Girl In Pieces (8 page)

I stared at the cash, then at him, then back at the cash wondering. Wondering if maybe his dark spell had finally lifted. Wondering if he’d given up hating me for whatever wrong he thought I’d done to him when dad died. Wondering if he’d been replaced with a pod person or an android. Not really minding if he had.

“Brian…I don’t know what to say. I don’t…you have no idea how badly I needed this. This will get me caught up on rent. It’ll get me some groceries. Shit.
Shit
. I don’t know what to say.
Thank you
 
doesn’t seem to cut it this time.”

He coughed and shifted uncomfortably in the chair. “It’s not a big deal. Technically you did earn it. And it’s not like I did anything but deliver it for Josh.”

“Thank you. I’m serious, thank you. And tell Josh…” His name slipped out before I could stop it, a little heart throbbing puff of air I hadn’t spoken out loud in weeks. I had to swallow his name again like a hard lump caught in my throat. “Tell him thank you. A lot. Smother him with appreciation.”

Brian grunted, a familiar wrinkle forming across his forehead. He was far too big for my puny little apartment and he seemed to feel it crushing him. He eyed the door each time he shifted positions, too obviously eager to leave as soon as absolutely possible.

 
“Tell him yourself. Aren’t you attached to his hip anyway?”

“Like I said, I’ve been busy.” I folded the envelope without looking at my brother and climbed to my feet. I couldn’t go see Sherman today and I couldn’t get to the bank until Monday, but I needed to be careful with this much cash. I needed to hide it.

My apartment came outfitted with a sealed fireplace. When I’d rented it, I thought it was cool and hip. Despite being sealed, it still let in drafts in the winter and mostly just ate up a huge chunk of wall space I could have otherwise fit bookshelves on. It did come in handy for having all these little nooks and crannies where bricks had either been pried loose or fallen out over the years. Inside one of these little brick holes I kept a box with a spare key and a lighter. I put the envelope in there.

“Everyone at the bar thinks you have a new boyfriend. That true?”

I laughed. “Wow the rumor mill is generous. No new boyfriend, although I do have a date tonight.” I gave a little celebration dance which actually brought a brief grin to Brian’s face. “First date. I was just getting ready when you knocked.”

“He nice?”

“Don’t know. He seems nice.” I shrugged and wandered back to Brian’s side. “Anything’s better than the whole lot of nothing I’ve had lately. Well, almost anything. Well, maybe not quite almost anything. Not axe murderers or Republicans or guys who like NASCAR. Definitely not those guys.”

“I’ve ah – I’ve actually been seeing someone too.” He twisted his hands across the arms of the chair and I realized his whole weirdness was because he was nervous. Nervous about this moment, about telling me his secret. I lowered myself back to the rug and grinned up at my big brother.

“Get out. Is she cute?”

A very tiny splotch of pink messed up Brian’s otherwise grouchy, scowly expression.

“Very.”

“And nice?”

“Sometimes.”

“If she’s not nice all the time, she’s not worth it. Trust me. Take it from a girl who has been there done that.”

“Sometimes is a lot better than the whole lot of nothing I’ve had this year.”

I grinned and nodded. “Yeah ok. Can’t argue with that.”

Brian’s cheeks pinked again.

“She’s not
not
 
nice. We’re still getting to know each other and she’s got baggage. But I like her company.” He cleared his throat and smoothed his palms down his thighs to his knees. It was so weird seeing him boyishly nervous. “I have no idea why she’s wasting her time on me.”

“Me either.”

He grunted again, but I thought I saw a tiny smile starting to curve his mouth before he pushed himself to his feet. “I should let you get ready for your date. Try not to talk too much and give away how annoying you are.”

“Har har.” I scrambled after him, giving him a childish shove out into the hallway. “Thanks again, Brian. It was nice not fighting for 5 minutes.”

“Yeah well, don’t get used to it.” He made a noise of annoyance at my neighbor Avery Alston as she appeared at the top of the stairs and he had to sidestep her armful of groceries. She smiled and he didn’t but if she noticed she didn’t look any less pleasant. She nudged her glasses up her nose with her shoulder, hiked a bag higher on her hip and got out of Brian’s way.

“Need a hand?” I leaned in the doorway and watched the red head lean into her doorway next to mine and fight to get her keys out.

“I got it. I’ve become a master at getting everything up the stairs in one trip and unlocking the door without having to put anything down. I’m not sure if it’s mad skills or epic laziness.” She jutted a hip, kicked the bottom of the door with her toe which popped it open and caught her second bag before it toppled out of her arms. “Viola. I should have joined the circus as a child. I’d have been a fantastic acrobat. Hey I’m making homemade cinnamon rolls tonight. Want to pop over about nine?”

“Rain check?” I grinned. “I’ve got a hot date and I would rather not be home before midnight.”

Avery’s brightness dimmed, her smile suddenly missing from behind her bags. We weren’t super close but I knew she was engaged to a guy from the nice side of South River which was where I was pretty sure she’d grown up. He came over sometimes but never seemed to stay long enough to meet me. I couldn’t remember his name.

“Lucky girl. I wouldn’t let you miss out on midnight make outs for anything, but I’ll want all the details tomorrow over coffee and leftovers.”

“You’re a true friend, Avery, even though you tempt me with buttery, sugar coated goodness and because I lack any kind of real willpower, as long as we stay neighbors I will always be shaped like a pastry.”

She smiled, the look of sadness vanishing as quickly as it had come. “At least I am in good company. Have fun. Make sure he pays for dinner or he doesn’t get to visit second base. Don’t do anything that could get you arrested.”

“Sound advice. Happy baking.” I started to push my door shut when her voice piped up from behind her wall of groceries.

“Hey Kat? If he’s boring, run the other way no matter how nice he is about it. If he bores you to tears, that’s as good as it’ll ever get until you can’t even remember what excitement feels like. Trust me. Nice isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be.”

I arrived at the restaurant Le Chat early with the idea that I’d case the place before deciding whether or not to go inside. It was upscale,
way
more than I could afford.

His ad whispered to me.

How can we please each other, my little pet
?
Can we talk? Can we kiss? Can you accept my control? Can you obey happily? Can you let go enough to learn? Would you like to be taught? Would you like to be mine?

Yes, yes, yes.
 
I daydreamed for hours before responding. He was poetry, promises of pleasure, offers of unconditional, temporary love and that was enough to bait me. That tiny, whispered promise was all I needed to be all in because the man I longed for had a tarty redhead between his sheets instead and that was starting to really piss me off.

The writer behind the ad emailed back before midnight. He felt confident and sweet. He wrote like he’d majored in English Literature and everything he said seemed intimately familiar, like song lyrics.

When he said,
I know you’re nervous. Me too. But we can figure this out together
, I felt like he had crawled inside my head and made himself at home.

And yet, Julie’s words haunted me. I couldn’t turn off my skepticism completely. She’d doubted Tyler because of the way Josh had been so cavalier with dismissing my heart. This stranger had no such motivations to take care of mine, so why should I trust him not to wreck it totally?

But,
I reminded myself,
 
you’re not giving him your heart. Just your body
.

He gave me his information and I sent it to Julie. She made me promise to text and call her every 20 minutes. I promised to take pictures of him when I arrived and send them to her.

He told me that he only liked the lifestyle in bed and afterwards he wanted someone he could have a nice conversation with. He wanted someone he could see movies with, cook for, hang out with on a Friday night without getting undressed. He wasn’t looking for a long term, serious relationship, but he was willing to commit as long as we met each other’s needs. The fact that he chose a restaurant called The Cat without knowing my name made me both excited and terrified. Maybe this was serendipity after all.

I’ll be the nervous man at the table by the window. Wear something purple. It’s my favorite color.

The skirt I wore was black. So were the knee high boots, but the thigh-high socks were the purple of his choice. I also wore a purple see-through shirt over a black cami. I felt cute, maybe more cute than I had since the disastrous party that ruined my life.

I paced outside for fifteen minutes before going in and by then I was barely on time. He was already there, by the window, fiddling with his phone.

He looked up as I approached. I felt his eyes take me in, all of me, straying along the lines of my body and hovering along the curve of my hips. My Dom was young. His age surprised me, mostly because it had taken all my power of self-denial to stop picturing versions of Josh when I pictured this man in the days leading up to our date. He looked maybe 24 and had close cut dark hair and glasses. He looked like a nervous accountant. Or Clark Kent. Not a Dom.

Nothing like Josh.

But then he stood up and reached for my hand and when his fingers clamped down around mine, a surge went straight to my knees. His grip was solid and unmoving. An image flashed through my mind, being on my back, hands pressed into the mattress, that grip holding me down. I felt a memory that hadn’t yet happened race down my body and I shivered without meaning to. He noticed, because the accountant burst into a grin that made me a bit weak.

“You must be her,” he said.

“I must be,” I answered, shaking as he pulled out my chair and scooted me in. “Kat. I mean, Katrina, but no one calls me that but my mother and my brother when he’s annoyed with me.”

Clark Kent laughed as he took his seat. “Thomas Tennyson. Just Thomas, for now. Maybe Sir later.”

He winked

Sir
. Shit.

“Tennyson?” I asked, clawing at normal, boring, vanilla thoughts before I turned into butter. “Like the writer?”

“The same, though I doubt there’s any relation. I’m a terrible writer, just ask every publisher I’ve ever submitted to.”

He laughed with white, picket-straight teeth and pink mouth. Wide lips. Kissable lips. I blinked when I realized he’d asked me a question and I’d missed it. He ducked to meet my eyes and repeated because I’d apparently gone stupid.

“Have you read him?”

“Just a little. In college.” I shook my head to clear it. “Good stuff, though.”

“You’re educated then? That’s good. I’ve got a boring academic streak in me I’m afraid, and I get bored easily with those who aren’t.”

He dismissed all the ignorant girls in the world with a flick of his wrist and dove right into his menu. All at once I felt turned on (in my knees! How did my knees know?) and insecure. His certainty made me feel a little off, but maybe I was projecting. I wondered if he’d find me too ignorant. Too…
something
. I badly wanted him to find me intriguing.

“So, you’re a writer?”

Thomas didn’t look up, but I noticed his mouth shrug with some unpleasant thought. “Not a paid one. Writing is an art. Not everyone appreciates art.”

“You’re not kidding about that. My graphic design work doesn’t quite pay the rent anymore.”

I couldn’t decipher what he saw when he looked at me. Did I turn him on? If I did, he didn’t show it. When he looked down without saying anything, my anxiety made my thoughts spin erratically.
 

“I wore purple,” I said suddenly. “Like you asked. It’s actually my favorite color, too.”

Thomas looked up from his menu again and nodded. “You did. So far so good.”

“So far so good?”

“I mean, so far you’ve done well. You were a little late though.”

Shit. Was that disappointment I heard? I squirmed in my chair.

The menu, and my stomach, called to me. I picked it up. Then immediately put it back down.

“You should know I’ve barely done any of this before. I don’t know how to do anything right. Yet. But I’m a fast learner.”

“I gathered from the tone of your email.” He smiled. “That’s ok. I actually prefer to train a girl to my specifications rather than break them of someone else’s. Don’t worry about your talents yet. You’ll have plenty of chances to prove yourself to me.”

My skin electrified slowly from my fingertips to my elbows. I put my hands in my lap, then on the table, then in my lap. I wondered how many girls had come before me. I wanted him to look at me. I wanted him to talk to me. I could imagine kissing him a lot, but it didn’t feel like those were the thoughts he was entertaining. He seemed more excited by the striped bass on the specials menu than he did about taking me home and tying me up.

His Clark Kent look felt so incongruous with his firm words and strong grip. He had a very confident voice and knew what he liked, which felt like there wasn’t enough room at the table for me.

And he seemed too young to know what he wanted with such absolution.

It’s because he’s not Josh
, I thought as I willed myself to look at the menu again. I was starving, hadn’t eaten a proper meal in a week.
You won’t want anyone unless it’s Josh, but you’re going to have to get over that
.

This is who you get. This is all you get.

The waitress appeared and looked first to Thomas. This little show of respect seemed to please him greatly. “Are you ready to order, sir?”

Sir.

“Yes. I’ll have the steak, medium rare, with vegetables.” Then he said, “She’ll have the house salad with chicken, dressing on the side.”

The waitress took my menu out of my hands and was gone before I could say
I hate salads and the people who eat them
.

I looked at my empty hands and considered carefully how to react. No one had ever ordered for me before, but it had also been a long time since anyone had offered to pay, either. It seemed rude to argue even if my stomach was very alarmed by this turn of events.

Calm down, Kat
. It wasn’t like he was a serial killer. He just wasn’t interested in some girl he might not like ordering the lobster, obviously.

Thomas turned his impressive attention on me, finally, and smiled big enough to blind the room.

 
“It’s healthier,” he said. “The salad. I hope you don’t mind. I like to take care of my girl in all ways. Healthy foods are just part of it.”

Oh.

Well.

He wasn’t cheap after all.

I put my hands back in my lap and tried to hide the lump there. He had said my size was fine, that he liked girls with
extra
. He said they looked
healthier
.

But clearly I didn’t look healthy enough.

“It’s fine,” I murmured, because how could I argue with the fact I could probably stand to choke down a few more salads and a few fewer Mac’n’Cheeses?

My stomach growled in response.

He made a soft
hmm
 
noise and nodded. “You seem nervous. Don’t be nervous. Dinner should be the easiest part of the night.”

This made me smile and he echoed my warmth. Certainly if we couldn’t make it through dinner, ropes and riding crops were going to be a challenge.

“I’ve never had anyone order for me before. It’s a little weird, that’s all.”

“There will be a lot of things I decide for you, from time-to-time. We’ll get to know each other well enough that I will be able to choose from things you enjoy when I want you happy.” He winked and my knees clutched together tighter.

But while my body reacted, my mind spun incoherent warnings. The way he said it made it seem like there might be times when he wouldn’t want me happy, that he’d choose things specifically to make me
unhappy
. Punishment, I supposed, and humiliation.

Certainly this wasn’t what I wanted. Not this.

Right?

Julie’s mind was as loud mouthed as mine. More so, probably, and she found happiness in submitting to Tyler so I had to be missing something, some important piece that balanced submission with empowerment.

Maybe I just didn’t understand after all.

Thomas chose a spoon from his silverware and I watched as he ran his thumb down its shape. The way he studied the polished silver made it seem like he could see more in its reflection than I could. It wasn’t hard to imagine those hands discovering the shape of my arm, leg, hips...

I bit my lip. My body definitely felt something my mind hadn’t quite figured out yet.

“So, Katrina, did you grow up in South River?”

Katrina. My skin bristled. I squashed the doubt back down.

“No, well, sort of. My dad was from here and after my parents divorced he moved back. I stayed with him sometimes.”

“And you live here now?”

“Yes.”

“And you work here as well?”

“Yes. At a magazine. And like I said, I’m a freelance graphic designer when I have clients.”

He nodded. “That sounds exciting. I can’t abide laziness.”

Can’t abide
. I picked up my water and took a sip.

Thomas watched me, dark eyes searching my face, down my throat and further. I couldn’t read his expression but there were little knots between his eyebrows.

After many heartbeats worth of panic, he reached across the table and settled his massive, heavy hand over mine. It was warm and dry, not sweaty and shaking like mine. He knew what he wanted. He felt so self-sure, unwavering, possessed of his own judgment. You had to admire someone like that.

And I admired his hand, the way it felt collecting mine between his. I liked the way his thumb ran across the webbing between my fingers, between my knuckles, along the wrist bone and back to the beginning of the journey. I licked my lips and thought of licking other things. He watched our hands until the knots between his eyes let go.

“You know what? I think we got off on the wrong foot. I’m sorry. We don’t need any of that other stuff right now. No orders, no expectations, no power exchanges. Not during dinner. Do you want steak? I’ll order you a steak. And dessert, if you like. Let’s just talk.”

Let’s just talk.

I exhaled the tension in my shoulders and sunk down into my chair. “You read my mind.”

“That’s my job. To read you. You’re so worked up you look like you’re about to run out of the restaurant. And I really don’t want that.”

He turned my hand over and I slid my fingers between his. Such a silly, gentle gesture and yet it made all the difference in my body. The sexual tension didn’t disappear, but it relaxed enough that I could breathe and touch him and not feel like I was going to explode. The nerves unwound in my stomach. I could smile and mean it.