Chapter 25
NOVA
Ileft Roman’s wings behind in the room of flesh. I found it poetic that way.
Wes carried me through the mansion. I stopped looking for Lorelei. All I saw was him.
Everything about the space had grown darker as the night progressed. Decorum and restraint had long faded. The demons were out to play, the hungry ghosts in search of satiation.
I didn’t protest when Wes carried me away from all of it—all of them. He set me down, and we collected our belongings from dutiful attendants in the foyer. I changed back into my dress in a downstairs bathroom.
Then we waited for our car on the steps outside. With my head resting on his shoulder, I watched a few fireflies spark to life in the distance.
“Why do you ride the subway, Wes?” I asked him as the black car pulled up the massive driveway.
“Because it’s real,” he answered. “I decided a long time ago I only wanted to pursue what was real.” He paused. “And… I love the subway.”
“That’s crazy.”
He shrugged, chuckling softly. “I don’t mind.”
When his lips brushed my forehead, a pleasurable shiver ran through me. I didn’t press him for more. He promised he would share himself with me this week, and I believed him.
In the car, exhaustion overtook me quickly, caused by an adrenaline crash somehow stronger than my unfathomable horniness.
Wes guided me to rest my head in his lap, draping his shirt over me like a blanket. It was warm from his body heat, and it smelled like him. I inhaled deeply, and Wes brushed his fingers through my hair.
As I drifted, I thought of the fear in Wes’s eyes—when I was taken away by the masked men, and when he found me after.
He’d waited for me there, just before the VIP section. Had he tried to get in? To follow me?
Something had happened to Wes to make him afraid, just like something had happened to me. Like something had happened to Lorelei.
The thoughts dissipated like fog over a country road. I melted into Wes’s soothing touch. My breathing slowed.
“I don’t deserve you,” Wes whispered, almost too quiet to hear.
I wasn’t sure if I was awake or asleep or somewhere between.
“But I’m afraid I’m going to take you anyway.”
The next morning, I awoke feeling like I’d been hit by a truck. For several minutes, I simply stared at my ceiling. Inara crawled all over me, meowing and pawing at my face like she’d gone days without food.
“Inara, do you not understand that Mother is having an existential crisis?” I asked her. “Actually, many crises, of the personal, collective, erotic, and socioeconomic varieties.”
Inara had been spayed and didn’t have to pay taxes, so she didn’t understand any of this.
I was terrified to check my phone, but part of me needed to see evidence that last night had really happened. Because as of right now, it felt more like a demented fever dream than real life.
Several texts populated my screen.
Hudson
You are in so much fucking trouble, young lady!!!
Oh shit, I totally may have forgotten to text him that I was alive, seeing as I fell asleep in Wes’s lap on the way home and then zombied my way through my nighttime routine before crashing for good.
I assumed Hudson and Delilah saw evidence of life from my bag by the door and the box of lingerie I’d left on the coffee table outside, hence why they’d allowed me to sleep peacefully.
Jayne
Archer and I are disappointed we didn’t talk more last night, but we’re pleased you and Wes seem to have hit it off. You’re a beautiful pairing. Dinner this week? Our treat.
My stomach twisted with dread. Were they inviting us, or were they inviting me? Either way, hard pass.
Maisy
Girl, you left way too early! The party had just started getting gooood. Archer organized a Sub Olympics, and there was soooo much drama, LOL. Let’s debrief this week.
What in the good God was a Sub Olympics? On second thought, I didn’t want to know.
I also missed seventy-two texts from The Circle girls group chat, which had been renamed overnight to Jayne’s Princesses.
Barf.
My heart skipped a beat, homing in on the last missed text from this morning.
Wes
Rest today. Hydrate. Meals with protein and healthy fats. No working. I’ll call you soon.
I’d already forgotten about the other texts. This text shone from my phone like a message from Gabriel, like gospel from on high. At least to my subconscious.
My conscious mind read the no working and greeted it with a huff and an eye roll. This was coming from a man who could afford a fifteen-thousand-dollar sex party ticket.
I had an editing job to finish, VidWave content to post, and readers to let down by writing a book they were going to hate.
With that lovely internal pep talk, I sprang from the bed. Inara let out one long, impressively loud meow as she ran to the door, which did nothing to help my burgeoning headache.
As I sped through my morning routine, I realized with great irritation that my body protested both thinking and moving.
Ugh. Maybe Wes was right.
The horror.
I turned my ringer on. Then, I turned it off, to be more nonchalant. Halfway through my second cup of coffee, I turned it back on, because I decided it was more nonchalant not to care about appearing nonchalant.
“What the hell!” were Hudson’s first words to me when he joined me in the living area.
I sipped my coffee. Inara trilled and rubbed against Hudson’s legs.
“Okay. I know. That was horrible of me. I had a lot on my mind—”
“A. Lot. On. Your. Mind.” Hudson’s nostrils flared. He crossed his arms, truly embodying an angry mother in a way that unsettled me. “You want to know what was on my mind?”
I winced. “No, not really,” I said. “But I can imagine. And I’m really sorry, Hudson. I fell asleep on the way home. I should’ve texted you immediately like I promised.”
Hudson huffed dramatically before turning toward the coffee machine. After the comforting screech of the machine had halted, he asked, “Well? Did she listen to reason?”
“Who?”
Hudson stared at me in utter bewilderment. “Who?” A vein in his forehead pulsed. “Who?” he repeated, louder this time.
Before he could continue his angry owl impression, I sheepishly set down my coffee. “Oh, yes, Lorelei.” I nodded. “She wasn’t there. It would seem I was led on a wild goose chase, for reasons I have yet to understand.”
Hudson sat down on the couch with his coffee, practicing his deep breathing. “Or, Lorelei got too wasted at the pregame to even make it to the party, as she is famously known to do.”
Fuck. Occam’s razor struck again. “Yeah, that sounds plausible.”
He raised his brows, his cunty expression slowly fading into reluctant eagerness. “Okay, well, what the hell happened then?”
Delilah burst from her room with a raised finger. “How dare you!”
A shirtless man with a six pack and no body hair trailed her, his expression that of an excited golden retriever. He shook out his luscious brown hair before he slipped his hands in his pockets and wordlessly stood next to Delilah at the front of the room. He nodded to us with an easygoing grin.
“You would debrief without me?” Delilah accused, still in makeup from the night before. Glitter and black smudges circled her eyes.
I pointed at Hudson. “He is the betrayer. I wasn’t going to answer his traitorous question.”
Hudson narrowed his eyes at me. “Oh, yeah, I’m sure.”
“Guess we’ll never know,” I sighed.
“Nova, spill!” Hudson and Delilah said at the same time.
The state school’s Phi Tau alumni gave up waiting for Delilah to introduce him. “Hi, I’m Bradley. I’m going to make omelets.”
“Thank you, Bradley,” I said, meeting the expectant eyes of my roommates.
“Where to begin. Um. Okay. So yes, there were notable figures there, but you all know how bad I am with faces. Oh, but I did overhear people saying that female rapper you both love was hooking up with a girl there, I forget her name, uhhh…”
“This is so painful,” Hudson said.
“Fine! People were getting pissed on! In a romantic way.”
Bradley halted his search of our fridge, slowly turning his head with a bewildered expression.
“And hogtied on dining tables. And hunted in a shrubbery maze. Sexually, not violently. But there was violence as well—consensual violence. Probably.”
“Probably?” Hudson repeated, eyes wide.
“Well, I don’t know! I wasn’t there for every pre-scene negotiation. And there was a lot going on. The outfits and the décor were insane. It was like an erotic fairy tale playground for the rich, truly. Lots of hole.”
Bradley stared at me again, mouth open. When I met his eyes, he quickly looked back to the stove.
Hudson laughed in spite of himself at the phrase lots of hole.
“What was the hole situation with Wes?” Delilah asked as she took a seat on a barstool, her smile far too eager.
“Wes didn’t show hole.”
Hudson snorted.
“We—we kissed,” I admitted.
Delilah clapped her hands with a small squeal. Hudson looked conflicted about this information.
I explained the auction scenario, leaving out the Roman Graves of it all. Which I did feel guilty about, but a slow reveal felt best when both of them were already gaping at me in horror.
“That’s so fucked,” Hudson said.
Bradley appeared scared to speak. He carefully cooked us breakfast, as if we were holding a gun to his head in some kind of Hinge hostage situation.
“Right!” I said to Hudson. “But getting anyone else to admit the auction was fucked up was impossible. I think sugar babies were using it as an opportunity to get paid on the side.”
“Yet you took part,” Hudson said self-righteously.
Defensive, my shoulders rose an inch. “To get into the VIP section, as I explained. I didn’t do anything with anyone. I just talked to an insufferable wealthy person for thirty minutes and watched others play.”
This was the truth… basically. Skepticism oozed from Hudson’s every pore.
“How much did you go for?” Delilah asked, glowing with intrigue.
I averted my eyes. “That’s not important,” I said quickly. “What is important is that I left that place with far more questions than answers. Again. Is it an exclusive kink community for the rich and powerful? Or is it a—”