She knew about Matthew, knew of some of the women before her. Spanish woman, Native American woman, East Indian woman, an occasional Asian girl, women who flocked to European men the same way men of African descent, Asian men, and Spanish men were fascinated with European women. She knew Matthew had been with many types of women, women he had met at art museums, smart women, older women who were good with their money, women who had taught him to be good with his money. Before her there had been so many different types of women.
But she was the one he had chosen to marry.
He had told her that when it came down to the time for a man and woman to settle down, no matter how much fun he’d had with women of other races, most times he picked someone from his own tribe. Everything else was just practice. Everything else was just pussy.
The way she saw it they were all the same race, the human race, and if God didn’t want what man had defined as being different races to procreate, then God would’ve made it so mixed races couldn’t have babies, or the offspring would be unable to procreate, like a horse and a donkey making a mule or a hinny, the end result being ugly as hell and sterile. If that were true then the arguments to not mix races would make some sense, but in her mind it was stupid. People had the same number of chromosomes for a reason. That was part of the plan. Whatever was here now was part of millions or billions of years of evolution, every day a fight to not become extinct. To her the mixing of races was as natural as evolution, and people were afraid of evolution because people were afraid of change.
People were afraid of change.
That was how she had felt, before today, before that meeting at Pigeon Point Beach.
All of her liberalism had been destroyed; all she could imagine was Matthew fucking that woman.
Fuck liberalism. Fuck broad-mindedness, fuck open-mindedness, fuck goddamn freethinking.
Fuck horses, donkeys, and mules.
She stepped back out of the bathroom, tried to keep calm, failed terribly, anger out of control.
“And tell me, Matthew, when did you learn to speak this patois they speak here?”
“Long time ago.”
“What did she say when I walked up?”
“Nothing you need to know. She’s always had an attitude like that.”
She snapped, “So you fucked her.”
“For somebody who was out all night and couldn’t answer one or two simple questions—”
“I was working.”
“Then why did you lie and say you were here sleeping? You are full of shit.”
“Did you?”
“Yeah, I fucked her. I fucked her
good.
”
That halted her, her anger expanding. “When did you fuck her?”
“Before I met you.”
“Have you worked for her before?”
“Worked for her husband before. He had some problems he paid me to fix.”
“Never for her?”
“She wanted to hire me a few years back.”
“To do what?”
“A contract on her husband.”
“Such a devoted wife. Did you take the contract on her husband?”
“It was a tight time frame. I wasn’t available that weekend.”
“Why not?”
“I was in Costa Rica on vacation with my wife. So it was farmed out, went to this other guy.”
“The guy we followed in London. The guy she called Gideon.”
“Yeah. The guy who calls himself Gideon.”
“When did you fuck her?”
“Before we married.”
“When before? The day before? The night before? Five minutes before? How long before?”
“Before before.”
“Where?”
“The Omni in Detroit.”
“While you were working for her husband.”
“Is there a point to this inquisition?”
“She suck your dick?”
“Don’t ask if you can’t handle the truth.”
“Did she swallow?”
“Get out of my fucking face.”
“Did she?”
“Don’t fucking push up on me.”
“You’re thinking about that
bitch
right now, aren’t you?”
“Move. Last time.
Move
.”
“That’s why your dick is so fucking hard.”
“Does it fucking matter?”
“Stop, Matthew. Take your hands off me.”
“What’s your fucking problem?”
“What’re you going to do? Beat me up or fuck me?”
“If you want me to fuck you just say so.”
“
You fucking pig.
I’ll
never
let you fuck me again. Never.”
She wrestled with him as he yanked her pants off her, tried to get away as he lifted her and threw her on the bed, squirmed as he pulled his pants to his knees, moaned as his dick went inside her.
She was sore. Tender. His harsh penetration brought tears to her eyes.
He asked, “Is this what you want? What’s the matter? Okay when you take what you want but when it’s the other way around, you don’t like it, do you? Stop trying to be a fucking control freak.”
“Answer the question, Matthew.” She put her nails in his skin. “Answer the goddamn question.”
His moan covered her as he moved, as her dampness spread, as she began to tingle with fire.
She moaned as well. “Answer . . . answer . . .”
She cursed him, his fucking like thunder and lightning.
She grunted, panted out her words. “You fucking . . . me . . . or you fucking . . . that bitch?”
His hand moved around her neck, choking her, shutting her up as he manhandled her.
She stared at him, unable to breathe, glowered at his intensity.
He was killing her. It felt like he was killing her. ’Til death do us part. And this was death.
Then his choke lessened. She gasped, coughed, felt him growing inside her, his stroke faster.
She grabbed his hand, put it back on her throat, his grip cutting off the blood supply to the brain. Everything intensified, every sensation; she felt his every stroke. Anger was erased, replaced with light-headedness, an overwhelming exhilaration.
The Red Stripe. The E. The weed. It was all there, lingering in her system.
Her orgasm came hard and fast, a series of waves, a tsunami that displaced all other emotions, a devastating orgasm that destroyed all in its path. She was drowning, gasping, her breathing so labored.
It was as if time were skipping. As if she were experiencing a temporary loss of consciousness.
His hand slipped away from her throat; she gasped back to life, sweating, dizzy.
It felt as if she were blacking out again. Everything so stretched out and so far away. Everything so blurred, the world melting. Her breathing was short and quick, rapid, hyperventilating.
Then it felt as if she were being pulled away from the world again.
In that transcendental state, she saw him. She saw his swarthy skin clearly. Saw his locks.
She left that nightmare, came back a little at time, life creeping back into her body.
Matthew was over her, jaw tight, yanking her back into him over and over.
He was going in and out of her so fast. His face as red as his hair.
Her hands went up, touched his face, grabbed his throat, choked him as hard as she could.
She struggled, growling as she strained against his strong neck.
She panted, “Come, damn it . . . will you fucking come already . . . shit.”
He bucked hard as he struggled to breathe. Bucked hard, swelling inside her.
“That’s it . . . that’s it . . . come . . . come . . . get your nut.”
She cringed as he pounded into her, fucked her with no mercy.
“Come on Matthew that’s it that’s the shit come on damn it come come Matthew come.”
Then he gripped her, letting out a roar as he exploded.
She held him as he came, her mind back at the Siboney, back on the lover she’d had hours ago. Back on the boy she had killed. In the throes of autoerotic asphyxiation, she had seen him.
She held Matthew as long as she could, panting, not wanting him to roll away and see her face.
In that moment she thought about the first time they had had sex. Right after a job on the East Coast. A fight between bookstore co-owners. Successful business. But money was the dividing line in a lifelong friendship and partnership. One partner threatened the other, brought an ax to a meeting, demanded a showdown. The other picked up his cellular and called their handler. Took out a contract on his business associate of twenty years. Wetwork, a twisted aphrodisiac. After the job. Sheraton. Rittenhouse Square. Philadelphia. The next week he had taken her to Place Pigalle, Paris’s sex district. Matthew had needed her to fulfill a contract on a Parisian woman. A whore who was about to step up and go to the media and expose a very important politician, destroy his career and his family. Matthew took contracts on women, had no problem walking into a house and taking out an entire family, adults and children, if that was what the contract called for, but he had called her in on the job.
The start of teamwork.
She’d done the job, then went shopping; he had bought her a present, that being unexpected, the first present he’d ever given her, a pair of brown suede Blahniks, tonal topstitching, three-and-a-half-inch heel, had given her a fifteen-hundred-American-dollar
shoegasm
. A bonus for doing such a damn good job. Brand-new Blahniks in her hand and a pair of cobalt-blue satin Blahniks on her feet, silver-tone hardware, crystal broach detail on the vamp, stilettos that made her four and a quarter inches taller.
She’d held his hand, her pussy tingling, the shopping making her so damn wet as they walked by sex shops, went inside peep shows, had drinks at strip clubs. Then back to Jays Paris for sex in a five-star room. New Blahniks on her feet. Matthew let her turn the experience into a sex-filled fashion show. Sex that lasted for two days. Sex that made him run out and come back with a new pair of Blahniks for her to wear as she fucked him, the new pair silver metallic leather with a grosgrain trim, button strap across the vamp, open toe, four-inch heel. Blahniks inspired her and her inspiration drove him mad. The madness made him give her rough sex that made her dizzy, nonstop sex that made her nose bleed, S&M that rocked her world, sex that made her give up dating all other men. And her sex made him stop and shop before they left the ecstasy on Champs-Elysées, inspired him to buy her another pair of Blahniks, black with red lining, gold-tone hardware, perforated detail, buckled ankle strap, four-inch covered heel.
Matthew was her Prince Charming, her shining knight, her Mr. Big.
She sucked his dick inside the crowded store. Had taken him inside the tiny bathroom and sucked his dick until he couldn’t stand it, made him moan as she sucked the come out of his dick, the new Blahniks on her feet, so inspired, so fucking inspired, so damn horny, willing to do anything.
Except swallow.
They were a team. A hardworking team. Fucking like maniacs and killing like crazy.
Bookstore owners. Drug dealers. Rappers. Politicians. Wives. Soccer moms. Children who wanted to accelerate the date of their inheritance, parents who were disappointed in their children.
Everybody wanted somebody to cease existing.
Everybody wanted someone to be unborn in order to make their existence a little more pleasant.
Money was always a dividing line.
And hate. Hate was a dividing line as well. Not all work was about money.
Some was simply rooted in hate. Like Detroit. The bitch Matthew had fucked.
Staring at the ceiling, she swallowed and managed to say, “Asshole.”
She let her husband go, pushed him away. A dollop of come leaked out of her, stained the covers on the four-poster bed. She saw Matthew was barely sweating. Her sweat was a raging river. When she positioned herself to look at him, he was already staring at her, intense El Matador eyes.
Matthew said, “At least this asshole can be honest and answer a question.”
“Fuck you.”
“That’s good, real good.”
“And now you have me working for her.”
“Money is money. If I had a wife who wasn’t a shopaholic and understood the value of a dollar . . .”
“Is she good with money? Is that what you like about that embezzling bitch?”
“Obviously, when it comes to finances, she’s better than you are.”
“She’s nothing more than a thief. Stealing from her precious city to pay for this shit.”
“Takes a smart woman to pull that off.”
“Anybody can embezzle.”
“You should know. You’ve had your hands so deep in my pockets my net worth has dropped. We are worth two hundred thousand. That’s all we have to last us the rest of our days. And if I let you, you would spend that much next week. The house we bought has decreased in value and the new cars you bought will never appreciate in worth. We’re in the middle of a recession; that means we have to save more than we spend, but you don’t get that. My credit score has taken a serious hit, one I will never recover from in this lifetime. I was worth a lot more before this marriage. A lot more when I was solo.”
“Maybe you should’ve married Suze Osmond.”
“Suze
Orman
.”
“Like I give a damn.”
Her clit throbbed. Her pussy ached. She still felt his hand around her neck.
Her thoughts remained the same.
Soon a dead boy would be found on the beach.
Across the room, on CNN, they kept yapping about a crumbling economy, the housing crisis, cosigning all the depressing shit Matthew had said, as if Gerri Willis had teamed up with her husband.
Matthew was up, heading for the bathroom, rinsing himself off, then pulling his pants back on.
“How many times did you fuck her?”
“Never fuck a woman once, because she’ll feel like a whore. Never fuck a woman three times, because she’ll think you’re in a relationship. How’s that for yet another answer?”