Complete Submission: (The Submission Series, Books 1-8) (66 page)

“You look
worse
.”

“We really need to try the crystal cleansing lady.”

“Have the guy with the wine come this way.”

“Christ, I think half of Stanford just showed up.”

Jessica slipped her hand between mine and tugged. I got up. I pulled her away to a quiet corner between two chest-high planters.

“Are you all right?” she whispered.

“I don’t believe in hypnosis,” I said.

“Of course not.” She pressed the orchid to my lapel and wove a three inch straight pin through it, fastening it to my jacket. Her eyes gazed at me suspiciously and with no little concern. “But you look like you just saw a ghost.”

“I remembered that night. Things I hadn’t remembered before.”

“That night? Jon, really. Which night?”

“The night Rachel died.”

She touched my cheek, and I brought my arm around her waist. “Tell me,” she said.

I put my lips close to her ear. “She’s alive.”

“How is that possible?”

“I remember. I woke up in the grass, and she was next to me. Her eyes were open. She blinked.”

Nothing about Jessica’s expression changed for the first second, and I watched her closely. I needed her to tell me something. Maybe comfort me, or tell me I was wrong. Maybe I’d missed a shred of evidence that proved what we’d always known. That Rachel was dead and buried and the family tracks covered with six feet of dirt.

She put her hand on my lapel. “You know, this isn’t a reliable memory, right?”

“Yes. But I also know it’s right. Sure as we’re standing here.”

“Well then, there’s only one way to know for sure.” She squeezed my hand and put her lips to my ear. “We’ll have to find her.”

A streamer floated down from a tree and landed between us, while the sound of the quartet drew my attention back to my engagement party and waiting guests.

resist.

MONICA

A
t 11:23 a.m., I turned past the historic fig trees. The gate opened. I pulled the Honda in and parked next to the Jag. I checked my face in the mirror and went up to the porch. I dropped my bag and knocked. Waited. As I was about to knock again, the gate clattered closed. The button for the gate was just behind the front door, so he must have been there. I had no idea how long he’d make me stand outside. Patience was always a part of his game.

The door opened. His hair was brushed back and clean, his face shaved. He wore a tan polo that was tight in the arms, accentuating his hard, smooth biceps. His jeans hung on his hips as though they were made for him. And the motherfucker had the nerve to wear a belt.

“You’re a sight for sore eyes,” he said. His eyes, however, didn’t look sore at all. He looked as if nothing ever touched him. I had no idea how he did that.

“Are you okay?” I asked. “I was worried.”

“I’m fine. It’s going to be fine.”

I had been waiting to hear that before I dealt with the other issue that had kept me from eating and sleeping for two days. “Then, what the fuck?”

“What the fuck, what?”

I crossed my arms. “What. The. Fuck. Jonathan.”

He put his fingertips on my jaw and slid them to the side of my neck. I sighed at his caress. His thumb brushed my cheek, his pinkie tickling the sensitive part of my throat. I involuntarily tilted my head into him.

“Your safe word?” he said.

“Tange-fucking-rine. Now explain—”

He grabbed the hair at the back of my head and yanked me to my knees. I lost my breath, the motion was so sharp and hard. I was kneeling in a second, and he flipped his pants open in a few swift moves. His dick was rigid and straight at my lips, glistening with a drop of liquid.

I had told him about that fantasy the night I gave him the list that became a song. He said he wouldn’t fulfill it until I trusted him. I closed my mouth tight.

“Open,” he commanded.

I turned my eyes to him, his cock in the foreground of my vision. His face bent toward me. He slapped his dick against my lips, twisting my hair. I opened my lips to tell him to fuck himself, but I was unprepared for the ferocity with which he jammed his cock down my throat. I choked, gagged.

He didn’t stop. He grabbed my hair with his other hand and pivoted me, controlling me, owning me. I felt as if he wanted me off balance and uncomfortable, held up not by my knees, but by the knots of hair in his fists that shifted my head where his cock wanted. I opened my mouth and throat and let him take me. I made noises there were no letters for. Spit ran down my chin, and when I looked up at him, he gazed back with fierce intensity. He took his dick out of my mouth.

“You fucked her,” I said.

“No, I didn’t.”

“You lie.”

He pushed me into the house. “Hands and knees.”

I fell, but I scooted myself to standing. I backed away. My breath rasped from the facefuck I’d just endured. “Say it. You and Jessica.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“You. Lie.”

He pushed me against the wall, hard. I pushed him away.

“Pick your skirt up” he said.

“Admit it.”

“Pick your skirt up, Monica.”

“Admit it.”

He took my shoulders and twisted me to face the wall, inches from a Mondrian. We had agreed to all of it, more or less, at the hotel in Vancouver. Hours of making that boundary list on the couch, and one scenario we embraced was that sometimes I’d fight him, and I’d use the safe word if shit got too intense or painful Right then, I wanted to fuck him as much as I wanted to resist. I’d longed for him for two days, hovering somewhere between rage and panic.

He yanked up my skirt, pushing me against the wall with his other hand. “What am I admitting?”

“The cops said you hit Jessica with a belt and fucked her.”

“They lied to get you to talk.”

“Fuck. You.” He moved my panties aside, jammed his fingers in my cunt, and flicked my clit with his pinkie. “First chance you get, you cheat.” I moaned.

“You’re so fucking wet, Monica.” He pulled my hair until my neck was twisted so I could face him. “You wouldn’t be if you believed that.”

“They didn’t pick you up for nothing.”

“What if I did fuck her? You left me.”

The thought made me so angry I flung my arm back and hit him in the face. He threw me over the sideboard, bumping a little bronze sculpture of stacked squares and knocking over a picture of his sisters. His dick pressed against my ass, hard, hot, and ready. One of my shoes fell off.

“They said they had audio,” I cried, face wet with tears. “They have pictures of her ass. It’s welted. You did it. Just say it.”

“It.” He pulled my panties down to mid-thigh.

“You fucked her.”

“I showed her what she was asking for.” He slid his cock in me as if he had an engraved invitation, fucking me as though he owned me.

“God, Jonathan,” I cried, tears forming. “Why? Why don’t I mean anything to you?” I didn’t say “no” or “stop” because even though we had a safe word, I knew him. If I told him to stop, he would, and the pounding I was getting was the pounding I wanted.

He slapped against me with every word. “I. Didn’t. Touch. Her.”

“Liar.” I swung back, trying to hit him. My reward was having my arm twisted behind my back so I couldn’t move it.

“What did you tell them, Monica? You told them I spanked you, too.”

“I said it was consensual. I don’t lie.”

“Good for you.” He let my arm go but pressed my face to the tabletop so hard I couldn’t move. He changed his angle and fucked hard and slow for a few strokes, pushing me down. The lacquer bit my nostrils. Pleasure was overtaking me, overwhelming my better sense.

That was what I wanted, wasn’t it? I wanted to get fucked, but I didn’t want to want it. I wanted his cock, and I wanted it hard, without the responsibility of asking for explanations. He pulled my hair again, yanking my head to the side so I could see him.

“I want to see you come,” he said.

“Go fuck yourself,” I replied breathlessly.

“Put your hand on your cunt.”

I twisted, resisting the order, and he used the torque to drag one leg out of my panties. He put that leg over his shoulder while the other stayed on the tabletop. My other shoe fell with a clop. I lay on my side while he stood, shifting to straddle the leg that wasn’t over his shoulder.

“Now.” He put his thumb in his mouth and made a wet, sucking pop as he pulled it out. He pressed it to my clit.

“Oh, God.”

He pounded me hard. The photo bounced off the sideboard and crashed to the floor.

“I said I want to see you come,” he gasped, taking my pussy with his dick.

“Fuck. I hate you, fucker.” I swung at him with my free hand, but he caught it before I struck him. He pinned it to my ankle with his strong fingers. “I hate you.” It sounded like a plea.

“Well,” he said, a word for each stroke, “I. Love. You.”

He kissed my cheek, and everything in me tightened around him as his cruel thumb pressed, twisted, rubbed my clit. He grunted against my cheek. He pinched the fleshy nub, pushing and pulling in opposite directions. I came like a gunshot, a crack of a scream exploding from my throat. I begged him to stop, but he kept rubbing, and I kept coming until my cries must have sounded far more like pain than pleasure. Jonathan pulled his face from mine, circling his hips as he groaned a long
mmm
sound.

He was coming, and I loved him. Fucker.

T
he cops had taken my information and made sure Lil picked me up. They asked me nothing besides my most basic information and let me know I had to make myself available for questioning the next day. They came to my house in the morning, gently asking the most painful questions, breaking my heart with every word.

I’d cleaned every corner of my house except Gabby’s room. I stayed up all night, eyes glued to the television and internet. Whatever was happening with Jonathan, it had been either unworthy of media attention or kept under a dark, wet blanket.

I had called Geraldine Stark to thank her for letting us know about Kevin. She should have told us right away, before Darren had to call randomly, but she treated the whole thing like squeaky gossip. I made excuses and hung up. I called Darren. He was with Adam and couldn’t talk. I didn’t tell him about Jonathan. It would have taken forever to explain that I knew nothing.

I could not have imagined more tortuous days between watching him get into the squad car and getting his text.

—Where are you?—

I’d grasped the phone, letting half the tension in my body drop out of me and onto the kitchen floor.

—Home—

I was frozen in place, looking at the ellipsis at the bottom of the screen that meant he was typing. The shelves from my fridge were dripping soap, forgotten in the sink.

—Can you play?—

Initially, my biggest fear had been that I was somehow responsible for the accusation of domestic violence. That someone had heard about us, or seen my bruises at the Eclipse show. Or that maybe Kevin had gotten a word in edgewise at the border. Because who else had he been with? Who else had he hurt?

—Fuck you—

—Be here at 11:23, exactly—

But then the police had gently questioned me. No cold room. No good cop, bad cop. Two female officers spoke in a soft voices and told me they’d protect me from the man I loved and the sex I craved. They told me Jessica had come to them for an order of protection with photos proving he’d abused her during sex. Her reputation as someone who wanted nothing to do with Jonathan’s kinky side indicated she’d been the unwilling victim of abuse and possibly rape.

I had gotten through the interview by using my customer service smile, but inside, I boiled.

—You missed the fuck you part—

—No, I saw it—

At 11:22 a.m., I had sat outside his gate in my car, waiting for the time on my phone to flip. I didn’t know what the exactness of the time was about. I felt as if he was taking a slice of control and connection in a situation where he felt he had none.

I didn’t believe he’d raped her, because I knew him. I didn’t believe he’d struck her without consent for the same reason. I was livid because during the time we’d been separated, he’d been so broken up about me he fucked around with, who else? Jessica.

At the same time, for two days, I had missed him. I worried about him. I didn’t sleep enough. I went to dinner with friends but barely ate. I checked my phone so often, Yvonne had snapped it off the table and pocketed it. When he finally did text, I felt relief, and rage, and at the sight of the word
play,
I felt rushing need between my legs that only he could release.

After he took full control of my resistant body, yanking an orgasm out of me, he picked me up and got me standing. I touched the hem of my skirt, but he moved my hands away.

“What now, Jonathan?” I was emotionally frustrated, sexually satisfied, and physically exhausted.

“Let me,” he said, kneeling in front of me. He held out the empty leg of my panties, and I stepped into them.

“You hurt me. And you cheated.”

“Hurting you isn’t my fault. It’s Jessica’s. And the second isn’t true.” He slid my panties back up my legs, running his fingers under them to get them in the right place.

“It doesn’t matter that we broke up,” I said.

“Yes, it would, if I’d done anything.” He pulled down my skirt, caressing my ass, my thighs, and my knees as if they were precious. “She came here the day I saw you at the Stock. Debbie said you’d moved on, and I was upset.”

“She said that? It wasn’t true.”

He looked up at me, his hands on the backs of my thighs. “I know. Debbie’s a yenta. I should have known. But Jessica was here, and she goaded me. That’s not an excuse, but it’s what happened. She said she wanted to do it kinky just once, and even after I explained exactly what that meant, she pushed all my buttons.”

“So you fucked her.”

“No! Jesus, Monica.” He cupped my ass as if to make me understand. “I had her unbutton her shirt, and she still wanted it. So I bent her over the table and gave her three whacks with my belt. I’m not proud of it. But everyone’s clothes were on.”

“Do you understand how unlikely that story sounds?”