Role Play (22 page)

So
I got a glass of wine and slowly mingled with the crowd. Up on stage, the auctioneer was cajoling everyone to buy a corset dress made of deep blue satin modeled by a lovely woman with coal black skin. The bidding was fierce.

That’s when
I saw Josh, the big guy who had come up to us at Festival to make sure the fight was over. He was the last person I wanted to see.

But Josh gave
me a huge grin and called out, “Sierra! Is that you? I called your sister
Sierra
at Festival, but I’m starting to see the difference.”

I
smiled back. Maybe I would never be able to shake my awful mistakes. “It’s nice to see you again, Josh.”

“It’s great to see you!” He was so enthusiastic that
I briefly worried what his intentions were, until he looked around. “I want to introduce you to my girlfriend. Anna! Come meet Sierra.”

A
voluptuous girl with a sweet smile joined us. “Hi, Sierra.”

“She’s one of the twins,” Josh told Anna.

I bit back my retort. Josh wasn’t trying to be mean. He couldn’t help it if I was haunted by my past.

But Anna saw that
I was irked. “They aren’t twins, you silly. You said so yourself.” Then she added, “Don’t worry, Sierra, everyone’s got a story floating around about them. It means you’re part of the family.”

That made
me feel much better. Acceptance was my preferred drug right now. “I’m glad. I hope Victor is happy to see me tonight,” I blurted out, without thinking.

“You’re not here with him?” Josh asked, looking around. With his height, he could see over the heads of everyone in the room. “He’s over that way, by the bar.”

I strained to see where he was looking. “I think I can find it.”

Anna was looking at
me, but now concern filled her face. “Be careful with Victor, Sierra.”

It was like a cold w
ash of water went through me. All I could think about was our first scene at the Chamber, when Victor had scared the life out of me. “Why?” I asked.

“I used to play with him once in a while. But he only does casual sex. He doesn’t have girlfriends.” Anna shrugged. “I
couldn’t handle it. It’s got to be more for me, and it wasn’t fun being rejected by him. I just want to warn you. He’s broken more than one heart around here.”

“Oh
...” It felt like the air had been let out of me. It was my worst fears confirmed. By a woman who knew better than anyone. I could hardly look at Anna now, knowing she had sex with Victor.

Josh had his mouth closed tight, but he was nodding slightly, as if he agreed with his girlfriend’s assessment. “
Victor’s a great guy. But… yeah.”
I realized after a few moments that I was standing there with a stunned look on my face as they watched me sympathetically.

I’m a real
hot mess, no doubt about it.

So
I put on my fake salesgirl smile and raised my glass of wine. “So here’s to some casual fun!”

Josh and Anna laughed along with
me, but Anna didn’t believe me. How could she when she knew exactly how thrilling Victor was?

When
we parted, I headed in the opposite direction of the bar where Josh had spotted Victor. I had my pride.

And
I needed to sort out my feelings. I knew better than to give up just because his friends didn’t think Victor had it in him to really care about a girl. I had to find that out from Victor himself.

Or
I would always wonder if these feelings we had shared when we were making love did mean there was something more between us.

But a
s I wandered around the charity auction, the words played over in my head, “He only does casual sex.”

Chapter
19

Victor

When I saw Sierra in the Sanctuary, I was blown away. She stood there in a slinky red dress that cut high on her thigh and low in the back. It clung to her body, and I could almost feel how the silky material would slide over her breasts, with her nipples hardening under my hand. My cock stiffened painfully fast, and in the swimming haze of lust, I almost went over and grabbed her.

Like it was
my right.

But it wasn’t.
I hadn’t spoken to Sierra for two weeks, ever since I had dropped her off at her apartment after we got back from the Festival.

So
I forced myself to stay back, to watch and find out what she was up to, rather than be an idiot and rush in.

Every man in the place looked
Sierra over at least once as she roamed around the former sanctuary of the 19
th
Century church. The Leather Pride Night auction didn’t allow play, but a small trail of men followed in her wake. She still had that untouchable air about her that drew them to her, but there was something else. Something new.

For one thing, she wasn’t hiding behind a disguise this time. It was the first time
Sierra was out in the scene as herself, and there was an added confidence that I liked.

And i
nstead of the pleasant expression she tended to wear, keeping people at a polite distance, there was intensity in her eyes and determination in the set of her jaw. She was a woman on a mission, and she didn’t mind letting everyone know it.

I
wanted to go up and talk to her more than anything. Over the past two weeks, I kept thinking she would text me to ask for help, since she obviously needed it. But I didn’t have any money to give her. The weekend in Maryland had blown my spare cash, and I was strapped until my next paycheck.

I
had dreaded getting that text from her, pleading with me for help. I was angry at her for being like all of the others even though it felt different when we were together.

And
I felt bad for her because it wasn’t her fault that life was hard and women sometimes needed help from their boyfriends to get by. 

But
I wasn’t her boyfriend. I was the guy who was lying to her about who I was.

And having
mind-blowing sex with her…

Sierra had ruined
everything for me. I surveyed the fetish scene bustling on one of the biggest nights of the year, where tens of thousands of dollars would be raised for charity. I counted eight women here tonight who I had played with, and all of them thought I was rich and successful. Including my date for the night, Karla, a pale blond woman who was nearing thirty and on a constant quest for a husband.

Instead of feeling
exhilarated, it made me want to run. That is, before I saw that Sierra was here.

Karla
approached me, laughing at something a friend had said, as she rapidly downed another cocktail. Alcohol was served because no playing was allowed at the auction.

“There you are!” Karla
sang out, long before she rejoined me.

She had texted
me yesterday that she had an extra ticket after breaking up with her boyfriend. Like with Tricia, I had been Karla’s booty call between boyfriends for over a year now, and she fully expected to go back to my place tonight.

But
she left me cold; her staccato laugh, her exaggerated flirting and the way she made it clear she was available to me again. She was hoping for more than friends with benefits, like they always ended up hoping for more.

“
I keep losing you,” Karla complained. “Where do you keep going?”

I
had my eye on Sierra at that very moment. So far she hadn’t seen me. But faced with the sudden choice, it was easy.

“I see woman I need to talk to
,” I told Karla. “She may tell me to get lost. You may tell me to get lost, now that I’ve told you this. But I have to apologize to her.”

Karla considered
me. “Which woman?”

I
indicated Sierra. “In the red dress.”

“What do you need to apologize for?”
Karla slurred her words slightly.

I
did not want to be having this conversation, but I needed to talk to Sierra without Karla drunkenly shoving her way in and asserting her “rights.” “I took her to Festival and haven’t called her since.”

Karla
was astonished. “Why not? She’s really pretty. And young. Too young for you to be playing mind games with.”

“I think she likes mind games. At least I hope so. Maybe
she’ll talk to me again.”

Karla was shaking her head at
me. “I should get mad at you. But I’m really not surprised. You’re bored with me, aren’t you?”

I
smiled sadly. “You want a boyfriend, Karla, and I’m not that guy for you.”

“I ke
ep hoping you’ll realize what a great thing we have together…”

I knew she
was thinking about my loft in the city and my supposed house in Connecticut, and a life of leisure as my wife. I could hardly feel bad when I wasn’t really the man who was breaking up with her.

“I’m sorry it didn’t work out.”
I only had to do was stand there and look sad, and eventually it would be over.

“Well, whatever
! I’m going to hang out with my friends.” Karla waved across the room at them.

I tucked twenty dollars in her palm. “Here’s cab fare so you can get home okay.”

It was a typical move for
my role, and I had done it without thinking. Because that’s the only thing my relationship with Karla had been.

She actually smiled, liking it.
Which made me feel a little sick inside.

It was even worse when
I turned to face Sierra. She was far enough away so that she couldn’t hear anything, but she must have seen me talking to Karla.

I
walked directly over to her, feeling as if the sticky mess of my life was falling away as I neared Sierra. I had never had a better time with anyone than our first night at the Festival. Not even with Adrianne. And I had never felt so close to a woman than when we made love in the barn and I told her “
You’re mine…”

And in this moment,
I felt it again.
You’re mine…

I
reached out to touch her waist, to lean in to kiss her gently. It was only after I pulled back that I realized she could have withdrawn or turned away to stop me. She smelled delicious, and I drew in a deep breath, my face lingering near her hair.

“How are you?”
I asked, all of my pent-up concern spilling out in those brief words.

Her smile was easy. “I’m doing great.”

I took her hand, unwilling to lose contact with her now that she was near me again. She flooded my senses—I couldn’t think for wanting to pull her close and kiss her again, this time for real. But some distant sane part of my mind was screaming at me to slow down.

“Is your sister here?”
I asked.

“
God, I hope not. I don’t think this is her kind of thing.”

I
looked around, realizing that was true. This was a high-end event in the kink community, with not a drum circle to be seen.

“You’re here alone?”
I asked.

She held her hands out slightly, as if that was self-evident. “I had such a good time at
the Festival, before the bad stuff happened, that I wanted to see more. I ran into Josh over there. He introduced me to his girlfriend. She said she dated you a couple of years ago.”

“Yes.” There was nothing positive to say about
my “relationship” with Anna, so I quickly added, “What’s happening with your apartment search?”

“I got a new place. It’s in
Greenpoint.”

“
Already? When do you move in?”

“Last weekend,” she said with a laugh.

“That was quick. You could have waited out the month. Saved the rent.”

She shrugged lightly. “I found the place I wanted. And now I’m settled in. I really like my roommates.
We have a rooftop view of the city that’s to die for.”

“
Greenpoint, huh?” Now I felt like an even bigger asshole for not texting her. It turned out she didn’t need me after all. She had been busy taking care of herself.

S
ierra talked about her new neighborhood and the Polish bakeries and the novelty of taking a bus ride as part of her commute and being able to see where she was going rather than being underground in a subway.

It wasn’t what I had been imagining. Sierra wasn’t begging for
my help. So the last day at Festival, she wasn’t trying to shame me into helping her. She had been taking care of things and figuring out where she would live.

It made
everything feel so real, that frankly, it was all I could do to listen. I was looking at her mouth as she talked, adoring the slight dent in her full bottom lip. And her lovely face, the way the curve of her cheek caught the light. And her dark eyes that dragged me in whenever I dared to look into them. It made me want to reach out and caress her bare arms and draw her close to me.