Chapter 6: The Vermont Weekend
The drive to the lodge took four hours, the city’s grimy sprawl giving way to skeletal trees and granite cliffs. Vince’s hands were tight on the wheel. The envelope of cash for the weekend—twenty thousand, in hundreds—was a lead weight in the glove box. Alex had kissed him goodbye at the door, a proprietary smack on the lips. “Remember, you’re a premium service. Act like one. Don’t speak unless spoken to. Your job is to perform, not converse.”
The lodge was a hulking shadow against the bruised twilight sky. He parked, the gravel crunching under his tires. The air was knife-cold, scented with pine and woodsmoke. He grabbed his small duffel, the one containing only toiletries and a change of clothes. Everything else was supposedly provided.
Chloe opened the massive oak door before he could knock. She wore a charcoal gray cashmere sweater and tight black leggings. Her hair was down, softening her sharp features only slightly. “You’re seven minutes early. Good.” She stepped aside, her appraisal clinical. “Leave your bag there. They’re waiting.”
The great room was cathedral-like, dominated by a riverstone fireplace where flames licked hungrily at a pile of logs. The heat was intense, a physical wall. Two other women were there.
Elena was perched on the arm of a leather sofa, a glass of amber liquid in her hand. She was maybe fifty, with a steel-gray bob that looked brutally expensive, and a body kept lean by what Vince guessed was a fanatical regimen of Pilates and disdain. Her eyes, the color of flint, scanned him from head to toe without a flicker of warmth.
Simone stood by the fire, staring into the flames. She was younger, perhaps late thirties, with an olive complexion and dark hair swept into a severe knot. She wore a simple, impossibly soft-looking navy dress that clung to subtle curves. She didn’t turn.
“This is the product?” Elena’s voice was a dry rasp, like pages turning.
“The specialty,” Chloe corrected. “Vince, this is Elena. And Simone.”
Simone finally glanced over. Her gaze was distant, as if he were a piece of the furniture she was vaguely considering rearranging.
“Alexandra’s briefing was… intriguing,” Elena said, sipping her drink. “A physiological guarantee. No pharmaceuticals, no psychological faltering. Just a trigger and a response.” She set her glass down with a definitive click. “We’d like a demonstration.”
Chloe nodded to Vince. “Undress. By the fire.”
The command hung in the heat. This was beyond the sisters’ apartment, beyond Margo’s silent penthouse. This was a ritual. Vince’s fingers felt thick, clumsy. He shrugged out of his jacket, peeled off his sweater, toed off his shoes. The women watched, their silence more intrusive than any touch. He unbuttoned his jeans, pushed them and his briefs down in one motion, stepping out of the pile. The firelight danced over his skin. As expected, the combined pressure of their focused attention, the surrealness of the scene, made him harden instantly. His cock stood straight out, thick and eager.
A low, appreciative hum came from Elena. “Efficient.”
“Lie on the rug. On your back,” Chloe instructed.
The fur rug was deep and prickly against his skin. He lay down, the cathedral ceiling soaring above him, the fire’s heat baking one side of his body. He was exposed, a specimen on display.
“Simone, you’ve been quiet. Would you like to initiate?” Chloe’s tone was that of a hostess offering the first canapé.
Simone turned from the fire. Her movements were fluid, unhurried. She walked over to him, her shadow falling across his hips. She knelt beside him, studying his erection as if it were a complex equation. She didn’t touch him with her hands. Instead, she leaned down, her face inches away. He could smell her perfume, something dark and floral. She opened her mouth and exhaled, a warm, slow breath over the head of his cock. Then her tongue emerged, a single, flat lick from root to tip.
A shudder ran through him. It wasn’t pleasure; it was a voltage spike.
“Responsive,” Simone murmured, almost to herself. She then stood, her fingers going to the tie of her dress. It parted, sliding off her shoulders to pool at her feet. She was naked beneath, her body a landscape of gentle slopes and dark, neat triangles. Without ceremony, she straddled his hips, one hand guiding him, not into her, but between her thighs, against her slick folds. She rocked back and forth, coating him with her wetness, her eyes locked on his, watching for his reaction. Her cunt was hot, the friction exquisite and maddening. “You’re just a tool, aren’t you?” she whispered, her voice devoid of malice, merely stating a fact. “A beautiful, predictable tool.”
She lifted her hips, positioned him, and sank down in one slow, deliberate motion. She was tight, a silken, gripping heat. She didn’t move at first, just sat fully impaled, letting him feel the full depth of her. A sigh escaped her, the first hint of true emotion—a deep, relieved contentment. Then she began to ride him, a slow, grinding rotation of her hips, taking him so deep each time his balls pressed against her. Her nails bit into his chest, not in passion, but in punctuation.
“Elena,” Chloe said.
Elena had already disrobed. Her body was taut, sinewy, small breasts with pointed nipples. She moved with predatory grace. She waited until Simone, with a final, clenched shudder, rolled off Vince, her own breath coming fast. Vince’s cock, glistening with Simone’s arousal, didn’t even twitch. It remained rigid, waiting.
Elena didn’t bother with any preamble. She pushed his legs apart, knelt between them, and lowered herself onto him with a sharp, driving motion. She was less wet, tighter in a different, almost abrasive way. She set a brutal, punishing rhythm from the start, her hips pistoning, her pelvic bone slamming against his. “Is this… all you can do?” she grunted, her flinty eyes boring into his. “Just… lie there and take it?”
Her words were meant to provoke, to dominate. Vince felt a surge of something—not anger, but a cold defiance. He thrust upward, meeting her downward slam with a force that knocked a choked gasp from her. “Isn’t it?” he shot back, his voice rough.
A flicker of something—respect, perhaps—crossed her face. Then it was gone, consumed by a fierce, competitive hunger. “Harder,” she demanded, her hands braced on his shoulders. “Don’t you fucking dare hold back.”
He didn’t. He fucked up into her with a mindless, mechanical power, the slapping sounds of their coupling sharp and wet in the room. She came with a series of sharp, barking cries, her body convulsing around him. She collapsed forward, her sweaty forehead against his sternum, before pushing herself off him with a grimace.
Vince was drenched in sweat, his heart hammering. He was still hard.
Chloe was the last. She had undressed while Elena used him. She approached not with hunger, but with ownership. This was her find, her arrangement. She climbed onto him, guiding him inside her with a practiced hand. She was the tightest, most controlled of the three. She rode him with a measured, analytical cadence, her eyes watching his face, monitoring his responses as if collecting data.
“You’ll be available on the third weekend of each month,” she stated, her voice only slightly breathless. “We’ll secure the location. You’ll be compensated as agreed. You will not see any of us socially. You will not contact us outside of the arranged channels through Alexandra. Is that understood?”
He could only nod, his throat tight.
“Good.” She leaned forward, her small breasts brushing his chest, and increased her pace. Her climax, when it came, was silent but intense; he felt it in the sudden, rhythmic fluttering deep inside her. She held herself there, milking him, until with a final, choked groan, he spilled into her.
For a long moment, there was only the sound of the fire and their ragged breathing. Then, one by one, they disentangled themselves. The women moved away, washing with towels and basins of water that seemed to have appeared from somewhere, dressing again as if putting on business attire.
Vince lay on the fur, spent, covered in the mixed scent and slick of three strangers. The fire painted the room in a hellish, dancing light.
Elena, fully dressed again, finished her whiskey. “Satisfactory,” she pronounced, the word directed at Chloe. “Book me for a solo session next time. The shared experience has its charms, but I require focused attention.”
Simone, buttoning her dress, simply nodded. She glanced once more at Vince, her earlier detachment replaced by a faint, speculative curiosity, before turning away.
Chloe walked over to the side table, picked up a thick envelope, and placed it on the floor next to Vince’s head. “Your payment. There’s a room down the hall for you. Be gone by nine a.m. Do not use the main kitchen.”
They left the great room, their murmured conversations about stock portfolios and gallery openings fading down a hallway. Vince was alone. The immense, silent luxury of the lodge pressed in on him. He was a tool that had been used, tested, and approved for future work. He picked up the envelope, the paper cool against his heated skin.
Rolling onto his side, he saw his reflection distorted in the polished brass of the fireplace surround: a naked, glistening man curled on a fur rug, a stack of cash beside his head. The part of him that had once cringed at a passing glance was now silent, buried under layers of cash and clinical approval. He felt nothing but a profound, hollowed-out chill that not even the roaring fire could touch. The tool had performed its function perfectly. And in the quiet crackle of the flames, he could almost hear the locking mechanism of his new life click definitively into place.