Authors: Rebecca Chance
Until, finally, her jaw locked, clamping painfully, and she
had to pull back, massaging its points with her fingers, looking
guiltily down at Lykke, starfished on the bed like an unearthly,
wingless fairy fallen to earth.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said awkwardly. More firsts for her: both the
apology and the awkwardness. ‘Was that enough?’
Lykke’s long white torso started to ripple, from her shoulders to her hips, as if the bed had a heated roller, Shiatsu-massage
function. It took Victoria a few seconds to realise that Lykke
was laughing silently. One pale arm reached up, finding
Victoria’s hand, pulling her down on the coverlet beside her.
‘For this time, it’s enough,’ Lykke said, still laughing, turning
her head to look into Victoria’s eyes. ‘Since you have never
done this before, I’ll let you stop. But the next time, you must
do it for at least an hour.’
‘Oh!’ Victoria realised she was being teased. It was such an
unusual experience for her that it took her a little time to
process it. Her jaw relaxed into a smile, matching Lykke’s. She
reached out to stroke her lover’s wisps of hair back from her
forehead.
‘I did not come to see you because you gave me the photo
shoot,’ Lykke said very seriously, the dark blue that ringed the
paler blue of her irises deepening. ‘I came because I wanted to.’
‘Really?’ Victoria said. She wanted to tease Lykke back in
return, but the joshing, sarcastic words faded on her lips: she
couldn’t say them. There was something about Lykke, her
calm, centred, pale beauty, that hypnotised Victoria.
‘Yes,’ Lykke said simply, smoothing back Victoria’s hair in
her turn. ‘I wanted to very much. I was so happy when I saw
you today.’
‘I was too,’ Victoria mumbled, so quietly that Lykke could
barely hear her.
Lykke sensed that she had pushed Victoria far enough
beyond her normal limits of reserve; she fell silent, gazing
meditatively at Victoria, the faint flush that had suffused her
cheeks fading again, one blue vein still pulsing in her forehead.
Words tumbled through Victoria’s brain, a complicated tangle
of thoughts and impulses, things she wanted to say and
wouldn’t let herself. Lykke gave her all the time she needed,
watching her lover’s face, seeing it contort with confusion.
Finally Victoria said gruffly, ‘No one knows I’m pregnant
yet. Apart from my husband.’
‘I will not say a word,’ Lykke promised. Her gaze drifted
down Victoria’s body; her hand released Victoria’s and gently
cupped one breast, light as feathers on the sensitive skin. ‘I
want to see these in a month,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘When
they are a little bigger. And this, too.’ Her hand slid to Victoria’s
stomach.‘It will be very beautiful.’
‘Ugh.’ Victoria pulled a face. ‘Not to me.’
‘In my country, they say that pregnant women have even
better orgasms,’ Lykke said solemnly. ‘They feel it more. It is
very strong.’
Her hand slid even lower, stroking Victoria’s completelydepilated mound, the index finger rubbing just below it,
making Victoria arch to meet it.
‘One more time,’ Lykke whispered, rolling over on her side,
rolling Victoria on her side too, pushing against Victoria’s back,
spooning her. Victoria moaned softly, unable to resist, her legs
parting, the upper one falling back a little against Lykke to give
her just enough access.‘One more time, to make you sleep . . .’
‘Oh
God
.’
Victoria rocked against Lykke as she started to come. Her
eyes closed; she realised how exhausted she was, how very
much she wanted to fall asleep, coming, cradled against her
lover. She had never shared a bed willingly with anyone in her
life, never fallen asleep in anyone’s arms; but then, she had
never been wrapped around by such a sweet, cool body before,
never been touched so cleverly by delicate fingers, never realised how much she relished the smoothness of a woman’s skin.
She was asleep almost as soon as her last, drugging orgasm
slowly subsided, in a deep, blissful trance, her eyelids fluttering
gently, her lips parted, breathing regularly. Lykke lay, holding
her, for another ten minutes or so; then, very carefully, she slid
her hand off Victoria’s hip, and gathered the silk robe up,
wrapping it around her prone body. She slipped off the bed,
pulled on her clothes, and then lifted the edge of the coverlet,
folding it over the sleeping Victoria, tucking it under her chin,
pausing for a moment to look down at Victoria’s serene
features, before she trod quietly over to the wall and turned off
the light switches, plunging the suite into darkness. Easing
open the door, she shut it even more carefully behind her, to
avoid making any noise at all that might wake Victoria.
She padded towards the lifts, the Ugg boots soundless on
the garishly-patterned hotel carpet. Hotel corridors were long
at the best of times, and seemed even longer when there were
suites on each side; fewer doors to pass, because the rooms
were so much bigger. So the door that opened behind Lykke,
further down the corridor, was far enough away for her not to
hear it; the person opening it was just as quiet as she had been,
guiding it closed with the tiniest of clicks of latch into lock.
It was Emily, her clothes looking as if they’d been thrown
on in a wind tunnel, her long blonde hair tangled and messy.
Ludovic, the photographer, had convinced her a couple of
hours ago in the bar to slip away to his suite with him; Lykke
wasn’t anywhere to be found, and if he couldn’t have sex
with the model after a shoot, a pretty assistant editor was his
next choice.
Emily was walking carefully, carrying her shoes in one hand.
Barefoot, because her tights had been badly ripped earlier in
the evening. She was sore in all sorts of places, with a sour taste
in her mouth and stubble burn everywhere: Ludovic’s sexual
tastes were catholic, and he had insisted on doing exactly what
he wanted, in his preferred order of business. A
Style
junior
editor had tried to warn Emily away from him, but Emily had
assumed the editor was simply jealous because Ludovic was
famous, rich, and good-looking.
Well, Emily had found out the truth the hard way. And she
would try to warn the next girl she saw being singled out by
him, like a gazelle being picked out from the herd by a lion –
but she probably won’t believe me either, Emily thought
miserably. Why should she? I didn’t.
Her inner thighs were chafed, and would be bruised tomorrow. Her jaw was stiff, and her lips sore. She had a feeling there
would be a bite-mark showing on her breast tomorrow, too.
I’m not going to think about it any more, she told herself.
There’s nothing I can do – he’s famous and rich, and I’m not. All
the wagons will circle around him, and I’ll never work in fashion
again if I say one word about the things he made me do.
Turning to walk away, determinedly blinking back her tears,
Emily did a double-take at the sight of Lykke – the model who
had been sensible enough to avoid Ludovic’s attentions – walking away down the corridor with loose, easy grace, her back
turned. It was enough of a surprise for Emily to forget, at least
briefly, the unpleasant experience she had just been through.
Where was she coming from?
With dawning amazement,
Emily realised that the only door from which Lykke could
conceivably have exited was the one on the other side of the
corridor from Ludovic’s, a little further up, and that – she
scampered along to check, silent on her bare feet – it bore a
brass plaque without a number on it, simply the words
Presidential Suite
.
Oh my God!
If anything could conceivably alleviate what
had just happened to Emily, this piece of gossip could.
Lykke
and Victoria Glossop? There hadn’t been a single rumour about
Victoria being gay!
Lesbians were two a penny in the fashion
world, naturally, but Victoria was not only married, but well
known to have had a career-ladder-enabling fling with Jacob
Dupleix. This was genuinely juicy, A-class gossip, and Emily
clutched it to her chest in excitement.
She was puzzled, however, when she reached the end of the
corridor, which finished in a T-junction, and cautiously peeked
her head, very carefully, round the corner, to see that Lykke
had disappeared from sight. Lykke’s room wasn’t up on this
floor, which was suites-only; models didn’t get that kind of
luxury accommodation unless they were household names,
with their own advertising campaigns.
Emily knew she hadn’t heard the ding of the arriving elevator. And there wasn’t a fire exit to a staircase anywhere that
she could see. Emerging into the T-junction, she looked up and
down the corridors on either side: nothing. She pressed the
down button, her brain still racing.
She can’t possibly have gone into another suite
. . .
But Emily was wrong. At that moment Lykke was standing
in the sitting room of Mireille’s suite, further down the corridor past the bank of elevators, looking at its occupant. Having
let Lykke in, Mireille was re-seating herself on her sofa, her
long, white-streaked hair brushed out and flowing over her
shoulders. Wrapped in an ankle-length, green velvet dressinggown, she was sipping from a brandy snifter, the huge emerald
solitaire on her left hand flashing richly in the soft lamplight.
‘
Et alors
?’ she asked Lykke, her finely-plucked eyebrows
raising in interrogation. ‘You have been with her,
non
?’
Mireille smiled in anticipation, the smile of the Sphinx. She
crossed her legs, smoothing the velvet dressing-gown over her
thighs.
‘Tell me
everything
.’
oco was wearing the Max Mara sequin dress for her date
that evening. It hung a little looser on her now – she had
barely eaten anything for the last few days, ever since accepting the dinner invitation – but still looked wonderful. Besides,
when you wore a sequin dress, you didn’t need accessories,
which meant one less thing to worry about.
She had had it dry-cleaned, of course, since that night at
Xavier’s the week before; woken up at the crack of dawn,
sneaked out, leaving him sleeping, and retrieved her dress,
knickers and shoes from his kitchen floor, borrowing a
sweater of his to throw over the dress for decency. It was
still, quite obviously, the walk of shame, but one of the best
things about living in New York was that there was almost
always a cab instantly available, and she’d been able to nip
home before going into work and change into more appropriate work clothes.
The worst part had been giving Xavier his sweater back.
She had seriously considered being cowardly enough to put it
in a bag and leave it for him on the
Men’s Style
reception desk;
if she didn’t include a note, that would be a clear hint that she
considered the night before to have been a one-off.
But I’d be livid if a guy did that to me, she’d thought,
ashamed of herself. I can’t be that much of a bitch.
She had been debating what to do all day; should she ring
him, arrange to go out for a drink, to at least have the decency
to let him know face to face that she didn’t want to date him?
Of course, she thought hopefully, he might not be interested
in dating me either. Lots of guys seem all keen until they’ve got
what they wanted.
But she’d sensed that Xavier was more serious than that, and
she’d been right. That afternoon, he’d come up to the
Style
offices, beaming with excitement, trying to act cool in front of
Coco and the other junior fashion editors, nonchalantly leaning
against her new desk. Coco’s heart had sunk at the sight of him.
‘I just wandered by to officially congratulate you on your
promotion,’ he’d said casually, for the benefit of the girls
around her, but his dark eyes, lit up and shining, gave her a very
different message. ‘See where you’re hanging out now.’
‘O-oh!’ she’d stammered. ‘Thanks . . .’
And her tone of voice had been all Xavier had needed to
understand that things weren’t going to go as he had hoped.
Anyone used to swimming in the shark-infested waters of the
New York dating scene had developed finely tuned antennae
that could pick up the merest whisper, the faintest hint that
interest was fading and that they should protect themselves by
feigning indifference. All of the light had drained from his eyes,
leaving them flat and dull as black stones, and he’d pushed
back off the desk, standing straight up.
It had been horribly hard to watch. Coco had had to bite
the bullet.
‘Look,’ she’d said, grabbing the bag in which she’d put his
sweater, ‘let’s just walk out to reception for a second.’
‘No need,’ Xavier had muttered.
She had insisted on following him back to the lobby, where
she’d given him the sweater and mumbled a few words about
being really busy at work for the foreseeable future.
‘I just don’t have time for anything serious,’ she’d said, a lie
so old and hackneyed she was embarrassed to trot it out.
Awfully, Xavier had taken this as a possible opening: looking hopeful, he had said immediately, ‘Okay, I get that. You
just started a new job. But we could hang out, have fun
together, see where things take us. You’ll settle in on the fashion desk after a while, and then we could see if you have more
time . . .’ Then he’d met her eyes, and his voice had tailed off
as he’d read the ‘No’ in them.
‘You deserve better than me,’ Coco had said, another
pathetic brush-off that she’d have groaned at if a girlfriend had
recounted a one-night stand saying that to her the morning
after.
Xavier wasn’t a fool, or a pushy egotist. There had been no
more attempts to convince Coco to date him.
‘Thanks for bringing back the sweater,’ he’d said stiffly,
taking the bag, avoiding any further direct looks at her. ‘Best of
luck with the job, okay?’
‘You too,’ she’d said stupidly. ‘Maybe I’ll see you in the
canteen sometime.’ It was the final coup-de-grace, the ‘I’ll see
you around’ that really meant ‘I’m deleting your number from
my phone. Don’t call me’.
As he’d turned away, heading for the bank of elevators, it
was impossible for her not to notice the slump of his shoulders, which had been set back so proudly when he’d strolled
into Coco’s office – the pride of a man who, the night before,
had finally got the woman he was after back to his bed, and
knew that he’d done a damn good job of satisfying her while
she was there.
‘Aww, shame!’ Lucy had called out as Coco walked slowly
back to her desk, her face twisted up into a knot of guilt. ‘Did
you just kick X to the kerb?’
‘I’ll have him,’ Emily had said excitedly. ‘Seriously, Coco,
did you just tell him to get lost?’
Coco nodded gloomily. Lucy clicked her tongue, spinning
her chair round, putting her feet up on Emily’s desk so she
faced Coco.
‘No good in the sack?’ she asked. ‘His yin didn’t fit your
yang?’
‘Oh my God, small willy?’ Emily blurted out, wiggling her
little finger in the air.
Lucy slapped her finger down. ‘Shut up, you racist English
cow,’ she said affectionately. ‘Asian men don’t all have small
dicks, okay? Why don’t you screw a few and find out?’
‘I’m rather concentrating on black men at the moment,’
Emily giggled. She was having a torrid affair with the go-go
dancer from Urge. It was the classic case of a posh white girl
sowing her wild oats with a working-class black guy. Emily
was destined to settle down with a rich Piers or Toby or
Harry, pink-faced and braying. She was taking her fun while
she still could.
‘X was great,’ Coco had said, slumping into her own chair.
‘It’s just – he’s not what I’m looking for, okay?’
‘He’s one of the good guys,’ Lucy had said more seriously.
‘And there aren’t many of those in this city, let me tell you.’
She’s right, of course, Coco knew. But I can’t date Xavier
while I’m thinking, all the time, of Jacob.
‘Coco!’ It was Alyssa, dashing over to her desk, looking panicky.
‘Oh God, what is it now?’ Coco said. ‘Has she run out of
linting tape? I told you to stock the cupboard with tons of it.’
‘No, she wants to see you – now! Come on – oh shit, my
phone’s ringing.’
Alyssa shot back to Victoria’s office, and Coco followed at
high speed, glad to get away from Lucy, who was making her
feel even guiltier.You never, ever kept Victoria waiting.Victoria
was pacing her office, looking even more fearsome than usual,
and it was all Coco could do not to run to the built-in fridge
and placate her with a glass of Fiji water and lime.
But I’m not her assistant any more. That’s not my job. I’m a
junior fashion editor now. Alyssa has to get her water
.