3. Gotham
Chapter three
Gotham
‘Can anyone explain how KIT inhibitors halt oncogenic survival and how this mechanism differs from that of PDGFRA inhibitors?’ Greta’s voice projected confidently across the auditorium.
Holding her glasses by the arms, she pressed her other hand firmly into the lectern. As always, she was every bit the powerhouse. Dark hair flowing loose, kissing the shoulders of her silk blouse, tucked neatly into wide-legged trousers that rested perfectly over her heels.
A sea of blank faces stared back. During the Pandemic, she had pined for this proximity, but the strong human presence now often offered nothing but an irritating silence.
Behind her, the massive screen lit up the faces of the first few rows of PhD students.
Greta tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and raised an expectant eyebrow.
Huffing out a breath, she tilted her head as she slid her round tortoiseshell glasses back on. ‘Nobody?’ Still nothing. ‘Well, in that case, this might be a good place to stop, at least until one of you actually has something to offer.’
Her sigh reverberated through the speakers and bounced off every surface.
She waited one more beat. The lecture had fifteen minutes left on the clock, but Greta had precisely zero fucks to give for non-participation; her time was far too valuable to spend it being blinked at.
She didn't bother hiding her eyeroll as she began to gather her things.
Snapping her laptop shut, a ripple of uneasy glances moved through the auditorium.
The students waited for the punchline, but it never came.
Instead, they watched in stunned silence as she draped her jacket over one arm and gripped her laptop bag with the other.
She stepped off the platform, dipping for her small holdall in one fluid motion, and disappeared through the exit.
Only then did the room erupt into a frantic hum of mutters and nervous giggles.
Today was not the day to antagonise Greta.
A week of restless sleep had left her nerves frayed.
She had been unable to silence the incessant chattering monkeys in her head, and they had spent far too many hours whispering about Remi.
The meeting with Remi at Hotel Gotham was later than usual to accommodate the lecture she had just given, a scheduling conflict she would rarely allow.
As her Uber crawled across the city, the stagnant Friday afternoon traffic did nothing to tamp down her annoyance.
By the time the facade of the art deco hotel loomed into view, Greta was seething.
Upon entering the grand but intimate hotel lobby, she was greeted by the polite hotel reception staff who obligingly checked her in, confirming that, yes, the hotel Wi-Fi was problem-free, so her international work call would not be jeopardised.
Greta requested that a bottle of Champagne be delivered to her room as soon as possible.
Not, she thought, conducive to fake international work calls, but she also felt uncharacteristically less inclined to care.
She didn’t usually drink when she met with Remi, but today, she needed to take the edge off.
The hotel lobby was so incredibly small that Remi, arriving shortly afterwards—she realised as she scanned the space—would be glaringly obvious but her fatigue had clearly weighed heavily on her decision making that week.
Instructions had already been sent to the agency. Remi was to arrive already strapped, dressed in dark blue tailored trousers, a crisp, high-collared white shirt, and a waistcoat. Lube was to be ready in her pocket—Margot had no patience for fumbling—alongside the remote for the built-in vibrator.
Turning to face the full-length mirror, Greta sipped her champagne, the cool effervescence tingling against her lips and tongue.
The amber light from the geometric glass lamps bathed the Gatsby-esque room in a sultry glow that felt worlds away from the university’s fluorescent harshness.
Beneath her, the black and white herringbone floor was striking and sharp.
The room was a plethora of bold colour and texture.
Gold curtains draped against floor-to-ceiling windows, framing a bed of crisp white linen; a long, turquoise ottoman sitting at its foot.
On a far wall a freestanding copper bath stood poised on a platform, its own mirror reflecting the black glass table beside it.
With her attention fixed on her own reflection in the black and gold frame opposite, Greta let her gaze travel over her Agent Provocateur underwear, purchased specifically for today.
A maroon satin and black laced matching underwear set, smooth bare legs leading to black, nosebleed-inducingly high heels, which would make her usual five-foot-six height now around the same height as Remi.
Despite the week she’d had, she couldn’t help but admire the view. She looked sensational.
Her intention was to redress the balance of last week’s slip-up.
She would dominate Remi until their hierarchy was restored, a visceral reminder of precisely who held the control.
The terms of their two-year agreement remained absolute.
She would make Remi ache for a climax, push her until she was almost blind with it, and then she would deny her. There would be no more deviations.
With one hand holding her champagne flute at her dark red lips, the other hand on her hip, Greta scanned her reflection.
She didn’t care that her hips and her curves were fuller than they once were, or that her stomach wasn’t the washboard it used to be in her twenties.
Her satin and lace-clad breasts admittedly sat a little lower than they once did without support, but whose didn’t at almost fifty with no cosmetic help?
She loved her body, and she knew Remi did too.
She’d seen the way Remi stole furtive glances when she thought she wasn't looking and how she would try to snag her gaze when they fucked, searching for something soft that she would never find.
Her dark, glossy waves hung loose, a look she suspected Remi particularly enjoyed.
Her perfectly sculpted eyebrows, one of which seemed to always be slightly raised, framed her deep brown eyes and long, naturally curled eyelashes.
Between her jet-black mascara and smoky charcoal eyeshadow, she was more than ready.
Newly manicured nails matched her dark red lips.
She looked especially good tonight; managing to bury the week’s fatigue under her immaculately polished veneer—as per usual.
***
Drawing in a long, stuttered breath Dylan stared at the hotel room door.
The silicone pushing against the inside of her trousers was Dylan’s nemesis; maintaining any semblance of composure while it thrummed over her clit as she fucked Margot deserved a national accolade of some sort.
A medal perhaps, or at the very least, a formal mention in the King’s Christmas Speech.
Huffing out some air, Dylan tried her best to move into Remi’s headspace.
Raising her hand, which was usually steady and firm but to her shock was now trembling, she rapped three slow knocks on the door.
***
Pulled from her reflection by three knocks at the door, Greta gave her image a final, unhurried once-over, checking for lipstick marks with a bared-teeth grin before moving to the centre of the room.
With one hand anchored on her hip and the other arm hanging loose at her side, the champagne flute dangling from her fingertips by its rim, Greta squared her shoulders and set her jaw.
Drawing in a long, steadying breath, her eyes softly closed.
With the exhale, she allowed Margot to take over.
‘Come.’ Her loud command cut through the anticipation and stillness.
The door pushed open, and Remi stepped in, a soft whimper escaping her the moment her eyes landed on Margot standing in the centre of the room.
Margot’s breath caught as Remi’s gaze swept over the maroon satin and the height of the killer heels before she hurried inside and closed the door behind her.
‘Turn around,’ Margot barked, before taking a slow sip of champagne.
Remi obeyed instantly.
Allowing her gaze to travel slowly over the tailored blue trousers, she admired how the fabric clung to the powerful muscles of Remi’s legs and her incredible arse. Then, caught between her week of exhaustion and the sudden rush of heat, she exhaled a long, heavy sigh of genuine longing.
Fuck.
‘I hope you don’t expect there to be any deviations this week, Remi?’ she said immediately. Her voice was low and thick with deliberate confidence. She was overcompensating, and she knew it…she just needed Remi not to.
‘Of course not, Marg—’
‘Miss Grenson,’ she corrected sharply.
‘Of course not, Miss Grenson.’
The clink of glass on glass as Margot placed her champagne flute on the table and the sound of her own approach were unnaturally loud in the silence.
As the sharp angle of Remi’s jaw came into view, Margot smiled, watching the muscles twitch and bounce in her cheek.
Stopping agonisingly close to Remi—leaving only centimetres between them—Margot caught the familiar scent of bergamot, oud and spice.
Her eyes softly closed as the smell she hadn't even known she craved hit her harder than she expected, invading every corner in her head.