Because He Torments Me (3 page)

***

“Where are we going?” I asked as we left the
store a few minutes later.
 
The poor
saleswoman had almost had a conniption when she found out we were leaving.
 
She gave me a suspicious look, like
she’d thought Callum and I had been having sex in the dressing room.
 
But I got the feeling she would have
turned the other cheek if she’d thought we were going to buy something.

“Lunch,” Callum said.
 

“I know lunch,” I said.
 
“But where?”

“The park.”

“You want to eat in Central Park?”

“Yes.”
 

“I haven’t been to the park yet,” I said,
delighted.

“You haven’t been to Central Park?”

“No.”

“Ever?”

“Ever.”

The side of his mouth twitched into a grin,
like he was happy he was going to get to experience the park with me for the
first time, and I told myself not to read too much into it.
 
“Walk or cab?”
 
he
asked.

I raised my eyebrows at him.
 
“You take cabs?”

He sighed, pretending to be exasperated with
me.
 
“Yes, Adriana, I take
cabs.
 
Contrary to popular belief, I
am not a complete snob.”
 

“When was the last time you took a cab?”

“Are you trying to catch me in a lie, Adriana?”

“When, Callum?”
 
I pushed.

He shrugged.
 
“Two years ago?”

I giggled.
 
“Wow, you really are a snob.”

He pulled his phone out.
 
“I’m calling my car.”

“No, no,” I said.
 
“Please, I want to walk.”
 
Now that he was here, in front of me,
after I’d thought I’d never see him again, I was nervous that he would
disappear before I was ready.
 
I
wanted to prolong my time with him for as long as possible.

“Tell me about your interview,” he said as we
fell into step next to each other.
 
“Was
there discussion about the death of traditional publishing?”

“No,” I said.
  
“And it wasn’t really an interview.
 
It was more of a formality.”

“You sound angry.”

“I’m not angry,” I said.
 
“I’m just confused.”

“About?”

“About why you did that.”
 
I glanced at him out of the corner of my
eye, his gait confident, his shoulders back, his legs forced to shorten their
stride in order for me to keep up with him.
 
He was just so good-looking.
 
It wasn’t fair.
 
How was I supposed to not lose my head
around him when he was so damn sexy?

“You wanted a job,” he said simply.
 
“I knew how to get you one.”

It wasn’t a satisfactory answer, and I
struggled to think of a response as we crossed Madison Avenue, hurrying to beat
the Don’t Walk sign.

And then there it was, Central Park, rising out
of the concrete jungle that was New York City.
 
It looked just as it did in the movies,
the lush trees, the green lawn, the stone bridges and walls.
 
Joggers dotted the winding jogging path,
tourists strolled by licking ice cream cones,
people
chatted on cell phones and stopped to take pictures.

The air smelled woodsy and clean, and the sounds
of a breeze ruffling through the trees and the stroke of rollerblades against
the path began to replace the traffic sounds coming from Fifth Avenue, which
flanked the park on its east side.

“It’s exactly how I pictured it,” I said,
looking around in wonder.

Callum laughed and shook his head.
 
“Oh, Lemon,” he said, amused.

 
We
continued walking through the park, past the statues and caricature artists,
the plaques and the Central Park Zoo.
 

Finally, Callum headed for a food cart.
 

“A hot dog stand?” I asked in surprise as we
joined the line.

“Best food in New York City,” Callum said as
the line inched forward.

“Really?”
 
I asked skeptically.

He looked over at me, raising his
eyebrows.
 
“Are you going to call me
a snob again, Lemon?
 
Because I don’t
know if my fragile ego can take it.”

I shrugged.
 
“With all the fancy places in New York,
I would have thought your favorite food in New York would be something
more…upscale.
 
You know, like that
place you took me the other day.”

“That was business.”

“And this isn’t?”

He didn’t answer me, and we lapsed into silence
as the line inched forward.
 

When it was our turn, he ordered for both of us
– hot dogs with spicy brown mustard, crispy crinkle cut fries, an order
of onion rings to share, and two icy cold bottles of water.

Callum had our food packed into a to-go bag and
we walked further into the park.

I still couldn’t get over all the activity–
street artists and performers, people on their lunch breaks eating from brown
paper lunch sacks, birds chirping and scavenging for crumbs, children on school
field trips.
 
It was alive and
exciting and I couldn’t believe I was a part of it.

All of the benches were full, so Callum bought
a blanket from a street vendor, and spread it out over the grass. I sat down
and he arranged my food in front of me, even going as far as to uncap my bottle
of water.

He sat there, just staring at me.

“What?”

“Try the food, Adriana.”

I took a bite of my hot dog.
 
“You’re right,” I said, nodding.
 
“Best hot dog I’ve ever had.”

He nodded in satisfaction and took a long pull
from his water.

“So your book,” I said, figuring it was safe subject
to start with. “What’s it about?”

He shrugged, then took his suit coat off and
loosened his tie.
 
His black button-down
hugged his broad chest, and I remembered seeing him shirtless, every muscle of
his bare chest and stomach seemingly chiseled from stone.
 
I shivered, even though the sun was high
in the sky, and it must have been at least seventy-five degrees out.
 
I felt like every woman in the park was
staring at him, even though I knew that had to be my imagination.

 
“Business,” he said.

“Yes, but what else?”

“My life.”

“Like your childhood and stuff?”

“No.”
 
He shook his head.
 
“My
philosophies.”

“Oh.”
 
My skin prickled with heat, and I took a sip of my water.
 
Being around Callum wasn’t helping my
body temperature, not even a little.
 
“And what are your philosophies?”

“The usual bullshit.”
 
He shrugged, like his business ideas
were no more important than any Joe
Schmo
off the
street.

I raised my eyebrows.
 
“There has to be more to it than that.
 
The catalog copy is promising all kinds
of business secrets from one of America’s most successful and youngest
billionaires.”

“You should know more than anyone that ad copy
is designed to sell books and has very little to do with the actual content of said
book.”
 

“Why should I know that more than anyone?”
 
I asked.

“Because you’re going to be working in
publicity.
 
It will be your job to
write that ad copy, at least for the catalog and the promotional materials.”

“And what I write can’t have anything to do
with what the book is about?”

“Not if you want to sell books.”

“So you’re saying I have to lie.”

“No, I’m saying people like to be promised
things, even if there’s no way you can deliver on those promises.”

A warm breeze blew through the park, ruffling
the trees overhead and casting long shadows across the green grass.
 
Callum’s tone had softened slightly, and
I had a feeling he was talking about more than ad copy.

I set my hot dog down in its paper container.
 
“Callum, why are we here?”

“Because I thought you would enjoy –”

“No.”
 
I shook my head.
 
“You told
me you never wanted to see me again, you made me
sign something
promising
I wouldn’t contact you.
 
And now
here you are, getting me a job interview, following me to Bloomingdale’s,
taking me to lunch.”

He looked away, and the sun dipped behind a
cloud, casting his features in shadow.
 
But I wasn’t going to let him off that easily.

“Callum.”

“Adriana,” he shot back cockily.

I waited a beat longer than necessary, giving
him a chance to explain further, to take back his one night rule, to tell me it
was a mistake, to tell me he wanted to see me again.

But he didn’t say any of those things.

Instead, he inched closer to me on the blanket.
 
His leg pressed against mine, and it was
the first time I’d been close enough to touch him all day.
 
My breath hitched, the moment stopping
in time, everything else in the park, every sound, every person,
every
movement ceasing to exist.
 

He reached over and brushed the back of his
hand over my cheek, his knuckles skimming down to my jaw.
 
His touch was familiar, the feel of his
hands on my skin both exciting and comforting.
 
His thumb grazed my bottom lip.

Heat rose on my cheeks, and I knew I was
blushing, knew my fair skin was betraying me once again.
 
I kept my eyes averted from his, because
I knew that was what he wanted, what he needed, hoping that my submission would
stir something inside of him, would cause him to decide he wanted to continue
seeing me.

I knew it was wrong, knew I should stay away
from him.
 
But he was like a drug,
taunting me, begging me to try it.
 
And I had, even though he’d warned me not to.
 
And now I was hooked, the need for him
on my mind constantly.
 
He’d turned
me into a junkie.

“Adriana,” he said gruffly.

But still, I kept my gaze averted.

I heard his breathing quicken, and I kept my
eyes on the grass, even though I wanted to see his face, wanted to see if I
could find any clue as to what he was thinking.

“Fuck, Adriana,” he said, and then his hand was
on my knee, inching the bottom of my skirt up, the material tickling my skin as
his fingers moved over my knee to my thigh.
 
He pushed the fabric higher, right here
in the park, in front of everyone.

I felt like he was daring me to stop him,
testing me, attempting to force me to be the one to finally put an end to this.
 
But I wouldn’t tell him to stop.
 
I didn’t want him to.

What I wanted, as crazy and insane as it was,
was to submit to him.

My desire for him overrode any of my reasonable
thoughts as his other hand moved over the hollow of my throat, skimming my
pulse point.

“Adriana,” he breathed.
 
“I cannot give you what you want, what
you deserve.”

“How do you know what I want?” I asked, and
then I couldn’t take it anymore.
 
I
raised my eyes to meet his.

As soon as I did, he took his hands from my
body, as if he’d been burned.
 
“You
deserve more than this, more than me,” he said.

“What does that even mean, Callum?”

“It means exactly what I just said.
 
That you deserve more than what I can
give you.”

“You mean more than being…your submissive?”
 
My mouth fumbled with the words, not
sure of the correct term but going off of what had been in the contract he’d
made me sign and the things I’d read about in books.

“I mean more than what I can give you.”
 
He sounded agitated now, his good mood
evaporating seemingly out of nowhere.
 

I swallowed, desperation filling me.
 
I reached for his hand.
 
“But you were… the other night, when
we…” I trailed off, trying to find the words to convince him that he was enough
for me.
 
“The way you held me,
Callum, that was – ”