Breaking Joseph Page 10

I hung up, annoyed–at him or myself, I wasn’t sure. Probably a bit of both.

  I brushed my teeth, slicked on lip balm, swept back my still-damp curls. In my sleepy haze, I couldn’t quite remember what sexy looked like and made do with jeans–a New York purchase, and Charlotte’s first pair. No underwear, mind. Seemed too much like hard work.

  It was surreal, tumbling into the back seat of the taxi with an overnight bag. He’d ordered me in like a pizza and there was something sweetly erotic about it, that he would call and I would come. Not that it was the first time this had happened to me, of course.

  The first time was the most interesting of all. It went a little something like this…

  * * * *

  “Are you getting in, then, or are you going to just stand there like a lemon?”

  William, owner of the fabled Ladarna escort agency, had sent my very first car. And there was already a man in it.

  “I’m Aidan, by the way.” He leaned out to offer me his hand. “You’re Leila, right?”

  Right. “Right.” It was a very large hand, and his brief pump smarted.

  “You are sure about this, aren’t you?”

  I stepped from one ridiculous heel to the other. “Were you?”

  The tall, grinning boy named Aidan spat dirty laughter all over the pavement. “No.”

  As I slid into the seat, the door clattered shut and the engine revved loudly. We sped off into the twilight.

  “Nice stockings,” he said.

  “Thanks.” I knotted my fingers over crossed knees. “So.”

  “You’re going to need a drink.” He pulled a silver hip flask from the inside pocket of his jacket. I gave it a sniff, and winced.

  “My alcohol tolerance is rubbish.”

  “Trust me. You need a drink.”

  Two mouthfuls of vodka burned everything from my tongue to my teeth.

  “Now close your eyes,” he said, “and we’ll talk it through.”

  “Why am I–”

  “Close ’em. Good girl.” He patted my thigh. Fondled it. “Now…what did Will tell you about your baptism of fire?”

  I swallowed. “That I’d watch until I felt comfortable joining in.”

  “That’s it? No technique, no policy, nada? Zilch?”

  “Um…was he supposed to?” As if my nerves weren’t skewered already. “We just talked about money and stuff.”

  “Jesus. We’ve got ten minutes before we get to the hotel. I’ll have to do the short version.” He gave a great, mocking sigh. “I need to know what kind of experience you have.”

  “Ah. Um. Well, I’m not a virgin.”

  “I should fucking hope not.”

  This was not making me feel better at all.

  “I’ve done all the usual stuff,” I managed. The driver was staring at me in the mirror, and his grey eyebrows wiggled in a tease. Ew.

  “Don’t mind John,” Aidan said, nodding at him. “He’s part of the company.”

  “Oh.”

  “Now close your eyes again. Usual stuff, eh. What, like anal?”

  I stifled a cough. “Yeah.”

  “Never forget your lube.” Aidan shifted about on the leather seat. “Do you swallow?”

  “Is that even a good idea?”

  “Mostly? No. But there have been a couple of guys that…well.” He chuckled to himself. “I keep it for besties.”

  “What else do you need to know?” And could I open my eyes yet?

  “Yes or no: lipstick lesbianism?”

  “I’ve been with a girl.”

  “Rope work?”

  “Japanese.”

  “Fisting?”

  “Check.”

  “DP?”

  “Only with toys.”

  He clicked his fingers. “Spanking.”

  “I…kind of hope so.”

  The car went silent, and even beneath my closed lids, there were flashes as we passed under streetlights.

  “Okay,” Aidan said finally. “Open your eyes.”

  When I did, he was draped around the back of the seat, his mouth suddenly inches from mine.

  “Who,” he whispered, “the fuck are you?”

  He tasted like vodka and breathmints. The flavour was sharpest on his cupid’s bow, and along the tendon beneath his tongue. Those large hands pawed at my breasts and hips, rubbing and stroking until I broke and purred.

  “We kiss, by the way,” he mumbled.

  So we did.

  Aidan grinned again. “And looky…Leila likes kissing.”

  Outside the hotel, we straightened each other’s clothes and smoothed our matching curly hair. I reapplied my boy-blotted lipstick. In the lobby, we held hands and waited for the lift.

  “His name is Abe,” Aidan said quietly. “Early thirties. Academic–something to do with politics, never really listened much. Normally hires me and another lad, but said he’d be quite happy to help us out tonight.”

  “So he likes girls too?”

  “I get the impression that there’s not a lot he doesn’t like, as long as it’s a group scenario.”

  The empty lift swallowed us with a metallic groan.

  “You have a day job, right?” said Aidan.

  “I’m a lawyer.”

  “You do have that look about you.”

  I froze. “What, I look like a lawyer?”

  He laughed to himself. “No, you silly cow. Like you have a brain.”

  “Oh.” I straightened. “Thanks.”

  “Here’s a tip.” He caught my hips, whispering as we stepped into the hall. “Don’t analyse it. Any of it. No wondering about why they do stuff, no feminist bullshit, no worrying you’re being objectified or any of that crap. It’s like chasing your tail.” He patted between my thighs easily. “And you…do not have a tail.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  “Seriously, it’s not the point. Some of them will even try to discuss it with you, but don’t go there. No opinions. No real info. Don’t ever tell them your real name.”

  “Of course not.”

  Now we stood in front of room 217, and my palm felt greasy as I closed it around the knob.

  “Go on in,” Aidan said. “He leaves the door open. This is always his room.”

  Panic rose. “You go first,” I hissed.

  “Gah. Suit yourself.” He patted me on the head as he nudged past. “Abe. A pleasure. I brought you a present.”

  I followed Aidan into the suite of dark wood and modern glass. A stocky blond guy was draped over the office chair, tapping his foot as he drank us in. I should be doing something, I realized, but I didn’t know what. Still had a million questions, too. Fuck…help.

  “Felix,” said Abe, wandering over to kiss Aidan on the cheek. “You must be…”

  I gulped. “Charlotte.”

  Just like that, I was a whore.

  “Charlotte.” Abe kneaded my waist as he brushed his lips to my collarbone. “I hear you’re in training.”

  “Something like that.” I managed a smile.

  “Well.” He glanced between me and Aidan. “I think she ought to train naked, at least.”

  Aidan gave a sage nod. “Point taken.”

  I dropped my bag by the desk and wrung my hands together. “You want me to, uh?”

  “Come here.” Aidan beckoned me with a finger. “We’ll undress you.”

  This was it. No going back now. I’d tried to prepare myself for more than just observing in the corner, but still…God, God.

  Aidan took Abe’s face in his hands and kissed him. They were starving, hungry, ravenous for each other. I’d never seen two men kiss up close, and there was a bluntness to it that made me shiver. Abe groped the air for me, still sucking Aidan’s bottom lip, and he tugged at the tie on my wrap dress.

  They wasted no time with my clothes. I’d spent three hours–count them–getting ready tonight, and ninety percent of the effort was on the floor within five minutes of entering the room.

  “What do you think?” Aidan spun me around.
“Will she do?”

  The smile bloomed softly over Abe’s square face, and he reached out to stroke my copper curls. “Are you two related?”

  Aidan rolled his eyes. “You wish.”

  “Hmm.” Abe thumbed my already stiff nipple. “I think I approve.” He nodded at the office chair he’d been sitting on. “Over there…go sit down. You can watch.”

  My nipple aching from his touch, I stalked over and did as he asked. They followed me, nudging my knees until my legs fell open.

  “Good girl.” Aidan’s palm crept up my inner thigh. “Very good.”

  Now I closed my eyes without instruction. I’d been a bad, brazen girl many times in my short life, but this kind of exposure was shockingly intimate, even for me. Aidan toyed with the lips of my pussy and like other parts, they swelled for him.

  “Ah. You like this,” he said.

  Yes, I liked being naked and mauled by two strange men. I know.

  All I managed was a single nod.

  “If she likes it,” said Abe, “then I want her to touch herself.”

  “Did you hear that, baby? He wants to see you rub your pussy while you take notes.” Aidan took my wrist and pressed my fingers over his. “Would you like that?”

  I opened my eyes. Caught his. He winked.

  “Yes.”

  “Mmm.” He squeezed my clit very lightly, and then drew away. The moan scraped in my throat and I fought to keep it caged–Aidan knew exactly what he was doing, and not just on the politics side.

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Oh, I was still nervous, still prickly. Ashamed. But underneath all that, Charlotte clapped with glee and then blew on my fingers.

  Aidan and Abe ignored me for the next ten minutes. I had a front row seat to their show. Naked, they were tanned and taut and shiny beneath the yellow-gold lamplights, and their shoulders and thighs slapped together pleasingly. Aidan lavished attention on Abe’s cock, and all the while, his own bobbed between his legs with a weighty pull. I watched it as my fingers curled inside, and my breaths darted back and forth like the thumb pad that worked my clit. I’d have put my head back, lost myself…but I wanted, needed to watch.

  After a bout of brutal kisses, Aidan sank to his knees and shoved Abe back on the bed. He licked down the man’s flat belly, along his v-section, and downed the cock with one swift gulp. Abe thrashed and groaned with handfuls of Aidan’s hair. I’d sucked my share of men and I had a few tricks up my sleeve, but I’d never thought just slurping the life out of the guy was the quickest way to send him falsetto.

  Awesome.

  “You,” Abe panted at me. “You’re wet. I can smell it from here.”

  For a moment, I was embarrassed. Then I remembered what I was there to do. I pulled up my hand, staring, and parted my fingers to display the sticky cobwebs.

  He went hoarse. “Oh fuck. Come here.”

  Don’t ask me why, but I crawled on my hands and knees to them, my bottom lip bitten to welts as I arrived. Aidan eased me into his spot between Abe’s legs, and they both pressed a hand on the back of my head.

  “It’s okay,” Aidan whispered. “Yeah?”

  “Mmph.” I already had a mouthful.

  Abe groped my breasts as I sucked him. He didn’t wear anything, and I began to worry about the whole swallowing thing…he might have been Aidan’s bestie, but he sure as hell wasn’t mine. I wasn’t even sure about having favorites–besides the whole AIDS thing, it seemed kind of elitist and mean. I’d planned to be an equal opportunities whore, see. Niche market.

  Aidan tipped my chin with a nudge of his fist. We went a couple of degrees at a time until I had just the right angle to take Abe down to the root, and then he gasped and bucked as I lashed him with my tongue.

  “Not…not like this.”

  I was shoved away a little too roughly, and Aidan caught me in his big arms.

  “Felix.” Abe was still panting, and he cupped his raw cock with both hands. “Have you had her yet?”

  “No.”

  “Then fuck her. I want to see her pretty eyes bulge when she takes that thing.”

  Oh. Oh my.

  “On her back,” Abe went on, sliding off the bed. “With her legs right up.”

  In that position, he’d see just about everything. We were about to be his own personal porn.

  The vodka had gone to my head by that point, and I was light-headed and fuzzy as I lay on the pillows. Aidan appeared over me and nuzzled my throat.

  “You holding up?”

  I sighed as he licked my earlobe.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.” He smirked. “Hussy.”

  There was a snap of rubber, a thud of enclosed flesh against my thigh, and then he nudged at my clit with his cock head. For the first time that night, I moaned, the drag of him just the right amount of pressure. Luscious.

  “Go on,” Abe urged. He stood over us, surveying the territory with an enemy’s eye. “Fuck her.”

  “Yeah.” My words steamed against Aidan’s neck. “Do it. Fuck me.”

  “Bossy, aren’t we? You and me…” He eased between my lower lips. “We’re going to get on…” Shove. “Just…”

  Split.

  “Ow!”

  “…Fine. Ah. Jesus.”

  In my bubble of shock and adrenaline, I hadn’t quite fathomed the girth of him. Or the length. No wonder he made money off the thing–he could throw a party on it, and God, the gatecrashers just barged inside me.

  Abe laughed. Laughed and stroked himself, angling for Aidan’s roving arse. Aidan, bless him, slowed his thrusts and gave me long, breathy kisses that tickled and teased. Soon, he caught me at the right spots and my yelps turned to whimpers. Whimpers melted to cries. When he built up the speed to go harder, I ached in places untouched for months.

  Our spectator pressed my thigh right back so he could watch Aidan come. There was a ripple at Aidan’s shoulders, a shudder at his hips, and he moaned my name into the heap of hair coiled on the pillow beside me. Abe sprayed over his back with a little squeal and a torrent of curses.

  Afterward, the three of us took turns in the shower together. Seemed like the cordial thing to do, and it limited the amount of conversation. Aidan kept Abe busy beneath the water while I combed my wet hair, and surrounded by groans and steam and a fat brown envelope, I peered into the mirror. Charlotte bit her lip. Do you come here often?

  Back in the car, I sipped a bottle of water I’d swiped from the mini bar, and Aidan picked at his cuticles.

  “Go on then,” he said. “Justify yourself. I know you want to.”

  “I don’t know what you mean.” I did, but it struck me then that I hadn’t thought about it once in the hotel room, and that could not be good.

  “You’re a lawyer, right? So what is it?” He raised a neat auburn brow. “Coke?”

  “Oh God. No.” I folded my arms. “It’s for my parents.”

  “No shit?”

  “No shit.” I smiled faintly. “They spent buckets of money on my school and my courses, and…well, everything really. They’re about to lose their house. And their business.”

  “Yikes.” He held his arm out, and I settled into the crook of it. Felt weirdly organic.

  “Did I do okay, then?”

  “You, my dear, were quite the natural.” He gave me a squeeze. “I’m going to tell Will that you’re good to go on the website. Is that okay?”

  “Yeah.” Another gulp of water. Public website. Fuck. “Thank you.”

  “No worries, Leila. Lay-la.” He tittered. “Shame you have to change that name.”

  “Rather appropriate, huh?”

  “Lay lay lay lay lay,” he sang, rocking me. “Shift up a little.”

  “Mmm?”

  He scooped up my legs beneath the knee, and laid them on his lap so he could reach between them. When he brushed the gusset of my knickers, I went rigid.

  “Relax,” he said softly. “I won’t hurt you.”

  “You didn’t.” I cleared my throat. �
�Earlier, that is.”

  “Oh, I did. A bit. Sorry, chick. Next time, we’ll practice.” Now he walked his fingers under the lace and sought my still-sore clit. “Here?”

  “I…yeah.”

  Of all the ends to the evening, I never anticipated this, to pant and mew in front of a bemused–and aroused–driver while my new partner-in-crime explored my girl-parts with the skill of a seasoned professional. But it was gradual and delicious and ah…wet…Aidan knew what he was doing, and could calculate the healing in it. I came on his fingers with thick contractions and sucking gasps.

  “Now,” he mumbled, as we pulled up outside my building, “go have a good cry.”

  I blinked. “Should I?”

  “You will.”

  “Did you?”

  He kissed my forehead. “Just don’t worry, when it happens. It’s normal. You’ll be okay.”

  It did. It was. And am I?

  I don’t know, I don’t know.

  Ask Charlotte. You might have to take off the duct tape first.

  * * * *

  The epic space of Joseph’s lounge made a night garden, with up-lights like buttercups making halos on the walls. His coffee table was a mess of paperwork, flickering laptops–two. Who needs two?–thickly stacked files and empty Coke cans. On the wooden floor, the National Geographic lay splayed like a drunk’s hand of poker.

  He didn’t touch me as I entered. I wasn’t sold to him, nor was I his lover, not in any agreed sense.

  “Been working?” I asked.

  “Had a busy day.” We sat apart on the sofa in carefully measured distance. He was at least three breaths away. “A lot to be done next week, too.”

  “I can hardly wait.” I leaned back and my breasts slid beneath the vest. Still he watched, his gaze hooked to the points of my nipples.

  “Have you decided?”

  “About us?” What a strange word. “Um. No.”

  “But you came.” He rested his elbows on his knees. “I don’t have a spare room, Leila.”

  “You could be a gentleman and have the sofa. It looks like it’d seat about twelve people.” I poked him in the ribs, but his eyes flashed as he caught my hand.

  “Tell me why you’re here.”

  His fingers clenched as they coiled around my wrist. They were thick, firm. Reminded me of his cock.

  This wasn’t my last job. It wasn’t a job at all, so why did it feel a bit like my first one all over again? The jumpy sense of foreboding, maybe…or because Charlotte beat louder than ever at my temples, and I was just as desperate to shut her up.