THIRTY Tightie-Whities
E LLIANA: DECEMBER
Despite making positive strides by reconnecting with Tristan, I don’t go to work the entire last week and a half of November. I feel terrible about shirking my responsibilities, but I can’t face clicking my way up those stairs to a place I’ve considered my Holy of Holies only to remember it as desecrated and stained.
I used to do magic up there. I used to create the exquisite, rare, and exceptional. But now, thinking about entering that room makes me sick to my stomach with fear.
And that infuriates me to the point of taking action.
I’ve never let what has made me afraid rule my decisions. I’m not one to be cowed or intimidated. So despite my physical repulsion to being there, I force myself to return despite the bile churning in my gut.
When I go in on Tuesday—Andre’s day off—Jackson insists on going with me. He winds up staying from open to close, too. He makes some excuse about Tristan’s dark mood getting on his nerves, but I know the truth.
Jackson is accompanying me to work because he knows I’m struggling. As much as I wish it wasn’t necessary, I appreciate it. It’s nice to have the moral support, especially when I didn’t have to ask for it.
Still, I only pretend to accomplish anything. I can’t focus on designing. Two of my part-timers are downstairs tending to the shop, yet every errant squeak and stirring of the breeze outside makes me jump. I’m being paranoid as hell, and if Jackson hadn’t come here to divert my attention every time I get spooked, I don’t know how I would be coping right now.
Not as well. That’s for damn sure.
Exasperated with myself, I put on my bravest “come at me motherfucka” attitude, don my optivisors again, and attach a smooth piece of opal onto a pendant. This is rudimentary shit. It’s neither intricate nor bold, the pair of styles I tend to favor. But a couple of hours later, it’s hanging on a chain, complete.
Can I give myself a gold star just for achieving the bare minimum?
I take an early lunch during which Jackson and I go out to the Chinese place that sits kitty-corner to Blingblang and therefore keeps it in view. It’s convenient enough that I can help cover any influxes should the store have some extreme uptick in business. We sit along the window keeping an eye on things, and I scrutinize every single person on the sidewalk that passes by.
Are you the bastard pulling this crap?
How about you?
Only when Jackson asks me something I totally miss do I realize what a basket case I’m being.
“I’m sorry. What did you say?”
“I just wanted to know if your beef broccoli is any good.”
“Yummy in my tummy,” I tell him, but that’s bullshit. I’ve eaten half of the dish without even tasting it.
It occurs to me that lunch is customarily our time to literally bang things out, but I haven’t been in the mood. This isn’t my normal modus operandi. I’m consistently horny. Even back when I had a cycle and more hormonal ups and downs prior to having my IUD placed, my libido ran to boiling. Yet I’ve gone three consecutive days without fucking any of my trio of men.
Men I sought out for that specific purpose.
What the hell is the matter with me?
I allow Jackson to finish my leftovers—I’m not hungry—then the second he’s done, rise from the table anxious to get back. I’m bound and determined to return to my regularly scheduled habits. I can’t let the son of a bitch who’s lining up to be my would-be stalker shake me up like this.
So, once we’re back upstairs, I close and lock the door. Then, I seize Jackson by his lapels.
“Do me. Do me right here against the fucking door.”
Jackson being Jackson has zero compunctions about picking up the gauntlet I’ve thrown down. “At your service, sweet thing.”
This particular lover of mine is known for never wearing any skivvies, so as he peels off his shirt and jeans and I see what he has on, I squint at him. “Tightie-Whities, Jackson? You?”
“These button flies have a seam that’s irritating, so sue me.”
“This is just...” I regard him as he pauses long enough to model them for me. Like everything else, he does this with panache. “So old school of you.”
“You don’t think they do nice things for my package?” His hand is over his heart as if he’s faux hurt, and I laugh.
“That they do. But it’s time for them to go.”
He obliges, peeling them off and going full Monty on me. Already, he’s ramrod straight and pointing at me. When I caress him, a clear drop of precum materializes at his slit. In a hurry, I spread it around his head with a finger and feel the space between my legs growing slick.
I reach beneath my skirt about to discard my panties, some simple light blue and navy polka dot bikinis, when he whispers in my ear.
“Leave them on.”
I’m about to protest when he pins my back to the door, slides the cotton crotch to the side, and enters me all at once.
“Sweet baby Jesus, yes ,” I groan out softly, all the noise in my head instantly drowned out. This is what I need. It’s what I’ve needed all along as I brace myself on his broad shoulders and feel his hips pressing back and forth as this phenomenal cock of his fills me all the way up.
There’s something delightfully decadent about me being fully dressed—I’ve taken not one single garment off—while Jackson is bare-assed. Maybe it’s the illusion that I could go from his cock buried inside me to greeting the next customer to walk in, but it spurs me on to new heights.
That, in combination with my lack of getting any over the past few days, makes achieving our objective remarkably swift. And in the next minute and a half, I’m coming despite him just having started plowing into me.
“Fucking Christ, that was fast.” Jackson keeps going, and he must’ve been whacking off in the interim because he holds out until I climax a second time before allowing himself to come.
The man is the Rock of Gibraltar when he wants to be.
And that’s... wow.
I have a weak and wiggly lower half that I don’t trust to carry me, so we stay that way for at least a minute as the sensation in my legs returns.
“Better?” he asks, smirking. He already knows my reply, the coy fucker.
“You know it is.”
His smirk deepens. “Yeah, I do.”
I snort at him because if there’s anything Jackson loves more than sex it’s getting a compliment. Yet my humor somehow morphs into something far more irksome as tears crest in my eyes and slide in hot streams down my cheeks. Worse, they not only won’t quit, my chest adds sobs into the mix, as well as a bawling cry I can’t quite keep muffled so he won’t hear.
The humiliation trifecta.
“Aww, Elliana honey, it’s gonna be okay.” I know it’s bad now. He’s never referred to me as “Elliana honey” before. And still, I can’t stop blubbering like a baby.
So, still naked, Jackson stands there rocking me in his strong and steady grasp until I manage to regain control of my composure. It’s a much longer interlude than I care to admit.
“Why me, Jackson? Why is someone targeting me?”
“I don’t know. But if I did, you wouldn’t be troubled by whoever it is ever again.”
I stare at him, checking to see if he’s joking, but he’s not. He’s nowhere even close to amused right now. And Jesus, such an upsurge of affection and appreciation for him rolls over me that it steals my breath. In truth, those feelings don’t only extend to him, but to all my guys. I adore all of them, and not as employees or contractors.
Not as fuck buddies or friends with benefits, either. No, my emotions toward them run deeper and truer. As rough as times have been lately, having them around makes everything a million times less terrible. Yet my time with them has an expiration date. I even know when it’ll land on the calendar.
January fifteenth.
It’s like the weeks are accelerating as they zoom past at lightspeed. Why couldn’t I have met all of them in the wild, so to speak? I know it would’ve been next to impossible, but I want all three of them to stay with me for a long time. Maybe longer than a long time.
I just wish the weight of me hiring them didn’t have to be over their heads. It makes any long-term romantic relationship untenable due to the power dynamic.
Is that what this is?
A romance?
Deep down, I’ve been feeling tenderness and loyalty for each of these men for a while now. This could even be bordering on love if such a thing were feasible. It’s not, though. It’s unlikely any of these guys feel the same. Which leaves me in a devastating quandary.
If I renew their contracts, they’ll stay, which would be what I want. But even if I try to cultivate a true and abiding romance with them all, I’ll have to ask myself if they genuinely love me or if they’re only in it to get paid.
By me.
I’m falling for these men, but there’s hardly any likelihood that they could ever reciprocate.
Jackson pushes a long lock of my hair behind the shell of my ear, and I trail my fingers along the R in his Rosie tattoo.
“What are you going to do when this ends?” I ask him.
“When what ends, honey?”
“When this contract with Elegance ends?”
He goes so stationary that he might’ve ceased breathing. It’s as if Medusa just turned him to stone. When he doesn’t reply, I prompt him. “Jackson?”
That finally unsticks him, and he peers at me, his expression so solemn that he doesn’t even resemble the playful and mischievous musician I know.
“Well, Elliana, that’ll be up to you, won’t it.”