Chapter 29: Chapter 29

Vadik

“What’s that?”

I enter Charleigh’s room with a dress for her, a sexy number, even sexier than the get-up she wears when cocktail waitressing.

It’s long and shimmery gold, with a slit that’s meant to expose the entire leg all the way up to the hip. The front has narrow swathes of fabric to cover the breasts, and it ties behind the neck. It’s all held together with a strip of fabric that wraps around the waist, sort of like a cummerbund for a tux, not that anyone wears them anymore.

“It’s a dress, Charleigh. And since I’ve brought it up to your room, it’s a safe bet to say it’s for you.”

Jesus, she’s in a shit mood. But that’s because she doesn’t know what awaits her. She only thinks she does.

She looks the dress up and down, then crosses the room to take a pinch of fabric between her fingers. The pinch turns into a handful, and I know I’ve got her. I knew she’d love the way it feels. Hell, I love the way it feels.

She takes the hanger from me and holds the dress at arms’ length, touching it, turning it, even looking inside it. Christ, she’s inspecting it like it’s something she’s going to eat.

But when she looks back at me, her eyes are dull and flat. I don’t like that we’ve done that to her. “Want me to try it on or something?” she says, bored, like she has nothing else to do.

I look around her room and see a book on the floor next to her easy chair. I guess she is bored. All she’s been doing all week is reading. That and walking around the property, especially my parents’ garden.

How do I know this, when I am working nonstop? First, there are cameras everywhere. And second, both the household staff and security regularly report to me what she’s been up to.

They think it’s a safety thing. But truth be told, I’m interested in what she does with her time. How she reacts to things. Which books she selects.

Fuck, I’m just interested in her.

She comes out of her walk-in closet wearing the dress. Because I didn’t bring any high heels for her to try on with it, she’s walking on her toes, loping across the room like a giraffe.

Regardless of her stilted demonstration, the effect she has on me is devastating. I actually get a lump in my goddamn throat, and I don’t think I’ve cried since I was told my parents died.

The dress floats down the front of her body like someone painted her in gold. It clings to her small breasts just enough to show their shape, but not enough to show everything. Her nipples protrude in the cool room like little gold nuggets.

I twirl a finger to get her to turn.

I’ll be damned if the back of the dress isn’t even better than the front. She’s totally bare down to the back of her waist, the dress’s sash draping perfectly around her hips. The fabric glides over her ass cheeks just enough to show a little jiggle when she walks.

The embodiment of flawless perfection, that’s what she is.

What every man wants. And few can afford.

“Charleigh, I’m not going to tell you how beautiful you look, because I’m sure you know. But I have something to talk to you about.”

She releases an exaggerated sigh, followed by rolling her eyes.

This is like a strike to the heart. My mother, my long-suffering mother, putting up with my father’s dalliances and other bullshit, used to do the same thing.

Clearing my throat, I force myself to look away, thinking back to how a lifetime with my father nearly wore her down. But she still loved him. I was told when their bodies were found, they were holding hands.

Is it too late for Charleigh? Have we completely worn her down? Ruined her? Put out the bright light that has enchanted my brothers and me since she arrived?

“Come here, darling,” I say, surprising myself with the tenderness in my voice.

Her gaze glued to mine, she crosses the room, no longer on tiptoe. She holds a bunch of fabric to avoid tripping.

“Yes?” she says defiantly when she is inches from my face.

She is not mine. And yet she will be. There’s no turning back now.

I reach behind her neck and untie the dress. It tumbles to her waist, leaving her breasts bare, and slides the rest of the way to the floor once I loosen the sash.

Before me stands a naked beauty, like Botticelli’s Venus or some such, the sort of vision that steals away all your words and even your breath. The kind that makes time stop while you just look at it, your gift, until you tire of it.

Although you know you never will.

* * *

Vadik

She is devoid of the shyness she had when we first played around. Perhaps someone has gotten to her before me?

No, that’s not possible.

She’s been better-guarded than the gold in Fort Knox.

She’s mine, goddammit. She’ll never be anybody else’s.

I back her up until she’s forced to sit on the bed.

“Take out my cock.”

She swallows and looks up at me, her eyes wide. Do I see some of her light coming back? Is she waking from the dark place where she’s been?

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, she pulls the stiff leather on my designer belt and opens my trouser hooks and fly. Pushing aside my shirt tails, she pulls down the waist of my boxers and reaches for my erection. I stop breathing, waiting for her hand, as if I’ve been craving it all my life.

Maybe I have.

Her fingertips run up and down my length, and she touches the drop of precum on my cock like she’s never seen it before. Gripping me lightly, lightly enough to leave me in agony, she slides down my shaft all the way to the root. I push forward, into her face and rub my cockhead on her cheek.

There she sits, below me, her eyes closed and legs parted enough that I can see her erect clit poking out of her pussy lips.

Is this woman real? I don’t see how she can be.

I reach down for her little tits, her nipples upturned and delightfully alive, and knead and pull them until she quietly moans. Without a word, she looks up at me, releases my cock, and slides back on the bed, her legs open just wide enough to let me see her, but not enough for me to slip between them.

That’s okay.

Pushing my pants below my ass, I join her on the bed, nudging her legs apart to position myself between them. I push her knees up gently, tilting her pelvis into the perfect position.

I know it sounds cheesy, but if I died right now, I wouldn’t care. This is the most perfect moment of my life.

I press my cock against her opening. Her precious opening. The one we are—correction, were—going to auction to some fucker sick enough to want to see a virgin bleed.

“You good, baby?” I ask, just hovering.

Her eyes are half-closed and her lips are full and pink, just like her pussy. “Yeah.”

“What do you want, Charleigh?” I whisper, wondering how long my control will last.

She looks at me, her hair fanned out around her head like a fucking mermaid. She reaches for my ass and digs her nails into me, propelling me forward.

I know she wants what I want. But I want her to say it. Say it out loud for both of us, like she’s blessing this thing we are giving each other.

In a barely discernible whisper, she answers. “Fuck me, Vadik. I want you to fuck me.”

I’m not one for virgins. I get no rush out of being someone’s first, some guy a woman will supposedly remember and talk about for the rest of her life. I don’t need that honor. It’s a messy business, and I don’t mean just because of the possibility of blood. There’s this vulnerability, this fragility, that any decent man should feel responsible for. Not that many do.

I haven’t.

But I do want Charleigh to remember me. Years from now, when she’s doing whatever she’s doing, I want her to think back, maybe even smile, and recall the strange circumstances under which she met a man like me. I want her to remember that I fucked her with care, that I made her come, and that she felt beautiful afterward.

And loved.

Fuck. I did not just say love.

“Guide me.”

There’s no way I’m going to slide into her tight pussy without a hand to steer me.

I push lightly, rocking against her, giving her time to open. She’s soaking wet, so that should help, and when I enter her a couple inches, she gasps, then her head falls back on the bed, and she arches her neck.

“You okay?”

She swallows hard and nods. “Yeah. I like it.”

“Can you take more?” I ask.

I’ve never fucked someone so politely before. What is this woman doing to me?

She nods.

I enter her slowly, so very slowly, in a steady movement until I’m balls deep. She winces and gasps, and I wait, giving her time to adjust. I want to pound her pussy, and it’s taking all the self-restraint I have to hold back.

Not to mention hold my orgasm. I want to unload in her, coat her insides with my cum. But not yet.

When her nails dig into my ass again, announcing she wants more, I slide in and out, watching her for signs of pleasure or pain. A small smile crosses her lips and I pump faster, cupping her ass with one hand, and her face with the other.

Her hands slide to her breasts, running her thumbs over her nipples like I did, and I take heady pleasure in the thought that I might have taught her something.

I just want to fuck hard, though I’m holding back from the full force of what I could deliver, holding on by a fragile string of self-control I am afraid is about to break. That’s when her eyes close, her mouth opens, and her arms tighten around me, as if they can get any tighter, and she lets out a cry that’s music to my ears.

The throbbing in my balls detonates through my cock, and I’m out of my mind, convulsing, groaning, being reborn, and knowing I’ll remember her even if she forgets me tomorrow.

*******

Charleigh

How is this supposed to work?

Now I have to fake being a virgin? Because I sure as hell am not one anymore.

Vadik told me not to worry about it when I asked, that there would be a surprise later tonight that I’m not to know about until then.

A surprise. Just what I need.

How about a non-surprise? Something predictable? Something normal?

Too much to hope for, no doubt.

What could my surprise be? A going away party, maybe? A gift? Another pretty dress to remember my time at the club by?

Goody.

I won’t lie. For some truly fucked up reason, when someone bids on me and I have to say goodbye to the guys, my heart is going to break.

How can I feel this way about men who are about to ruin my life? Throw me away like I’m nothing?

Who do I hate more? Myself or them?

It’s a draw.

I’m grateful I lost my virginity to Vadik, and I’d be lying if I don’t admit I liked it.

Actually, loved it.

I’m extra-grateful it won’t be taken by some creep who buys me like just another possession. He might not know I’m no longer a virgin—you can’t always tell, I read in some internet article—but I’ll know and I’ll be laughing on the inside, enjoying that he was suckered. That’s he’s getting screwed even more than I am.

God, I sound like a bitter bitch.

In the club’s huge party room, I wait out of sight behind a curtain, trying not to shake. Or vomit. Or pass out. I shift in my high-heeled pumps, where I hid my cash under the inner sole lining. It’s not comfortable, but what else about my life is? I don’t know how tonight will go down, but if I’m whisked off the moment the auction ends, at least I’ll have some money with me. I couldn’t fit much in there, but it’s something.

The troll Alexei, holding the program that still claims I’m a virgin, is already in the center front row surrounded by his goons, smiling like a cat about to jump its prey. Even from where I am sneaking a peek, I see sweat running down his temples in the temperate room. His sausage-like fingers push through his greasy hair, and he pops a mint into his mouth, his lips twisted into a rubbery smile.

As if his ‘having’ me is a foregone conclusion.

Such arrogance.

If this doesn’t put me off men for the rest of my life, I don’t know what will.

I spot Dimitri, who walks in like he owns the place and because of course, there’s instant drama over something he says, which I cannot hear across the room. I can’t tell whether the guys are trying to corral him or kick him out altogether. God knows what he’s done this time. He’s his own worst enemy with his big mouth and clueless entitlement.

“How you feeling?” Kir asks, poking his head behind the screen where I wait, startling the hell out of me.

I want to hit him. But I smile and shimmy in my gold dress. “Wonderful Kir, like any girl who’s about to be sold to erase the debts of her father. It’s what I’ve always wanted. The perfect direction for my life. My mother, if she were alive, would be thrilled.”

His head snaps back on his shoulders like he’s surprised at my vitriol. Does he really expect something else? Am I supposed to be jumping up and down and squealing like a girl who just made the cheerleading squad?

Fuck him. And fuck his brothers.

I look away, full of disgust in myself, the Alekseevs, all the men at the auction, and the world in general.

Everyone gets a break in life. Everyone except me, that is.

I lose my mother when I’m ten, my dad stops being a parent and can barely even continue to run his little business, I have to raise my younger sister, and then this? After I finally believe I have a track to follow that will put my life on a trajectory that I control? I wanted to be a professional woman who wears nice clothes and eats in restaurants every now and then. Hangs out with my BFF, Luci, and even takes occasional vacations to warm places like Florida and California.

How is it that’s too much to ask?

Where’s my fucking break?

“Um, I take it Vadik hasn’t spoken to you,” he says.

No, he hasn’t spoken to me. He fucked me, but he hasn’t spoken to me.

I don’t bother answering. My scowl says it all.

Kir nods slowly. “Okay. Well, just hang tight. One of us will be right back.”

I throw my arms up in the air. “Hanging!” I say as if I’m having fun.

He disappears and I look around the screen again, this time watching Dominika get in on the drama at the back of the room.

Anger wells up in me. Actually, it kind of rolls over me, squashing me like a Mack truck. It oozes out of my pores, through the ends of my hair, and if someone were to even look at me wrong, I think I could kill them with my bare hands. My skin crackles with the strange sensation, and the depth of hate I feel at this moment scares me. I’m trying to shake it off when I hear raised voices. I poke my head around the screen again.

Everyone is still preoccupied with Dimitri—even Alexei is now turned around to watch the fuss—that the club front door is not being watched. Seriously. The bouncer, on his way to restrain Dimitri, has left the door unattended.

Could it really be this easy?

I can run. For god’s sake, I can run.