Page 89 of His Turn

“If I had only been thinking of myself I’d have fucked you hard after you sucked my cock. I’d have continued to use you up and then I’d walk out and throw you away.”

“Are you serious right now?”

“Why wouldn’t I be serious?”

“Is that your usual response to players? Use them up and throw them out?”

“No,” he says. “I’m typically in a regular game. I’m just having… an off season.”

I laugh so hard, I almost spit out my taco. “An off season? Do tell.”

“Never mind that,” he says, changing the subject with a wave of his hand. “My point is, yes, I’m playing a game. But I take the game very seriously. I like to make the game last and the only way to do that is to submit to the needs of the other players. I’ve always been like this. Smith and Quin and I—”

“Those other players you had? The ones who came before Jordan?”

“Yes,” he says. “We always thought of each other. We submitted to each other in certain respects. We were equals and we didn’t take more than our share. And we did this with one end in mind.”

“What end?” I ask. Not to be snotty, but because I’m really interested in knowing how he perceives winning.

“To keep the game going for as long as possible.”

“But you’re not in that game, Bric.”

“Elias,” he says, an edge to his voice. “Stop thinking of me as Bric and start thinking of me as Elias.”

“Elias,” I say, conceding. Because I do, in fact, call him Bric in my head. “That game ended. You lost all your players.”

“Yes,” he says. “And now I have two new players. You and Jordan. So I’m invested, Nadia. That’s my point. I will consider your needs ahead of mine. Submit to you when it’s in your best interest.”

“How big of you,” I say, finishing my taco and wiping my mouth.

“And if you’d just submit to me instead of making snide comments at every revelation I hand out, then you’d learn the lesson I’m trying to teach.”

Learn the lesson. I just smile. Because this oaf really thinks he needs to teach me a lesson. “You’re fucking my mind, Bric.” I use that name for him on purpose. “Not my body. And we both know this.”

“And you like it, Nadia. Or you wouldn’t be here.” He stands up, grabs his coat off the dining room chair, shrugs it on, and then leans in to kiss me on the cheek. “I’ll pick you up from work at two tomorrow,” he says, backing away, reaching into his pocket to jingle his car keys. “We’re going shopping for furniture.”

I watch him walk away. He pulls open the front door, then hesitates and gives me a sidelong glance over his shoulder. “I’ll make sure Jordan comes tomorrow. So you can give me a complete answer to my earlier question.”

Even though I don’t want to… I think about him. For a long time after he leaves. While I brush my teeth and climb in bed. When I’m masturbating to give myself the last orgasm he denied me. Denied me, I remind myself. Under the pretense of taking care of me. Not using me up and throwing me away. And even as I drift off, spent from an exhausting day of rehearsal and mind-fucking, I’m still thinking about how he’s playing his game.

Do I want to live with them?

Yes, Elias, I decide. I want to live with you. You’re already bending your rules for me and we’ve barely just begun to play.

Imagine how much further I can push him if I have twenty-four-hour access.

My world goes fuzzy and I enter dream space picturing all the many, many ways I will get to know them…