18. Derek
I’m sitting on the couch facing the door when it opens.
She takes me in, looking concerned.
While I’m in a relaxed pose with my feet on the coffee table, my arms resting across the back of the couch on both sides, I’m shirtless, shoeless, in just a pair of jeans with the button undone.
“Close the door and come here,” I say.
She backs up. “This was a mistake.”
“Chloe, stop,” I order. “Come here.”
She backs away.
She’s halfway down the hall when I get to her, walking backwards, clumsily fumbling to pull the bottle of bear spray from her pocket.
She drops it before she hurriedly squats to grab it and then points it at me. “Don’t come any closer or this will burn your eyes badly. It might even blind you permanently.”
I stop two feet away. She’s full of it, but I need to calm her down.
“Why does my fingerprint get me in here, Derek? How do you know where Adam is? How did you know about the jam and the rye toast? You’re kind of freaking me out with this creepy shit, but I’m giving you a chance here to give me a reasonable explanation why I shouldn’t report you to the police. And before you make another move toward me, someone I know knows I’m here right now and the cops will be called if they don’t hear from me in fifteen minutes.”
“Creepy?” I ask.
“Yes, creepy!” she cries out, her pitch now soprano. “Why the fuck did my fingerprint open your doors, Derek?”
“You shouldn’t have called your friend. Pass me your phone.”
She jolts in surprise.
“Send the blonde a text message and tell her you’re good. That everything’s cool, you overreacted and misunderstood the threat, and you’ll call her later. You don’t want her or that lawyer buddy digging into me. I’ll forgive you this time for making that call, but don’t disobey me again, Chloe. And if you use the word totally in your text message I’ll have to act fast to do damage control and believe me, you don’t want that.”
Her body trembles. Her eyes widen. My cock hardens.
“Don’t be afraid. I won’t harm you,” I assure.
“I don’t understand why you’re doing whatever you’re doing,” she whispers, eyes filled with fear. She begins to back up again.
“Do what I’ve said, little bunny. I’m about to make another of your fantasies come true,” I tell her.
“Derek, you’re freaking me out. Let’s be rational here.”
“I’m as rational as I can be, believe me. Give me your phone. Here.” I reach out and snatch the spray and scoop her up into my arms.
She pulls in breath and I’m sure she’s about to scream, so I cup her mouth with a hand.
“Shh. Don’t be afraid. You’re okay. I’m not gonna hurt you.”
Grace’s car was outside when I got back, and I don’t need to run into her in this hall.
She tries to struggle in my grip, but I rush into my place, placating, “Don’t be afraid. This isn’t like that,” I tell her. “I’d never harm you, Chloe. Never.” I sit, tossing the spray to the other side of the couch while keeping her on my lap and reaching into her coat pocket, fetching her phone myself.
She watches me stop and erase the recording she’s been making of our conversation. I open up a message to Alannah and begin typing a reply while she stares at the screen.
So he wants more of what we had the other night and he’s making a good argument/being kind of irresistible so I’m gonna listen to what he has to say and talk this out with him. I misunderstood the threat and you’re right. He does investigate anyone he hooks up with to make sure they’re not bunny boilers. Call off your search for now. I’ll let you know if I want you digging further. K? I’ll call you later to explain more. Just messaging you from his bathroom. XOXO
Yes, I know the way she signs off. I’ve read her blog, a lot of her emails, her social media statuses and text messages, and I know how she writes texts to her best, rather breast friend. I can see she’s coming to grips with some things as I set the phone down on the coffee table and reach for mine.
I phone Kenny on speaker.
He answers on the first ring.
“Yeah, Derek?”
“You’re on speaker. Chloe will be leaving here at eleven. You’ll follow her to make sure she gets home safely?”
“Got it.”
I end the call and wrap my arms tighter around Chloe’s trembling body.
“Now,” I say, “I know you’re upset and confused, but I really wanna take you to bed and fuck you senseless for the next three or four hours.”
“No,” she whispers, looking terrified.
“Yeah, baby, I do. You’re lucky I even let you out of here Saturday. I wanted to keep you in bed all weekend. I knew you weren’t quite ready for that. Based on your behavior since then, I can see it’s time to take the reins here, so it’s what I’m doing. Let’s go to my bed so we can take the edge off. We’ll talk specifics after.”
She blinks at me, panic all over her pretty but currently pale face.
“Be my good girl, Chloe, or things will move at a pace you’re really not ready for.”
“What does that mean?” she asks.
“One step at a time. Tonight, we’re gonna have some fun. From here, I’ll figure out the pace. Your actions will dictate it at least partly. Okay?”
She shakes her head. “No. Not okay. None of this is okay. You’re freaking me out, Derek. I don’t understand what’s happening here. Why you’ve done all these things.”
“I promise you’re safe with me, Chloe.” I drop a kiss on her forehead, get up, and carry her toward the bedroom, leaving our phones where they are. “Nobody will keep you safer than I will.”
“Put me down. I’m leaving.”
“I’ve got plans for you.”
“Are you crazy?” she whispers.
I tip my head. “Dr. Jones called it antisocial personality disorder, though he proved himself to be a quack, so… We can talk about that all later. I don’t like talking about it so let’s build up to that. I’ll tell you whatever you wanna know about me eventually. But let’s get you on board first.”
“I’m not doing this,” she tells me as I set her down on the bed.
“You are,” I whisper and run my fingers through her hair.
“No, I’m not!” she shouts in my face. “And you need to leave me the fuck alone.”
“You are staying here for at least a few hours, Chloe,” I say calmly, “otherwise… something you don’t want to happen could happen.”
“Such as?”
“For example, the recording I have of you and Alannah Fisher talking at Downtown could be played for Adam Hallman.”
Her eyes widen with horror.
I ask, “You want him to hear you and your breast friend discuss him being your boring-ever-after? A potato with no seasoning? And beyond that, you want him to hear you tell your friend that I’m what was it? Forty-four thousand and sixty nine out of ten?”
Her jaw drops.
“Gotta say, that made me smile. I don’t do much of that. But every time I look at you, think about you, I find I’m doing it.” I run my hand up her leg. “It’s taken a lot of self-control to give you space until today.”
My fingers wander to undo the bottom button of her blouse.
She swats my hand. “There’s something seriously wrong with you.”
“Not gonna disagree,” I put in. “Now, are you gonna be my good girl or my bad girl tonight?”
Her gaze narrows.
I continue, “I know all about the good girl and the bad girl fantasies too, Chloe, and I’m more than happy to punish you for your transgressions in a way we’ll both enjoy.”
She’s perfectly still. Wide-eyed.
“Love your blog by the way,” I tack on.
Her lip trembles and I watch her eyes get shiny, then pretty tears drip out and trail down her cheeks.
“I’m fascinated by you. When I become fascinated by something, I need to dig deep, get well-versed. Now, are you my good girl, my bad girl, or will you be my punished girl tonight? You pick.”
Little lines appear over the bridge of her nose. “Punished?”
“Decide if you’re good or bad. Cooperate because if I choose punished because you don’t choose, I’ll take you to RJ’s Bar to meet up with Hallman and the three of us will have a chat.”
“You’re blackmailing me for sex,” she states.
“Like I said the other day, I want more of what we had. It was everything I didn’t know I was missing in life. So you’re gonna cooperate and give me more. You’re not gonna fuck anyone but me. No hall pass with anybody else, and I mean that. You don’t wanna test me on that. Although I think we both know that’s not who you are.”
“You really are certifiable,” she whispers.
I undo another button on her blouse. She doesn’t stop me.
“Yeah, you’re gonna be a good girl tonight, Chloe. Know what I think? You wanna be bad, deep down, but you don’t know how. You’re too sweet, too good. So guess what?”
She says nothing as I undo the third button.
“Let’s make this easy. This is my fault. Right now, I’m gonna make you be my good girl. So, blame me, curse my name after you scream it into my sheets or my skin, but you and me will know the truth.” I pause for effect. “You’ll secretly love it.”
I’ll bind her in my chains so she can actually be free. Give her everything she wants. And what she needs. Show her how much I want her, how far I’ll go to have her. Show her what she’s missing by staying with him.
“Are you wet for me, Chloe?” I shove her chest and she falls to her back on the bed.
“No,” she whispers the lie I’m about to prove.
“You don’t want him to hear all about you using the hall pass, do you?” I pull my zipper down. She watches. “Break his poor, fragile heart especially now that he’s so ecstatic about that new ride that gives him some freedom back?”
“You’re a terrible person,” she whispers.
“A terrible person who dropped twenty grand toward that new ride.” I stand up and drop the jeans and underwear, then climb back into bed. My cock is rock-hard. “Thirty if you count the ten grand you forked over to him.”
More shock registers on her face.
“Yeah, another sign pointing to how pure and sweet you are. Giving your bonus to him when you’re down to just four thousand and eleven dollars in your savings account. Only a little over two grand in your checking. Did you know he’s got more than triple what you’ve got saved right now? And that he’s got around forty k in bonds he didn’t cash in when you guys bought the house?”
She frowns.
“Didn’t think so. Didn’t think you knew you cleaned everything out to make your mortgage as low as possible when he held money back.”
“Why are you doing this? Why me?”
“Don’t know. Never been fascinated with another person this way before.” I shrug. “I get fixated on goals. Overheard that conversation in my bar and you became the goal.”
“Just like that?” she asks.
“Just like that,” I confirm.
She shakes her head skeptically. I watch her eyes, knowing she’s working through all the facts running through her brain right now.
“You’re not gonna do that to him, are you? Force my hand and make me play those recordings for him?”
Her expression contorts like I’ve said something hurtful.
“Naw. You’re gonna let me do what I want to you tonight, so I don’t tell him what you really think about his skills back when his dick still worked. Right?”
“You’re despicable,” she says sourly.
I chuckle. “Maybe. But I don’t feel bad about it. Especially not after the shit Hallman wrote about my family for one of the local rags he writes for. And anyway, an attractive, bad man making you bend to his will is one of your fantasies, after all, isn’t it? Serendipitous that you happened to be there intriguing me that night. You don’t believe in coincidence, do you? But you do believe in serendipity. You wrote that in your blog, too. One of the early entries when you didn’t know what the blog was about yet. Back before you loosened up and focused on sharing your sexual fantasies, including having an attractive bad man making you be a good girl...”
“It wasn’t real. I wrote most of what’s on there before I even met Adam. It no longer applies.”
“Lots of capture fantasies. Being taken hard. Talked dirty to. Being with someone who can’t get enough. Not what you wound up engaged to at all, am I right?”
“That’s an anonymous blog so nobody was meant to read it and I never intended to act on anything that’s in there. It’s just–”
“Bullshit.” I undo her jeans. “You’ll look back on this soon and realize you love it. I saw that fire light in your eyes last Friday when I did dirty things to your body, things you’ve wanted but never expected to happen outside the saucy books you read, those dirty fantasies you write down. You’ll feel bad about this a time or two, but my guess: it won’t take long before me commanding you to come to me will instantly soak your little panties.”
She shivers as I caress her face.
“You’ll come to me wet, Chloe, even as you pretend to be angry about me blackmailing you. I’m sure you can’t wrap your head around the fact that this is really happening to you, that your fantasy is coming true. You’ll get there. One day you’ll admit that your friend blurting all those personal secrets in my club was the best thing that ever happened to you. Right now, I’m gonna make you come. Hard. You already know what I can do to this sweet little body, don’t you? And I’ve gotta tell you, all those things we did barely scratch the surface of all the fantasies I’ve got, all the ways I want to fuck you.”
I shimmy her jeans down, pressing a kiss to her hip. She doesn’t protest, doesn’t move. But she’s got tears in her eyes. She looks sad. Afraid. It won’t last. I’m about to make her body light up.
“My good girl. You’re about to get two-for-one here, too, because I seem to remember an old blog post about a very demanding boss with big muscles making you do naughty secretary things in order to keep your job. Since I just bought the company that’s your biggest and now only client, here we go...” I flex my biceps, shooting her a wide grin.