Then I hear him lift his hand to his lips to taste me.
Oh, fuck, if I wasn’t wet before, I am now. I wonder if he can actually see it welling between my legs. My pulse has quickened, and every inch of my body is newly, sharply sensitive—and yet my head still reels, the alcohol making everything slightly surreal.
The next sound is the sound of Jonah stripping off his pants and sweater. I want to look up and see him, his magnificent body pale in the dim moonlight through the gauze drapes. But that would betray the game. So I lie there, pliant and helpless, awaiting his pleasure. His will.
Jonah rolls me onto my back, the motion taking me to the edge of the bed. My arm spills over the side. He tugs down the scoop neck of my tank to expose my tits, then begins to play with them—fondling, squeezing, jiggling. Arousal spirals through me, down to my core, as he kneads me, teases my nipples, presses my breasts together tightly. There’s none of the punishment he’s sometimes inflicted on my body. It’s more as if he’s exploring. Testing me to see how much I feel, how much I’ll allow before I start to struggle.
I writhe beneath him once, with a whimper. No more.
Then he nudges my face sideways; my eyes remain shut. When I feel the head of his cock brush against my lips, I pull back—the room tilts—and he catches me under my chin with his fingertips. More firmly, he works my mouth open and slips his cock inside.
My only reaction is a groan, which he seems to like. I do nothing with my lips or tongue, simply allow him to rock in and out. But he’s not aggressively fucking my mouth the way he sometimes does. He’s just proving he can do this, that I’m so out of it he can violate me without my even turning my head.
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What would I do, if I were drunker than this—so drunk a man I barely knew could get in here and work me over? Clumsily I push at him as I pull my head back. My resistance is useless—it’s meant to be—but it’s also meant to turn him on.
It works. Jonah breathes out sharply. Through my half-shut eyes, I see him moving to the foot of the bed, his hand around his cock as he gets himself harder.
A thought flickers through my head—that it could be hot to watch Jonah get himself off. Not sure how that would fit into one of our games, but I might mention it some other time. For now it’s enough to watch his hand stroking the length of his shaft and to know every inch of him is for me.
He pulls my legs apart. By now I’m so wound up that I have to stifle a moan of pleasure from that sensation alone—the air against my cunt, the grip of his fingers on my thighs. Jonah shoves one knee to the side, then tugs my other leg up so that it’s almost bent upon my chest. I realize he’s enjoying the ability to manipulate my body. Twisting and turning me makes it even clearer that, for now, I’m only his plaything. Nothing more.
Jonah flips me over onto my belly and positions himself between my legs. Even the pressure of the mattress against my clit is enough to send a thrill through me. My powerlessness is getting me even hotter than it’s getting him.
His cock bumps against me. Then into me—only a couple inches, to see what I’ll take. I whimper and try to twist my body to one side, but Jonah leans over me, a broad hand on each of my arms, holding me flat on the bed as he starts shoving himself all the way inside.
The burn as he opens me—the way my entire world narrows until I perceive nothing but this inner blaze—only Jonah gives me this. Only Jonah, ever.
Immediately he starts thrusting fast, like a man trying to get off as quickly as possible. If this scenario were real, he would be. He’d want to do what he needed and get the hell out before I could come to enough to stop him, or identify him. So he’s going for it, all out.
Doesn’t matter. I’m right behind him, arousal arcing higher inside me until the world goes dark and fuzzy around the edges. The alcohol makes every sensation more overpowering. When I feel the inevitability of orgasm—that exhilarating moment before the fall, when you have to let go—I can’t keep myself from crying out. Because then it’s on me and I’m coming long and sweet and good, until I think I might faint.
If I weren’t already lying down, I probably would.
Jonah pays no attention. He stays on me, thrusting for forever, as I lie beneath him limp and weak. Finally his hands tighten on my arms, and he pumps into me deeper and harder than before. A low, primal grunt—and then his hands relax.
As he straightens, I feel his cock slip out of me; his hot come spills onto my skin and the sheets. For a moment all I want to do is lie there and feel it.
“Vivienne?” he whispers. “You’re—you have to be awake. ”
“I am,” I mumble. “Just happy. ”
With that I summon my strength to crawl further up the mattress. At least the wet spot won’t bother either of us tonight. As I curl onto my side, I hold a hand out for Jonah, who still stands at the foot of the bed, staring at me.
I whisper, “C’mon. Come to bed. ”
Jonah spoons behind my back and hugs me so tightly that at first I think I won’t be able to fall asleep like that—and then I do.
• • •
In the morning, Jonah’s still sound asleep after I’ve emerged from the shower. He must be exhausted; I wonder how much rest he’s really had since this whole nightmare with the police and Carter began. Not enough, it seems.
Amazingly, I’ve avoided the hangover I so richly deserve. Although I feel a little dehydrated, it’s nothing some orange juice won’t cure. We didn’t order one of the in-room breakfasts because there’s a sumptuous buffet downstairs, but I don’t want to wake up Jonah when he’s finally getting some decent sleep. However, I also really want that orange juice, like, now.
Best of both worlds—I’ll sneak out of the room, have some OJ and cereal, then bring Jonah breakfast in bed. Okay, this breakfast is going to be bagels and a cardboard cup of coffee instead of the traditional elegant French toast on a tray, but it’s the thought that counts. So I put on jeans and my thickest gray sweater, grab my key card and cell phone, and tiptoe out the door.
My cell phone rings just as I’m pouring maple syrup onto my waffle. I manage to put down the bottle in time to answer. “Carmen! What’s up?”
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“Just wanted to check in on you. Normally this is the point in your visits home when it stops being merely crazy, and the deep crazy sets in. ”
She’s not wrong, except for the part where I haven’t kept her updated on where I am. “Actually, Jonah and I left New Orleans the day after Christmas. We’re visiting his family in Chicago. ”
“Oh, my God. You’re in the deep, deep crazy. ”
“Pretty much,” I admit as I slide into a chair at an empty table. “But mostly we’ve hung out with his brother Maddox, who’s awesome. ”
That’s true without being the whole truth. It’s as much of Jonah’s personal business as I feel comfortable sharing. There might come a time when I could confide more to Carmen, who I trust as much as I do anyone on Earth. But it’s not now, while I’m sitting in the middle of a hotel’s dining room surrounded by other drowsy travelers.
She says something that surprises me. “You guys are really going to work it out?”
“Um, yeah. ” I would’ve thought the trips home to meet each other’s families made that clear. Her reluctance comes through too strongly. “I thought you liked Jonah. ”
“I do, I guess. It’s not like I know him that well, and he’s not, uh, talkative, but he seems like an okay guy. ”
“Wow. Don’t know if I can handle that much enthusiasm. ”
“I didn’t mean it like that! Jonah’s hot. He’s smart. He’s crazy rich. He may have the single greatest arms I’ve ever seen on a man. What’s not to like?”
I finish chewing a bite of my waffle. “You tell me. ”
“This isn’t about Jonah,” Carmen insists. I can hear the tinkling sound of the baby’s mobile in the background; she must be babysitting Nicolas so Shay and Arturo can go out to br
unch, or just sleep in. “It’s only that—well—I was wondering whether you and Geordie were back on again?”
“Geordie?” Oh, no. “He didn’t—Geordie hasn’t said—”
“Oh, no, he hasn’t mentioned anything. But you talked about picking him up at the clinic, and you helped make all these arrangements for Christmas, plus I know you guys went out to eat a couple times—”
“It wasn’t candlelight and roses! I mean, one time we went to Torchy’s. ” Don’t get me wrong; I love Torchy’s. But its indoor location isn’t high on ambiance.
“You also mentioned throwing an alcohol-free New Year’s Eve party,” Carmen continues resolutely. “So it just seems to me like you’ve been thinking about Geordie a lot. ”
“Yeah, of course I have. He’s my friend, and he’s going through a rough time. ”
“You two were way more than friends a year ago. ”
Not this again. Carmen seems really, truly unable to let go of the idea of me and Geordie. “We’ve moved on. People do. ”
“Really?”
“Really,” I insist.
“Are you sure Geordie has moved on too?”
“Of course he has. ” Though I wonder. While I feel sure Geordie has no illusions about our getting back together, and accepts our breakup is for the best—he’s still a little raw about my being with Jonah. It’s a topic I talk around when we’re together.
Then again, everyone sort of hopes to be the one who finds someone new first, don’t they? If Geordie had fallen for somebody else already, I admit, I might be . . . wistful. But that doesn’t mean I’d want Geordie back, and I’m pretty sure he isn’t longing for me.
“We’re fine,” I say. “He’s just reaching out for support right now, which is exactly what he should do while he’s in recovery. ”
“Ohhhh-kay. ” Carmen gives up the subject, but obviously remains unconvinced. We make some small talk about Nicolas’s first Christmas, and how proud his abuelos are, before I hang up and finish my breakfast.
As I sip my long-awaited orange juice, I think more about what Carmen has said. It’s not that I doubt my conclusions about what Geordie feels, and certainly I understand my own emotions about him. But Carmen’s continuing worry strikes me as odd in some way. If she doesn’t object to Jonah, and she understands the reasons for our breakup, then why is she so fixated on this?
It hits me just as I’m taking the last bite of my waffle. What if Carmen’s thinking so much about Geordie not because she thinks I’m still in love with him, but because she’s fallen in love with him?
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I start to smile. If I’m right . . . this would be so perfect. Two of my best friends, together? Carmen’s so steady and grounded that she’d help anchor Geordie, and his sense of humor and fun would keep her from wearing herself down with responsibility. It could work.
Not right now, of course. Geordie needs to be a whole lot healthier and stronger before he attempts a new relationship.
But that day will come.
My matchmaking plans keep me amused as I pour Jonah’s coffee and fill a bag with bagels and danishes. By the time I’m back on our floor, sliding in the key card, I’m humming the song “Call Me Maybe,” for some reason—
“Vivienne. ” Jonah grabs me almost at the door. He’s naked, his hair rumpled. But what strikes me is the tension in his whole body. His arms go around me tightly, like he expects someone to tear me away. “Christ. I thought you were gone. ”
“I was gone. Downstairs. See? I brought you breakfast?”
Jonah doesn’t let go. “I mean, I thought—maybe last night took things too far, you wanted to say no and you couldn’t, and then you left. ”
“Hey, hey. Remember what I said? You have to trust me to speak up when it’s too much for me. It almost never has been. ”
“Last night was all about you not being able to speak up. ”
“I was pretending to be drunker than I was. Seriously. Not even hungover today. ” Mentally I cross this fantasy off the list. While I’m confident in our ability to handle it as beautifully as we did last night, Jonah doesn’t share that confidence yet. This one is a step too far, for now. “I’m okay, I swear. Last night was great. And I brought you coffee. ”
Jonah finally lets go of me and accepts the coffee. But his face remains ashen. Haunted by the thought of the harm he could do without knowing.
Sixteen
Normally, if I had an unexpected few hours to spend at the Art Institute of Chicago, I’d head straight for their etchings collection. It would be incredible to soak in the details, study the techniques close up.
But we’re here primarily to distract Jonah. My geeking out over beautiful etchings will only isolate him and push him deeper into his thoughts. So instead I lead us on the greatest hits trail—past the Georgia O’Keefe, the classical Indian sculpture, the Impressionists. None of it has much impact until we finally find Hopper’s Nighthawks.
Most people know this painting more as kitsch—the posters that show James Dean and Marilyn Monroe at the bar instead. As we stand before it today, though, we’re able to drink in the painting’s true resonance: these strangers drawn together in the night, the unexpected brightness of their clothes compared to the outside gloom, the way this one corner bar seems to be the last source of light in the world. Jonah connects to this one even more than I do, I can tell.
“I always thought of this as a sad painting,” Jonah says. His arms are folded across his chest, his gaze locked on the image before us. “You know, barflies getting drunk, all alone. But now I see they’re connected to each other. Even if they never met before, they’re speaking now. Bitching about . . . I don’t know, whatever you’d bitch about then. Dewey versus Truman, maybe. ”
I smile despite myself. “Yeah. They’ve found a place not to be alone. ”
Are these people forming friendships, sharing jokes, truly bringing some brightness to the dark? Or are they sharing one fragile moment before sinking into isolation and despair? You can read the painting either way.
I don’t suggest the darker version to Jonah, however. For once, he should get to focus on the light.
One of the reasons I want to be an artist is because art has the power to restore people. If they’ll look—really look—one simple image can fill their minds with new thoughts, fresh emotions. A piece of art that speaks to you can open windows in a room you hadn’t even known was dark.
Nighthawks does this for Jonah. His mood improves as we keep wandering through the exhibitions, and by the time we sit down to our overpriced museum café lunch, he seems like himself again.
“I should’ve brought you here long ago,” he says. We’re at a small plastic table, surrounded on every side by tourists from half a dozen countries. “Let you browse to your heart’s content. You could show me all the nuances I’ve been missing. ”
“Don’t sell yourself short. You see a lot on your own. ” If he hadn’t seen so much in my etching of the man holding the bird—would we even be here now? This is the first time it’s struck me that if Jonah didn’t have an artist’s eye, our first split would have been final.
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Jonah leans onto the table with both arms. “We could go on a great museums tour sometime. Spend a month of the summer in Europe, going to the Louvre, the British Museum—”
The Reina Sophia! Topkapi Palace! my mind cries. I feel as gleeful as a little kid running around with sparklers. And yet next summer feels almost impossibly far away, on the other side of a long and treacherous journey. Even getting past this afternoon will be a challenge. Then again, Jonah knows that. I lean my elbow on the table, rest my chin in my hand. “You’re giving me something to look forward to, aren’t you?”
“And me too. With you as my guide, I’d have a whole new way of seeing . . . not just the art. The world. ” His hand closes over mine, warm and strong. It doesn’t matter that we’re sitting in a huddle of tourists, wearing the same gray sweaters an
d blue jeans as half of the other people in the room, surrounded by the clink of cheap silverware and a dozen discarded museum maps. Candlelight and a symphony couldn’t make this moment more romantic.
Softly I say, “Then it’s a plan. ”
Neither of us hesitated; we both believe we’ll still be together this summer.
This relationship began within a very strict, specific set of boundaries. Now it seems like we’re knocking the last of those walls down.
We can get through anything if we’re together—even the next few days.
• • •
In the early afternoon, we walk back to the same building that houses the Orchid. The snow clouds have finally moved along, leaving behind a flawless blue sky that doesn’t seem to belong above the ice-crusted city below. In the sunlight, the metal and glass of the skyscrapers sparkles.
“Looks so much warmer,” I say to Jonah as we go inside. “Feels so much colder. ”
“Just Chicago playing tricks with your head. It loves to do that. ”
This time, we take a different bank of elevators to go to the residential levels of the building. Maddox has chosen to live only stories from his club. Does he ever feel closed in? No, I realize, he can’t. Not with the views from the Orchid, and probably from this apartment too.
So I’m looking forward to getting a look around—until Maddox opens the door, letting us into an argument.
“You’re judging me,” says a blond woman, voice strained as she paces in the background. “I thought you promised not to do that. ”
“I’m not judging you,” retorts Maddox. “I’m judging him. ”
“Stop calling Griffin him!”
Maddox sighs and looks at us like, You see where this is going. I don’t, but Jonah obviously does. Already his lips are set in a firm line, a small wrinkle between his eyes the only evidence of the frown he’s trying to suppress. He says, “Elise? It’s me. ”
“Jonah!”
Elise stops pacing and hurries toward him, arms outstretched, almost like a little kid would. Maybe on some level we always remain childish with the people we knew at the beginning of our lives. Jonah bundles her up in his hug, more openly affectionate than I’ve ever seen him, except with me.
When he lets go of his sister, I’m able to get a good look at her. She’s a couple inches shorter than I am, voluptuous for her height and weight—the kind of woman who probably curses the day the hourglass figure went out of style. Yet her clothing swallows her, pastel drapey stuff that turns her pale, china-doll complexion almost ghostly. Although I know she’s older than Maddox, in her late twenties, Elise looks almost like a girl in high school. Her style contains only one element of pure chic—her blond pixie cut frames her round face to perfection. The part of my brain programmed by Mom and Chloe whispers, Any girl who realizes she can pull off that hairdo ought to know how to dress better.