I changed into something casual, a pair of jeans with the knees torn out, a black T-shirt that hung off one shoulder and a baseball cap jammed over my head. Saki always complained that I never dressed my age. But honestly, I never knew what women my age were supposed to be wearing, what with fashion changing so often. So I wore whatever was comfortable and to hell with everyone else.
I stuffed my wallet in my back pocket, pushed my keys into my right pocket, and headed out the door.
Hailing down a taxi was easy and the traffic wasn't so bad.
Halfway there, my phone vibrated again and I flipped it open, thinking it was Ayaka messaging me to hurry.
It was not her.
Come tonight.
An address near Roppongi Station, which was—as luck would have it…or was it fate?—not too far away from where I was supposed to meet Ayaka.
Can't right now. I'm meeting a friend.
I'll meet you after, sorry.
Heart pounding, anticipation making my pulse beat faster, I closed my phone and thanked the Fates I had thought to thread Nobuki's key on my keyring that morning.
I didn't think he would ask to see me so soon.
Was it a good thing?
Or was it bad?
I found the place Ayaka was talking about, a fancy whiskey bar that I dallied in front of for a couple of minutes after the taxi had long sped away. I had no idea what anyone was supposed to be wearing to enter this expensive club, but I was sure my clothes would get more than its fair share of looks.
Then again, I was used to getting stared at, so I pushed open the door and walked in with a show of confidence that didn't match what was in my heart.
The bar was very elegant, all dark mahogany wood and tasteful metal accents that made me feel like a little kid in pajamas, wandering into an adult's cocktail party.
And yes, I got more than my fair share of looks, but I squared my shoulders and made my way to the other side of the establishment, where I found Ayaka huddled in one corner of the bar counter, a bottle of liquor and a half-empty crystal cut glass in front of her.
I slid onto the stool next to her and murmured a thank you to the young male bartender who passed me a thin leather-bound menu.
Ayaka looked up, her eyes narrowed and blood-shot.
I stared at her, lost for words. I couldn't remember the last time I saw her looking so terrible. Automatically, I poured myself a glass of whatever she was drinking and tossed it down my throat.
I regretted doing so as a line of fire descended my esophagus and blazed all the way down my stomach. "Holy hell, what is this? Paint thinner?"
She blinked and stared at the bottle. I could practically see her eyes rolling in their sockets. Jesus, she was smashed. "Um. Johnnie Walker, I think? Hey, that's expensive. It's their blue label."
She offered me some more. "Drink."
"No way, it tastes like crap."
The bartender who stood nearby polishing a glass looked shocked at my blunt words, and when I asked for a gin and tonic, he went away with a scandalized look.
"Ayaka," I said, putting a hand on her shoulder. "What's wrong? What are you doing here? This is nowhere near your place."
She was shaking badly and she snatched a handful of napkins from a nearby dispenser, dabbing at her eyes so eyeliner and mascara wouldn't run down her face. "Shuichiro said he wanted to meet me for some drinks."
Shuichiro was Ayaka's on-again, off-again boyfriend. Supposedly, he was the only guy she could stomach. I had never met him myself, but if Ayaka liked him, then he must've been something special, considering how picky she was with men. "What happened?"
"I came here." She sniffed, and I sipped the smooth cocktail the bartender placed on a nicely folded napkin. I had a feeling I needed more than one drink as she continued, "I thought it was going to be a nice time. I mean, since you've been gone, it's just work, work, work. We're slammed right now, trying to get ready for the summer."
I nodded understandingly, although I had a sneaking suspicion I knew where this conversation was going. "Then?"
She sniffed again and blew her nose. "He sat me down, poured me a glass of this, and then told me he couldn't be with me anymore."
I blinked. "He what?"
She swiped at her eyes again. Uh-oh, her mascara was running. She must've been truly drunk if she let herself be seen in such a condition. "He said he couldn't wait around for me to decide if I wanted to get married and that he wasn't getting any younger, that his parents were pressuring for him to have kids…" She threw back a mouthful of that fiery whiskey as though she didn't care if she lived through the night. "He's dumping me. For a kindergarten teacher. Me! Ayaka Sono! For a woman who wipes spit off a brat's chin!"
She crashed her glass so hard against the counter that it sounded like a gun shot, and the conversation around us died as people started to gawk at the spectacle she was making.
When I glared at them, they turned back to their tables, all the while shooting surreptitious glances at us, one of us dressed to the nines with black rivers running down her pallid cheeks and the other looked like she left a hip-hop class.
I sighed and patted Ayaka somewhat ineffectively on her shoulder, not knowing what to do. "I'm so sorry, hon. If it makes you feel any better, my sister just roped me into a marriage meeting with some guy she went to school with. Trust me, I know what you're going through."
"I mean, what's wrong with not getting married?" she asked belligerently, looking like she wanted to bash the cup again. I took it out of her hands and put it out of reach, because I did not want to responsible for prying glass shards out of her pretty hands when she inevitably broke it. "What's wrong with staying single? Why do I have to prove my worth to society by pumping out a kid? Why is my worth based on what kind of man I marry? Why can't people judge me on my job, on my accomplishments?"
I honestly had no idea what to do, and I grabbed her hands, massaging her fingers. "Ayaka, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. You're way too good for him. He doesn't deserve you."
Her hands tightened, hard enough to make me wince as pain shot up my arms. "Rika, listen. Just listen to me, okay?"
I nodded, knowing it was past time to leave. "Okay, I will. But after, let's go home, okay?"
She wavered on the stool. For a moment, I thought she would fall on her face. But she righted herself, glaring at me balefully. "Men…men are so untrustworthy. You put everything on the line for them, you give them everything, and they take it. They take it all! And then they step all over it. They step over it, Rika. This is the kind of person we're supposed to be spending our lives with? Don't fucking kid me."
She reached out suddenly, her fingers digging into my shoulders, pulling me so close I smelled the alcohol on her breath. "Whatever happens, Rika, don't fall in love. It's okay to fuck a guy, but never give him your heart, got it? Because the second he has it, he'll stomp on it."
I watched Ayaka sobbing out her troubles into a napkin, the bartenders too awkwardly young to do anything about it.
Come to think of it, I wasn't sure what do to either.
"Ayaka, please."
Her eyes were wide, frighteningly wide. "Promise me, Rika. Promise you're not going to fall in love."
I sighed. "I promise."
Her eyes narrowed. "You swear?"
"Stick a needle in my eye."
Guiltily, I thought about that text from Nobuki, the one asking me to go to his house. That wasn't…this, right? It wasn't like I was in love with him. I just wanted his body. I was old enough to know that sex didn't equal love.
Besides, I got the feeling that Nobuki was like falling in love with the snow. Beautiful to look at, but slowly, steadily it will take all your warmth and leave you dead.
"I swear to God, if I see that pathetic bastard ever again, I'll kick him in the crotch so hard, his balls are going to end up in his stomach!"
Her voice was getting louder and louder and someone approached us, dressed differently from the bartenders. He looked like the owner, judging from his casual, but expensive attire, and I waved him away with an understanding nod, trying to tell him with my eyes that I'd take Ayaka home before she started making a real racket.
"Come on, Ayaka, let's go," I said and asked for the bill.
"The Johnnie is paid for," she muttered, forehead on the counter.
Yikes. It was past time for Ayaka to hit the sack, and I slid over a thousand yen bill to pay for my gin and tonic.
That got a look from the bartender, and I gawked at him in horror, realizing the thousand yen wasn't enough for a single mixed drink that I finished in two gulps.
"Really?"
He held up three fingers. "Three thousand."
I almost exploded with indignation. "Three thousand? For a gin and tonic? That's robbery!"
He shrugged and nodded to the menu that had gone unread by my elbow. "Look at the menu. It's all there."
Grumbling under my breath, I slapped two more bills on the counter and threw a couple of coins as a tip, although the price should've covered tips and everything else. Hell, for the price, they should've given me a massage. God knew I needed one.
I dragged Ayaka out of the whiskey bar and got lucky with a taxi that was passing by.
I gave the taxi driver Ayaka's address and we arrived about twenty minutes later. I passed him a few more bills and told him to wait while I half dragged, half-carried Ayaka into the lobby of her new, sparkling-shiny apartment building and took her up three floors via the elevator.
How I got the door open with her in my arms, I never figured out, but I had her spilled out on bed, her shoes shucked off, and left a bottle of water with some pain pills on her nightstand.
There was nothing more I could do.
She was sound asleep, but I patted her cheeks, hoping she would remember even a fraction of tonight. "Hey, Ayaka?"
She moaned and pushed my hand away.
"All right, see you tomorrow," I whispered and turned out all the lights before letting myself out.
Luckily, the taxi was still idling outside her apartment building, and feeling all giddy, like a girl about to go out on her first date, I gave the driver Nobuki's address.
The thick traffic downtown was expected. The taxi fare would be outrageously expensive, but I thanked my thrifty nature that my money was usually spent on food and little else, since I mostly wore the clothes my sister procured for me as samples, my mother fed me often, and even my main source of entertainment, books, was provided by the company.
The taxi dropped me off in front of a tall apartment building. My wallet felt considerably slimmer, and I slipped the driver a few extra coins for waiting for me and not just running off like a jerk.
I stared up at the building, wondering which window on the seventh floor was his, wondering if he was looking down as I was looking up.
There had been no new messages since I told him that I couldn't meet him right away and as I got into the elevator and pressed the button for the seventh floor, I wondered if he was angry I chose my best friend over him, that I hadn't dropped everything in favor of fucking him again.
Suddenly, I wished I had brought something more than my wallet and keys. I checked my reflection in the mirrored elevator walls, to see if I looked okay. There wasn't a speck of makeup on my face, and I put a hand over my leaping heart, trying to force it to calm down with sheer willpower.
This was no big deal, I kept telling myself. This was just a simple fuck and dump.
Ayaka was right. Once emotions got into a relationship…everything went to shit. I was living proof. I thought I had loved my boyfriends, but in the end, nothing panned out.
But this was different. What Nobuki and I had…it was an arrangement, and I was taking advantage of what he offered.
Not taking him up on his offer would have been the stupid choice.
I got off the elevator and walked down the hall, stopping at the door with the number 705. It was at the end of the hallway, and I took a deep breath, wondering what I was supposed to do.
Was Nobuki home? Should I knock?
Should I use the key?
I clenched my jaw and knocked.
Nothing.
I knocked again, harder this time.
After a few minutes of waiting like an idiot in the hallway, I pulled out my keys and jammed the one he gave me into the keyhole.
It slid in and the doorknob turned easily under my hand, as though it had recently been oiled.
Either that, or he lived at a higher-class place than my parents' old apartment building, where the pipes were always rattling and people complained about drafts coming in through the gaps in the windows and the walls.
I pulled open the door and almost had a heart attack when I saw Nobuki standing in the entryway, leaning against the wall, his arms crossed.
"Wha—" I pressed a hand against my chest, surprise at seeing him so close making my heart race even more. Yeah, that was it. Surprise. Not the fact that he looked drop-dead gorgeous in a pair of blue flannel pajama pants and a plain white t-shirt. How the man made sleepwear look so damn good, I didn't know. "What are you doing there? Didn't you hear me knock?"
He raised a brow at me in his typical imperious way. "And didn't I give you a key?"
I closed the door behind me hastily, not wanting to let in any bugs. "So you just stood there? Waiting for me to use the key? What would you have done if I didn't use the key and went home?"
That raised brow didn't budge. "Then it would've been a shame for you, hmm?"
I kept waiting for my heart to stop pounding so fast, so hard, but it continued in that same frenetic pattern. "Um. Okay."
He pushed himself away from the wall and turned around, walking back into what looked like the living room, with a few doors down a hallway that presumably were the bathroom and two bedrooms. "Do you want something to drink?"
"Water would be great," I said as I slipped off my sneakers and padded into the surprisingly large and spartan-furnished living room.
Just a white leather couch in front of a large screen TV hung on the wall and a white coffee table in between them.
The kitchen wasn't much better, with a wide, long counter, empty of any appliances. He opened the fridge and handed me a small bottle of mineral water.
"So what was this business with a friend you decided was more important than coming here?" A corner of his lips twisted up, and I paused in the middle of cracking the bottle top.
Oh crap.
I was right.
He was pissed.
His facial expression was the same, emotionless, cold, haughty, but there was something about the set of his shoulders, the slight tilt to his dark, slashing brows that made me want to take a step back, back to the door and the illusion of safety.
With a quick jerk of my hand, I undid the cap and chugged half the bottle, while he stood there, watching me with that haughty air.
"I'm sorry," I said when I put the bottle back down on the counter, concentrating on closing it tightly, eyes fixed on it, so I didn't have to look at him. "A friend needed help. I had to make sure she went home okay. I couldn't shove her in a taxi and hope the driver did nothing weird to her."
"Hmm," he mused. "And who'll take care of you when I'm through with you?"
His words were like a red-hot poker through my heart. "I already apologized. What more do you want me to say?"
Then he came to me, took me in his arms and tilted my chin up to meet his mouth.
"Nothing," he said against my unresisting lips. "Don't say a damn thing."
His kiss was hard, punishing, but I didn't resist. If anything, I pressed myself closer to him, tried to touch him, but he broke away, a sadistic tilt to his lips. "Don't think so. Bad girls deserve to get punished, don't they?"
I tried to swallow the lump in my throat, the pulse pit-patting in the back of my head. "Punish…?"
"Yes," he said as he grabbed my arm and half-pulled me through a door that turned out to be a large, spacious room with nothing more than a bed with a nightstand at each side. "I'm going to make sure you come when you're called."
"But, I did," I protested weakly, feeling like a total moron as he pulled the white shirt up over his head, exposing a sun-kissed, leanly muscular torso. "I'm sorry I'm a little late, but I couldn't blow off Ayaka—"
His lips were on mine again and he ripped the hat off my head, throwing it away, and my shirt was discarded in a similar fashion.
He paused and looked down at my admittedly faded and frayed sports bra. "That's not very suitable to an interlude, is it?"
I refused to let the shame show on my face and kept my arms ramrod straight by my sides even though I was fighting the near instinctive urge to cover myself. "I was already outside when you contacted me."
He reached out, a finger tracing the shape of my collar bone, and I shivered. "And yet…maybe it's not so bad, after all."
He forced me slowly, inexorably on the soft bed, and I felt his hands under the waist band of my jeans, pushing them and my panties off my hips, down my knees, and tossed onto the floor.
My heart thudded against my chest as I watched him watching me from between my thighs.
A corner of his lips twisted up. "Now to decide the manner in which to punish you."
"Please," I whispered. "Don't…don't hurt me."
A brow went up. "Hurt you? Oh, I don't intend on hurting you. Well, not too much."
He blew against my heated core, that treacherous part of me that wanted everything he offered, the part that wanted him to hurt me even. My back arched, fingers clenching into the soft, silken bed sheets as he did it again.
I heard him laugh as though he was somewhere far away. "Yes. Yes, I think I like that a lot."
He used his tongue after that, laving my cunt in slow, masterful strokes that made me cry out in wild abandon as I fought to get away, fought to get closer, feeling that subtle, yet undeniable climax that was maddeningly just out of reach.
So close.
So…close!
Just when I thought it would happen, when I thought the oblivion would take me, he pulled away, leaving me wet, confused, and cold, my cunt flexing in a vain attempt to bring about something that only he could give me.
I levered myself up on my weak elbows, shaking, sweating. "Wha…what? Why did you stop?"
He went back on his haunches, smiling widely at me. "I told you I'd punish you, didn't I?"
I stared at him. "Seriously? This is it? You're going to punish me like this?"
"Of course. I need to make sure this won't happen again," he said as he kicked off his pajama pants and slid onto the bed next to me. "Suck me off."
And the sad thing was, I complied, levering myself up with joints almost too weak to obey.
I took his hard, straining length into my mouth, feeling his hands in my hair, keeping it out of my face, as I used every trick I read about in magazines and books to bring him to satisfaction.
It never occurred to me to "punish" him in the same way as he had done to me. That and he would have, no doubt, taken it not too kindly that I dared to turn the tables on what he thought was well-deserved justice.
His hand tightened in my hair, bringing me up and off his pulsing cock, off that bitter, smoky taste of him so heavy on my tongue.
"No, I think I have more in store for you," he whispered as he brought me up to his mouth, his tongue plundering mine, tasting himself and me. Then he rolled me under him, keeping me pinned under his weight, while he reached over and pulled something out of a drawer from the nightstand next to the bed.
It looked like a long strip of silk, and I eyed it hanging from his hand as though it was a snake. "You're not…"
His eyes glinted in the moonlight streaming through the vertical blinds, as he grabbed my wrists and pushed them over my head, tying the silk expertly around my wrists.
With my wrists bound together, my breasts thrust up even higher, I felt breathless, offered up like some sacrifice to a vengeful god…or devil.
"Is this…" My throat tightened up. "Is this necessary?"
"Shh," he said as he pried my thighs apart, and I closed my eyes as the glorious sensation of his cock pushing through my wet folds brought back the faint strains of the release I had so wanted.
"Don't stop," I whispered and he pinched my cheek hard, bringing forth a brilliant shade of pain that somehow made the pleasure even sharper.
"Shut up," he said mildly, still pressing forward. "You don't get to tell me what to do."
When I thought he couldn't go any further, when I was almost uncomfortably full, he started to move.
Slow, measured thrusts into my wetness that made me turn my head into the pillows to stifle the cries tumbling forth.
Every pump of his hips was calculated, as he looked down at me, his eyes narrowed, intent as he brought me close to that precipice of release.
The moment I thought he would bring me to climax, his movements slowed and the pillow was wet with my tears as I begged him for that climax he kept so cruelly away from me.
I moved my hips under his, tried to roll him deeper into me, but he kept himself aloft, clearly enjoying the sight of me writhing under him, begging like a sinner that couldn't possibly achieve redemption.
I promised him everything, promised him I would never come late to his requests again, promised him I would listen and heed his every demand if he allowed me to come, but the smile only spread on his dark claret lips.
He tsked his tongue as I tried to push against him, and he pulled back enough to hover over my grasping cunt. "Now, that wouldn't be much of a punishment if I let you come, would it?"
Then as the waves of pleasure ebbed away, he fucked me again, slowly, and then fast, then slow again, until I turned into a sobbing mass of nerves, begging for a release I thought would never come.
This must've been what hell was like.
And he was the tormenting devil to torture me for all eternity, to never let me reach satisfaction.
When I couldn't stand it anymore, when I thought I'd lose my mind, I felt his breath on my ear.
"Have you learned your lesson?"
My wrists twisted in their bonds as I nodded frantically, feeling his hands come up under my hips, pressing me against his throbbing member. "Yes, yes, yes. Please. I've learned my lesson!"
"You're mine. To do with how I please. If I want to fuck you, you come. Nothing is more important, got it?"
At that point, I would have promised him my soul to achieve release. "Yes! Please, Nobuki, fuck me."
And fuck me, he did.
I lost track of the number of times I came. They all blurred together into one long session of pure sensation and vaguely, I heard Nobuki groan, his head pressed into the pillow next to me, as he spent himself inside me, jerking, spurting, his hips pummeling against mine.
I was exhausted, shaking, and he pulled the covers over us, in a surprising show of gentleness, even though we smelled like sex and sweat.
Then his hands undid the silk rope around my wrist and finally, finally I could relax in that bed, pressed up against Nobuki, his arm over my shoulders.
During the night, he slipped out, and I heard the shower start. Uncomfortably stiff and sticky, I wrestled out of the covers and joined him in that large, marbled bathroom, as he stood underneath the shower head, letting the water run over his slack face.
I opened the door and stepped in next to him. There was more than enough room for the both of us and as though it was the most natural thing in the world, I put my arms around him.
He turned around and kissed me under that almost too-hot spray of water and then washed me with a soapy sponge, his touch gentle, tender as I leaned against the wall, knees too weak to keep me standing for long.
He drew me back under the hot spray again and kissed me and when his fingers slipped into my tender pussy, I drew in a quick breath, hands clenching into his shoulders.
"It's okay," he said into my ear, as his fingers worked their way in and out of me. "Relax."
He brought me to another climax like that, using his fingers and when the explosions of color and sound subsided, he carried me out of the shower and toweled me off before slipping me into bed, his body warm and hard next to mine.
When I woke up next, it was three in the morning, and I inched out of bed, wincing with every move I made. Slowly, I dressed, but had to forgo my panties because I couldn't find them by touch. I wasn't going to turn on the light to wake Nobuki up, who was a heavy sleeper, if he still hadn't woken up after all my whispered curses as I bashed various limbs into furniture that seemed to be made up entirely of sharp corners.
I waited out on his street corner for about ten minutes until a taxi, the driver blinking tiredly, stopped and took me back home, a relatively short fifteen-minute drive.
The walk up to the fifth floor of my apartment left me shivering and sweaty and it was all I could do to kick off my sneakers and stumble to bed. I was already half-asleep when my face hit the pillows and before I knew it, the raucous beeping sound came from my chicken alarm clock that I always set to six AM on the weekdays.
I groaned and rolled over, still dressed in the clothes from the night before, my muscles aching as I tried to reach over to turn off the alarm before my next-door neighborhood could start pounding the wall in protest.
I didn't quite hit the snooze button; actually, I knocked the clock off the table entirely and the battery rolled out, but that was okay. At least it wasn't beeping anymore, and I blinked at the white ceiling, listening to the distant sounds of traffic, a barking dog somewhere down the block.
Just a start of another day for Rika Hasegawa.
Right.