by L. L. Ash
“You tell me what is the matter right now, boy. You have to the count of three.”
Suddenly I felt like I did when Babushka was angry with me. And I would do anything to avoid that.
“It’s...It’s about a girl, Maggie. Nothing for you to worry about. I’d rather just make you feel good...”
“Tell me about her,” Maggie plopped down onto the bed, arms still crossed and fully dressed,
She wasn’t going to let it go.
“Is it one of your clients?”
And here I thought Maggie had been living in blissful naïvete all this time.
“We only have an hour...”
“Then use it talking to me.”
Wow, she really was serious.
“She’s a client. But that’s the problem,” I admitted with a sigh, sitting on the bed beside her with my typical suit on.
“You don’t want her to be? What do you mean that’s the problem?”
“I mean, I...feel things that I shouldn’t for her. She means more to me than she should.”
“You love her?” she raised a wrinkled brow.
“I don’t know...” I shrugged.
“So, have you told her this?”
“No. We haven’t talked in a week.”
“And why is that?”
I sighed and shoved my fingers through my hair.
“I went to her smelling like someone else. Met with her after another client.”
After her, actually.
“Well if that isn’t the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” she said in a hard voice. “If you love the girl, then you should marry her!”
“Whoa, nobody said anything about the M word,” I chuckled, loving her sudden directness. “She wouldn’t want me anyway. Not permanently. Not like that.”
“And why not?”
“Because I’m an...escort,” the word ‘whore’ almost popped out of my mouth, but escort sounded a little less brash.
“Bullshit,” Maggie cursed.
It shocked me a little. I’d never seen her act anything other than a demure lady, even in the throes of passion.
“If she loves you too, then she won’t care. And if you don’t call your other clients and tell them you quit, then I’ll be supremely disappointed in you.”
Standing up, Maggie gathered her purse and placed the little yellow envelope on my nightstand.
“I don’t know who this woman is, but she’s lucky to have captured your heart like she did. You give this every chance to succeed and if it doesn’t work out, I’ll be back. Until then, I expect you to do what you have to do to make things work with your woman. Do you understand, boy?”
My jaw was on the floor in shock.
“I asked you a question.”
“I heard you,” I choked out.
“Now, call me if things don’t work out. In the meantime, I’ll find my entertainment elsewhere.”
She clicked in her heels out the door, pulling it closed firmly behind her.
My phone started ringing at that moment and I put it to my ear, still in shock.
“Serge?” a delicate but strong feminine voice filtered through the line.
“Adele?” I was choking again.
“I need to ask you something.”
“Ok, shoot,” I breathed in disbelief.
“I’m leaving the country. Going to Bora Bora for Christmas. I’m going on my own no matter what, but I wanted to ask if you’d go with me.”
Was I fucking hearing correctly?
“I’ll pay you overtime, of course. Ten thousand a day for the twelve days we’re there. And I’ll pay for the flight, room, food, everything.”
Holy fuck…
I’d never gone on a vacation with a client before. Never once. I’d turned them all down firmly because I didn’t want to ruin the aesthetic we had that was mixed with quite a bit of mystery. But this? I wanted to say yes so, so bad.
“Serge?”
“Ok,” I breathed into the phone.
“Ok? You’ll go?”
I nodded emphatically, but managed to keep my voice sturdy and low for her.
She didn’t need to know I was screaming like a pre-teen on the inside.
“Yes. I’ll go. When do we leave?”
“I-I was booking tickets for the day before Christmas Eve.”
“I’ll pick you up before going to the airport.”
“No. I’ll send my driver for you. I’ll text you the itinerary when the tickets are purchased.”
Blowing out a silent breath, I agreed.
“Ok. I’ll wait for your text.”
We hung up soon after, and the first thing I did was tell my clients that I was temporarily suspending services.
I could take the time to really figure out what Adele and I were, and what I wanted to do with my future.
Even if things didn’t work out, or even blew up in a fantastic fashion, my life wasn’t seeming so wonderful anymore, anyway. The endless, meaningless sex felt like nothing compared to the intimacy I’d developed with Adele. And if things didn’t work out with her, I wanted to find someone else that I could have that with.
Maybe the marriage bug had finally found me, just like my grandmother had warned me about.
Hits all Russian men sooner or later. Guess I was just a late bloomer.
Speaking of grandma...I was going to have to break the news that I wouldn’t be around for Christmas.
Shit…
That was something better said in person. And since my day just opened up, I pulled some jeans on with a coral colored t-shirt and headed to Brighton Beach to visit my grandma.
Chapter Fifteen
Serge
My leg wouldn’t stop shaking the entire subway ride from the Upper East to Brighton Beach. Grandma wasn’t expecting me, but I was hoping that she would be happy to see me after I told her the news.
She was going to be mad. No doubt about it. But telling her I was going out of town with my girlfriend... that was an even bigger deal.
Babushka would demand to meet her as soon as we got back, and I wasn’t sure what I would do about that, because I wasn’t going to bring a client home to my grandma, but there was also no way I would not go to Bora Bora with Adele.
I’d just take the consequences as they came.
When the house door opened, she looked at me with a look of surprise that quickly morphed to worry.
“What is the matter, my little kot?” she asked, ushering me in.
I stood in the small entry, kissing her cheeks and holding out the flowers I’d brought for her.
She eyed them.
“What did you do?” she asked now, suspicious.
I just laughed.
“I’m not allowed to bring my babushka flowers on a random Tuesday afternoon?” I asked her, pressing the bouquet into her hands.
“No, you’re not,” she said wearily.
“I have to tell you something,” I finally said, not wanting to drag it out.
“And what would that be,”
The colorful silk scarf on her head really brought out the pretty flush of anger on her cheeks.
She knew what was coming. Somehow, she knew.
“I’m not going to be in New York for Christmas,” I blurted out, and her face went from anticipating anger to full blown oh shit mad.
“Then where will you be?”
This was harder than I’d expected.
“My girlfriend and I are going to Bora Bora for the holiday.”
So many things flashed over her face at those simple words.
But finally they ended in overwhelming joy.
“Girlfriend?” she shrieked. “Why have you not told me you had a girlfriend?!”
“It’s still really new, Babushka… We just want to get away from work and the cold and...I don’t know. We want to see where things go.”
Not all of my reasoning was a complete lie.
I did want to get away from work, and I did want to see where things went. And
getting out of the cold and into tropical heat sounded pretty damn good after the chilly walk I had from the subway station.
Grandma looked at me with a scowl before nodding.
“I will forgive you if you bring her here. We'll go to church together. She is a good, Russian, Orthodox girl, isn’t she, Sergei?”
I winced.
“She’s a good woman, and you would like her.”
“Then she comes. The Sunday after you get back.”
How did I agree to that? There was no way Adele would come along to church with my grandmother and meet her, which really meant suffering through babushka’s interrogation.
“I’ll ask her,” I supplied and it seemed to satisfy her.
“Now, it’s too late to go home. My boy stays for dinner, yes? I’ll make something. You will stay tonight, yes?”
Shit…
After bailing on her for Christmas though, it’s the least I could do.
“Sure, I’ll stay,” I agreed, preparing myself for a rough night on my childhood bed.
Adele
My foot kept tapping and tapping against the marble tile in the entry. My car had gone to pick Serge up forever ago and it would arrive anytime to get me.
It’s been almost two weeks since I’d seen him, and the only emotion that even began to touch on my excitement was nervousness.
Of course nothing had changed. He still was intimate with women for a living, and he would probably never stop. But at least I had him for a couple weeks.
For those days, he was all mine.
No other women, no other distractions. I would get to wake up with him and go to sleep with him every day, never losing a moment of his attention.
A knock sounded on the door and I jumped before tearing it open. There Jimmy stood with an ever-ready smile on his face.
“Good morning Ms. Wilder!” he said all chipper for five forty-five in the morning.
Serge had whined over the phone when I told him to be ready by five. And I loved it.
“Good morning, Jimmy. My bags are just here,” I told him, giving him a quick smile.
He nodded and went to retrieve my bags for me so I could lock up.
Jimmy placed my bags in the trunk as I moved toward the car, and toward Serge, who was standing outside the door, holding it open for me.
“I kind of hate you for making me get up this early,” he grinned at me. “But I’m so damn glad to see you.”
I laughed breathlessly at that. I was so happy to see him, too.
“Well, I wanted to get an early start. It’s a long flight.”
He just shook his head and pulled me to him.
His lips pressed against mine in a welcome kiss, just a simple touch to reinforce his statement of missing me.
I returned the kiss before dropping into the seat, scooting over so Serge could slip in beside me.
The ride to the airport was quiet, and so was the process of getting through the airport security. When we were led to the first class lounge, the first thing we both did was get a hard drink.
“I’m warning you ahead of time,” I nudged him on the shoulder. “I’m not a great flyer.”
“Then you need a few more of these,” he said with a small smirk. “I’ll take care of you.”
Sipping his highball glass almost filled to the rim with vodka, he winked at me.
“You’re going to be drunk off your ass in less than an hour if you finish that thing,” I protested. “Then how are you going to take care of me?”
He just laughed.
“Malishka, I’m Russian. I can drink three of these before I start feeling anything.”
It was obviously an exaggeration, but I had been around some Russians before, and they could drink anybody under the table to the point of alcohol poisoning.
Except maybe the Irish.
I just laughed and watched as he guzzled the drink, sighing as if it’d been refreshing instead of biting against his throat.
Sipping my martini, I just watched.
“So, I have to ask, Ad. Why...why me?”
“Why you?” I parroted.
“I mean, why did you ask me to come with you?”
I shrugged.
“I’m sure you hear this from all the girls, but I don’t like sharing you. The thought of your hands on someone else just...” I shuddered.
“I get it,” he nodded slowly. “I’m the same when I think about some other man with his hands on you.”
But why would he be? For a man who could have almost any woman in the world...why would he care about me?
“Well, that’s not something you’ll ever have to worry about,” I smiled weakly. “Men aren’t interested in me anymore. I’m too old.”
He raised an eyebrow and stared at me like I was stupid.
“Really? We’re doing this again?”
I lift an eyebrow right back.
“Doing what again?”
“We already went through this. You’re incredibly sexy, Adele. Like, I think about you and fantasize about you in the shower, if you know what I mean.”
My cheeks were burning up instantly.
“You could still pass as thirty-three or thirty-four, just FYI. And not because of Botox, either, You’re just naturally gorgeous and youthful. Lucky bastard.”
I laughed.
“Says you.”
“Yeah, well the world is a lot nicer toward men and aging than women. For some reason women have to stay young forever, but a silver fox is sexy. Besides, I have maybe another ten years in me before the ladies flock to someone younger, fitter and hotter.”
“Ten years, huh?” I sighed, spinning my glass on the bar top. “I think in ten years you’ll have barely hit your stride.”
“That’s nice of you to say so,” He grinned, polishing off his glass and sliding it to the bartender. “Water please.”
“It’s true,” I just shrugged.
“Well, I don’t see that it really matters that much, anyway. I won’t be doing this for too much longer. It’s...not like it used to be.”
“It changed, or you did?”
“Me,” he nodded firmly. “Definitely me.”
Our flight was called so we got off our seats, Serge throwing a couple twenties on the bar before taking my carry on bag onto his own shoulder and wrapping his hand round mine.
“Let’s go to paradise,” he said with a husky voice as we moved toward the plane.
Hmm… Paradise sounded good.
Chapter Sixteen
Serge
God bless the person who came up with bikinis.
Normally I wasn’t super hot on women just displaying everything they have at the beach, preferring more to unwrap them myself. But Adele in a bikini was a transcendent experience.
We got to the hotel more than twenty-four hours after we left. We’d had a couple hour layover in LA, then an ‘overnight’ layover in Tahiti’s main island before catching our flight into Bora Bora. The overnight layover was a joke. We’d gotten to our hotel room so fucking tired, we collapsed in our clothes on the bed and didn’t get up again until Adele’s alarm was going off like crazy. We barely caught our flight on time, but when we arrived about an hour after that, we were both so pumped to get onto the beach, we didn’t care how tired or jetlagged we were, we just wanted to get in the sun and the ocean.
Hence how I sat in the sand, little white grains clinging to my damp body as Adele played in knee-high water in a white, twisted bandeau bikini top and matching string bikini bottom.
Our hotel was beyond swanky, all views of water as it sat on stilts above the ocean, and the weather was superb. But nothing could beat the view of Adele grinning and splashing against the waves.
I adjusted the crotch of my too-small trunks, regretting that I had to go out and buy a pair of swim trunk during a fucking New York winter.
Needless to say, there weren’t many options. Hence the shorty shorts that kept riding up my ass.
Adele came in from the water and co
llapsed beside me on the sand.
“Ok, I admit. This is a way better way to spend Christmas than in New York.”
“Agreed,” I nodded, taking a fistful of sand and letting it sift through my fingers.
“You enjoying yourself?” she asked me, hunching forward and curling herself around her knees.
“I am. But you should probably get some sunscreen on because you’re starting to burn.”
Her eyes widened as she got up quickly and started toward the bungalow that was our home for the two weeks or so.
“And this is why you don’t come to the beach by yourself,” she called over her shoulder. “You need to have someone watching the lobster syndrome for you.”
I laughed and caught up, brushing the sand off my hips and thighs.
“Maybe I’ll go take a nap and get some aloe on my skin,” she said with a happy sigh, eyes sparkling in the midday sun.
“That sounds like heaven,” I agreed. “Mind if I join you?”
“In the nap or the aloe?”
“Both?”
She laughed and pushed her hand against my chest, only for me to catch it in mine and pull her along.
Inside the bungalow we took turns in the shower, Adele going first.
I took the time and unpacked a little. I’d brought one suit that I hung up to try and get rid of any wrinkles, then I stuffed a few things in one half of the drawers, including a second pair of swim trunks that were even weirder than the ones that currently graced my body. It was hot pink and mid-thigh with flamingos on them. I would have never gotten them, except I kept thinking about how Adele would love them. She was quirky like that.
So I stuffed them away to wait for the perfect time to unveil them, then pulled out my toiletry bag.
Setting a few things onto the counter, I put the rest in the drawer with my other things, tucking it away from view.
Adding to my stash the box of condoms I’d brought. You know, just in case.
The water turned off and I quickly shut the drawer, listening to my cologne bottles rattle as I was trying to hide the conspicuous box from my bedmate.
“Your turn!” she told me, already in a tank top and shorts, towel-drying her hair.
