Chapter 13
Alessa
Dinner with Julianna has a different air from last night. The décor of the restaurant isn’t as sultry; the food isn’t as sumptuous. The only thing that remains as wonderful as the night before is how good Julianna Marcon looks in her office dress.
I avoided her for much of the afternoon, which was easy enough since she had meetings and Vern trained me to use the executive network. I had to avoid Julianna. Because every time I saw her, I suffered such an enraging hurricane of anger and lust that I barely recognized myself.
Suppose it was good for me, though. I needed to ground my mind, heart, and loins from the high they had experienced for the past few days. Julianna Marcon is not my girlfriend, no matter what she says. She’s got some twisted ideas about dating if she’s presenting me with a nebulously legal contract stipulating the major points of our “relationship.”
You heard me! She presents me with a contract!
At least nothing’s been left out. The first half is an HR-approved job contract detailing my administrative role at Bradford & Marcon. Standard stuff, like my insurance, other benefits, rate of pay, and the general expectations of my job (and what I’m not allowed to do, both by law and the rules already laid out by Bradford & Marcon.) This is something they could’ve gone over with me at the office, but the reason I’m seeing it in private is because of the second half.
Julianna has gone out of her way to detail every aspect of our relationship.
To be fair, she’s offered many concessions so I can stay on top of my schoolwork, and I guess I have my personal life. My mornings, regardless of whether I wake up at her place or not, are mostly mine. When my job starts in the afternoon, however, I’m hers. Almost literally.
I keep my expression neutral and my anger checked as I read over the contract in silence. Julianna gets up to use the bathroom, confer with the ma?tre d’, order a replacement of wine for the glasses we finished, and shoot the breeze with someone in a nice suit. When she returns, I’ve read through most of the contract and consumed another glass of wine. I needed it.
How many women have been in this position before? I honestly want to know. This is beyond some sugar-baby shit. I mean, she’s only paying me for my actual job. I don’t get some million-dollar bonus for sticking it out. I do, however, get a lot of financial benefits like free trips in her private jet, luxurious dinners like this one, a shopping budget so I can deck myself out in the finery of a billionaire’s main squeeze, and she’s silently agreed to help me cover my expenses so I can save paychecks. This means my rent, utilities, and groceries are covered.
I’m no longer expected to take TriMet since I have access to her car and driver whenever I need. Screw that, I’m still getting next month’s pass. I don’t know how long this will last!
If there’s anything this contract makes clear, it’s that any “relationship” we have is purely about sex and her image. I get to be her public lover, and I suppose I must play the part of a real girlfriend when we go to functions, but behind closed doors, I don’t expect her to be a loving, caring girlfriend. She wants me for sex. Good sex, I hope. From some of the things written in weird jargon, she wants some kink, too. As long as I feel that I can get out of it if I’m uncomfortable, I’m fine with it.
That’s what my logical side tells me. But I also know that, aside from relationships that lasted up to a few months when I was in high school, I don’t have a lot of relationship experience. What I think might be fine may turn into something that breaks my heart later on.
But I can’t think like that. Especially when Julianna asks me if I’ve made it to the end. I nod, flipping the contract shut. I haven’t signed it, although I see her fresh signature at the bottom of the page.
“Compelling stuff, Ms. Marcon.”
“If you have any issues with it, tell me now. I’d like to get it fixed before we move on with our relationship. Particularly by this weekend. I’m taking you to the wedding mixer on Saturday. I want to make sure we fall exactly in line with one another. No surprises.”
“I can agree with that.” I want Julianna fully on my side if she’s taking me to meet her folks – her folks, damnit! Even if it means a bit of a performance on my end. I can do that.
This isn’t about love. It’s about constructing a mutually beneficial relationship between two consenting adults.
“My brother’s wedding mixer is the next biggest event before his bachelor party next month. Then his actual wedding. After that, we can stop caring.”
I would laugh at how effortlessly she says that, but I don’t want to be rude. “I’m fine with going to all of those if you want me to, madam.”
“I do. That said, I’m having Vern arrange for you to be fitted with appropriate clothing. My mother especially would expect any woman I date to only exhibit the most flawless tastes. She is an otherwise insufferable woman, so if we can please her on that, it’s worth the hassle.”
Sounds like a blast.
“First impressions are everything in my family.”
I don’t doubt that’s where she learned it from. The only other thing I know about Julianna’s family dynamics is that she has an older brother named Edwin who runs the Marcon family business. The pictures I briefly Googled spoke of the quintessential male version of Julianna who already has salt and pepper in his facial hair – and he’s not even forty yet. If that’s any indication of what Julianna might look like several years from now as a woman, I may have to stick around…
“Alessa,” my sugar mama says with the slightest inflection. “I want to apologize for earlier today. I suddenly realized that we hadn’t cleared our medical histories and wanted it out of the way so we no longer had to worry.”
I choke on my wine. You know, I had been willing to forget about that for the rest of the evening, for the sake of propriety. “I wasn’t happy, no.”
“I gleaned as much. I didn’t think it would bother you, though.”
“Think of it from my position, Julianna.” This is it. This is one of my rare chances to put some of my rules down and assert myself in front of this woman who already has so much power over me. “We’ve had sex twice. You never once asked me when I had most recently been tested. To be fair, I didn’t ask that either. But can you imagine my shock when your on-call nurse hauls me into a doctor’s office for a physical? I thought it was for my new insurance, but once I realized what I was there for, I lost it. I haven’t been that angry in a while.”
“You’re right. I apologize. I should have briefed you beforehand, so you were prepared.”
“No, what you should have done was ask me. I’m a big girl. I can make my appointments with doctors I know and trust already. You can’t be cavalier like that and suddenly decide it’s important. Or, if the brain in your head finally does outreason the one in your crotch, you talk to me. Treat me like a human being, for fuck’s sake, not like your personal sex toy.”
“I have no intentions for you to do…”
“That was figurative!” Sheesh, how dense is this woman when it comes to people? “I know that we have to be formal about a lot of things, but my health is not one of them.”
“Like I said,” Julianna growls through gritted teeth, “I am also willing to share my medical history for your peace of mind.”
“By the way, are you bothered that I’m on birth control? I’m sure that came up in the physical you sniped the results from, too. You’re not going to be weird about it, right? Because I need it for…”
She waves her hand. “I’m confident in your assertion that monogamy is not an issue. I’m also not the kind who gets angry at the mere thought of my young girlfriend being attracted to the opposite sex, so even if you weren’t a virgin, I don’t care why you’re on birth control. It should be covered under your new insurance, anyway. Besides…” She snorts. “I can’t get you pregnant, so it really is your business and not mine.”
“I take it to help me stay on the clock, so to speak. My PMS is dreadful without it.”
“You don’t have to explain it to me.”
I cock my head. My, isn’t she a bit flustered about this? “You’re on birth control too, aren’t you?”
She sniffs. “Not the same brand as you.”
Oh, this is fun! Tilting Julianna Marcon off her axis… utterly delightful.
“Unlike you, though, I didn’t know the other benefits I would have until I started taking it many years ago. I was dating a young man my mother set me up with and I… well, I had a lapse of judgment about which way my sexuality drifted. Even after I dumped him, I stayed on birth control because I don’t have time for debilitating periods, and until then, I had no idea that such things were not normal.”
“You don’t strike me as the kind of woman who has dated men before.”
“Why? Because I fuck like one?” She crosses her legs and sips her wine, studying me. “Not that you would know about that.”
Christ, Julianna! How do I not laugh at that? She is so freaking… defensive.
“Besides, one never knows what might happen to a woman out there. Some of the situations I’ve been in, even in business…” She shrugs, attempting to be nonchalant, but I sense a deeper story than the one she’s telling. If nothing else, she’s been spooked enough to take precautions. “I’m not interested in begetting progeny before marriage.”
“As it so happens, neither am I, and I’m not interested in getting married until I’m at least… thirty.” That sounds good.
She fights back a smile. “That long, huh?”
“Hold your tongue, madam. I’m only twenty-one. I’ve got shit to do before having kids.”
“Well…” she relaxes back in her seat, “we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
What does that mean? She can’t be thinking long-term with me. Certainly not nine more years long-term. Right?
“There’s still the matter of sex when we get back to having it.” Julianna finishes her drink. “Which better be sooner rather than later.”
“What about it?” The terms in the contract were pretty explicit. This is a sexual relationship, and Julianna Marcon expects me to be rather open about what we do and how often. While the wording was definitely in my favor and ability to say fuck no, honey, was there, I’m under every assumption that her voracious sexual appetite will find me on the other end of her attention about as often as it was last night. This was the woman who promised to fuck me in her office this afternoon before suddenly remembering what safe sex was.
“At some point, I would prefer if our sexual relationship evolves above vanilla every single time.”
Told you she was kinky.
“One thing at a time,” I implore. “I’m not opposed, but I don’t want to jump into it.”
“Absolutely not, I agree.”
I don’t want to think about it. Sure, fantasies are hot. Julianna pinning my wrists down and talking dirty while she takes control sets me on fire. Whips and chains and paddles and latex are on a different level, though. Maybe I’ll like it, maybe I’ll find it abhorrent… either way, I’d rather it not be sprung on me. It’s certainly not happening tonight.
Nothing is happening tonight.
We have a mutual agreement. No sex until everything comes back clear. Julianna takes me home and I’m left with my homework… and erotic thoughts of her.
I’m not ashamed to say that I go to bed with my other girlfriend. I’m sure you remember her – the lady I was seeing the moment Julianna first called me and told me to get my ass to her office Friday night.
Suffice to say, a real human touch is better than the most powerful vibrator. Fuck my life.