CHAPTER THREE
EXECUTIVE SUITES WAS eight blocks from Barcel, in a building made of obsidian glass and black metal. It stood forty-stories tall in between a bank and a five-star hotel. The simple print above the door with the address looked inconspicuous, but modern.
Black leather furniture juxtaposed against gray marble floors and walls decorated the grand lobby. Inside, the glass darkened the entire space to the point of making it appear as though it was nighttime in the middle of the day. The crystal chandeliers were the only light source in the lobby. The scene was a prelude to a nice restaurant, not a corporate business.
A security desk stood at the end of the lobby, and beyond it, a small hall led to the elevators. To the side of the elevators was a grand staircase.
People mulled around me, eager to get to their tasks for the day. The well-dressed and coiffed employees piqued my intrigue right away. While they varied in ages, all were strikingly beautiful.
The place was unreal. Was it a modeling agency, or the headquarters of an adult wish fulfillment center?
“Are you here for an appointment, ma’am?” a woman, dressed in a gray wool skirt suit, asked while approaching me from the stairs. Jet-black hair layered and styled with pristine curls bounced around her shoulders.
I passed the digital card her way.
Her eyes lit up, and she pushed her thumb across the screen, making it turn from red to black. “Welcome to Executive Suites, Miss Barcel. My name is Sandra, should you need anything. Allow me to take you to your appointment.” With a nod, Sandra turned on her heels to head up the stairs.
A massive privacy wall stood behind a large black desk. Couches and chairs were scattered on either side of the open area.
From behind the desk, Sandra handed me a tablet; an electronic application for services. She guided me around the privacy wall toward a set of elevators in the middle of the large space with vaulted ceilings and no windows. She opened a panel that stood between the two large brass elevator doors and punched a series of numbers into it. An elevator door opened, allowing us to move inside the car.
The elevator ride took less than a second. Strangely, I barely felt the car move.
Correction: I didn’t feel it move.
A grand black desk stood between the elevator and Michelle’s office.
“Good morning, Miss Barcel,” the receptionist greeted me with a smile and stopped what she was doing. “There’s another meeting in Miss Mastin’s office now, and she’s running late. Would you like a beverage while you wait and fill out the application?” Her crystal blue eyes darted to the white mod leather seating set against the wall leading to Michelle’s office.
“No. I’m good.” I gave her a fake grin and took a seat in one of the leather chairs, setting the tablet on my lap.
Five minutes later, whoever was meeting in Michelle’s office came out. I glanced at the first guy, recognizing him as Michelle’s dining partner from the other night. We gave each other cordial nods, and he went about his business.
The man who came after him left me frozen while searching my bag, set on the floor beside my feet, for information I needed to retrieve to put on the application.
He was one of those guys that just demanded attention. While you took notice, the world around you slowed because he was insanely beautiful, with his square jaw, rose-tinted generous lips, heavy-lidded dark ebony eyes, and a haircut I knew he didn’t skimp on by visiting a second-rate barber. Even his beard, which could’ve doubled as two-day stubble, was well groomed. He was quite possibly an Egyptian God walking on Earth. I couldn’t confidently affirm his nationality. When could someone ever tell another’s origins by simply looking at him and never hearing him speak a word? Short-sighted people who need to travel, that’s whom.
He caught me staring and smiled at me, revealing his bright white, straight teeth, and deep-set dimples in the center of chiseled cheeks.
The cool room turned into an overcrowded sauna.
His smile made him pretty. His tailored black-on-black suit and shiny Italian leather shoes made me feel very underdressed in skinny jeans and a vintage black Living Colour tour t-shirt marked with splotches of bleach during the first time I attempted to do my own laundry.
“Good morning.” His quiet but deep voice dripped with a panty-wetting cadence. He could’ve told me to take off my underwear right then and there, and I would’ve obeyed. Hell, he already made me feel a little wet. Who needed panties around him, anyway?
I crossed my legs, and stared ahead, doing the exact opposite of what I wanted to do. Fuck.
I tried to excuse my behavior; he had to be cocky as hell, up to the hilt in women falling all over him, and didn’t need another dropping to her knees and opening her mouth like it was raining chocolate.
His pretty brown eyes returned to the receptionist as he leaned across the desk. They had a hushed conversation with each other. I soon realized I couldn’t stop staring. The receptionist looked entranced with him. She kept calling him “sir” with a flirtatious smile and sat straighter in her desk chair, as though he was the big man in charge.
“Regan?” Michelle stood in front of me, amused by the fact that she had to snap her fingers to get my attention. “I’ve been calling your name for a minute. Are you all right?”
I didn’t realize I was in a daze. I caught Mr. Perfect’s eye while strolling into Michelle’s office. He gave me a wink and a crooked grin, implanting his fishhooks and reeling me in to devour me. I nearly ran into the wall—okay, I actually ran into a wall. Michelle grabbed my shoulders and showed me the doorway.
Upon Michelle’s arrival inside her office, the windows—once clear—turned pitch black. Dim lights flickered on. Michelle’s image reflected in the darkened glass.
“I’m so sorry you had to wait,” she said, moving toward her desk.
“I know—” I fanned myself to cool my temperature while whispering to her like Mr. Perfect could hear me, “you have got to be fucking him every day and twice on the holidays.”
“Having sex with whom?” The word ‘fucking’ would’ve sounded foreign from her mouth. She was so proper.
I pointed my chin over to the glass door, watching him. “That demigod.”
While he made his way to the elevator, he paused like he knew someone was eye-fucking him. He thumbed his lips, and his eyes lifted to catch mine. He gave me another grin as if he was inside my head and knew every single X-rated thought I had.
The elevator doors closed, and I could still feel the pull inside my body. I shivered dramatically.
“Regan?” Michelle’s charming laugh brought me back to this planet.
“Who—” I cleared my throat, realizing my voice was cracking like I was a pubescent boy. “Who was he? Can I have him?”
“I’m glad you changed your mind. I think you’ll be happy with what we offer here.”
I shook my head because our conversation didn’t follow. Was she trying to tell me that Mr. Perfect was something they offered? Because I’d sign over all of my assets to have one night with him. “I don’t know what it really is.”
“Do you still have the list you made previously and your completed application?”
I handed her a folded up piece of paper and the tablet.
She studied both objects. “For legal reasons, I have to tell you that we don’t offer sex as an option in our packaged experiences.”
“I’ve been through this before,” I explained. “I’m—was a busy woman, thanks to my career. Conventional relationships weren’t possible.”
“There’s only one other issue. While we pride ourselves on an immersive and realistic experience, I can’t guarantee your Experience Creator will agree to the marriage.”
“I know it’s way over the top. You know I’m dying. We won’t be married for long, and we can make sure the paperwork keeps us both safe.”
“I don’t mean to be harsh or imply that I don’t believe you. We can offer you something against our typical program due to your life-threatening illness.”
“Wait.” I scanned my list of crazy and implausible fantasies. “The vampire line item isn’t a problem, but marriage has to be discussed?”
“You would find it surprising how often we receive requests similar to the vampirism kink. We have an archetype that aligns with the lore of vampirism. In fact, it’s something we specialize in. The differences are slight, but I think you’ll enjoy it either way.”
A strange man walked in then and stood beside my chair.
“Mr. Paré will escort you to our testing facility,” Michelle said. “I hope you’ve cleared your schedule for the rest of the day. Our tests can take anywhere from an hour to half the day to complete.”
THE SUBBASEMENT LEVEL appeared to be a sterile lab for serious dissections and studies. The stark white walls and state-of-the-art health equipment set the space apart from the rest of the facility. White plastic privacy cubicles spanned the entire space and had computers built inside them.
Through glass double doors stood a corridor appearing to extend for miles. Countless doors leading to private places lined the halls.
Mr. Paré halted at an empty desk and pulled out a chair. “You’ll undergo a series of personality questions to test your reactions and comfort levels.”
“It’s really important that I’m surprised. The last thing I want is to be comfortable.”
“Would you like us to input no personality?” Mr. Paré was far from engaging or warm. With every passing moment of our interaction, his face soured.
“I have this vision in my mind,” I relayed, my voice floating on a dream. “A story of how I want things to go and who I want to be—who I will be.”
“Enter additional information in the comments section. The test is a requirement for everyone who seeks our services. You can’t skip it. Once your questionnaire is complete, we’ll test it against our standard personality requirements. If you pass, you won’t receive formal notification of your initiation date. Your experience will start at the will of your Experience Creator.
“Because we pride ourselves on realism, at no time during your experience are you permitted to reference the experience, or attempt to break the character of the person involved in controlling your experience. Do not disclose the details of the experience to anyone you believe to be directly, indirectly, or free from involvement with Executive Suites. If you violate the rules, we’ll cancel your account, and terminate the experience without warning.
“If you’ve told any of your friends or family about Executive Suites, or in rare cases, they were present when you were approached, you must sever ties until the experience ends. Should you prefer it, you may list the individuals who have knowledge of Executive Suites. We’ll contact the individuals and have them removed from your life before the experience begins. Be advised, if you contact them after the experience ends, they won’t respond to you unless your Experience Creator believes they will add to your experience.”
“You don’t have to worry about friends. I have none. Well, I had one, but he’s not a friend anymore.”
“Everything you’ll experience will look and feel real,” he continued without addressing my confession. “Never question the validity. We pride ourselves on realism, even in what’s considered extreme scenarios. Never alert the authorities or officials about what you see and hear.”
I scanned the paper, noticing a strange omission. “There isn’t anywhere I can input the personality or the kind of person I want.”
“We ask that you refrain from describing your type. We find it diminishes the attraction by lacking in mystery and circumvents any expectations of your type. I can guarantee you’ll find your Experience Creator attractive.”
Mr. Paré left me to take my tests; one on the tablet he provided and the other on the screen built into the computer desk.
In the white room with halogen lights and study booths, only two other people were in the testing facility.
It took an hour to float through two hundred questions—invasive, general, and teetering on mind-fucking—and an hour more to input my comments.
Mr. Paré returned. “Time’s up.”
In a scramble, I hurried to finish up the comments section and include every possible thing I wanted that couldn’t have been extracted from the questionnaire.
As Mr. Paré neared me, I typed in the most crucial sentence: Make me feel my mortality, because I’m in denial.
Mr. Paré leaned forward and typed a few things into the tablet. My exam disappeared from the screen. Standing back, he fiddled with his tablet and gestured for me and the others to follow him toward the elevator shaft. After a moment of scanning his tablet, Mr. Paré eyed the two gentlemen in front of me. “Thank you for your time, but we don’t believe you’ll be a good fit for our simulated experiences.”
Watching the men’s backs as they left, I waited for the same speech.
“Miss Barcel? Here’s the preliminary estimate for the cost of services.” Mr. Paré extended his tablet at me. A long series of figures blared across the screen with a rectangle bar that called for my signature. “If you agree with the amount, please sign. Thereafter, sign at the X on page 25, 54, and 102. Those are liability and billing contracts, which we’ll file with our legal department.”
Stunned, I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the number in red on a black background. “Is there a reason the bill is the exact amount of what’s left in my trust and savings accounts?” I asked. “If I agree to this, I’ll not have a cent to my name.”
“It’s a sliding scale, Miss Barcel.”
If these people could obtain my name and my exact holdings so freely, I questioned if I could trust them at all. However, the growing voice of irresponsibility took over and screamed at me to sign my name. I had nothing left to lose but my life. Giving up what I had in order to immerse myself in what I always wanted couldn’t match any price tag.
“What if I had nothing?” I questioned, pondering the possibilities after signing over what I had left of my life away. “Would you turn me down?”
The man was fast and stealthy. I hadn’t realized he stuck me with a needle until a sudden prick on my shoulder caused me to yelp.
Mr. Paré revealed his hand, showing a computerized steel needle. Whether it was full or empty, I couldn’t tell. The world went white for a while.
“I apologize,” Mr. Paré said, sounding far from apologetic, “but if I’d warned you beforehand, you would’ve braced for the pain.”
“What was it for?”
“Several things. It covers testing for communicable diseases, pregnancy, and such. Things that would make you an unfit candidate for the experience.” He pocketed the syringe, likely going against any contamination protocol. “You’re all set. Once the experience begins, we won’t allow reentry into the facility.” He ignored my question and darted his hand toward the elevator across the way.
“What if I want a second experience?”
“Yours will be a onetime experience.”
“Because I’m dying?”
Mr. Paré gave me a terse smile.
“How will I know when it ends?”
“It”—his eyes darted to a particular place on the ceiling, “will be very clear. Have a good day, Miss Barcel.”
I rubbed the minor bump on my neck, wondering if the syringe injected a cure instead of drawing my blood. I came to Executive Suites with a wicked headache, and somehow since then, it had been eradicated.
As I walked outside of Executive Suites, I thought of more questions. “What if I don’t like my—”
I glanced behind me. My uppity guide disappeared.