Chapter Eleven - OLIVER
Dinner is good. Better than good, it’s great. I have to admit, fucking Victoria can cook. There is absolutely no Mister talk at the table. In fact, everyone is in a pretty great mood. The girls are drinking martinis and us guys are still finishing off that bottle of Stoli, so by the time we’re done eating, we are all good and buzzed and business is behind us.
That is until Pax kicks me under the table and nods towards Ariel’s office while no one is looking.
Right.
“Hey, Ariel,” I say, interrupting the conversation. “I need a landline. Mind if I use your office phone?”
“Sure,” she says, barely looking at me. “Just make sure it’s legal.”
I wince, looking around at my friends to see if they heard that slip-up. They did. Because they are all looking back at me with little squinty eyes. And then Ariel catches her mistake and laughs it off. “Kidding, little brother. Whatever.”
She’s drunk. And she made a mistake.
I put both palms on the table and push my chair back, wondering what the fuck is wrong with Ariel. She never makes mistakes. That just doesn’t happen.
I walk away, still bothered by it, and then shut the door behind me once I’m in the office.
She needs to stop drinking. That’s what she needs. She’s got no boyfriend here to keep her in check.
My phone buzzes in my pants, so I take it out and look at the screen.
Ariel: Whoops. Time to get sober.
Me: You bet your ass. I do not need these guys asking me about the “illegal” business I may or may not be doing in here. WTF, Ariel?
Ariel: Sorry.
I put the phone away and slump down in the office chair to wait for the guys to make their way in here. And just out of instinct, I open up Ariel’s laptop sitting there.
I expect it to be shut down, or at the very least, locked. But it’s on, and it’s open to Five’s Finder app. Who has Ariel been checking up on? We don’t use Five’s app unless it’s important. It makes him very nervous to have our business tied to him.
I stay absolutely still, listening for sounds of people approaching on the other side of the door. And then I type in Katya’s name.
There she is. Katya Kalashova. 305 North College Avenue, #602. And it lists two numbers. Landline and cell.
It’s almost like… she wants to be found.
Just like the day we first met.
I seduced her that night. I seduced her with the tree, and the food, and the beer, and the music. My tattoos that transfixed her. The muscles she couldn’t stop touching. She was a girl. It was very plain by the way she let me fuck her that night.
Inexperienced.
Eager to please.
Tiny moans that made her embarrassed. Unwilling to do it standing up, or against the wall, or on the kitchen counter. Protest after protest for every kinky fucking idea I came up with.
Not there. Not like that. Not with the lights on. Not in front of the window. Not in the shower.
It makes me laugh now. Because in the end we fucked in all those places, in all those ways, and she came back for more.
I made my move before I even started cooking. Fingertips on her bare thigh brushing up against her skin. Just the slightest touch as I slipped my hand underneath that little tartan skirt and found the wet spot soaking through her panties. I fingered her through the thin cotton. She wanted to take them off but I was not in the mood to give in that night. I was in the mood to have everything my way. Just the way I wanted. For once.
She came with my fingers inside her. Her body folding against mine, her nails digging into the thick muscles of my shoulders. And then she sank to her knees. Her bare skin on that hard concrete floor.
She looked up at me and smiled.
I got my cock sucked good that night. She let me guide her any way I wanted. Opened wider on command. She let me face-fuck her. She licked my balls, fingered my asshole. Put her hands behind her back and looked me in the eyes.
I figured why not? Why not get one good night out of her?
She wants to be a whore? Make money dishing out the fantasy? I can be her customer.
I took her to my bedroom—which was nothing more than a mattress on the second-floor loft where tires were still being stored, and reachable only by a moving set of stairs on wheels.
I undressed her in the fading light. Just enough light to make her fair skin glow and look beautifully surreal. Her gun came off first. Put safely aside on an overturned crate acting as a bedside table. Then the blue blazer. The shirt was untucked next and I started unfastening the little clear buttons denying me a view of her breasts spilling out of that innocent white bra. I kissed her shoulder as I slipped the shirt down her arm and let it drop to the floor.
I left the skirt on and started eating her pussy while she was standing up. Her legs spread open just enough to give me access, my fingers pulling aside her already wet panties.
I didn’t let her come that time. Just played with her until her knees got weak and her thighs began to tremble. Then I took her hand and led her to the bed. Pushed her back against the pillows, opened her legs, and positioned myself between them.
“Take off my skirt. My underwear.”
“No,” I remember saying as I entered her. “I like the school-girl look.”
Her back bucked, arched. She grabbed her breasts, pushing them together still inside her bra.
We fucked slowly that time. It stands out in my mind that way. Slowly. Everything was slow that night. Time disappeared along with all my expectations.
I don’t know why, exactly. I don’t know what made me do it that way. I’m not one of those careful lovers. But there was something about her. Something damaged or maybe even broken.
And I remember wanting to kiss her neck after we came—moaning and breathing hard. I slumped off to the side, pulled her in to my chest, and my lips were already there, searching for that soft skin under the ear, when I realized she still had her scarf on.
When I started taking it off I felt her breath hitch. It almost made me stop. Almost. But then she relaxed and I untied the knot holding the silk to her neck. Pulled it free and tossed it aside.
My mouth was there on her skin. My tongue dancing along her earlobe, then down to that little hidden cleft on the side of her throat.
I pulled back, intending on kissing her lips next—and that’s when I saw the scar.
A raised silver-white line that started just below her ear and traveled down across her throat. When I placed my thumb on her chin to make her turn towards me so I could see where it ended, I understood what I was looking at.
I traced it with my fingers over and over again, searching for the right words to say. I leaned over her to pick up the gun off the bedside crate and looked her in the eyes as my hands automatically popped out the magazine, checked the gun for ammo. “Who did this to you?” I asked, clicking it back in place and pulling on the mechanism that loaded a bullet into the chamber. “Because I need to have a little talk with him.”