CHAPTER 8
Hannah
I save the dusting of Asher’s apartment as the last of my chores for the day. It’s sort of a nostalgic thing for me, since it was my dusting of his Chihuly vase that landed me in his bed.
Or rather, in his sex club.
We’ve not been on a bed yet.
Couches, pools, and pillows, but not on a good old-fashioned mattress.
I wait for a flush of shame to hit me, but that’s happening less and less when I think of my current situation. Perhaps I’ve just tucked it away into a box and placed it in a far corner of my mind, or perhaps I just don’t care anymore because I’ve got a good opportunity to get custody of Hope now. However it boils down, I can’t bemoan a situation where I’m working less hours, making more money, and having enough extra to fight for my daughter.
The attorney I hired is going to file a motion with the court to reconsider the terms of custody and child support. He wants me to have at least a month of employment under my belt at my new job. Of course, I didn’t tell him “house manager” was just a term used to mean “sex toy,” but I was confident that would never be an issue. Asher put me on his payroll, and I’m having taxes taken out. I had to fill out a W-9 and everything. He even went as far as to offer me health insurance, which I wasn’t idiotic enough to turn my nose up at.
Of course, all these things happened after our night together in the Waterfall Room at The Wicked Horse, and they happened via email and text. I haven’t seen Asher since then.
There was no explanation as to why he hasn’t asked me back to the Wicked Horse, and he’s been gone to work each morning by the time I’ve arrived at his place. He’ll usually leave me a handwritten note of what he wants done. If he doesn’t, I just clean the same areas I’d cleaned the day before. Asher has what must be the cleanest abode in the state of Nevada.
I start with his bedroom, an area of the apartment that affects me the most because it smells just like Asher. It’s decorated in black and gray with just tiny hints of white. It’s stark and barren, but it’s decorated just like the rest of his apartment. There are no personal photographs of his family, nor any warm or whimsical pieces of art adorning the walls. The black lacquered furniture is austere, but at least it shows any dust that might dare to have accumulated since I cleaned the previous day.
I make short work of his room and the spare bedroom, moving past his locked private office he instructed me to ignore my first day. The kitchen has already been scrubbed top to bottom, so I head into the living room. When I finish that, I turn to the foyer, which has a small table on one side of the door and the white marble pedestal that used to house his Chihuly vase before I broke it.
I see something laying on the top of it I hadn’t noticed when I let myself in this morning. As I get closer, I see it’s a photograph of something I recognize at once.
The wooden stocks that are in one of the glassed rooms of the Silo, which is one of the sub rooms within the Wicked Horse.
I pick it up and study it. There’s no one in the room and certainly no one locked in the contraption, although I’d seen it in use on my first visit there. A woman had her head and wrists enclosed as she was being fucked from behind by a man. That hadn’t been shocking, but the fact there were four other men lined up after him to take a turn had been. I was horrified and turned on at the same time, which made me feel like a total slut that any part of that would appeal to me. I guess it was knowing the woman was enjoying herself, which was clear by her moans and screams of pleasure, that had made it seem tantalizing.
Shaking my head to clear it of those thoughts, I turn the photo over. Near the top, Asher had written Tonight at ten. Under it was another short message: Enjoying this far more than the Chihuly.
A snort of amusement involuntarily pops out of my mouth, and I clap my hand over it. Given my observations of Asher’s apartment and the fact the Chihuly was about the only color he had in here, I’m going to take a guess and say that the vase had some special significance to him. What that could be, I can’t imagine, but it makes his words a little more shocking that he’s liking sex with me better than his custom-made vase.
I simply don’t know what to make of it.
I will have to admit that the two nights I went to the club with him were by far the best sex of my entire life. Of course, my earlier experiences were limited to my first boyfriend, who I lost my virginity to, then Nelson, and then one guy after him who just wasn’t a good match on any level. None of them even understood what foreplay was, and I was lucky if I could manage to get myself off with my fingers whenever Nelson was humping me with no finesse. Our sex life was something I truly hated about our marriage. I hadn’t known how to make it better, and I never felt comfortable enough to talk about it with him. I was always afraid of hurting his feelings or something.
Asher on the other hand?
He is sex incarnate. He embodies everything that is lust and pleasure. He’s beyond adventurous and totally confident in whatever he does. When he commands me, I’m powerless to say no.
We were in the Waterfall Room on Monday. Every night since then, I’ve gone to bed thinking about it with my fingers playing between my legs. The orgasms I gave myself were soul shredding as I repeatedly replayed in my mind how satisfying it was to suck his cock, or how wanton and liberated I felt when he put me on that platform in the middle of the pool and buried his tongue deep inside of me. I came so fast I couldn’t quite understand what had happened, and he continued to mercilessly suck and lick at me until he drove me to another orgasm, then another, before he finally fucked me.
And when he fucked me, he did it by putting me on my hands and knees and driving into me with almost a brutal sense of determination. He pulled my hair, slapped my ass, and pinched my nipples so hard they bruised, but I kept begging him for more.
Face flushed, I shove the photo in my pocket. Using the feather duster, I attack the marble pedestal and try to drive those memories out of my head. If I don’t, I’m apt to go lay myself across Asher’s bed and get myself off. I’d then wipe my wet fingers on his black satin duvet cover and wonder if he’d smell me later.
“Ugh,” I growl out in frustration. I can’t stop thinking about him or the sex we have, and it worries me.
It worries me that he has a power over me that has nothing to do with the ridiculous amount of money he’s given me and will continue to pay me to be his fuck toy.
“Stop thinking about it, Hannah,” I chastise myself out loud, hoping it makes a bigger impression on my conscience.
A text chimes on my phone, and I nab it from my pocket. It’s my mother, and her words are just what I needed to make me smile. Thinking of you. Know you are loved.
Carol Brantley was dealt a hard life from the moment she was born in Gaffney, South Carolina to a deadbeat dad and an alcoholic mother. The oldest of five kids, she had to go to work at the age of thirteen to help support the family. She didn’t graduate high school, ending up pregnant with me shortly after she’d turned seventeen. My dad left as soon as he found out he’d knocked her up. I’ve never met him. My mom was unlucky in love a second time, too, and married Toby and Frank’s dad. He left shortly after Toby’s birth, so it was just the four of us. My mom raised three kids on a bartender’s salary.
To say life was hard is an understatement, but it’s also molded me into a hard-working woman with grit and determination. I started working when I was just twelve—after school and in the summers—to help with the family expenses. It was usually cleaning the neighbors’ houses or raking leaves to earn a few bucks here or there. Every little bit helped, and I routinely contributed to buying groceries, school supplies, and thrift store clothes for my brothers and me.
I was determined to break the family tradition, though. After I graduated from high school, I went to community college for one year. But then I met Nelson, who was attending a conference in Columbia while I was working part time at a coffee shop there. He swept me off my feet, and I jumped at the chance to run off to Nevada with him. I was just nineteen when we married. Not a day goes by that I’m not guilt ridden for leaving my mom and the boys behind, but my mom was happy for me. She wanted nothing more than for me to pursue my dreams.
I text my mom back. I love you. You’re my hero.
She replies with a heart emoji.
It doesn’t take me long to finish dusting the foyer, and I leave a note for Asher on the counter that says, See you at ten.
By the time I’m walking out of his apartment and locking the door behind me, I’m making a mental calculation of the time I have left in the day. I was going to work a four-hour shift this afternoon doing customer service support, which I can do from home. I did not quit that job as the hours are flexible. Since Asher wasn’t keeping me busy all day, it was a good way to pick up a little extra cash that I stashed in a Christmas pot I would use to buy Hope something special.
Instead, I decide to go car hunting. The daily Uber charges to get to and from Asher’s apartment, as well as to The Wicked Horse, are adding up. I’m sure I can get a cheap used car for a lot less than what I’m spending on Uber and far less than getting my repoed car back. I only had to put down a five-thousand-dollar retainer for the attorney to take the case, which was the original bonus Asher had given me. The lawyer will require another five thousand to file the motion, so that’ll leave ten grand in my savings account. I figure I can get a car for hopefully less than half. I consider it a wise investment, especially since I’ll be getting Hope tomorrow. The last thing I want to do is pull up in an Uber at my ex-husband’s house. I don’t want to deal with the humiliating remarks he’ll make when he learns my car has been repoed.
Yes, I have a good plan of action today. After I go car hunting, I’ll work a few hours doing customer service support from the comfort of my own home if I have time this evening. Then I’ll get showered, put on the red dress I wore on my first night at the Wicked Horse, and meet Asher there—where I’ll let him lock me up in the stocks to do God knows what to me.
I’m not sure whether I should hate myself or not, but I’m looking forward to it.