“Interesting,” said Nicholas.
“What?”
The waiter came then with the plates and the tea and Jay clammed up fast, shooting Nicholas a silencing look. He smiled but it was a dangerous look on him. It was the smile of a man who might do anything. “Thank you,” said Jay, looking anxiously at her curry and salad.
Now please leave.
“What was it you said you made in tips per night?” Nicholas asked, as soon as the waiter was gone. “Fifty to seventy-five dollars, was it?”
“You—” Jay drew in a deep breath. Don't give him what he wants. He's always been like this. Fucking with people. Getting a rise out of people. It's what he's good at. She just hadn't realized how much better he'd gotten at it until now. “You haven't changed at all,” she said at last.
“Now I wouldn't say that.” Nicholas sliced off a piece of sizzling lamb. “I'm not another fuck-up hiding behind a rich father. I own a company. I call the shots—and people let me, because they know I get results, one way or another.” He glanced at her as he popped the lamb into his mouth, and it made her face feel hot for some reason. “If anything, it's you who's stayed the same. I bet you still dance in your bedroom.”
Jay took a bite of her pickled salad but the carrots kept sticking in her throat. She stared at a pink piece of radish, hating this, hating him. Hating how powerless he made her feel.
“I probably still have that video around somewhere,” he added offhandedly, making her eyes swing back to his face. “On an old flash drive. You remember the one.”
“Are you going to blackmail me with that, too?”
“No. It's not exactly career-ending these days, is it? A college girl, touching herself beneath her clothes? That's just spring break or a weekend at Vegas. It's the look on your face that makes it so affecting. You make the same one right when you're about to come. When you bite your lip.” He regarded her over the rim of the tea cup. “I don't want anyone else to see it.”
Looking into his eyes made her feel as if she were falling upwards into a winter sky.
Snow-blasted, she thought, and frozen. She actually did feel a little cold, except with her face, which still felt hot. “You are such an unbelievable bastard,” she breathed.
“Yeah, I am.” His mouth twisted. “Guess I didn't grow out of it, after all.”
Chapter Twelve
2017
▪▫▪▫▪▫▪
The drive home from the Afghan restaurant was tense, shot through with bleak memories and unspoken hostilities. The hostility might have only been on her end, though; she was so angry, she felt as if she could hardly breathe around all the words burning in her throat.
As soon as they arrived at the house, Jay immediately went to her room and slammed the door shut,
leaning against it for a long, furious moment—You're Daddy's little bird now.
It felt like Nicholas would stop at nothing in his personal quest to humiliate her and make her life hell. Just remembering what he'd said to her in the diner was enough to make her face burn. And yes, maybe she had been trying to provoke him. It had been so easy when he was younger and his temper had burned hotter. But this colder, collected version of her stepbrother left her feeling wildly uncertain.
Three thousand hours.
Jay heard the sound of his footsteps going up the staircase and then silence and strode to her bed. She started to lie down and then immediately sat up. The sheets smelled like sex. She began yanking the sheets off, balling them up with the pillowcases and the comforter, until all of the bedclothes had been gathered up in her arms. The sheet was trailing, though, and she tripped on it on her way down the staircase. Suddenly, the floor was no longer beneath her feet and Jay shrieked as she slipped, tumbling the last couple steps onto the pile of soiled bedding.
Upstairs, a door clicked open. Nicholas leaned over the rail, looking down at her from the balustrade. A dark angel, backlit against the light pouring in from the window. “You don't need to do that,” he called down to her. “I have someone who comes and does the sheets.”
“I want to,” she said, too fiercely. “I can do it myself.”
Nicholas gave her a strange look. “You remember where the laundry room is.”
“Yes,” she said coldly, even though it hadn't been a question.
“Suit yourself, then. If you need me, I'll be out in the pool.”
Jay went to the laundry room but it was like that sudden burst of fire had been wiped out as quickly as it surged. She shoved her bedding in the washer and started the machine, taking a moment to push her hair out of her eyes. What the hell am I supposed to do now?
He still hadn't mentioned her employment—her other employment, she amended bitterly. She was beginning to wonder if there was an other employment. If maybe he had just wanted to lock her up in his house as if she really were a bird.
Lying on the stripped mattress, alone in her time-frozen room, she scrolled through her phone. There was a text from Lily, sent this morning. Hey, boo-boo. How's the new job? You didn't forget us, yet, did you? Jay still hadn't responded because honestly, how could she?
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