Chapter 2
TWO
Val didn’t know how she got home, only that she’d found herself sitting at her desk, staring at her reflection in the dark monitors in front of her. She’d taken the day off of work to prepare for the evening, picking her outfit—a pair of relaxed fit jeans, a dark green turtleneck, a color her mother once said brought out the color in her eyes, and a pair of black and white Chucks—psyching herself up for her first face-to-face with the man she loved, and cleaning up her house just in case he wanted to come back to her place to…talk.
All of the preparation was wasted. And now, she was sitting at her desk, wondering if she should just act like she’d never been at Cool Hands, had never seen or heard what she did…that her heart didn’t break. Could she get on their chat tomorrow and act like nothing had changed, knowing everything had? Was she that desperate to be loved that she was willing to ignore his lies just to keeping speaking with him, keep fantasizing about when they would finally be together?
He doesn’t deserve another second of your time, Val, a raspy, neglected voice in the back of her mind grated.
But…what if tonight was just a mistake. Maybe this was the first time in forty-eight days he’d taken someone home. Maybe he wasn’t really planning to have sex with her, maybe they were going to film one of those scenes for his OnlyFans, the ones where they look like they were going to fuck but they didn’t.
Can you hear yourself, you fucking moron? This was another voice, one she heard often, the voice that was always there, always picking away at her self-esteem. The voice of brutal truth. Because she was a moron.
That pathetic, hopeful loser inside of her desperately wanted the night to have all been a nightmare. The things Red said in that booth to his brothers…they couldn’t be true. He’d told her he’d wait for her, that he wanted her, wanted to be with her, to start something special with her—he’d told her that during a video chat, his expression sincere, his words ringing with veracity and warmth.
But we both know he’s good at putting on a scene for the camera. There was that voice of truth again.
Struck by those words, the ones she’d known at the depths of her being, she exhaled heavily.
She had to know for sure.
Her hands moving with long stored muscle memory, she turned on her computer, clicked through her bookmarks to Redtube’s OnlyFan’s account, and began watching the videos from the beginning.
Blue.
Black.
Sparkly pink.
Red.
Orange.
Two more black.
White.
Two more red.
Again and again, she clicked, watched, and counted.
With each video, the number and variety of hair ties accumulating on his dark gray bedpost grew.
Finally, she clicked on his most recent video, one he’d uploaded two days ago, a week after the last one was posted. Yeah, she was a na?ve fool to think he was just “acting”, that he was just giving subscribers what they wanted, playing the part of the gluttonous thirst trap, seducing the woman in the scene with him, that the “acting” stopped when the camera turned off, that the two players would go their separate ways, and Red would spend the rest of the night thinking of Val, wishing he could be with her, waiting for her….
Sucking in a deep breath, holding it, Val clicked PLAY.
The tears burning the backs of her eyes broke loose and cascaded down her cheeks. Ravaged sobs built, then exploded from her chest.
There were five new hair ties on his bedpost.
Her thoughts screaming, her heart racing, her body stiff and numb at the same time, she couldn’t tear her gaze from the screen. She couldn’t stop watching.
“Shut the fuck up and take that dick like a good girl…” the deep, rumbling, sex voice pouring from the speakers made all her girly bits ache despite the much sharper ache in her chest. That voice, the images on the screen…they were sexy, sensual, and naughty as fuck. Even an inexperienced weirdo like her could agree that what she was seeing made her thirsty as hell—which was the point of the videos—him turning people on to make himself feel good. Her heart, on the other hand, ached for a different reason, and she found that her mouth was dry, her throat was tight, and the tears running unfettered down her cheeks were dripping onto her chest.
He is doing this again, right now, with the blonde.
This was the way he made money while living out his exhibitionist kink; making women all over the world cream their panties by simply shedding all of his clothes, revealing that cut, tanned, tattooed body with those jacked abs, that lickable V of muscles, and a perfect sprinkling of dark hair. Right then, the camera showed him naked, straddling the naked woman on the mattress, with a deep red devil mask perfectly positioned over his face. The camera angles, the way the blankets were placed, the shadows, and how the couple in the bed moved gave the illusion of what was going on without actually showing the “goods.” That was the tease, though, show them what they wanted to see…but keep the best part hidden, like a treasure only the truly worthy would ever get to gaze upon.
Apparently that blonde…and all those other women, were worthy because they got to see everything, touch everything, experience everything.
And that would never be her.
In the video on her screen, he’d brought another woman—it was never the same one—in front of the cameras for a little “play time” for his OnlyFans…fans. He strategically placed the camera, the bed, and the action in such a way that it didn’t show anything that could otherwise be uploaded to PornHub or…Redtube.com—the website from which he’d gotten his road name.
Having seen these videos before, having seen his content on Insta and TikTok, his promise of waiting for her, of treating her special, should have been a huge red flag—no pun intended.
Not that she had any say in whether or not he took another woman to his bed, but after long nights of talking with him, sharing with him, knowing him—like no other woman did—she, foolishly, believed that things would be different.
When would she learn?
When would she finally convince herself that what they had, what she wanted them to be, would never happen? And not just because the man she loved was a manwhore who had an exhibitionist kink, it was also because he had no idea what she looked like…and if he ever did, he’d never talk to her again.
Do you even want to talk to him again?
He lied to you.
He betrayed you.
He used you to make himself feel good —because for what other reason would he befriend her, talk with her, tell her all the things she wanted to hear if not for her to praise him, adore him, tell him everything he wanted to hear?
Could she really continue the charade of “friendship” now that she knew he never intended to make good on his promise to wait for her?
Could she cut him off, go no contact, with the man she loved?
A man who obviously doesn’t love you back or he wouldn’t be fucking the blonde right now after lying to your face about keeping his dick in his pants.
She sucked in a hard breath, her chest expanding painfully, and dropped her trembling hands into her lap. Her fingers brushed against her belly…where the biggest scars were. Even through the material of her t-shirt, she could feel the strange roughness of the ruined flesh, flesh that had been ripped, then burned away, leaving devastating wounds from her sternum to her belly button. Clothed, she looked like every other chubby, socially awkward computer nerd. But naked…God…she hated looking at herself naked…. Naked, she looked like a horror show, complete with lumpy raised, red skin, and pale scarred flesh.
At twelve, she’d been shy but eager, uncertain but excited, loved and loving. Now, twelve years later, she was a shell of the girl she should have been…if that car hadn’t slammed into theirs.
Shaking away the impending memories, Val stared down at her hands.
With those hands, she’s made a career for herself as a white hat cyber security expert—AKA a hacker, but all her assignments were legal. With those hands, she’d broken into some of the most secure corporate and government systems in the world. With those hands, and the work she’d done, she’d amassed enough money she could buy whatever her heart desired and still have millions left over. But that wasn’t what she’d been the proudest of just yesterday, because with those hands, she’d met, befriended, and fell in love with Damian Daniels, Redtube, MC tech guru.
And tomorrow, those same hands would…. Would what? Was she really prepared to give up hope altogether, to cut him off, to forget him and try to move on?
He doesn’t want you like you want him.
He has been playing you to make himself feel good.
He will play you until he gets bored and then he’ll cut you off.
You know the truth, about his lies, how can you actually sit there tomorrow, chatting with him like nothing has changed, when everything has changed?
Could she really talk with him, hearing his voice, remembering what that voice said in all those videos with all those women…and those hair ties? Could she really be happy acting like he hadn’t lied, acting like they were actually building something special, that one day they would be together, like he hadn’t been breaking his one promise to her even right fucking now with that goddamn blonde?
Her body shaking uncontrollably, her throat closing tight against the burn of tears, and her heart racing, she lifted her gaze to the screen once more, her attention catching on the frozen image of the man she loved, his hands fisted in another woman’s hair, as she forced her to her knees.
“I’ll wait for you, my Daisy…” he’d said, such sincerity in his voice, but those words could not drown out that same voice demanding another woman pleasure him. A woman who wasn’t her.
Because it wasn’t her he wanted.
He’d lied.
And she had her answer.