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Please, not again.
At the end of her silent appeal, her mind ran to the two small, velvet-lined boxes he hid in the bottom draw of his bedside table beneath his socks. She knew he’d kept them. Had he bought another? God, she hoped not, since the thought of rejecting him again weighed like a stone in her heart. Why couldn’t he understand she wasn’t that kind of woman?
Jason frowned at her silence, then pushed away from the bed to sit straight-backed with a resigned sigh. “Can’t you say it. Just once?”
I wish I could
But she wouldn’t lie to him. Forcibly swallowing the lump in her throat, Mina closed the lipstick and placed it back amongst the others before wheeling around and giving him her best reassuring smile. It did not quite reach her eyes however. Almost cool, they held his imploring look as she walked towards the bed, her feet seeming to glide over the soft carpet without a sound. Then, she bent forward and rested both hands on the footboard, until his eyes were level with her breasts. She drew in a breath, just enough to lift the swells of her bosom and emphasize the way the very thin fabric stretched over her cleavage.
She wanted to love him, she really did. He was a good man, fun and dependable and deserving of someone much better than her. But her heart was a fickle bitch, devoting itself to a lover, opting to never truly open up. She’d seen where that road led and what came of giving herself to someone completely.
Despite himself, Jason’s eyes flickered downward at the movement and lingered there, the shape of his manhood rising sharp and strong against his jeans, tenting the otherwise slack denim. Mina smirked, her plush tongue darting out suggestively over her rosy lips. “Hold that thought for me, lover boy.” Jason’s eyes darted back up, but she was already backing away. “Wait up for me and I promise, when I get home, we can pick up where we left off.”
She felt cold steel against her fingertips as her hand blindly closed around the door handle. “Until then, here’s a little preview…” As her left hand pulled the door open, her right grabbed the hem of her top and dragged it up, flashing him a provocative view of her cleavage.
Then she was gone.
Her heart thundered with excitement as she bolted before the door had even closed behind her, a broad smile on her lips as she envisioned Jason chasing her through the house before having his way with her against the door. Pushing her top back into place, she almost ran down the house’s spiralling staircase into the airy foyer. Slipping on a designer pair of brown leather boots and the matching jacket, she grabbed her keys off the oak side table and the plastic shopping bag beside it containing Mark’s presents, before opening the ebony front door and stepping out into the cool evening air.
The sky was a dwindling tapestry of pink and orange beneath a sinking sea of violet, the sun long hidden behind the western horizon. Los Angeles was nothing but a ghostly silhouette, the city a prisoner in the twilight purgatory that divided night from day.
Bathed in the golden glow of the hanging iron lamp, she walked past the four huge columns of pale alabaster stone that supported the upper balcony, and down the porch’s three wide steps. In her wake, the heavy door slid shut with a booming bang.
Parked in the centre of the ringed pebble and coral driveway, and polished to a high shine, was her sleek, black, Luxury Ride Lexus RX 350. Clicking the key to unlock the vehicle before pocketing the fob, she clambered into the driver’s seat, carefully placing the shopping bag in the passenger seat’s foot-space. She dragged the door shut behind her, strapped on her seat belt, took off the handbrake, and pressed the ignition. The engine bellowed to life, emitting a deep rumble that had the seat vibrating deliciously beneath her. Mina slipped the shifter into drive and put her foot to the accelerator, sending the SUZ roaring forward. Pressed back into her seat by the sudden motion, she drove around the doughnut-shaped driveway, passed through the high-arched, black iron gate that marked the end of her 1.2 acre estate as it swung open automatically at her approach, and without looking, turned sharply onto the winding street beyond.
Turning off at the lights, leaving Benedict Canyon Drive and the majority of the traffic in her rear-view mirror, she sped down the long Sherman Oaks Boulevard. The road teemed with clusters of convenience stores and a dozen or so minor residential streets, each lined with modest two-storey homes that branched off on either side. Counting each junction off, she swerved down the eighth to find the street chock-a-block with parked cars. Though her father’s house was more than halfway down the stretch, the sheer number of cars parked along it forced her to pull over beside the dark silhouette of a broken streetlight standing on the curve of the cul-de-sac that ended the road.
Overhead, the sky was black, night’s cloak having fully descended. There was no moon, but stars twinkled merrily overhead, dotted here and there, shining brightly against the all-consuming blackness in their ageless tapestries across the celestial sphere.
Turning off the ignition, she undid her seat belt, opened the door, and clambered out into the night, a shiver running down her spine as her hair began to flutter in the wind. Despite it being mid-October, there was an unseasonable bite in the night air and she drew her jacket close before retrieving Mark’s presents from the passenger side. Reaching into her jacket pocket and locking the SUV with a click of the fob, Mina started down the left-hand sidewalk, past nine near-identical, modest yet homely properties, and up the paved driveway.
Even from the bottom of the street, her father’s house was easy to spot. Parked across the sloping garden were half a dozen cars and a colourful banner draped from the roof, proclaiming ‘Happy Birthday Mark’ in red and gold glitter, but only half visible amidst the low glow of nearby street lights. Party music boomed from the open windows and door. As she walked up the drive, a group of young men were loitering on the doorstep, smoking and conversing amongst themselves in hushed tones.
Spotting her approach, the one that stood farthest back, leaning against the doorframe beneath the porch light with a cigarette dangling from his lips, gave a slight nod. The excessive amount of gel in his flaming red hair caused it to glisten like amber at the movement. All at once, the group fell silent and wheeled about to confront her. By their sheepish expressions, she could tell they were up to no good but she chose not to say anything. When they realised she was not a cop, the group begrudgingly shifted a step to let her pass.
Curls of pale smoke weaved around her as she stepped onto the porch, and the air was heavy with a sickly sweet aroma that had her stomach churning with the first breath.
Marijuana!
Taking care not to look any of them in the eye, Mina carried on without a second’s pause. She could feel the heat of their lecherous leers on her as she passed, following her every step and giving her an all-encompassing once-over before finally settling upon her backside. They watched her with all the subtlety of a pack of starving hyenas studying a zebra herd, sending a shiver that had nothing to do with the cold crawling up her spine.
Just as she was about to cross the house’s threshold, one of them muttered something she couldn’t hear that had the rest sniggering. Pausing mid-stride, Mina had a momentary impulse to wheel about and ask them if they’d like to take a picture, but then she put it from her mind. They weren’t worth the breath.
Inside, she found a scene straight out of American Pie. Music was blaring from an iPod boom dock speaker system that had been set up on the living room coffee table. Across the narrow foyer, she could see an aluminium beer keg in the kitchen amidst a buffet-style bonanza of party foods on disposable plates. And there were people everywhere either commingling in gangs of three or five, or gyrating mindlessly against one another to whatever musical abomination happened to be playing over the hi-fi.
The only thing missing is Seann William Scott shouting profanity.
As she surveyed the scene, Mina could hardly contain her look of amazement. While she’d known Mark had been given run of the house for the party, their parents having gone out for dinner and a show before spending the night in a hotel, she’d certainly never expected something so very, well, un-Mark.
She just hoped they didn’t destroy the house. It had not been easy getting her father to agree to the idea…
She should have known better than to let the conversation turn to the matter of money, let alone direct it there. But when they had drifted to the inevitable topic of Mark’s 21st birthday in two weeks, he’d said her stepbrother would be home from university that weekend and had asked to have the house for a party. Mina was so excited she couldn’t help herself. Mark had never been very social. While his friends had been playing in the park and going round each other’s houses after school, he’d spent hours playing Diablo and Crash Bandicoot.
In all the years they’d lived together, he’d never had more than a handful of friends round so there was no danger of the party getting out of hand, however her father had still been reluctant. She, on the other hand, made no effort to hide her enthusiasm. Without thinking, she’d offered to make arrangements for him and her stepmother to have dinner at her favourite seafood restaurant and then spend the night in a top hotel on La Cienega Boulevard.
“No, Mina.”
“But Daddy.”
