“I don't understand, Mister Petersen,” she said, those dreamy baby blues of hers filling with confusion. “What would my stance on fish rights have to do with anything?”
“You spend all this time reeling in a catch, fighting with it, not to mention the money spent on equipment, boat rental, time off from work… all these factors figuring in to landing a marlin or whatever you've managed to hook, only to just let it go? That's a weak stance to have, Ms. Ryon. Ethical or not, and frankly I don't care, it speaks volumes about you. It wreaks of soft heartedness. Not the trait of a person, or company, we wish to deal with. Don't you agree, Martin?”
“It might be an interesting change of pace,” he replied, staring at me with eyes so glazed over I was surprised he could see straight. Maybe he couldn't.
“Mister Petersen, if I may? If I had answered differently, would that have changed your perspective? Because I think you may have made your mind up well before tonight.”
I didn't know Ontario even had a winery. That made two things I didn't know about, all in one evening. The winery was no big deal, but the girl back at the office was. Her heated brown eyes, her exquisite Spanish body, her perky tits, the gun,...
Ryon leaned her elbows on the table, pushing out her chest which I estimated to cost upwards of ten thousand dollars, and tipped her head to the side. There was a splash of freckles along her collarbones, sprinkled against her ivory skin.
“Would your decision have anything to do with, well…would it have anything to do with what Drixoll does for a living?”
I slammed the wine list shut. She didn't flinch.
“Despite what I'm sure your boss told you to say, and grand media speculations aside, no. Not a thing.”
“Then why go through all the trouble of confirming a meeting, attending a meeting, not to mention all the scheduling and paperwork that goes into it… all these factors...when you had no intention of ever agreeing to our proposal?”
I sneered at her. She was cute. “I just like fucking with people.”
Her mouth parted, her perfectly pink tongue resting against her perfectly white teeth. She got treatments, obviously. You could land a plane by the glow of her incisors alone.
“My goodness,” she said. “I knew you were a son-of-a-bitch, but you're so much more disgusting in person.”
“Thank you, Ms. Ryon,” I said, getting up from the table. “And so this evening won't be a total loss for you? Please, indulge in whatever you'd like.” I handed her the wine list. “It's on me.”
Ryon batted her eyelashes. Her fake eyelashes. I never understood why women glued those things to themselves. They looked like caterpillars doing calisthenics every time they blinked.
“In a respectful decline, Mister Petersen, I'd rather choke on my own vomit.”
“Then, by all means, please do. And, Martin?” Martin barely looked at me, but even then, his eyes were shooting daggers. “I'll leave the limo for you.”
“Thank you, Maddox,” he said. Or at least I think that’s what he said. It was hard to tell, what with his teeth clenched together. But I was on to better things. Much, much better things.
The driver couldn't go fast enough. He was some Eastern Indian guy trying to eek out an existence by working for one of those ride share services, and when I told him speed limits were for losers and chicken shits, he apologized in a thick accent and said he simply couldn't afford to get a ticket. That he had a wife and kids to think about and this job wasn’t just his livelihood, it was theirs, too.
Before he’d finished his speech, I pulled out a hundred-dollar bill, stuck it in his vent-mounted air freshener, and he suddenly decided he knew where the accelerator was.
I drummed my fingers on the armrest, stared out the window, and tried to distract myself by counting the number of homeless encampments under the overpasses. They were clusters of squalor, filthy canvas cities that had sprung up like a cancer on the face of what was once a decent place to live.
Australia had the right idea, back in the day. Round them up, ship 'em off. Give them their own fucking island and be done with it.
I rubbed my face, jamming my fingers into my eyeballs. Martin was right. I was off my game.
My initial idea was to string Shanna Ryon along for a while, give her and Drixoll the false hope of being welcomed aboard the Petersen & Stiller train, then pull away from the station leaving them in a billowing cloud of smoke.
It would have been great fun, and I'd entertained the thought of continuing the charade until tomorrow. After I'd persuaded Shanna to accompany me back home. Wink, wink. She’d be pissed when I turned the company down, but elated when she thought back on how my sheets felt beneath her back.
But the crazy bitch with the gun happened, invaded my thought patterns, and all I knew was that no one, no one, had ever left such an impression on me.
Was it the threat she represented?
Some sort of seductive danger factor?
Some folks get their rocks off by erotic asphyxiation (never a deviance I cared for, but I admired the commitment) so perhaps that had something to do with it.
Who was she, who was she, who the fuck was she…
Trustworthy Phyllis couldn't place her face.
Wracking my brain didn't help.
I took out my phone to check on my little jumping bean. Still there, her face against the pillow. Was she crying? No. Just asleep.
Note to self – remove the center ring off the headboard. Tacky.
Abu pulled off the freeway, toward the main boulevard.
My mouth began to water.
It hadn't done that since high school, when I was first diagnosed. Ah, the look on my poor mother's face, when she'd come into the principal's office to pick up her oldest son.
They'd caught me jerking off in the school bathrooms before, but this time carried a little more weight to it. A little more consequence.
I found it enthralling. Even at such a young age. My penis had been dictating my actions for years, but when the hormones started to kick in with gusto, there was nothing I could do to control it. Not that I wanted to.
Everyone knows the tales of young boys not being able to leave their desks because their pants are tented with teenage erections. I was different. I didn't care.
I'd raise my hand and ask to be excused, find my favorite stall and bring myself to full release. Two, three times a day. The teachers couldn't deny me a restroom trip, as it was against state policy. Besides, my father would have sued them from here to next week should I develop a bladder infection or some other related illness.
It was when I convinced Suzy Berkmen to join me in the bathroom did the administrative powers determine parent involvement should be considered.
In my defense, the girl made my mouth go moist. She was my first love - I suppose you could call it.
The more she refused my advances, the more I wanted her. She finally gave in, maybe just to get me to shut up and leave her alone. But, Lordy, she was a looker. Already a C cup, and whose nipples didn't know the meaning of the word 'flaccid'. And we weren't having sex, just pleasuring ourselves. Which I equated to primal desire, the root of the human race. What was wrong with that?
What was wrong with that, as the school psychologist tried to explain, was it was inappropriate. There are times and places for everything, and tandem masturbation in a school lavatory wasn't one of them.
I didn't agree. Besides, I was too entranced by the way the good doctor's skirt rode up her legs, creating a little cavern between her thighs to pay much attention to anything she was trying to say.
I ended up being suspended for a week. Expulsions were reserved for the really hard core criminals, like the kids who chew their Pop Tarts into the shape of a weapon. And in order for Suzy Berkmen's parents not to bring suit against the entire district, a one week 'hiatus' was agreed upon by my father's lawyers, the Berkmen's attorney, and the head of the school board. I was also to attend gentle counseling, to help me with my problem.
I balked at first, but my dad insisted. He was good at that. He was the third generation of Petersen & Stiller, and didn't need his horny ass son tarnishing his reputation.
I liked to think of myself as a sexual savant, but when I told that to my mother, she broke down in tears.
My parents sent me to various counselors until they'd find the one who would tell them what they wanted to hear. That I was simply a very intense young man with too much testosterone, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and early onset hyper-vigilance.
All I needed was the correct medicinal cocktail, and my brain would rewire itself accordingly.
They prescribed me a bunch of pills that I didn't take. I'd give them to my brother who would hide them under his mattress, in the secret compartment we had made in the boxspring.
As I made my way through college, my condition intensified. Jerking off in the bathrooms became old hat, more of an obligation than a pleasure.
Porn was readily available, and that helped for a while. But like any addiction, the more you do the more you need. There were so many girls, too. Young, blossoming women, and me being a god damn good looking sonofabitch standing on top of his daddy's mountain of money certainly didn't hurt my cause.
I could have any of them I wanted.
And I did.
All except one. Denise VanHorne, who wanted nothing to do with me. Despite my best efforts, my family's bank accounts, my future already secured at Petersen & Stiller, she pretended like such things didn't matter.
She'd been dating some band geek since freshman year, and they were exclusive. He wanted to marry her. When she told me to fuck off for the last time, and I watched her sturdy, round ass storm down the hallway as she flipped me the bird, my mouth went moist. Just like it had done with Suzy Berkmen.
Just like it was doing now, as the sedan pulling to the curb, putting mere inches between me and the firecracker of a Latina in my office.
Chapter Four
SOFIA
I kept drifting in and out of consciousness.
My dreams were fuzzy, as if I were looking at them through a thick wad of gauze. Images blurred together, muted colors like sunsets on foggy nights.
Rebecca was in the last dream I remembered. She was walking through what may have been a forest, it was hard to tell. The trees weren't exactly trees, but giant, silky rose bushes. There was wildlife, too, but none of the animals had heads. Deer, squirrels, bats… I couldn't understand how they were able to survive, being that they had no mouths. How could they eat, or drink?
“You're over-thinking it,” Becca said. “You're always over-thinking it.”
Becca was sitting next to one of those rose trees, peeling off pieces of bark, filing and then cleaning her nails with them.
I wanted to run toward her. It had been years since I'd seen her, alive. But my legs wouldn't move. They were caught in a bog, a quicksand pond. And I was terribly thirsty. My throat was parched, like I'd been swallowing sand for hours on end. It was so scratchy, I couldn't even call her name.
“Be good, Ramone,” she said, getting up from the tree and tossing the bark to the side. She always called me 'Ramone'. Ever since I could remember, that was her pet name for me. Rebecca got the better name, as far as I was concerned. I never liked 'Ramona.'
“Don't leave me here,” I thought, hoping she would hear me even though I couldn't speak. “Take me with you.”
Becca kept walking. Slowly, but surely, she was disappearing into the rose tree forest. The headless animals followed her, like a sick take on a fairy tale. The further away she moved, the more my heart pulled and stretched.
I tried to chase after her, but my legs had sunk deeper into the mud. I couldn't feel them anymore. It didn’t matter. If she heard me, if she knew I was there, then she’d turn back. She’d come for me. Take me with her. All she needed was to hear my voice.
I tried to scream again, but just like all the other times, this time it didn’t work, either. I tried to raise my hands to my face, to cup them around my mouth and my painful throat.
My arms were useless, too. As if weighted down. Paralyzed.
I was scared, and all I wanted to do was to catch up with Rebecca. The two of us were always able to get through anything, but we had to be together to do so.
The fog grew thicker, darker. Funky grays morphed into silver, then black. All the muted colors disappeared, and suddenly, I was naked. Naked, laying on the mossy floor of what I could only assume was the forest, and still paralyzed.
I licked my dry lips, wishing I had some water, wishing I wasn't here. Wishing Becca was with me.
Then, something wet. Wet, and warm, against my chest.
I strained my neck, raising myself just a little from the moss, because the heat, the moist heat, felt soooo good. It was against my nipple, massaging it. Sucking on it, then moving to the other.
My back arched in response to the sensation, and my head fell to the side as the heat kept rubbing, rubbing.
“You like that,” someone said. I could hear them smiling.
It was a man's voice. I'd heard it before. But…where did I hear it before?
Hands on my breast, pulling the flesh taught, making my nipple more exposed, more vulnerable. The warmth licked against it, kissed it, suckling and teasing, and then another kind of heat began to rise within me. Pleasure, desire, between my legs. The heat kissed my nipple once more, then turned to ice.
My eyes snapped open, and my first instinct was to flee. I twisted to the side, why couldn't I run, and the sound of chains rattled softly above me.
My arms were spread wide apart, my legs numb from being confined for so long.
Maddox smiled.
“Someone's awake,” he said, and dipped his finger in his glass of ice water. “Hold still, now, princess.”
Holding still was the last fucking thing I was going to do. But no amount of twisting, or thrashing would free me. By this point in the evening, everything had been spent, gone weak. My muscles had nothing left to give.
Maddox plucked out an ice cube.
“Are you thirsty?”
I glared at him.
“Mmm. The short, silent type,” he remarked, and held the ice just above my breast. A droplet of freezing water fell against my tit, and trickled down the side. I shuddered. “You like that, too, don’t you?”
I swallowed over a sandy lump in my throat. “Fuck you,” I croaked.
He laughed, and took a long drink of water, then licked his lips.
“You're a funny girl. Can you habla anything but 'fuck you?'”
“Kiss my ass. How about that?”
He nodded enthusiastically. “That can be arranged,” he said as he placed the water on the nightstand.
He scooted closer to me, put his arm on my other side, and looked down at me as if he had never been so amused in his entire life. His finger, the one that had been in the water, began tracing my areola. My nipple grew harder, it was completely involuntary, and made him smile wider.
“Remember how I said I never forget a pair of tits?” His fingertip drew casual lines from one breast to the other. He sighed dreamily. “Honey, I would never forget yours. They're amazing. Really, you should be proud.”
He got up from the bed, and started taking off his tie. If my shoulders could sag, they would.
Here we go, I thought. Typical fucking guy. Tie the girl up, rape the girl, rinse, lather, repeat. How god damn original.
“Can't think of anything else to do, dick head?” I said.
It hurt to talk, and I longed for just a sip of that water. I made sure not to look over at the cool, sweet relief sitting on the nightstand. One – I didn’t want him to think I thirsted for it. Two – I didn’t want to tease myself with something I knew I wasn’t going to get.
“You didn't seem to mind earlier,” he said, pausing at his middle button.
“I was passed out, fucktard. Don't flatter yourself.”
“Your lips say one thing, señorita. Your body said another.”
He tossed the tie to the floor, paused for a moment, then went back to retrieve it. He picked it up, looked at it, wrapped one end around his hand, then glanced over to me. He raised his eyebrows up and down.
“You ever play the strangle game? Some chicks dig that. I never understood it, really, but, how 'bout you?” He wound his other hand into the free end, and snapped it in front of him.
I turned my head to the side. Didn't close my eyes. Just looked at the other nightstand, where there wasn't any water, just a copy of To Kill A Mockingbird.
I was so over this. It was a stupid idea to begin with, but I really thought I could pull it off. Just blow his head apart, then sit down in his premiere office suite and wait for the police. There was also the option of suicide by cop, that was a thing, yet if I were to go – and God, I wished I had – I wanted it to be by my own hand. That was the one thing that hadn't changed in the last couple of years. My sense of pride. In fact, it seemed to have grown stronger. Or stupider, given my current situation.
“Señorita?” Maddox asked, taking a few more steps toward the bed, still holding the tie taught. Like a tightrope. A mockingbird could walk across it, no problem. He sat on the side of the bed, waiting for me to say something. “So, by your lack of speaking, am I to gather you're not into asphyxiation fun?”
“You don't read these,” I said, and swallowed over the increasing scratch in my larynx.
“What?”
“The books. This one, all the ones in your office. You've never read a single word of any of them, have you?”
“I think you're a little delirious, jumping bean.”
I chuckled. Which hurt like hell, to be honest. “I wonder why.”
Maddox unwound the tie from his hands, and placed it neatly on the nightstand near the water.
“Tell you what,” he said, and picked up the glass. The ice cubes clinked against the side. I would not turn my head, though. I wasn't going to look like a dog begging for a Milkbone. Seriously, fuck that. “You're thirsty, I have water. We can negotiate.”
Forbidden Sensations: A Dark Romance Page 4
