by Cynthia Dane
Natalie held herself back from the table. If she had any appetite before now, I had probably ruined it. Just like my topic of the evening had ruined our date. “I’m… sorry. I thought I was going in the direction that you wanted. I thought you wanted me to see you as a woman first and foremost.”
I sighed. No matter how well I knew people, this never got any easier to explain. Even Brooke and Sherman looked at me as if I were an alien sometimes. “I suppose that was true. I’m the one who should apologize. This is the real danger of getting involved with me. I seem to suck everyone into this confounded black hole of gender and sexuality.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“No, it’s not my fault.” Everyone always said that. Even the ones who thought I had the power to flip a switch as soon as society caught up with the times. “But I’m the one who has to deal with it.”
“Hopefully,” Natalie said, brushing a hand against my leg, “you don’t have to do it alone.”
Her touch gave me chills. “I have those close to me and a couple of therapists who attempt to keep me grounded, but it’s difficult to not blame myself all the time. For fuck’s sake, I’m in my thirties now. I should be able to be truthful with the world if I want to be.” I shook my head. “But now you know both of my biggest secrets. Not only am I not what the world sees, but I am conflicted about what the world doesn’t see, too. It’s not as simple as whether or not I’m a man or a woman. Perhaps I’m still exploring it.”
Natalie poked at a grape, but I knew her attention wasn’t on our food. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
She glanced at me, sizing up not only my body, but the aura I surely exude without a care for it. Could she read it? Did it tell her something I never meant for the world to know? How much was my heart really on my tailored sleeves? “How many people have you been with?”
That question gutted me. In a pitiful bout of offense, I countered, “How many have you been with?”
Natalie furrowed her recently plucked brows. “After you answer my question first.”
It was only fair, I suppose. Nevertheless, a sigh wracked my body. Even if I bothered with calculations, I would never come up with a solid answer. “Honestly, I don’t know.”
Incredulity slammed against the table. “You don’t know?”
“No. I don’t.” And I didn’t want to know, truth be told. “There are quite a few women I’ve been with, especially in the past few years. There were women before Brooke, too, although they were a bit easier to keep track of since I wasn’t as reckless. I guess the breakup took a toll on me.”
Natalie slumped in her seat. “For some reason I thought it wouldn’t be that many.”
“I had my encounters down to a restricted science, if you know what I mean.”
The disappointment flushed her cheeks. How hard was she being on herself in that moment? Did she wonder if I didn’t truly desire her as much as I did? That I thought she was a game? How much of her insecurity was wrapped in her perceived self-worth, and how much was of it was because of me?
Perhaps it really was because of me. That was the only explanation for her taking a low blow with her next question. “You were with a man once, right?”
I nearly spat out my next grape.
“That was a long time ago.”
“Was it Sherman?”
Sometimes I hate her for being a master of deduction. It hasn’t gotten better over the years. Natalie has a power that allows her to see into people’s minds and read their pasts with one steady perusal. I had said that I once experimented with a man. She eventually deduced that it must have been Sherman, the only man I could ever trust with my body, let alone my nerves.
Even so, I did not appreciate the bile in my throat as the memories came back to me in the middle of a lovely restaurant like Bridgeport. I was on a date with my girlfriend, an enigmatic woman who could put any spell she desired on me. She had decided on… this.
“Don’t ask me that.”
“Sorry.”
I swear I was not being so petty when I said, “It’s your turn, anyway.”
“You mean how many people I’ve been with?”
“Yes.”
“Including you…” she must have already thought it through, “about eleven or twelve, I suppose.”
My chest constricted. It wasn’t the number that galled me. “Mostly men.”
“Yeah.” Natalie wavered between not giving a fuck what I thought about that and ready to collapse in shame. “Is that a problem?”
“You’re taking it the wrong way. The thing I need you to understand is how it looks from my point of view. You’re primarily attracted to men. You thought I was a man. This might become a wedge between us sooner rather than later.”
Natalie almost threw her hands upward, but refrained once a server slid behind us, taking a shortcut to another section of the restaurant. “I’m so confused,” she admitted, and I hated that my status as a human being gave such an intelligent woman so much confusion. “Who are you, exactly? How do you want me to see you? Do you know?”
“No.”
Her elbow hit the table, and she gritted her teeth as if to say, “Fuck you.”
“I’m sorry, Natalie. I have a propensity for being a huge pain in the ass.”
I could only pray that there would not be tears of frustration in her eyes. Not after the stylists at the boutique went through such extensive pains to doll her up for our date. “I’m not expecting this relationship to be easy, for fuck’s sake.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. Anything to keep the determined tears at bay. “But I need us to at least be on the same page. Am I on a date with a man or a woman tonight?”
She might as well have asked me if I wanted vanilla or chocolate ice cream for dessert. “I don’t know.”
“You know what?” Natalie said with a defiant tone, “You’re right. I did think you were a man. I thought you were one of the hottest men I had ever laid my stupid eyes on. The first time you kissed me, I was ready for you to throw me down and completely own every stupid part of me. So what if I was shocked to find out the truth? Who wouldn’t be! But do you think I was any less attracted to you this past week? Your body isn’t the only thing I’m attracted to. I should hope that you feel the same way about me.”
“That I’m not only attracted to your body?”
“No shit.”
I sucked my bottom lip into my mouth to keep from laughing. “I don’t think you have to worry. Because I spent the past twenty seconds more turned on by your attitude than listening to what you said.”
“Go to hell, Eric.”
One second later, we both erupted in relieving laughter. Was it really so funny? No. My relationship with my identity is no laughing matter, and how it affected Natalie, should she choose to stay with me, deserved our serious consideration. But when we faced these challenges, let alone so early in our blossoming relationship, laughter was necessary.
“Whether you call me Eric or Erica,” I began, after regathering my bearings, “I hear nothing but respect in your voice. I appreciate that.”
“So are you saying that it’s not as simple as you really being a woman in man’s clothing?”
“That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to say.”
“You’re right. I respect that.” Natalie was back in top form, and I knew I needed to brace myself. “But as your girlfriend, going forward, I need more transparency about how you feel at any moment. Don’t spring shit on me. You want me to be a part of your inner circle? You want me as your lover? You can’t hide anything from me, got it? I don’t have the patience for head games. Think you might be pleasantly surprised at how easily I go along with things. I’m really only a hardass at work.”
I leaned back in my seat, drinking in the sight of my audacious girlfriend in her bright yellow dress and come-hither stance. “You’re quite the hardass right now, honestly.”
“Yeah? So? It turns you on. Admit it.”
/> Those weren’t tingles in my loins for nothing, no. “It does.”
Natalie and I could be a force to be reckoned with. Her gumption and my experience? My competitors should fear what we were capable of, and my employees could benefit from some fresh ideas – let alone from someone who knew what it was like to be them.
“Tell you what.” I pulled out a piece of scrap paper from my wallet and asked Natalie to hand me a pen. By that point, I was well acquainted with her mantra to always have a pen on her person. “I’m going to write down what I want tonight on one side, and you write what you want on the other. We’ll go from there.” My hand moved with eased now that I knew we were on good terms again.
“Just for tonight?”
“One night at a time, Natalie.”
I slid my paper toward her. “Do I look at what you wrote before or after?” she asked.
“After.”
Natalie considered what she wanted to write while the server brought us our entrees. I didn’t have eyes for my food, however, even though it was one of my favorite dishes at Bridgeport.
“I want you to give me your all.” That’s what I watched her write, although she thought I couldn’t see her words from where I sat.
One minute later, she would see what I had written. “I want to be Eric tonight.” I had meant it, too, though it wasn’t something I had contemplated with sincerity when I picked her up in my Lambo and drove us to dinner. I was simply me in that moment. The thought that I should be either “Eric” or “Erica” didn’t enter my mind until that conversation we had while waiting for dinner.
Natalie had discovered what it meant to make love to the private me, Erica, whether we were in a hotel room or my downtown office. She thought she knew what it meant to be with Eric. In a way, it was true. The first time we had sex, she thought I was a man – I had hidden myself too well. But that meant I also held myself back from taking her the way she deserved to be possessed by any man… including me.
I pushed our boundaries every chance I had. I needed to know how far we could go – and how good it could feel.
Chapter 44
NATALIE
“We’d prefer to not be disturbed tonight.” Erica attempted to shut her bedroom door in Margot’s face. “Unless it’s an absolute emergency. Even then, don’t disturb us.”
“But…”
“My security team has been informed. Bring something up with Nick, if you must. He’ll be out here.”
Nick kept to himself in the hallway leading to Erica’s chambers. I knew we were constantly surrounded by security, though. Patrols stalked the perimeter of the manor, including the green space beyond the bedroom windows. Drones covered the airspace. Security cameras could catch anyone coming in and out of the main entrance to Erica’s chambers. At any moment, we could pull an alarm and summon half the night crew. The way Erica explained it, she had to once or twice before, both times because of possible intruders.
“Yes, sir.” Margot exchanged one last look with me before turning around. “I take it Ms. Chen will be having breakfast in the morning?”
“I’ll let you know if that changes.”
“Then I’ll preemptively put in an order with the kitchen.”
“Do so, please.”
Margot marched back down the hall, passing Nick without a second glance.
I went ahead of Erica into her room. The lights came on before she slammed her bedroom door and swept me up in her embrace.
“What do you think? Something hard or something softer?”
My lips lingered on hers. The last thing I wanted was to forget what her mouth tasted like. “Excuse me?”
“The drinks.” Her chuckle put me in my place. “Of course you thought I meant something else.”
I reluctantly let her leave my arms. “Considering our entire week…”
“Something hard, then?”
I shuddered in preemptive delight. “You better.”
She removed her jacket and tossed it over the back of a chaise lounge. The sounds of ice and bottles clinking together serenaded me as I sat on a couch and wondered if it was too early to take off my underwear.
Had to admit, it was much more comfortable playing the slow seduction game in a bedroom than it was rushing through love in a busy corporate office. Not that Erica had left me wanting much more whenever she was done with me for the time being, but there was definitely something to be said for relaxing and taking one’s time.
Yet by that point I was used to Erica dropping her façade around me. Whenever we were alone, she’d shed the pageantry that was presenting as male and let me see the wide swing of her hips when she walked and hear the exasperated sighs tinged with feminine tones. She’d be frank about her hormones making her feel one way or another. She’d bemoan the oncoming PMS.
Not tonight. Even though we were now in the most private place she could ask for, and I was no stranger to her female form, I only saw the man I had initially fallen for returning to me with a stout glass of brandy.
She hadn’t been kidding when she said she wanted to be “Eric” tonight. She projected a heterosexual fantasy I hadn’t indulged in since finding out the truth. Even so, I couldn’t bring myself to change how I saw her in my mind. It now felt wrong to call her anything but she. There was only a single sound difference between “Eric” and “Erica.” I suppose it was the same for “She” and “He.” But one was a name that could change with a single decision. The other was deeply embedded and screamed from the soul.
Why? Why did it do that? I had never thought about it before. Until I met the love of my life, I never had to think about the intricacies of gender and how it impacted all facets of life. The doctors who delivered me called me a girl and it had never changed. I grew up a girl. I became a woman. What that meant to me was my own, but it so happened that what it “meant” matched up more or less perfectly with what my cultures expected. My mother kept my hair long and put me in skirts and dresses. When I was old enough to decide my style, I didn’t deviate.
Was it bad that I couldn’t switch Eric and Erica back and forth in my mind as effortlessly as she could? Would she be offended if I didn’t completely see her as she wanted?
Because I didn’t know how?
“Why are you so tense?” She sat next to me, one arm wrapped around my shoulders. I couldn’t help it. I so easily clung to her body that my other insecurities slipped away. Maybe I shouldn’t overthink it. She would want me to go with the flow and enjoy wherever the currents took us. “Don’t tell me you’re suddenly shy, Natalie.”
“Whatever happened to Ms. Chen?”
“Hmph. You liked it when we acknowledged our real relationship, hm?”
“It was pretty hot, yeah. That whole forbidden relationship thing. Getting fucked by my boss was a thrill I may never get to experience again.”
“Please. I’m still your boss.”
The wine at Bridgeport had relaxed me. The brandy emboldened me. “Maybe you’re not bossy enough.”
“Is that a challenge?”
My voice transformed into a meek little squeak. “Maybe.”
She yanked the glass out of my hand and placed both of ours on the coffee table. “How’s that? No more drinking.”
‘That’s being controlling. Not bossy. Not the same.”
“Aww.” Her hand discovered my warm thigh beneath the neon yellow skirt of my designer dress. “Would being bossy be like… take off your clothes and sexually service me?”
“Not with that droll attitude, it’s not.”
“So you want me to be bossy and make you feel that forbidden aspect of our relationship?”
“Pretty sure our relationship is already forbidden in more ways than one.”
“But you want to play it up.”
“Jesus, Eric.”
“That’s right.” She grabbed my chin and tilted my head back until there was no option except kissing. “Eric. I’m the man who’s going to rock your world tonight. You know what?”
>
I still had yet to reclaim the feisty voice I knew I had. “What?”
She kissed me so hard that I fell back against the arm of the couch and readily accepted her between my legs. “I’m going to be the best man you’ve ever had.”
Didn’t she know? She already was.
***
“Don’t you dare blindfold me tonight.”
“Why would I dare? I’ve got nothing to hide from you now.”
“I’m just saying. You don’t get both tonight. You can’t tie me up and blindfold me. You’ve gotta give me something.”
Her lips pressed upon mine once more. “I am giving you something. You just haven’t received it yet.”
What I had received was two ropes around my wrists, binding my arms against the headboard and with little leeway to let me move. Somehow, I doubted I was allowed to do more than lie there and look beautiful.
Not a hard task, let me tell you!
The only question it begged was how Erica would get the dress off my body. Because it hadn’t been on my mind when I agreed to get on her bed and assume the position. This was after we moved from the couch, where she teased my thighs until I quivered myself into orgasm.
Whoops. Logic and practicality tend to leave the mind when hot sex is granted.
“What?” I asked when she hopped off the bed and headed toward the bathroom. “You’re not going to tie up my legs, too?”
“Eventually,” Erica called over her shoulders.
It was only after she closed the bathroom door behind her that I realized what I must have looked like. My skirt was already bunched up around my waist and my left breast thought it a fantastic thing to show me my nipple, because who cared about collars and bras? The fixed position of my arms meant I couldn’t fix a damn thing about my appearance, either. I could ball my hands into fists and flex my fingers, but Erica’s expert knotwork solidified my role as the submissive recipient of whatever she wanted to give me.