With the Lights On
Auteur·e
Jackie Ashenden
Lectures
15,7K
Chapitres
21
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS DIFFERENT tonight and I knew it the moment I walked in the door.
Normally when I had an evening with Trajan, the lights would be dimmed and he’d have music playing in the background. Sometimes it was a woman singing, low and husky and sad, sometimes dark and dirty blues. He liked classical and opera as well, and occasionally there’d be something electronic and dreamy.
Music to fill the silence, I’d thought initially. But then after I’d got to know him better, and he’d got to know me, he’d put on music that we both enjoyed and that he wanted to share with me.
Tonight, though, there was no music.
And, tonight, all the lights were on.
I stopped just inside the door, letting it shut with a heavy thump behind me, my heart beating far too fast for comfort. I’d never actually seen Trajan’s apartment fully lit before—he was a fan of ‘diffuse’ lighting, as in so diffuse that it was sometimes difficult to see—but right now I was too distracted to take a proper look around.
I worked for Company of Strangers, which I’d heard some call a glorified escort agency, and to some extent they were right. But sex wasn’t its only purpose. Or, rather, it was only one aspect of its purpose, which was essentially to provide people with company. That company might be sex, if both parties agreed, or it could be simply dinner and conversation. A friend to have a drink with in a bar. A casual coffee and a gossip.
Clients tended to be mostly lonely business people who didn’t have either the time or the inclination to forge friendships and who were willing to pay someone to keep them company for a couple of hours. Sex could be included if that was desired, but only if the Strangers employee was willing. And it was, of course, extra.
From an employee perspective, Strangers was an excellent company to work for, since all clients were heavily vetted before they could access the services provided, and there were lots of systems put in place for the safety of both clients and employees. I’d never felt unsafe, not once in the years I’d been working for them.
However, that had changed over the last two months, though it wasn’t my physical safety I was worried about. It was my heart I was afraid for, especially since that last meeting with Trajan, where I’d exploded everything...
I took a slow, deep breath, trying to calm myself. My palms were damp, though I knew better than to wipe them on the red satin of my dress.
Honey; I had to be Honey. That was my persona, the warm, nurturing, sensual woman who was Strangers’ best and most highly paid employee. The most sought after, the most booked. She was expert at putting a client at ease, at figuring out what they wanted, and providing them with the best experience possible. She was never shocked or surprised. She always knew what to say and she always knew what to do.
But I was having a hard time holding on to Honey right now, because whenever I was around Trajan I always found it difficult to hold onto her. Especially now. Especially after what had happened between us two weeks earlier.
Never get involved. That was the motto everyone in my industry tried to stick to and it had never been a problem for me. Never, ever.
Not until now. Not until him.
Feeling slightly calmer, I walked slowly down the short hallway and into the big, open-plan space that was the penthouse apartment proper.
It was unusual for a client to invite me into their home. Normally meetings were in hotel rooms, bars or restaurants. But even from the first Trajan had been different.
He’d invited me to his private residence, a gorgeous penthouse that looked out over Central Park in Manhattan. It was decorated in a very minimalist fashion, with white walls and dark carpet and low, soft couches upholstered in textured white linen. The coffee tables and shelves were all of sleek powder-coated black metal, the only colour the rich, silk antique Persian rugs dotted at intervals on the floor and the velvet cushions scattered here and there.
There was no art on the walls, no photos. He’d told me he didn’t want anything to compete with the floor-to-ceiling views of the park, which made sense. Though, I suppose he could have hidden any personal decorative touches when I was there in order to keep his identity secret.
That was usual for Strangers. For the protection of both employee and client, no real names were used. Trajan was the name he’d given me and he knew me as Honey. But over the course of our meetings we’d gradually come to know more about each other than just our names, and then two weeks ago we’d crossed a boundary we couldn’t come back from. The boundary that separated pretend from real...and real was the one thing I could never be, not with anyone...
I frowned around the room, trying to figure out why the lights were all on, and where Trajan was, because he didn’t seem to be here.
Normally he either greeted me in the hallway or he called me through into the living area or the kitchen; if he’d called, I hadn’t heard.
The room was empty.
I moved over to the big windows, looking out over Central Park, a long rectangle of darkness dotted here and there with lights like tiny sequins.
My heart was beating faster now and I felt jittery, though I tried to tell myself it was less about facing Trajan again after our last meeting and more about the fact that I shouldn’t have been meeting him at all tonight.
My evening had been booked by someone else, a guy who wanted only sex and who paid outrageously well to get it. He was a black-star client—which meant he was on Strangers’ trusted clients list—and every woman who’d ever been hired by him had nothing but good things to say about his bedroom skills. I should have been with him tonight, but Trajan’s request had come through and I couldn’t not see him.
So I’d let my best friend Vesta convince me to let her have the black-star client while I spent the evening with Trajan. It was an extremely bad move, as Vesta wasn’t actually employed by Strangers. But I hadn’t been able to find a Strangers employee who was either free or willing to fill in, and I just couldn’t turn down a chance to see Trajan.
There were things he and I had to talk about.
The bright light of the room threw my reflection back at me in the glass: small and curvy, my extremely tight red, silk dress glowing in the light. My curly blonde hair—gone even more curly in the summer humidity outside and impossible to do anything with—I’d left loose down my back. I’d kept my make-up to a minimum, except for my lipstick, which was bright red to match my dress and red stilettos.
I was very definitely Honey tonight, not Maggie, but then I had to be. I had to put some distance between us, and being Honey was the only way I could do that.
Staring at the glass, I lifted a hand to adjust my hair and then froze. Reflected in the window was Trajan, his tall figure motionless behind me, standing near one of the low sofas, so still I’d almost missed him.
My breath caught as the hard punch of desire came, the way it always did when I saw him, and had from that first day.
He was the most beautiful man I’d ever seen, and I’d seen a lot of men.
Over six-two at the very least, he had wide, heavily muscled shoulders and a broad chest tapering to narrow hips and long, powerful thighs. He embodied strength, radiating it like the sun radiated warmth, and I found it incredibly attractive. It was a patient strength, and solid too, like a mountain. The kind of strength you could lean on, trusting totally that it would hold you up.
He wasn’t pretty—his features were too strongly carved for that, with a sharp jaw, cheekbones to die for, a high forehead and a straight nose. His was an intensely masculine, compelling face. Fierce, uncompromising and absolutely mesmerising.
He’d never spoken about what he did for a job, but it had to be something high-powered—not only because the penthouse must have cost millions, but because he exuded the kind of self-confidence and arrogance that heads of companies did. And I should know; I’d met quite a few in my line of work.
His hair was black and shorn close to his skull, and he had the most startlingly clear dark-blue eyes.
Right from the first night when he’d opened the door to me and I’d looked into those eyes, I’d felt dizzy. And breathless and excited and hungry, everything a highly paid escort shouldn’t feel for her client. But, since I hadn’t been attracted to anyone in years, I dismissed the feeling as an aberration.
I shouldn’t have. Because then I wouldn’t be where I was now, with something immense and heavy sitting in the air between us, squeezing the life out of the atmosphere and making it hard to breathe.
Sometimes he wore a suit, which always made me dry-mouthed with desire, because he was all kinds of hot in one. Tonight, though, he was in jeans, worn and faded, sitting low on his hips, and a black T-shirt that clung to his chest in a way that sent desire spiralling through my veins.
God, I was stupid to be here, especially after last time, when I’d run from him as if the hounds of hell were on my tail. But maybe that was what I was. Stupid.
Stupid to have put my livelihood at risk by letting my best friend take my other client for the night. Stupid to meet again the client standing in front of me, the client I’d already been warned off.
Stupid to let my heart get involved in the mix.
Well, as of tonight, I wasn’t going to be stupid any more.
He said nothing. I said nothing. The memory of us on the couch, sipping expensive brandy and talking, lay between us.
It had been so late, and I’d already had a couple of glasses of wine and was more relaxed than I should have been. We’d been talking about something innocuous—I couldn’t even remember what—and then somehow the conversation had strayed onto more personal topics. Topics that I’d never talked about with anyone before. About growing up with my grandmother, and my mom’s stints in jail, and how bullying at school had scarred me. And then he’d poured us more brandy and told me about his own cold upbringing and the car accident he’d had at seventeen that had involved his girlfriend and that had nearly killed both of them.
It had been two a.m. and I’d forgotten myself. Forgotten that the contract Trajan had with me was a ‘friendship only’ contract and was not for sex. Which meant touching wasn’t allowed. But, as he’d told me about the accident and how his girlfriend had been injured, I’d put my hand on his hard thigh in instinctive comfort. He’d gone utterly still, then had looked at me.
And, before I knew what I was doing, I’d leaned in slowly and kissed him.
I’d kissed lots of men. But I’d kissed all of them because they were my clients, and if they wanted a kiss I gave it to them, since making them happy was an important part of my job. I’d never actually kissed a man because I’d wanted to, not even the guy I’d lost my virginity to in the back of his car after prom. I’d only kissed him because the situation had seemed to demand it rather than out of any personal need.
Yet I’d kissed Trajan. And that was when I realised what was happening. I was falling for him, pure and simple, and it couldn’t happen. It just couldn’t.
Terrified at my own feelings, I’d jerked away and left the apartment before he’d been able to protest. I hadn’t seen him since. Part of me had been hoping he’d never book me again, while another part had been dreading that he wouldn’t, that that night was the last I’d see of him.
Then I’d received the booking notification and I hadn’t been able to stay away. I had to see him one last time, if only to tell him face to face that he couldn’t book me ever again.
The silence sat heavily, the bright light around us an intrusion.
His intense gaze focused on my reflection in the glass, black brows drawing down as if he’d seen something in it he didn’t like. ‘Are you okay?’
I wasn’t expecting either the question or the soft note in his familiar deep, rich voice, and it sent a hot stab of longing through me.
Unlike every other client I’d ever had, Trajan had always been solicitous of me. He always made sure I had a drink or something to eat, and it was always something I liked. And he always seemed to notice if I was too cold or too hot, either adjusting the AC for me or wrapping a throw around my shoulders. He was never hard to talk to and I never had to work for conversation.
Sometimes it was almost as if I was the client and he was paid to look after me, and maybe that was partly why I’d started to feel things I shouldn’t for him. I didn’t know why the question made my heart constrict painfully in my chest, even now when I knew it was wrong.
I liked the way he always thought about me. I liked it far too much.
But it wasn’t what I was paid for.
I took a silent breath and turned from the window, pasting on my best Honey smile. ‘Yes, of course. Were you worried about what happened last time?’
He stood so still, entirely motionless, his gaze riveted to my face as if he’d never seen it before in his entire life. ‘You left very suddenly. I wondered if I’d hurt you.’
Oh God, I hadn’t thought of that. The only thing in my head was the need to get away, to put some distance between us, because that kiss should never have happened.
‘No,’ I said, because I couldn’t let him think it was his fault. ‘It wasn’t that.’
‘Then what was it?’ The expression on his beautiful face was oddly intense, different from the cool, charming man who’d greeted me that first day, whose cold blue eyes had been guarded and whose smile had been slight and impersonal.
Slowly that had changed, though. Slowly his smiles had become deeper, warmer, and those blue eyes had lit up with rare amusement and even rarer laughter as I’d learned the kind of man he was beneath that cool, controlled exterior.
But there were no smiles for me today, only a strange, glittering heat in his eyes that made my pulse beat even faster.
‘Trajan,’ I began, wanting to say it quickly, because the quicker I said it the quicker I could leave, and that would be better for both of us. ‘I need to talk to you about—’
‘Our contract?’ he interrupted. ‘Yes, I changed it.’
I blinked, not understanding what he was talking about, too caught up in what I’d been going to say. ‘Our contract?’ I echoed.
His gaze remained riveted to mine, his tall, powerful figure radiating a curious leashed tension. ‘Yes. I called them about it this morning. Did they not tell you?’
I’d been busy today, running around after my grandmother, and there had been a couple of missed calls from Strangers. But I hadn’t had a moment to call them back, not with Gran and getting Vesta up to speed for her own meeting tonight, and besides, I’d assumed it wasn’t urgent.
I swallowed. ‘I had a couple of missed calls on my phone, but I didn’t have a moment today to call them back. So, what did you change?’
His focus was absolute. ‘I don’t want a friendship-only contract any more. Tonight, I want to have sex.’ He paused then added, as if I hadn’t understood, ‘With you.’
