by Tasha Fawkes
I played up my relationship with Stewart to Tory twice to save my own skin. The truth is, I don’t consider what we have as a ‘relationship’—but he does.
What I consider a relationship, I’m finding is a lot more intense than most people can comfortably stomach.
I sit down behind my desk. Pen and Quill Publishing is a casual, open-door kind of publishing house. I don’t know why I thought that coveted concept of privacy could be found in the break room today. I pop open my laptop, my eyes skimming over what I’ve written, before hitting Save and exiling my manuscript back to the hidden folder I keep on my desktop.
Tory is right. My novel’s nameless hero is none other than Daniel Stone, the company CEO. Our boss. My boss. The descriptors I’ve employed in every hot passage so far point directly to my muse. It’d probably be a good idea to update some detail—any detail—to make it less obvious, but somehow, I can’t bring myself to render the changes. I want the hero to be Daniel Stone. And I want that bound, shuddering, gasping little sub begging for release beneath him to be me.
Somehow, I thought putting words to my most intimate fantasies would get them out of my system. No way that sort of relationship is possible—not with Stewart, and definitely not with Daniel, the multi-millionaire who barely remembers my name, but it’s only gotten worse since I started writing, and now I find I can’t stop. I’m hopelessly addicted to the plight of my raven-haired heroine, and I’m way too invested in the forms her punishments take.
Maybe it’s the close call with Tory that makes me more sympathetic than usual to queries from prospective authors today. I tab open my inbox and start replying to e-mails, avoiding my usual stock pleasantries and copy-pasted form rejections and focusing a little more on encouragement than usual. You might try querying at The Lifted Kilt Literary Agency, I advise one aspiring historical romance writer. Here is the contact info for one of their newer agents who is in the market for writers like you to represent! Feel free to use me as a reference. While our own preferences at this time lean more toward the contemporary, you’ll have an easier go of querying in the future once you’ve locked in an agent. Best of luck!
“Knock, knock.”
I glanced up from my latest dispatch. Elektra Ahladiotis, the firm’s senior editor, leans in the doorway. Elektra is a petite older woman in her fifties, although she doesn’t look it with that jet-black hair of hers and beautiful skin. She speaks with just a hint of her native Greece, which lends her voice a scintillating quality as exotic as her looks. She’s Daniel’s right-hand woman, and a formidable force of nature that I feel lucky to work directly beside most days.
“How is my assistant today?”
I’m not only Elektra’s assistant, but the editorial assistant to every other editor at Pen and Quill; still, what resources Elektra decides to command, Elektra gets. That includes me.
“Good.” I hit the Send tab on my latest e-mail and lean back in my chair, trying to school my expression to something carefully neutral even though my heart thuds erratically in my chest. Any unexpected appearance by Elektra usually makes my mind and pulse race with worry about having missed some minor editing detail, but today is worse than usual. Has Tory mentioned my pet project to her? Maybe I should’ve reiterated that she was to tell nobody. Maybe I should’ve made her sign a contract in blood. Maybe I should just start looking for another job since my career at Pen and Quill is as good as over.
“I just wanted to check in with you about the Christmas party this coming Saturday,” Elektra says. “As I recall, you were put in charge of food. I haven’t heard anything about it recently, so I assume it’s taken care of.”
She peers over her spectacles at me with those flinty dark eyes of hers, and it’s all I can do to not breathe an audible sigh of relief. All thoughts of living in my car with only my manuscript to keep me warm evaporate. “I’ve got it locked in,” I confirm. “Daniel’s… Mister Stone’s favorite restaurant has agreed to cater.”
“Maurelli’s?”
I nod. Elektra’s sharp gaze warms approvingly. “Your attention to detail has once more been noted, Ashley. Not many of Mister Stone’s employees make it their business to know his preferences. He is sure to be pleased.”
I nod again, more to hide the heat flooding my cheeks than anything. Of course, I made it my business to know Daniel’s preferences. Calling Maurelli’s was one of the first things I did when I learned he would be attending the party, and it hadn’t been an easy gig to secure. There’s a cunning quality to Elektra’s look now that makes me think this latest evidence of my devotion is sure to trickle back to him.
“You’ve done well, Ashley. I’ll leave you to it.” Elektra raps her knuckle on my desk in parting and glides back down the hall. Once I’m sure she’s gone, I do a gleeful spin in my chair. I have no delusions about Daniel’s availability, especially to someone like me, but I can’t deny how goddamn good it feels to succeed on even this minor front. And who knows? I might even get an acknowledgement Saturday from the big man himself.
Big man…
The thought triggers a mental image I could definitely use in my novel. “You need help, Ashley,” I mutter through a dreamy smile. I focus on work then, making sure I’ve caught up with all my e-mails before I click open the hidden folder. At the very least, I have time to finish that last paragraph before—
My work cell chimes. Text message. I’m still looking at the Word document, at all that empty space that needs filling—at that mewling heroine who needs filling most of all—when I thumb it open. I grimace when I see who the texts are from.
Stewart: Yo!
Stewart: Want me to come over tonight and help you relieve some stress?
Stewart: You’ve earned it. ;)
Stewart: I had us penciled in for some sexy times so just let me know. Also wanted to confirm the time of the holiday party this Saturday.
Stewart: Can’t wait to see you!
My inspiration shrivels. I close my laptop and mull over how to respond, which ends with me just staring blankly out an office window. How to reply? I told you not to text me at this number? We’re not in a relationship. I’ve told you a thousand times to quit acting like we are.
I used to think it wasn’t Stewart’s fault he couldn’t take a hint, but now I’m not so sure. I’ve been pretty clear on this front, and his unwillingness to recognize my waning interest—or to even listen to me when I tell him outright that I need more in the bedroom and less during the light of day—is starting to wear on me. I don’t like being the salacious, it’s-only-sex-between-us villain in Stewart’s life story, but maybe that’s who I am at the end of the day.
Good girls certainly don’t daydream about whips and chains and a healthy dose of mind-blowing pleasure with their pain.
Am I the villain? I stare at Stewart’s unanswered texts. The more I find myself able to put words and meaning to what I want, the more liberated I feel and less certain who I might hurt in the process.
There’s one thing I know, at least. I’m not afraid if the one who winds up bruised and begging is me.
Two
Daniel
“Daniel!”
The woman beneath me screams. It’s the way I prefer to hear my own name: in the form of a helpless plea; an explosive cry; a shapeless, senseless appeal for me to pull the trigger and end her suffering. But suffering is what Crystal loves. It’s why she comes to me.
And why she comes for me.
“Not yet,” I growl, leaning over the sweat-soaked, shuddering plane of my sub’s back. I thrust my thick cock between the cheeks of her perfect ass, burying myself to the hilt again and again as I take her from behind. Her magnificent breasts bounce with the force of the rhythm I dictate, catching and scattering the papers on my desk.
Crystal is the reason my office at Pen and Quill is soundproof. We’ve been going at it for almost an hour now, and her wails increase in volume as I come up with new and creative ways to make her beg for it. Getting fucked this har
d from behind takes her to the absolute limit of her endurance, and I’m not about to let her off easy after one or two plaintive calls for mercy.
Crystal’s visit caught me unaware today—a surprise worthy of the punishment she’s receiving—but I don’t have the usual tools at my disposal. But I’m not her Dom due to my lack of imagination. I pull harder on the belt I’ve used to cinch her wrists behind her back, and she arches with a sweet little moan of compliance. I only need one hand to fist the belt around; I bury the other in her rich brown curls and yank her head back so I can get a better look at her expression. Her pretty face is contorted in ecstasy, her eyebrows pulled together until they can’t possibly climb any higher. I break my rhythm to thrust into her unexpectedly and watch her wince. She wasn’t ready that time. Her mouth drops open again and she tries her best to look over her shoulder, which requires her to fight against her restraints. Those big brown eyes almost dare to look outraged.
I live for the little rises, the fleeting challenges to my authority, that I get out of Crystal. They don’t come often enough for my taste.
And my tastes are voracious.
“Too hard for you?” I taunt. I punch my hips into her and watch as her tits press against the polished wood surface beneath her. “You’re the best thing to pass across my desk all day.”
“Fuck me, Master!” she pants. Hearing that word on her cherry-red lips both thrills and annoys me, as it should. Crystal’s not the one who gets to make demands in this relationship, and she knows it.
“You should see yourself right now.” I crane closer, winding her thick locks tight enough around my fingers to straighten that girlish curl right out of them. “You flounced in here this afternoon like you owned the place, but we both know I’m the one who owns you. If you could see the way my cock now fills your tight little pussy… maybe then you’d remember who’s calling the shots.”
“I’m going to come,” Crystal moans, dragging the word out in a hum. My cell rings, and I debate whether or not to let her achieve a final release before picking up. Letting it go to voicemail isn’t an option, especially not when I see my fiancée’s name on the caller ID.
Crystal’s discarded panties are conveniently within reach. I grab them, ball them up tight, and stick them between those protesting, voluptuous lips of hers. She clamps down obediently, wide eyes imploring, but I need her quiet. I wrench the belt that binds her wrists, testing my improvised gag as I use my other hand to pluck my phone off the desk. Her answering squeal is muffled to my satisfaction. I slide my cock all the way in to reward her as I answer the call.
“Daniel here.”
“How’s work?” Karen Queen, mother-approved fiancée, asks, her voice sounding bored.
I eye Crystal’s pretty, splayed form beneath me and grin. She wiggles in alarm at that grin. “Oh, you know. Same as always. Chained to my desk today.”
Or at least someone is.
“I just wanted to make sure you hadn’t forgotten our dinner plans tonight.”
Her voice is disapproving, as usual, like she’s already made up her mind that I have. Which, balls-deep in Crystal, I definitely have.
“Dinner.” I don’t give her the satisfaction of hearing the question in my voice as I glance over to scan for my day planner. One of Crystal’s earlier thrashes must have sent it toppling to the floor. “Of course, I haven’t forgotten.”
“Good,” she says. “Because I don’t intend to be left alone with your mother yet again. With all the wedding planning your absences are forcing us to get done, I might as well be marrying her.”
Beneath me, Crystal makes a muffled noise—apparently, she can hear every word that Karen says on the other end. I give her restraints a warning tug, and she arches her back in cat-like pleasure as my cock brushes up against her secret inner spot.
“I haven’t forgotten, and I don’t intend to,” I tell Karen. “I’ll be there.”
God knows I don’t want to be. Maybe fucking Crystal is what’s gotten me into a domineering mood at present, but I want to tell Karen—and my mother—that I’ll be available to plan a wedding precisely when I have the time and desire to do so. Which may be never.
Instead, I find myself agreeing to meet them wherever it is we planned to meet. I mentally detach from the bland conversation with Karen and my thoughts drift, going beyond even the four walls of my office and the reality of the naked woman beneath me. Listening to myself talk to Karen is like listening to a man going through the motions of a life that he knows isn’t worth living. It’s a depressing thought, but one I’ve resigned myself to.
I don’t love Karen. Karen doesn’t love me. I don’t love Crystal. Crystal doesn’t love me. We all have requirements that need to be satisfied. Karen knows I see other women, and it doesn’t bother her so long as I keep things purely physical. Crystal knows I’m not interested in anything other than sex. It’s a perfect system. It should satisfy my need for control. Then why does it all feel so pointless?
“All right. We’ll be expecting you at seven.”
Karen signs off without a real parting word, but it doesn’t matter. I’m sure that later, we’ll pick up wherever we left off. I toss my phone down onto my desk and rein Crystal in. I remove the panties from between her teeth, and she sucks in a lungful of air.
“Everything all right?”
I glance down into those big brown eyes and debate whether or not to answer her. Then again, there’s nothing substantive I can tell her when I don’t know the answer myself.
I stick to our script. I release my grip on the belt and let her fight the restraints as much as she wants as I pound her into the desk. Soon she’s crying out once more, senseless with need, a slave to the whims of her body and a tool for my sexual release.
And for a fleeting moment, it almost does feel right.
“… well, I’m glad that you’re at least picking up Karen’s calls now while you’re at work,” my mother comments while she swirls cabernet in her wine glass.
I watch the ruby-red whirlpool that forms, trapped within the bowl. I wait for even a single drop to escape; to slosh out over the edge and form a hundred-dollar stain on the restaurant’s impeccable white tablecloth. It never does.
Shannon Stone is good at avoiding potentially messy situations.
My mother is young at sixty-eight, made younger by countless plastic surgeries and rejuvenating treatments that she diverts all my father’s leftover fortune toward. I don’t see the point of the practice, personally. No one is immune to the ravages of time, and my mother’s poised, petrified face is no exception.
Karen can talk with my mother for hours long stretches about the latest beauty breakthroughs and cleansing tricks. I almost wish they would find the time to talk about it now. Instead, my mother appears insistent on bringing up Pen and Quill. She never approved of my embarking on my publishing venture, and she still doesn’t approve, even after I agreed to remain CEO of Stone Exports. The look of measured disdain around the edges of her mouth isn’t something even her most highly-paid plastic surgeons can get rid of.
“I’m in and out of a lot of meetings, Mother,” I reply. It isn’t a lie. Crystal’s sweating, sublime body comes to mind as I recall our latest meeting.
“He’s delegating more,” Karen offers.
She leans over in her chair to wrap a hand around my forearm. I tolerate it, but just barely. She knows what she’s going to marry: a classically handsome, physically fit, statuesque poster boy who can’t seem to shake the stuffy smell of old New York money or the bloodhounds that pursue it. She’s going to marry into a multi-million-dollar fortune generations in the making, just the way her daddy always wanted.
And what do I get out of our arrangement of convenience? Political connections. Like I give a damn. Mother couldn’t be happier, of course. She may rail against my involvement with Pen and Quill, but what she really wants is for me to run for office. Even Stone Exports comes secondary to her true ambitions.
But what do I
get out of it? I’m Daniel Stone the Third, the third in my family to own the name and the shrewd business savvy that comes with it. It doesn’t even take a Stone to see that I’m getting the short end of the stick. I don't want to go into politics. I can barely manage to work up the interest to deal with Stone Exports. Maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll finally get some peace and quiet—and some much-needed privacy to pursue the off-hours recreation that actually satisfies me.
I watch Karen charm my mother. She regales her with an amusing anecdote about how she was forced to fire the latest wedding planner last weekend when she noticed the other woman looking at me in a way she didn’t like. My mother laughs and comes back with a similar story of her own. Karen leans harder into me, and I’m certain we must appear exactly as she hopes: close, cohesive, and head-over-heels in love.
I could muster a smile, but I don’t bother. The two women won’t expect it—they won’t even look for it. I’m a man in control of everything and nothing.
Concessions. Compromise. That’s all life is for me now; the pursuit of meaningless victories and the manufactured enjoyment of their empty rewards. I’ve been splitting my attention and bending over backward to accommodate everyone for so long that I’m not certain that isn’t how things are supposed to shake out in the end.
That doesn’t keep me from wishing I could get out of this goddamn marriage.
Three
Ashley
“No, I… yes, that will be fine.”
I pinch my nose, needing a light reminder that this is the incompetent reality I inhabit. The woman on the other line—who purports to be Maurelli’s manager—tells me that she'll make up for the missing vegetarian lasagna with a full refund on half the order, and have an additional dessert sent over from the restaurant.
