“I wasn’t lying when I said you were one of the most intelligent women I’ve come across in a while. Don’t get me wrong. There were several intelligent women there tonight, but I can’t see myself working with any of them the way I could work with you.”
“Work?”
“You do want to get involved with more than me, right?”
“I haven’t really thought about it.” What could Alicia possibly contribute to Danica’s career, outside of helping her create the stable home and family she craved? “I don’t know anything about what you do.”
“I do many things, but the one you would be most suited for goes back to your experience. How did we meet, Alicia?”
She cringed to remember. “We met at your sex club, ma’am.”
“Indeed, we did, and you were a hostess there, like you had been for most of your life. Wouldn’t you say that you’re good at it? You have to be, if you got hired at my club.”
“Don’t you dare tell me you’re going to set me up as a hostess somewhere.”
“Not unless you begged me to.”
Could Alicia roll her eyes hard enough?
“I have further interests in hospitality. You have plenty of experience being on the front line of customer service. You maynot have a big business degree, Alicia, but you have something even more important to me.”
She had nothing to lose now. “A tight pussy?”
“Experience.”
They were both quiet.Experience, huh? Funny.Here Alicia was, convinced that was the one important thing she didn’t have when it came to her relationship with Danica. No experience with sex, very little with real love and relationships… but it was her shitty work experience Danica was interested in? “Guess it’s nice you don’t only want me for a sex and house slave.”
“You jest, yes?”
“What? That I think that’s all you could want me for?” Alicia shrugged. “Sometimes I wonder.”
“Did I do something to offend you tonight?”
“No.” Alicia sat up, but did not face her. “It’s… you have to understand how this looks. I’m a nobody, and we only met a little while ago. Now you’re declaring to the world that you love me, unlike anyone you’ve ever loved before. Your father is pissed. Do you know how many people have warned me about him? About you?”
Danica stood up. “Who has been saying that?” Her voice was like a boulder dropping on Alicia’s fragile form. “Who has been shaking your confidence and trust in me?”
Your own mother.
Alicia met her hardened gaze. Eyes of searing amber threatened to tear down her boundaries, but Alicia did not surrender. “It says a lot that the thing you’re worried the most about is my shaken trust.”
“I should hope so.” Danica got down on one knee, hand taking Alicia’s. “Nothing is more important in our relationship. If you can’t trust me, then we have nothing.”
Alicia wanted to believe that.
“Last night, you asked me about my mother.” Danica squeezed her hand. “The truth is, I remember quite a bit. For the longest time, I thought I had made up my memories. A child’s memory isn’t the most reliable thing, right? For instance, I was much too young to have possibly remembered my brother’s birth and death, but sometimes I swear I remember my mother crying in the hospital. Which is absurd, because there’s no way my nanny ever took me to see her, especially while she was grieving.”
Alicia remained silent.Where is this going?
“I’ve had a lot of time to think about my mother and my memories of her. I haven’t seen her since I was seven or eight years old, but I remember a woman who was doting and involved with my life. Honestly, I don’t have many memories of my father from that time. I don’t know why. He was around, wasn’t he? Then I remember that my only memory of my parents together was from right before their divorce. I’ll never forget the thing coming out of my mother’s mouth the most. She was begging my father to believe her about something. For the longest time, I assumed she was cheating. It’s no secret that my father had other lovers, even during his marriage, but for my mother, that would have been sacrilege.”
“Quite frankly, it sounds like your mother didn’t trust your father.”
“She didn’t. That has always stayed with me. I must admit that there have been many times when I haven’t trusted him, either. Not when it comes to my personal life. Why would I want a man like him giving me advice in matters of love? His one marriage ended badly enough that I never saw my mother again, and he’s never been in a real relationship since.”
She stood again.
“So it’s important to me, almost more than anything else, that you trust me. Not because of the type of play we might get into, but because my childhood taught me that trust is one of themost fragile things in the world. You can’t buy trust. You can buy superficial love, but not trust.”
