JENNIE
There was nothing in the world like the feeling of bass pumping against my brain, reverberating throughout my entire body. The fast and steady beat pulsed in me, entangling with the chardonnay I'd just pounded, manipulating my limbs and looping my hips. Flashes of red, green, and blue pierced the darkness of the dancefloor. A white spotlight flickered over glowing, sweat-dampened skin.
A man took my hips from behind. For the briefest second I wished it was Lisa, but for all the restraint we'd shown, she'd never grab me out of nowhere. I pushed the hands off and made my way to the bar to order more wine.
As I waited for the bartender, a heavy arm landed across my shoulders. "Hey, babe," a young, stocky blond said, swaying with me. "What's your name?"
"Who are you?" I asked, trying to slip away, but his grip tightened. I'd vetted every name on the guest list, and those I hadn't met face to face were at least of drinking age, while this guy looked barely eighteen. "Who are you here with?"
"I work in the restaurant downstairs and just got off," he said, his words slurring together as he put his mouth to my ear. "My friend and I snuck in."
"Dude, shut up," said another guy in a black button down. "You'll get us in trouble."
They burst into laughter. "What's your name?" the blond repeated. "You're hot."
"You guys aren't supposed to be here," I said. "I have to throw you out."
"Aw, come on. Lighten up," he pleaded. "Let's get a drink. I'll buy."
"The drinks are free. And no." I tried wriggling out from under him. "Please, get off of me."
"Huh?"
"She said get off," Lisa's voice boomed a second before she yanked the guy's arm, twisted it, and sent him flying back toward the dancefloor. Lisa positioned herself in front of me and towered over the stocky blond, whose face flashed with a new alertness. "What the fuck don't you understand about get off?" Lisa said, shoving him into his friend.
The friend yelled something, holding up his palms, but I couldn't hear over the music. They hurried away and ran right into security.
Lisa turned to tower over me . "You need to start paying more attention to—"
"What the hell are you doing?" I sizzled. "I can take care of myself."
"Clearly you can't," she said. "Those guys—"
"Were completely harmless."
"You don't know that."
"Forget it." I pivoted on my heel. "I'm leaving."
"Hang on," she started.
I spun around to cut her off. "Stay here. Go find Amber and have a good time," I muttered, craning my neck to look for Rosé.
"I've barely looked at anyone else tonight, meanwhile Mingyu's slobbering all over you," she said. "I didn't think he was your type."
"I don't have a type, Lisa. I'm married."
Lisa took a step closer and the thrum she'd inspired in me gave way to a full-body vibration. "So you keep saying," she said, staring me down. "I'm beginning to wonder if you flirt with all of them the way you flirt with me."
I balled my hands into fists on each side of me. "I was trying to set him up with Rosé. You were standing right there."
Lisa's eyes dropped to my hand as I tugged down the hem of my dress.
"And I don't," I said.
"Don't?" She repeated, riveted as my fingertips grazed against my bare thigh.
I lowered my voice and rasped, "Flirt with them. Flirt with anyone, actually, the way I flirt with you."
She blinked from my hand to my eyes. I had her attention now.
"Goodnight, Lisa," I said and turned to leave.
"Jennie," she commanded and grasped my wrist. "Stop running away."
Her touch sent electricity up my arm, threatening to zap any resolve I'd been clinging to not to give in to her. "Don't," I said, withdrawing.
I went directly for the elevator, impatiently punching the button.
"Where are you going?" Lisa asked my back.
"Home."
"This is your event," she said.
"I have to be up early," I said. It wasn't a lie. I'd promised George from the local animal shelter I'd spend the day helping him plan their annual masquerade ball. "Just go back to the party, Lisa."
The numbers above the elevator car stayed at the lobby.
Lisa didn't budge. I knew why. I knew what she wanted in order to leave me alone. What she needed. I had to tell her I didn't want her, and I had to mean it.
But it was more than that.
I had to tell her I didn't want what she could give me. I had to choose the life I was barreling toward. Lying awake by my husband in the quiet dark, getting myself off in the bathroom, a slower pace, putting a family over my career, a home with a nursery, and a baby to put in it. The decision had been haunting me long before Lisa had come along. Perhaps even before I'd accepted Taehyung's proposal. And I was expected to decide now , once and for all, while every fiber of my being longed to run into the arms of the man behind me?
My chest tightened with panic. With the fucking elevator stalled at the lobby, I turned and bolted for the service stairwell. I burst through the door, slamming it against the wall, and rushed down a flight of steps.
"Jennie," Lisa called from above.
I held my purse to my breast. "I can't do it, Lisa," I said over my shoulder. "I can't. Don't ask me to."
My heart leaped when her hand wrapped around my arm. She was damn near impossible to outrun. Or was I allowing myself to get caught?
"I'm not letting you run again," she said firmly. "Tell me why you're so angry with me. And where's your coat?"
I whirled around to face her on the stark, ugly landing, a much more suitable place to have this conversation. The sleek and smooth party happening above us was too perfect, while this cold stairwell resembled the steel cage around my heart, rattling with the emotions beginning to escape. "Why did you come here?" I asked, seething. "We said this was over."
"I tried." She dropped her hand to her side. "Believe me, I did."
"Tried what?"
"To stay away," she said steadily. "For my own sanity, to protect myself, I fucking tried to stay away, but I can't." She glanced down at her feet, and when she looked up again, her eyes blazed. "Come home with me."
Breath flushed from my lungs. For her, we were already home. Over her shoulder, a sign with the letters PH in bold red sat above the door. I'd flown down the stairs and landed right at her penthouse. She'd warned me what would happen if I returned to her apartment. I could almost hear my body buzzing, so coiled with desire from our back-and-forth.
"Why, so I can humiliate myself again?"
"What the hell are you talking about?" she asked.
I watched her closely. "Is this some sort of game for you? You pushed me away in Jisoo's office. Then, you told me you never wanted to see me again. That you were finished with me." A fluorescent light flickered somewhere above us, as though channeling my anger. "Suddenly you want me?"
"I have never not wanted you, Jennie. Not for a moment." She swallowed, her brow furrowing. "I left you in Jisoo's office because there was too much on the line. Because I couldn't break up a marriage. Because I was afraid of pushing you into something you might regret. But you make it so fucking impossible," she said, pleading up to the ceiling. Her breath turned ragged as she looked back at me with stormy eyes. "I can't be around you anymore because you drive me crazy every second of the day." She ran both hands through her hair. "Fuck, if I don't distance myself from you, I'm going to lose it."
I understood. Every word she spoke was true. I wanted to deny it—especially because it made walking away harder. But it didn't change our situation.
"And when I stood there in your office and ended our relationship, you just took it. You didn't even care. Just let me walk out." She stepped toward me. "Tell me you care, Jennie, and that I'm not completely delusional."
How could she think I didn't care? It oozed from my pores all the time, how much I wanted to touch her, how I thirsted for her attention. "You know I can't," I whispered.
"Then show me," she said.
"What do you want from me?" I asked. "You expect me to jeopardize everything—everything —for . . . for what—sex ?" My voice bounced off the empty walls. "My marriage, my work, my life. My marriage." My body swayed. "I can't do it, Lisa."
"How many times do I have to repeat myself? Do you hear anything I say? This isn't just about sex," she said slowly, deeply. "And you know it."
"Oh, sure." Sweat formed on my nape despite the cold. My sense of reason began to spin out of control, overtaken by my fear that I wouldn't be able to walk away. I needed her to be the one to do it. "Isn't that why you're standing here now? To see if I'll fuck you?" I stepped up to her, coming right under her chin, my temper flaring. "You claimed to be a gentleman, but you're no different from every other player."
"Even gentlemen have limits, Jennie," she said, above me. "Even gentlemen like to fuck."
My knees weakened. Lisa had never been shy, but she'd always edged the line of polite—until now. And her crudeness melted my insides along with my resistance. "Well, what's stopping you?" I put as much venom as I could into the words, and they tasted bitter leaving my mouth. "Why not take me here? Now?"
"So help me God, Jennie," she whispered, locking her hands under her armpits. "Don't test me. I know what you're doing. I know you're afraid."
"Afraid? I am afraid—of losing everything."
"No, of this." She gestured between us. "I am, too, but I want—"
"Stop," I said, covering my ears as I looked at the ground. "We have to stop this."
"Jennie, listen to me." She took an audible breath. "I am afraid. I've never touched a married woman. You might not believe what I said before, but pursuing you goes against the person I try to be. But my fear is nothing compared to the agony of keeping this inside. I can't hide it like you. And if I honestly thought your husband was the right person for you, I'd have walked away long ago."
My heartbeat pounded in my stomach, reverberating throughout my body. she paused, waiting until I dropped my hands, raised my head, and consented for her to continue.
"Come inside and spend the night with me," she said. "And when the sun rises, stay." Her angular jaw sharpened with resolve. "I want what he has. All of you. All to myself."
The confession hit me like a blow, echoing through the stairwell. "How can you say that?" I asked, incredulous but no longer yelling. "You barely know me. You're with Mina, yet you see other women. You're Chicago's bachelorettes of the goddamn year. Nothing you say means anything. Give up already," I said, desperation threading my words. "You only want what you can't have."
She took a step forward, our bodies nearly flush. "You think I can't have you?"
"Wait," I said, panicked as her nearness threatened my control.
"Is that what you think?" she flexed a hand. "I don't. I want you. And I think you want me, too."
She didn't wait, but neither did I. Our mouths collided for a hard kiss, thick whiskey on her tongue. She took my shoulders, and the warmth of her hands on my skin spread through me. Without removing her lips from mine, she whipped off her jacket and wrapped me in it, pulling me closer, drowning me in a mossy blend of pine and aged leather. In her.
"Show me you care, Jennie," she breathed. "I need it. I need you." She pressed her lips to the spot beneath my ear that made my knees buckle. Feather-light kisses along my jawbone lit chills over my body, and she stopped at my lips. She stilled there as I became painstakingly aware of the empty feeling between my legs I wanted her to fill.
I looked into her eyes, and for a moment, everything else fell away. She took away the pain, all the things that hurt, that I could never say out loud. Brown eyes pleaded with me to let her take over, to let her ease the hurt.
She squeezed my arms, reminding me with a flex of strength that if she wanted, she could take me whether I agreed or not. "Show me, Jennie. I need you. Only you."
"I . . ."
Davena had told me to seize the moment in her own way. Desperation for her filled me to the brim. She'd warned me if I tried to stop it, it would leak out, flood me, pull me under. She'd tell me to swim, to submerge myself in the tide of Lisa's want.
With my slight nod, Lisa engulfed me in a primal kiss—all mouth, saliva, lips, teeth.
Our hands, for the first time, explored each other furiously. Her traveled behind my neck, over my shoulders, and along my arms. They grazed the crease of my ass as she bunched my leather dress. She pulled me against her erection, but I was already there, tugging her shirt from her pants, reaching underneath, touching her firm stomach—oh , how I'd longed to know what her skin would feel like beneath my fingertips.
She withdrew suddenly, ripping me from my adulation. "This isn't right."
"What?" I asked with breathless shock. After everything she'd just fought for—
"Come inside." She tugged my blazer closed, hiding me in it, and put her lips against the curve of my neck. My face burned from her delicious lips and only more would soothe the sting. "I want you in my bed the first time."
The first time. That implied she'd have me more than once. My eyes nearly crossed with lust, rolling up to the ceiling as if the answer might be written there.
"Choose me," she said. "Walk through that door, and I promise I'll spend every minute, every hour, every day proving you made the right choice."
Before I could respond, she picked me up, and my legs locked around her. Her hungry kiss stole my senses, my hands taking greedy handfuls of her soft hair. After a beep and a buzz, we moved out of the harsh, fluorescent light into a warm, inviting glow. The stairwell vanished. Lisa carried me away as we consumed each other until I was pressed against a wall. Voracious lips locked on mine as her hand found the hem of my dress. Stiff leather crackled, interrupted only by the treasonous moan that escaped my lips when her rough hand moved against the soft skin of my inner thigh.
She was going to take me here, wherever here was.
And I wouldn't stop her.