me out of the gutter the night before to make a wild offer, an insane offer, the kind of offer he never would have made to me if he’d known the truth about me.
He’s not here with me right now. I’m alone with the maids: three women in traditional maid uniforms, obviously fetishized, revealing legs and breasts for the benefit of their employer’s gaze.
They help me out of bed. I don’t think that I need the help until I’m actually standing, and then I realize how sore I am in all the right ways. Sore between my legs, sore where Galen violated my ass, sore from bucking against the wall while he buried his face between my legs.
Like I said, all the right ways.
It’s nice having steady hands hold me up. They dress me in unfamiliar clothes. The stockings caress my legs as they slide up my ankles to my knees and higher. The underwear holds me tightly. It makes me think of being tied down.
Then there’s the dress. A black sheath, probably couture. I’m even more grateful for the maids when I see it. There’s no way I could do the zipper that runs all the way down the back without help.
It doesn’t quite fit me. Neither do the shoes. I wear them anyway.
The maids walk me through Galen’s apartment, and I’m still feeling a little sick from all the alcohol and drugs the night before. I didn’t eat enough for dinner. I probably should have eaten something. The floor is unsteady underneath me, the walls twisting. The doorway seems to blur.
And then sunlight.
We’re obviously still in Las Vegas. I can feel it in the bite of the sun on my exposed flesh and the way it stabs deep into my irises. It heats the top of my hair. I’m of Irish descent, so I’m practically flammable in sunlight, and there’s nothing quite as vicious as the cruel dry heat of the southern Nevada desert.
The asphalt radiates with heat. I shouldn’t be wearing thigh-highs. I’m sweaty immediately, slick inside the dress. It only takes a few steps to reach the round driveway and I’m so hot by the time I get there.
The limousine is waiting for me. Its windows are tinted too dark for me to see inside.
Even so, I know who’s waiting for me in there.
Its air conditioned embrace is a relief, even though I was only outside for a moment. I’m cold. And grateful for those stockings.
Galen Blood sits in the corner, nestled by leather, chin resting on the curve of his forefinger and thumb. He wears sunglasses. His hair falls over his forehead in arrogant line, a little too boyish to match the perfect, razor-cut lines of his charcoal suit.
There is a wall between us, putting miles between our souls even though the toes of my ill-fitting shoes are only an inch from his when I sit.
Someone shuts the door, entombing us in the limousine.
It moves.
He doesn’t speak.
“Are you taking me back?” I ask. “Back to that club? Back to…?” I can’t finish my sentence. Are you taking me back to my old life?
He surveys me coolly. I don’t need to see his eyes to feel the way that his eyes rove over my body, reminding himself of the curves that he claimed as his the night before.
Whatever he thinks of me, he doesn’t show it on his face. He is as expressive as a mannequin showing off fine business wear down on The Strip.
“Do you want to leave me?” he asks.
No matter how calm he sounds, it’s a loaded question.
Never say no .
That was the rule. I don’t deny him anything. Enthusiastic consent for everything, and I can have the world.
Better yet, I can have him .
Galen Blood. Billionaire. Celebrity. Troublemaker. Notorious.
No, I don’t want to leave him. And that’s not an answer I plan on giving him. I don’t want to know how picky he’ll be about “never say no,” so it’s better to remain silent, hands folded in my lap, eyes fixed upon my feet in a show of submission.
My body says yes, keep me, please .
I want him to take me now. I want him to violate me again. I want it so much that it hurts all over, and I want