Victorious(42)

“What did I do?”

She laughs and shakes her head. “You know just what to do.”

“Are you tired?”

“I’m wrecked. Utterly and completely ruined.”

“Then I’ve done my job as your husband and as your Dom.” I kiss her and look down at her, drinking in the sight of her flushed and worn and sweaty from our loving. Reluctantly, I withdraw from her. “Get some sleep. We still have a couple of hours to go.”

“Only if you’ll come sleep with me.”

I have scripts to read, proposals to review… A million things I’ve let slide in the last few weeks. I’m so far behind, I may never catch up. But my wife wants me to sleep with her? I’m there.

“Let me clean up our clothes and check on Fluff. I’ll be right back.”

By the time I crawl into bed with her ten minutes later, she’s out cold.





It’s raining when we arrive in LA, where we’re met by Seth and Josh, who drive us home to Flynn’s house in the Hollywood Hills. I guess his house is my house now, too, which reminds me of something I’ve wanted to ask him for a while now.

“Did Valerie live here?”

He pauses midway through opening a beer. “Not really. She never actually moved in. We spent most of the time we were married filming the only two movies we were in together back-to-back.”

“So those aren’t her plates? The sheets on the bed?”

“Mine and mine alone. Everything in this house is mine, and you should feel free to change up anything you want to make it yours, too.”

“That’s nice of you. Thank you.” I pause before I ask the one question that has been weighing on me for days now. “If she never lived here, how did she know about the room in the basement?”

He puts the beer on the counter and leans his hip against it, crossing his arms. As always, the topic of Valerie raises his hackles. “After we wrapped the second film, we were talking about finally moving in together, officially, when I decided I should tell her about it. I showed her the room, which was much less elaborate then than it is now. Obviously, it was a huge mistake to take her down there, because she had no desire to understand me or what’s important to me.”

“She has no idea what she missed out on.”

He stares at me in that intense way he does so well. “When you show me how badly you want to understand me, it gets me,” he says softly, “right here.” He lays his hand over his heart. “I actually feel it.”

I go to him and kiss him, caressing the stubble on his jaw. “I know that feeling. I get it, too.”

Putting his arms around me, he holds me for a long quiet moment.

“Have I completed my punishment?”

“Oh damn, I forgot all about that.”

I raise my head, intending to chew him out for forgetting, but he’s laughing. He hasn’t forgotten anything.

“You’ve done a great job with your punishment, sweetheart.”

“So how do I get this thing out of me?”

“Go into the bedroom and take off your clothes. Slide to the end of the bed with your legs as far apart as you can get them. I’ll be right there to help you out.”

“Are you serious? We’ve had sex—wild, monkey sex—three times today already. You’re going to break me.”

“Who said anything about having sex? You said you wanted the plug out. That’s all we’re doing.”

Crossing my arms, I eye him skeptically. “Why do I find that hard to believe?”

He takes a drink of his beer. “I have no idea. Now isn’t there something you’re supposed to be doing?”

I shake my head in frustration and amusement. Clearly he enjoys keeping me off balance in this new arrangement of ours. Still wondering what he’s up to, I go into the bedroom, where a rack of clothes is waiting for me—gorgeous dresses in various lengths and colors. And shoes… pair after pair of delicate, beaded, open-toed shoes, posed on top of their boxes.

“Flynn!”

He comes to the door, Fluff along with him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing is wrong, but what’s all this?”

“Tenley dropped that off for you. We’ve got the Oscar nominee luncheon Monday and the Nominees Night celebration at Spago Monday night. She’ll be here that morning to help you get ready.”

“Is there some sort of list I could get of all these events?”

“I’m sorry. Yes, of course. I’ll ask Addie to get you something and make sure you’re included on all the emails going forward.” He pulls out his phone. “What’s your address?”

“It was my school address. I need to get a new one.”

“We’ll set you up with a Quantum address. Addie will take care of that for us.” He punches in a text and then grimaces. “Fuck.”

“What?”

“Emmett texted me. The meeting with the FBI agent is on for Monday morning.”

“Okay…”

“It’s not okay. We had nothing to do with it, and they’re wasting our time.”

“Then we have nothing to worry about. Let’s just talk to him and get it over with.”

“It’ll have to be early. I want you to have enough time to get ready for the luncheon.”