by Alam, Donna
‘Why, Edera.’ Amusement ripples over his face because those reactions aren’t the only emotions I’m inadvertently revealing. ‘Are you jealous?’’
‘Are you an arsehole?’
Face burning, I raise my chin when his fingers catch it. ‘I’ve fucked plenty of assholes lately. And I have you to thank for that.’
I pull away from him, turning and wrenching the entrance wide before storming into the cavernous and darkly lit space.
The music pounds; starting at my feet, it works its way up my legs and ends in a thrum between my thighs. Maybe five or six couples are dancing. A bar is set against the far wall, and a bartender serves cocktails. The whole place, at first glance, could be any club in the world . . . until you notice the subtle flash of flesh under a strobe light, and the bodies pushed together in corners. A woman sandwiched between two dancing men. The music works its way to my centre, settling low, and though I hate to admit it, the presence of Dylan at my back is mostly responsible.
Ignoring him—I’m sure he’s standing there purely to assess my flight risk—I keep my eyes fixed on a man sitting on a high stool at the bar. A man with a woman standing between his splayed legs. She looks familiar. Was she in a movie I watched last week with Nat? They’re not doing anything out of the ordinary; nothing overtly sexual, in any case, but there’s something about them. Something that makes it hard to tear away my gaze. The whole setting is too much—too sexual—but as she slides her hands through his hair, the intimacy calls out to me. Makes me long for the same.
Deepens a certain flutter between my legs.
‘How many fingers does he have in her pussy, do you think?’
My insides clench emptily at his words. In the split second it takes Dylan to pull away, the woman throws her head back, pleasure curled in the soft o of her mouth.
‘Two? Three?’ he asks again.
Two and a thumb playing her clit. I turn my head, though not really to answer, and find his mouth within kissing distance. His darkened eyes dance back and forth between my own, seeking something undefined. They drift to my lips and linger. Travel over my neck and between the valley of my breasts. His Adam’s apple moves as he swallows, and I sway towards him.
Stupid, stupid girl.
Chapter 14
Ivy
I sway millimetres closer when Dylan laughs. It’s a throaty hum of laughter, not at all bitter like I know it should sound.
‘Tempting, as always, cutz.’ His fingers trail the skin of my bared back, tantalising each of my vertebrae and igniting every nerve ending. It’s all I can do to stop myself from turning, forcing him to feed me his next sentiments from his tongue. ‘But you’re not here to fuck me tonight.’
I swallow thickly, coming back to our reality. He’d called me cutz the first night we met because of my job. The day I left him, he called me it again but without affection. He referred to me cutting out his heart.
‘You remember the purpose of tonight? Your fucking me over? Our divorce? Your lies?’ His breath is warm and whisky-scented. Mixed with the smell of his cologne, it’s like a brush with the past. ‘Pay attention, Edera. We’re here to find you an easy fuck.’
‘What are the rules?’ I swallow thickly, my throat burning at his words. He’s not going to make me do this; I know he’s not.
‘A man,’ he replies, tapping his chin, ever the thespian. ‘A woman would be a step too far from your comfort zone, I think.’
‘Yeah because being penetrated while my husband looks on is much less frightening and way more fun.’ I almost stutter over my use of husband, the truth of the word holding too much hurt.
‘You’re not here to enjoy yourself. But who knows? Maybe you will. Maybe I will?’
‘I’m not watching you .’ He laughs then, like that’s the funniest thing he’s heard. As I turn my head from his amusement, I realise we’re being watched.
‘Him,’ I announce. ‘I’m doing him.’ What makes me say it, I don’t know, though my mouth seems pretty content to run. ‘He’s sort of cute.’
Is he cute? I don’t appear to be processing. I only recognise his is the first gaze mine connects with. Maybe I’m just calling Dylan’s bluff?
I make to move toward him when Dylan catches my arm.
‘That’s not how this works,’ he growls, his mirth having dissolved into distaste. I curl my fingers around his in an attempt to pry them from where they pinch. ‘You don’t get—’
‘Hey,’ a third voice drawls, interrupting. Sandy hair and a deep tan suggested he works outdoors most of the day. He’s good looking, in that ordinary way. Sort of safe. His gaze falls to where Dylan’s fingers curl around my arm. ‘Angry roleplay?’ He reaches to scratch the back of his neck, maybe realising belatedly that Dylan’s anger is anything but make-believe.
‘You got us,’ I respond. ‘He likes to pretend he’s against me playing a slut.’ My words are bright and over enthused. I’d be a rubbish actress. Meanwhile, Dylan’s mouth remains a grim line, and his fingers continue to pinch my upper arm.
‘I’m not into threesomes,’ Sandy-haired man says. ‘My kinks are pretty straight.’
Straight kinks; a bit of an oxymoron. While I’m just a plain old moron. My jaw aches from smiling, so I know I must look a little like one. Jesus Christ—this conversation could’ve been lifted from our book club. If he tells me he’s a billionaire CEO, I’ll die. I look down at his shoes; leather Keds. So not CEO material. He looks more like a tech geek, especially as I catch a glimpse of his watch. Expensive and complicated.
I attempt a smile, though it’s the short-lived kind. I fix it firmer on my face and tilt my head, my gaze solely for Dylan.
‘Straight kinks work. We’re not interested in, erm, that sort of stuff, and he’s just here to watch.’
‘What, no golden showers? No ass fucking,’ Dylan snarls—that’s what it sounded like, anyway. A snarl from the pit of his gut. And he looks seriously pissed. I unfurl my fingers from Dylan’s pinching ones, tearing my gaze from his.
‘Where are my manners?’ I hold out my hand. You still bring manners to a sex club, right? ‘I haven’t introduced myself. I’m—’
‘My wife.’ I’d always thought growls were something heated, but somehow, Dylan manages to lace his with ice. ‘That is all you need to know, and we sure as fuck don’t need to know your name.’
‘Cool, man,’ Sandy responds, his tone chilled but not at all cold. ‘I know you from someplace?’
‘No.’
‘You look real familiar.’
Of course he is—don’t you have a TV? Internet?
‘I have one of those faces,’ Dylan deadpans.
‘But you,’ Sandy says, turning fully to face me, ‘you’ve got a real pretty face. I’d remember if I’d seen it before.’
If his tone was meant to be seductive, it falls a few miles short. And looking me up and down? That’s not helping. And not creepy at all. Just all the creepy. Doesn’t matter , I tell myself. Because this isn’t going anywhere real. Dylan wouldn’t. I know he’s just playing with me.
I have to believe.
‘Oh, thank you.’ I think. More politeness when, out on the street, I’d have told him in no uncertain terms, where to stick his compliment.
‘What part of Ireland you from, good lookin’?’
‘She’s from the Scottish part,’ Dylan grates out. ‘So we’ve established I look familiar, and my wife has a pretty face—’
‘Know what’ll make your face even lovelier?’ he says, cutting across Dylan as though he wasn’t midsentence. ‘When I have my head between your legs, and you’re crying out my name.’
Corn central. Someone pass me a sick bag. I giggle, probably still a little drunk.
‘This,’ Dylan sneers, looking the man up and down, his focus turning to me, anger and distaste radiating from him. ‘This is what you want?’
‘This is what you want,’ I snap, running from mildly amused to angry immediately. ‘Apparently, what I want doesn�
��t matter.’
Searing. That’s what his returning glare is. I feel burned and blackened and hardened on the surface. Yet raw underneath.
‘Fine.’ That one arctic word brims with so many meanings, all of them a world away from fine. A world away from comfortable.
I almost can’t bear the weight of his stare but refuse to turn away. For the life of me, I can’t guess what his gaze is trying to convey. Is it that he hates me? That he can’t wait to see me be fucked? Fucked over? Or maybe, and this is probably more likely, he’s waiting for me to back down. And if that’s the case, he’ll be waiting for a very, very long time.
This isn’t going anywhere. He isn’t going to make me go through with this. He’ll baulk first.
‘Fine,’ I spit back, balancing my weight on one hip.
‘Let’s get it on.’
‘Literally.’
Dylan turns on his heel and strides off in the direction of glass doors, leading to some sort of patio. Of course, I follow angrily behind. At the door, he swings back and calls out, though it takes me a second to realise this message isn’t only meant for me.
‘The cottages. Number six. I’ll be waiting.’
He storms out.
I follow the sound of his footsteps past a free-form pool with an actual grotto, complete with cascading waterfall. At least a dozen people are milling by the poolside; some of them in very little clothing, and some of them moments away from getting hot and heavy, it would appear.
‘It’s like the bloody Playboy mansion,’ I grumble to myself.
I follow Dylan’s dark form through the gardens while trying to ignore the sound of Sandy’s softer footfall behind. I can’t believe he’s actually following; he must be pretty desperate for a shag to think anything good could come of taking his jeans off between two hotheads. But maybe dangerous sex is his kink.
This isn’t going anywhere real—Dylan’s not going to make me do this.
He won’t. I have to believe this.
His strong back suddenly disappears within the dense garden of greenery; bromeliads, soft gingers, and ferns. Even though the grounds have a secret garden feel, the pathway is very distinct. Before long, I reach a row of small bungalows—half a dozen of them or so. The kind you’d find at a resort hotel. At the structure farthest to the right, Dylan stands. The door to the bungalow is open, and he leans one shoulder against the frame. I can’t make out his expression; one side of his face cut by darkness, the other a dim light, but I suddenly find I need to remind my feet how to work.
By the time I get to the doorway, Sandy’s behind me and Dylan has turned from the door.
‘Hey, baby. What’s the rush?’ His hand trails down my bare back, and I shiver. It’s the opposite reaction to what Dylan’s fingers brought forth.
Out there, in the other room, with the music and dancing, the place heavy with the atmosphere of sex, I’d thought him unthreatening. Unthreatening in a place three miles out from my comfort zone. I remember thinking he had warm eyes, that he’d maybe be kind. That he’d understand when this fell apart because Dylan wasn’t truly going to make me do this, was he? I now think the opposite, and all I want to do is peel his fingers from my skin and douse myself in a vat of Lysol.
‘Are you here to talk or fuck,’ calls a voice from inside.
‘He doesn’t like that I called you baby.’
Sandy’s whisper is meant to be conspiratorial, but I don’t want to conspire with him, let alone have sex with him. And truthfully, I don’t like that he called me baby, either. I say none of this as my eyes adjust to the light.
Dylan stands at the far side of the room, his broad back to me as he switches on a lamp. As he turns, our gazes lock. He looks at me as though he’d prefer not to—as though he’d prefer to look at anything but me . . . yet has no choice.
I hold his gaze. Letting him know I’m not going anywhere as I’m compelled to step over the threshold. I ignore the inadvertent dance of Sandy’s fingers down my spine as I move. On the sideboard next to a lamp stands a tray of glasses and a bottle of black labelled bourbon. Dylan pours two fingers in one, holding it out to me, and my feet don’t stop moving until the tips of my shoes are almost touching his.
I take the glass wordlessly. Bringing it under my nose, I hope to drown the overwhelming scent of him. It’s torture to my senses; the spice of his cologne and the underlying scent of laundry detergent from his shirt. If I reached out right now and touched his cheek, I know exactly how those dark bristles would feel against my fingertips, almost recalling the sensation of them against the tender skin between my thighs. It’s the little things that hurt the most. Small reminders that steal my breath—the tiny scar on his jawline that most people wouldn’t notice, and the way one of his incisors overlaps ever so slightly, making him appear less than perfect up close. And a little more real . Small things that, from across the ocean, I could choose not to recall, but this close to him, I don’t have that luxury, and the sense of nostalgia pains me acutely.
I throw the fiery liquid back, closing my eyes tight against the burn.
‘You never did appreciate good liquor.’ His mouth lifts in one corner as he takes the empty glass from my hand.
‘The good stuff is rarely made in Tennessee.’
‘You’re a disgrace to our people.’
A long-standing joke between us. Scots are supposed to have whisky in their veins, and he’d often said he was looking forward to the day we’d travel to Scotland together. That we’d visit the distilleries, sampling spring water and single malts, and it’d take him nothing more than a few hours to convert me. Because I’m so malleable to his wants and desires. But the truth is I’m a lightweight; I like a glass of wine or two. Maybe a fruity cocktail by the side of the pool on holiday. Spirits have never been my deal until . . .
‘I developed a taste for vodka this afternoon.’
He lowers his gaze from mine quite suddenly, lashes as black as the lies I’ve told shading his eyes. As he looks up again, our connection is severed, his focus sliding over my shoulder to where the other man stands.
‘Let’s get on with this,’ he says, his voice all business.
He turns fully from me, and I begin to shake bodily at his denial of me, almost stumbling to the dresser in my haste to fill my glass again. And that’s what I do; no measly half shot this time. Much like the first mouthful, it burns on the way down; only this time, I’m able to sell it to myself that it’s the booze stinging my eyes.
I can do this. Even if I think I can’t. I won’t break down.
Across the room, Dylan lowers himself to an armchair, my glassy gaze making his image watery and indistinct. I’m a tactile person and always have been, so it’s fair to say as Sandy appears next to me and strokes my cheek, I lean into him. Lean into him, all the while looking at Dylan and feeling his fingers touch me. Blame the bourbon. Blame the man watching me from a chair at the end of the bed. Blame his cruelty. Blame a career choice where I spend my day touching strangers. Massaging heads.
This is so fucked up, but I can do this. Dare me, Dylan. Let me call your bluff.
Sandy’s hands turn me to face my husband fully and panic grips my throat. This is where it starts. Or ends. But how can he sit there watching? Watching another man touch me. Defile his marriage bed. The fist holding my heart squeezes tight, demanding I take action. Demanding I leave. But I don’t. I don’t have that luxury.
Hands run from my shoulders to hips then kisses press against the back of my neck. Wet, open-mouth kisses while Dylan’s green eyes bore into mine. As soft breath feathers across my skin, I shiver again, rolling my neck to keep my jawline—and mouth—away from this man. It’s not meant as a green light for him to begin sucking there, but he does. I try to muffle the sounds of my distress, the emotion hitting the air as a shaky groan.
Tactile. I’m tactile, I tell myself as his hands move to my shoulders once again. I realise a moment too late that he’s pushing at my dress. It slips from one shoulder the
n the other, sliding down my arms and catching at the elbows where my fingers grip them. And I’m frozen like a deer in the beam of Dylan’s gaze because, of the two men in the room, one is whispering seductions while the other just stares. Watches me. Watches my fingers flexing against the urge to cover myself.
Fuck you, Dylan. Fuck you, and fuck all those girls you fucked since I left. Fuck you for believing what your eyes couldn’t see. And fuck you for coming home covered in the evidence of some slut sucking on your dick.
When I’d chosen this dress earlier, I hadn’t anticipated coming this far, yet here we are. I’ll show him . . . Uncrossing my arms, I allow my dress to slither to the floor, my bareness reacting to the cool of the room. Not at all a gentleman, Dylan’s eyes consume; from the hard peaks of my breasts to the brevity of my thong.
I try not to react—try not to jerk—as Sandy’s arms slide around my ribcage, his fingers rising to caress.
I’m tactile. It’s just physical contact. I can deal.
My nipples tighten as his fingers pinch. I try to make sure my face doesn’t do the same, casting my eyes heavenwards. Beyond the sounds of this man sucking on my neck and my heart pounding against my ribs, I hear the liquid swish around Dylan’s glass.
Fuck you and the plan you rode in on.
Fuck you if you think I’m backing down.
Sandy straightens, rubbing his hardness against my ass, so I reach my hand over my shoulder to pull his head to mine, and all the while his mouth moves over me, whispers to me—as his hands maul and his dick rubs—I’m watching the man in front of me. The man whose relaxed demeanour is made liar by a very taut jaw. The man who stabs my heart with his gaze. And like a rapier through my heart, truth passes between us. For the first time since I arrived in LA, I feel the truth. This thing; this monstrous act he’s brought me here to complete, is his severance of me, not my punishment. And I can’t lie to myself anymore; he’s going to make me go through with it, and he’s going to watch. He truly intends to watch me debase myself with another man, to sully my skin because he needs this from me.
Maybe there’s an ounce of love left in him even if he doesn’t want it anymore.
