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20
I’d gone home to my apartment after being told not to tell anyone anything, except that I was recouping after losing my job and going away for a while, to Europe. Apparently, my friends were expected to believe I had enough savings left to pay for a European holiday?
Charity arrived on my doorstep to check on my mental health.
She squeezed past to get into my apartment.
My half-packed suitcase, the plane ticket, my jittery if flushed excitement, these convinced her something weird was going on. I denied it all. Denied it categorically. When I followed her back down the hallway after a coffee and the cupcakes she’d brought with her, and her long lecture about making rash decisions, she paused in the doorway.
Her mouth was pinched. “Are you sure you’re okay, Emme?”
I, the lying, rude friend, said “Yes.”
“Is this that unsafe Dom?”
I told her, no, three times.
Charity was an insistent wretch. And a good friend. I promised myself I would tell her the truth when I returned, when this failed. These things always failed at some point. I imagined Grayson expected it to, as well. We were kindred souls seeking the darkness, just with different starting points in the maze.
I waved, smiled, then closed the door on Charity, and I felt relief. Then I bit my finger and left marks because, clearly, I was a lying piece of shit. Reconciling betraying her with my avant-garde sex life seemed impossible. Making bad choices was my thing, currently.
All the god-damned way to the airport, I felt guilty.
I was still feeling bad when I boarded the plane.
Frowning, I nestled into my middle seat on the left-hand side of the plane aisle. I eyed the empty window seat and wondered if the stewardess would mind if I shifted over once we were airborne. There had been that article about dead people being identified in crashes by the seats they occupied.
“Excuse me.” A soft request.
Dammit, my seatmate had arrived, after all.
Even softly said, the words finally lit up in recognition. As I looked up, I knew it would be Grayson.
He smiled down at me and managed to inch past, with his front toward me. A rude way to do it if this was a true stranger. His crotch was almost in my face.
“Hello,” I ventured.
Axl seated himself on my right, locked his belt, and ignored me by talking over me at Grayson. They managed to invent all manner of topics, and butting in was treated as would be any interruption by a strange woman. They acknowledged me and moved on. I gave up and sat in silence until the plane took off, and we were cruising above the clouds.
Grayson leaned over and pretended to show his phone screen to Axl.
He dropped a plastic bag in my lap at the same time.
The note on the screen: Go to the restroom and stick this plug up your asshole, dear Emme. Then return.
My instinctive, never-to-be-rescinded reaction was a sinking in my stomach, and a fuck-no, not another weak-as-piss dom-like command? I could easily refuse and then…nothing. At most a paddled butt when we landed and were somewhere safe?
I grimaced and took the in-flight magazine from the pocket on the seat in front. Found that also boring and fished out the paperback I’d brought. The Goblin Emperor was far more interesting. They could up their game, or I would leave when we landed. I wasn’t in this to be bored.
Suck on that, boys, I thought, as I turned back the cover. At least the trip to Berlin wouldn’t take long. Being pandered to by two rich dudes was never my fantasy.
After a few minutes, Grayson held his phone before me again, displaying a message. NOW
I wrinkled my nose, took his phone, and typed NO, gave it back, then I dropped the bag on Axl’s lap.
Grayson began typing a new message.
The ensuing strained silence was only local, only in my head. People around us were talking, drinking, chatting up the air hostess, and the muted engine noise was a vague reminder we were in the air carving through the atmosphere inside a metal tube with wings.
