In the Dark
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Jackie Ashenden
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CHAPTER ONE
I STOOD OUTSIDE the St George Hotel, housed in a gracious brownstone on New York’s Upper East Side, taking a couple of deep breaths and trying to calm my racing heartbeat. I didn’t get nervous often, but I was nervous now, and with good reason.
The instructions my friend Maggie had forwarded to me were quite specific.
I was to go to the desk and ask for the penthouse suite which had been booked specifically for the night. The door would be ajar and there would be no need to knock. I was to go into the living area and sit down in the armchair. A blindfold would be provided on the table next to me. I was to put it on and make sure it was secure. And I was not under any circumstances, no matter what I heard, no matter what happened, to take it off.
Maggie hadn’t had this particular client before, but he was apparently renowned for his specific instructions. And for his massive tips. And for his magical ability to give orgasms to every woman he hired from Company of Strangers.
Clients who used Company of Strangers didn’t expect sex—it wasn’t that kind of agency—but every single woman this client hired always wanted it from this guy. Even though they never, ever saw him.
A mystery man. A faceless stranger.
Perfect for my purposes, in other words.
I wanted someone to help put behind me the man I’d loved since I was sixteen, who consistently refused to have anything to do me. Someone to take the virginity that had hung around my neck like a millstone for the past nine years.
Someone I could imagine as someone else.
Yes, he’d do.
I took another breath and approached the hotel, pushing open the discreet wrought-iron black gate and going up the marble steps. The heavy front door opened soundlessly and I found myself in a flagged marble atrium, very old-world with luxurious leather couches and jewel-toned Persian rugs everywhere.
A huge chandelier hung over the antique oak of the check-in desk, scattering glittering prisms of light over every surface.
The place breathed money and glamor, uncomfortably reminding me of my own privileged upbringing, though that was seven years in the past and almost an entire continent away. A much more West Coast kind of rich. Infinity pools and white stucco, martinis and plastic surgery.
Ugh. Thank God I’d left all of that behind.
Gathering my courage, I put a bit of ‘fuck you’ confidence I didn’t feel in my step as I approached the check-in desk.
Maggie had told me that there was no need to go all out with my clothes or make-up, so I’d decided on discreetly sexy. Blue silk bias-cut shift dress with very narrow straps. Simple, but it left my shoulders basically bare, showing off my ink, and it matched the blue tips of my hair. I’d dressed it up with some black platform sandals with ties winding up my calf, and no underwear, just for kicks. Because what woman pretending to be a high-class escort, filling in with a client for her friend, would go to said meeting with underwear on?
I hadn’t checked with Maggie about that. But then, I liked to live dangerously.
I gave Maggie’s name to the woman at the desk and she gave me a professional smile and directions to the penthouse suite. Unlocked the private elevator. She didn’t give me a key.
I moved over the marble floor towards the elevator, trying very hard not to look as though I was pretending to be someone I wasn’t.
Company of Strangers provided high-flying business people of both sexes with ‘company’ for however long they required it. ‘Company’ could be just that—a friend to talk to for people who had no time to build friendships and were happy to pay for them. Or it could involve more, depending on the agreement of both parties.
My best friend Maggie had been working for them for a couple of years, and she’d been very happy with the arrangement, though I’d been unsure when she’d first started. It had initially seemed like a glorified escort agency to me—not that there was anything wrong with that—but I’d realised as time had gone on that it was a little more complicated.
All the clients on Strangers’ books had been vetted for the safety of those working for them. Meetings were conducted as ‘friendship and company’ only, but sex could become part of it if the two parties were willing. All employees had a panic button they could press if things became difficult and security was only a minute or two away at any given time.
It was all very organised and above board. Maggie liked working for them because she viewed herself as providing an essential service—providing human contact to very lonely people.
It helped that Strangers paid staggeringly well.
Which was part of the whole reason I was standing in an enormously overpriced hotel in New York pretending to be Maggie. She’d scheduled this job for herself, but then another request had come through at the same time, and she’d been desperate to take that one because she really liked the client who’d requested her.
She’d tried to find a replacement in amongst her colleagues, but no one was available, and she’d been upset about it. For whatever reason, she’d particularly wanted to be available for her preferred client, but she couldn’t leave this one in the lurch, either—not if she wanted to retain her standing in the company.
So what was a girl to do when her best friend needed help? Offer to fill in, of course. Maggie had refused point-blank. The company absolutely forbade that kind of thing—something to do with agreements, contracts and all kinds of bullshit that I didn’t listen to when Maggie had tried to tell me what a terrible idea it was—and she would get into terrible trouble if I was caught. She’d be fired, taken to court, et cetera, et cetera...
I’d just told her I’d make sure I wouldn’t get caught. She told me it wasn’t that simple. It might have ended at an impasse if she hadn’t wanted to be with her preferred client so desperately, but she did. I was concerned about that and told her so, since falling for a client couldn’t be a good idea, surely? She’d explained why minding my own business was a better one. And then she’d finally let me do the decent thing and help her out.
Not that it was entirely selfless of me. The money was a big drawcard, especially as I was hoping to get a second tattoo shop up and running. But it was more that my latest attempt to make contact with Eli had resulted in yet more silence and I’d decided that I had to do something to get the bastard out of my head.
Saving one’s virginity for a man who would never see you as anything more than his best friend’s little sister would do that to a girl.
Move on—that was what I needed to do. Being a tattooed virgin at twenty-five was just sad, as I’d told Maggie. She’d said she’d thought I didn’t care what people thought of me. I’d said that I didn’t. I cared what I thought of myself. And I thought I was sad.
She’d had no answer to that.
The private elevator was mirrored, and almost silent as I rode it up the building. I didn’t look at my reflection, not wanting to see any sign of the nervousness that was gathering in my gut.
I could still pull out, send an apology via the check-in desk, but quitting was for sissies, and I wasn’t a sissy. This was my chance to get over Eli once and for all and I was going to take it.
The elevator chimed as it reached the top floor and I took another breath, trying to calm my nerves and resisting the urge to wipe my sweaty palms down my dress.
The doors opened and I stepped out into a small hallway. It was utterly silent, the noise of the city muffled behind layers of brick and steel and sound-proof glass. Not to mention copious amounts of money.
I had no idea what to expect from this. As sex was only something that happened if both parties agreed, there was a chance this client wouldn’t want sex with me.
Especially when he’d chosen Maggie. Maggie was not only beautiful, she was also very warm and very friendly. She knew how to talk to people. How to make them feel at ease. How to make them drop their guard and feel comfortable. She was nurturing while I...wasn’t any of those things.
I was sarcastic, spiky and difficult. Challenging, my brother called me, when he bothered to call me anything at all. Selfish, according to my mother. My father, who thought the sun shone out of my brother’s rear end, simply ignored me and had done all my life.
Yeah, the client was probably going to get a shock when he got me instead of golden and beautiful Maggie. But, hey, maybe he’d like my tattoos. Maybe he’d like the piercing in my eyebrow and the one in my nose.
Maybe he’d like being the first man to see me naked. The first man to touch me at all. Some guys did. Some guys really liked deflowering virgins, so that was kind of my back-up plan. If he really didn’t want me, I’d tell him I was a virgin and he could have me at a discount.
You’re always a discount.
Shut up, brain. No one needs you.
Nervousness fluttered in my gut like a frightened bird as the elevator doors closed behind me.
Maggie had said this client was what the company termed a ‘black star client.’ That apparently meant he treated employees exceptionally well and paid very good tips. He never requested the same woman twice—which was part of the reason Maggie hadn’t protested about my filling in quite as much as she would have normally—and another reason I’d said I’d go in her stead. It suggested that he wasn’t fussed about which woman he had, he just wanted a woman.
Which hopefully meant he wouldn’t mind getting me. I’d simply tell him that Maggie was sick and hadn’t been able to make it, and that I was filling in for her. With any luck, he’d simply shrug his shoulders and go with...whatever it was he wanted to do.
The door was ahead of me, slightly ajar, as per the instructions. A streak of light coming from the penthouse illuminated the black marble floor of the hallway.
My black platform sandals made no sound as I went towards it, then I stopped again.
Hell, I was a lot more nervous about this than I thought I’d be.
Maggie had said that some clients were very specific about what they wanted from a meeting, and some weren’t. But the company’s rules were very strict when it came to sex: anyone forcing one of their employees would be reported to the police, no matter who the client was. And, even if the client was a stand-up individual, they couldn’t penalise the employee for refusing sex. The employee would get paid for an entire night regardless. Sans tips, of course.
But you’re not an employee. Those rules don’t apply to you.
Well, no. But hopefully the client wouldn’t figure that out. And, besides, his reputation was stellar within the company. Maggie had mentioned that some of her colleagues were desperate to be picked by him for a night because of his ability to give them the most incredible pleasure. Not to mention the fact that a night with him was easy money. You didn’t have to talk or make nice, flutter or flirt. All you had to do was sit in a chair, follow his instructions and bring on the orgasms.
That sounded like me. I could just sit there and let someone else do all the work. It’d be a nice change from all my self-administered orgasms over the years.
I moved to the door and stood outside it, my heartbeat speeding up. Nervousness was careening around inside me, sure, but also something else I couldn’t identify.
No, I knew what that was. Excitement.
I shivered.
I needed this. Nine years was a long time to want a man, especially a man who had precisely zero interest in returning the favour. A long time to stay celibate. I was sick of that. Sick of pining. Sick of wanting what I was never going to have.
It was time to put the ghost of him down.
I stepped inside, leaving the door slightly open, as instructed.
The suite was quiet, the only sound the gentle, subsonic hum of the air conditioning.
Slowly, I moved down the short hallway to the suite’s living area.
Big windows looked out over the street, framed by long, rich, blue velvet curtains. The room was very cosy, with comfortable couches in soft-looking dark brown leather and lots of cushions made of out of jewel-bright Indian print silk. The floor was carpeted in the same deep blue as the curtains, thick and soft, with more Persian rugs over the top. Hand-carved occasional tables and shelves in dark wood were scattered around the room, everything lit with side lamps carved of the same wood, with silky shades.
A sumptuous room. Like something out of an English country manor or a castle.
Well, except for one of the wing-backed armchairs that had been dragged into the centre of the room. There were discreet spotlights in the ceiling to give added light, and the chair had been placed directly beneath one.
It was kind of like a display pedestal.
Interesting.
Beside the chair was a small table, a black length of fabric coiled neatly on top of it.
An odd little thrill went through me. All the clients of Strangers had their identities kept confidential, but this guy was even more mysterious, as no one even knew what he looked like. He could be an old guy in his seventies or some young buck in his twenties. No one was sure. But he’d had all the requisite background checks that the company required, so he wasn’t a psychopath at least.
I didn’t care. As long as I could wear that blindfold and pretend he was Eli, that was all that mattered to me.
I moved over to the chair and put my bag down on the floor beside it. I laid my phone down on the table next to the chair and sat down. The leather was as soft as it looked and it warmed quickly.
I reached for the blindfold. The fabric was thick, soft and very silky, and it felt nice against my fingers. I stroked it for a few moments, strangely comforted by the sensation. Then I took a deep breath, lifted it and tied it around my head securely.
The darkness was absolute. I could hear my heartbeat thumping in my head, and the hum of the air-conditioning seemed louder. The leather beneath warmed still further and I was very conscious of the press of the silk of my dress against my skin.
Was this what it was like for my brother? Trajan had been steadily losing his sight for about five years and was completely night blind, much to my parents’ distress. He was the golden child, had graduated high school with honours, and was planning a long and illustrious career in the armed services. At least, until he’d started losing his sight.
Not that Traj had let that stop him from being as successful as he could possibly be. Since then, despite his incipient blindness he’d gone on to build a multi-billion-dollar company with his best friend Eli, off the back of a patented material used in making highly specialised armour for the military. He and Eli had subsequently widened their focus to broader commercial applications, such as bullet-proof vests for bodyguards, the police and anyone else who needed body armour.
Yes, he was very successful, was Traj. My parents thought he was a god. They didn’t think as much about their daughter, who preferred drawing to doing anything else. Who’d dropped out of high school and who could barely read. And they didn’t consider a highly profitable and Instagram-famous tattoo parlour in New York to be a success.
As far as they were concerned, I wasn’t pretty as my mother, and I didn’t like lunching with her and her friends along Rodeo Drive, and I didn’t have degrees for days and a solid career in advertising, which was what my father thought I should be doing.
Tattoos and piercings were for failures, which I guess made me and my extensive client list a failure. I was okay with that. At least I wasn’t an asshole like my dad.
I leaned back slightly in the chair.
The instructions hadn’t been clear about what I was supposed to do now. Just sit and wait?
I stared at the blackness behind my blindfold. The air was cool on my skin, giving me goose bumps. I would have put the air-con up a couple of notches for comfort’s sake, if I’d had a choice. Clearly this guy, whoever he was, preferred a cooler room.
Then I heard a soft click—the front door of the suite closing—and my breath caught. Was that the client? I couldn’t hear anything so either it wasn’t the client, and the door had shut on its own, or he was here, moving soundlessly.
My breathing got faster. I tried to control it, sending my awareness out to see if I could sense anyone in the room—Traj could do this with uncanny accuracy when he was night blind. He’d told me once it was because he paid attention to the rhythm of people’s steps, the sound of their clothing and the way they smelled.
I couldn’t hear anyone’s steps, couldn’t smell anything, either.
And then—I don’t know what it was...some movement of the air, or maybe even a sixth sense I didn’t know I had—suddenly I was aware that I wasn’t alone.
