KILLING SARAI(70)

Victor looks right at me. “Izabel, don’t sit with your arms crossed like that. It makes you look like a stubborn child.”

Slowly, my arms fall away and I fold my hands together within my lap, straightening my back.

“Come here,” he says in a gentler tone.

I slide over the few inches separating us and sit right next to him.

His fingers dance along the back of my neck as he pulls my head toward him. My heart pounds erratically when he brushes his lips against the side of my face. Suddenly, I feel his other hand slip in-between my thighs and up my dress. My breath hitches. Do I part them? Do I freeze up and lock them in place? I know what I want to do, but I don’t know what I should do and my mind is about to run away with me.

“I have a surprise for you tonight,” he whispers onto my ear.

His hand moves closer to the warmth between my legs.

I gasp quietly, trying not to let him know, though I’m positive he definitely knows.

“What kind of surprise?” I ask, my head tilted back, resting in his hand.

Just then another couple walks up to the table, a tall blonde-haired woman with mile-long naked legs and an even taller man with his hand around the back of her waist.

Victor stands up to greet them. I stay right where I’m at, staying in character, yet at the same time not really having to pretend to be disappointed by their presence because I was enjoying the moment with Victor before we were interrupted; for a few minutes I had forgotten why we were even here.

“Aria,” the woman introduces herself.

“A pleasure,” I say with obvious distaste.

She sits down on the other side of the rounded booth. The man takes the outside seat after her, just as Victor sits.

“It has been a while, Victor,” the man says with an accent that I can’t place.

How do they know each other?

“Yes, it has, my friend,” Victor says as he gestures for the waiter.

The waiter comes right over and takes the man’s wine order.

“Izabel,” Victor says, “this is my old friend Fredrik from Sweden. He’ll be running my offices in Stockholm when the expansion goes into effect next month.”

“Oh, I see,” I say, taking another sip of my wine, sizing ‘Aria’ up as I look at her over the rim of my glass.

Her breasts are practically busting out of the top of her dress and I feel inadequate all of a sudden. But I don’t let it show. I am the most beautiful and most important girl in the room, I remind myself. It doesn’t matter in the slightest that her double-D’s dwarf my C’s or that she’s quite beautiful and has the most magnetic blue eyes I’ve ever seen on a woman before.

I round my chin proudly and look away from her.

“What is my present, Victor?”

Victor’s lips lengthen subtly and he places his glass back upon the table.

“Fredrik and Aria, of course,” he says. “You’ve been so good lately and I’ve been neglecting you while away in Sweden that I wanted to celebrate you tonight.”

Fredrik smiles seductively across the table at me with his lips pressed to the rim of his glass. He is gorgeous, with dark wavy hair and strong cheekbones.

“Couldn’t we celebrate alone?” I ask, giving Fredrik no more of my attention. “I don’t understand what you’re getting at. Surely you don’t mean for me to f*ck them.”

Victor’s smile is openly sly but secretly proud by how easily I caught onto the plan.

I just hope it doesn’t go farther than this table…

His hand moves away from between my legs and he places both arms upon the table, bent at the elbows.

“No, of course not,” he says and that surprises me. “I would never share you, you know that.”

Aria smiles at me, continuously trying to make eye contact which makes me want to look at her less. Fredrik’s left hand disappears underneath the table and probably between her thighs like Victor had his between mine just seconds ago.

“Victor tells us,” Fredrik leans forward just a bit and lowers his voice, “that you prefer an audience. Aria and I would very much like to watch. If that is something you’d be willing to allow.”

I’m not sure when the act ended for me, but right now I’m struggling to swim my way through feelings of lust and pleasure to find my way back into the real world. For a long few seconds I don’t say anything at all. All I can think about is Victor having his way with me and Fredrik and Aria watching as he does it. I’m suddenly tingling between the legs. But I’m ashamed of my own thoughts and try to force them out of my mind.

“Izabel?” I hear Victor say.

I snap back into the moment, not entirely sure anymore how I’m supposed to act. Maybe Victor should’ve prepared me better by giving me the particulars of important details like this. I fumble over my thoughts, using my wine glass as a distraction as I finger the stem with my right hand all while still trying to exude this self-possessed personality of Izabel Seyfried that I’m not exactly feeling anymore.

“I would like that,” I say. But then I glance coldly at Aria and add, “But not her. Only Fredrik.”

Aria’s face falls and then twists faintly into something bitter.

Victor’s expression remains standard and I take that as a secret sign of his approval for my decision to exclude her.