Katherine’s face says it all. She’s simultaneously glowing with pride and seething with envy.
“How the fuck did you manage that? Holy shit, Millie,” she exclaims in a loud whisper as a waitress approaches the table cautiously. “That’s so naughty.”
“Are you two set to order?” the waitress asks with an uncertain and questioning look on her face. She must have heard at least half of what I said. The poor thing’s just trying to do her job.
“Absolutely not, but we’ll take a bottle of wine for the table,” Katherine states, smiling madly like an unregulated child at a birthday party.
The waitress nods politely and steps away, and Katherine grabs both of my hands. “Okay, you realize you have to fuck him again, right? If he reduces your rent after you have sex with him once, imagine all the amazing shit you could squeeze out of him if you strung him along a little bit.”
I feel my stomach tighten at the thought of using him strictly for material gain. Even though he clearly has the upper hand in our dynamic, the idea of having sex with him solely for cute clothes or expensive dinners makes me feel more like a whore than dancing at the club did.
Not only that, but if the rumors are true, then there’s no way in hell I want to get legitimately entangled with someone like him. That would be putting me at risk in ways I can’t possibly imagine. It would be a gateway into a lifestyle that I’ve seen ruin people.
“I don’t know. I don’t want that. It would be so messy,” I reply.
The waitress brings over a huge bottle of red wine, and I watch Katherine’s eyes light up all over again as she pours both of us a generous glass. She wants to get me as drunk as possible, and I just might let her. I deserve to let go a little.
I take the glass from her, gulping down the equivalent of the entire first glass in one go. The wine is dry and fruity, and despite how bitter it tastes, I always feel like an actual grown adult drinking dry wines. To be honest, though, I would down a whole bottle of rose without shame if given the opportunity. I’m not above it.
“He could have lowered your rent because it’s the right thing to do, not because you put out for him,” Katherine offers. “It would be totally mutual. And besides, if he’s a rich guy without a wife, he’s probably extremely bored and is just looking for someone cute and fun to spoil. Don’t let that opportunity go.”
I know she’s got a point, and Viktor doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who would fall in love and get his heart broken if I chose to keep having sex with him. But I have to admit that the thought of engaging with him scares me a bit. He looks at me like he wants to eat me alive and knows that he can.
What would regular involvement with someone like him even look like? If my mother were around to see my thought process, she would drag me by my hair to the nearest domestic abuse shelter, and the irony would be completely lost on her.
“I don’t know about all that, but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it all day. It was like something out of a movie. I couldn’t even believe that it happened at first. He pulled the fire alarm to make all my customers leave, which was annoying. I wish I could make him pay for that, above all,” I reply, taking a sip of my wine as the last glass kicks my heart rate into overdrive.
She shakes her head. “Men are crazy.”
“Well, speaking of crazy, Erik actually dropped by earlier,” I continue, feeling the tone of the conversation change at the very mention of Erik’s name.
“Oh, god. How did he even find you? Have you gotten a restraining order yet?” Katherine asks, her eyes filled with both worry and the sting of remembering.
“I thought he would just forget about me once I left the club. I mean, he has a type, and I knew he’d just hire on more of that type once I told him to mail my last check and go fuck himself,” I reply. Even though it was years ago, the unease from that time in my life still pervades my whole body whenever I’m reminded of the way he would leer at me as I changed. I wish I had known better than to tolerate that, but I was young and so tragically broke.
If I’m being honest with myself, I wish that Viktor had been there when Erik showed up. Even though I don’t know Viktor at all, I feel like he would have scared Erik off just by talking to me openly like he was.
I probably would have even leaned into it a little, maybe being flirtier with him to give Erik the impression that I was taken by a huge tattooed Russian man. That would scare him off for good. He’s such a weasel. He would never stand up to someone like Viktor.
“Maybe you need this new guy around to scare Erik off,” Katherine adds as though she can read my mind. She takes another shrimp from the fancy square plate and pushes the rest of them in my direction.
“What, like you think Erik would stop bothering me because I had a boyfriend? How did that work out for Annika?” I ask, recalling the girl from the club who had to quit because Erik would relentlessly try to hook up with her despite her well-known, established relationship.
“Not just because he’s your boyfriend, but because Erik is slime and has no backbone. If your new guy is the way you describe him, Erik would be sent running,” she replies, finishing her wine and immediately pouring another glass. I hope she doesn’t plan on driving home.
I consider her words. It’s true that Erik is a notorious bitch when it comes to confrontation, which is why he won’t even pick on women in the same weight class as him. He always needs to have the upper hand in the interaction, or he’ll fold. With Viktor around, I might never have to worry about seeing Erik again.