I don’t think I have the strength to leave.
He steps toward me slowly, casually. His hand is tight when it fists in my hair. I remember he used to love my hair. He used to stroke it, to play with it, to press the strands between his blunt square-tipped fingers. Now all he wants to do is pull it, use it like a leash to yank my head back. I stare at a chrome light fixture. Yellow light clashes with the stinging tears in my eyes, making a kaleidoscope, something pretty in the face of an ugly past, an ugly present.
His voice is low in my ear. “You’re going to walk down that hall and go inside my apartment. Then you’re going to strip. I don’t need to watch. I see you do that any night of the week. What I want is what comes after. You. On the couch. Facedown, ass in the air, ready to take whatever I give you.”
*
He said he didn’t need to watch, but I still thought he would. It’s somehow more unnerving to get undressed when I’m standing alone in the living room.
It makes me feel ashamed, which shouldn’t even be possible after what I’ve done at the club. Blue is just gifted like that—gifted at making me feel like shit. I take off my dress with quick, efficient movements and toss it onto a chair in the corner. My heels get kicked off to the floor underneath. My bra and panties come next. Then I’m naked in a room I’ve never been in, my skin pebbling under the cool air from the vent above me.
Blue returns from the kitchen with an amber bottle hanging from his fingers.
Only one bottle. Of course he hasn’t offered me a drink. I’m not here to enjoy myself, and he’s not my host. We aren’t going to pretend this is a date. I haven’t forgotten what this is about, but if I ever do, he’ll remind me with the subtle digs.
He nods to the couch. “Bend over. I want to see what those fuckers don’t get to.”
And the not so subtle digs.
My skin is covered entirely in goose bumps. Even my nipples are stiff and proud, like some cruel parody of arousal. I’m not even wearing my heels anymore, but my legs are wobbly when I cross the small space.
The carpet is softer than anything I’ve ever felt. This is the floor where he walks with those bare feet. This is the floor he might lounge on or do push-ups on. This is the floor he might fuck some other girl on, a girl he actually likes, one he doesn’t order to bend over.
The leather of the couch looks worn—artfully worn, like rich people have. Even in my shame and my nervousness, I have the sense to wonder where he got all that money.
And why he’s corralling drunk assholes at the Grand if he doesn’t have to.
“Now, Lola. Stop stalling.”
His voice sends a shiver down my spine. Cool leather kisses the fronts of my thighs. I bend at the waist, using every ounce of grace, of strength I’ve built up while stripping. He wants to see something those fuckers don’t see, but that’s all I show him—the smooth descent, the blunt display of my ass, as if I were onstage and he were standing two feet away with a twenty in his hand.
It feels like a victory, that small defiance. Like I’ve held something back.
Especially when I hear his breath catch at the sight.
Confidence steadies me as I dig my heels into the soft pile. My hands stroke the buttery leather before settling into place, fingers spread.
The heat from his body touches me first. It breaks through my defenses, invisible and undeniable. A hundred men have touched me, have grabbed me, have ground their dicks against me. And just the whisper of his body, the evidence of his nearness makes my heart pound.
His finger is featherlight against the small of my back. He touches me like I’m delicate, breakable, when we both know I’m anything but. He touches me like he’s tracing the lines of me, drawing the curve of my ass, dipping into the tender space between my legs.
“You’re shaking,” he says as if remarking on the weather. “And you’re wet.”
Of course his words only make me shake harder. They only make me wetter.
He leans down, his forefinger notched to my pussy, barely invading me, casually possessive. His mouth is close to my ear, his whisper low and gruff. “Are you afraid of me?”
“No,” I lie.
Two fingers shove inside me, deep and fast. My body is lubricated, but not enough. I flinch and hop up on my toes. It presses my face into the cushion—and I think that’s exactly what he meant to do.
“Tell me the truth,” he says, the spider to the fly.
I’m already caught in his web. There’s no way out.
My voice is muffled even to my own ears, mouth half-smashed against a leather couch that probably cost more than my car. “Candy says you’re not really going to hurt me. She says you…you just want to fuck me. That you’re not really mad.”