Madame X (Madame X #1) (14 page)

Him.

The table holds two other couples, one a pair of celebrities, the other an elderly couple ignoring the auction completely. The chair beside Logan is empty, the place setting removed.

He lounges in his chair, a glass of red wine held by the stem in one hand. As the bidding continues, he lifts the glass as his signal, ruby liquid sloshing in the goblet.

The bidding reaches seven figures.

I need to look away, but I cannot.

He is a jaguar, all sleek and perfect features, compact, easy power held in repose, exuding threat simply by his mere existence. Blond hair like a fall of gold, swept back in kinked and wavy strands around his ears, the ends brushing his collar. Indigo eyes sweeping the room.

Finding me.

He does not look away. Even when he lifts his wine in a silent bid, he does not look away.

Neither do I.

You are beside me. Logan is across the room. Caleb Indigo is under my skin.

I have no pulse, no breath, no vital functions. All I am is sight, the war of nerves, the fire of need, the calcification of fear inside my throat.

“Friend of yours?” you ask, your voice low, pitched so only I can hear.

“No.” It is the only answer of which I am capable.

“You’re a better liar than that, X. I saw you two dancing.” You take a long swig of scotch. You have been drinking heavily. I worry. “Logan Ryder. I’ve heard of him.”

“Oh?” I endeavor to sound casual, and almost succeed.

But my eyes are still locked, pulled, hypnotized, drawn to the exotic gaze of the man across the room. I must look away or betray myself yet further. Only . . . I am incapable. Made weak.

My will is gutted by the memory of a near-kiss. I am shredded by the desire to finish it, to consummate the kiss.

“He’s kind of a mystery in the business world. Has his fingers in a dozen of the most lucrative pies in the city, but no one knows shit about him. Where he got his money, how much he’s worth, where he lives, nothing. Just showed up one day on the scene, investing here and there, in this and that. He’s got this uncanny knack for selling off right when the prices are best. He never comes to events like this, though. Total recluse.” You sound speculative. “He a client of yours?”

“No.”

“But you know him.”

“No, I really don’t.” I sound almost cool, almost even, almost believably casual.

You lean close. “I’ll give you your lie, Madame X. I owe you that much.”

“I’m not—”

“Just do me a favor, will you?”

“What’s that?” I force my gaze away, at long, long last, down to my empty plate. I am unaware of having eaten dessert, but there is nothing left except brown smears and crumbs. I feel his eyes still watching me from afar, even with my own closed, pinched shut.

“Quit pretending I don’t know you better than that. Quit pretending I didn’t see the way you two danced. You may not know each other, but you
want
to.”

“No, I don’t.”

“Don’t you, though?” Your eyes are sharp, too much so.

“No.” I swallow hard, force my eyes to yours. “I am loyal to Caleb. But I will agree to drop the subject if you will.”

“Fine with me.” You stand up. Extend your hand to mine, assist me to my feet. As soon as I’m upright, you let go. “I’ve had enough of this shit-show. Let’s go.”

“Very well.” I accomplish a miracle: I do not look back. Not once.

No Lot’s wife, I.

You, Thomas, and Len, you all three escort me out of the building. I am in the lead, escaping the hot confines of that building. Once we are out into the night, sirens howl and horns blare and eight people pass between me and the entrance in a gaggle talking, laughing, trailing clouds of cigarette smoke and gaiety. Fingers tangled in the gauzy crimson at my thighs, I bunch the skirts, lift them clear of the sidewalk. Stare out and up into the night sky, at the window squares, familiar buildings seen from an unfamiliar angle, yellow taxis in serried ranks. Stoplight, cycling from green to amber to red, the lights much larger and brighter from down here.

I ignore Thomas, ignore your questioning stare, ignore Len’s puzzled eyebrows raised in an arch. I stride away, skirts held around my ankles, heels clicking on the concrete. Freedom. Ripe, thick air in my lungs, noises in my ear.

The heel of my shoe catches in a crack in the sidewalk and I trip, one foot bare on the cold concrete now. I stumble, nearly hit the ground. But a hard body is there, an arm around my waist.

A door, propped open with a wedge, a suddenly familiar blast of scent: cinnamon, wine, and now cigarette smoke, strongly.

I look up, and there he is. “Cinderella. You all right?”

I cannot be this close to him. Cannot.

I turn away, intending to leave my shoe caught in the sidewalk. I have to get away from him before I kiss him. The need to taste his mouth is overwhelming, the need to feel his arms around me all-consuming.

“Your shoe.” He bends, retrieves my shoe, and hands it to me.

I slip it on my foot, and then Thomas is there, a huge hand gripping my upper arm, turning me in place. “It is time to return now, Madame X.”

I see a light in Logan’s eyes as Thomas gives away my name.

I walk beside Thomas back to the car.

Oh, I turn and look back. I must.

Place a foot in the car, a hand on the roof. Stare out over the long roof and sleek hood, watch the stoplight flash to bright green, the cars in a line accelerating. Another crowd of people passes under the awning, but this is an incidental crowd, none speaking to the others.

He is there, watching me intently, blond hair loose and wavy. A hand in his pants pocket, the other lifting a cigarette to his lips, an orange-glowing circle casting his eyes and forehead and sharp high cheekbones into brief illumination—a pause, and a pall of white smoke curling up and away and dissipating.

This is a vignette, seen in a quick glance, and then Thomas presses me gently but firmly down and into the car, the door closes with a soft
thunk
, and then he is out of sight as the Maybach rounds a corner.

I see him still, though, his eyes on me through the veil of smoke, seeing me, searching me, wanting me as much as I want him.

•   •   •

A
t my door, accompanied by Thomas, Len, and you, and I wish only for a quiet moment alone, a word with you. Instead, Len and Thomas linger in the elevator doorway, blocking it open, making it clear you will not be going inside with me, but away with them.

“Thank you for going with me this evening, Madame X.”

“You are welcome.” I offer you a small, tight, sad smile. “Good-bye, Jonathan. And good luck with your business.”

“You, too.” Your fingers move in your right hip pocket. “Wait.”

I pause with my door open. You approach me, take me by the shoulders, turn me around. You stand behind me. I feel you, hear your breathing. Something cold and heavy drapes against my breastbone. I look down, see a huge sapphire. The antique necklace you won in the auction.

“Jonathan—”

“Not up for debate, X.” Your hands work at the back of my neck, fixing the clasp. You step back. “There.”

I turn, and you smile. Nod.

“Why?” I ask.

You shrug, and there’s that smirk, that insouciant grin. “’Cause I can. Because I want to. It looks perfect on you.”

“Why did you buy it, Jonathan? Not for me, surely.”

That shrug again, less easy this time. “Because Dad was there. To make a point.”

“You spent a quarter million dollars to spite your father, to show him that you could, just because?”

“Yeah, basically.”

“That’s childish.” I reach up to unclasp the necklace.

“Maybe, yeah. But it’s my childish decision to make. Keep it, X. My gift to you.” Something in your voice, something in your eyes convinces me.

I lower my hands. Lift up on my toes, hug you briefly, platonically. “All right, Jonathan. In that case . . . thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” You salute me, index and middle fingers together, touched to your forehead. “See ya.”

And you’re gone.

I won’t see you again. I feel more sadness at this than I’d expected to.

Alone, finally, I stand at my favorite window. Watch the taxis and the delivery trucks pass, watch the nearest stoplight cycle
green-amber-red, feeling the memory of free air in my lungs, the sound of horns and sirens and voices, the smell of the city.

Indigo eyes.

Thumb on my cheekbone, lips on mine, some inexplicable knowledge of a secret forever passed in stolen moments in a men’s room, the feel of breath on my breath, a warm voice and strong gentle hands, the scent of cinnamon and cigarettes.

I want to cry for what I lost when I left that men’s room.

But I cannot, for I do not know what it was I lost, only that it is gone, and that it meant everything to
me.

I
wake suddenly and completely, sensing a presence. “Caleb.”

“X.”

It is black, totally. But I smell signature spicy cologne, hear a slight breath inhaled, exhaled. The shuffle of a foot on wood.

“What time is it, Caleb?”

“Three forty-six in the morning.”

I don’t sit up. I remain on my right side, facing away. I allow myself a touch of venom in my voice. “What do you want, Caleb?”

“I’ve had enough of your attitude. I said I was sorry. It’s over.” My bed dips. A hand on my hip, over the blanket.

“Am I not allowed my own anger, Caleb? You hurt me. You frightened me. And over what?”

“You don’t speak to me that way. You don’t question me.”

“Or you’ll strangle me? Like William did?”

“Or I will be angry. And that’s not a good place for me to be, not for anyone. Least of all for you. I didn’t mean to hurt you, X.”

“Yet you did, and I’m not okay with it,” I say.

I wish desperately to push the hand away, yet it slides up my waist, and fingers hook in the blanket. Draw it away. I’m cold now.

Huge, hard hand, pushing me to my back. I don’t resist. Not yet.

“Come on, X. Let it go.”

“Don’t you think I’ve tried? I can’t. I can’t just let it go, Caleb.” I finally sit up, wishing I could draw the blankets up around my chest, but they’ve been tossed aside, and it’s dark, and I don’t dare risk making physical contact.

“Goddammit. All of this because of that stupid bitch Sara.” Anger, raw and rife.

“Sara didn’t put her hands on my throat, Caleb.
You
did.”

“And am I never to be forgiven for it?”

“I don’t know.” I remember the taste of come in my mouth, that day.

The way my sexual service was just . . . expected. And given, so easily, without question. I despise myself. I loathe myself for dropping to my knees and putting my mouth on that waiting erection, for doing what I was told without question. Why did I do that? What am I, to offer such ready subservience?

Maybe this is all a refraction, everything distorted by my memory of a so-very-different touch on my skin, the way lips touched mine.

“No.” I say this firmly.

“No?” Amused now. “No, you’re not going to forgive me?”

“No.”

Hands on my arms, groping, seeking, finding the back of my head. Pulling me. Heat and heaviness hovering over me. “I think you will, X.”

“Caleb . . .” I squirm, trapped, claustrophobic, feeling his oppressive presence crushing me down and down and down to the bed, until I’m horizontal and hands are feathering over my skin, scraping
up the loose cotton of the T-shirt I wear as a nightgown, pushing it up around my throat, baring my breasts to the shadows. All is blackness, and heaviness, and my skin being touched. Palms, gentle but insistent. Fingers finding and tugging away my underwear.

“Caleb.” I find strength. “I don’t want this, Caleb.”

Lips, on my skin, at my belly. Hair tickling my hip. “Yes, you do.”

The problem is, my hormones remember what those hands can do. The damp slit between my thighs remembers what those fingers can do, what the erection I know is ready and waiting can do. I remember, and I feel the contradiction. The lies, tangled and mixed. I lie. I do want it. I know what happened was a moment of anger, isolated. And I know, too, that it may perhaps not be so isolated. Perhaps, if I ask the wrong question, say the wrong thing, wish for the impossible, maybe those hands that can offer such pleasure will offer pain once more. Pain as punishment. Another accidental moment of strangulation, even a fist, or an open palm. Who knows?

I remember also a stolen moment in a men’s restroom, and the sensation of utter safety.

Who am I, and what do I want?

Does it even matter what I want?

“See? I can smell you, X.” A nose, nuzzling my thighs apart, inhalation. “I smell it. You want this. You want me. You’ve always wanted me, and you always will. You know it, and I know it.”

I squirm, heels dig into the mattress, feel my hips lift off the bed at the wet swipe of a tongue. A thrill, lancing through me. Such pleasure, the tongue tip tickling and twirling at the precise spot where I’ll feel the most pleasure, zeroing in, flicking.

But stronger than the pleasure is the self-loathing. The hatred of myself for succumbing, for being weak, for giving in, for letting pleasure dictate my actions. For letting pleasure take away what little freedom I have.

I reach down, tangle my fingers in thick hair . . . and shove. “
No
, Caleb.” I twist, roll away.

Slide off the bed. Find the light switch, flick it on. Dark eyes, squinting against the sudden light. Mussed, imperfect black hair. A smear of my essence around the expressive mouth. T-shirt, suit slacks—tented.

Barefoot. Beautiful. Brutal.

How did I never see the brutality, before?

“X . . . what’s going on with you?”

I’m breaking. The status quo is crumbling. “I can’t help wanting you, Caleb. But I
can
help giving in to it.”

“Giving in to it? Like it’s forbidden, or something? Like there’s something wrong with you and I having sex?” A step around the bed, closer to me. Crowding me into a corner.

“What are we, Caleb? Who am I? What am I, to you? Where is all this going? Why am I . . .” I swallow, let out a breath. “Sometimes, Caleb . . . sometimes I feel like a prisoner here. I feel like your captive.”

A breath, harsh and long and shuddering. A hand passing down from forehead to chin. “X . . . come on, don’t be like this. This isn’t you. Why are you asking me these questions?” I’m up against a wall, and big hands land on either side of my face, framing me, hemming me in, trapping me. “You
died
, X. You have no one. You knew nothing of yourself. I taught you to walk again. Taught you to speak again. I taught you how to be a fucking
person
again. I gave you a home. Gave you a skill set. Gave you a job. Gave you a life.”

“And in return, all I have to do is have sex with you? Suck you off whenever you feel like it? Never ask questions? Never want more?”

“That’s not how it is, X.”

“It certainly feels like it, sometimes.”

“You’re wrong. We have something.” A breath on my cheekbone.

Dark eyes fraught with indecipherable emotion. I cannot read this face, cannot read those espresso-brown eyes. This, the proximity, the honesty, it’s new and disorienting. It’s as if a vein in the mountain has been opened, revealing a fissure, letting out long-pent pressure.

“What do we have, Caleb? Explain it to me.” Silence. “You saved me, yes. You’ve provided for me, yes. I remember all that. I have not forgotten. But this?” I put my hands out, touch hard pectoral muscles, move my hands between my body and the one opposite me. “I don’t know what we are. What this is. What you really want from me. I saw you with another woman. You’ve got a lot of women, you said as much. You visit women all over the city and you fuck them? And then you return here, to me, whenever you feel like you want something different, and you fuck me, too? But I’m not allowed to question that? I’m not allowed to even take a walk outside?”

“You have a panic attack just going outside. You wouldn’t know what to do out there, X. We tried, remember? You get overwhelmed. You stop breathing. I’m not keeping you prisoner, I’m keeping you safe.”

I do remember. The early days, there would be walks outside, in the city, on the sidewalks, afternoon crowds rushing past us. I’d make it a block, and then the noise and the heat and the countless faces and the babel of voices, the sirens, the cars . . . it all crashed down on me, slammed me to the ground, made my lungs seize and my eyes go dizzy, made the world spin and my head throb and I would have to be carried back inside until I could breathe again, safe in my room, in the darkness, with the mantra whispered in my ear:

You are Madame X. I am Caleb Indigo. I saved you from a bad man. You’re safe here. I’ll keep you safe. You are Madame X. I’m Caleb Indigo. You’re safe with me. I won’t ever let anyone hurt you again. It’s all just a bad dream now. You’re safe. You’re Madame X. I’m Caleb.

Suddenly it’s there, those words, that mantra, whispered in my ear, now, here and now, in my bedroom, in this moment. Reminding me, bringing me back to when the world was new, when I was being birthed into personhood. When I was relearning what language was, what it meant to speak and listen and walk and think and be alive.

“I am Madame X. You are Caleb.” I cannot help whispering it back. “You saved me. You taught me everything I am.”

“That’s right, X. You’re safe here.”

And, for the first time in six years, for the first time since the night of dreams and red-eyed monsters and blood, I feel a kiss pressed to my lips, soft and slow and hesitant, as if to kiss thus is as new both for the one kissing and for me.

I dare not even breathe until the lips pull away. Dare not. To breathe would be to inhale the poison of truth, mixed with confusion, laced with seduction.

I press palms to chest. Push.

“I have grown, Caleb. I have changed. I have learned new things. I am not at all sure of anything anymore. Least of all you and I.”

“Damn it, X.” This is hissed. “Don’t do this to me.”

A long, long silence. I do not move, for I cannot. The heavy, perfect body still hems me in, traps me against the wall of my bedroom, arms beside my ears, lips not quite touching mine.

“Don’t
do
this to me.” This is, very nearly, a plea.

I feel something sharp within me. I push again. Harder. Until the wall of chest and arms and thighs swivels away. I dart past heat and anger, slide into my bed, naked but for a thin cotton T-shirt whose hem just barely covers my backside. I turn away from the scrutinizing gaze. Breathe deeply, evenly.

“X?”

I do not answer.

A sigh. It sounds . . . sad. Forlorn. Lonely. Sharpness in me, something hard and callused. Something that remembers a moment in a men’s room, when I felt safe.

When a kiss made me feel . . .

Treasured.

I was changed in that stolen moment with a stranger.

And I cannot go
back.