Resist (Songs of Submission #6)(46)

He turned my lipstick tube until the brand was visible. “Lancome, apparently.” He fondled the emerald end of my lariat as if it was part of my body. “I can’t wait for this circus to be over.” He shifted closer and whispered, “I’m taking you home, and I’m going to tie your wrists to the banister. I’m going to blindfold you, then I’m going to undress you slowly. I’ll put my lips all over you until you beg me to take you, which I may or may not do.”

“Jonathan,” I whispered, his name a white flag of surrender.

“Did you just shudder, or is it cold in this parking lot?”

“Was there anyone before you?”

“You might have thought so at the time.”

“I feel like no one’s ever loved me before.”

“I’m sure they did their best, but you always belonged to me.”

The parking lot’s lights were fluorescent and cold, but his gaze was more than warm—it was hot and fixed. I did indeed feel as though I’d never been loved before. At least not correctly. Not with purpose.

He broke our connection to glance over my shoulder, then back to my face. “Vipers descending.”

I looked back. Jessica, wearing purple and cream, walked with a crowd, her hand clutching the arm of a man with an athletic build. I nodded at her. She did not nod back. She looked away to make conversation with a ruddy-cheeked man rather than engage me at all. A face I knew stood out from the crowd.

“Geraldine,” I said. “Wow. Hi.”

Trompe l’oeil street artist Geraldine Stark looked at me, then Jonathan, and smiled. She’d let her curly brown hair go wild and wove sparkled strands through it. Her dress was a macramé shift of a thousand colors over a black satin slip. She gave me a Los Angeles hug, but I felt her eyes on Jonathan, who kept his hand on my back.

“Oh my God,” she said. “Did you hear about Kevin?”

“No, I—”

To my side, Jonathan greeted Mr. Athletic. They shared words I couldn’t concentrate on. As the crowd moved toward the elevators, I heard Jessica laugh behind me. Her voice was caught in the lilt of small talk and joyful greetings.

“He’s stuck in Boise,” Geraldine hissed. “Three years.”

“What? Why?”

“His parole is real strict. He gets actual jail time. They’re pissed. So…” She glanced at Jonathan, then back at me as we stepped into the elevator. She thought I didn’t know she’d been with him. She thought she would surprise me for dramatic effect. She thought wrong. Looking meaningfully at me, then at Jonathan, who spoke to the blond guy, she muttered, “Have you heard about your date? It’s all over town.”

“The thing about Kevin is terrible. Honestly.” The news shook me. I didn’t care if she’d f**ked Jonathan a couple of nights back when I didn’t know he existed. I didn’t care if she wanted to rub my face in it for fun. Jesus Christ, I knew the guy wasn’t a virgin. A hundred women in the city could commiserate on my lover’s prowess if I were the commiserating type. Which I wasn’t. I was the type who got upset when her ex-boyfriend went to jail. “It’s awful.”

Geraldine looked away. I hoped she was ashamed.

“We incorporated light into the design,” Jessica said to someone I couldn’t see. “The right temperature of light was the hardest to achieve. We wound up finding old tungsten bulbs in a warehouse in Torrance.”

The doors opened onto the patio at L.A. Mod, which had been decked out in hanging lanterns and silver streamers. The effect was beautiful, incandescent, as if a few dozen artists had collaborated on the décor.

“Five minutes,” Jonathan said in my ear as the crowd filed out. “Stay in my sight.”

Geraldine’s date pulled her with the tide out toward the patio, but not before she grabbed my hand and said “Do it...” She laughed as she disappeared into the throng.

Photographers and reporters waited, and the flashing lights made me wince. I waved to her quickly to say good-bye, and she waved back. I wished she’d stayed, even to talk about sex or prison time, because I was alone. Jonathan was ten feet away by a serving stand, talking in serious tones to the light-haired guy. Jessica was surrounded by a gaggle of people, all laughing as if they didn’t have a care in the world. Jonathan and the big guy looked as though they were going to come to blows. He glanced at me and held out his hand in a slight gesture that meant “stay away.”

The elevator doors slid open and another group got out. I heard the phrase again, though Geraldine was far from me.

Do it...

It sounded recorded. I looked behind me. Two girls stared at a phone, the light glowing on their faces.

Do it...

One pocketed the phone when they stepped onto the patio, giggling.

Jonathan’s conversation wasn’t going well. I couldn’t stand there. I just couldn’t. I walked over.

“Hi,” I said. Jonathan slipped his hand over my shoulder. “I’m Monica.” I held out my hand. The blond guy didn’t take it.

“You stole something from my house.”

Jonathan pulled me closer. I felt his body inching between the other man and me. “This conversation is over.”

“It hasn’t started. I’ve got a lawyer.”