DITW 11-3: Blood Red

Devlin held her hand and they marched westward on Yorkville, heading to Avenue Road and she resisted him at last, demanding to know where they were going. Devlin told her The Hazelton, the hotel where they were meeting Benny Chan, and she said, “It’s too early. We didn’t eat,” and stopped on the sidewalk, the high noon sun coming straight down on them.

Devlin didn’t let her hand go. “Early’s better than late,” he said, and she winced at the reminder of those two pink lines her urine lit up this morning.

“Devlin, where are we going?”

“I told you: The Hazelton.”

She wanted to argue and wanted to resist, but when he walked again, she followed along with him, both of them connected by grip, weaving around slower pedestrians, crossing the narrow street when they got a chance. They made their way to the entrance of the five-star hotel, striding under the cooler shade of the street-side honey locusts.

Devlin had purpose and vigor and they were an hour early for the meeting and she sensed, of course, something else was up. She pulled her hand from his in the lobby. “Why are we here so early?”

“We’re not early.”

“The meeting’s at two.”

Devlin said, “What meeting?”

She looked around the lobby, the cool and grim space, chilled with silent air conditioning, high ceilings, concrete and gray, bright blue fabric and burnished gold accents. The incredible quiet, the solitude. And realized she’d been had. “The meeting with Benny.”

Devlin’s expression was stone serious, not amused, not playful. “I moved it.”

“Why?”

“I have a staffing problem I have to deal with first.”

She frowned, closed her eyes and opened them again. She said nothing. She was the staffing problem. She wasn’t wearing heels. She wasn’t who he wanted her to be.

She snatched her hand away from his and scowled at him, her gaze burning hot and baleful. “I’m not fucking you,” she hissed through gritted teeth.

He returned the venom. “Who wants to fuck you, Kimmy? That’s not the only thing I care about.”

“You brought me here.”

Like she’d made a good point, he stilled, considering it. He said, “It’s not what you think. Just follow me.”

And like a good employee, like a dutiful worker, she did follow him. They loaded onto the elevator and rode to the fifth floor. A left turn out of the elevator cab and they faced a black door which Devlin opened with a key card. He’d already checked in, already claimed this room. The room meant for the meeting with Benny Chan, but there would be no Benny Chan here today.

He ushered her inside like he was annoyed with her, and she entered the hotel room. No, a suite; she stood in foyer before a main room, a sedate and sophisticated space with muted, mushroom colors and pale gold accents, two couches, a bureau, a blank TV above the bureau; two black pocket doors slid open on the opposite wall, a glimpse into a bedroom.

Devlin said nothing about the space, but her reaction was autonomous. She missed this. Missed luxury spaces meant for sex, missed post-fuck room service, missed whisky, missed spending an afternoon in a place like this. But her hand protected herself, protected the unborn inside her, palm over the flat below her skirt’s waist. Her lips trembled.

Devlin stepped past her, heading to one of the pocket doors. “Come with me.”

She followed her employer into the bedroom, using the other pocket door, the one he hadn’t used, arriving in the same room, standing on the opposite side from him. On Devlin’s side of the bed another pocket door was slid away to reveal a large bathroom, every surface clad in black marble with jade and ivory rivers traveling its landscape.

Spread on the bed between them were women’s garments and a pair of beautiful shoes. Devlin wanted her to play dress up.

Her head bowed with a heavy sadness and her gaze fell on her simple gray suit and her scuffed brown loafers. Clothing suitable for work. But unsuitable for Devlin. And Devlin would tell her they were unsuitable for Kimmy Chang.

She wanted him to say it. Wanted him to whisper it in her ear.

But instead she bowed her head further, overwhelmed with a tidal swell of regret and shame and hurt.

“In here,” Devlin said, and when she looked up, he’d moved into the bathroom, beckoning her to follow.

She trudged past the bed, her eyes roaming the fine clothing, looking for labels, admiring their luxurious fabric, recognizing the shoes as Louis Vuitton Blossom sandals in black patent, the four-inch heel a slender inverted tulip. Shoes she’d wanted. Sleek, minimal, barely there; a bright gold V on the ankle strap.

Devlin pointed to a stool with a gray padded seat, set between the huge marble tub and the marble vanity that ran the length of one side of the room. She stopped on the threshold of the bathroom, her hands gathered at her front and holding her pocketbook over her crotch, like a woman protecting herself before a purse snatcher or some other villain who wanted more than the valuables she carried on hand. “Devlin...”

“Have a seat, please.” His tone was even and patient, but objection wouldn’t be countered. Perhaps for the first time ever, Devlin seemed like her boss. Like someone whose requests were to be followed. She’d never seen him that way, hadn’t ever considered him as a man who held a position over her. She’d always thought of him as less-than. As fun. As arrogant. But harmless before her own machinations. But things had changed. Today she was afraid. Not of the man’s demands, but of his authority. How he could take from her the things she wanted. That she’d earned.

She approached the stool but didn’t sit. There were cosmetics on the counter, expensive things; lipstick and hair gel and— A jealous hammer thunked her chest, the clawed end ramming between her ribs. Another woman had been here with him.

But, no. That wasn’t the case.

With his hands on his shoulders, Devlin guided her to face the mirror, oversized and irregular shaped, like the shape of a hand-drawn circle. She regarded her reflection, Devlin over her shoulder, handling her hair.

He said, “What do you see?”

“I don’t want to do this, Devlin.”

“I see a boring bureaucrat. A beige office dweller failing to thrive under fluorescent lights.”

She shook her head, but not enough to shake her hair out of Devlin’s stroking hands. “A bureaucrat?”

“Women make good bureaucrats. Not you, you were one, then you weren’t. But look at you now. . . . Kimmy, I had unleashed you. I had revealed your true self, and you loved it.”

Her hand came up to take her hair from Devlin, her eyes turning away from the reflection, uncomfortable emotions coming to the surface.

“You were one. A bureaucratic lawyer for the regime, a do-gooder, but the do-gooding didn’t make your pussy wet.”

She scoffed. “I didn’t work for the government, Devlin.”

“You know you did. You were an outside agent who understood the government’s own tangled bureaucracy, and you helped those-in-need navigate it. Which is what the regime wanted you to do.”

She said nothing, even when he stroked her hair again and guided her to look at the mirror once more. He gathered her hair back from her face, took away the shaggy locks that hid . . . Hid her what? Her beauty? She sniffled and rolled her eyes.

“You’re afraid of that woman in the mirror. You don’t see her when you’re looking out her eyes, but you see her when you meet your own gaze.”

“Metaphysical nonsense,” she muttered.

He turned her around to face him. “You don’t even deserve to see that woman.”

It shamed her and she held her own lapels like she wanted to cover herself, like he’d arrived unannounced and found her lounging in her bathrobe, naked underneath.

He pushed her hands away and took hold of her lapels, his face close to hers. “Women can be vicious but are generally agreeable. They’re agreeable because they hate chaos, they don’t want anyone to disturb their nest. They sit in bureaucratic positions like a viper in a nest of vipers, ready to defend their tiny bureaucratic throne like a mother goose on her eggs. But you don’t see them threading the network of that bureaucracy, or, god, creating something from nothing, giving life to wealth where none existed.”

Creating life. She said, “For that you need a man?”

He smirked. “Doesn’t have to be. You’re not a man. You’re far from a man.”

“Then what am I?”

He whispered, “A huntress.”

Her gaze roamed away from his, moving to the tub behind him. Devlin unbuttoned her shirt. She didn’t stop him. Button by button, he worked his way down the shirt, the shirt tucked in and blousing open, revealing her stomach, her bra, her collar. She still didn’t stop him. Didn’t stop him when he pulled the shirt out of her skirt’s waistband and let it hang like her open jacket. She stepped back until her butt rested against the marble edge of the long vanity. Devlin followed. Followed and opened her jacket and her skirt, peeling them back to reveal her bare shoulders. He was hard. His cock was big and aroused, hanging still, the meaty bulge touching her thigh as he disrobed her.

The discovery of Devlin’s arousal didn’t revolt her. Didn’t anger her. She hated how it stirred heinous emotions and desire. Her neck craned like she would submit to him, but her body stayed rigid and non-compliant, letting this brutish rogue remove her shirt and jacket, taking her arms out now and tossing the clothing to the floor.

He looked down at them. “They don’t even look good on that marble floor.” Then he returned to regard her, his eyes stroking her bare skin, her shoulders, her covered breasts, her ribs and sternum. “They sure don’t make a man wonder what’s under them. Look what’s under them. Look how incredible you are. You are perfection, Kimmy Chang.” His huge warm hands went on her bare shoulders, and he stepped back, giving her space, turning her to face the mirror again. “Don’t look in your eyes. Look at your skin. Your collarbone. Your long, beautiful neck.” His fingertips stroked under her hair, starting under her ear and traveling to her collar, raising her arms in gooseflesh.

She stared, her struggle to resist against his powerful command soft and feathery. She looked good naked next to him; her bare skin beside his expensive suit, his height, his masculine face. He unlatched her bra, and it slumped on her chest. He pulled it away to reveal her traitorous nipples hard and swollen.

A small and satisfied chuckle rumbled behind her, Devlin pleased at the sight of her arousal. He unzipped her skirt and let it fall to the marble floor. She stood only wearing plain underwear and tights and loafers. His huge penis pressed against her backside and upper thigh.

Devlin reached past her to the cosmetics arranged on the counter, selected a stand-up tube, popped the cap and squirted something into his palm. He raked his fingers through her hair, pulling it back from her face, revealing her stark jawline, her long neck. Her hair gleamed like liquid with whatever he’d applied to his hand. He slicked her hair right back until it hung in heavy wet locks to her slim shoulders, and she admired herself a moment, turning her face one way, then the other, while Devlin wiped his hands dry on a crisp white towel.

“Turn around and face me,” he said.

While she turned, he selected something else from the cosmetics. She watched him twist the end on a lipstick, a Rouge Louboutin, the blood red stick rising from the black and gold tube.

He touched her lips with the velvety stick, spreading warm and soft on her sensitive flesh. She closed her eyes again, and lifted her chin. Devlin held her throat and painted her lips red.