GLASS: A Standalone Novel

by Arianne Richmonde

  I told her the whole Will saga, and Star agreed I should go to Vegas, and even offered to come with me.

  “It’s fine,” I told her. “Really, I can handle it, and I’m okay—I feel rested and strong enough to fly.”

  She looked doubtful. “Really?”

  “Really. I’d rather deal with my family alone. No offense, but you know how it is.”

  “Yeah, I do. Family can be really fucked up.”

  When I got back to Star’s house, I spoke to Dad, who was horrified that Will had fibbed to me, saying what a great idea it was to go to Vegas.

  Unfortunately, it was too late to turn the clock back now. Or rather, the invisible clock, because we all know that in Vegas they have no clocks. Will had been missing since five a.m., from the hotel. I knew what he was up to: playing in a casino somewhere.

  “There’s no point in you even coming,” Dad objected. “You’re weak and need all your strength—you can’t be running around Vegas looking for Will in your condition.”

  “I’m worried about him, Dad. He could get into serious trouble if they get wind of his game, his method, whatever . . . that is, if he has one.”

  “He’ll be okay,” Dad said, sounding unconvinced.

  “How much money did he have on him when he left the hotel this morning?” I asked.

  “Like fifty dollars, if that.”

  “Have you searched the hotel?”

  “There are four thousand and four rooms here, a casino the size of three football fields, and sixteen restaurants—where should I begin?”

  “Well you could start by calling him on his cell, have you tried that?” It seemed like a really obvious thing to say, but my father often bypassed the obvious. Practical was not a word in Dad’s personal dictionary.

  “He’s switched off his cell,” he said, his tone hopeless . . . helpless.

  “Well I’m coming out.”

  This time, he didn’t protest.

  Just as I was stuffing the last things I needed into an overnight case, my cell buzzed again. Daniel. Normally, I would have lost all concentration with what I was doing and morphed into a panting Daniel Glass groupie, but right now I had no time for him, or his movie.

  “I’m running really late, Daniel,” I snipped, sitting on my suitcase and zipping it up. “I’ll call you later.”

  “Wait! Janie?”

  I hung up. It was rude, but I could not be distracted by Daniel Glass, right this minute, not with Will roaming around casinos, with no clocks on the walls. If he’d been missing since five a.m. that meant he’d won money, which meant he’d play until his luck ran out. Where had he even learned to play cards or roulette in the first place? Online? It didn’t bear thinking about. He didn’t own a credit card; if he had, he probably would have totaled up a grand debt by now. Hence his fascination with Vegas. How dumb could my dad be?

  Very dumb, as it happened. You would have never known he had letters to his name and was a bona fide professor. Okay, he was a professor of music, so perhaps that did lend a clue as to how on the ball he could be in the real world. But still.

  Jake and Star offered to drive me to the airport, but I knew how busy they were, so I convinced them to let me drive myself, since Star had so generously given me carte blanche with her car. Apart from a bruise on my right arm where the IV had been, I felt fine. I raced out the door and went flying headfirst into . . .

  Daniel.

  “What the heck?”

  “Janie, I was outside the door when I called you.”

  “How did you even know where I was?” Was he stalking me?

  “Good guess. Where are you going?”

  I told him the whole saga as I rushed toward the car. He grabbed my case from me and simultaneously pulled me into an embrace. Or was it an embrace?

  “You’re not driving,” he ordered.

  “Just try and stop me,” I foolishly protested, trapped close against his hard chest.

  “I am stopping you.”

  “Let me go, Daniel, I have to catch my plane!”

  “I’m coming with you, or rather, you’re coming with me.” He entwined his arm around my waist as I shuffled along beside him, trying as I was, to break free. “Don’t be silly, Janie, we’ll go to Vegas together and we’ll take my jet.”

  “What is it with you and your private jets lately?”

  “You are not getting on a commercial plane on your own when you’ve just come out of the hospital. Someone will start sneezing all over you.” Just like Daniel. A veritable Howard Hughes when it came to hygiene. “You’re coming with me, and I won’t hear one more word to the contrary.”

  He bundled me into his black Mercedes and drove off, both of us traveling in silence, the atmosphere a wall between us. Boy, he annoyed me. Who did he think he was, calling the shots? I didn’t have the strength to argue, though, so I slumped into my car seat and gazed out of the window.

  It seemed like we arrived seconds later because, apparently, I had dozed off for the entire car ride.

  “You see? You were tired,” he remarked, as we pulled up to the airport.

  I opened one eye and saw a vision of beauty before me. All in black, his hair flopping over one side off his face, a blue eye—turquoise even, speckled with flecks of black—was sizing me up with approval. He parked the car, his wrist casual on the steering wheel, sporting a beautiful, Patek Phillipe watch. Even when Daniel was dressed down, he looked elegant. Never sneakers, but hand-made, Italian, leather shoes. Daniel Glass had my heart pounding again. Was I really about to take a private jet with him to Las Vegas?

  “Where are your brother and father staying?” he asked.

  “At the Aria. Why?”

  “Just wondered if they were at one of mine.”

  “One of your what?”

  “One of my hotels.”

  “You own hotels now, too?”

  His mouth lifted into an easy smile. “Part of my inheritance. My father had fingers in many pies.”

  “And those pies are all yours?”

  “Yes.”

  “You must have very sticky fingers.”

  He gazed at me for a long beat and said, “I like having sticky fingers.”

  I realized the innuendo of what he just said. In my dreams those fingers had been in me and all over me, but in reality all we’d done was kiss. Then I remembered; it wasn’t me he was referring to but all his blondes. Ugh!

  “Yes, I’ve heard all about your roaming hands,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant.

  He got out of the car and closed the door with a loud clunk. What I said obviously irked him. Yes, the truth can hurt. I mentally geared myself up to confront him about this pertinent issue and let him know in no uncertain terms what I would and would not accept if I were to take the part of Sylvie. I still hadn’t said yes to doing the movie.

  He came around to my side and opened the door for me. “Let’s go,” he said in his low, no-nonsense voice. “We can talk on the plane—we patently need to clear a few things up.” Patently. I smiled. His choice of vocabulary was always succinct—he used words that were so out of style they almost sounded hip.

  The jet was outrageous. I could see why Cal had been so impressed. Smooth leather seats, and conference tables, plush carpeting. All this was Daniel’s private property? I realized that for all my Wikipedia and Google stalking, and hours, weeks, and months in rehearsal with Daniel, I actually knew very little about him.

  “I know nothing about you, really,” I pointed out, lying back in my seat after I’d buckled up. We were about to take off.

  “Your imagination, Janie, runs away with you. You assume things about me that simply aren’t true.”

  “My imagination? Am I imagining this swanky jet and the fact that you are basically a billionaire?”

  He swiped his hand through the air, waving away my observation. “It’s company money, I don’t consider it mine.”

  “Oh, so you have a bunch of shareholders?”

  “No, I own
the company outright.”

  “So let me get this straight; you own the company outright yet you don’t consider it yours?”

  “Of course it’s mine.”

  “Yet the money isn’t? That doesn’t make sense.”

  He laughed, his wide smile spreading across his face. He looked amazing when he laughed—so carefree. “You’re right, what I said was preposterous.”

  He put his hand on my thigh—tingles shot down to my toes and up to my dizzy head. He edged closer to me, even though the plane was steaming along the runway, about to lift off. “Look,” he said, “I think you’ve got the wrong impression. What you said in the car unnerved me. About roaming hands. What was that supposed to mean?”

  “The word is that you have quite a reputation, Daniel Glass. And to be honest with you, I’m not interested in shooting this movie with someone who could be riddled with sexually transmitted diseases.” There, I said it.

  He burst out laughing again.

  “I’m serious, Daniel. What you do is your business, but if I’m to be pretty much naked, with you all over me, I want to know you’re as clean as a whistle.”

  He tried to put on a serious face. “I haven’t had sex with anyone since my wife died,” he said, still chuckling to himself.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Janie, I don’t know what gossip you’ve heard, but I can assure you, I’ve been far too busy to run around looking for pu . . . possibilities of hook-ups.”

  “That’s not what half of Hollywood says. Seems like you have a penchant for busty blondes.”

  He stared at me. Hard. “Actually, if you really want to know, I have a ‘penchant’—as you say—for petite, undernourished brunettes.”

  His half-lie made my stomach flip. “Okay, then you won’t mind getting tested.”

  “No, not at all. If it makes you happy, then fine. You can get tested too.”

  “What, me?”

  “Yes, you. I don’t know where Cal’s been, or anyone else you might have had relations with.”

  “I . . . nothing happened with Cal!”

  “That’s not what I heard.”

  “What? Who from? Him? We had a little itty bitty kiss, nothing more.”

  “Tell that to half of Hollywood.”

  “It’s gossip!”

  “Well, there you go, gossip has a way of traveling its way into people’s gullible ears and straight out the other side, without even a thought as to whom it could be hurting.”

  I puffed in protestation. “Well, I don’t fuck around, just so you know.”

  “And nor do I, just so you know,” he said in an even voice.

  I glared at him. I supposed it was possible that this was all gossip. Yet he was so sexy and handsome, and ridiculously successful, not to mention loaded, and I knew women were throwing themselves at him any chance they got. I eyed him warily.

  “Anyway, you’re still in love with your wife,” I added, like a petulant child asking for someone else’s share of candy.

  “What do you mean by that, Janie?”

  “I mean what I say, that you’re in love with her.”

  “And if that were to be true, why should it affect you?”

  “It would make it complicated for the film.”

  “Ah, I see. So my being ‘in love’ with my wife would affect your decision about whether to take the role of Sylvie or not?”

  His words cut me. The way he laid it out so . . . so . . . blatantly made me look like an ingénue idiot. He had a point. I was a professional actress and I was being absurd. I could feel my lips pouting—I had no answer to his question.

  “Are you jealous?” he asked.

  My fake laugh would have fooled any audience, and I hoped Daniel too. “How can I possibly be jealous?”

  “You’re answering my question with a question.” He lowered his voice and said in a sensual whisper, “Are you jealous, Janie? Does the idea of my loving someone else torment you?” He brushed my lip with his thumb.

  I felt a lump gather in my throat and my eyes flood until they burned. Hot tears slid down my cheek. Talk about wearing your heart on your sleeve. And my heart was like fragile glass.

  “I thought so.” He smirked a little. What a bastard! He was getting off on this! Having me so desperately into him while he still held a flame for Natasha freaking Jürgen!

  I turned my face away from him so he couldn’t humiliate me any further, but he held me by the jaw and forced me to look at him, unbuckling his seatbelt, getting down on his knees so he was kneeling in front of me. The fact that the plane hadn’t stabilized didn’t deter him.

  “Look into my eyes,” he demanded. “Look at me, Janie, and tell me how you really feel.”

  I was blubbering now. The pathetic little student in love with her teacher, the lapdog who would follow her master off a cliff. Why can’t I be stronger than that?

  “Are you in love with me, Janie?” He unbuckled my seatbelt and, at the same time his hand brushed across my belly, his fingers feeling for my flesh, his touch light. I let him continue, too weak to protest, too stunned by his cruelty at causing me to fall apart. “Are you in love with me, Janie,” his echo murmured into my mouth—not even saying it as a question, but as a statement—his hand reaching inside my jeans and slipping down under the thin fabric of my panties. I gasped. His tongue found my mouth, prying my lips apart.

  “No,” I whimpered into his mouth, “I’m not.”

  He hooked his other hand around the waistband of my jeans and started pulling them down.

  “Oh, fuck,” he said, his fingers gliding inside me. I was soaked. This was real, not a dream, and it was different from any of my fantasies. Even more intense.

  My eyelids fluttered in submission as his thumb found my clit and pressed on it like a button, all the while his fingers sliding in and out of me.

  “Because I could swear that you were completely crazy about me,” he said, taking my lip between his teeth. I moaned. His free hand trailed up my stomach and circled my nipples, one by one, not touching them. I found myself bucking my hips at him, eager for the extra contact with his thumb on my hard nub. “But then again . . . you’ve put up quite a fight,” he murmured.

  My jeans and panties were somehow halfway down my thighs now, and I vaguely wondered where the airplane steward was; if he’d find me in this semi-naked state. Daniel’s lips trailed from my lips to my breasts, which he started licking one by one, and then sucking each nipple individually. Hard.

  “Oh, God,” I groaned. My seat had been pushed back in my delirium, and my pants were even lower. Daniel’s mouth traveled south, and in one aggressive tug he yanked my panties down all the way and pressed his head between my thighs. His tongue took over from his thumb and fingers, as he growled into my pussy, eating, nipping, sucking me into his mouth. It felt amazing.

  “Please,” I cried out.

  He carried on, flicking his tongue at my clit now, lashing it with lightning fast strokes to the point of torture. It was too much—the sensation too much.

  “Fuck me, Daniel . . . please.”

  He knelt up, looked into my eyes, then stood up. I could see the hard ridge—that bulge I’d seen before, massive and intimidating. He bent down and scooped me up in his arms and carried me to a private cabin, where he plunked me on a bed. I watched him as he took a condom out of his pocket, and ripped the foil packet with his teeth.

  This was it; Daniel Glass was going to fuck me. Finally.

  For real this time.

  He started to unbuckle his belt, then unbuttoned his black trousers, as I stared transfixed at the apparition before my greedy eyes. He came closer, his crotch level with my face.

  “Is this what you want, Janie?”

  I nodded.

  “It’s all yours.”

  I sat up and brought my trembling hands up to his hips. I slowly unfastened his fly as his cock flexed beneath the fabric of his pants. I laid my hand on his mountain and sucked in a sharp breath. It was rock hard
and even bigger to my touch than I expected. “You’re huge,” I said. He was. Huge.

  He clenched his eyes shut and parted his beautiful mouth as my fingers nervously grappled with the stubborn fabric. I hadn’t done this up until now, and I was shaking. I’d had one serious boyfriend in my life and he had never asked me to undress him. Finally, the pants slid off Daniel’s hips. My gaze fixed on his boxer briefs—my next hurdle. The bulge was even more enormous—the outline of his throbbing crown reaching up to his navel in a thick solid arrow—and I shuddered, wondering how it could possibly fit inside me. I hadn’t had sex for so long, I could hardly even remember how it all worked. Would this be painful? My ex didn’t have this kind of equipment—then again, I had never felt so ready for anyone in my life as I did now.

  I touched his ridge with my lips, then nibbled him there, my teeth sinking tentatively into the combed cotton of Daniel’s boxer briefs.

  “Fuck, Janie,” he groaned, opening his eyes and casting his gaze down at me. I continued to nip along the long, thick shaft, too scared to take off his underwear and reveal his mammoth erection in the flesh. He made my mind up for me, by pulling off his boxer briefs so his cock sprang free. He grasped it in both hands. “I’d fucking love it if you took me in your sexy mouth. Open up.”

  I did as I was told, and he eased himself into my mouth, a deep guttural groan emanating from his throat as he did so. I felt a rush of moisture shoot between my thighs, and my clit started to pound with longing. I had never felt such an ache or yearning before, and I feared it—I could sense myself losing control. He started languidly fucking my mouth, his hands clawing my hair as he guided my lips up and down his massive length.

  “I want thizz inthide of may,” I gagged.

  He stopped mid-plunge and said, “You’re sure?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  He slowly pulled out. “Fuck, you’re sexy, Janie, “you make me fucking ravenous for you. You’re sure?” he asked again. I nodded. “Because I could hurt you without meaning to.”