The Christmas Gamble

by Sienna Ciles

  That reminded me about her shocking bit of information about having never had an orgasm with someone else, and I had to remind myself not to let my expression or body language show anything about it. Don’t knock off just yet. You still have an audience.

  “Okay, we have a couple of single bed suites available still,” the receptionist said. “I assume you’re paying by card?”

  “Yes,” I replied. I would get her to smile at me--and mean it--if it killed me. “Clean and easy. We’re staying here the duration of the reunion.”

  “Sure thing,” the woman said. She took my card from me, and saw that it was an AmEx platinum. That got a smile from her. “We have a full room service menu, and multiple shops, as well as an on-property restaurant and concierge, for your convenience.” She swiped my card and glanced up at me, and sure enough, she looked a lot cheerier.

  “Thank you so much for taking care of us,” I said, giving her as warm a look as I dared to without breaking character.

  “You don’t have to charm her, you’re already getting laid tonight,” Bethany said, with just a hint of jealousy in her voice.

  I rolled my eyes and the woman on the other side of the counter glanced at my pretend girlfriend with a quick look that told me that she would have been happy to be with us when that fictional sex went down.

  “I hope both of you will enjoy your stay with us at the Clairmont Hotel,” the woman said, smiling at both me and Bethany. She gave me my card back and turned around to a key-card coder. I gave Bethany’s waist a squeeze and leaned in to kiss the top of her head, the way I’d done dozens of times with my real girlfriends.

  The receptionist gave us two key cards in little folders, and I took mine and shoved it in my pocket. “Which room are we in?”

  “Right there, on the outside. It’s room 3140,” the blonde said, standing to point out the information on Bethany’s key card. “The elevator is just on the other side of the front desk, and the stairs are at both ends of each hallway.”

  We thanked her again and left the front desk arm-in-arm. I wanted to get up to the room already, and when we got onto the elevator I was able to relax a bit, since we were the only ones there. It would be good to get alone, even if we were going to be in close quarters for the weekend. At least I’d be able to make the run back to Bethany’s place and have some time to myself for about thirty minutes or so. I had nothing against companionship, but playing a role for half the night was getting on my nerves.

  The room the front desk woman had given us was pretty spacious, which was a relief. There was no couch, but a couple of comfortable-looking chairs and a little breakfast nook-type table, along with a dresser, a closet, bed stands, and--of course--the big, sprawling bed. The attached bathroom contained the usual toiletries, and a pretty deep bath tub, along with the needed showerhead. It was as good as anywhere I’d been, at the end of the day, but the big, glaring problem was the fact that we were two people who barely knew each other, and there was one bed.

  “I’ll sleep on the floor,” I said. I’d hoped the Clairmont would at least have some kind of settee I could curl up on, but I thought I could at least arrange the chairs to make a decent camp bed.

  “No, you paid,” Bethany countered.

  “How many times have you slept on a floor before?” I crossed my arms and looked at her levelly. The weekend was going to be stressful enough for Bethany without her being up half the night, uncomfortable.

  “Enough to know that I can manage,” Bethany said tartly, holding my gaze.

  “I’m not going to make you sleep on the floor the whole time,” I told her matter-of-factly.

  “How about we switch?” she said. “One night one of us gets the bed, the other night the other one does, however long we end up being here?”

  That made a lot of sense, and I was happy to take the deal--after all, I could have the bed, guilt-free, at least one of the nights we were staying in the hotel room.

  “How do we decide who gets the bed first?” I asked.

  Bethany shrugged in response to my question. “Flip a coin?”

  I grinned. There was a quarter in my wallet, and I took it out. I always keep a quarter, and usually a couple of dimes and nickels, just in case I need to make change for something.

  “Call it,” I suggested. Bethany thought for a moment.

  “Tails,” she said, and I raised an eyebrow at her unusual choice; normally people pick heads, though I’ve never really known why. I flicked the coin into the air, caught it, and slapped it down onto the back of my other hand. I left my hand covering it for a moment, letting the tension drag out just for the fun of it.

  When I lifted my hand, I saw--at the same time that Bethany did--that she’d lucked out. The face showing was the back of the coin. “You get the bed first, then,” I said. “That’s fair, right?”

  “It’s fair,” Bethany agreed.

  “I’ll go get our stuff from the house,” I suggested, as Bethany looked around the room, almost seeming at a loss.

  “You’re sure? It’s getting cold out there,” Bethany pointed out.

  “Better to do it now than when the storm starts up,” I countered. “Besides, you’ll want stuff to sleep in, and all that.” Bethany nodded her acceptance of that fact and sat down on the edge of the bed, reaching over to the bedside table to grab the remote control. As I crossed the room, I saw that she’d already kicked her shoes off, and I smiled to myself. It was a weirdly domestic situation, even if I would be sleeping on the chairs at least one of the nights--almost like the real thing, if you ignored the fact that we barely knew each other.

  Bethany settled in and I took the keys from her, leaving the room after I made sure that I had my key card in my pocket.

  The temperature had dropped another good five degrees by the time I stepped outside and started toward the car, and I wished I’d grabbed my coat after lending it to Bethany. I hurried to the car, eager to get the heat going to thaw out my fingers, and thought to myself that I might snoop in Bethany’s room just a bit. Not her underwear drawer, of course--but I’d see what I could find out about her nonetheless.

  Chapter Eleven

  Bethany

  I watched TV for a while after Ransom left the hotel room, and then started feeling restless. I had no idea what my classmates had thought of me showing up with a date--not really, anyway--and now I was going to be spending a few nights alone in a hotel room with someone I barely knew. Was I out of my mind?

  I decided that the best way to deal with my agitated mind was to get a shower. I’d cleaned up before getting ready for the dinner, but I needed to get the makeup off of my face, and anyway a long, hot shower should at least relax me a little bit. It occurred to me to think that it would put me in a predicament to be naked and damp from the shower when Ransom got back from getting our things from my parents’ house, but I figured that if I took a long enough shower, I could just have him toss my bag into the bathroom and sort out what to wear to sleep in privately.

  Then too, I discovered after a quick look, our room came with two full-length robes, both in a heavy, waffled-terry type of material, which would cover more than some of the pajamas I’d brought with me. I grabbed one and went into the bathroom, playing over the night’s events in my head and engaging in that terrible habit of figuring out better things to have said to my classmates after the fact, when it wouldn’t make any difference.

  We’d slipped up a couple of times in terms of not knowing enough about each other for two people who’d been dating for nine months, but I thought that my former friends and acquaintances hadn’t really noticed that much. I thought about the chat Jess and I had had during the dinner--she’d been impressed with the guy I’d managed to find.

  “Are you even serious? You met him last night?” she’d asked.

  I’d given her the bare bones of the story by text message, after I’d gotten home the night before, and now that we were face-to-face she was shocked at how daring I’d suddenly become.


  I’d told her that Ransom seemed like a fairly above-board kind of guy, and that I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to steal my parents’ silverware or anything--that if he’d given me a bad vibe I never would have gone through with it, no matter what the situation had been. Jess hadn’t quite believed me, and I couldn’t entirely blame her for that.

  I stripped off my dress and underthings and took my hair down, and looked at myself in the mirror. The last guy I’d dated, before I’d given up on the idea of getting involved with anyone, had said that it was a waste that I was as hot as I was, when I was clearly frigid. It had stung at the time--not least of which because I still just couldn’t believe that I hadn’t managed to achieve an orgasm with anyone I’d had sex with--but now that I thought about it, it was almost funny.

  I had to think that Ransom had gone along with the deal I’d had in mind at least in part because I was reasonably attractive. I’ve never had any real illusions about my looks, of course, and I’ve known for years that I’m not ugly or even really plain. Some guy once told me that he could tell I was no good in bed, and I’d hotly told him that I was fine, it was other people who were the problem.

  “Why am I thinking about sex at a time like this?” I tried to shake the thoughts off and started the water to the shower, holding my hand out as I tweaked the temperature to wait until it was just how I liked it--a little under scalding-hot--before I actually stepped under the showerhead. I hadn’t given sex with another person any real thought in years, but ever since I’d met up with Ransom, it had been popping up in my mind every few hours in one way or another.

  I still couldn’t quite believe that I’d confessed never having gotten what Jess liked to call “a big O” with another person. It was the kind of thing that I never told anyone. I hadn’t even told the last few guys I’d had sex with. The second and third guy I’d had sex with, I’d told about it--hoping that they would be able to figure out how to make it happen--and they’d taken it first as a challenge and then as an insult that they hadn’t made me come. I’d faked it with the last two, just for the sake of not getting into a fight with them about it, or having to deal with them going on all night, trying to get me off finally.

  I let the hot water beat down on my head and closed my eyes. Ransom was probably the kind of guy who would take it as a challenge, if we were in a position to actually have sex. If we were actually seeing each other instead of just pretending. I laughed at my own idea. I would never have the guts to ask Ransom out for real, so there would never be a reason for him to decide I was challenging him.

  The hotel had pretty generous shampoo, conditioner, and a few other toiletries, but no makeup remover. I used the bar of face soap as best as I could, grimacing to myself as I felt the way it dried out my skin without making it feel properly clean. Hopefully Ransom would grab my toiletries bag when he got the rest of my stuff, and I could get the layers of substances off of my face completely before I went to bed.

  The thought of Ransom hanging out at my parents’ house alone gave me pause for a moment, and I thought about how crazy Jess had thought I was to even include a stranger like him in my scheme. “Don’t get me wrong, he’s hotter than a five-alarm fire, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t also a thief,” she’d pointed out.

  I’d countered that he hadn’t taken the offer of the money but had instead wanted my help in finding some information that I had access to through work, and that had only made Jess more suspicious of him. “I hope you never leave him alone with your valuables,” she’d told me doubtfully. I’d rolled my eyes at that and pointed out to her that a guy who used a diner in the middle of the night as the setting to find a mark for some theft scheme was not a very successful thief, she’d backed off of it, but she’d told me to be careful anyway.

  And there I was, ignoring her advice. Surely Ransom wouldn’t have gone along with the whole scheme simply for the excuse to get to my parents’ house on his own? That was too convoluted for even a bad thief. I shook off the notion completely that Ransom was secretly trying to find a way to rip me off, and rinsed the conditioner out of my hair.

  I was trying to think of a way to meaningfully extend my shower when I heard the door to the room slam shut. “Bethany?”

  “I’m in the shower,” I called back in response to Ransom, grateful that he’d arrived before I had to deal with the conundrum of figuring out what to do with myself sitting around in a bathrobe with a bunch of smeared and running makeup on my face.

  “Want me to just put your bag in there? I promise not to look,” he called out, and I smiled to myself. Jess was wrong about him--at least a little bit. Ransom had to be an okay guy.

  “Yeah, just leave it in here, I should be out in a few minutes,” I half-shouted, deciding to scrub the rest of my body down one more time. The shower gel the Clairmont provided was surprisingly high quality, and smelled like a deep, mossy forest in the best way.

  I heard the bathroom door open and the scraping sound of my suitcase being pushed across the floor, and then the door closed again. I was pretty sure that Ransom hadn’t even tried to sneak a peek, based on the noises, which further enhanced my impression of him as a basically decent guy. I scrubbed down one last time, rinsed off, and climbed out of the tub-shower, feeling more or less human.

  A quick inspection of my luggage told me that Ransom must have just shoved whatever was out loose in my room and the bathroom into the suitcase and closed it; not the most mindful approach, but that and the fact that he’d gotten back so soon meant that he probably hadn’t been stealing anything while he’d been at the house. I found my cream cleanser and managed to get the last of my makeup off--with relief. I set about getting through the rest of my usual night time routine with the big, thick hotel towel wrapped around me, not even really thinking of Ransom anymore but instead just focused on making sure I wouldn’t get an inconvenient pimple during the weekend.

  I brushed my teeth and smoothed on some moisturizer, and then I finally peeled off my towel and threw on a pair of pajama pants and a tee shirt. It was a little chilly in the room, but the bed had a thick duvet on it, so I was pretty sure I’d be warm enough, and I was also pretty sure that Ransom wouldn’t comment on the sight of my nipples, hardened against the fabric of my shirt.

  I organized my toiletries in the bathroom out of the way and closed up my luggage, dragging it back into the room. Ransom was stretched out over the room’s two chairs, a throw draped over his legs, watching TV. It felt so weirdly normal to see him relaxing that I wished--for just a second--that this relationship wasn’t just a sham.

  “I feel like a human being,” I told him, putting my luggage down in the little closet, out of the way in case one of us needed to get up in the middle of the night.

  “Think there’s enough hot water for me to get a shower, too?” Ransom looked at me and I saw something flit through his eyes, but it was too quick for me to know what it was.

  “Yeah, there might be--there’s probably a lot of people showering or taking baths right now,” I said. “But you should definitely get comfortable.”

  Ransom smiled wryly. “Ah yes. Make myself at home,” he said.

  I wasn’t sure what could be wrong with him. He hadn’t been awkward like this before. I pulled the robe on over my shirt, thinking maybe he’d been more shaken by the sight of my nipples than I’d thought he would be. But that doesn’t make any sense, if it’s the case. It’s not like he’s some virgin or even particularly prudish.

  “I guess try your luck, and if the hot water runs out, then there’s always the morning,” I suggested.

  Ransom nodded and rose from his makeshift bed quickly. He’d taken off some of his formal clothing from the dinner, and I saw his feet were in actual dress socks--that had been a detail I hadn’t noticed before.

  I watched him gather up some stuff from his backpack and tried to figure out what the hell had happened in the short time we’d been apart.

  Chapter Twelve

  Ransom<
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  I wasn’t sure if Bethany had noticed when I’d gone to the bathroom to get a shower, but by the time I had my clothes off and the water running, I was already a little more than half-hard. I closed my eyes as I climbed over the lip of the tub and into the hot water, but immediately regretted that decision: everything I’d been thinking about before she got out of the shower flooded back into my mind.

  It had started when I’d been at her parents’ house, in her room, gathering up her stuff to bring to the hotel. Just being in her room, without her there, had given me a little bit of a naughty feeling--it was so ridiculously high school, but I couldn’t deny it. I hadn’t gone into her underwear drawer or anything, but I had definitely looked around the room, curious about her.

  Of course, it wasn’t the room she lived in normally, but the fact that there was no kind of what I considered chick porn--romance novels, or pictures of hot guys, or anything like that--anywhere that I could see, and there weren’t even any innocent-looking vibrators or anything like that, told me that whatever the reason, sex wasn’t a priority in her life. I’d seen inside the bag she’d packed as I gathered up her things to put in it. I wasn’t really snooping, just kind of glancing over stuff as I made sure to grab whatever I thought she might need for the weekend, and I hadn’t seen anything that was even really sexy--at least, not outside of the usual tame business-type sexuality that most women seem to try and adhere to.

  That had opened up all kinds of thoughts in my head, in regards to what I’d learned about her. She’d said that she’d never had an orgasm with someone else--that had to be a lie, didn’t it? I’d grabbed my own bag from the guest room and loaded it up in Bethany’s car along with her suitcase, and made sure the house was locked up. It was just impossible for me to believe that someone who was a grown, well-rounded woman had somehow managed to have the bad luck to consistently end up with people who had no idea how to get a woman off.