Maximum manipulation mode
Lucy arrived at one o’clock. I was alone in the house so all I had to do was take her hand and lead her up the stairs, to my room.
“What’s gotten into you?” she asked when I closed the door behind her and pushed her against it.
“I need you.” I knew how it sounded and I knew she wouldn’t be able to resist. I gazed into her eyes, in maximum manipulation mode, and kissed her. I felt more than I had anticipated — instantly wanted and extremely desired. Lucy didn’t hesitate, not for a split second. We tore at each other’s clothes until we were naked enough. I let her ecstatic smile wash over me, let it warm me up inside. It was frantic and rushed and extremely wrong but it was love, at least on her part, and that’s what I craved, something unconditional, someone overlooking all my flaws, someone for whom I was more than enough.
Afterwards, when we had moved to my bed and I felt dirty and disgusting, the dizziness of mad desire and grief no longer filtering my emotions, I broke down. I cried for Lucy and Joan, for Lou, for Claire and for myself most of all.
“Should I split up with Joan?” Lucy asked.
“That’s not for me to say,” I hiccupped in between sobs.
“But it is.” Lucy stroked my face and wiped away my tears, her eyes beaming every emotion I had ever wanted a woman to have for me. She was my solution now. The answer to my questions. The remedy for my heartbreak. I needed her love.
“Then I think you should.”
“I’ll do it today.”
“Just like that?”
“For you? Yes.”
It felt so wrong and so right at the same time. So twisted but so necessary.
“I may need protection.”
“Don’t worry about Joan.”
“She can break me in two with the snap of a finger.”
“I won’t let anyone hurt you, Lee.”
Somehow, I believed her. I let her comfort and sweet-talk me for an hour longer, until she had to go. Once she left, I called Alex.
“Good God, Alex,” I said. “I believe I may have lost my mind.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.” His voice crackled through the phone, all warm and friendly and I knew he would understand. He probably wouldn’t agree or think of it as a successful move on my part, but he would get it. By then Alex had a decade of training in dyke drama.
“Ben can be your bodyguard,” he said.
“As beefy as he is, not even Ben can weather the wrath of Joan Harris.”
“Don’t insult my man, Lee. I can take a lot, but there’s a line.”
“It’s not an insult, homie. It’s a testament to his sensitivity.”
“You did steal her woman. I guess it’s only fair to let her be upset.”
“As long as that doesn’t include beating me up.”
“Are you sure about this, Leesbian? This whole Lucy thing? She’s your boss and maybe this time around she won’t be as forgiving when things turn sour.”
“I was sure that Lou loved me. I was sure that Claire wouldn’t stab me in the back anymore. What’s being sure ever done for us, anyway?”
“I suppose what I really want to know is, if you, huh, still have feelings for her?”
“Oh Alex, I haven’t got a fucking clue what I feel anymore.”
To be continued…
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Trying to Throw my Arms Around the World
RomanceAs Lee Harlem Robinson struggles to come to grips with the insanely fast-paced city of Hong Kong, where she was sent by her employers, she starts to wonder where it all went wrong. The reader is taken on a journey back in time from Lee's early years...
