Page 10

Chapter 10

Apollo

“Are you done?” Esme asks. I almost let go of her silky hair as I blink sharply in response to her voice and come back to the moment. Would’ve been a shame, considering the absolutely perfect braid I managed to create.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry.” I secure it with a tie and meet her eyes in the mirror in front of us. “Looking good!”

Esme smiles widely. “Thank you. I love it!” She always looks gorgeous, but the two side braids frame and show off her face in a way that makes her even more mesmerizing.

I step away and go back to my station, past the other dolls who are getting ready for work. Sadie walks out of the changing room as I sit down, struggling with tightening her black lacy corset which makes her waist almost non-existent. She gives me one desperate glance and I’m already up, hopping behind her to help with the lacing.

“Isn’t this enough?” I ask while crushing her organs. “More?”

“J-Just a little,” she mutters. Her breasts look like they’re going to explode, but then again, that’s probably the look she’s going for. “Good. Tie it like that.”

I make a bow at the bottom of the corset. “Done.”

Sadie looks at herself in the mirror and sighs with satisfaction—as much as her reduced lung capacity allows her to, anyway. “What’s up?” she asks, perking up her brows when she focuses on my face in the reflection.

I blink and look up. Must’ve zoned out, staring at the floor again.

“Nothing,” I say and go sit down. I’m pretty much ready, wearing my new see-through shirt with bell sleeves and an open front together with some tight leather shorts. According to the handler, I’m going to have a busy night, so I try to empty my mind of everything before having to walk out there, being the person they all want me to be.

Unfortunately, it’s a little harder put my thoughts aside today than it usually is.

“I know when you’re bothered by something,” Sadie says and goes to the back of my chair. She rests her elbows on the top, with her breasts spilling over my shoulder and into my face as I turn to tilt it. I snort and attempt to push her away, but she wraps her arms around my chest, threatening to smother me if I don’t spill it. “You’re easy to read.”

“I’m not,” I say, snorting.

Sadie smirks at me dangerously, as if I’m one of her submissive clients who like her to order them around and punish them for being bad. Knowing there’s not much Sadie can’t make a man do if she wants to, I relent with an eye roll and hang my head back, resting it in her soft cleavage while I glance up at her.

“I…told Jasper I want to fuck someone outside work.” I don’t know why I feel so damn guilty about it. This strange sensation keeps echoing inside me and I’m not sure if it’s shame, guilt, uneasiness about something new or…fear.

She looks surprised. “Huh. Who?”

“That’s the thing. I know who, but I haven’t told him yet.” I wanted to do it in the morning before we left but couldn’t bring myself to do it. Why? Why am I being like this? “It’s that driver I mentioned before. Kobe,” I say, lowering my voice.

Sadie loudly gasps, making me squint and frown under her. “Shit, Apollo. You really had to pick one of his underlings? His own driver at that?” she blurts, feigning outrage.

I ignore her toying with me. “I already asked, and he was fine with it. It’s actually telling Jasper who I want to pursue that makes me nervous. I mean, he fucks other people all the time. He doesn’t even tell me who or where anymore.” Letting my frustrations out feels good. “So I don’t know why I feel so unsure about his possible reaction…”

Sadie darts her eyes across my face, furrowing her brows with care. “He’s a commanding man. It’s not weird to be worried, darling.”

I shouldn’t be. I shouldn’t fear telling him. He’s my partner.

Maybe the fault is with me.

“But the driver?” she adds when I say nothing, finally releasing me from her embrace. Leaning against the table in front of me, Sadie pensively looks up. “I guess he is kinda cute. He always averts his gaze from the naked dolls when he passes them,” she says with an amused chuckle. “ Adorable , really.”

“I don’t even know if anything will come of it. We might go out and spend some time together. Maybe we fuck, maybe we don’t. Maybe we don’t even click,” I think out loud. I’d be lying if I denied the chemistry I’ve felt around Kobe. Unusually comforting kind of attraction I can’t explain. That is, besides last night, when I saw the glimpse of genuine desire in his eyes that made my cock ache.

“Then there’s nothing to be worried about, hm?” Sadie encourages me.

I smile back at her, nodding. I suppose she’s right.

When Jasper pulls me out of work early that evening and takes us out to dinner in his favorite restaurant, I promise myself that no matter what, I’ll ask him before the night is over.

For some reason, telling him in public makes me a little more assured. While it’s packed when we arrive—as it always is, considering how sought after the food and service here is—Jasper gets us one of the more private tables by the windows overlooking the back garden. It’s the sort of place I would love to visit fully dressed up.

He orders the best wine after torturing the waiter with incessant questions about the wine list until I tell the poor guy he can go.

The elegant classical music softly playing in the background helps me relax. While we wait for our steak, I hold the glass of wine against my lips and study Jasper, tilting my head that rests against the back of my hand.

“What?” he asks, looking up from his phone.

“I thought you said no more work today.”

With a smirk, he places it screen down next to him and gazes at me with his piercing blue eyes. His beard is getting longer, making him look older and a little more like his father. “You know my work doesn’t just end when I leave that building like yours does. But you’re right. I apologize.”

There are things Jasper has been keeping boxed up recently. It worries me. He didn’t even tell me about what he and his father argued about yesterday. Or where he went when he disappeared for half a day after that fight. He was simply back in bed when I woke up in the morning, seemingly in an unexpectedly stable mood.

Sometimes it feels like there is so much to him he never lets me see. I never know if the fault is me for not being worthy enough for him to open completely. And sometimes I think someone like me isn’t worth that at all.

“What’s on your mind?” he asks, stretching his arm out across the table to touch my hand.

I look down at it and back up at him again. “I figured out who I want to fool around with. Like I mentioned when—”

“Ah.” He interrupts my hesitant muttering, brows raised. I analyze his face for any worrying reaction, but all he seems is…surprised. “Who then?”

I open my mouth, reaching for air, but my pulse pounds against my temple and no words come out. A vortex of unnecessary rumbling swirls through my mind. I need to explain why Kobe and how he means nothing. I need to explain the unexplainable way he sometimes makes me feel, but I don’t want him to think he isn’t enough or did anything wrong. All that while knowing he most likely doesn’t even care. He’s not like me. Jasper’s secure and confident and…

“Apollo.” The firmness of his voice pulls me in again. His eyes pin me down, still expressing only curiosity. “Tell me. It’s nothing more than being in the mood for a fresh flavor of liquor, right? You’re allowed to taste all you want. I promised,” he says, giving me that reassuring look.

My heart hiccups. He’s calling back to the thing he told me when we got together—how with him by my side, I’d be able to taste every flavor life offers, never having to deny myself or despair ever again.

“Your new driver. I want to see what’s there to him.”

Jasper pauses. Only for a moment, something flashes across his face before humming responsively and leans back in his chair. “The omega?” he asks doubtfully, one brow pulled down. “Ha,” he exclaims. “It’s a bizarre choice, but who am I to stop you from having fun?”

The sudden way he turns his surprise into amused indifference makes me a little uneasy. It seems genuine enough. As he sips his wine, Jasper looks no different than he would if I didn’t say anything at all. Even when the waitress comes up with our meals, he thanks her with that polite, charming smile and digs in.

It dawns on me when I pick up my fork.

He doesn’t care because Kobe is an omega. In Jasper’s eyes, it means he’s no threat. Or worse, he might think it’s just some weird experimentation. I know his not-so-favoring opinions on the same venus variations being together.

“I-I know it’s kind of strange,” I blurt out, since I don’t want him to think badly of me or my taste. “It’s just that I’ve never used my screw around pass , so I thought I’d start with something easy and—”

“I told you already,” Jasper interrupts me calmly, more annoyed at me for bothering him while trying to eat. “I don’t care as long as you follow our rules. As long as I know where, when, and give you my blessing. Obviously, neither of you will get a get-out-of-work-to-fuck card, but what you do in your free time is your business.”

Swallowing, I feel my apprehension and anxiety slowly subside. Jasper is right. And this all went much better than I expected. In the end, there was no reason for me to fret about it at all.

?

Or so I thought.

Jasper came off supportive enough back then. Now, nearly three weeks later, every attempt at setting up a date with Kobe has resulted in defeat. Or a fizzling out, rather.

It’s nothing new that I get pretty busy or that there are times when clients seem to frequent the Dollhouse more than usual. And the unstable situation between the gangs Jasper has to juggle, whatever it is that’s going on, makes it so even Kobe is getting worked like a dog together with the other members of the group.

Still…it didn’t feel nearly as hard to get a moment to meet before, did it?

When we finally find out that we’re both actually done with work and have some free time in the evening, Jasper is unreachable. His phone is turned off, or he’s in a meeting and by the time he responds to me, agreeing to me going forth with my plans, it’s already too late to do them.

It’s while we both lie naked in bed in the morning and Jasper brushes his fingers against the outline of my spine after fucking me throughout half of the night that I finally let myself accept the ugly truth: he’s doing it on purpose.

Without going back on his word or coming off as insecure, he does it in the exact way that would make it impossible for me to even confront him about it without sounding unreasonable.

Maybe I am.

Maybe me wanting to go out with Kobe, despite it appearing like the entire universe is standing against it, isn’t healthy. Isn’t good for the actual relationship I have. With that thought floating around my head, I look up at Jasper. He stops the movement of his hand and looks away from his phone.

“Another busy day?” I ask attentively before he has a chance to apologize for breaking the rule of no screens during our shared time once again.

He groans. “Mhm. The old man wants me at the cabin for the evening. To bitch and lecture me about what kind of leader I’m supposed to be, no doubt.” Jasper grinds the words through his teeth with venom dripping from them.

Is Kobe going to drive him there?

If there’s another fight, which there always is when he and his father get together recently, Jasper will probably want to cut himself from everyone and run away again for a while.

“I was hoping we could watch that movie that comes out today in the cinema,” I say, giving him the puppy-eye look while resting my chin on his shoulder. A dirty, disingenuous plan already forms in my head as he glances at me.

“You can’t expect me to tell my father no only to see a movie with you, doll,” he says, drawing his brows together as if in disappointment, using that irritating nickname.

I sigh and roll on my back next to him. “Well…I guess I’ll just go with one of the girls then. Make a nice night out of it. I haven’t been out with them in ages,” I say.

Jasper smiles, brushing my hair. He kisses me softly on the cheek. “You do that.” With a strained groan, he gets up and stretches by the bed. “I’m taking a shower before we head out. Come join me,” he says as he’s walking away toward the bathroom.

I shouldn’t let myself do this. Shouldn’t scheme behind his back or lie… And I shouldn’t feel good doing it. But this time, he gave me no choice.

Suppressing a mischievous smile, I reach for my phone and text Kobe.

If Jasper won’t allow this to happen all the while pretending he doesn’t mind to not look like a hypocrite, I’ll have to be resourceful enough to take care of it myself.