Hotel Indigo (26 page)

I look forward again. “It doesn’t matter. You can touch her. You’re a masseur.”
 

“I only want to touch you.”
 

I almost laugh. But a tear spills from my eye as I try. “You’re being ridiculous.”
 

“Maybe I’m being brave.”
 

I turn and shake my head. “It’s fine. We had what we had. It’s over.”
 

“I don’t want it to be.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I say nothing.
 

“I want to be with you,” he tells me. “For as long as I can.”
 

“It’s getting complicated. When I saw you with that woman … I got …
mad.”
 

“And when I saw photos of you with Hunter Altman, I was furious.”

“He’s just a friend.”
 

Marco nods. “Like you said, it’s getting complicated.”
 

“So we should end it now. Before it gets worse.”
 

“I don’t care if it gets worse.” He brushes the hair from my neck. Then he kisses me, just below the ear.

“It’s not what I thought it was,” I tell him. “We agreed that this was only sex.”
 

He moves closer to me. I feel his erection. “Then let it be. Until it’s over.”
 

“We’ll just make it worse, Marco.”
 

His hand moves down to my breast. I didn’t realize how aroused I was, but his hand is heaven. It slides down my body and slips into my panties. I’m soaking. And that feels so much better.
 

“At least stay the extra days.”
 

“Stop.” I say it as I wriggle into him, encouraging his fingers to enter. My breath is suddenly heavy. I feel his cock pressing against my ass. I know he’s shirtless, so maybe he’s only in shorts. More than anything, I want the fabrics between us out of the way. I want him inside me, even if it’s the final time.
 

“Say it again and I’ll stop,” Marco says, rolling his fingers across my slippery clit.
 

I moan.
 

Marco reaches back with his top hand and shifts behind me. I feel his dick as it lays hot against my leg, now free. Then the same hand is at my hip, peeling my panties down just enough for him to touch me from behind.
 

“Tomorrow—” I begin.
 

“Let’s deal with today first, then see what tomorrow brings.”
 

His hard cock head presses against my pussy from behind. Then he moves closer and enters. With my legs closed, the fit is tight as he slips inside me. I gasp. Marco’s head falls into the hollow between my neck and shoulder. I can feel his breath in the moonlit dark.
 

“Tell me what you want, Lucy.”

“I don’t know.”
 

“Not tomorrow. Not next week. Not five years from now. Now is all that matters. Tell me what you want right now.”
 

I don’t know what I’m feeling. Pure lust? Something bittersweet? My heart doesn’t know which direction to beat. Marco’s hand is back on my chest and his mouth is on my neck. He’s filling me, his thrusts reflecting the way I’ve seesawed through the day: he’s there, he’s gone, there, he’s gone. He’s inside me.
He’s inside me.
And
oh God
it feels so good.
 

“I want you to fuck me,” I pant as my first orgasm builds.
 

So Marco holds my hips as I climax, and does.
 

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

M
ARCO

I’
VE
FUCKED
UP
SO
BADLY
.
 

Last night, things made sense to me — in that they didn’t at all, but with my cock hard and Lucy’s motor running, it hardly mattered.
 

Nothing is different in the morning. If anything, things are worse. Lucy’s phone call yesterday hurt like a spear through the chest, but maybe she was right to end it — if I’d let her, that is, rather than sneaking into her room. Because now that we’ve both gotten off, we’re back where we left it: one step forward and another two back.
 

We’re holding hands as we leave the elevator. It’s terrible. As bad as yesterday hurt, neither of us is stupid enough to believe that the eventual sundering, now that we’ve rekindled things, won’t be so much worse. I mean, we’re
holding hands
for fuck’s sake. But Lucy reached for my hand on the way down from her suite, and I eagerly took it. As if dreams could last forever.
 

But nothing’s changed.
 

Lucy’s still a rich girl from San Francisco. She lives an executive life in an ivory tower, surrounded by billionaires — like her brother, and Hunter Altman.
 

And me? I’m still a masseur who’s one firing away from being a dirt-poor kid, just like in Italy. I haven’t saved a penny, doing everything I can to hack at the debt. I’ve sent all I can back to Amalfi for my family, punishing myself with imposed poverty for leaving them.
 

Neither of us wants a relationship. Lucy doesn’t have time, and I don’t have the temperament. We’re both bad at being with others. I’m still not healed from my almost-marriage and the year of near-suicidal depression that followed. Lucy’s story is different but equally awful. This Aaron guy hurt her when he left, and worse, he cost Lucy her business. While she was in a relationship and focused on him, her business wavered.
 

Even if we could be together, it would be at the cost of Lucy’s biggest dream.
 

But I can’t think about that now. Her hand is in mine, and if I can forget the future I’ll still feel amazing. My usual pain will fade if I live in this moment with Lucy by my side. I can dream for this second, and then the next one, knowing it will eventually end.
 

We stop. Lucy turns and embraces me, kisses me the way a girlfriend would. It lasts too long and there’s too much contact between our bodies. I want her, but not just sexually. I need to hold her. I want to keep her with me, forever.
 

She steps away and says, “Just a second.”
 

“Aren’t we getting breakfast?”
 

“I need to stop by the front desk.”

“Why?”
 

“I need to extend my stay again.” When I hesitate, she smiles. And then, as if to sweeten the deal, she adds, “I’ll get us some candy bars afterward. My treat.”
 

I take a slow breath. My emotions are complicated and contradictory. I want Lucy to extend her stay so I can see more of her. But I also know how much worse another three days will make our inevitable parting, so some part of me wants to sabotage it. To end this now, while I still think we can take it.
 

But I don’t want to tell her
no
, so I hang on for an extra second. Then our hands part and she gives me this little smile that says she knows exactly what I’m thinking.
 

“It’ll be okay,” Lucy says, then turns to walk away.

In her flickering eyes I feel a yawning wash of memory. I relive our time together. I see the top of the water tower, making love last night, walks spent deep in conversation, the night she met Mama, the evening I met her mother.
 

In that moment I realize something horrible.
 

I’m not just attached.
 

I love her. I love Lucy White with all my heart.
 

It doesn’t matter if we’re star-crossed. Or that we don’t make sense. It doesn’t matter if we live a nation apart and neither of us have time for what’s next. It doesn’t matter, because this is more than me and more than Lucy. This comes from somewhere else. We don’t get to choose. We can only submit to the feeling, and heed its call.
 

“Lucy!”
 

She turns back, expectant.

I open my mouth to share my epiphany, but words won’t leave. She waits, seeming to sense something coming — maybe feeling the same reckless feeling I am — but then the moment passes and she seems to decide I have nothing. Or, maybe more likely, she decides I have plenty, but that there will be time for it later … before the hourglass sand is all gone.
 

She kisses her fingers, holding them out and blowing me a kiss.
 

Thirty seconds after she’s gone, I get a face full of Thomas Booth. He steps beside me from down the staff hallway and watches Lucy depart. Then he ticks his head toward her before turning his stare on me.
 

“What the fuck are you still doing with her?”

I’m not sure how I’m supposed to reply. It’s irrelevant because he doesn’t give me a chance.
 

“I’ve been leaving you messages since yesterday morning. Jill Wyland has been chewing my goddamn ear off. Kendall’s, too, based on the way she keeps bursting in on me like a scared little bird. What exactly did you do to piss her off? She won’t say. Just keeps making petty threats. You’re not in your cabana, you’re not by the pool, you’re not answering your goddamn phone. Where the hell have you been, Marco?”

“I’ve been busy.”
 

“Busy with what?”
 

When I don’t answer right away, again he preempts me.

“Do we have a problem, you and me? Because I expect my employees to be reliable. So you’d better tell me what’s happening. I need you on call for things like this.
On call.
Do you hear me, Marco? The job market is
slim
right now. I’d think someone in your
privileged position
would appreciate what he has and just how bright his future could be if he’ll keep playing ball. I assume you’d be grateful. Because what helps me helps you. Got that?”
 

I want to shout him down, but Booth’s hit the nail right on its head. Not only does Hotel Indigo pay me twice what I made in my old job, but that old job doesn’t exist. In my bolder moments, I’ve considered quitting so I can stop being a plaything for him to shove in front of these sad, obnoxious, women. But there’s nothing out there. I could work as a cashier. Or sweep floors. And what could Mimi count on then?
 

This all doubles if Booth’s threats about advancing me out of massage and into sales pan out. I don’t have a high standard of living, so another raise would set me up for a while. I’d have money to send home and pay my bills, plus enough left over to start hacking at my debt — maybe even start a savings account once it’s finally paid off.
 

I nod, hating myself.
 

“What happened with Wyland?” he asks, when it seems we agree.
 

“She wanted more than was on the menu.”
 

“So?”
 

“I know you’re not suggesting you’d let a guest exchange money for sex. I may not know much, but I know that can’t possibly be what you’re implying.”
 

Booth’s tongue sneaks into his cheek. He eyes me. “Of course not. But you don’t need to piss her off.”
 

“It’s a work in progress.”

“Well, then maybe you should be
progressing
on it instead of chasing White’s tail out the door. Where’s the logic in escorting
her
anymore? Kendall spoke to Miss White a while ago and says she’s happy; something urgent must’ve made her cancel. She’s in the bag. Her stay is over.”

“She’s going to re-up right now, Thomas.” Then, because he has too much upper hand and I know exactly where he’s going, I add, “I got her to stay.”
 

Thomas looks at me, then says, “Not interested.”

I look at him sideways.
 

“Wyland already snatched up the Emperor Suite when White cancelled the last time. So what if she stays? I don’t really care about three more nights in another room. Kendall says she got Hunter Altman here yesterday, and his limo was on HipPic, with the Indigo in the background. We’re good there. Now it’s time to focus on Wyland. Do to her whatever the hell you did to get White extending her stay the first time. Do that and this place will be dripping with models. And they
talk
. Are you with me, Marco?”