Lost in Scotland

by Hilaria Alexander

  Not once.

  In fact, he seemed even happier than before. He’d just won a Golden Globe, and both his girlfriend and his mistress were happy. Ratings were still not that good, but the future was looking somewhat bright.

  As was my revenge plan.

  Operation D&H—Douchebag and Harlot, as I affectionately dubbed them—was going great. I had enlisted my mother’s help and got some…equipment from one of her friends. I hid it everywhere—his office, her office, his car—and I started piling up the material. The downside of it was that I had to go through all the recordings—audio and video—of the two bastards. I had to listen to flirty words, seduction games, and the fucking moans. The kitten-like moans were the worst. Quinn sounded like one of those porn actresses. There was absolutely no need to moan like that, ever; any woman with half a brain would tell you so. I was thoroughly disappointed because up until I’d found her rubbing up against my boyfriend, I had been kind of fond of her.

  One night I told Eric I was going to spend the weekend with Amira, and instead I stayed at my sister’s house while she was away on a local shoot to go through all the material I had accumulated. My mother started questioning my sanity because I kept collecting and collecting evidence while still living with Eric and acting as if nothing had happened. In reality, I couldn’t stop thinking about how and when to drop the bomb.

  My life was a fucking mess, and it sucked. My revenge plan was the only thing going according to plan. I wanted it to be executed perfectly.

  It had to be epic.

  I knew I should have felt devastated—depressed, unmotivated. I should have just left Eric and gone to live at my sister’s, but I didn’t want to give up on my plan. Even though part of me was thoroughly heartbroken, the part thirsting for revenge was stronger, pulling me forward.

  At work, we lived in a euphoric state for a couple of months, but not even the two awards the show had won did much to boost our ratings. We thought we’d still get lucky, but nothing was for certain. These days, networks cancelled even moderately successful shows if they weren’t pulling the ratings they expected.

  Bottom line: the future of the show was still up in the air.

  I kept debating when and how I should let Eric, Quinn, and the rest of the world know about their cheating ways, but I couldn’t decide.

  There were so many different ways I could administer the blow, but still, none of them sounded right. Then, at the end of April, Beyoncé dropped her surprise concept album, “Lemonade.” I had always been a fan of hers, but after watching the HBO special I felt…electrified. She was speaking my language, one betrayed, humiliated woman to another. “Lemonade” definitely put a spin on my revenge.

  I called Amira, and she had her stylist get us in touch with a talented seamstress that could recreate the Roberto Cavalli dress from the “Hold Up” video. Initially, Amira tried to get me the real thing, but it proved nearly impossible even for her stylist since it was fresh off the runway and had become a hot commodity.

  When I tried on the dress the seamstress made for me, I could hardly contain myself. I had been walked all over, and I was ready to release all my frustration, pain, and heartbreak. I was ready to make my lemonade.

  “I need to be there,” Amira said.

  “What? Hell, no. You can’t be involved in this.”

  “No, I need to see this happening. I’ll video it. Pleeeease?” she asked. “We can make our own version of ‘Hold Up.’ I’ll come with you.”

  “You can’t be there, Amira. You have too much to lose. Your publicist and agent will be furious. You cannot be involved in this.”

  “Fine then, I’ll have Bucky take a video for me so I can witness your triumph. I won’t be there, but at least let me help you get ready.”

  It all went down on a Friday at noon. I went to work early that day and brought the dress and a basket full of evidence.

  During my lunch break, I pulled out my laptop and uploaded the incriminating video/audio mix I had made to YouTube. Then, I sent it to everyone on our email list. A few minutes later, I hid in a dressing room and put on the dress. I came out looking almost as fierce as Sasha Fierce herself, and I held a basket full of USBs in my hands.

  That’s right.

  Instead of going around the show’s offices smashing things with a baseball bat, I walked around throwing USBs loaded with the revealing video on everyone’s desks.

  Everyone was getting back from the lunch break, and from the looks on their faces, I could tell they were thinking something was wrong with me. Some gave me compliments on my dress while others just gave me weird looks.

  Bucky was videoing the whole thing, smiling like a fool.

  Someone in production asked if we were shooting a spoof of Beyoncé’s ‘Lemonade.’

  Not quite.

  I left the building with Bucky, middle fingers up in the air as my phone started buzzing incessantly with messages and calls from Eric—and pretty much everyone else I knew in Hollywood.

  The entire time I had been planning my revenge, I’d wanted to hurt Eric and Quinn. I’d wanted to hurt their reputation. What I hadn’t thought about was that the network would use it as an opportunity to cancel the show.

  And I certainly hadn’t thought Eric would try to make me pay.

  I was called by Eric’s attorney to come in that weekend for a formal meeting with his and Quinn’s legal representative, and my mother contacted her lawyer since I didn’t have one. To my surprise, when I went to the meeting, the bitch wasn’t there. She either didn’t have the courage to face me or was too busy licking her wounds after being exposed to the world.

  Eric wanted me to hand over the original files, but at that point, it was out of my control since I’d made at least three hundred copies and distributed them to everyone I knew—I had even sent one to TMZ. Anyone could have uploaded the video, even after mine got taken off YouTube. As my attorney explained this, the face of the man I used to love turned the ugliest shade of purple, and I saw a side of him I’d never seen before.

  “You fucking bitch! You’re done! I promise you will not work in this city ever again!” Eric yelled at me. For the very first time, I felt happy we were over. I froze as he made a spectacle of himself. His attorney had to restrain him, and after a while, I left with mine, wondering if I’d really get slapped with a defamation lawsuit as Eric’s attorney had said I would.

  The scandal was all over the place that weekend, and even though Eric and Quinn were minor players in the Hollywood game, it didn’t take the gossip sites very long to find out he’d had a girlfriend who just happened to be Mira Farouk’s sister. In fact, some of the headlines were: “Mira Farouk’s sister delivers epic Lemonade-style revenge to her cheating boyfriend”.

  I wasn’t mad about it. I’d accomplished what I had been focusing on for months, but I wasn’t sure what to do next. I hadn’t thought about what would happen afterward, and I hadn’t thought about the fact that my plan would end up hurting other people.

  A couple weeks after my Lemonade-inspired diss, the show got cancelled. The network blamed the poor ratings as well as the scandal, calling the show’s cost “damaging,” a “loss” for the channel. I had known my stint would create a stir, but I hadn’t thought it would go in that direction. Many of my friends lost their jobs.

  A lot of people blamed me.

  In the end, my revenge plan backfired.

  For weeks, I couldn’t find another gig. I didn’t really need to start working right away, but in order to start over, I needed to move out of my sister’s house. Plus, now that I had a lot of free time, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I had been working ever since I had gotten out of school. Amira suggested I sit tight and wait for her to have a break in her schedule so we could travel together to all those places she had always had to go but never really had the time to visit. It was a great plan.

  Unfortunately, I felt restless, and after a couple months of looking for a new job, it became clear from the many rej
ections I had gotten that no one wanted me on their set.

  I was a liability.

  I was deemed a hassle, someone who’d cause unnecessary drama.

  Me—dramatic.

  I had been a good girl all my life, a patient, loving girlfriend waiting for her boyfriend to commit when, in the meantime, he was screwing his coworker.

  And now, no one in LA wanted to work with me. It made me angry.

  I was the one who had been betrayed, but now I was seen as the dangerous one.

  “The reality is, when I set all of it in motion, I had no idea how it would play out. Of course, I had no intention of damaging the show; I just wanted to tarnish their reputation. I wanted them to suffer, not anyone else. I hadn’t realized what kind of repercussions there would be for knocking down the first domino.”

  I looked into his eyes, trying to decipher what he was thinking. What did he think of me? Did he consider me shallow and vindictive? Was he going to cast me away as others had done?

  “How long have you known?” I asked him.

  “A few days.” He exhaled deeply through his nose. His face looked serious, but not severe. He looked pensive, and my eyes fell on his lips, which were slightly curled up at the corners, even when his face was serene and expressionless.

  “Why didn’t you ask me about it sooner?”

  “I have been trying to find the right time.”

  I frowned and narrowed my eyes at him, needing more of an explanation.

  He noticed my confusion, and with a loud exhale of breath, he said, “My brother told me about you. He remembered reading some headline. I looked it up and read some stuff after that. I wanted to talk to you about it, but I knew we needed to be alone, and I didn’t want to do it last night. I didn’t want to ruin your birthday.”

  He didn’t want to ruin my birthday?

  “Aren’t you mad? Don’t you think I’m mental?” I asked, using Cecilia’s favorite word for crazy.

  He shrugged, and that alone shocked me.

  “I have been trying to understand how I feel about it for days. On one hand, I can’t fault you for what ye’ve done. I mean, the bastard deserved it all. I am not sure I could have ever lived through being with a person who’s cheating on me. It’s awful. It must have been awful, Sam.”

  “It was,” I said in agreement, still shocked by his calm and understanding demeanor. Hugh MacLeod couldn’t be real. He was too good, too perfect.

  He exhaled, and in that moment, I feared I might be in trouble.

  “On the other hand, you did publicly scorn them. I am not sure I completely agree with the way ye handled it, but I am in no position to judge you. I have never been through something like that. Who knows what I’d do if I found myself in the same situation? I don’t think it would be fair for me to point fingers.” I had been holding my breath. The air trapped in my chest came out all at once, accompanied by an overwhelming feeling of relief at hearing his comforting words. He didn’t hate me, but still…what did this mean for us?

  “So…you’re not mad at me?” He shook his head no. “You don’t hate me?” Another shake of his head. “You don’t think I’m a crazy troublemaker? A bad person?”

  “No,” he said, and after he let out another breath, his lips curled up in a dazzling smile. Suddenly, the light in the room began to change. I turned around to see the sun coming up behind me through the kitchen window, and it looked like a giant red ball flaming around the edges. It was rising above the sea, transforming the water into a golden mirror. I turned around to look at him and found him smiling at me. The sun shone in his eyes, turning them a light shade of orange, his whole face a light gold. The sunlight made his hair look a fiery red, and I felt stupid because I couldn’t stop staring at him. His eyes were fixed on my face, full of…love?

  Strange. I had been dreading him finding out the truth, and he’d just had the opposite reaction of what I would have predicted. He still wanted me after I’d just told him plain and simple that I was bad news for his career.

  “I didn’t want to talk about what happened in LA for selfish reasons,” he said. “We’ll have to be careful and keep it quiet until we can manage to make the network reconsider their stupid strategy, but I am not letting you go.” He took my face in his hands and placed a kiss on my lips. “Sam,” he said in a low growl, his breath a sweet caress against my skin, his voice charged with need. “I want you. If you’re a bad person, I want to be bad with you.”

  Hugh

  Our naked bodies together looked like caramel and milk. I could never get enough of burying myself in her, her legs wrapped around me, taking me home again and again. I could never get enough of touching her soft curves, the swell of her breasts, her glorious arse. When we were together, there was one word I repeated over and over in my head.

  Mine, mine, mine.

  I wanted all of her. She was mine, and I could never let her go. Going back to a life without Sam wasn’t a possibility. She’d asked over and over if I was going to be okay with what I’d found out, if I could forgive her, but the problem was that I didn’t seem to have a choice when it came to her. My weakness should have worried me, but instead I felt empowered admitting to myself how much I cared for her. I was falling in love with Sam, and it was the most amazing and inebriating feeling, comparable only to the excitement and euphoria I experienced when performing.

  We hadn’t gotten a lot of sleep the night before, so after our talk, we had come to bed and fallen asleep after getting lost in each other.

  I woke up after a while, partly because it was a bit too bright in the bedroom. When I lifted my head from the pillow and turned in her direction, I was once again bewitched by the woman in my bed, a dark beauty against the white bedding, her black hair framing her stunning face, so peaceful in her sleep. I lifted the comforter slightly to admire her body. Her full breasts showed her tan lines, as did her lower belly. In both places, her skin was just a lighter shade of brown. The slight, natural curve of her belly drove me insane. She was a Venus. She looked like a goddess, soft curves in all the right places, and that little triangular patch of black hair was the gateway to the most blissful heaven. She stirred, and I covered her again, not wanting to disturb her, but her hand moved and her eyelids fluttered. She frowned for just a second, taking in her surroundings. She smiled sleepily at me, stretching out an arm to touch my face.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” I told her.

  “It’s okay,” she whispered. “I don’t want to be sleeping all day. I want to be with you.”

  I laughed. “You are with me.”

  “I want to be awake with you.” She ran her hand through my hair, playing with my locks. My hand caressed her skin from her waist, to her hip, to her arse. She arched her body in response, and a low hum escaped her lips. She wrapped her leg around my waist, pulling me closer to her. I chuckled.

  “Do you want to go for a walk by the beach?” I asked her.

  She chewed on her lip and gave me a sultry look.

  “What is it?”

  “I would love to, but—”

  “But?”

  “We need to do something about your hard-on first,” she said with a serious look. I laughed heartily, and she wrapped an arm around my neck then pulled me on top of her.

  “Make love to me, Hugh MacLeod,” she said, her voice full of need. Her eyes burned with desire as I lowered myself on top of her. I trailed kisses down her chest, pinching one of her nipples with my fingers. I moved down to her stomach, her body shivering under my lips as I kissed her right above her belly button. I licked the skin below her navel before I brought my mouth down to the small patch of hair at her pussy. I kissed her right there and she squirmed under my touch, her legs trembling on my sides, her hands fisting the sheets in anticipation. I parted her lips and flicked my tongue against her swollen, trembling clit, wrapping my arm around one of her legs, pinning her down. I increased the speed, and her hips buckled, asking for more.

  “Ohhh, fuck me,”
she moaned as her fingers twisted in my hair. I laughed against her skin, and she squirmed under my breath, her hips arching against my mouth. I inserted two fingers into her warm wetness as my tongue licked and sucked on her clit until she stiffened under my touch and came, crying out my name. It was ecstasy hearing her moan my name as I brought her to the brink of pleasure over and over. I could never, ever get tired of that. I sat up, and she looked at me sheepishly, her cheeks colored in a faint shade of red, her eyes bright but feral.

  “I need you inside of me—now,” she said in a raspy tone, pulling herself up on her elbows. I reached for a rubber on the nightstand and handed it to her. She tore the foil with her teeth and leaned closer to put it on me, but first she licked the tip of my cock and sucked it slowly. A growl escaped my mouth, and I tried to think about several things that would distract me from coming too soon, namely sport injuries. Sport injuries were such a buzzkill, and I could always count on them to keep me from premature ejaculation. Sam rolled the condom on my cock and looked up to me with hooded eyes. I placed myself between her legs and brushed my cock against her sensitive clit and wet pussy. She lifted her hips and I held on to them, sliding inside her. An “Oh, fuck” escaped my mouth as I stilled for a moment. Being inside her was too good, too much all at once.

  She opened her eyes, alarmed, but I reassured her with one long, slow thrust.

  Her mouth opened, forming an O, but no sound came out.

  “Do ye know how fucking good you feel?” I asked her as I thrust into her deeper.

  She licked her lips and cleared her throat. “As good as you do, I imagine.”

  “I can’t get enough of you, Sam,” I told her as I thrust into her faster, her legs wrapped around my hips, her body moving in sync with me, meeting each one of my thrusts. “I’m afraid this hunger will never stop.”

  She smiled, her face in ecstasy as I moved frantically inside of her.