Chapter 2: The Unexpected pleasure
The shower ran for a long time. Daniel lay on the ruined silk, listening to the water hit the marble, trying to reassemble himself. Piece by piece. The Mayor. The Husband. The Father. He clothed himself in these identities, but they hung loose now, ill-fitting. The memory of the night was a live wire under his skin, a constant, humiliating buzz. He could still feel the ghost of her mouth, the ache in his muscles.
When he finally heard the water stop, he moved. He gathered his clothes from the floor, each article a piece of evidence. He dressed quickly, his fingers clumsy on the buttons. The room smelled of sex and expensive perfume. He needed air that didn’t taste of her.
Ana emerged from the bathroom wrapped in a white terrycloth robe, her hair a dark, damp cloud. She watched him tie his shoes, her expression unreadable.
“Running away so soon?” she asked, her voice still husky.
“I have a city to run,” he said, the words coming out sharper than intended. He stood, adjusting his suit jacket. It felt like a costume.
“Of course you do.” She drifted to the bar cart, pouring herself a glass of water. She didn’t offer him one. “The door’s open, Daniel. It always will be.”
He left without another word. The elevator ride down to the lobby was a silent, plummeting descent. The mirrored walls showed a man with shadows under his eyes, his salt-and-pepper beard looking less distinguished, more unkempt. He avoided his own gaze.
Outside, the morning was crisp and mercilessly bright. His driver, Leo, was idling at the curb. He’d been waiting all night. Leo’s eyes met his in the rearview mirror for a fraction of a second too long before looking away. No questions. Just a quiet, “Office, sir?”
“Home,” Daniel grunted, sinking into the leather seat. He rolled down the window, needing the chill to scourge him.
The justification began on the drive, a quiet, insistent voice in his head, smoothing over the cracks.
It was just a physical thing. A mistake, yes, but a bodily one. A chemical reaction. You were drugged, for Christ’s sake. You weren’t in your right mind.
He pictured Sara, her laugh, the way she squinted in the sunlight. He loved her. That was the bedrock. What happened with Ana existed in a separate universe, a pocket of distorted time with no bearing on the real world. It was an experience, an intense release of pressure, nothing more. He had not kissed Ana with his heart. He had not whispered promises. He had used her body, and she had used his. It was a transaction, completed. It meant nothing.
It meant nothing.
He repeated it like a mantra. By the time Leo pulled into the circular driveway of his large, empty Colonial in the Oak Heights district, he had almost convinced himself. The guilt was still there, a heavy stone in his gut, but he had built a shelf for it. He could put it up there, out of the way, and get on with his life.
He walked into the silent house. He poured himself a glass of orange juice in the vast, sunlit kitchen. He called Sara.
“Hey, you,” she answered, her voice warm with sleep. “I was just thinking about you.”
“I was thinking about you, too,” he said, and for a moment, it was true. The sound of her voice was a lifeline to the man he was supposed to be. He told her about the celebration, leaving out everything but the boring parts. He told her he’d been exhausted, had slept hard. He told her he loved her. He meant it. He did.
For three days, he buried himself in work. Budget allocations, infrastructure meetings, a tense press conference about downtown revitalization. He was sharp, commanding, in control. The stone on the shelf stayed put. He barely thought of Ana, except sometimes in the dead of night, when the house’s silence felt absolute, and the memory of her whisper would snake into his ear: “It will itch.”
On the fourth day, Mark called.
“You’ve been hiding, Mr. Mayor. Hibernating. The people need to see your victorious face.”
“I’m working, Mark. It’s what I do.”
“All work and no play… Look, a few of us are grabbing drinks at The Vault tonight. Low-key. No press. Just… debriefing.” Mark’s tone was light, but there was an edge of something else. An invitation. A challenge. “You should come. Blow off some steam. You were a goddamn legend the other night.”
Daniel’s grip tightened on the phone. The stone on the shelf wobbled. He saw the burgundy liquid, felt the chalky aftertaste. Then he saw Ana’s silhouette against the window. The itch was a sudden, physical sensation across his skin.
It meant nothing. It was just physical. A one-time release.
If it was truly nothing, then it could happen again without consequence. A man could have a drink with friends. A man could enjoy female company. It didn’t touch the core of him. It was separate.
“What time?” Daniel heard himself ask.
The Vault was all exposed brick and low, amber lighting. It was louder, more public than the penthouse, but their booth in the back was shrouded in shadow. The same faces were there: Mark, Carl, a few developers, a union rep. The congratulatory backslaps felt different now. Complicit.
“He returns!” Carl boomed, sliding a martini toward him. “We were starting to think you’d gotten lost.”
“Just busy,” Daniel said, taking a sip. The gin was clean, cold. Normal.
“Bullshit. You got a taste of freedom and it scared you,” Mark grinned, clinking his glass against Daniel’s. “Don’t worry. We’re here to ease you back in.”
The conversation flowed around him—politics, sports, crude jokes. Daniel laughed in the right places. He felt a strange, detached calm. He was observing, participating from a slight remove. The justification was a solid wall now. He was here as a man, not a mayor. This was his private time. He owed nobody an explanation.
That’s when he saw her watching from the bar.
She was younger than Ana, maybe late twenties. Blonde hair cut in a sharp, angular bob. She wore a simple black dress that clung to every curve. Her eyes, a piercing blue, were fixed on him with an unnerving directness. She didn’t smile. She assessed.
Daniel looked away, a flush creeping up his neck. But he felt it again—the pull, the curious hunger.
Mark followed his gaze and chuckled. “Ah. Natalie. She’s… something else. Friend of a friend. Very… direct.”
As if on cue, Natalie slid off her barstool. She walked toward their booth with a hypnotic, swaying gait that silenced the men at the table. She didn’t acknowledge anyone but Daniel. She stopped right beside him, her perfume a sweet, candied scent, like crushed cherries and vanilla.
“You’re the mayor,” she stated. Her voice was higher than Ana’s, almost girlish, but it held a flat, certain power.
“I am,” Daniel said, forcing a polite, political smile.
“I saw your speech on the new transit bill. It was boring.” She tilted her head. “But you weren’t. You looked like you wanted to be somewhere else.”
Daniel blinked, thrown. No one talked to him like this. First Ana, now this woman. It was as if the mayor’
First Ana, now this woman. It was as if the mayor’s crown had become a beacon, drawing in these sharp, hungry things that saw the man beneath the title and wanted to pick him clean. Natalie didn’t wait for an invitation.
“Scoot over,” she said, not a request.
A tense, eager silence fell over the booth. Daniel, his politician’s smile frozen, shifted on the leather seat to make space. She didn’t take the space. She took him. In one fluid motion, she turned and settled directly onto his lap, her back against the table, facing his startled friends. The weight of her was sudden and solid, the thin fabric of her dress and his trousers no barrier at all. He could feel the warmth of her through the wool.
“Better view,” she said to the table, her girlish voice now a private weapon for him alone. She pressed down deliberately, grinding the soft curve of her ass against his groin. A jolt of unwelcome, instantaneous heat shot through him. His body, traitorously, began to respond.
Mark let out a low, appreciative whistle. “Told you. Direct.”
“I’m sitting right here,” Daniel managed, his voice tight. He placed his hands stiffly on his own thighs, a futile attempt at propriety. The eyes of his colleagues, his supporters, were on them, wide with booze and voyeuristic delight. He was a spectacle.
“I know exactly where you’re sitting,” Natalie purred, shifting again. She reached across the table, her movement causing another slow, torturous roll of her hips. She picked up Daniel’s half-finished martini. She swirled it, then held it to his lips. “Drink up. You look tense.”
He turned his head away, a feeble denial. “I’m fine.”
“No.” The single word cut through the bar’s murmur. Her blue eyes locked on his, and all the girlish pretense vanished, replaced by a flat, uncompromising authority that mirrored Ana’s in its certainty. “You’re not fine. You’re wound so tight you’re humming. Let’s fix that.”
With her free hand, she reached into the small clutch on the table that Daniel now realized was hers. Her fingers emerged holding a small, familiar plastic bag with a single chalky blue pill. The table went quiet. Carl’s grin was a gash in his face. Mark gave an almost imperceptible nod. This was planned. This was the offering.
A cold understanding washed over Daniel, cutting through the gin and the shock of her body. The stone of his guilt, so carefully shelved, cracked right down the middle. They were all in on it. They had chosen this for him. The humiliation was complete, but beneath it roared a sudden, furious surrender. Why was he fighting? This was the price of the seat. This was the secret handshake.
“See?” Natalie said, her voice softening back into that candy-coated tone as she dropped the pill into the golden gin. It fizzled weakly, dissolving into a cloudy, burgundy-tinged vortex. She brought the glass back to his lips. “Just a little help. For both of us.”
Daniel stared at the concoction. He saw Ana’s penthouse window, the city lights blurring. He heard Sara’s voice on the phone, so trusting. The two images collided and shattered. He opened his mouth. The bitter-gin-chemical mix hit his tongue, and he swallowed it all in one long, gagging gulp. The table erupted in cheers, but the sound was muffled, far away. Natalie’s smile was a victory.
“Good,” she whispered, wiping a droplet from his chin with her thumb. She then put that thumb in her own mouth, her eyes never leaving his. “Now, let’s go somewhere you don’t have to be the mayor.”
She stood up, taking his hand. His legs felt unsteady, whether from the drink or the drug or the sheer velocity of his fall, he didn’t know. He followed. He didn’t look back at his friends. Their laughter trailed them like confetti at a funeral.
Her room was at the opulent, anonymous Grand Regency, not a private penthouse but a high-floor suite with the same dizzying view of Dunhill’s heart. It was clean, corporate, sterile. A vase of white lilies sat on a desk, scenting the air with a funeral sweetness. Natalie locked the door, the click final. She turned, leaning against it.
“Strip,” she said. No ceremony. No velvet whispers.
The drug was a furnace in his veins, a relentless pulse narrowing his world to this room, this woman, this imperative. His fingers fumbled with his tie, his belt, his shirt buttons. The expensive fabrics pooled at his feet like shed skin. He stood there, exposed, the middle-aged lines of his body under the harsh downlights. She appraised him, a mechanic looking at a machine.
“Not bad,” she said, pushing off the door. She kept her dress on. Her heels clicked on the parquet as she walked a circle around him. “For a politician.”
Her touch, when it came, was clinical at first. Her nails, short and polished a shell pink, traced the line of his shoulders, down his spine. He shivered. It wasn’t desire, not yet. It was a raw, animal alertness. She stopped in front of him, her eyes level with his chest. She placed a flat palm over his heart, feeling its frantic hammer.
“Your wife doesn’t make it beat like this, does she?” she asked, genuinely curious.
Daniel flinched. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” She pressed her body against his, the cool silk of her dress a shock against his skin. She kissed his collarbone, then his neck, her mouth open and wet. It was nothing like Ana’s calculated artistry. This was voracious. “Don’t say her name? Don’t remind you?” She bit down, not hard enough to break skin, but enough to make him gasp. “She’s not here. I am.”
She pushed him backward until his knees hit the bed. He sank down. She followed, straddling him, finally shedding her dress in one impatient shrug. Her body was taut, gymnastic, a landscape of tan lines and sharp angles. She took his hands, which hung limp at his sides, and placed them on her breasts. “Touch me. Unless you don’t know how.”
The goad worked. A rough, frustrated sound tore from his throat. He gripped her, his mayor’s hands, his father’s hands, rough on her soft skin. He kissed her, a messy, biting collision of teeth and tongue. It was nothing like making love. It was conquest and retaliation. She met his fury with a cool, guiding control, redirecting his energy, pacing him.
“Slower,” she breathed into his ear, her hand snaking between them. Her fingers were deft, insistent, circling and pressing until his thoughts dissolved into static. “See? You just need instructions.”
He was adrift in sensation, the drug magnifying every touch into a seismic event. His own hands moved on her, clumsy then precise, following her murmured commands. He learned the geography of her, the hidden rhythms that made her breath catch. This was forplay as demolition, a systematic dismantling of his resistance. He forgot his name, his office, the man in the mirror. There was only pulse and heat and the shocking, intimate pressure of her fingers inside her, his thumb circling, her strangled gasp hot against his neck.
“Now,” she commanded, her voice frayed. “Now.”
The transition was brutal, urgent. She guided him into her, sinking down with a sharp, surrendering sigh that seemed to rip through the center of her. For a moment, they were both still, locked in that first shocking fullness. Then she moved, setting a punishing, rhythmic pace that brooked no argument. Her eyes were open, watching his face crumble.
“Tell me,” she grunted, each word punctuated by a roll of her hips. “Tell me how it feels.”
Daniel clenched his jaw, his
“Tell me how it feels.”
Daniel clenched his jaw, his fists gripping the rumpled hotel sheets as if they were reins. He wouldn’t. Giving her that voice felt more violating than anything their bodies were doing. It was the last fortress.
Natalie stopped moving. The sudden stillness was worse than the motion. She hovered above him, a slick, beautiful statue, her expression shifting from pleasured concentration to cold analysis. “Fine,” she said. She began to lift herself off.
A raw, panicked sound escaped him. His hands shot to her hips, gripping bone, holding her in place. The drug was a roaring in his ears, a chemical insistence that threatened pain if he denied it. He was a puppet to his own blood.
“It feels…” The words were stones in his throat. He forced them out. “It feels fucking empty.”
She tilted her head, intrigued. Not the answer she expected. She sank back down, a slow, deliberate acceptance. “Empty can be good. Empty means there’s room.” She began to move again, a slower, deeper rhythm. “Try again.”
He was breaking apart. The image of Sara’s face, which he had clutched like a holy card, dissolved into pixelated nonsense. There was only this heat, this friction, this woman who was a stranger. “It feels… like I’m not here,” he grunted, the confession torn from him.
“Better.” Her breath hitched. She leaned forward, her breasts brushing his chest, her mouth beside his ear. “Now tell me how I feel.”
The command shattered him completely. The last pretense of a mutual act evaporated. He was a tool for her validation, a mouthpiece. The humiliation was acute, but it fused with the pleasure into something monstrous and potent. He opened his eyes and looked at her, really looked at the focused, expectant face hovering over his.
“You feel… greedy,” he rasped, his voice not his own. “You feel like you’re trying to drink me through a straw.” Her rhythm stuttered for a second, her eyes flashing. He pressed on, a surge of dark power fueling the words. “You feel tight and angry and fucking perfect. Is that what you want to hear?”
A sharp gasp escaped her, part surprise, part something else. Her control slipped for an instant, her hips losing their metronomic precision. “Yes.”
“You feel like a fucking vice,” he continued, the words coming easier now, filthy and free. “You feel like you’re going to break me in half and I don’t even care.”
That did it. Her composure cracked. Her nails dug into his shoulders as a rough, shuddering climax took her, her body clamping down around him in uncontrolled waves. The sight of her loss of control, her professional detachment incinerated by his crude, honest words, unleashed his own. His release was a white-hot seizure of emptiness, a vacuum that sucked every thought, every memory, every name into its core.
For a long time, there was only the sound of ragged breathing and the distant hum of the city’s ventilation systems. She rolled off him, onto her back, staring at the textured ceiling. Daniel lay like a felled tree, his mind a blank, static sheet. The drug was ebbing, leaving behind a hollow, metallic fatigue. He didn’t think of Sara. He didn’t think of tomorrow. He thought of nothing at all. It was the most peace he’d known in years.
When he woke, the room was filled with the gray, directionless light of a city morning. His mouth tasted of gin and decay. Natalie was asleep beside him, her back turned, the sharp lines of her shoulder blade and spine like topography under the sheet. The memories of the night flooded back, not as a narrative, but as sensory flashes: the taste of her skin, the pressure of her hands, his own voice saying those terrible, true things.
A new sensation coiled in his gut, beneath the fatigue. Not guilt. Something darker, simpler. Hunger. The hollow peace was gone, replaced by a raw, physical want that felt entirely separate from his mind. He looked at the sleeping curve of her hip.
He didn’t think. He moved.
He crashed his face into the space between her legs, his mouth and nose pressing against her through the thin cotton sheet. It was not a kiss. It was a claim, an animal reassertion. The violence of the motion woke her instantly.
She jolted, a muffled cry escaping her. “What the—?”
He didn’t answer. He hooked his fingers into the waistband of her underwear and yanked them down, his movements rough, purposeful. He buried his face in her, his tongue seeking not to please, but to consume, to reignite the engine of the night before. She was asleep-warm, musky, real. She stiffened for a moment, then a low laugh vibrated through her. Her hand came down and tangled in his salt-and-pepper hair, not pushing him away, but holding him there.
“Morning, Mr. Mayor,” she mumbled, her voice thick with sleep. Her hips arched up to meet him. “Someone’s eager.”
He didn’t speak. He worked. This was his. This need, this act, this woman—they were functions of a separate self, a self that operated on pure physics. Friction. Release. Function.
Afterward, as they dressed in silence, she scribbled a number on a Grand Regency notepad. “My direct line. Not the agency. You call this.” She handed it to him. “If you want a repeat.”
He took the slip of paper. He looked at the ten digits. A direct line. It felt more significant than a business card. It felt like a treaty. He nodded, folding it into his wallet next to his driver’s license and a faded picture of his daughter. The two realities sat side-by-side, neatly compartmentalized.
The stone of guilt was gone. In its place was a circuit board, clean and logical. Physical pleasure was a biological requirement, like food or sleep. It regulated mood, sharpened focus, alleviated stress. For years, that circuit had been disconnected, resulting in the fuzziness, the loneliness, the restless anger. He had merely reconnected it. Sara was part of a different system entirely—emotional, historical, familial. The two systems did not need to intersect. In fact, they functioned better apart.
He called Natalie two days later, from his private cell phone in his city-issued car. He didn’t preamble. “The Weston, room 1412. Seven pm.”
A pause on the line. He could hear the smile in her voice. “An hour?”
“Ninety minutes,” he corrected, his tone mayoral, discussing a zoning bill. “I have a dinner at eight-thirty.”
“See you at seven.”
It was different this time. He arrived first. He had the room key. He let her in. He’d already poured two glasses of whiskey from the minibar. He handed her one. “Drink this. Then get on the bed.”
She raised an eyebrow, that cool appraisal back in her eyes. But she took the glass, knocked it back, and did as she was told. He took his time. He used his mouth, his hands, with a focused detachment that was more intimidating than passion. He learned what made her gasp, what made her legs tense, and he wielded that knowledge like a mechanic operating a complex machine. He didn’t ask. He commanded.
“Turn over.”
“Don’t make a sound.”
“Look at me.”
She complied, her earlier defiance melting into a kind of impressed submission. When he finally took her, it was with a steady, grinding intensity that was about his own release, on his own schedule. She climaxed when he allowed it, through the precise application of his thumb while he moved inside her. It was transactional, efficient, and profoundly empowering.
After, as she dressed, he said, “I’ll call you next week, Nat.”
She stopped, one heel in her hand. “Nat?”
“It’s a nickname,” he said, pulling on his trousers. “For my fuck girl.”
She stared at him. A flicker of something—anger, insult—crossed her face, then was smoothed into her professional mask. She gave a slow, conceding nod. The power balance had officially shifted. He had named her, categorised her. She was a function. Nat. It was clean.
Over the next two weeks, the circuit hummed. He saw Natalie four more times, each encounter arranged via terse, logistical phone calls. “Thursday. My place. Use the service entrance.” The anonymity of the hotels felt unnecessary now. He had a guest room over his garage, soundproofed and separate from the main house. He brought her there. It was his territory.
The other five encounters were with other women, arranged through Mark’s discreet “agency.” A redhead named Chloe who liked to talk politics afterward, which he found irritating. A shy brunette who reminded him of a younger Sara, which made him end the session early. He refined his type: silent, skilled, emotionally null. He treated them like therapeutic appointments, necessary maintenance for the machine of his ambition.
Guilt would occasionally spike, a phantom limb pain. He’d be on a video call with Sara, watching her plan their garden in Mexico, her face alight with a future he was methodically poisoning. The stone would try to reform in his gut. He would mentally open the control panel. Physical system. Emotional system. They are separate. This is what allows me to be present with you. This is what makes me functional.
And it was true. In the city council chambers, facing down the union reps, he was a razor. The fog of lonely frustration was gone. His patience was thinner, his decisions quicker, his presence more intimidating. He slept through the night. He enjoyed his food. The world had sharpened into a series of solvable problems and available pleasures.
He was in his office, reviewing police budget cuts, when his direct line buzzed. Not his cell, the other one. The one only a few people had. He answered without looking. “Daniel.”
“It’s been a while, Mr. Mayor.” The voice was a slide of silk and smoke. It went through him like a current, tripping every alarm and every desire at once.
Ana.
He froze, the budget figures blurring. He hadn’t heard from her since that morning in the penthouse. He’d almost convinced himself she was a hallucination. “How did you get this number?”
“Please. A number is the easiest secret to know.” He could hear the smile. “I told you the door was open. But you’ve been… busy. Playing with newer toys.”
He stood up, turning his back to the door of his office. “What do you want?”
“I want to see what you’ve become. All this… functionality. It sounds dreadfully boring. I’m at The Orangerie. Booth in the back. Come have a drink. Not that kind of drink. A real one.”
“I’m working.”
“You’re hiding,” she corrected, her voice gentle and absolute. “And you’re curious. Seven o’clock.” The line went dead.
Daniel stood holding the phone, his heart hammering against his ribs. The clean circuit board in his mind sparked, wires crossing. Ana represented the origin, the first crack. She was not a function. She was a variable. She saw the man, not the system. Talking to her was a risk his new, efficient logic could not compute.
He looked at his watch. It was five-thirty. He had a “constituent dinner” at seven-thirty he could reschedule.
The justification failed him. This wasn’t about physical need. This was something else, a pull from the old, disordered world. A hunger no pill could address.
He called his assistant. “Move the dinner with the Parks Foundation. Something came up.” He ended the call before she could ask questions.
He sat back down, but he didn’t see the budget papers. He saw her deep, knowing eyes, and the teasing, cruel smile. She had seen him break first. She knew the shape of the cracks.
At six forty-five, he told Leo he was walking. The autumn air was crisp, slicing through the wool of his coat. He walked the twelve blocks to The Orangerie, each step feeling like a regression, a walking back into a dream he’d tried to forget. The restaurant was all glass and gleaming brass, dripping with money and whispered deals. He saw her immediately.
She was exactly as he remembered, yet somehow more. She wore emerald green, a colour that made her olive skin glow. She watched him walk through the room, her gaze a physical touch. He slid into the booth opposite her. A martini, perfectly clear, sat waiting for him.
“No blue special,” she said, raising her own glass.
“Why am I here, Ana?”
“To report,” she said, sipping her drink. “You’ve been a good student, I hear. Very… disciplined. But discipline is just fear with better posture.” She leaned forward slightly. “Tell me, Daniel. When you’re with your Nat, do you ever close your eyes and see me?”
The question was a grenade in the quiet booth. It was true. Sometimes, in the frantic, silent rhythm, a flash of her penthouse window would superimpose itself over the ceiling of his garage apartment. A ghost in the machine.
“No,” he lied.
She laughed, a soft, genuine sound. “You’re a worse liar than you were a lover. And you were a terrible lover that first night.” She let that hang, watching him flinch. “But you’re learning. I just wonder what you’re learning for. Is it just to feel nothing? Or is it to feel so much that everything else disappears?”
“It’s none of your business.”
“It became my business the moment you let me lead you to that bedroom,” she said, her voice dropping. “I started something. I’m invested. I don’t care about your little fuck-girl routines. I care about the man who is using them to disappear. That’s a tragedy. And a waste.”
“What do you want from me?” The question was a plea, stripped of his mayoral authority.
“I want you to stop pretending this is about biology.” Her foot brushed his leg under the table. “I want you to admit you’re chasing a feeling. The one I gave you. The one where you lost control completely. Where you weren’t the mayor, or the husband. You were just… want. And it terrified you. And you’ve been trying to get back there ever since, by controlling every single second. You’re going about it backwards.”
Daniel drank his martini in one long swallow. The gin burned, clean and punishing. She saw right through the entire architecture of his denial. She saw the scared, hungry thing at the center of it.
“You’re dangerous,” he whispered.
“I’m honest,” she corrected. “Which is far more dangerous to a man like you.” She slid a keycard across the table. It was black, with no markings. “Penthouse A. The Monarch Tower. Not a hookup. A conversation. Tonight. If you’re brave enough to stop running your little experiments and talk about the real problem.”
She stood up, leaving cash on the table for the drinks. She leaned down, her lips close to his ear. Her perfume was the same—jasmine and dark parchment. “Your wife calls you every night at nine-thirty, yes? You have two hours. Decide what you’re hungry for.”
She walked away. Daniel stared at the black keycard. It was not a phone number. It was an invitation to a different kind of void. This wasn’t the circuit board. This was the wilderness.
His cell phone buzzed. A text from Natalie. Free tonight?
He looked at the text. He looked at the keycard. Two systems. Two hungers.
He picked up the keycard, the plastic cool and final in his hand. He typed a reply to Natalie. Not tonight.
He left the restaurant, the momentum of his fall suddenly accelerating, pulling him toward a darker, deeper gravity he no longer had the will to resist.