“We got the contract signed in a week,” he said.
“I know.”
The fourth floor door smacked open and Leanne Drazen tore down the stairs. Theresa’s Irish twin, she was two years and ten months older than Jonathan, but she looked and acted like she was in her mid twenties. A tote bag flew behind her, and her red cowboy boots clopped down the steps. She was otherwise tattered and slovenly, strawberry blonde hair falling out of a ponytail and her bag open.
“That’s f**king unheard of,” Eddie said. “And we had to send twenty-two people home. Do you know what we paid to get them in there on two day’s notice?”
“No.”
Leanne grabbed the bannister and swung around, inertia and centripetal force taking her to the top of the next set of stairs. She grabbed my shoulders and said, “he’s out!”
I put my hand over the receiver.
“A f**king lot,” Eddie said into my ear.
“How does he look?” I whispered to Leanne.
She put her thumb up and smiled, then took off down the stairs with a wave. Sweet girl. Too bad she was never around.
“I have to be here, Ed,” I said as I bounded up to the fourth floor.
“I’m not saying I don’t understand. I was at the show. I saw it. What I’m saying is, I don’t know if I can herd these cats again.”
“Tell me what hoop I have to jump through to get a reschedule and I’ll jump it.” I strode through the waiting room, past two sisters and a mother. Margie indicated a room at the end and I went in. Sheila was with him, the most vulnerable-seeming of the bunch. With wild wheaten hair and four children born close together, she was the one most visibly upset about her brother.
“When can you do it?”
Margie yanked me into a recovery room that looked like all the others. Jonathan was there, lying on his back arms on top of the blankets and tubes everywhere.
“Next week. I think he’s going to be better.”
“I need a guarantee.”
I touched his arm, and he opened his eyes. When he saw me, he winked.
“Guaranteed,” I said and hung up the phone.
“Well?” I said to Sheila, “It went okay?”
“Yeah. They just pulled a tube out of his throat and unstrapped him.”
Jonathan picked his hand up and flicked his fingers to Sheila. The international sign for shoo. She started to object but Margie grabbed her arm. “Come on. The kids need you.”
“Onna has them.”
Margie pulled her out, but Eileen, Jonathan’s mother strode in.
“Ma,” Margie said. “You were just here.” But Eileen ignored her.
“Jon,” she said, standing over him. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired.”
“Should we go?” She put her hand on my arm, as if I was going out with her.
“Yes. I mean, let me talk to Monica for a minute.”
She smiled, the biggest, fakest thing I have ever seen in my life. “Of course.”
“Oh, ma?”
“Yes?”
“Spot for Christmas Eve.” He pointed to me. “Okay? Don’t forget.”
“Of course,” Eileen said, then looked to me. “You’re free?”
“You bet,” I put on my customer service smile. Once she was out I sat next to him. I didn’t say anything, but somehow he intuited what I was thinking.
“That’s just how she is.”
He looked as pale as death, and his body was flat under the sheets as if he could have just sunk into them. And his face. His face looked slack, inactive. His eyes were unfocused and the lids didn’t want to stay open. This wasn’t Jonathan. This was some other, powerless man who didn’t yank my head back by the hair as he pounded me from behind, or f**k me in such a slow and controlled way I felt every inch of my orgasm. This wasn’t the man whose name I’d cried into the night; the man to whom I entrusted control, to whose dominance I submitted. This was another man entirely, and I loved him.
I took his hand.
“You look like shit,” I said.
“You look like an angel.” His voice crunched like gravel under a tire.
“I should tie your elbows behind your back with a belt and spank you until you scream. To get your voice back. Works every time.”
A smile curled the side of his mouth.
“A week,” he croaked so low I had to put my ear to his mouth to hear him. “I’m going to do unspeakable things to your body.”
“Really?” I kept my face to his and my voice low. “Like what?”
I realized I’d asked too much of him when he licked his lips, paused, and said, “Secret.”
He’d love to tell me, I knew that, but between having his chest cracked open and the tube down his throat, it probably hurt to speak.
“I know already,” I said. He raised an eyebrow. “I can read your mind.”
“Not this. It’s filthy.”
I reached over until my body bridged his and touched his ear with my lips. “The great and powerful Madame Monica will predict the future with utmost certainty. Are you ready to hear your destiny, young man?” I looked into his eyes so closely I could see the blue flecks.
“What’s this gonna cost me?”
“Everything.”
“Worth it.”
We are in your house. The living room. I’m naked from the waist up, and you’re in jeans and a polo shirt. You’re looking at me like you want to eat me alive, but you’re not. Yet. You’re waiting. You’re thinking. You’re constructing the next minutes of my life like a movie director blocks a scene.
You tell me to take my pants off, and I do. You watch. You like my body. The way my br**sts hang when I bend over to release my feet. My ass when I bend at the waist.
When I step out of my jeans fully, you step toward me in your bare feet. I look nervous. You tell me to stop my hands from twitching, and when I cast my eyes down and say ‘yes, sir’ you can feel the power surge in you, that everything’s under control. Everything’s going to be all right, unless it’s not. What you have planned can go terribly wrong. The worry bothers you.
You ask me my safeword, and I tell you to shut up and f**k me.
‘Oh Goddess,’ you say. Then you take the hair at the back of my neck and pull until I’m looking at the ceiling. My lips part, and I sigh.
‘Say it. Or you can put those jeans back on and go home.’
I mouth the word tangerine, but don’t use my voice.