Head On (The Head On Trilogy) (8 page)

It took a moment before I finally realized that it was over. Short of breath, I waited to see what Parkin would do next. He was still inside me, and I could feel his heartbeat pulsing through the vein on the underside of his cock. I wanted to say something, to ask him what we were supposed to do next, but he seemed content to do nothing, and I wasn't sure whether it was my place to break the silence. Besides, I didn't want the moment to end. Still gripping the sides of the table, I turned my head slightly, looking over to one side but unable to look all the way back and see Parkin's face. I could hear him breathing, and finally I felt him slide his cock out of my hot, wet pussy. Staying in place, I listened to the sound of him cleaning himself, and then finally I stood up and turned to him.

"I'll be in touch," he said, looking a little distracted.

As he headed to the door, I realized that sex seemed to change him. Both times we'd fucked, he seemed more thoughtful after the orgasm, as if his defenses had come down for a moment.

"Do you mind if I say something?" I asked suddenly, even though I knew it was probably a mistake. "It's kind of personal, but -"

"No," he said firmly. "Don't." He paused, as if he might be about to say something else. "As I said, I'll be in touch. Good night, Kathryn."

Once he'd left the room, I stood in silence for a moment. I wasn't entirely sure what was going through Drake Parkin's mind, but he'd fucked me twice now in just a few days and I couldn't shake the feeling that he was leaving a lot of things unspoken. I wanted to get inside his mind, to understand what he wanted and then to give it to him, but there was clearly a barrier that he was very carefully keeping intact. My heart still racing, I got dressed and finally, with my legs trembling, I figured it was time to go home. I headed out of the hotel, past the leering doormen, and I hailed a cab.

As promised, when I got back to my building, I found that there was fifty thousand dollars in cash stuffed into my mailbox. My legs were still shaking as I put the money in my bag and headed up the stairs.

Part Three

Weekend in Vegas

Kathryn

"I really need to drag my vagina into the twenty-first century," Donna said, staring out the window of the little cafe in downtown Manhattan. After a moment's further contemplation, she turned to me and smiled. "I mean... you know what I mean."

I stirred my coffee. "Um..." I paused. "Not really." I rarely knew what Donna meant. Her thought processes were a little 'out there', and it was impossible to predict what she'd come up with next.

"I was thinking about it the other day," she continued, apparently oblivious to my obliviousness. "It's like, counting up how often I have sex, and how long it lasts, I worked out that even discounting times when I'm asleep, I use my vagina for fun less than 0.7% of the time. Do you know what that means?"

"You need to get laid more?" I asked.

"Apart from that," she replied. "It means that, as a resource, my vagina is doing really, really badly. Like, so badly that if it was part of a company, I'd have cut it loose long ago."

I frowned. "You want to fire your vagina?"

"I want to improve it," she said. She'd clearly been thinking about this, a
lot
. "I want to use it more often. I want to get a better return on the time and money I invest in it."

I stared at her. The truth is, Donna's long, meandering speeches were becoming my preferred way of distracting myself from everything else that was going on in my life. It had been three days since I'd last hooked up with Drake Parkin, and although his friends had been calling and attempting to set up appointments, Parkin himself had remained strangely quiet. I couldn't help wondering if I'd done something wrong. But what?

"I know you know what I mean," Donna continued. "Come on, Kathryn. A vagina's an asset, especially when it's a young one that hasn't been through childbirth. So why not
use
it as an asset?" She sighed. "I mean, the economy's doing terribly.
You
got fired,
I'm
walking on eggshells in case the same thing happens to me, and yet this amazing asset is sitting between my legs doing... nothing." She looked down at her crotch. "It takes more than it gives. I want to balance things out a little."

"I see," I said, sipping at my coffee. "The pressures of modern life have driven you insane and -"

"I knew you'd understand," she said. "I'm not talking about becoming a whore -"

I spit coffee out onto the table, almost choking.

"Jesus, are you okay?" Donna said, grabbing some napkins and helping me regain some of the respectability and poise I just lost.

"Yeah," I said, "I'm fine." But the truth is: I wasn't fine. The conversation had just veered away from being fun, and toward being a little too close for comfort. Donna had no idea about my new line of work, and I wanted to keep her out of the loop. Then again, after three days, I wasn't even sure if I really
had
a new line of work. Drake Parkin, Archer and an investment banker were still the only clients I'd fucked, and despite the steady stream of phone calls from prospective new men, I'd been rather picky when it came to new clients. I'd already canceled a session that was supposed to happen two days ago with some random friend of Parkin's. Despite having accepted my new line of work, and despite loving the financial freedom, I was having trouble finding the courage to actually put myself out there. I didn't want to admit it at the time, but deep down, I was hoping Parkin would call again.

"Damn it," Donna said, sighing, "maybe I should just become a whore. The money must be good, right? And look at me. I'm twenty-seven years old. My window of opportunity isn't going to stay open forever." She smiled, and for a moment she seemed lost in thought. "Nah, I couldn't do it," she said finally. "No way." She took a deep breath and looked at me. "So what's your big secret, huh?"

"Secret?" I asked, immediately tensing up.

"Well, you claim you haven't got a new job, but you're rolling in money. What's the big secret, Kathryn?"

"There's no secret," I said, scrambling to deploy the lie I'd been using every time anyone asked what I was living on. "Like I told you, I had some money saved up, and I got a tax rebate."

"No way," she said, "I am
not
buying that. What are you really doing, honey? Are you opening your legs for rich men? What is it? Twenty dollars for a hand-job? Thirty to suck your nip-nips? A hundred for a fuck?" She laughed.

I laughed too.

She kept laughing.

I kept laughing, hoping she was just joking.

"I don't blame them," she said finally. "Do you?"

"Who?" I asked blankly.

She leaned closer. "The whores," she said conspiratorially. "If you've got it, use it."

I smiled with relief as I realized she didn't suspect me at all. No-one would ever suspect good old Kathryn, reliable, romantic, dependable Kathryn, of being a hooker. After all, I spent five whole years chasing after the guy of my dreams, telling everyone I met that I wasn't going to be one of those Manhattan girls who sleeps her way to the top. I'd stuck to my guns and refused to bend. And yet suddenly, I was in a whole new line of work, poised to sell blow jobs for $200 a pop; full sex (with condom) for $350 an hour; full sex (without condom, but with recent HIV test) for $1,000 an hour; and anything kinky by negotiation only. And all of it paid cash in hand, paid by some of the wealthiest men in the city.

Donna laughed. "I tell you what," she said. "If things haven't picked up in a year, we'll both become hookers. Deal?" She reached her hand across the table.

"Deal," I said, shaking her hand while desperately hoping I could find a way to change the subject. "So do you want to go to the library later? There's this class I want to sign up for."

"Sure," she said, "but I thought you were in a hurry. You said you've got an appointment at two."

"Yeah," I said, "but we can swing by the library on the way, right?"

"Sure," Donna replied. "Anyway, what's the appointment for?"

I swallowed hard. "Job interview," I said as I paid the bill and headed to the door. "For a... marketing company." That was a lie. A big, fat lie. I wasn't going to a job interview. I was actually supposed to be meeting a client and going to Las Vegas with him for the weekend. Of course, now that the moment was fast approaching, I was having second thoughts and thinking about canceling. I guess there was a part of me that didn't want to have lots of different clients; I wanted to be Drake Parkin's own private prostitute. The problem was, he seemed to have backed off.

Taking a deep breath, I decided it was now or never. If I backed out of this appointment, it would mean that I wasn't a prostitute after all, and the whole thing had just been a flash in the pan. If this was truly my new line of work, it was time to put up or shut up. Vegas or nothing.

Drake Parkin

"Four days?" I said, sitting alone in my apartment and staring out the window. "That seems... sooner than I'd expected."

"We've tried everything," said Dr. Stanley Lazier, his voice buzzing in my earpiece. "Sometimes..." His voice trailed off for a moment. "We've already worked miracles here, Drake. Seriously, we've pushed this back a long way, but eventually, inevitably..."

I took a deep breath. I knew he was right, of course, but that didn't make the news any more welcome. Still, I knew that it wasn't Lazier's fault. He was the best of the best, probably the best in the world, and even he hadn't been able to nip this in the bud. Although there was a kind of dark anger brewing steadily in my chest, I knew full well that Lazier wasn't the man who should feel my wrath. I'd always prided myself on keeping my emotions in check, and whenever I felt as if I was going to explode, I had an ace up my sleeve: I simply imagined how my father would have reacted in this type of situation, and then I purposefully did the exact opposite.

It was a tactic that had stood me in good stead over the years.

"Thank you, Stanley," I said eventually. "I know you've done everything possible, and I'll make absolutely certain that you receive a bonus on top of your retainer -"

"That's not necessary," he replied, interrupting me. "You've already paid me a fair wage for the job. I have a policy of not accepting bonuses, Drake. It muddies the water. Bonuses are for your world, not mine. The only bonus I wanted in this case was victory, and we fell short. Not by much, but we definitely fell short."

"By a hair," I whispered.

"I'm going to explore a few other options," he continued. "Leave no stone unturned, and all that jazz. Still, I want you to start preparing yourself. It's..." He paused again. In the five years I'd known Dr. Lazier, I'd never heard even the slightest hint of emotion in his voice, but today he sounded genuinely troubled. "I'm sorry again, Drake. Rest assured -"

"Rest assured that you still have my full confidence," I told him firmly. "You've done an amazing job, and I'm sure you'll continue to do so. Right now, however, I guess I should take your advice and start preparing, so..." I took a deep breath. "We'll speak soon."

Once I'd disconnected the call, I sat in silence for a moment. Beyond the window, New York was getting on with its business. I liked to watch the city at times, observing the rhythm of its ebb and flow, feeling the push and pull as it breathed in and then out. I was usually able to calm my anger through the quiet ritual, but today things were different. Today, all my anger was just building and building, and although I'd managed to spare Dr. Lazier the brunt of my fury, I knew there was no point holding it back much longer.

There was only one thing left to do.

Kathryn

"Las fucking Vegas," said Robert Foxington-Chambers, staring out the limo window at the bright neon signs that burned through the night as we drove along the strip. "City of Angels."

I frowned. "Isn't that Los Angeles?" I asked after a moment.

He turned to me and laughed. "Good point! I meant Demons, not Angels. Easy to get them mixed up!" He chuckled at his own joke. "So which are you, Kathryn? Demon or Angel?"

I smiled. "I'm whatever you want me to be," I said eventually.

"But in real life," he said, fixing me with an amused expression and - to be honest - getting a little more personal than I would have liked. "Which are you in real life? When you're not on the job?"

"A bit of both, I guess", I said, fidgeting slightly in the leather seat. I was starting to realize that I needed to get better at separating the two sides of my life. Glancing out the window, I spotted a girl standing on the street corner, blatantly hustling for business. As we drove through the streets of Las Vegas, I was being given a crash-course in how lucky I'd been so far. I wasn't the kind of prostitute who hung out on the street, addicted to alcohol and drugs, risking her life with unknown men for a few lousy dollars. In fact, I was starting to think that the word 'prostitute' didn't really describe what I did. I was more like a high-class escort. Or was I just deluding myself?

"Did you shave your pussy like I told you?" Robert said suddenly.

"Of course," I said, smiling as I turned to him. "I did everything you asked. You can always rely on me."

Robert Foxington-Chambers was a billionaire many, many times over. The boss of half a dozen of England's biggest companies, he was in his fifties and he was just coming out of his fifth divorce. To call him a billionaire, though, didn't really cover it. The guy was dripping with money. He probably used wads of cash as door-stops, and he wasn't afraid to spread his largesse around. I had him checked out - discretely - before I agreed to come away with him. He was well known for paying girls to spend the weekend with him, and they always left with cash stuffed in their suitcase. I was expecting a big payday.

But...

He wasn't Drake Parkin. Hell, he wasn't even 1% of Drake Parkin. Drake Parkin was calm, and Robert Foxington-Chambers was excitable and brash; Drake Parkin had class, and Robert Foxington-Chambers kept leering at my cleavage and shoving his hand up my dress; most importantly, Drake Parkin seemed to be in control, whereas Robert Foxington-Chambers seemed to be out of control. There was really no comparison at all, and I was finding it hard to think of this guy sexually. Still, I realized with a sigh that not
every
client could be like Parkin.

"Man, you've got good tits," he said, pushing a hand down the front of my dress and giving my left breast a good grope. "I can't wait to get you on your back, honey, if you know what I mean."

The other problem was, Robert Foxington-Chambers had a reputation for being a little kinky. He knew what he liked, and he wasn't afraid to ask for it. I could turn anything down, of course, but I'd lose a lot of money if I did. That's why I already told him, upfront, that I was willing to do anything he wants. Anal, oral, group... anything he could think of. When I told him that, I figured I was being responsible by laying it out on the table, but now I was starting to worry that I'd merely set him a challenge. The guy seemed to have no limits. Hardly the ideal guy to have as my next client. After all, after Parkin, my second client had been Parkin's choice. This time, with client number three, I was striking out on my own.

"You wet?" he asked, shoving a hand up my dress and poking a finger into my vagina. "We'll get you dripping wet before long."

As Robert told me when he phoned me up, he wanted to "hit Vegas hard and, when it hits back, hit it again." He said he wanted to "leave the fucking city with a black eye." His final ambition, he told me over the phone, was that whereas most people leave Vegas with a hangover and a hole in their wallet, he wanted Vegas to be the one suffering pain while he rode off laughing into the sunset. Robert Foxington-Chambers had come into his money quite late in life, in his early fifties, but he was determined to make up for lost time. His enthusiasm was kind of endearing; it wasn't his fault that I kept comparing him to Parkin.

"You expecting a call?" he asked.

Almost without realizing, I'd taken my phone from my pocket in order to check, for the tenth time since we left the airport, whether Parkin has called. He hadn't, of course. Still, I couldn't shake the feeling - or rather, the
hope
- that somehow Parkin was pulling the strings of my trip to Vegas. After all, he'd been behind my session with Archer, so I figured he could easily be controlling Robert. I kept glancing around the limousine, wondering if he had a hidden camera somewhere. Parkin was an extraordinary man, and I wanted to believe that in some small way, he was here with me in Vegas.

"No," I replied politely, putting the phone away. "Sorry."

"You look nervous," he said, eying me carefully.

"Not at all!" I said, forcing myself to smile. "I'm sorry, I've just never been to Vegas before." That, at least, was true: I'd never been anywhere near Vegas, or anywhere
like
Vegas
. It was totally not my kind of town. As I looked out the window and saw strip joints and massage parlors, I realized that this was the kind of world to which I now belonged. I couldn't look down on hookers, because I
was
a hooker. In some strange way, I felt as if I'd been cut adrift from polite society. I couldn't stop thinking about how my friends and family would react if they knew why I was
really
in Vegas or why I could
really
afford all the new shoes I'd bought recently.

"Lots of people come to Vegas," Robert continued, oblivious to my concerns, "but most of them don't really
hit
the town. Not properly. This is the kind of place that you have to get to know. Like a woman!" He put a hand on my knee. "Vegas doesn't give up her secrets easily." He laughed again. "Tell me, Kathryn. How long have you been in this kind of work?"

"Just a couple of months," I said, figuring I should pretend to be a little more experienced. To be honest, I was focused on trying not to think about what my mother would say if she knew what I was doing. She thought I was still working in marketing. Big difference. Well, medium-sized difference...

"It shows," Robert said. "Don't worry, though, I like that. You seem like you're not entirely sure what you're supposed to do, but that's fine. Now let me guess. You had a good job in the city, then you got fired and you had nowhere to go and you ended up whoring yourself out. Correct?"

"Uh..." I paused. "Yeah, I guess."

"Don't be offended by my use of the word 'whoring' there," he continued. "It's an honorable trade. It's honest. Most other professions
aren't
honest. I have respect for the whoring trade. We all whore ourselves out one way or another." He suddenly unzipped his trousers and exposed his surprisingly large cock, which was only semi-erect. "Blow me, yeah?" he said. "Before we get to the hotel. Take a suck on what I got."

If anyone else had just sprung their cock out and demanded a blow-job, it'd seem rude and crude. But there was something so friendly and jovial about Robert, and I kind of didn't mind. He made everything seem like a joke. "Okay," I said, grinning. I glanced along to the other end of the limo, to make sure that the driver wasn't watching, and then I started to lean down toward the large purple head of his cock. I had absolutely no enthusiasm for the job, but again, I figured I had to accept that sometimes I wouldn't enjoy my clients. At the end of the day, I was at work, not on holiday.

"Wait!" he said. He paused, grinning. "Give me something to work with here. Show me your tits."

Without really thinking about it, I slipped my dress off my shoulder and dropped it down so that my breasts were exposed. Not really sure what to do, I sat there while he reached out a hand and gently stroked the curve of the right breast. To my surprise, I realized that my nipples were getting hard, even though I had zero interest in this guy and I wasn't remotely turned on. It was as if my body was simply reacting to the sensory stimulation.

"Good," he said, still staring at my breasts. "Now carry on. Blow me."

I leaned down and reached out my tongue, gently caressing the very tip of his cock. He was still only partially erect, and I half expected him to start popping little blue pills. But as I sucked on his soft shaft, I felt him starting to grow in my mouth, the tip getting larger as more and more blood flowed to the right places. Within about a minute, he'd gone from comfortably filling my mouth to being a bit of a mouthful, and now the smooth flow of pre-cum was smearing onto my tongue. He was clearly ready to ejaculate already, and I knew I just had to take it nice and slow and give a good first impression. I gently lowered my lips down his shaft until my nose was touching his bush, and then I ran my tongue all the way along his cock. I was being gentle with him, but only because I wanted to shock him when I started getting rougher.

The truth was, I'd spent hours and hours online over the previous few days, trying to research the tricks that hookers used. I was painfully aware that I didn't really know how to give a good blow-job, and I'd been looking for a kind of Hooker 101 that might get me up to speed. Although I'd found plenty of sites covering the topic, however, I'd ended up realizing that I needed time to develop my own techniques. Most of all, I figured I had to be attentive and react to my clients on the hoof.

"That's good," Robert said, sounding as if he was enjoying himself. "You've got the lips of a fucking angel."

I started moving his cock in and out of my mouth faster, tightening my lips to create a little more pressure. As he gasped, I got faster and faster and faster, feeling his cock getting even more swollen. Suddenly it happened: he grunted and I felt his semen squirting into the back of my mouth, and forming a thick, hot pool on my tongue. I kept sucking him off, and he continued to ejaculate until finally there was no more to come out. Most of his cum had already slipped down the back of my throat, but I made sure to conspicuously swallow the rest while I slowly slipped his cock out of my mouth. I stared at it as it remained erect, glistening in the lights that shone in through the limo window. A final small bead of cum appeared on the tip and started to dribble down the shaft, so I leaned closer, reached out my tongue and slowly licked it off.

"We'll be there in five minutes," he said, sounding a little exhausted. "You just earned your first thousand dollars on this trip. Drake Parkin was right on the money when he said you were good."

"You spoke to him?" I asked, feeling a shiver pass through my body. "What did he say about me?"

"Just that you're a good fuck."

I smiled awkwardly, even though inside I was suddenly feeling extremely uncertain. "Sure," I said, forcing a smile. "I guess. I hope so." Still, I couldn't deny that the mere mention of Drake Parkin's name had affected me profoundly. I was still worried about the fact that he hadn't called to arrange another session. Had my very first client dropped me already? And why the hell did I care so much? Reaching into my bag to check my phone again, I felt something else in my fingers, and moments later I realized it was the earpiece that Parkin had given me while I was fucking Archer. Pulling it out of the bag, I paused for a moment before surreptitiously slipping it into my ear. There was nothing but silence, of course. How could I be so stupid? There was no way Parkin would still be using the damn thing. With a sigh, I put the earpiece back into my bag, just as Robert Foxington-Chambers leaned over and started kissing my bare breasts.

"You like that, do you?" I asked, trying to sound as if I cared, and as if I wasn't thinking of another man thousands of miles away.