Breaking Joseph (7 page)

The doorman at
the apartment building was expecting me. He ushered me into a lift,
pressing the button for the top floor with a gallant nod of the
head. I was so used to creeping into these places with my eyes
down, I didn’t quite know what to do with myself.

Joseph answered
the door barefoot, his shirt untucked and collar open. In my
skyscraper heels, I didn’t have to stretch to peer over his
shoulder.

“This is a
funny-looking restaurant,” I said.

He stepped
aside. “I couldn’t be arsed.”

“And they say
romance is dead. I–is this yours?”

The apartment
seemed small enough beneath the milky lamplight. His London flat
had a minimal feel to it, but with its thick carpet and aged
leather sofas, this was cosy. Bookshelves tapered into sloped attic
ceilings, and the cityscape poured through glass doors to paint the
walls in shadows. Outside lay a wide terrace with curved railings,
and the wooden rise of a hot tub. Leather, glass and outdoor baths:
he’d brought a little of Sweden to New York.

“Hungry?”

Next to the
doors, he’d set out a picnic, blanket and all. “Joe. You are
secretly so twee.” I sank down beside him on the soft throw and
arranged my legs awkwardly.

“Fuck off.
Blini?”

I plucked one
from the tray he offered.

“And before you
say anything about the cupcake stand,” he went on, “Sadie hired it
from…somewhere.”

“Of course she
did. Have we got ginger beer too?”

“It’s ginger
ale over here. And yes. With whiskey.” He sprang up toward the
kitchen area. “Ice?”

“Please.” If I
even liked whiskey. Erm. I’d been offered it a hundred times on
networking dinners and always associated it with those
bleugh-tastic liquor chocolates nobody wanted at Christmas. “Why
are you staying in a hotel if you’ve got this place?”

He pushed a
tumbler into my hand, the ice clinking in pale syrup. “Bringing you
straight here might have been a little strange. And I can keep an
eye on everyone if I’m at the hotel.” He scowled. “Especially
Yves.”

“What kind of
cupcakes do we have?”

“I don’t know,
some lavender shite. This is what it’s like to live with Nigella
Lawson, isn’t it?”

“I can only
imagine.” I watched him as I chewed. “I’m sure you have.”

“Not really my
type.” He reached out and touched me for the first time since I’d
arrived. It occurred to me then that without even noticing, I’d
grown comfortable with him, even in this unfamiliar space. He
traced the seam of my stocking with a fingertip and my blood
followed in a hot little surge.

“I like these,”
he murmured. “They suit you.”

“Thank
you.”

His hands
curved around my ankles, toying with the shoe straps.

“Did you have a
good time visiting?” I asked.

“Yeah…was good
to see my sister.”

“You didn’t
catch your parents?”

“It was good to
see my sister,” he said drily.

I smiled as his
fingers made the journey back up my calf. “How is it that they’re
all over here, and you’re in England?”

“My dad’s
American. They moved when I was a teenager. I didn’t want to go, so
I stayed with my grandmother.” He reached my thigh and kneaded
hard. Harder.

“They just left
you?”

“Pretty much.”
He lowered his eyes.

“And where does
the Swedish thing fit in?”

“It’s where my
Grandmother is from. She had my mother in England.”

“Sounds
complicated.” I caught his hand as he went to lift my skirt. “Be
patient.”

He sat back and
eyed me playfully. “If that’s what you want.”

Before he
moved, I brought his fingers to my lips and nipped at each one.

“I’ve had the
image of you doing that in my head all day,” he said. “That kiss
you gave me this morning…”

“I like making
you wait.”

He drew his
hand away and reached for a cupcake adorned with mint leaves. “I
like it more than I ought to.”

“Why’s that?” I
stole some of his cake icing and he went to smack my palm. “What’s
wrong with a bit of delayed gratification?”

“Nothing, if
you have the time.”

“We’ve got all
evening, haven’t we?”

“We’ve got
until Friday. Do you think it’s enough?”

I blushed,
unsure where to look. Whores weren’t meant to blush, of
course–cliché declared it genetically impossible. Maybe that only
applied to Charlotte, who would roll her eyes at the act of
modesty. “There’s one more job left, remember? I’m sure you can
think of something.”

“Oh, I will.”
He observed me with a strange melancholy: considering.
Dissecting.

In an effort to
ignore that, I took a great mouthful of whiskey, then almost choked
on the dull, dry heat.

“Not a whiskey
fan, hmm?” He laughed.

“Sorry.” The
glass clinked as I set it down. “That wasn’t very graceful.”

“You have grace
in the right places.” He was stroking my legs again.

“Thank you,” I
whispered.

“And you’re
gorgeously coy,” he went on, pushing plates aside so he could sit
next to me. “You could teach a lot of women in your profession a
thing or two.”

“Lawyers, or
call girls?”

He kissed my
throat. “Both.”

“Gifts,
compliments, cake stands…I’m starting to get suspicious.” I took
the half-eaten cupcake from his hand and sampled it. “Or is this
the gold standard from the Chairman of the Whored?”

He cocked an
eyebrow.

“Elise warned
me about your evil, manslutty ways,” I said.

He cracked a
grin over the rim of his glass. “And you answered her with a
straight face?”

“I’m quite good
at looking horrified about prostitution. Go on. Try me.”

“All right
then.” He crossed his legs and fell back on his hands. “You might
be interested to know, Miss Vaughn, the things I’ve learned about
your lady colleague. She appears to be selling herself on the
side.”

“Oh God.” Hair
went tight around my finger as I twisted. “I’ve never understood
that kind of thing.”

He chewed his
bottom lip; he was convincing, comically so. “Me either. Why waste
a couple of grand when you can invite a girl to an overpriced floor
picnic that your assistant did all the work for?”

“Now there’s
the mark of a man who wants to impress.”

His laugh was
dry and mocking. “Oh, fuck off.” He sprang to his feet. “Come and
see the view from the terrace.”

He pulled me
up. Waited as I steadied myself on the heels. Then he unlocked the
glass doors and flattened himself against them as I stepped
out.

I didn’t get as
far as two feet on the ground.

A light little
kick took one leg from under me and I smacked forward on to the
tiled floor, my palms hot and fizzing on impact. The door slammed
and it rang in my ears. Then he eased me over with another foot to
the shoulder, and I lay sprawled on my back beneath the darkening
sky.

Kneeling, he
brought my trembling arms above my head.

“This morning,”
he murmured, tugging me toward the railing, “the way you said no to
me. I liked that.”

There were no
words–I poked them, prodded, but they wouldn’t come out to play.
This businesslike manner of his aroused me. Disturbed me. Did both
because all this was planned.

Something cool
and smooth bound my wrists together. As he secured me to the
railing, the ends flew across my face: a thin twist of silk rope.
The mark of a professional. He checked his knots with a vague frown
of concentration and then snipped the end with a pair of scissors.
He’d brought a little of the other side of the mirror to New York
too, it seemed.

“What are you
doing to me?” Charlotte played his game, but Leila heard the blood
soar in her ears.

“Making sure
you stay just where I want you.” He crawled back down and took my
ankle in his hand. “It’s very convenient, this terrace.”

I tugged my
foot away and he caught it again, looping the rope in a tight
crisscross. It chafed against my gossamer-thin stockings.

Breath stuck in
my throat. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“I’m just
practicing my knots, baby.” He snapped another tight. “It’s an art
form. Did you know that?”

I twisted
sideways to look at him. “Untie me. Teach me how to do them.”

Creamy hair
fell into his face and obscured the smile that flickered. “Nice
try.” He fondled my free calf, raked his nails over the seamed
black nylon. “I’m going to leave this one free. Makes things a
little more interesting.” Then he came forward on flat palms and
settled between my spread thighs.

“Joseph–”

“Shh.” The kiss
was inescapable; he filled his hands with my hair, held me tight to
his mouth. He tasted like mint and sugar.

Now the world
became a cold stone landscape with its edges barred in black iron
rails. The breeze drew shivers, cool despite humid air, as if the
setting sun was a fire ablaze in the distance. So Charlotte came to
purgatory, tugged so fast she arrived with no plucky escape plan,
or bag of tricks to rival his.

But maybe she
didn’t want to escape. Liked to be helpless. Liked the frothy kiss
of pain at her wrists.

Joseph appeared
above me clutching the scissors, and I split the silence with a
wrought yelp.

“What?” he
whispered.

“Don’t–”

“You mean
this?” Twin blade tips lifted my skirt. His signature was obscured
by my suspender belt and he eased the band down with uneven breath.
A fingertip traced scratched letters. “You think I’m going to do
this again?”

“Please
don’t.”

I think.

“Oh no,
sweetheart. This is perfect as it is.”

There was a
rough snip as he cut the hem of my dress, and then the roar of torn
fabric filled my ears. I wanted to weep as he split it up the
middle–it held so many memories–but a strange calm took hold as he
ripped the capped sleeves. He stripped Charlie away, destroying any
slither of his grasp on me. Naked, sacred…I was utterly bare.

When he was
done, he pulled the remains of the dress from under me and I winced
as my skin hit cold tiles. Another slice and the belt came off in
one severed piece. I wore only the stockings, shoes and an
unintentional pout.

“When I get out
of this, I’m going to make you pay for it,” I warned.

His face
appeared before me, lightly tanned skin against the twilight. “Is
that so?”

I cocked my
heel and drove it sharply into his ribs. There was no flinch but he
groaned, and his eyes turned vivid beneath a glassy sheen of
pleasure. “You’ll have to do it a little harder than that,” he
said, chuckling.

“Is that a
threat or an invitation?”

“Both, I
think.” He kissed me again, his tongue slow this time. Pulled off
to stare me in the eye and then descended before I remembered to
breathe.

I tried so hard
to be disagreeable but my body already followed his, my back
arching so my nipples caught against his shirt. The rope was a lot
harsher than the black scarves he’d used before, and it cut into my
flesh, stinging to numbness as I moved beneath him.

He broke off to
pour breath down my belly. His tongue dragged over the scratched
brand that was healing so unfortunately well. Already, I ached for
him to sink lower–I hadn’t forgotten the teasing kisses he planted
there that morning, or the riot of my pulse in response.

He parted me
with his fingers first. “You’re very neat down here. Do you know
that?”

“Uh…thank
you.”

“I’ve seen a
lot of women. You’re neat.” He toyed with my clit lazily. “And you
get so fucking wet for me.”

It was an
effort to dart from his hand, to resist the urge to buck on it.

He inhaled.
“Tell me why.”

“Why…what?”

His thick thumb
slid inside me and grazed along the bottom wall. “Why you get like
this. Are you such a sticky mess for all your clients?”

“No.”

“Just for
me?”

“You’re not
like my client.” I was tired of failing to resist. No good at
it.

“Would you do
what I said if I wasn’t? Would you still be tied up on my terrace,
would you have bent down in front of me that first night and begged
me to fuck you?”

“Quite
possibly,” I mumbled.

A warm hand
cupped my cheek. “Did you always want me, Leila?”

I tugged at my
bonds without thinking. All those work meetings, the permission to
stare at him, fantasizing about what his throat would taste like…I
never thought it would happen like this. “You have no idea.”

He grinned,
made me suck his wet thumb. “I thought you were a prissy little
trophy girl.”

“You’re an
awful judge of character.” I teased. “You thought Matt just wanted
a fuck too.”

“You are a
prissy little trophy girl, though. In the office.” He pulled his
fingers out again and smeared up over my clit. “A dichotomy in
every sense of the word.”

“That’s the
worst pun I’ve heard in a long time.” I kicked his ribs, playfully
this time.

He grabbed at
my ankle and unbuckled the shoe. “Shut up.”

Everything
about my jutting lower lip was a challenge, and his cheeks turned
pink as he noticed.

He pulled the
shoe off my free foot and pressed my thigh back on my belly. Ah,
being exposed so blatantly…I got drunk on it, and I loved how this
man, so composed in the light of day, delighted in every inch of
me.

He held the
shoe up. “They have a good heel.”

“They do.” I
jumped as the heel grazed my inner lips.

“It’s pretty
long,” he went on, watching me. “A little sharp, too.”

He pressed it
inside, and I moaned as the foot slapped into my clit. It barely
slid in an inch or two, and felt narrow, but the point scratched at
flesh inside with razored sweetness.