by Amber Burns
I smiled back at her, trying to read what feelings she might be concealing behind those milky eyes. But of course, as usual, I could not. Molly was beautifully withdrawn, her true thoughts as accessible as a princess locked away in a high tower.
The ceremony transpired as ceremonies do: long and winding with many drinks and forced laughter. The clapping sounds of sweaty palms meeting together in handshakes were more for show than for camaraderie. Most of the people who filled the halls and danced until the day turned into a new one were people I had never met. They were the friends and family members of my boss, the company’s owner or the investors. It seemed as if he had taken my wedding as a chance to throw a massive, expensive, company party. As I danced with Molly, I couldn’t help but feel annoyed at this.
“What is it?” Molly asked as I left the dance floor.
It was just after four am, and the party was finally dying out. The last guests were stumbling out the door, clutching at their party favors.
“It’s nothing,” I said, brushing a hand over my tired face. My cheeks hurt from all the forced smiling I had endured throughout the day.
“No, it’s definitely something,” Molly insisted, and she swept her lacy dress around me and gripped my shoulders. She looked me in the eyes. “Hey, Nikko? Even though it’s an… arrangement… I’m your wife now. So you should probably allow yourself to be open with me. At least to some degree.”
I stared back into Molly’s eyes for a moment and felt myself crumble. It was hopeless to try and conceal things from those perfectly pretty doe eyes. And besides, having someone trusted to confide in was definitely something that my life desperately needed.
“Well, it’s just this,” I said, taking a breath and gesturing around the room. “My boss started this whole thing in motion because he needs me to look a certain way. He orchestrated this part of my life, you see?” Molly watched me intently, nodding her head slightly. “And then, okay, I oblige him, I get married… and he has to make it all about him. I mean all of this; it’s just all about him. It’s just some giant game that he makes the rules for, and then he calls the shots for.”
“And you are the key player who has signed up to play the game,” Molly retorted coolly. I looked at her, caught off guard by her words. “Don’t act like some naive intern, Nikko, because you’re not. Not one little bit. You chose this. You knew full well, when you began climbing the ladder to the top rung of CEO, what you were getting yourself into. And what were you getting yourself into? A lot. A lot of money, a lot of sex, a lot of benefits, a lot of abilities and power… and also, a lot of bullshit. But you knew that. So do not stand there now and complain when you have signed the papers to your ownership of all this,” Molly said, raising her arms to gesture at the enormity of the mansion that stretched around us.
I sighed and nodded my head. I knew she was right. I reached out a hand and fondly ran my fingers down the soft peachy skin of her cheek.
“You really are something lovely,” I heard myself saying, and then I stopped.
I pulled my fingers away and shoved my hands into my pockets and swallowed, looking away. Molly took a step forward. She reached out and fished my hand out of my pocket and held it in her own.
“You obliged him,” she said, looking at me.
I turned back to face her.
“What?” I asked, confused.
“You said,” Molly replied, her honey brown eyes pouring into my face. “You said you married me to oblige your boss. Is that the only reason?”
I stared back at Molly, my heartbeat quickening, my fingers trembling between hers. I opened my mouth then slapped it closed again. What was she looking for? Was this some sort of a test? What did she want me to say? She knew the agreement we had made.
“I… Molly, you know very well…”
But before I could attempt to force out a sentence, Molly’s finger was pressing against my lips.
“I know full well that we are about to have the best sex any two people have ever had. You did, after all, promise me husband and wife with benefits,” she whispered, and her eyes glittered devilishly.
I felt my blood surge downwards towards my cock, and I laughed out loud, completely caught off guard by her turn of phrase.
“Well then,” I said, squeezing her fingers now. “Shall we?”
And with that, I scooped her up in my arms and carried her across the emptied dance floor and up the stairs to the wedding bed.
12
Molly
Nikko dropped me down on the bed, and I lay there waiting. The silk sheets were strewn with rose petals that my fingers played with, tracing their lines as I longed to trace his skin. He looked deeply into my eyes and, reaching down, slowly began to undo his pants. My body roiled on the inside and the outside followed suit. My breasts pressed up against the lace bodice of the dress, squeezing my nipples against the patterned flowers; my hips curled and swayed as he slowly dropped the pants to the floor, exposing thighs thick with muscles, calves round and hard, statuesque. He grinned at me, the left side of his mouth curling up towards his nose, that trademark snarl that drove me wild. Then he began to undo the buttons of his shirt, slowly, teasingly, the whole time keeping his eyes steadily boring into my own.
“Mmmm,” I heard the anticipation escape me, and it made me bite my lips, and my fingers fluttered subconsciously down towards the valley of lace that was tucked between my thighs.
My hands slipped beneath the ruffled hem of the dress, and my fingers began to work in circles around my clit. I couldn’t help it, I had to appease myself, give in to my body’s begging, as the most attractive man in the world stood before me, snarling, tearing off his clothes.
Nikko worked his shirt over his shoulders; his arms jutting back to push forward his impossibly well-muscled chest. His abs were gleaming with a light sheen of sweat, the product of our dancing. I licked my lips as I traced my eyes down the tantalizing line of his pelvic muscle jutting out of the tops of his briefs. The vision of manly perfection in front of me was all too much and my neck tilted back as my fingers work more quickly. My lips pouting in agonized longing and I could no longer stand it. I leapt up off of the bed and threw myself upon him, my hands sliding down the well-defined ridges of his body. My lips found his lips and our hands tangled frantically as we ran our fingers over each other’s flesh. I felt as if this was the last time we would ever be able to have sex again. It seemed that Nikko felt the same as he suddenly spun me around and pulled me to him.
“Ahh yes,” I sighed, as his fingers yanked on the zipper and pulled me free of my dress.
He gently ran his fingers over my shoulders, knocking the thin lace off of my arms, revealing my collar bones. He leaned forward and kissed me, gently tracing the lines of my bones pressing against my pale skin. Then he turned me around again and pushed me down onto the bed. I felt my stomach flip over with the thrill of his animalistic nature as he yanked my dress free of my body, exposing my entirely naked flesh. I adored the way he stripped free of his briefs and then grabbed me by my legs and pulled me toward him. I relished every inch of cock when he entered me. His manhood was hard and throbbing, an image of perfection, sliding inside of me and making me moan with pleasure. He worked his cock in and out of my pussy. Gently, passionately, his hands found my face and his lips finding my neck. His slick tongue traced lines down my chest, across my tits until he found what he was looking for. Nikko’s, my husband’s, lips were sucking on my nipples as my breasts bounced up and down against his cheeks. His cock was sliding against my g spot until I thought I would explode with pleasure right then and there.
I was moaning, maybe screaming, and pawing at whatever exposed flesh I could find. I knew something was coming as I felt myself erupting with explosive pleasure, a sensation unlike anything I had ever felt before. My body was shaking and my hands grabbing at Nikko’s back, his arms, anything to keep myself from flying off into the air and splitting into a million pieces. I needed some support as my body seemed to
go limp and I was unable to regain control. I was cumming, we were cumming. A stream of sweet liquid spurted from me and ran down his cock as he filled me with his own cum.
“Holy shit, yes!” Nikko called out as we came together.
He was gasping, and everything was bursting into light and fire. The thrusting of his hips slowed, and his head nearly fell limp in ecstasy. I brought my lips to his as I rolled through the explosive bursting sensation. Both of us were gripping, gripping, holding. He was kissing me and I was kissing him.
In between our lips meeting I heard Nikko whispering, “I love you, Molly. That was amazing. Molly, I love you. I fucking love you.”
And those were the words that brought me back, that grounded me again and stopped the explosion. Those words quieted the earthquake of passion and orgasm that rocked my body and mind. I turned my head his way, my lips brushing against his as I spoke.
“We can do this,” I gasped. “Anytime. But one thing I will never have you do,” and I paused to try and calm the heaving of my chest, “is tell me that you love me.”
Nikko’s fingers fell away from my face, and his lips hovered inches from my own.
“What do you mean?” His voice fell meekly on my ears.
“I mean,” I said, this time unable to look him in the eyes. “That… that I care about you. And I do not want to. And I understand what this marriage is. So I will continue… not to care. But in order for that to work, you must not tell me things like that. Things like… like you love me. Okay? I don’t think I can handle that, not when you really don’t mean it.”
A moment passed between us, our bodies still pressed together, our breath still colliding, but our lips fell silent. It felt like an eternity before Nikko spoke.
“I know it sounds crazy,” he said, looking away from me, his brow creasing. “I know it sounds crazy and that’s because it is crazy. It is totally fucking bullshit crazy. This whole thing. The fact that… that all this had to happen like this.” Nikko took a breath, and then forced his eyes upon my own. I did not look away; his copper gaze was too much to look away from again. “And I’m going to say this quickly, Molly, because I know that it is not going to sound great, and that’s because, well fuck it, it isn’t great. No. It wasn’t great. But please know that what I’m going to admit to you now has nothing to do with what I’m feeling for you right this moment; has nothing to do with what we just did here. Please know that what I’m going to say to you is… real.”
I looked at him, unsure of what was coming next.
“Okay,” I said.
“Okay,” Nikko repeated. He took a breath. “Alright. So two days ago, before we made our deal and everything. When I was asking you about Melandra…”
I burst out laughing before correcting him.
“Nikko! For the last time, it is Melissa!” I giggled, swatting at him playfully. “For such a smart man, you sure have a hard time with names.”
“Yet, not your name,” Nikko responded quickly, and his eyes roamed lustily over my naked body. “And that is the only name that matters.”
He gazed at me for a moment, as if considering whether or not to keep speaking. I nudged at his chest with my cheek, encouraging his pretty lips to keep on revealing secrets. I wanted to know Nikko. I wanted to know truly, deeply, everything about him, no matter how dangerous or uncomfortable. I wanted to know him inside and out because I felt certain that I could and would love every single tiny inch of this man. This man whose muscular chest I pressed the flesh of my cheek against, ran my lips softly over.
“Well,” Nikko began again, tentatively laying a hand, down on the curve of my hipbone. “Well. Two days ago, when I was asking you about Melissa, it was for a reason. It was because my boss, as you know, had delivered me that ultimatum. The very ultimatum that has brought us right up to this very moment, right here, right now.”
Nikko paused, and I saw his lips slapping clumsily open and closed out of the corner of my eye.
“Okay,” I said, suddenly feeling pressure to fill the uncomfortable silence. “Yes?”
“...well, I was asking about you Melissa because, Molly, well… she was the woman that originally came to mind when the big man told me I had to be married.”
I felt my stomach drop and I immediately began to feel as if I was going to be sick. I could not understand why Nikko’s admission made me feel so queasy. I should not have been surprised. After all, that was typical, that was my life. Melissa was always the pretty one, the one desired by all the men. I was always just the other girl, the plain, nerdy one. The leftover scraps to be picked over. Why should my marriage end up being any different? I felt instantly stupid; as if for a second, a single moment, I had let myself drift into a dream world and believe that this marriage was anything more than a basic business contract. I had fallen too hard and fast, and of course, it had left my heart burning with hurt. And yet, even though I knew that I shouldn’t hate Nikko for not finding me beautiful, for not genuinely wanting me with all of his heart, I could not help it. My heart began to race, and I felt my mouth go dry. My eyes began to fill with the threats of shivering tears.
“And then, of course, you were there,” Nikko said, still not looking at me, his hands dancing through the air. “And I thought, alright okay. This could work. You have to understand, Molly, I simply didn’t look at you that way. I couldn’t look at you that way. I was looking at you as the professional, first. I’ve always looked at women as, well, it pains me to admit it, but I’ve looked at them as tits. As asses. You were… different. So much so that I naturally I didn’t think of you as an option. But then… then it became so much more than that.”
Nikko paused, and his face fell down into his hands. I just sat in stunned silence, unable to offer either condolence or pity or rage.
“Fuck, Molly,” he spoke from between his fingers. “In the lounge… and then the next morning… and now today. I just… I’m looking at you and thinking, okay, what the fuck, like I don’t believe in faith or fate or anything like that but this is feeling a lot like it was meant to be; like it was supposed to happen. Because right now I’m looking at you and I’m thinking: You know what? I am lucky. I am the luckiest man in the world. Because somehow, some-fucking-how, I have wound up with this woman. The greatest woman on the entire planet. And no matter how it happened, Molly, it has happened.”
“Okay,” I said. It was the only word I seemed capable of saying. I didn’t know what else to say, to feel. Was what he was saying true?
“I love you,” he finally said with confidence. “Beyond anything I could have ever imagined experiencing. You are the single greatest thing that has ever happened to me, that has ever come my way. You make me… you make me feel things, and get excited, and you make sex… Well, you make sex something absolutely inexpressible. It’s that amazing, and I don’t know how you do it, but fuck am I glad for you. You are everything I never knew I wanted. ”
He looked at me then, and his eyes were filled with warmth, with honesty, with some sort of pained desperation. I wanted to believe him. I wanted to forget the fact that he had just admitted I was the second choice, the scraps he had to turn to when he had no other choice. But I also wanted to fall back into him and drown inside those copper colored eyes. But I couldn’t. Everything in me felt wrong, and my heart had begun to hurt.
“Just, just, tell me something,” I said, forcing myself to look into his eyes. “Please, Nikko. Just answer my question.”
Nikko sat up, pouring his copper gaze into my eyes, making my heart throb and ache. I swallowed to keep the tears from falling. I didn’t want myself to feel this jealous, to feel this hurt, and yet I did. I cleared my throat and forced myself to maintain his gaze.
“Would you rather be with Melissa? If all had gone well? If she had, by some chance, been the type of girl who really did like to build birdhouses… would you have rather ended up with her? I know it’s a contract,” I quickly added. “I know this was all just business, and that love was not s
upposed to have nothing to do with it. So tell me, would you rather have ended up in this here, in this now, with Melissa draped over your bed?”
Nikko watched me. I tried but was unable to read his face. Was he angry? Frustrated? Or just plain disgusted at the idea that he was going to have to spend the rest of forever with someone who looked like me?
“Molly,” he said softly, his eyes filling with sadness. “Please. It is… was a business deal, yes. But… But Molly, it’s more. I swear. It has become more. It has very quickly progressed to something real, and life changing, and well… I am trying to, for the first time in my entire fucking waste of a life, trying to be really, truly, fucking real and honest! You are beautiful. You are stunning. I was a fucking blind fool not to see that earlier! It’s me… it’s this life. I’m so fucking hung up on stuff and impressions and what people think of me. None of it has ever made me happy. But you… right here… right now…”
I looked away, disgust visible on my face. He hadn’t answered my question, and my mind quickly decided he had done so on purpose. He was avoiding, evading the hard truth the way CEO’s and businessmen do. Why did he have to feed me such bullshit? Why couldn’t he just admit it? Nikko sensed my feelings and impulsively reached forward, his hands gripping at my own.
