Role Play (33 page)

I
hugged her tight, kissing her with abandon.

Chapter 30

Sierra

I
felt Vic holding back at first, but then he let go and I let go with him. I felt so bad for him. Now a dirty tow-headed boy replaced the snotty rich kid I had imagined him as a boy. Why didn’t he realize that people would respect him more to know he had made a success of his life despite such hardship? The rejection he suffered from his family had cut him deep.

Our kiss quickly caught fire.
As he picked me up and carried me to the bed, taking his time to strip off my stockings and kiss my legs all the way from my toes to my lips, I threw away restraint.

I couldn’t get enough of the way his skin felt, the hardened muscles
shifting underneath as I clung to him.

He was insatiable, and so intense in the way he watched
my every reaction, and drank in every moan and gasp. He seemed to take the most satisfaction in giving me pleasure.

The beauty of his eyes, pale gray-blue, so clear it was like
I could see inside his soul. It made me feel as if I was saving him, like the romantic movies that I loved.

Th
at feeling was more than pleasure as we rocked together, him quickening and then pausing to plunge as deep inside of me that he could, making me moan to be so filled. Building slowly, our bodies moving together, never stopping until pure sensation was rippling through me.

I
wanted him with a fierceness that I’d never imagined. All of him, not just his body and the feel of his hands on me, but his thoughts and emotions, too. I wanted to know everything about him, and it felt as if we balanced on the verge of something grand, tipping over into a passion that would unite us as one.

He looked into
my eyes, brighter than tears, as I arched my back. He started to come, and I knew it was because of me, that I was giving him that pleasure.

It sent me right over the edge.

...

When
I woke up in the morning, the sunlight was streaming through the big windows even though the loft faced west. I could hear the sleepy holiday traffic and distant sirens through the glass.

Vic was still
asleep, his thick bronzed lashes fringing his closed eyes.

I
looked down at him as he slept, and felt a swelling of love like I had never felt for anyone. I wished I could wipe away the past that haunted him. But I also wanted to talk to him about it, so that he would know he was finally understood and loved. I was ready to dive into the abyss with him if it would help him heal.

It was a miracle that
I had finally broken through to him. It hadn’t been planned, my sudden burst of tears last night. But when he said, “
You’re mine…
” I knew it wasn’t true. I could feel it in my heart, a sudden sharp pang, that there was something terrible standing between us.

Our
masks said it all. I wanted to take mine off, but he wanted to keep them on. At first it was so freeing to wear my mask to the Masquerade. It let me get beyond myself, enough so that I had let him cut off my thong in the bathroom in front of everyone and begged him to have sex with me right then and there.

He touch
ed me in ways I didn’t know existed, playing with my mind and emotions as much as my body. I would have done anything for him last night, and that’s why I kissed his boots.

Why did the thought of it make
me squirm and throb between my legs? It was so wrong, but it felt so right.

But in the end,
I couldn’t make love to him with our masks on. Not when he called me “mine.” Not when I wanted desperately for it to be true.

So he had to be honest, and he
did it for me. Because he wanted us to be together.

I
was reluctant to wake Vic, as much as I wanted to talk to him—I had tons of questions stored up for him. But he was sleeping soundly after our late night last night. I sneaked into the bathroom and then into the galley kitchen. Going quietly through the cabinets, I saw that Vic had run out of nearly everything. There was nothing I could throw together for breakfast, not even eggs.

I picked up my discarded costume from the floor and untied the gold cords so it was an ordinary long skirt again. And I tightened the neck of the blouse so it didn’t fall over my shoulders. Picking up the bronze corset, I carefully folded and smoothed it with the cords, laying it on his desk. Vic’s place was so compact there weren’t many places to put things.

I
took his keys and quietly let myself out of the loft. It was a beautiful morning, with the hottest weather of the summer safely past. The street was empty, probably because it was the long weekend, the last of the summer when so many people left the city. But things like holidays didn’t matter for a girl like me. I would be working tomorrow on Labor Day.

The corner deli had nice-looking lox, so
I ordered two toasted everything bagels with lox and cream cheese. And two large coffees.

I
was returning with our breakfast when I saw Dick. He was lurking between two cars, looking up at Vic’s windows.

I
stopped short.

A surge of anger made
me clench my fist in the bag. That asshole lied to me! Lied to my sister, too. Took advantage of us both. I remembered Lola in handcuffs with mascara smeared under her eyes, standing in the door to our apartment with Dick holding onto her arm. I was so scared that Lola was going to be arrested and ruin her life. I was so grateful to Dick, so pathetically grateful that he wanted to take care of Lola.

“
You! Dick!”  I marched toward him, juggling the bags while pulling my phone out of my purse and dialing 911. With my thumb poised over
send
, I ordered, “Get the
fuck
out of here! Or I’m calling the police.”

Dick raised his hands, caught off guard
with my approach from behind. “Sierra! Hey, wait… I tried to text you but you didn’t answer.”

“So you
come here to stalk me?”

“Your rich boyfriend will pay. Lola owes me two thou. You know
she does. Hell, I handed it over to
you
some months to cover rent.”

“That’s between you and Lola. I don’t live with her anymore.”
I pushed past him. “You better go now or I’m calling the cops. And I’m telling them you impersonated an officer. You handcuffed my sister and threatened to arrest her.”

He blanched. “
Hey, wait a second… You can’t do that.”

“Oh, yeah?
Consider it done.”

I
punched the number and when the operator came on, I said, “I want to report I’m being harassed by a man who identified himself—”

Dick eyes went wide
. He turned and abruptly ran off. His bulky body swayed back and forth as he scuttled around the corner. It served him right to run like a scared rabbit.

The dispatcher was asking
for my location. “I’m sorry,” I said. “He heard me and ran off. I don’t know where he is.”

As
I hung up with the dispatcher, I saw Vic standing in the doorway of his building. His hair was standing on end and he was wearing sweats and no shirt or shoes, like he had run down six flights of stairs to help me.

“Are you all right?” Vic demanded, coming up to
me panting and flushed.

I
was shaking. “Did you see Dick run when I called the cops? Like I lit a fire under him!”

Vic was shaking his head. “I saw you
two from the window. What happened?”

“He
asked for two thousand dollars. He says Lola owes it to him.”

“Then he better go ask Lola,” Vic muttered. “Wh
y’s he here looking for you?”

“He wants me to pay it
.” I wasn’t going to tell him about that “rich boyfriend” crack Dick had made. “I called him on lying about being a cop. The coward ran off.”

Vic had his arms around
me. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. But he looked like he had been punched, like he was in pain.

As
we went upstairs, I was proud of myself for confronting Dick and calling him on his shit. I was talking too much, keyed up, but Vic didn’t have much to say. At first I thought he was worried about me. I expected him to tell me to call the cops as soon as we got inside his place.

Instead,
Vic said, “I have to tell you something, Sierra. I should have told you last night.”

The pit of
my stomach dropped, the same way it felt when Dick told me Lola had broken up with him. Like another disaster was about to hit.

But
somehow I had known it all along. I wanted to believe in the fairy tale last night. But the Great Wall of China that separated me and Vic couldn’t be as easy to surmount as a revelation about a selfish teen-aged mother who refused to acknowledge her own son.

“What is it?”
I asked.

“I’m not rich.” His voice was flat, his eyes cold. “I’m not an airline executive. I’m a baggage handler
. I’m up for promotion to supervisor. It should come through next week.”

My
head shook slightly. “What do you mean? You’re not… what about this place?”

“I inherited it from Adrianne, my first girlfriend.
She was living here for ten years before I moved in so the rent is still cheap. She married an investment banker the week before she turned thirty, and she said it was because I wasn’t good enough for her. That I’d never be good enough.” He tightened his lips briefly. “I don’t have a house in Connecticut.”

Shocked,
my eyes went to the photo on the table behind his couch, but it wasn’t there. I hadn’t noticed that last night. It was gone. Like it never existed.

Vic
stood there, only wearing sweatpants hanging low off his hips. He looked gorgeous, but it was fake.

“You lied to me,”
I realized.

“I lied to everyone,” he agreed. “I give girls what they want—the billionaire lover who rocks their world.”

“It’s a
lie
.”

“
Of course it is! Do you really think you can start a relationship the way we did? You were wearing a disguise, and I was
Victor
.”

I
backed up a step. “You scared me because I called you
Jersey
. Because I saw through you.”

His chin jerked.
“Yeah.”

My heart was pounding too fast, and I felt like my world had been cut out from under me. I was hanging in midair, waiting for the hard drop.

E
verything had changed. But mentally I couldn’t catch up to figure out in what ways—except the shock that this man I trusted was not who he had pretended to be.

“No…” P
anic ripped through me, as I hoped that there was some way this could be fixed and everything could somehow go on. I didn’t want it to be true.

I
was falling in love with him…

“Sierra, please.”
He tried to reach for me, but I retreated to the door.

Slowly i
t was sinking in—he had been lying to me all along. Every time he talked about his life. Every times he looked into my eyes, he was hiding that lie. That’s why he didn’t take me out to dinner. That’s why he arranged it so we never talked. That’s why he kept disappearing.

I
had been making allowances for him, while he was taking advantage of me.

Everything was f
ounded on lies. Not some little lie told last week, a mistake in judgment, an aberration from the norm. This was the original lie, the game he had played with me from the start.

He
made me feel like I wasn’t good enough for him! Those times he had withdrawn, and I thought it was because I didn’t fit into his life. It was because he was lying to me. Manipulating me!

He used
me, while he had the nerve to act superior to me.

“You’re
worse
than Dick,” I told him, pulling open the door.

“Sierra, don’t go.” He stepped forward as if to stop
me, but I glared at him.

“Stay away from me,”
I said flatly. “Don’t call me. Don’t text me.”

I
ran when I reached the sidewalk. I couldn’t get away fast enough.

...

Later on, I couldn’t remember a thing about that subway ride. I came to and was sitting on the edge of the bed in my tiny room. I wasn’t even sure if I had seen any of my roommates when I came into the loft—it was a terrible blank.

Everything
Vic had ever said was suspect. What was true? What were lies?

You are mine…