Page 24 of Endless Obsession

So she was telling the truth. Her ex is a cheating son-of-a-bitch who never gave her an orgasm while going out and doing all the “disrespectful” things he wanted in bed with other women. That anger fuels me, and I do something that I rarely do for personal reasons.

I start to dig deeper into Nathaniel Lake.

A hack into his cell phone provider gets me a string of recent texts, a lot of them from a woman named Valerie, as well as a few others, all of them filthy. Full of fantasies that I can tell just from having spent a couple of hours with Charlotte that he never told her about.

I’m willing to bet that she would have tried a lot of them, if he’d ever asked. But once again, I’m not a good man—because despite the obvious emotional damage that this has done, I’m glad he never asked her.

That means that I’m going to get to be the one to introduce her to all the things she wants but has never known to ask for. The one who is going to teach her what it means to come from my tongue on her until she truly can’t take any more. What it feels like to come on my cock while I fuck her in all the ways that she’s been told she shouldn’t be fucked. What it feels like to suck me off because she’s desperate to taste me, not because she’s been told she’s supposed to.

Just the thought has me rock-hard, throbbing painfully as if I didn’t already come once tonight. I reach for my zipper, drawing out my aching erection as I start to stroke myself in the neon glow of my screens.

And the whole time, I’m thinking of all the ways that I’m going to ruin Charlotte Williams for any other man.

—

Monday morning, I put my hastily assembled plan into action. The smarter thing to do would be to put off meeting her in person, giving myself time to meticulously plan out how I’m going to do this. But the truth is that I can’t wait. I spent the remainder of the weekend unable to get her out of my head, constantly at least half-aroused and frustrated as hell with the memories of her spread out on that velvet bed for me. I woke up this morning from dreams of her, couldn’t get out of bed until I’d made myself come again to thoughts of her, got hard in the shower just imagining her there with me. I need to see her again, with a near-desperation that’s beyond anything I’ve ever felt before.

It would be alarming, if I could keep my thoughts straight long enough to really let that sink in.

I already know where she works. Figuring out a way to ‘run into her’ was as easy as hacking into her bank records. Unsurprisingly, she has a tendency to frequent the same cafe for lunch a few times a week. I have no idea if she’ll be there today, but I’m prepared to stake it out every day until she is.

Hopefully, she’ll be alone.

The way I dress for the day is just a different kind of mask. When I’m left to my own devices, I prefer comfortable t-shirts and black jeans or cargo pants. When I go to the Masquerade, with my faux-British accent and all my defining features covered, I wear a tailored suit. On occasion, for family events that I can’t get out of, I do the same.

Today, I need to be the kind of man who could sit down to lunch with Charlotte Williams as she is day to day. Not the kind of man she met at the club last night, and definitely not who I really am.

I dig out a pair of dark brown chinos and a heathered, cream-colored henley shirt. Classy enough to look like a man of her social status out to lunch, not so overdressed that I might remind her of Nate—or of the man she met at the club last night. Despite all of my efforts to conceal my identity there, she has seen part of my face. I can’t discount the possibility that she might suspect me, if she saw me dressed the way I was there.

That’s not something I’m willing to risk.

Besides, I’m used to slipping into different identities. I do it online all of the time. Doing it in reality is only slightly uncomfortable. As I finish getting ready, making sure I’m clean-shaven, my hair styled neatly instead of the usual shaggy mess I leave it in, the man in the mirror has just become a different version of myself.

One that I think Charlotte will be attracted to. One that she could fall for. Someone different from her ex, but not so far outside of her comfort zone that she’ll be afraid of me.

That’s the goal, anyway.

The air outside is crisp and cool when I step out of the front door, fall coming in fast and hard now that it’s close to October. I breathe in a deep lungful of it, feeling myself relax a little at the sensation of it in my lungs, soothing me. Fall and winter are my favorite part of the year. I like that the air is colder, that the world feels more empty, that it gets dark earlier. It feels like a state of being that I’m more suited to. It makes me feel like I belong.

It’s the perfect day to drive my Mustang with the windows down, so much so that I don’t even mind the early-morning Chicago traffic, or the fact that I’m up this early at all. But the possibility of seeing Charlotte again was enough to make the latter part worthwhile, all on its own. I turn up my music, leaning back in the leather seat, all thoughts of my family and what I’m forced to do for them, the dangers that I’m dealing with, and my dealings with the feds all fleeing my mind. All I’m thinking about is her, and it feels like that cuts through all the stress and worry and noise, leaving me lighter and freer than I have been in months.

I park at a garage a few blocks from where she works, locking the car, and starting a brisk walk to where I should be able to get a glimpse of Charlotte walking into work. A half a block away, as I cut through the crowd of commuters, I see her walking down the sidewalk.

Her hair is up, leaving her gorgeous face and long, slim neck bare. She’s wearing dark jeans molded to her perfect body, a dark blue button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, and a pair of black suede ankle boots. She pauses some yards away from the front of her building, and I watch her curiously from where I’ve stopped, leaning up against the corner of a nearby building within eyeshot as if I’m just waiting for a ride.

A car pulls up to the curb, and the other woman who was with her at the club gets out, giving Charlotte a quick hug before they both start walking towards the building. I’m not surprised—my research on Charlotte turned up the information that her friend also works with her, but in HR. I didn’t dig much further than that on Jasmine Bakir—she’s not the woman I’m interested in, and I had no desire to violate her privacy.

I’m not a monster or a stalker.

I just need to get to know Charlotte better. On a more even playing field. One where she’ll be comfortable.

I watch her until she disappears into the building, through the glass doors, until she’s gone from my sight. And then I push myself away from the wall, heading towards a coffee shop that I’m familiar with where I can wait until it’s time to go to her lunch spot.

—

I get to Cafe L’Rose an hour before most corporate lunchtimes start, not wanting to miss the window of time when Charlotte might come by. I settle down with a book—a recent mystery that I’ve been wanting to read—and my second cup of coffee for the day.

I’m not a superstitious man, or one who believes in coincidence, but even I find it ironic that the second time I meet Charlotte will be at a little French bistro, after meeting her for the first time in the Versailles-inspired luxury of Masquerade. And her safeword there—Paris. It’s another sign of how obsessed I’ve already become that I can’t help but think of it as a sign, when I know all of that is bullshit.

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