Just One Night, Part 3: Binding Agreement (14 page)

“You have spent your life cultivating power plays and dominance. Your name might not be as well known as Koch and Gates but behind closed doors everyone knows that it’s you who can’t be crossed. You who can and will ruin a man for an insult. That’s who you
are
, Robert!”

“That’s the man that they know,” he corrects, softly. “I’m asking, what if I can be the man that you’ve seen? You have seen me, haven’t you, Kasie? You’ve peeked behind the curtain. You know the truth about Oz.”

I clench my teeth but my jaw still trembles. The cards fall from my hands and splay across the table in a wave of hearts and clubs.

The bartender turns on the stereo. Simon & Garfunkel sing of silence. Robert shows me his hands, palms up as if to prove that he hides nothing.

“The other day Daemon led a presentation at Maned Wolf. It didn’t go well. He didn’t understand the nuance of our needs the way you did. We won’t be using that firm again.”

“So?”

“Asha stayed behind. I saw her as I was pulling out of the garage. She said her car broke down. It was threatening to rain so I offered her a ride.”

I freeze; my stomach does a little nauseating flip.
I’m the woman Mr. Dade wants you to be.

“Her car didn’t break down,” I say quietly.

“I know that.”

“You know that
now
.”

“And I knew it then.” He sighs, casts a wistful glance at my scotch. “I wanted to understand what you see in them. Dave, Tom, Asha—they all treated you like you were a prostitute. A whore paid to put up with their leers and abuse. A slut who didn’t deserve their respect let alone their civility. And yet you asked me to spare them all. I wanted to understand why.”

He’s Robert Dade and I’d be a willing and eager player in his bedroom games. Not because I want his assistance but because I’d like to see if I could break him.

I reach for the scotch then push it in his direction, urging him to take a sip. “Did she . . . help you understand?”

Robert takes the drink but doesn’t raise it to his mouth. “In a way.”

I close my eyes against the images those words bring up. Robert with Asha in his arms, she underneath him, wrapping her legs around him the way I used to do. Digging her nails into his skin. Asha turning sex into a knife.

“She’s a sociopath,” he says.

The words jar me. Cautiously I open my eyes.

“She’s only interested in herself,” he continues, “has no consideration for others, enjoys revenge more than she enjoys love. And you don’t want to be her. You asked me to spare her, Tom, and Dave because you’re better than all of them. You’re better than me, too.”

“Robert, did you—”

“Sleep with her?” he shakes his head. “No. It’s obviously what she wanted. She left her coat in my car in hopes of giving me an excuse to return it to her.”

“Which coat?” I ask. It doesn’t really matter but I’m trying to visualize this.

“It has a fox-fur trim.”

I nod. I remember it. “Did you return it?”

He shakes his head. “It didn’t seem right that I see her again. Not because I’d be tempted to sleep with her but because I know how she treated you and seeing her would tempt me to destroy her the way I almost destroyed your fiancé. I’m trying to be decent, Kasie. To be better.” He pauses, takes a drink. “So I decided I’d tone it down a bit and instead of ruining her career I just took the coat to Goodwill.”

I break out laughing. It’s easily a $700 coat. Not small change for someone in Asha’s position. The idea of some unemployed club-going teenager wearing it fills me with a certain kind of glee.

I look down at the cards covering the table. “Thank you, for letting up on Dave.”

He nods, his mood serious again. “Tom Love isn’t being blackballed anymore either. He deserves to be, but I let him off the hook.”

I look up, take the scotch back from him. “Why?” I ask.

He shrugs, suddenly seeming almost shy. “Like I said, I’m trying to be better. I think maybe . . . maybe it’s time to stop running.”

I meet his eyes, take a drink. “I’m building a life for myself,” I say quietly. “One that I can be proud of. If I just jump back in where we left off . . . I’m just not sure that’s a good idea, Robert. I don’t know that I really want it.”

I see the hurt but this time he doesn’t pull away or grow cold. “What do you want, Kasie?”

“I want to stand on my own two feet. I want to know what independence is. I want to . . . to pace myself. I only get one life, I want to savor it and make it count for something.”

“So we can’t pick up where we left off,” he says in a whisper, “because then your life wouldn’t count for something?”

“No, because we started it all wrong. If Dave and I tried to build a relationship based on conformity, you and I . . . we built a romance based on betrayal.”

He nods, twirls a card around on the table. “I thought you might say something like that. So I was thinking . . . what if we try for a do over?”

“Excuse me?”

“You know.” He smiles; it’s a boyish grin and endears me immediately. “We could do it right this time. Last time I met you I was in disguise in a way. I was hiding away everything that hinted at my . . . my sentimentality.”

I raise my eyebrow at that but don’t interrupt.

“I was hiding anything that could be seen as being warm or vulnerable. I was . . .”

“You were a stranger,” I finish for him.

He nods. “Yes. A stranger to you . . . and you were a stranger to yourself.”

I sigh as I relive the memory. “I let a stranger pick me up at a blackjack table.”

“Yes,” he says cautiously. “And now I’m asking if you’ll let a friend pick you up at a bar.”

I laugh. I can’t help it.

He meets my eyes and the way he looks at me . . . it just brings back all those old feelings. The excitement, the longing, the arousal, everything.

“You’re still my ocean,” he whispers.

I shake my head. “No,” I say.

His face falls, but again he doesn’t get angry. “All right then. I won’t try to pressure you—”

“I’m not your ocean,” I say. “But if tonight goes well, I might consider being your girlfriend.”

He stops.

And then his smile, bigger than the last one, it brightens up the whole room.

It brightens my heart.

Never taking his eyes off mine he waves the cocktail waitress over. “This scotch you just served us,” he says to her. “I’d like to buy a bottle to take up to a room.”

“Oh, we can’t do that.”

He takes out his wallet, puts $400 on the table. “I think maybe you can.”

The waitress hesitates only half a second before scooping up the money and then after a minute more, returning with a paper bag concealing a bottle of scotch.

We leave the bar quickly, head straight down a large hallway that leads to the lobby.

“I can’t believe—” I begin, but before I can finish, he pulls me to him. His arms are around me and he kisses me. His hands move gently through my hair, then up and down my back. My hands stay on his shoulders, squeezing hard, almost afraid to let go.

A couple of teenagers pass us. “Get a room!” One yells.

Robert pulls back slightly.

“That boy’s wise beyond his years.”

I giggle as he leads me the rest of the way to the front desk and hang back almost shyly as he checks us in, gets a key for a suite.

As I watch him give his information to the check-in clerk I have a moment’s pause. This is reckless . . . more reckless than that night in Vegas because now I know what I’m getting myself into. What if it all goes wrong again?

But when I turn my head, I catch my reflection in a mirror hanging on the wall. I recognize the reflection. I know who I am now.

I can’t be controlled anymore. I have the courage necessary to be my own person. The very fact that I’m even aware of this, can contemplate it and turn it over in my mind . . . it means something. It means that this time I’m not going to get lost.

And so when he turns, offers me his hand, I take it without hesitation, without trembling, and instead of letting him lead me I walk by his side. In minutes we’re in our room. This one is less grandiose than the one at the Venetian but it’s also warmer, its colors and lines are softer and compelling. He lifts me up into his arms like a princess in a fairy tale and then lays me down on the king-size bed so gently it makes me sigh.

Carefully he takes his place beside me, touches my cheek. “Kasie,” he says.

“Yes?”

“Promise me you won’t let any more strangers take you up to a hotel room, okay?”

I grab the pillow and hit him over the head with it. In a moment we’re rolling on the bed, laughing, our clothes tangling together as I kiss him again and again and again.

Finally he pins me down, pressing my arms into the mattress and smiling into my eyes before lowering himself to kiss my neck. “No perfume today.”

“Is that a problem?” I laugh.

“Not at all,” he says, his voice softer now. “I like the scent of you. Still . . .”

His voice fades and he rolls off of me. He rises and goes to the dresser where we placed the bottle of scotch and brings it back to the bed.

My eyes cloud over with the memory of the first time he had poured me a glass of scotch . . . back when he was still a stranger.

“You’re not joining me?” I had asked.

And he had smiled, his eyes filled with mystery and mischief. “Oh, I’ll be joining you.”

But now there is no glass. He simply sits on the edge of the bed, opens the bottle and dips his finger into it. When he draws it out it’s slick with the liquid. Carefully, he runs a cool finger against the tender flesh behind my ear; I lay perfectly still, knowing what’s coming, vibrating with anticipation.

He lowers his face into my hair and then I feel his tongue tickling my skin as he licks off the scotch, then nibbles on my earlobe, then tastes and teases until my breathing grows uneven and I reach for him.

But he pulls away. He’s not done marking me with this strange perfume.

“Take off your shirt,” he says quietly.

And I do.

There’s nothing stopping me this time. No guilt, no betrayal, no fear. I know what I want. I arch my back, allowing him to remove my bra. My nipples harden as he dabs them with scotch, and I groan as he flicks his tongue over them and grazes them with his teeth, his hands exploring my contours all the while.

He dips into the scotch once more, but this time he slides his finger into my mouth so I can taste the smooth, smoky liquor tinged with the salt of his skin. He draws his finger in and out as I gently suck and lick up the drops. His free hand moves between my legs, pressing up against my sex as I grab the fabric of his shirt. I writhe against the soft comforter beneath me as he strokes me.

He pulls back long enough to yank off his shirt and again I reach for him. This time he acquiesces and I pull him down. I guide him onto his back before climbing on top of him.

“My turn,” I whisper.

I pull off his belt, my eyes never leaving his. He fondles my breasts as I work on the buttons of his pants before pulling them off of him, then come the boxer briefs. I make my hand into a cup and pour in a small pool of scotch, as it drips between my fingers I coat his erection with the cooling liquid before enveloping him with the warmth of my mouth.

This is the taste I want.

He groans, slides his fingers into my hair as I devour him, sliding my lips up and down, my own hands roaming his body. I relish the feeling of my breasts pressing against his muscular thighs.

Robert once tried to make us like gods. But like the ancient Greeks, it’s the human form that I worship. He’s my Olympian and I cannot wait to possess him.

I release him, get up and slowly remove the rest of my clothes while he watches, his desire radiating across the distance that separates us. Just the intensity of his stare sends shivers of pleasure through my body. One look from this man, that’s all it takes to excite me. Is that normal? Really, will we
ever
be normal?

Maybe, maybe not. But maybe we don’t have to be. Now that we know how to do it, we can just be us.

I stand by the side of on the bed, now naked and oh so ready. Sitting up, again he presses his hand up between my legs, feels how wet I am. Standing, he leans forward and kisses me ever so gently before grabbing me roughly and throwing me back down on the bed. I like this, the enticing mix of tender romance and brutal passion. It’s
us
.

He lays on top of me, brings his face to mine, and kisses me again. I wrap my arms around him, press myself into him. His body is so familiar . . . it’s home.

Gently he turns me on my stomach and I stretch my arms over my head and open my legs for him, but only a little. I don’t say please this time, I don’t order him to perform. Instead I savor the kisses that are tracing a path across my shoulders, each one a little different, each one fueling my mounting fervor.

And when he finally does press inside of me, I gasp. No memory could ever compare to this feeling. I cross my ankles together, squeezing my walls tighter around his erection so I can feel every ridge, every pulse as we rock together creating our own quiet love song. I feel his tongue toying with my ear as his hands move back to my breasts, stroking them, making my nipples ever harder.

When he whispers my name, the world erupts.

But I want to see him; I want to see the real Robert Dade. The man so very few people have been allowed to see.

As if sensing that, he sits back on his knees, turns me on my side so I can look up at him. I’ve never seen him this open before. The way he’s looking at me . . . he loves me.

He loves me.

With one leg still extended along the bed I raise the other up in the air and rest it against his shoulder. I lift my arm and let my fingers gently touch his chest, coaxing him forward.

And there, kneeling before me on the bed, he enters me.

Looking into his eyes as he thrusts inside me, I feel dizzy with the overwhelming sensations shooting through my body. But even as the room spins I hold his gaze.

He caresses my thighs and as he continues, my happiness builds to indescribable ecstasy. I cry out as he brings me over the edge. My muscles contract around him my body trembles as he growls his approval. This feeling is so much better than any fantasy. This orgasm isn’t just intense . . .