Dark Secret Love (6 page)

Suddenly, I was living in a world of strangers.

You want me to have mourned him, don’t you? You want me to say that I slaved long hours to save up enough money so I could go meet him, that we set up house in Georgia. It would be a dream come true, right? Connor bartending to pay the bills while I set up a typewriter on the kitchen table and pounded out porn.

But it wasn’t like that. Yes, I sported a spanking-new cherry tattoo on my hip. Yes, I had Connor’s belt, and I wore it whenever I had on jeans, stroking the old silver buckle absentmindedly the way he had. And yes, it took a few weeks for the bruises he left me to totally fade away.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t make what we had love. And in any case, I didn’t have a second to mourn. I was working as many temp jobs as I could land, shuttling all over the city wearing the few dresses I’d scavenged from the dry cleaners, trying my best to look professional. Trying to pretend I had my shit together. Weeks had
passed and I still hadn’t been able to get into my house and collect my stuff.

My new roommates were extremely supportive, going so far as offering to beat Byron up for me to make him return my belongings. Lois roomed with a grad student and a director, two completely different types of guys, in an old triplex in the Hollywood Hills. Nathan, the director, had dark hair, dark eyes, and a look that was insolent and sexy, in-your-face and sly. Garrett, the student, was six-foot four, barrel-chested, with choirboy good looks, and he’d recently had his heart destroyed by the heels of his college sweetheart. He seemed to be in a constant daze.

The house was surrounded by vibrant bougainvillea vines and had an old-world charm, a remnant of forties Hollywood. The interior was something else, seventies green shag carpet in the living room, cracked linoleum on the kitchen floor, stained Formica counters. Nathan and Garrett were the type of guys who stole stacks of cocktail napkins to keep by the commode rather than the pristine rolls of Charmin I was accustomed to.

I’d never had roommates like this, and I was fascinated. Odd that total strangers put me up, willingly let me sleep on their thrift-store sofa, drink their coffee, stake out their phone for interview appointments. I made their place cleaner, definitely, and more livable. I replaced the Spider-Man napkins with real toilet paper. I washed the dishes in the sink. I was suited to taking care of people. Besides, I wanted them to like me.

Although they were all friendly, Nathan intimidated the hell out of me. He had ties on the four corners of his mattress and a hidden hook behind his bed to hang handcuffs, which he proudly showed me on my second day in
the apartment. His bookshelf boasted my favorite filthy titles:
The Story of O, Justine, The Pearl, 100 Days of Sodom
. He would come in after dates and collapse next to me on the sofa, making it feel natural to be in his arms as he told me about his X-rated adventures.

“I ate her soul,” he said one night.

“You what?”

He explained that his date hadn’t wanted to do something he’d requested—he left whatever that thing was to my vibrant imagination. (Anal sex? Some power game? Outdoor fucking?) And he pushed until her boundaries were broken, and then left, satisfied, while she cried. He dated extremely pretty girls, starlets he met at casting calls or out at clubs. He fucked them once and moved on. But he liked to talk to me, to stroke my dark hair away from my face and tell me his secrets. “We’re exactly alike,” he whispered one night to me, while I shook my head. “Don’t deny it,” he said, “we’re two of a kind.” I didn’t know what he meant, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out. But still, I liked him. I appreciated his twisted sense of humor, and I liked how confident he was.

The third roommate, Garrett, didn’t pay me much attention. He seemed bemused to find me on the sofa when he came in to watch the news. He was wary of me, but friendly in a standoffish way.

This was my new life, and I did my best to be cheerful about it. I no longer had a real home, or a real room, or any real friends (mine were scattered around the country). I put my head down and worked toward getting a job. At night I wrote stories on Lois’s old typewriter, deciding that if I didn’t have to worry about Bryon’s critiques, I might actually be able to create something worthwhile. I was plotting something—my new life. The life I’d always wanted.

Following an interview at a salon one morning, I was nearly crushed by a dog that escaped from its leash. The owner apologized profusely as he pulled the beast off me. “Really, I’m sorry,” he said, and then smiled, “but if it’s any consolation, he only knocks over the pretty girls.”

The man invited me to dinner that night at a gourmet hotspot on Robertson to make up for the behavior of his out-of-control mutt. I hadn’t been on a date-date in years. Connor and I didn’t date. I was intrigued. Jack was older than me—no big surprise there, huh?—and he looked refined, like a businessman. I was excited to go out, but I met him at the restaurant, wanting to have an escape plan.

Dinner was surreal.

Jack ordered us shots and beers, strange drinks for such a fancy environment. I got drunk as my date described in minute detail what he wanted to do to me. He described the most extreme bondage, punishment, discipline. He wanted to strip me naked and make me crawl across the floor to him, to bow at his feet, to call him Sir. He wanted me to kiss the tips of his shoes, to kiss the tip of his crop, to take the pain he had in store for me.

“You need it,” he said, “Don’t tell me I’m wrong.”

Once again, someone had found me. Snap your fingers. Strike the match. I wanted the things he described, but even drunk, I knew better than to go home with a total stranger, to let him tie me to his bed. He promised things that were constantly in my head. He said, “I know you want this. I know what you deserve.”

I looked at my plate, then up at him.

“How? How do you know?”

And he laughed, like Connor had laughed. “It’s clear.
You wear your desires on your sleeve. The longing. Almost desperate.”

His hands were on me even at the table, touching me, stroking me. He cradled my face in his grip and he said, “You need it to hurt.” The words were simple. Matter-of-fact. As if he’d said that my eyes were brown. Or that my skin was pale.
You need it to hurt
.

Fuck me. Why did he know? How could he tell? I took another drink, felt as if I were actually transparent, made of glass. Could everyone in the fancy restaurant see what Jack saw?

He shrugged, reading my mind so easily. “I don’t know why, baby doll. I can’t tell you the reasons. I can only tell you what you need.” He touched my face again. “That’s not totally true. I can tell you what I need as well.” And he continued to talk, about the clamps he would use on my nipples and on my pussy lips, about the whips he had, about the canes. I don’t think I ate more than two bites, and when he paid, he took me outside while we waited for his car. He held me in his arms against his strong chest. He kissed my hair and let his hand run down my back to cradle my ass. He felt the tremor work through me, but he seemed to know I wasn’t going with him. When his car came, a dark blue Jag, I couldn’t get in. I wanted it all. Every frame. Every image. But he scared me.

Jack didn’t mind. He gave me his number. He told me to call. “I know you’ll call,” he said. And then he kissed me and drove away.

I didn’t ask for my car. I was too drunk to even consider driving. I went back into the restaurant and called “home.” Garrett answered, a surprise since he was usually out catering—he worked as a chef to pay the bills. “Cancelled,” he said. “What’s up?”

I’d lived in a desert for years, and now my fantasies were raining down on me. If I’d gotten Nate, I could have explained easily, said what was going on, begged for a ride. Instead, I got Garrett, and I confessed. Crazy desires. I had only meant to explain that I was too drunk to drive, but the words spilled from my mouth, until I was telling him everything. Every single thing Jack had said, and everything I knew in my heart that I wanted.

“Shhh, Samantha,” Garrett whispered. “Don’t do this. Not on the phone. Let me come get you.”

I sat down on the curb and waited, and he pulled up twenty minutes later and helped me in. He looked shell-shocked. “You need help,” he said.

“No,” I shook my head. “I need someone to spank me. With a belt. With a paddle. I need to be punished.”

“Really,” he tried again. “That’s not healthy. You have to get help—”

I was crying, trying to tell him that I didn’t care. I didn’t want to be fixed. I wanted what Jack had offered. But not from Jack. Not yet, anyway. Garrett drove us around the city instead of taking me home. He found us a hotel on Sunset. He had never raised a hand to a woman before, never been rough in any way. And at first, he continued to try to convince me that I didn’t want what I wanted. But I saw a look in his eyes that let me know not to let up.

There was a huge tub in the room and there were mirrors on the wall, and I made him punish me bent over the lip of the deep tub, made him fuck me simply by explaining that I needed it. I deserved it.

I corrupted him. Evil thing that I am.

But I truly believe that Garrett had the same fantasies I did. He’d just pushed them down. Covered them up. He’d been with the same girl since high school, and all they’d
ever experienced together was simple, pretty sex. Now I was giving him the opportunity to open the dark door in his head and let loose his inner demons.

He surprised me. He surpassed what I’d hoped. Not letting up on me when I started to cry. No pity. He was a natural Dom. He spanked me until I felt as if my ass were on fire, and then he showed me my reflection in the wall of mirrors, making me look. I was a mess. My makeup streaked, my carefully done hair all loose. He threw me down on the bed and fucked me, and he made me tell him what Jack had wanted to do. Made me tell him everything, promising that he would take over.

The call came in two days later. I’d landed the job at the salon, front desk, decent pay. The only glitch was the dress code: all black. That was the only thing the owner allowed. So what was the problem? I owned plenty of black—in my closet at Byron’s house.

“That’s it,” Nate insisted when I explained that I couldn’t afford to buy a whole new wardrobe. “We’re getting your stuff.”

Garrett agreed, although he was oddly quiet. He hadn’t spoken to me much at all since our night together, and I wondered what he was thinking. I didn’t expect him to be my boyfriend now. I didn’t know what I expected, but boyfriends weren’t high on my list of priorities.

I do know that Byron didn’t expect what he found when he came home from work that afternoon: Garrett and Nathan and me, sitting on the front curb, waiting. Byron hadn’t taken my calls, had refused to return the messages I’d left at work and on his machine. So now here I was, with two tall young bucks, both wearing solid, serious expressions.

“She needs her clothes,” Nate said as Byron came slowly up the drive.

“She should have thought about that before she fucked the boy toy.”

“Meaning what exactly?” Garrett asked, standing to his full height, and I saw how much taller he was than Byron, how much fitter. Byron must have realized that as well, because he didn’t sneer so much as he said, “Look, I got rid of everything.” He shrugged and I felt my heart sink. I hadn’t thought of that, hadn’t considered that he might not keep my things.

“Let’s make sure,” Nate said, staring at Byron. I glanced from him to Garrett and understood that although Nate was slightly shorter and leaner, he was definitely the more menacing of the two. “Maybe you missed something.”

Byron shook his head. “I’ve got company tonight,” he said. “Why don’t you all come back this weekend?”

Nate stood there blocking the door, holding Byron’s expression with his own, and Byron gave in. He moved forward, and Nate waited until the last second before stepping aside. Once inside the apartment, it was clear why Byron hadn’t wanted us to enter. The place was a wreck. I had been the good little homemaker. Now there were clothes everywhere, and through the hatch I could see dishes piled in the sink. Pizza boxes decorated the dining room table and bags of garbage sagged against the back door. Even more obvious to me was that Byron had been lying. All of my things were still there, although not in the places I remembered. My favorite rose-pink silk nightgown was crumpled on the sofa, next to a pillow and the blanket from our bed. Had he been sleeping with my nightie?

Byron wouldn’t look at me.

I headed up the stairs to the bedroom, the boys
following after me. My huge suitcase was under the bed and I pulled it out, opened the closet, and threw in as many clothes as I could. I took pillowcases from the closet and Garrett and Nathan emptied my drawers into them. Knickers and stockings and bras spilled free. We hadn’t come armed with boxes. This was true guerilla packing, as fast and as thorough as possible because I didn’t ever want to come back. Hefty bags came next, and I tossed in all my keepsakes, anything I felt I couldn’t live without.

Garrett and Nathan began toting my belongings to the truck, but I was aware that they made sure I was never alone in the townhouse with Byron. They did this to protect me, but Byron was no visible threat. He seemed to have gone somewhere deep inside himself. As I made my final trip downstairs, I saw him on the sofa, bong in place, staring at the silent TV. But he looked up at me as I headed out the door.