Page 58 of Lair

He squeezes my hand.

When I’m led inside, my jaw drops for what feels like the thousandth time since I’ve met Adrian Voper.

So. This is the world of the one percent: a mega-mansion that exudes glamour and soars in every direction, decorated with Italian furniture and antiques and fine art. A DJ presides in a flaring of blinding red strobes at the top of the sweeping staircases dominating the lobby, and techno music throbs in my sternum like the growl of the Lamborghini as the sea of partiers flooding the house surge up and down to the beat. The crowd is eye-popping, filled with the most beautiful people I have ever seen: perfectly groomed men in Italian suits or chic, shimmering Asian jackets, women so stunningly hot they look like creatures from another world as they parade about in bikinis or ruched, glittering mini-dresses, scornfully ignoring the provocateurs dancing in birdcages above them. I suddenly feel like a diminutive impostor on Adrian’s arm.

“Why am I here?” I whisper.

“Because you’re with me now,” he whispers back. “And because you deserve to live like this.”

His voice is a rich cognac, filling me with sweet assurance: I belong here. I deserve this.

That’s right. Screw you, Josh.

“You’ll want this,” Adrian says, handing me a fluted champagne glass off the tray of a girl dressed like a go-go dancer. Then his head turns. A blonde-haired bombshell with fierce eyes gives him a smoldering look as she passes, and I feel a primal, cavewoman protectiveness flare up inside me.

“She has nice hair,” I remark acidly.

Adrian makes a face—Very funny—and my scowl lapses into a grin as he grabs my hand. “Shall we?”

THIRTY-ONE

We pass through pockets of revelers: elegant European tycoons with girls hanging on their arms and feeding them caviar, Manhattan hedge-fund managers getting lap dances in plush armchairs. I raise an eyebrow, but Adrian tugs me on, leading us through the massive space that opens onto the first floor of the villa. We don’t get far. A crowd swarms us, everyone seems to know Adrian and wants his attention. He nods and smiles hellos, charmingly fending off a bright surge of flattery. Instinct overtakes me and I pull back to give him space, but his hand never lets go of mine. “This is Aurora,” he keeps saying, and I realize: He’s showing me off. Unlike Josh, who always hid me from his friends and trained me to grow accustomed to the shadows, Adrian is proud to be with me. Wants to be seen with me.

Wants me.

I swallow, flushed and breathless and every nerve ending alight, as Adrian breaks free and leads me on a tour through the house. As far as I can tell, each room is themed to a different form of hedonism. In a gin palace ringed with burlesque girls scissoring their legs in oversized martini glasses, we watch a team of bartenders pour liquid blue fire between tankards and spark cocktails into roaring founts of cinders. In a gastronomy room full of crepe and doughnut stations, we watch a laughing couple cut a cake with a six-foot flaming claymore to the cheers of onlookers. In a dimly lit cigar room full of leather furniture, my eyes bug as men snort lines of coke off the ass of a nude supermodel on all fours on a coffee table. But there’s more. A hallway door opens and a horned thing with a billy chin skips out, baaing. A goat. It’s a herd of little goats clopping across the carpet, followed by a naked, glitter-dusted woman leading a blindfolded man on all fours by a leash. The man is also naked, his body discolored with bruises and smudges of dirt from the goats butting and bleating about him. My jaw hangs. Then the woman sashays past, slinky and sparkling in the shadowy cigar room, and our eyes meet. A shock. To see a woman here, in power. A woman controlling a man.

That can happen.

Then she’s gone, like a dream, goats slipping past like wisps of cloud, and it’s just Adrian and I staring at each other, gobsmacked. “Did we just see...?” I splutter. And then, “Have you ever...?” and Adrian laughs and shakes his head, tugging me on. I stumble after him like a gawking teenager. “This is ridiculous,” I whisper.

“It is,” he says, and flashes me a rakish smile. “Isn’t it?”

Before long we’re threading through the surging bodies in the lobby again. Before long we’re dancing, strobes flaring about us. It’s a shock to see Adrian dance. I had never before imagined him doing such a thing. But now, nothing could seem more natural. As ever, he is in full command, guiding my body and holding me close with strong, assured hands. Our bodies in rhythm, in perfect sync. Everything in full, delicious contact. We lock eyes, inches apart, feeling the sparks jumping between our lips. You have nothing to worry about, his look promises. You are mine now.

He bends to say something in my ear. It takes a moment for me to process it over the noise, to understand what he’s asking.

Do I want to go upstairs?

I meet his eyes and nod, my mouth dry.

Yes. Yes, please.

He takes my hand and leads me toward one of the sweeping staircases. Heads turn, and both men and women eye me up and down as we pass. “Why do I feel like you’re not the only one who wants to eat me?” I comment, in a desperate bid to distract myself from this flood of happiness.

He smiles, and I gulp. Steady, Aurora.

At the top of the stairs, Adrian leads me down a hallway and away from the noise. I catch glimpses out of bedroom windows of a pool filled with scantily clad partygoers. In the shadowy bedrooms girls kneel before men, their heads bobbing up and down. A master bedroom is brightly lit and filled with a gymnastic orgy of naked bodies. I’m trembling all over as Adrian tugs me past. “Come on.”

I giggle, feeling warm and floaty with tipsiness (God, I’m the cheapest date ever), and he grins as we hurry on down the hall. I should be disgusted at myself, I know. But a small part of me thrills in response to this atmosphere. So many places where we could be alone. And me, with a man wanted by everyone else.

As if to prove this, that blonde bombshell reappears, bumping into Adrian. “Excuse me,” she gushes, tucking a sleek curtain of gold hair behind an ear. “I got lost.” She lifts her lashes slyly at him and slips by, avoiding my withering gaze. Adrian turns to me, holding a door open to a dark and empty library. “Does this look—”

I stop his words by sucking onto his face and pushing him through the door. He’s too shocked to object. We crash against a bookshelf and I tear at his belt buckle, a desperate sound twisting out of me. There is no shyness in me right now, no demureness. I’m all want.

You are mine, Adrian Voper—

He pulls back, breathing heavily, and stares into my eyes. Is he—?

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