Becoming His Ch. 06

Quiet? She was always quiet. She'd been quiet from the start. Perhaps he'd liked her better that way. She opened her mouth, then shut it. His lips crashed into hers, her body pinned beneath his. She swooned, surrounded by his smell, a heady rush of masculinity and his freshly-pressed suit and his cologne and the alcohol on his tongue. Champagne. Bourbon. Bubbles bursting inside her. One bubble swelling around them.

The elevator operator cleared his throat. She looked up, her mouth bruised, eyes wide, the girl in the mirrored walls thoroughly debauched by the man still pressing kisses to her neck. She tugged at his lapel.

"Cameron." His name slipped breathlessly off her lips. "We're here."

He stepped back from her and straightened his tux, taking out his wallet.

"Thank you," he said to the operator, letting a few hundred dollar bills flutter down to the floor. Lila pulled him out, her heart sinking into her stomach. She had never seen him undone before. He had always been the one to undo her. But he was undone now, and it frightened her. He leaned heavily against her, and she supported him down the hall.

"Here." He slipped something into her hand. A key. Everything was old-fashioned in this hotel. "Four-o-four."

She nodded wordlessly. Was it all a ploy, this helpless act of his? To stop her from leaving, to stop her from being angry with him? Where did the truth lie in all those things Jennifer had said? She had to read it between the lines.

They reached the door to room 404, and she settled him against the wall before unlocking it, her fingers trembling on the key. It was a brass key, and she knew with certainty that she would remember it shape and weight in her hand for the rest of her life. He watched her with hungry eyes, until she at last turned the knob and the door swung open for them.

"Ladies first," he said, but she pushed him through in front of her.

"Ladies after drunk gentlemen," she said, shutting the door behind them and bolting it from the inside. She stood looking at him with her hands on her hips.

He gave her a lopsided grin.

"Hey, baby girl, I'm not drunk. At least not very."

"Sure," she said.

She brushed past him into the room. It was a beautiful room. She found herself wondering whether he had gotten it for them before or after they had arrived at the Langley that evening. This could have been part of the plan. He was very good with plans, after all, not so good when they went awry as plans were apt to do. She stood by the window looking out at the city in the falling darkness, and he came up behind her and smoothed her hair back in his hands and kissed the shell of her ear.

"So what now?" she asked softly. She suddenly felt much older than her years, as if time was pulling her apart at the seams.

"It's up to you, princess," he whispered, his arms encircling her waist. "It's always been up to you."

She guessed that was the truth, and turned in his arms to face him. For a moment they clung to each other. She opened her mouth to tell him that this couldn't go on, but then shut it again, his finger against her lips rushing back to her, hush, hush. She looked up at him, her eyes melting.

"I want to give you -- " She faltered, her voice trailing off into a breathless whisper. "Make love to me."

He lifted her in his arms. They had turned on no lights. In the darkness he set her down on the bed's silken sheets, casting the blanket aside and pulling her gown over her head in one fluid motion. At the foot of the bed, he doffed his jacket, and she watched him undo his bow-tie and toss it away.

He came and joined her naked, the whole of him exposed to her for the first time, and fitted her hand into his.

"I haven't made love in a very long time," he said, his voice low. He bent and kissed her on the forehead. "But I'll do my best."

She pulled him down. They kissed, their lips inextricably bound. Her hand closed around the hardness that jutted against her hip, and a tremor seemed to run through him. He kissed her harder, his weight pressing her into the sheets. She felt his hand come between her legs, and then his fingers danced against her entrance, one dipping into the channel.

He drew back and held his hand up. His fingers glistened. She took them eagerly into her mouth, sucking her own arousal off of his skin.

"God, you're tight," he whispered, working a single finger back in until it met resistance. "I won't lie to you, baby girl. It's going to hurt at first."

"It's okay." She sank her teeth into her bottom lip, coaxing a low groan from his throat. "I don't mind, as long as you promise it will feel good after."

"I promise." He lifted her, settling her against the pillows. "Spread your legs for me, princess. There you go."

She felt him between her legs, the head of his cock pressing insistently into her. Her soaking folds stretched around him. She felt exposed, wide open, completely at his mercy. He grunted as the head slipped in.

"Shit, baby," he murmured, leaning down toward her. "You're so fucking tight."

"You have a dirty mouth," she whispered.

"You would too, if you were in my position." He eased himself forward, millimeter by millimeter, her channel stretching around his girth. There was no discomfort until the head of his cock butted up against the barrier of her virginity, and then she let out a little squeak, her hands grasping at the sheets.

"Do it," she said breathlessly. "Just do it."

"I'm getting there, princess." His breath came sharp and hot against her face. "You're so tight it hurts."

She lay still, afraid if she moved it might hurt him more. Later she would realize that he had likely been exaggerating. There came a moment when he pushed further, and suddenly she felt something give way within her, and then he was deeper, and her hands tightened around fistfuls of the sheet, and she screwed her eyes up to stop the tears that had welled up in them from the sudden fiery pain that had burst to life between her legs.

Somewhere above her in the darkness, he reached down and touched her face, laying his hand flat against her cheek.

"Are you all right?" he whispered, some urgency in his voice.

She was all right. He had completed her and broken her all in the same thrust. She nodded, her eyes fluttering back open. He loomed above her in the darkness. For a moment she thought he would stop. But then he began to move, and the sunburst of pain faded slowly into a dull, pleasurable ache. She released the sheets, then gripped them again as he sheathed himself inside her. A little whimper escaped her throat.

He leaned down and held her in his arms, stroking her hair tenderly. His smell enveloped her, and she lay there in the darkness rocked by his thrusts, her body shaking.

"So fucking tight," he grunted between thrusts. "You're so fucking tight."

He reached down between her legs and began to rub the swollen, aching spot above her entrance, and her hips bucked up to meet his, moving of their own accord. She cried out, thrusting her head back against the pillows, her limbs commandeered by ecstasy. Behind closed eyelids she saw fireworks when she came, her taut, silken walls shuddering around him.

"There you go, baby girl," he said, his voice husky. He pulled out with a grunt and flipped her in one smooth motion onto her stomach. "Now it's my turn. I'm going to fuck you."

She had only a second to get her bearings, fumbling about on her forearms, before he pulled her ass up toward him and sheathed himself inside her once more. She felt him deeper, butting up against tender spots inside of her, and she cried out in surprise and pain, trying to twist herself around to get a look at him. But she found herself pinned in place against the pillows by one strong hand near the base of her neck.

"I told you, it's my turn," he growled in her ear. "This is what I've been wanting to do to you for a long time now. So lie there and take it. If you want me to stop, you know what you have to say."

The color red swam before her eyes. He'd been gentle before, but now he was rough, thrusting into her core, not caring if he hurt her, caring only about his own pleasure. She lay quivering beneath him, her body absorbing the onslaught of each blow. A tear trickled down her cheek, and then another. He hadn't made love in a while, because he usually fucked. She could read that between the lines now.

"Touch yourself," he ordered from above, his tone brusque. He caught hold of her right hand and wrenched it downward. "Touch yourself. Get yourself off for me. I want to feel that tight little snatch cumming around my cock again."

She obeyed. She had a choice. Always a choice. It swam before her still, in shades of red and purple and muted black. She thought of Jennifer. There's a whole world of pain out there... what are you and Cameron doing after? Visiting the petting zoo?

This was not the petting zoo. She squeezed her eyes shut, holding back a flood of tears. He hadn't noticed she was crying, or else he didn't care. He was damned either way. They both were. She worked her clit in maddening circles, drawing back whenever she got close. He pounded into her, his thrusts becoming rapid and jerky and shallow. She could hear from his ragged breaths that he was near his own climax.

She pushed herself over the edge, screaming into the pillows, releasing a pent-up torrent of tears. He grunted his release, and a moment later she felt the warmth of his seed deep within her. She wriggled free, suddenly aware of what they had done. Of what he had done. Of what she had allowed him to do. She didn't know much, but she did know how pregnancy happened.

In a flurry she found herself on her knees in front of him, and she reached up and was about to slap him in the face when he caught her wrists in his hands.

"Don't play, Lila," he said.

His eyes were dark, as dark as the night. There was no feeling in his voice, nor in his face when she searched it. He was like a man dead to the world. She wrenched herself free and curled into a ball on the bed and sobbed, hugging her knees to her chest.

"You had to take it from me," she whispered. She fumbled for a pillow, for the blanket, for anything. "You had to take everything."

He stood above her at the bedside, unmoving.

"You asked for it."

"I know. I did."

"You didn't stop me."

"I know!" she cried out, springing back up, anger reignited. Then, as quickly as it had burst to life within her, it faded. She said nothing, her hands balled into fists, tears tracking their way silently down her cheeks. The glow of his phone lit the darkness, bathing his face in luminescence. After a moment he tossed it down on the bed and turned away without a word. The bathroom door opened; the light turned on, and then she heard the sound of running water.

His phone lay face down a few inches from her legs, but the screen was still lit, pressing its glow into the sheets. Her heart pounded in her chest, Jennifer's words ringing through her head once more. He still texts her every day.

She was losing him. She had already lost him. She could read this between the lines, if nothing else. Blinking back tears, she picked his phone up. It was unlocked, as she'd suspected. The screensaver shocked her: it was the picture she had taken of herself and Cloud, the day she'd played with the kitten at the animal shelter. She almost cast the phone aside, but desperation pressed her forward. She opened his text messages.

The sound of the water ceased behind the bathroom door.

Claire's name was there, near the top. Claire. Nothing as damning as an emoji heart, but there nonetheless. She opened the messages. They had not texted that day, nor the day before. But the day before that there had been an exchange between them. Through eyes blurred with tears she read the message that had caught her eye, because it pertained to her.

So she's not even going to college in the fall? Claire had asked.

Gap year. She's interested in art school, ran Cameron's reply.

She drew a breath, tears fluttering up in her throat. She heard the bathroom door begin to open, and a crack of light ran across the bedroom floor. Cameron was returning. Her eyes brimming over with tears, she turned back down to Claire's response.

Sounds like your kind of pet project. You owe me a thousand dollars when you realize she's never going to be good enough for you.

The bedroom light flicked on, but not before she read the final text in the chain. Fine. Bet's on.. She blinked, momentarily blinded. When her vision recovered, Cameron was standing over her, staring at his phone in her hand.

Lila burst into tears and cast it aside.

"How could you talk about me like that?" she cried out. She flung herself at him, beating at his chest with her feeble little hands. He made no move to defend himself. "Is that really what I am to you? A pet project? Something to place bets on with your perfect ex-girlfriend? Jesus! I actually thought better of you!"

"It's not what you think it is," Cameron said. He had finally extricated himself from her, stepping back. He reached down and took the phone from her hands and locked it. "You didn't need to look. There's nothing in there."

"That wasn't nothing." Her voice shook. "That wasn't nothing. This is over, all of it. I want to go home."

"No," he said. The fierceness in his voice seemed to surprise them both. "No, I don't want you to go. It's no good for you there. I want you to stay with me."

"Why, so you can..." She fished for words, tears streaming down her cheeks. "She's right, you know, I'm never going to be good enough for you. No one ever will be. Maybe you want to fix me, but you need just as much fixing. I guess you told Jennifer everything, even though you couldn't let me in."

"Listen to me, Lila," he snapped. "I agreed to Claire's stupid joke bet to get her off my case about you. And as for Jennifer, a man feels safe telling a woman things when he knows there's nothing in it with her. What was ever going to happen between us? I'd see her for a few months, then I'd move on to someone new and it'd be over. What did it matter if I told her something personal? And she wasn't meant to disclose that to anyone, anyway. She signed a fucking NDA. Lucky for her I'm a nice guy. I won't sue her ass."

"You're not a nice guy." Lila stared at him, shaking her head. "Maybe you are in your head. But none of this is nice. I can't believe I let you do the things you did to me. Now I want to go home."

"Lila, you have made me feel things I've never felt before," he said. He stood unmoving before her, stubborn, a man made of stone with a heart just as cold. "Maybe I wasn't prepared for how much you make me feel. Maybe I don't know how to handle it. But please stay here."

"Why?" She had stopped crying, and tears sat drying on her cheeks. Her tongue hung dumb in her mouth. "So you can keep me here? So you can control me? I'm not yours to keep, Cameron. I never have been."

"Fuck, Lila!" He raked a hand through his hair. He had begun to pace back and forth, his steps agitated. "Please don't do this. I feel like I'm losing you."

"I was never yours." She blinked angry tears away. "But you already have."

"Is that what this is about?" he went on, as if he hadn't heard her. "Do you want to make it official? You can be my girlfriend. You can have whatever you want. Just don't go. You're the best thing that's ever happened to me."

She snorted, inhaling tears.

"I highly doubt that's the case."

"Doubt it all you want, but it's the truth." He knelt down in front of her, his eyes supplicating. "Please, princess. Stay with me tonight. Stay with me in the morning. Stay with me forever, I won't fucking mind."

She stared down at him.

"You have no idea how crazy you sound," she said, her breath whistling between her parted lips. She made to move, only to find his hands on her knees, holding her in place. She gritted her teeth, pressing against him. "Let me go. If you won't take me home, then I'll find my own way."

"No." He pushed back on her harder. "Don't go. Don't leave me."

For a moment, she became still. She had known this man for a month. She had learned bits and pieces, filled in some of the gaps, but he remained an enigma to her. Looking down at him now, she didn't think she knew him at all. In fact, she was convinced that this man in front of her was not the same man she had thought she had known. He was not cultured and urbane and gentlemanly. He was naked and afraid and savage.

"Red," she whispered, the word slipping off her tongue. "Red, Cameron. If you care for me at all, you'll let me go, and you won't come after me."

For a moment, his grip on her legs tightened. Then it slackened, and then he released her, stepping backward. She got up and began to dress herself. With trembling fingers she pulled the zipper of her gown into place, and then she turned to him. He had said nothing since she had used the single word that seemed to hold some power over him, a word that had never been intended for a purpose like this one at all. For a moment she held her breath, willing herself not to cry.

But when she opened her mouth, fresh tears spilled out of her eyes.

"Goodbye, Cameron," she said.

He said nothing. Behind his silence she sensed some of the stubbornness, some of the resolve that remained, but also a terrible sinking desperation that she felt reechoed in her own heart. Perhaps it had all been a dream, a month-long fever dream that had transpired between them. As she departed the Langley, she thought it must be so. On the train, her phone vibrated in her hand. He was calling her, over and over again. Finally it went still and silent.

She arrived back home a little past eight. The front door was unlocked, and she slipped inside. She found her mother sitting on the couch watching TV alone in the living room, and she went to her immediately and curled up beside her and lay her head in her lap and cried, while her mother stroked her hair and tried to comfort her about something she didn't know or understand.

Saturday evening. The clock on the wall ticked toward six thirty. Lila finished her portion of pasta and meatballs and cleared her throat.

"Mom, Robert," she said. Beneath the table, she squeezed her hands together in her lap. "I have some news."

Robert grunted. Her mother looked up. She'd been trying to get Lila to explain what had happened since she'd come home crying and in a ludicrously expensive dress the previous evening.

Lila cleared her throat again.

"Last night I emailed the Dean of Admissions at Tufts," she said. Her voice, in her own ears, didn't sound quite like her own. "She got back to me today. I can't start in the fall, but I'm going to start after the first semester, at the end of January. I declared a psychology major."

"Well, that's good." Robert looked up from his food long enough to meet her eyes. "That's good news, girlie. I knew you'd come around."

"Is that all, hon?" her mother asked.

"Jesus, Miranda!" Robert turned on her. "Your daughter gives us the best news she's given us in months and you ask her if it's all. What kind of question is that?"

"I just -- " Lila's mother smiled, but the smile didn't reach her eyes. "Congrats, honey. That's great news. I hope it makes you happy."

"Yeah. It does," Lila said, her voice fading with each word. A great weight had been lifted off her shoulders, only to be replaced by another. She had Tori's strong assurance that she, too, would be at Tufts for the spring semester, and that they could dorm together.

But the future stretched out unwritten before her, and she would have to be the one to find her own way forward. There was no light, no guiding hand. No one she could rely on but herself.