Taint

  “What?” I ask her, pulling her into my home and into my arms.

  “She’s…”

  “Tall? Cold? A little scary?”

  “Gorgeous. And yes, a little scary. She’s like the female version of you.”

  I shake my head. “You think I’m scary?”

  “You were.” She wipes the glossy imprint of Heidi’s lips from my cheek and replaces it with her own. “But I believe in facing your fears. Now you’re about as frightening as a kitten. Who was that, anyway?”

  “Publicist.”

  “Everything ok?” she frowns with concern.

  “Of course. Just some paperwork that needed to be signed in person,” I lie seamlessly.

  “Oh, I hope I didn’t interrupt.” She looks back at the door and frowns. “She doesn’t suspect anything with us, does she?”

  “Would it bother you if she did?”

  Ally shrugs and turns back to me, her gaze unfocused. “I don’t know. I mean, I know, but I’m not really sure how I feel about it.”

  “You don’t know how you feel about us.” It’s not a question.

  Her eyes touch mine, searching. “No. Yes. I do—of course I do—but I feel like it’s wrong to feel this way. Like I’m a horrible, disgusting person to harbor these feelings because of my situation. And if I acknowledge them, they’ll take over. They’ll consume me. You’ll consume me.”

  I step in as close as humanly possible. Close enough to feel her heartbeat stutter against my ribcage. “I want to consume you, Ally. I want to devour every bit of you until there’s no you and there’s no me. Until we’re nothing but sensation and exhaustion. Until you see music and hear colors.” My lips are just a breath away from hers, longing for a taste. “You don’t have to define your feelings for me, Ally. Let me do it for you.”

  She opens her mouth to speak, but I smother her words in a searing kiss. Her response isn’t necessary. What we have, what I feel for her, goes far beyond rational explanation. When I pull away, there are sad stars in her eyes.

  “Why did that feel like a kiss goodbye?”

  I kiss her again just to keep my mouth from admitting that it was. The beginning of the end. The very start of the saddest goodbye in history. Because after tonight, she’ll walk away from me and go back to him, holding a piece of me in the palm of her hand. And whenever I look up at the sky at night, wondering where she is, if she’s happy, if Evan laughs at her corny jokes or smiles whenever she does, that empty space left behind within me will ache with remembrance. Because her light once filled it. She filled me in a way that nobody on this Earth could. And I’ll never feel whole again.

  We don’t speak as I lead her into the bedroom. Our eyes stay transfixed on each other as we slowly undress. When I touch her, she shivers, yet her skin is burning under my fingertips. I wrap her in my arms, wishing I could cover her in a way that would make her disappear in me. They can’t take away what they can’t find.

  “You’re so small,” I whisper in her hair.

  “You’re just so big. But I like it.”

  I hold her until the pain of my erection becomes too great to ignore any longer. She slips a hand between us and squeezes it, hearing my thoughts and making me groan without a shred of dignity.

  “So big,” she repeats with a satisfied grin. “But I like it.”

  “It likes you too.”

  Then there are no more words, all signs of jest erased as I lay her down and cover her body with mine. I kiss her mouth, her neck, each of her pert breasts, the dip of her navel. When my tongue finds the apex of her thighs, she opens for me automatically. I drag a thumb through her folds before pressing her clit. She shudders, and I repeat the motion, slowly trailing my thumb down through her pink flesh, tracing her sex with precision before bringing it back up to apply pressure on her sensitive bud. By the time I give her my tongue, she nearly breaks apart.

  “What are you doing to me?” she pants, teetering on the edge of orgasm.

  “Exactly what I taught you,” I reply. Then I send her flying into oblivion, giving her my mouth and fingers. Sucking her until her release trickles down my chin. Until she pulls me up by my shoulders, begging me to stop.

  “Oh God,” she sobs. “I can’t take anymore. Too much.”

  I kiss her so she can taste herself, my tongue snaking with hers as we share her arousal. I’m perfectly aligned with her entrance, still slick and hot, so I slowly push until the head of my cock is nestled inside her. Ally gasps at the intrusion, and I trace her lips with my fingers before hooking two inside her mouth. I delve in some more and watch the emotions play out on her face, all varying shades of carnal insanity. When I’m completely submersed to the hilt, I pull out so suddenly that she whimpers, and I flip her onto her stomach.

  “Up you go,” I say, elevating her ass and hips, and bending her legs in a way that causes the soles of her feet to touch. I admire the way her sex contracts, begging for me to fill her once more.

  One hand on her hip, the other on her shoulder, I enter her from behind, slowly at first. I’m so deep at this angle, that I can feel her heartbeat in her stomach. The sheets rumple under her tight grip, and Ally grits out a curse.

  “Is this ok?” I ask. I don’t even know why I’m asking. I’ve never asked for anything I’ve wanted, and I damn sure didn’t care enough to do it during sex.

  Ally nods into the pillow, eyes closed tight. “Yes. Better than ok.”

  I pull out to the tip and plunge back in, pulling her back into me by her shoulder. We both moan in unison, and her knees tremble.

  “Good?” I don’t know why I’m asking again. I know it’s good. I can feel it’s good to her.

  “Yeah,” she rasps between whimpers.

  All restraint is diminished, and I let go, thrusting into her with ravenous intensity. I lean forward and kiss her back, smothering my groans of pleasure in her skin and hair. She turns her head, and my lips instantly find hers.

  If this was a different time, and I was a different man deep inside of a different woman, I’d look into her eyes as my body dipped and rolled into hers. She’d stare at me lovingly and caress my jaw, a look of pure ecstasy on her face. I’d sweep her hair to one side over her shoulder and drag my tongue across her neck to her ear. And when her back begins to arch, as the first tingles of orgasm seize her body, I would whisper “I love you,” because I’d want those words to be the only thing she hears when she comes for me. Only for me.

  Regardless of my feelings for Ally—and there are feelings—I’m not that man and she’s not that woman. And all the time we have is right now. Uttering those words would only spark confusion and conflict for both of us. So I swallow both our moans of surrender as I give her the parts of me that I can give. The parts of me that quiver and pulse until pain and pleasure become one and the same. Until heat and cold race up my spine, and my joints are too flooded with sensation to move, and I release it all into her—the fear, the anger, the bliss of just having her in my arms—it’s all hers.

  I’m hers.

  SOMETHING STIRS ME from sleep, but I try to fight it. I don’t want to move, I don’t even want to breathe. But it sounds again from the living room, and I know I have to leave this bed and the warmth of Ally’s body.

  Fuck. My phone.

  Dim light filters through the blinds, and I realize that we’ve sexed and slept the day away. There was talking, some eating, even some hydrating, but mostly our time was spent kissing, touching and pushing our bodies beyond pleasure.

  As gently as I possibly can, I unravel my arm from under Ally’s frame. She stirs, murmuring something unintelligible before resuming a soft snore. I shake my head and laugh silently to myself as I make my way to the living room. Before Ally, every woman I had ever been with, looked like supermodels even in slumber. Hair and makeup somehow stayed meticulously in place. Part of me didn’t even believe they ever truly slept, just fluttered those long-lashed eyes closed and posed like wax statues on the bed. But with Ally, everything is
different, more real. Her red hair is in knots all over both our faces. She snores a bit, not loudly, but loud enough that I know she’s asleep. And a little drop of drool settles in the corner of her mouth.

  Maybe all women really sleep this way. I don’t know. I’ve never stuck around long enough to find out.

  I follow the chimes resonating from my phone, and find it on the coffee table. Missed calls and text messages from Heidi. One from Diane, checking in. Another from Riku asking me if everything is ok. I ignore them all and zero in on the half-dozen Google alerts clogging my screen.

  Breaking News…

  This Just In…

  Shocking Truth Revealed…

  Same bullshit, different headline. But all I can see is a face, a name. A wolf in sheep’s clothing, crying false tears of remorse and longing.

  Evan Carr’s shocking revelation: I sent my wife to the sex doctor

  In a press release earlier today, Evan Carr revealed that he regrettably sent wife, Allison Elliot-Carr to celebrity sex therapist, Justice Drake, under the pretense that Drake was an intimacy professional, NOT a sexual deviant.

  “When we first were told about Mr. Drake and his practice, we thought it would help Allison build her confidence and become in touch with her sexuality,” said the socialite. “We signed up with the assumption that it would be positive for our marriage. Little did we know what Justice Drake was really about. I would have never put my wife in this situation had I known.”

  A tearful Carr goes on to say that he is doing everything in his power to locate his wife and bring her back. “Her place is with me,” he says. “Not with some hack that sold us a lie. I can’t even imagine what he could be doing to Ally and God knows who else.”

  Evan Carr provided details of the enrollment forms, saying that the women would be sent to an undisclosed location where they could have no contact with the outside world for six weeks. When asked about Justice Drake’s identity, Carr shook his head.

  “No one has ever seen him. I can’t even be sure that he’s a man. All contact has been through his PR or email.”

  Drake’s publicist, Heidi DuCane, was unavailable for comment.

  I dial the illusive blonde next, my heartbeat pounding painfully in my head.

  “You’re lucky I have shit to do,” Heidi says after picking up on the first ring. “I wanted to storm your little love nest and drag your ass out of there.”

  “Where are you?” My voice is gruff with sleep and aggravation.

  “Headed back to New York, but had to make a stop first.” She pauses to give the driver instructions to a hotel on Michigan Ave. “Something came up and I want to check it out.”

  “You’re in Chicago?”

  “Yeah. Art is meeting me here.”

  I exhale heavily and lean back on the couch. Arthur Cambridge, III is my attorney. If he’s involved, something is up. “What’s wrong?”

  “You’re being blackmailed, Justice. A few hours ago, I was sent an audio recording of you having sex. I don’t know who it was with, but the woman was very vocal. She kept calling you by your name. Know anything about that?”

  I close my eyes and rub the tension collecting in my temples. “No. How do you know it’s not doctored?”

  “We checked it out. It’s authentic. However, my team was able to trace the IP address back to Chicago.”

  I almost smirk. “You have a team of hackers, Heidi?”

  “Doesn’t everybody? And even if it is from years ago, we can’t take that risk. Not with the press calling for your head on a platter. I’m texting it to you now. Listen. Call me when you’re done.”

  A message chimes a second later and I hang up with Heidi to open the attachment. Heavy breathing. Moaning. A sweet voice singing my name as I instruct her to fuck, then suck me.

  I don’t need to hear anymore. I was there. Just yesterday, I was there.

  I call Heidi back, and she answers immediately. “I have a pretty good idea who’s behind this, and I’m sure you do too.”

  Erin.

  Stupid fucking Erin.

  I think back to when I took Ally right here on this very couch. I remember telling her to take off her shirt and then capturing her flawed beauty through the lens of my camera phone. Then my mouth was devouring her pink-tipped nipples and demanding she take off those ridiculously oversized boxers. And then I was deep inside her, losing myself to pleasure, my phone forgotten.

  How the fuck did Erin get a recording of that? Hers was the last number I dialed, but the screen was locked. Had she called? Did we accidently graze that evil, little green icon, while Ally rode me like a cowgirl?

  “We’re going to bury her,” Heidi continues. “Her grandchildren will be paying you their lunch money.”

  I shake my head in frustration. “How much is she asking?”

  Heidi makes a tsking sound. “Two million, which technically won’t kill you but still…”

  “Give it to her.”

  “What?”

  “Tell Art to give it to her. Give her the money.”

  Heidi’s voice goes a pitch higher than I’ve ever heard it. “You can’t be serious! That bitch is in direct violation of contract, and you want to reward her? She has nothing, Justice. There’s no way she can prove it was you-”

  “It doesn’t matter, Heidi. None of it matters. Retrieve the evidence, give her the money, and do what you need to do to ensure she disappears.”

  The line goes quiet for several beats before Heidi chuckles. “You’ve gone completely mad, haven’t you?”

  I chuckle too. I don’t know why. My business is crumbling at my feet, I’m being blackmailed by a girl who didn’t have two nickels to rub together before she met me, and I’m having an affair with a married woman that I can’t shake. I am mad. Mad, yet I’ve never felt more normal. More tied to the life I left behind—Ally’s life.

  I hear light shuffling behind me, and I look up in time to see Ally leaning against the doorjamb, wearing one of my sweatshirts, sleep and sex sparkling in her eyes. She smiles at me, and a feeling too strong to fully contain bursts in my chest before sinking into the pit of my stomach.

  “Take care of that for me, Heidi. And what we talked about earlier… I’ll do it. I’ll send them.”

  Her voice takes on that soft, feminine sound again. Like she pities me. Like she cares for me. “Got it. This’ll be good, Justice, and everything will be ok. You can start over, rebuild. You can be whoever you want after this.”

  I don’t have a response, at least one that I can voice, so I just hang up. Heidi is used to my terseness. I’m like that with everyone. Everyone except Ally.

  As if she can hear her name ringing melodically in my head, she slinks over to the couch just as I set my phone on the end table. I grab her by the waist and pull her onto my lap as she squeals. I bury my face in her hair, trying to soak in as much of her scent as I can, while I can. I can smell myself on her, mixed with her perfume and sweat.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” I say against the smooth skin behind her ear. “I was just about to come back to bed.”

  “I’m tired of sleeping,” she sighs.

  I look at her, my brow raised sardonically. “You’re tired of sleeping?”

  She pinches me on the arm. “Oh, you know what I mean.”

  I snatch her hand and kiss her palm. Then we’re quiet, as we watch shadows grow before our eyes, dusk fading into night.

  “Can I ask you a question?” Ally asks, her voice small in the vast silence.

  “Don’t you always?”

  She pinches me again. “Knock it off! Can you be serious for five minutes?”

  I give her a level stare. “You’re asking me to be serious?”

  “Ugh!” She tries to shimmy out of my arms, but I wound them around her tighter.

  “Ok, ok, I’m sorry. Ask me anything. Seriously this time.”

  Ally nods toward shadowed, white walls. “You don’t have any pictures up.”

  “That’s not a qu
estion.”

  “Shut up, will you, and let me finish.” She smiles and shakes her head, before laying it on my shoulder. “You don’t have any photos, and you’ve never really talked about your family. And since you already know all about me and my life, I thought…”

  “You want to know about my family.”

  “Yes.” She turns toward me, a tearful apology in her eyes. “I want to know you. We only have a little over a week left together. It’s not enough, Justice. I need to soak up as much of you as I can.”

  I take a deep breath and position her body so I’m forced to look at her. So I’m forced to see the judgment and regret that will undoubtedly be on her face.

  “My story is nothing new; you’ve heard it before. My father never loved my mother. He was charming, rich, powerful, and an impeccable liar. She was gentle and naïve, thinking that her love for him would change him just enough to make him feel for her. She was too good for him, yet too stupid to see it and leave him alone.”

  She gives me a soft smile. “Sounds about right.”

  “She didn’t, of course. And soon, he found himself a shiny, new toy to feed his ego. My mother had served her purpose, and so had I. His relationship with me ended with theirs.”

  “Where is your mother now?”

  “Somewhere grieving her broken heart, probably a dirty martini in hand. She never got over him. When he sent us away, I told myself that it was his loss. But it was ours too. I lost that warm, compassionate woman that was just too optimistic for her own good. The one that’d tell me how I’d grow up one day and be a movie star and marry the most beautiful woman in the world, and give her half a dozen grandchildren. I lost her, and she lost herself. She lost her reason to live.”

  Ally cups my cheek and looks at me like she can see right through my impassive exterior. Like she can actually see the broken pieces of me that are glued together by lies and deceit.

  I muster a weak smile and remove her hand. “Don’t feel bad for me. I don’t.”

  “But it has to be lonely.”

  “How can I be lonely?” I smirk. “I’m constantly surrounded by beautiful women and a very efficient, if not overbearing, staff.”