Gambling For The Virgin:A Dark Billionaire Romance(108)

Sixty-nine.

That's the first time Henry called me. He was, and still is, referred to  in the Simulated Pleasures databases as Client 5, but to me he's King  Henry. This job was never supposed to be a permanent operation. It was  supposed to be like stripping. Something I do to tide me over for money  until I start putting my Art History degree from Yale to use. Lately,  I've come up with a newer plan that you may not like. That plan is to  have as much phone sex with Henry and as much real sex with Arsen as  possible, because I won't be able to hang on to both forever. That much  is clear. I have to come clean to one of them.



Sixty-two thousand three hundred and ninety one.

Otherwise known as $62,391. That's how many dollars Client 5 has been  billed in the last month. Charges start at $9.99 a minute and out of  that $62,391, I'm getting big bonuses, that's for sure. Just from Client  5. Who I'm starting to fall in love with. When I'm not feeling guilty  because I'm also falling in love with Arsen. The only positive about all  of this is that I'm making more money for less effort now than what I  was doing at the strip club. It gives me more time to go to the gym,  start paying off student loans, and start laying the foundation for my  future. But every time I get a call that shows Client 5, my future comes  crashing down. Every time I see Arsen, along with the excitement comes  the crushing guilt at how this is all going to end.



One hundred.

That's how many times I've cum in the last seventy-five times Arsen and I  have had sex. And it keeps getting crazier and crazier. It's like a  drug. I can't get enough. Every time I have him, I cum. And every time I  start to normalize, the first thing I want is more. I would be fine if  you took away food, water, and sleep from me, as long as you left Arsen  and his cock. We've done it in every room and surface of his apartment  and mine. He's taken me in public-not just near Southwest New York, but  other areas as well. One afternoon we went for a walk in Central Park. I  was teasing him about his shirt. He ended up slapping my ass playfully.  I was wearing yoga pants and I could feel the slap of his hand on my  ass cheek. It reminded me of when Henry had me slap my own ass. Arsen  saw the look on my face and I brought my hand to his crotch and felt his  cock thicken in my hand. We ended up having sex on a bench, hoping that  no one would discover us. A week later, I gave Arsen a blowjob in a  taxicab coming back from dinner. The next morning he returned the favor  and used his fingers to hit my G-spot enough times in a come hither  motion that he brought me to a giant orgasm underneath the table of Le  Cirque. I'm not lying when I say I'm addicted to sex with Arsen. I would  shuck myself on his cock all day if I could. The only thing that would  draw me away would be having to take a phone call from King Henry.



Forty-two.

That's how many times Henry's made me cum. If I have to be honest, I  never thought that working as a phone sex operator would mean I would be  having regular orgasms. In fact, I think most people would agree with  me when I say that I was pretty convinced I would have to up my faking  game. I mean, it was already pretty good-remember, my last job was at a  strip club, but still, over the phone people can tell when you're not  into something based on your voice. But every time he calls, my heart  starts to beat faster. I pick up and hear his confident, commanding  voice asking me what I'm wearing. Then he tells me what he wants me to  do to that will please him. In that moment, I exist for his pleasure. To  service him. He owns me. After he's done with me, my mind stays in a  fog of lust and confusion for several hours afterward. I can still go  about my day, but it's as if I'm sleepwalking. Because the day feels  empty without the large presence of Henry in my heart.



Five.

That's how many times I've tried to tell Arsen that I love another  person in addition to him. But I can't do it. I mean, don't get me  wrong. I haven't even told Arsen that I love him, so we're a long ways  away from me telling him I love two people. And I can't honestly say I  love him when my soul aches for someone else as well. I know I'm going  to have to choose one day. Never mind how crazy it sounds that I'm  giving myself to someone I haven't ever seen. Whose only interaction  with me has been through his voice over a phone sex line. I can tell  that King Henry-Client 5, feels the same way about me, from the snippets  that he tells me of his family or of him growing up. The sighs I hear  when we talk. Even the silences are things that I pay attention to. With  Arsen, his very presence is stimulation enough. And I have so much more  with him. I can see him. I can touch him. Taste him. The impact he has  on me is spread out over so many senses. Henry's impact is just based on  what I can hear.         

     



 



One.

That's how many other people know about my dilemma. Remember Yasmine?  From Scorcher's? Figures that she should be the one I go to with all my  troubles. But believe it or not, ever since I left, she and I have been  getting close. We meet up for coffee or go to yoga together now on a  regular basis. I'm happy to spend time with her because she understands  the problems I'm facing.

"I think you need to tell Arsen what's going on," Yasmine advises me one  afternoon after yoga. I had come to yoga after an appointment with  Client 5 where I literally shook and convulsed as my fingers on my clit  brought me to a mind-numbing orgasm. "You can't keep going on like this.  You're going to drive yourself crazy."

"I know," I agree with her. "But it's already been so long I don't know how I get out of the hole I'm already in."

"The longer you stay silent, the deeper that hole gets to climb out from though, babe," Yasmine says and I know she's right.

The only problem isn't sitting with Arsen or Henry. It's sitting with me.



Twelve.

That's how many hours ago I texted Arsen, telling him that I needed to  see him. He seemed okay and we made plans to meet at the Central Park  Boathouse.

I got there before him and ordered a dirty martini from the bar in the  Main Lounge, looking at the Lake in Central Park as it surrounded the  veranda of the Boathouse outside.

I'm sitting here now, as I see Arsen approach. He must have entered the  park from the 81st Street entrance to the Park. I can hear a piano from  the far corner of the Lounge and I wonder if this will be the last time  that we have together at the Boathouse.

Arsen comes up to me and comes over to kiss me but I shy away. He takes a step back and looks at me with concern.

"What's going on?" Arsen asks, and I wonder if he can imagine what I'm about to tell him.

My Dad always says to rip a band-aid off as quickly as you can instead  of prolonging the misery. And if I'm going to do this, I might as well  get it over with. I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Then I look at  Arsen.

"I love you," I say to him, and look at his eyes.

To say that there is surprise going through them is an understatement. What he doesn't understand is why I look so sick.

"Well, Ash, I lo … " I don't let Arsen finish because I don't want him to  say something that he's going to have to take away so I interrupt him.

"But I also think I'm falling in love with someone else," I say. I pause to give him a moment.

"Oh," Arsen says after a moment. "Well, fuck."

Despite myself I allow a brief smile. It wouldn't be Arsen without an F-bomb.

"Who is it?" Arsen asks. "Anyone I know?"

I close my eyes and sigh to myself. This is the hard part.

"I don't think so," I say to him. "It's going to sound silly Arsen, but it's someone I work with."

"But you work as a phone-" Arsen starts but then lowers his voice. "As a  phone sex operator. You don't work with anyone except for the people  that call you."

I look at him, hoping he understands. After a moment of matching my  gaze, it dawns on him. "Oh," he says. "You're falling for a person  that's calling you?"

I nod. A single tear starts to form in my right eye.

"I've been talking to him for some time now and he's single too," I say,  rushing the words out. "He lives in New York City also and he's in real  estate."

Arsen looks at me like I just slapped him with a glove. His eyes are  stricken. I can't imagine what he must be going through right now. How  betrayed he must be feeling. I take a sip of my drink.

"Does he go by the name of King Henry?" Arsen asks.

What the fuck?

I don't think neither of us notice as my martini glass drops to the floor.





82





Arsen





"Does he go by the name King Henry?" I ask with a smirk and Ashley  freezes in time. It's like her muscles seize up, and not the good kind  of seizing like when I make her cum. This is the bad kind, as if she's  having a fucking stroke.

The martini glass falls to the ground, the olives from her drink rolling  toward my shoe. I'm vaguely aware of the elderly couple next to us at  the bar turning to look at us.