The Delicious Torment Read online

  “Yes, Jack.” And then, trying to redeem myself: “Yes, Sir.”

  “Bring the black-and-red paddle with you when you go back to the living room, and tell Alex I want him to pick up the phone.”

  Had I cringed before? Now, I bit my lip in pathetic despair. I’d thought I was tough. I’d thought I had a hand up on Alex. When in moments he would have one up on me.

  “Alex—pick up!” I yelled. Then I held the phone to my ear for a second before Jack said, “See you tonight, Sam. Go do as I said.”

  Shamefully, I grabbed the paddle and headed down the hall to Alex, wishing I’d worn something other than the white-tiered skirt and formfitting white tee. Wishing I didn’t feel like such an ingénue, an idiot novice, as I waited for Alex to hang up the phone.

  “You could have simply said ‘yes’ when I arrived,” Alex told me, snidely, emerging to slide the paddle from my grip. “You could have avoided this”—he paused—“this little unpleasantness.” I’d left off cruel when describing him previously. Young, blond, and cruel. Trembling, I prepared myself.

  Alex settled himself on the sofa, taking his time to get comfortable. He was like a baby Dom in training from Jack. But he was good. I’ll give him that. He enjoyed every fucking moment. I waited, rocking on my shoes, those insane white espadrilles that I never should have worn. They always brought me trouble.

  “You know the position,” he said, his voice soft now, almost crooning.

  I nodded. I would not call him Sir.

  “Then why am I waiting?”

  I hurried to his side, and then lay over his lap, promising myself not to not to do something like this in the future. And yet a tiny voice whispered in my head: if I hadn’t double-checked, if I hadn’t called, wouldn’t the same thing have happened to me later, over Jack’s lap? It was a no-win situation, as usual for me. But as Alex pulled my skirt to my hips, as his fingertips worked my panties down my thighs, I realized that as always, even when I lost, I won.

  Chapter Three:

  Short Leash

  Sometimes I sensed a difference in Jack, a holding back that I couldn’t quite understand. He surprised me more often with interruptions by his assistant—Alex showing up unexpectedly at the apartment with something Jack wanted me to do. Alex driving by my favorite café when I was working—I didn’t always spot him, but several times a week, I’d look up from my work to catch him cruising by.

  Jack didn’t trust me. That’s what I realized.

  I’d told him my history. I’d spilled my secrets. The darkest things that I carried with me. And yes, these confessions had made us closer. Had brought us tight together. But confessing to him also meant that he knew what I was capable of.

  The crazy thing is that I’d always thought of myself as such a sweet girl. If asked to write a description, I wouldn’t have put cheat in the top fifty words. Wouldn’t have listed heartbreaker. But I could tell when I woke up to find Jack staring at me, or when I saw Alex drive by for the second time, that those late-night confessions had resonated somewhere inside of Jack.

  Perhaps at first he had thought we were merely a fling. Perhaps it hadn’t mattered to him at the start that I’d been with those other men while I was supposed to be with Byron. Perhaps…he was getting serious. And when you’re getting serious you want to be able to know—know forever—that your partner would never, ever look at another man. (Or in Jack’s case, not bend over another man’s lap, or kiss another man’s lips, or be whipped by another man, without his explicit permission.)

  Don’t get me wrong. Jack didn’t treat me poorly. He wasn’t ignoring me or disparaging me or trying to drive me away. Yet there was a space between us—even when his body was aligned with mine. There was a distance between us—even when we couldn’t get any closer together physically. And I felt ice inside me from the sensation.

  At first, my response was to show him how good a girl I could possibly be. I was there, every evening, when he walked through the door. Dressed in one outfit after another, all of his favorites. I had his whiskey in hand, like a ’50s housewife, and I had toys spread out on the coffee table. So maybe not exactly like a ’50s housewife—unless there were kinky housewives in the ’50s—but docile and sweet, ready with “Yes, Sirs” and “Thank you, Sirs.”

  Jack seemed as wary of my new behavior as he had been of my old.

  And Alex’s drive-bys increased.

  My next plan was to show him that I didn’t care. He could mistrust me, question me, follow me if he wanted to. He wasn’t going to catch me doing anything unexpected. I held my head up high, pretending not to see Alex. A fuck-you attitude, I suppose, but one that gave me strength. Yet, I got bored with that. It’s demoralizing to feel as if the man you love thinks you’re a whore. And that’s the feeling I got. Creeping in. Slowly. Easily. I started to feel as if Jack was simply waiting for me to fail.

  I tried to approach the situation like an adult, telling him, “I’m yours.” Over and over. “Only yours.” Explaining. Pleading. “I don’t want anyone else…” Still, I felt the mistrust. Felt it as if he’d put a heavy weight on me, around my neck.

  I wouldn’t fail him.

  But I couldn’t live like that, either.

  When I’m unhappy, I can’t write. So it became useless to take my notebook to the café. For years, I have run to clear my head. So I started driving down Sunset to the beach and running from Santa Monica into Venice and back again. I didn’t even try to find Alex. I was sure he was there somewhere. But I ran, hard, every day, and then headed to the apartment to get cleaned up.

  Then I went to a new café, one that didn’t have so many open windows. This one would be more difficult for Alex to play his cat-and-mouse games. If he wanted to make sure of my surroundings, then let him show up in person. I took things a step further. I parked my car several blocks away, and entered an office building, choosing an inner door to reach the café, rather than the one on Sunset.

  I did this for several days before Alex figured out where I was. He must have been searching the offices first, because finally he entered the café and looked around, spotted me in the corner, and let himself relax.

  He came over without any sign of embarrassment, and sat at the table.

  “You’ve been here every day?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why aren’t you going to the other place?”

  “Change of scenery.”

  “Why don’t you run at the gym?”

  “I like fresh air.”

  “No such thing in L.A.”

  “Why are you here, Alex?”

  “You’re a smart girl. Answer that yourself.”

  I looked into my coffee. “Jack doesn’t trust me.”

  “He wants to know you’re safe.”

  I met his eyes. “He doesn’t trust me.”

  “Take that up with him.” There was the sound of a dare in Alex’s voice, as if he didn’t think I would.

  “Tell him you couldn’t find me.”

  “What?”

  “Tell him you looked, but you lost me. Again.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because I’m asking you to.”

  Alex regarded me for several seconds. “I don’t understand your plan.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “Tomorrow,” Alex said, “I’m going to tell him where you go each afternoon.”

  I nodded. “Fine.”

  He hesitated a moment before standing. “Don’t fuck this up, Samantha.”

  “It’s already fucked up, Alex.”

  “But not irredeemably. You can still fix it.”

  I grinned at him. He was a romantic at heart, wasn’t he? I didn’t need to make him squirm, although I kind of enjoyed the power. “Don’t worry,” I told him, “That’s my plan.”

  Chapter Four:

  Wicked Game

  Ah, now you’re questioning me.

  You think I’m one of those people who gets what she wants and then doesn’t want it a
nymore. But that’s not the truth. I wanted Jack more than anything I could possibly imagine. I was illuminated by the way we fit intricately together, the way Jack could read me. My wants. My needs.

  Yet I couldn’t stand the frightening distance slowly growing between us. I’d already lived in a war zone with Byron. And I’d wound up captured, a victim for years. This time, I would confront the situation with full force.

  But I couldn’t do it alone.

  I may have acted as if I had no friends in L.A., no allies at all. Of course, that wasn’t true. I’d met buddies at school and at the different salons where I worked. Mostly superficial, but a few I held on to. My best girlfriend was a manicurist to the stars. She’d painted the toenails of nearly every famous celebrity there is. Elizabeth was starlet beautiful—with porcelain skin and large cobalt eyes. Slightly taller than I am and sleek, she had hair that fell to the middle of her back. And although she’d have been flat-out gorgeous if she kept her natural hair color of pale chestnut, in reality, she was a chameleon. Working in a salon, she had easy access to hair dye and to the best colorists in the industry. One week, she’d be platinum blonde, the next—wham—she was a redhead.

  Right now, to my great relief, she had hair as dark and glossy as mine. I called her up and explained a bit of the plan. She didn’t understand everything, because I wouldn’t give her the full details. (She would have been shocked if I’d told her the true story of my love affair with Jack.) But as a fan of noir films, she appreciated the concept.

  The next day, Elizabeth came to the apartment as soon as Jack left. I gave her the keys to the car, dressed her in one of my standard running outfits, and had her put her hair back in a typical ponytail. Up close, we don’t look much alike. But as a blur running by on the beach, she’d fool Alex for a moment.

  I took a deep breath, scanning my surroundings. And then I grabbed a box of Hefty bags from a cabinet in the kitchen and started. In a few hours, I’d gathered up everything I owned. Every tube of lipstick. Every stray stocking. I didn’t pack anything that Jack had bought for me. Only the items I’d arrived with. But I put away all of my treasured knickknacks, the bergamot-scented candles, the black-and-white postcards on the fridge. The space returned to the masculine, sterile atmosphere it had been when Jack found me.

  The bags fit neatly in the empty closet of the spare room. If things went according to my plan, I’d be emptying them shortly. If not, well, I was already packed.

  I’d told Liz to do my typical run then drive to the café on Sunset. She didn’t have to pretend to be me. She should get a coffee and wait. I explained that Alex would probably show up—and she didn’t have to tell him anything. But if it was Jack who arrived looking for me—and that was the only thing I was worried about—then she should let him know I was at home, waiting for him.

  When I was finished “moving,” I took a shower and headed to the bedroom for the final preparation. I hoped I hadn’t miscalculated.

  The key in the lock let me know that someone was home. I heard the hesitation, heard the intake of breath. Knew that it was Jack. Not Alex. That Alex had fallen for my plan, and then, upon discovering Liz, had called Jack. That Jack had hurried home from work, thinking the worst.

  He must have been surprised to see the way the place looked. I hadn’t done all that much, but the little feminine touches had made a difference. I wanted him to know what life would be like without me, on the very basest of levels. I wanted him to miss me before I was actually gone.

  I heard him walk slowly down the hall, but when he got to the bedroom door, he stopped. The door was almost all the way closed. Was he steeling himself for finding an empty room? After a moment, Jack pushed open the door, and our eyes met. And then there was silence. So long. So hard. It took everything in me not to fill in the blanks.

  Finally, Jack said, “You want to tell me what the fuck is going on?”

  “You start.”

  “It’s your move, kid. You seem ready to call the shots. Who’s the girl?”

  “Friend of mine.”

  “She knows about us?”

  “She knows enough.” He waited, leaning against the wall now, and I continued. “She helped me out. Bought me time.”

  “For what?”

  “This—” I hadn’t dressed after the shower. I was on the bed, naked, and I’d cuffed my ankles and tossed the keys to the corner of the room, clicked the cuffs onto my wrists, and hung the chain from the hook on the wall. I was as exposed as I could possibly be. And deeply grateful that it was Jack in the room and not Alex. I didn’t know if I could have handled this reveal twice.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You don’t trust me,” I said, my voice soft, but unwavering.

  “Sam—”

  “You don’t. You don’t trust me at all. That’s why Alex does his little drive-bys every day. That’s why you’ve been pulling back from me.”

  “I haven’t—”

  “Jack.” I said it in the same tone he’d said my own name, and it stopped him. “You have. You think about the fact that I was with those other men while I sported Byron’s rock on my finger. What type of girl acts that way, right? You didn’t care at first, because—” I stopped. I was guessing here. “Because you didn’t know what we’d mean to each other. But now you’re starting to like me, and you can’t deal with the fact that I fucked those men and then slept in a bed next to Byron every night. You can’t deal with the fact that I was a cheat, and a—”

  “That’s not—”

  “It is. It can’t be anything else.”

  He stared at me, and I felt his eyes roaming over my body. “So what’s the rest of this all about? Where’s your stuff? Why are you cuffed like that?”

  “If we can work past this, I’ll stay. Otherwise—”

  “You’re threatening me.”

  “No. I would never. I’m telling you. I can’t be here if every time you look at me, I see the word liar in your eyes. I haven’t lied to you, Jack. I haven’t cheated on you. I haven’t.” There were tears in my voice now, and in my eyes—“I wouldn’t—I can’t believe you think I would. That I could.”

  He came a step closer to the bed.

  “But why are you cuffed?”

  “I need to know. Is this how you want me? Is this what I need to do to show you that I’m yours? Stay here, naked, every day, cuffed to the bed. Nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide. Is that what you want?”

  He shook his head. “Jesus, no.”

  “Or in a cage? Do you want to lock me in a steel puppy cage before you go to work? Have Alex take me out and walk me at lunchtime, then find me waiting with my head down, for my Owner at the end of the day?”

  “I’m not your—”

  “What do you want, Jack? What do you need me to do? How can I show you? How else?”

  He was closer to me, and I could see the conflict in his eyes. He wanted to believe me. He wanted to so badly. “I trust you,” he said.

  “You don’t.”

  “I do. I don’t know why I had Alex tail you. I wanted to know what you were up to. I never thought you were seeing someone else. And then, when you started doing weird things, changing your schedule, going missing, that’s when I got worried.”

  “Suspicious.”

  “Worried,” he said. “Watch yourself. You don’t know everything.”

  Jack was taking back control. I could feel it. He had made a decision—a decision that meant I could unpack. Once he set me free.

  “You’re pretty clever,” he said, “going to all this trouble. Cleaning up. Hiding out. Making me worry.” And then he laughed, that low, almost sinister chuckle. “But you fucked one thing up.” I stared at him, waiting. “You cuffed yourself the wrong way.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I want you face down, Sam. Not face up.”

  He was quick with the keys then, undoing the ankle restraints, flipping me into the position he craved. “You play a mean game,” he said, hand stroking
my naked ass. “And you’re pretty damn good. I’ll give you that. But you know the rules. To the victor go the spoils.”

  As he went in search of his weapon of choice, I wondered who he meant. Had he won this round, or had I?

  And did it really matter?

  Chapter Five:

  Wrapped Around Your Finger

  Jack stroked me all over with his bare hands. Up and down. Not leaving any part of my body untouched. I’m trained as a masseuse, and yet I’m one of those strange creatures who don’t like to be massaged. In fact, if I don’t know someone well, I don’t like to be touched at all. I don’t hug people on greeting. I don’t spontaneously hold hands with my friends. I have a history of being standoffish in this way.

  And yet…

  When Jack used his bare hands to stroke from the tops of my shoulders down to my feet, he made me purr like a relaxed panther. My body was humming, electrified. He didn’t tickle me. He didn’t touch me too gently. He used firm strokes, over and over, until I felt as if I were flying.

  Only then, after he’d put me into an almost hypnotic trance of pleasure, did he bend close on the bed, press his face near the nape of my neck, and say, “You worried me.”

  He’d lulled me, tricked me, created this false sense of safeness in my surroundings, and now that was replaced by instant awareness. My skin prickled. My muscles tightened.

  “On purpose,” Jack continued.

  His breath warmed the back of my neck, but I would not turn my head to look at him. I was frightened of what I might see in his cold blue eyes.

  “I told you before,” he continued in a menacing whisper. “I told you not to make me worry.”

  Oh, I’d been so pleased with my plan. And it had worked exactly how I’d hoped. But should I have confronted Jack in a different way? Spoken to him like an adult rather than playing behind his back? No… He understood this. He understood dirty pool. Christ, he was a lawyer after all. But that didn’t mean I could get away free. Jack had to take back the power. And that meant I would endure the punishment he chose.

  I could feel Jack’s body against mine, pressing hard. He was still dressed, which made me feel more naked than ever. He straddled my body from behind, so that I could feel how hard he was, and I knew that I’d turned him on. He was like steel. Even when I’d made him worry, I’d managed to turn him on. We had a powerful connection, a type that rarely exists. You can meet people who will spank you. You can meet people who will tie you up, who will fuck you six ways to Sunday. But this was different.