CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
MY BLACK COTTON shift dress with a deep V-neck required invisible underwear. I went without panties to avoid the hassle. My eyes were smoky, my lips were neutral, and my hair had a deep side part with my curls defined.
As I stepped out of the hall, Calind stunned me into stillness. He stood in the doorframe of the patio, chatting with someone on his phone, looking perfect in his casual black pants and button-up.
Upon sight of me, he ended his phone call and approached. He kissed the back of my hand, eyeballing me from head-to-toe. “Stunning.” His expression changed at the sight of my choice of trainers instead of heels.
“What? It’s a movie theater.”
“Wear heels.”
I thumbed his lips with want. “Make me.”
“I would like to be on time,” he warned with a raised brow.
“Forgetting about the sneakers versus stilettos situation. Did you think you could walk out that door, looking like that, without me making you late?” With a grin, I unfastened his pants and pulled out his cock while sliding to my knees. I slipped his half-erect cock into my mouth.
He released a gasp of pleasure and clasped the opposite wall. When I took him halfway down my throat, his forehead touched the drywall.
I sucked on his erection, enjoying every inch swelling inside my mouth. I joined my hands at the base and kissed the head, flicking my tongue on the softest part. My hands worked to slather him in saliva as I sucked on the head a little more.
Calind slipped a hand into my hair to grab the back of my head as he gasped my name. The pleasure building within him seeped inside me, creating a constant ping pong match between us. He clenched my hair and growled his pleasure as he tensed.
I grabbed his rock hard ass and worked my mouth up and down the shaft, coercing him to come.
After another sweet grunt of my name, he left a deposit inside my mouth.
Before I swallowed, he grabbed my hands, pulling me to stand, and tongued my mouth.
I melted, burning with a fever for him.
He tore away from my kiss as his hand slipped up the split in the back of my dress. When his fingers reached around my ass and touched my bare pussy, he clucked his tongue and grinned.
Kneeling on the floor, he pulled the bottom of my dress upward, bunching it at my waist. His mouth was only inches from my pussy. He blew out a stream of air at my clit, and I shuddered in response. He teased me again, raking his tongue between the lips of my pussy and ended the torture with a kiss on my nerve center.
Weakened, I slipped back against the wall. “Calind,” I begged.
A taunting grin stretched his lips. “Not yet, sweetheart. Let’s not fuck up my plans with your impatience.” He stood, shoving me toward the bedroom to replace my shoes.
A CLOSED FOR a Private Party sign was affixed to the window of the multiplex. An attendant greeted us like honored guests and offered us beverages and snacks from the counter.
Calind declined and ushered me through the hall into our theater.
We sat in a split row right beside the wide walkway, giving us room to stretch our feet. I glanced around, expecting to have the entire movie theater to myself, but I found someone behind me. The person occupying the seat was Emile.
I quickly became cognizant of the point behind the outing. Calind didn’t flinch under my oppressive stare.
As the movie began, I wiggled in my seat, fuming. He claims he was done with the games, and then he does this?
Calind squeezed my hand, shaking his head while wearing an irritating grin.
I snatched my hand from Calind’s hold and tried to leave. On the other side of the aisle, Emile stood in the way of my exit path. “Regan?”
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, my tone bitter.
“Someone invited me. I didn’t know he’d be here. Shit, I didn’t know you’d be here.”
The sudden pressure and heat signaled Calind’s presence behind me. I turned to Calind, impeding his path to Emile.
Calind spun me, pressing my back against his chest. He slipped his hand across my torso, restricting motion. “Before you leave, Emile,” Calind addressed him with acid coating his words, “there’s something we need to address.”
Emile turned toward Calind with a questioning look in his green eyes.
Calind slipped his hand up my dress, startling me, and cupped my pussy.
I tried to move his hand, and I was kidding myself to think I could be strong enough to curtail a determined Calind. “Stop it,” I whispered, struggling to get away.
Calind leaned toward my ear, whispering, “I will fuck you. Right here in this theater and make you come before this bastard walks away. If you truly don’t want it, I’ll stop. But if you do—” he rolled my clit around his thumb and slid a finger inside me, eliciting a gasp, “move your fucking hand.”
I took my hand away, allowing it to dangle at my side.
Calind sucked on my earlobe. “Tell me what you want, sweetheart.”
“I want it,” I said to Calind while staring at Emile, who appeared crushed by the words. “I want you.”
Calind’s fingers worked harder, making me squirm. “What do you want me to do to you?”
Trying to stifle a moan, I gripped his wrist, torn between stopping him and making his hand move faster. He clasped my hand, gathering it with my other behind my back, guaranteeing he wouldn’t receive another interruption.
“I want you to fuck me and make me come,” I whimpered. “I want Emile to watch.”
Emile’s attention was a catalyst and made Calind’s torment more intense.
“Baby.” My neck became weakened along with my body, and my legs quaked.
“This isn’t needed,” Emile protested. “I won’t stay here and watch this.”
“You will stay,” Calind taunted him, his voice deadly calm. “I want you to watch what I’m doing to her. I want you to listen when she answers a long-awaited question. When she does, I want you to internalize it. Then, I want you to remove yourself from her life permanently, or I’ll do it for you.”
“Why would I stand here and watch you treat her like she’s a piece of property?” Emile questioned, his voice rising. “You’re no different from her father.”
Calind unleashed a curt laugh and continued to thrust his fingers inside me with an intense rhythm, steady and deep until I came apart on his fingers.
Holding my body firm, Calind guided me to a chair and bent me over, situating my knees on the seat and my upper body over the backrest.
He shoved my dress up, allowing a chill to tickle my ass. As the telltale sound of a zipper echoed in my ears, he turned me to the side and rubbed his erection up my slit. Without a second of delay, he shoved his thick cock into my wet pussy.
“Fuck,” I groaned.
Calind pumped inside me hard and deep, fucking me as if he hated me. His hand dwarfed my neck, compelling me to watch Emile’s reaction. “Tell him what he needs to hear before I pummel it into his memory.”
My body was responding to his words and his cock, rendering me incapable of rebelling. “I don’t love you, Emile.”
Dissatisfied he wasn’t making me fight more, Calind’s movements became more brutal with the slamming of his groin against my ass. “And?”
Calind’s forearm wrapped around my stomach and rubbed my clit while his cock went to work, creating friction at a spot inside me, making my knees buckle.
It was too intense. I couldn’t even think of wishing the feeling away. It consumed me and weakened me. “I don’t love you. I never have,” I proclaimed through quivering lips as Calind brought on the flood of euphoria.
His cock was sopping wet, creating noisy sounds as it pumped inside me. His thumb hit my clit, circling the perfect spot to make me squeal.
My watering eyes pleaded with Emile to walk away. He dumbly stood there, motionless.
“Tell him more,” Calind rumbled.
“I never want… Ugh, fuck. I-I never want to see you again.” My body tensed up, unable to fight the pending verge. “I’m gonna come so fucking hard!” I closed my eyes as the rush hit me hard and I bit my lip, feeling the trickle of fluid trail my legs.
Calind grabbed my hips, holding me upright, forcing me to take every thrust of his cock.
I covered my mouth to quiet a scream. Calind snatched my hand away to make sure Emile hear how much Calind drove me up the wall, over the edge, and into the sky.
I tried to catch my breath and my bearings. The wooziness made the room spin on an axis, as though I’d been on a two-week bender.
“Did he ever compare?”
I shook my head in response to Calind’s question.
“He can’t hear you, sweetheart. Speak up.”
Weakened, my head drooped. “No. Emile never compared to the way you make me feel.”
Calind slipped out of me and made me stand on my wobbly legs. If it weren’t for his strong partial grip on my body, I would’ve collapsed on the floor. He yanked up the front of my dress to make sure Emile saw the moisture slicking my thighs.
Emile glanced everywhere but at me before raising his hands in defeat. “You won. You didn’t need to show off. She’s your wife, right?”
“You would do well to remember that. You’re lucky I didn’t take this any further and fucked her ass and mouth.”
“Yeah, I’m the fucking lucky one.” Shaking his head, Emile turned on his heels and left.
“I know what he says, but he’ll never stop trying to be with you.” Calind released my body from his iron grip.
Too weak to stand, I held on to the nearest seat I could find to keep from falling on my face. Feeling a mix of pissed off and ravaged, I glared up at Calind.
His smile turned up to megawatt on the brightness scale. “Collect yourself and return to me. We have a movie to finish.”
I staggered through the walkway, toward the bathroom on the right wing.
While sitting on the curb in front of the movie theater amid searching through my clutch for a lighter, a stranger walked past me and dropped something at my feet. They ran up the street before I could question them or find out their identity. I inspected the object—a memory card. I fiddled with it before removing the back panel of my phone and connecting it to my cell.
Scrolling through the contents of the SD card, I found a lone video. The date coincided with the burglary that occurred at my father’s estate.
A woman ransacked my father’s house. She took nothing, and left a mess. Words scrolled across the screen: She is looking for information on the project. The burglary was a cover.
The camera cut to my father’s bedroom where a man stood by his side, looking over my father. Another clip showed the security feed of another time—the day my father fell into a coma.
A woman was standing by my father, arguing with him. There was no sound, and the woman’s face was too pixelated to decipher her identity. At the peak of the argument, she did something indiscernible. The video went black for a second or two. In the aftermath, my father fell to the ground, lying unconscious.
Another recorded feed showed the date of my father’s death. A woman was at his side and she looked like she could’ve been the same one from the burglary. I couldn’t be sure due to the low resolution. She unplugged the machines. The feed became pixelated for a few minutes.
When the screen cleared, it showed my father was alone, struggling for life. A man appeared out of thin air and leaned toward him. The video ended before I could see more.
Then more words flashed across the screen: Claudette Hawkins is the key to everything.
Claudette Hawkins? Talk about fucking random.
Claudette was a drug kingpin who disappeared roughly two decades ago. She owned a pharmaceutical company rumored to be a cover business and despite the DEA’s best efforts, it was never proven to be fraudulent. The company continued its operations to this day.
Intrigued by a ruthless woman who amassed great power in a short time, I once wrote a thesis paper on her in college. The motivation behind what she had to do with my father was beyond me.
Emile wanted me to see one thing, but I saw another—the truth. Both sides were lying. Everyone around me was lying. It was time to meet up with June.
The moment I withdrew the memory card, it shorted out and stung my hand. I dropped it on the ground. It burned and turned into black soot between my feet.
There could only be one man at my father’s bedside when he died. The same person who was stealthy enough to end up on a private beach, naked and unnoticed.
I fussed with my gold lighter and tried to handle this tidbit of information.
A lit match lowered in front of my face. I cupped Calind’s hand to deflect the wind from snuffing it out and took a drag. “What were you doing at my father’s house just minutes before he died? Why the hell were you there? Did you kill my father, Calind? And Claudette Hawkins? Do you know her?”
Calind gripped my shoulders, pulling me to stand. His eyes were dark and set on a deep, brooding mode. “Who showed these things to you? Emile? He’s a danger to you in ways you don’t yet understand. I’ve fallen guilty to the same thing I accused you of and allowed you to become an obstacle for what I should’ve done the minute I smelled him on you. I’m no longer waiting. I will deal with him.”
“Touch him and I—”
He covered my mouth with his palm. His hard expression softened as though I had hurt him with what I hadn’t said. “You would threaten me?” he asked, incredulous. “Over him?”
I growled in frustration, fending off his hold. I was successful, because he released me. “If I don’t come home tonight, don’t you dare look for me.” I walked away.
He rushed toward me and swung my body over his shoulders. I beat his back, making a scene the whole way back to the car. He held me tighter, his strength overcoming mine.
When he set me on the pavement, I struggled to leave and was sandwiched between his body and a car. He came behind me and lifted me up, thrusting me on top of the hood of a car that didn’t belong to either of us.
“No. No! I’m so pissed off at you.” My attempts to push him away were aimless. “You’ve had enough of my pussy for one night.”
Harsh with his actions, he spread my reluctant legs, elongating the split in the back of my dress. He placed his body between my legs and attempted to kiss me. I bit his lip until I tasted a small trickle of blood on my own. The flavor was oddly sweet.
He tangled his hands in my hair and jerked my neck back. The small cut on his mouth disappeared when he sucked his bottom lip. With one hand, he freed himself to enter me. I tried to shove him back. The action was like trying to shove a boulder.
“Maybe Emile was right about you,” I snarled. “You crossed a line tonight. A line you never should’ve crossed. Don’t be surprised if I call you ‘Daddy’ from now on.”
Someone or something shoved him away, but there was no hand between us to part him from me. He turned his back on me, the hard muscles there spreading and tensing underneath his shirt.
“What the fuck was all that about?” I asked, gathering myself.
“I’m no longer sure.”
The self-assured man with all the answers suddenly had none. It was enough to make me sharply inhale. Then again, I knew the answer, and it was one of the few times I had figured the man out.
“You’re going to lose me, Calind. But it won’t be to another man.” I touched his shoulders.
He removed my hand from his shoulder and directed me back to the car, keeping his face shielded from my scrutinizing eyes.
BACK AT HOME, I went out onto the patio and slipped my wrecked body on a lounge chair by the pool. I kicked off my shoes, bringing my feet underneath my thighs.
Calind slipped his tux jacket over my shoulders and handed me a vodka on the rocks. As he sat next to me, he toyed with my hair.
“I’m unsure of what you were shown. Nevertheless, images can be manipulated.”
His contrite face displayed a complete contradiction to what kept being thrown at me here and there. He could, at times, be romantic and incredibly sweet. Though, there was also that other side—the distant and calculating side—that appeared occasionally. Was I looking at a lie? Or was it something much worse?
“Are you working for Claudette?” I asked. “Is that what your disappearing acts are about? Her?”
“Whatever I do in Claudette’s name—none of it will hurt you, Regan.”
My mouth gaped in shock. I never thought the dots connected between him and her. Calind may as well have made an adjoining line between him and Claudette with a neon fucking highlighter.
I picked up my jaw from the ground and tried to think of more sensible thoughts. “Claudette, from what I read about her, is a very dangerous woman.”
“She’ll never be a danger to you. Nothing will ever harm you. I won’t allow it.” His words were final, guiding me away from asking for more details.
“Whatever you can and can’t to, you can’t keep me from dying.”
He stared silently at the pool and leaned against the chaise lounge with his arms resting on the back.
“What about the things Claudette might make you do? Things you already promised to?” I ignored his implicit warning and kept pushing the issue. “If you touch Emile, it will affect me.”
Calind bristled at the mention of Emile’s name. “I’m willing to do whatever is necessary to make certain you rid yourself of him. He’s painting me as the monster to push himself into a better light. He’s not. His timing is impeccable, don’t you agree? I don’t regret fucking you at the theater. You can say things to the contrary, but I felt you quiver around my cock. You relished in having him watch. I think you’re only upset that I didn’t ask him to join.”
I bolted up, ready to leave. He grabbed me, laying me back on the lounge, and crawled over my body. “You gave him too much of you. Now, he thinks he has control over you.”
I shook my head in denial.
His fingers dallied with the curvature of my breasts peeking out from the deep cut in my dress. He kissed my neck, setting it on fire. “All you need is right here.” His fingers moved to my jaw.
“I know you said you chose me, but you are the one I wanted. I chose you to spend my last months with. It could’ve been him.”
“And what of your accusations?” he asked. “Do you think I could be the monster responsible for your father’s death, then turn around and be with you? Don’t believe it. They are trying to tear us apart. Don’t allow them to.”
I touched his face. “They? There is no ‘they,’ or any person who will end us. My disease will.”
He closed his eyes, clinging to my touch. “You can ask me to do anything to prove to you we are real and that you can trust me,” he said, going beyond reading my mind. “Anything, Regan, and it’s done.”
A part of me wanted to understand what was right in my face. Another part wanted to live in the fantasy.
I decided to continue living in my own world with a population of two.
“Make love to me,” I whispered.