Miss Bright shook her head. “Forgive me for saying this but sweet is the last thing you need. The right man for this fantasy should challenge you. He should make you feel desired and excited, maybe even a bit angry.”
Mona’s large dark eyes widened. “Let me get this straight. You think my fantasy man should annoy me?”
Miss Bright nodded. “Absolutely. Think about it. Imagine yourself in bed with your sweet, tender lover.” She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against her chair’s back. Her voice took on a lilting quality as she described the scene. “It’s a warm, tropical night and the windows are open to let in a cool ocean breeze. You can hear the waves lapping and the palm trees rustling outside. The Egyptian cotton sheets slide against your dewy skin and then he’s there, on top of you. He’s kissing you softly, whispering in your ear how beautiful you are. It’s all so perfect and sickeningly earnest.” She sat up abruptly and her eyes snapped open. “But ask yourself this? Is it exciting? Arousing? Or do you think you would find yourself freezing up at the last second? Because no matter how sincere and wonderful this man is, he’s still a stranger who’s there to take your virginity. If it was me I’d prefer someone to distract me from the awkwardness of the situation. A playful, sexy, and somewhat irritating man could provide you with an experience that accomplishes your goal but is fun and pleasurable as well. Doesn’t that sound more appealing?”
Mona bit her lip and seemed to consider Miss Bright’s suggestion for a long, drawn-out moment. “I understand what you’re saying but I chose a honeymoon fantasy because I wanted every woman’s ideal. I’ve waited for this my whole life and I want to be able to remember this experience fondly. Being pissed off isn’t part of that, so I’m going to have to insist on what we originally agreed upon. I want a besotted bridegroom who takes my virginity with gentle passion, not some obnoxious comedian who cracks jokes as he’s screwing me.”
Miss Bright sighed. “That’s not precisely what I meant but I see you’re set on this course of action. So I will do my best to give you what you want. This is your fantasy, after all.”
“Yes, it is. But I do appreciate your input, not to mention your honesty. You’ve obviously had a great deal more experience in this area.” She waved her hand at the yellow folder on the desk. “So answer me this: am I being unreasonable? Is sweet too much to ask? Your guys must be pretty jaded. Maybe they’re not capable of fulfilling my fantasy. Should I forget the whole thing?”
Miss Bright shook her head and gave a short laugh. “Oh no. That’s not even an issue. Believe me. Most of our Scene Facilitators are quite capable of tenderness. But it is a rare request. Most women come to us to have their more depraved fantasies fulfilled. The loss of true innocence is something different entirely. I’m sure it will be a welcome change for whoever takes on this particular challenge.”
“Then you think I came to the right place?”
“Indeed I do.” Miss Bright stood up again and held out her hand to Mona. “It will be my pleasure to make your fantasy a reality.” The two women shook hands briefly and then walked towards the tall, double-doors of Miss Bright’s office together.
They walked slowly down the long hall, making arrangements as their high heels clicked on the cool grey marble beneath their feet. They passed the conference room on the right and Miss Bright glanced inside. No meetings were scheduled this morning but she caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye. Pausing she looked closer and nearly stumbled into Miss Porter. She knew exactly who was in there. Inwardly she groaned as the tall, dark shape sitting at the head of the table slid his chair down the length of the long room to better track their movements down the hall. By the time they reached the lobby he was standing in the conference room doorway, watching them with undisguised interest.
Miss Bright ignored him. Instead she focused on hustling Mona onto the elevator before she could spy the powerful man staring at them with the predatory gaze. It just wouldn’t do if her client saw him before the scene was set. Plus, she’d have to do some fast talking to get him to help her out with this fantasy. He wasn’t exactly a fan of her work. In fact, he thought fulfilling fantasies for a living made her a pimp. Asking him to act as a Scene Facilitator would require calling in a few favours. If he wasn’t so perfect for this particular fantasy she would never even mention it. He was exactly what a certain forty-year-old virgin needed, even if she didn’t realize it yet.
Chapter One
Mona Porter gave her stylish brown leather suitcase one last shove and yanked the plane’s overhead compartment closed on it with way more force than necessary. A resounding slam would have been so very satisfying but the stupid door refused to cooperate and closed with a gentle ‘whoosh’ instead of the dramatic ‘bang’ she’d wanted. It just figured. Nothing was going right today.
Slumping down in her seat, she tried not to scowl as she looked around at the other passengers in First Class. She was sitting on the aisle, in the last row of their section, so she had an excellent view of the other people boarding the plane. Was he here? She sat a little straighter and craned her neck around but there wasn’t anyone remotely gigolo-ish anywhere in sight. But the seats were still half empty. Maybe he would get on the plane in Seattle or perhaps he took an earlier flight? Did DOV Inc., make their talent fly coach? She somehow doubted it. Everything about the fantasy fulfillment agency seemed classy. Well, as classy as a glorified sausage-factory could be anyway.
Miss Bright had said her Scene Facilitator would meet her at their private bungalow on the beach in Lahaina. Mona’s scowl deepened at the thought of what would happen after she met her fake bridegroom.
She should be in a fabulous mood. After all, she was on the verge of finally unloading her hated virginity. No prom night fumbling for her. Not even an awkward one night stand. Nope. She was going to shed that hated hymen in truly spectacular fashion. Yup. She would be deflowered on her own terms and she`d do it in an ideal setting, under perfect circumstances. She was taking control and making her fantasy a reality. Well, aside from the whole paying to sleep with a complete stranger part anyway. A stranger who would act like he actually cared about her feelings but was really just there for the money. Yikes. As good as it all sounded in theory, in actual practice this whole experience was starting to feel hollow and borderline pathetic. And that was the problem. She’d thought she could go through with her plan but now she was having second thoughts.
When she’d been sitting in Miss Bright’s plush office at Delta of Venus Inc., she’d been eager to have her fantasy fulfilled. But now that she was on the actual plane which would whisk her away to her fake bridegroom, genuine panic was setting in. Hence the terrible mood. She’d worked way too hard on herself to allow doubt to creep in now. She needed to remember that she was strong and confident. She didn’t waver once she made a decision. Second-guessing herself at this point was not acceptable. She needed to shake off her old insecurities and carry-on with her plan. She was bold and decisive, damn it. And more than a little famished.
Yes, that’s it. Hunger must be a contributing factor to why she seriously wanted to throw her carry-on at the perky flight attendant in the impossibly short skirt at the front of the plane. But hunger was nothing new to Mona. She felt like she’d been vaguely ravenous for the past two years.
That faint emptiness in her stomach also reminded her that she hadn’t been entirely honest with Miss Bright and that guilt wasn’t helping to improve her state of mind. Yes, it was true that she was still a virgin because she hadn’t met the right guy and it was also true that her job was demanding and took up most of her spare time. But there was another contributing factor she believed accounted for why she was able to hang onto her innocence for so long. Well, actually there were about 123 factors. One for each pound she’d lost over the past two years.
The fact was that she’d been obese for most of her adult life. Not just chubby or curvy but really fat. And though Mona believed there were many heavy women out there w
ho were genuinely happy with themselves and had satisfying romantic lives, she wasn`t one of them. She was utterly convinced that the extra weight she carried made her practically invisible to men. You’d think being so large would make a person more visible but the opposite was actually true in her case. Men didn’t seem to see her or if they did they didn’t see her as a viable sex partner. Her fat made her asexual to them. But she wasn’t asexual or frigid. Under the right circumstances she thought she’d probably have a pretty healthy libido. Not a nymphomaniac, obviously, but she was certainly interested in sex. If her choice in reading material was an indicator then she was definitely preoccupied with erotic activities. She’d just never had the opportunity to find out where she fell on the whole sex drive scale. She hadn’t even been seriously kissed since she was eighteen, so how would she know if she was a sex kitten or not?
The really scary part of this whole over-the-hill virgin thing was that she’d accepted her role as the funny, fat sidekick in her friend’s more exciting lives. She’d been mostly content watching as they experienced things she could only imagine, like passion, devotion and true love.
Okay. She`d been lonely, but not unhappy. Not at all. Mostly she`d been too busy creating her cupcake empire to really think about what she actually wanted out of life. She told herself she was too preoccupied with building a successful business and focusing on her career to care about what she was missing. She was extremely adept at keeping herself pleasantly distracted from the fact that deep-down she felt that she was unlovable because of the way she looked
Until one morning when one small discovery had changed everything. She`d been putting on her plain, boring bra with the thick, reinforced straps when her fingers brushed something unusual. It felt like a small lump in her left breast. It was hardly noticeable so she touched it again. It was definitely something that needed to be checked out.
That tiny mass had altered her entire destiny.
She’d been extremely lucky. The lump had been benign and the scar from the lumpectomy barely showed. All her worries and fears during the mammogram and biopsy procedures had been for nothing. She was fine. She could go back to her life. She still looked normal. She wasn’t disfigured and she had her entire future to look forward to.
But something was different. She wasn’t content anymore. Or more likely, she realized that she`d never been content in the first place. She`d just been so focused on living her life that she hadn`t noticed that it was almost half over and she hadn`t done anything she`d planned, except work.
She’d looked at the people around her and realized she’d been living on auto pilot since high school and that just wasn`t good enough. She didn’t want to just exist anymore. She wanted to live. And one of the biggest obstacles to making that happen was her own body. She realized that she’d been hiding behind her fat like a shield. It protected her from having to actually try to have a normal life. In order to pursue her goals she felt like she needed to become visible again. She needed to lose the weight. For real this time.
She`d tried to lose weight in the past and the results had always been disappointing. This time, however, she was motivated by the thought that she`d already wasted most of her life hiding. Did she really want to live whatever time she had left being fat and alone? The answer to this question was always an emphatic “Hell, NO!”
She’d committed herself to getting fit. It hadn’t been easy. She’d struggled every single day not to make excuses, to be conscious of what and why she was eating. To make smart choices regarding nutrition and exercise. Some days she’d wanted to cry with frustration at how difficult it was to stay on track. Other days she was angry with herself for letting herself get to this point. But every once in a while the infuriating little red needle on her scale would jump to a slightly smaller number or her pants would feel a bit looser. Those rare and wonderful moments made her feel like she was finally in control of her body and her life.
About a year into her weight-loss journey she’d actually started to feel somewhat visible again. Men were noticing her and instead of being delighted by this turn of events she’d felt exposed and self-conscious. She’d even had a short binge-eating relapse when Darryl, one of the buff, young personal trainers at her gym had begun consistently asking her to go out with him. At first she’d thought it was a cruel joke or some kind of motivational tool, but after weeks of his undivided attention every time she entered the weight room it became obvious that he really was interested in her. It also became abundantly clear that she had no idea how to flirt or react normally to a man finding her attractive. After all, she hadn’t experienced mutual attraction since high school. Since Joe.
When Darryl abruptly left for a job in Alberta, she’d actually been relieved not to have to deal with him. That’s when she realized that the fat had only been part of the problem. Lack of confidence was the real issue. For some reason she didn’t feel worthy of male attention. Despite the changes in her body, she was still the same overweight wallflower on the inside and nothing would really change unless she could figure out how to feel good about herself.
So she’d started an internal makeover to go along with the external one. This part was actually much harder than the weight loss because she had to really face why she’d allowed herself to settle for such a safe and sheltered existence. She read practically every self-help book she could find hoping to find the magic self-esteem formula but all she’d discovered was that fear of rejection was at the heart of her problem. Recognizing the issue didn’t help conquer it. In fact, the knowledge that she had subconsciously sabotaged her own happiness for most of her life made her feel helpless and out of control. How exactly could she overcome twenty years of negative programming by her own design? Her task seemed overwhelming.
She did what she’d done with the weight loss: called in some professionals. The nutritionist and personal trainers at her gym were able to educate her in planning her work-outs and diet to maximize weight loss. Perhaps a counselor or psychologist could help her work on the underlying issues that made her allow herself to become obese?
With that in mind she’d asked her doctor for a referral and had embarked on the quest for someone to help her figure out why she was so messed up. She was uncomfortable opening up to her close friends and yet now she was looking to pour her deepest, darkest secrets out to a complete stranger. It all seemed so unnatural to her but she knew had very little choice if she wanted to embrace any real change.
It had taken her a couple tries to find a counsellor she felt compatible with but then she had walked into Dr. Nora Freedman’s tastefully cluttered office. Nora had immediately struck her as both non-judgmental and no-nonsense, which is exactly what she needed.
At first, she had felt incredibly awkward talking about herself and why she was able to run a successful business but was completely unable to control her eating habits or talk to men without wanting to turn tail and run to the closest Cheesecake Factory. Sitting across from Nora and complaining about her fairly awesome life seemed so self-indulgent and dramatic, but after a few sessions she started to feel more comfortable with the ritual. Nora gave her several embarrassing confidence-building exercises and eventually she started to appear more poised and self-confident in social situations. Eventually she was able to put on an excellent show of being exactly the kind of woman she admired: cool, witty and occasionally even flirtatious.
Once Mona reached her goal weight she celebrated by going on an extravagant shopping trip to New York with her best friend, Lana. The new clothes and stylish accessories she tried on made Mona feel not just confident but sexy for the first time in her life. She was no longer invisible. It would seem her transformation was complete. At least externally. Inside, the butterfly still felt like a chubby caterpillar. But she hoped that would change with time.
Lana always looked good so she was significantly less awed by the experience of shopping in the extravagant shops. For Mona, however, shopping in a city famous for its fashion was the
fulfillment of a dream she never thought could come true. After some initial awkwardness she was actually able to stand in front of a full-length mirror in some of the ritzy shops in Manhattan and almost feel like she belonged there. Until recently, she’d been too intimidated to shop anywhere but plus-sized stores. Most of her clothing was actually purchased through online shopping sites just to avoid dealing with patronizing salespeople. Being treated with obsequious enthusiasm by salesgirls who looked like models and were famous for treating unattractive patrons with disdain was unreal.
At one particularly swanky boutique, Mona had looked up from the pricey shoes she’d been trying on to find Lana shaking her head in disbelief.
“What? Do they make me look like a stripper?” She’d asked, frowning as she stared down at the shiny, black pumps.
Lana snorted. “Absolutely. And in the best way possible. Those look amazing. And you know it.”
Mona gave Lana a surprised look. “Amazing? You mean compared to how much my legs resembled Miss Piggy’s ham-hocks before, right?”
Lana rolled her eyes. “No. I mean amazing by anyone standards. Muppets included.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes. I just can`t believe it. You`re like a different person. Who knew this,” she waved her hand up and down Mona’s body, “existed underneath all those bulky clothes and extra weight.”
“C’mon. I’m exactly the same. Just a smaller version.”
Lana shook her head from side to side. “But you’re not the same at all. I don’t know if you realize it or not but you just put that snotty little shopgirl in her place. You. The woman who used to apologize constantly and never stood up to anyone. Ever. Not even her employees.”
Mona adjusted the ankle strap on the shoe and mumbled from beneath her fall of dark hair. “You make me sound like a doormat.”
Mona's Honeymoon Fantasy (Delta of Venus Inc.) Page 2
