Work Text:
When Roman returned to his COO duties only a week after the failed sibling coup in Italy, Gerri was about equal parts surprised, impressed, resentful, and wary. She had felt as safe as it was possible to feel under the circumstances, knowing from their research that Gojo had no General Counsel, only a VP of Legal, and believing that her experience as CEO would make her valuable to Matsson. If, that is, Logan—or for that matter Roman—didn’t seek revenge.
But Logan seemed thoroughly distracted by his baby project, fully cooperating with both Matsson and with her—in her dual role as interim CEO and effective General Counsel—in order to get the deal through as quickly as possible, content with the promise of Chair. He had seemingly learned at last that he could torment his children more effectively with indifference than with mind games. Gerri expected that, like Lear, he would realize too late that he had abandoned any real power and regret it, and also regret, at that time, no longer having the children under his thumb.
As far as Roman was concerned, Matsson let drop soon enough that Roman had told him he and Gerri “made a good team.” That astonished her. She knew she’d become flustered for a moment, trying to determine if there was any double meaning in the original statement or in Matsson’s repeating of it. In the end she decided it was best policy to take it at face value while remaining vigilant.
By coincidence, that same day she and Roman ended up alone in the elevator together for a couple of floors. Spontaneously, she decided to accept the olive branch, if it had been offered.
“I’m glad you’re back,” she said. “I think you made the right decision.”
“Don’t remember asking your opinion,” he replied immediately, eyes ahead. “I think we’re past that stage.”
The doors opened and he gestured for her to go ahead. “Right. Very well.” She nodded at him as she passed.
There was to be no friendship, then, but his professionalism was impeccable. As the weeks went by her initial wariness changed to bitterness that he couldn’t have been this person for her before, since evidently it was within his power, and then to a perverse desire to provoke some sign that he wasn’t over her, that he still wanted her. But she kept herself in check, knowing she ought to assume Matsson knew about DickpicGate (why wouldn’t he, with Tom around?). Now and then she did catch Roman staring at her, quickly looking away when she noticed, and felt a mixture of satisfaction and regret. But there was never an inappropriate text, call, or remark.
She had no time to dwell on drama or regrets, however, with the running of the company and completion of the deal taking up all of her attention. The end result, however, was that the acquisition of Waystar Royco by Gojo was complete, against all odds, in time for Christmas, and Gerri would be staying on as General Counsel.
By the time Valentine’s Day rolled around, she had actually stopped waiting for Roman to revert to his old self. So when he poked his head into her office and asked, “Got a hot date tonight?” she was so startled she was unable to think for a moment.
“No,” she said, her mind still frozen.
“No man in your life, or you just don’t observe the day?”
“Roman, is this an appropriate workplace topic?”
“Oh come on, Gerri.” He passed through the door, moving fully into her space. “It’s been over six months. We’ve got to be able to make office small talk. I’ve been asking everybody about their plans for tonight. Squirting the social lube all the fuck over the place, Matsson’s big on that. So is it true: do you hate romance? Or do you spend your lonely nights at home getting three martinis deep, shovelling in the popcorn and pining over Colin Firth in a wet nightie or Leo back-channelling Kate Winslet on a ship’s bow?”
“How... do you even know those references?”
He shrugged. “I have a mum and a sister, you know. I used them as my excuse for watching mushy movies. Also I have a not-so-secret hankering for Colin Firth’s nips.”
“I’m afraid you’re not going to uncover any kind of secret mushiness here. I’m really a very straightforward person, Roman.”
He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows at her. “You have a secret, Gerri.”
The way he said it made her squeeze her thighs together.
“Tell me just one romantic movie you like,” he continued. “Just one, and I’ll stop.”
“La Belle et La Bête.” It was the first thing that came to mind.
“Mm-hm. Because nothing says romance like reading subtitles.”
“I understand French, Roman.”
“Okay, pretentious and a show-off. What do you like about it?”
“It looks stunning, for one thing. The set design and makeup are very imaginative."
“But does it have a singing teapot in it? Because if not I think you’re watching the wrong version.”
“I answered your question, now you can go.”
“But that’s a kid’s fairy tale. It’s not romantic.”
“It certainly is.”
“How? What makes it work for you?” He was looking straight into her eyes, avid for any disclosure, and she realized she’d fallen into a trap. But she had fallen—she couldn’t immediately extricate herself.
“I suppose—the way they’re forced to get to know each other. Because of the whole...,” she couldn’t think of another way to put it, “imprisonment situation.”
To her surprise, he didn’t immediately try to make something kinky out of it. Instead he actually looked interested. “Oh you mean it’s likeThe Breakfast Club.”
“I haven’t seen that since it came out. They’re all in detention together, aren’t they?”
“I’ve seen it, I dunno, 20 times? It’s a classic. Yeah they’re in detention. And there’s all kinds of opposites-attract shit. I guess it’s my favorite romantic movie.”
“Well,” she said. "This peek into each other's souls was fun and excellent for morale, but real work calls."
“Yeah, go ahead, go back to working yourself to death.” He was looking something up on his phone.
Since he seemed to have no intention of leaving, she decided to ignore him. She’d just gotten back into the groove of work when she heard him laugh out loud.
“Roman, do you think you could—?”
“I found the craziest Letterboxd review of your movie. It’s some woman going on about how ever since she was a little girl the Beauty and the Beast story turned her on. Like, what!? She said it was the movie that made her realize she had a kidnapping fetish. That’s a thing?” He glanced up at her, and immediately she knew that he saw. “Wait a minute. Geraldine you freaky bitch.”
Her hand went to her pussy bow, stroking it pointlessly. “What?”
“This is your review.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I gave you what you wanted. Now let me finish my work. And you can go fantasize about Letterboxd profiles if that’s what you want to do.”
She thought about deleting her account the moment he was out the door (after nearly walking into it, since he was still staring at his phone and laughing hysterically). But that would only confirm his suspicions. So instead she had to think about Roman Roy delving into the secrets of her imagination. She knew he was gobbling it up, even now. He wouldn’t be able to take his eyes off his phone for hours. And Jean Cocteau’s version of Beauty and the Beast was the least of it.
Her Letterboxd account had a one-track mind: she had used the anonymity of the internet to explore a strange, dark part of herself that she hadn’t thought about much during her marriage. Only when she needed to come. But after Baird died, amidst the wreckage of her grief and loneliness, she’d found herself thinking about these fantasies more and more. And she’d fed them with movies, starting with respectable cinematic experiences like Hitchcock’s Marnie or Almodóvar’s Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!. When she ran out of those, however, she’d turned to exploring the world of softcorn porn. But that wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough until she was also able to write about what she watched, to really break down the genesis and permutations of the fantasies. And since she wasn’t a teenager with a diary, she did it on the internet. Anonymously.
When Roman made his stream-of-consciousness marriage proposal, or whatever it was, it had gone by so fast she thought she must have misheard the part about “abduction.” Even afterwards, when she’d replayed it—which was often—she couldn’t believe he’d said half the things she knew he’d said. But he’d never brought up anything like that again. The castration bit, that had come up again, but not the kidnapping idea.
“I abduct you and force you to live with me.”
She had tried to fold it into her fantasy life, the thought of Roman kidnapping her, but it was impossible to picture. He could never be that dominating. It still made her laugh inwardly, remembering how he’d sounded during that first phone call when he’d told her, “Technically, I’m your fuckin' BOSS.” Like a toddler pretending to be a teenager pretending to be her boss.
She tried not to worry about what it meant when he didn’t reappear in her office the next day, or the day after that, or the day after that. Not that there were as many excuses for it since her demotion. She started to wonder if what he’d found out had repulsed him. That would be the irony to end all ironies, if she turned out to be too kinky for Roman Roy.
But then, exactly a week later, he showed up again, not even bothering to tap on the door before he entered. He sat in the chair in front of her desk and just stared, but she steeled herself against the pressure of his gaze and ignored him, waiting for him to disclose the reason for his visit.
“I want you to have dinner with me,” he said at last.
“No,” she replied, without looking up.
“At my place. Tonight. It’s all arranged.”
That annoyed her so much that she couldn’t help but glare at him—and realized immediately that the little stinker had won. But he smiled as soon as she did, the heart-melting smile he pulled on her sometimes like a secret weapon.
She continued to frown. “You think it’s going to entice me to hear that you’ve taken my agreement for granted?”
“Not at all, Ger. I just know that you can be persuaded by a good argument.”
“The only trouble is that you’re particularly bad at making persuasive arguments. At least where I’m concerned.”
“But you’ll go along with it anyway. Like Rock Star and Mole Woman. If it serves your interests.”
“You have thirty seconds.”
“That’s all I need. You want to get rid of me, right? Like, you never want to be bothered by me again with any,” he waved his hand between the two of them, “stuff.”
“Correct.”
“Because you fucking hate me.”
“I wouldn’t go that far, Roman.”
“Are you saying that you love me?"
“My feelings for you are... appropriately collegial.”
“Uh-huh. And when I piss you off?”
“Then they’re... uncollegial.”
“The point is that I can’t leave you alone.”
That did something to her, hearing him say that while he continued to steadily meet her gaze. Her hand went to her chest, stroked the bare skin above her blouse. “No?” Her reply was much breathier than she’d intended.
“No. I’ve tried, and it’s hopeless. I’ve been beating my tiny-but-mighty brains out over it, and it finally occurred to me: if you could just show me how to, you know, romance a woman like you, like what I’d have to do to make you fall in love with me, I could apply that knowledge elsewhere.”
He sat there, looking pleased with himself, waiting for her answer.
“That’s it? That’s your plan. For me to mentor you in romance, for you to use on some hypothetical substitute for me?”
He folded his arms. “You’re not the only business-bitch MILF in New York, Ger. Place is full of them. And this is what you want, isn’t it? Me To Fuck Off.”
Her eyes become narrower still. “And there’s no other way for you to Fuck Off.”
“I’m giving you my fuck-off terms. And it goes without saying,” he leaned forward again, “that there would be boundaries in place. Unless you want to—”
“No,” she cut him off. “And yes.”
His eyebrows nearly flew off his face.
“‘Yes’?”
“But I am trusting you Roman. The terms are one dinner date, in exchange for—”
“Yeah yeah, me fucking off.”
His face was so soft, with a hint of a smile. “Thank you.” He rose, rubbed the back of his neck. “So. Tonight at eight.”
Her phone was ringing. She gave him just a slight, dismissive nod as she picked it up, ignoring his tiny wave on his way out.
For the rest of the workday she managed to push any speculation about the evening out of her mind. It wasn’t that hard: she was still learning the new business, and the novelty was enough to help her suppress unwanted thoughts and wayward desires.
She got home at seven, showered, touched up her makeup, and tried to decide what to wear. Eventually she settled on her standard first dinner date dress, the same one she’d worn for Laurie not so long ago (she smiled to herself, thinking how crazy it would make Roman if he knew that, and wondering if she could make it through the evening without finding a way to tell him). A little black dress with a modest neckline and an empire waist that made the most of her bosom. And then, after a further moment’s thought, applied her evening perfume.
It was madness, what she was doing, and she knew it, but she was being pulled along by a current she didn’t understand. Something to do with him discovering her online identity. She didn’t for a second believe that this date was what he said it was, but she didn’t believe it was a regular date, either. She didn’t know what was going to happen, she only knew that she wanted to find out. She was like that woman in the horror movie who couldn’t help looking behind the door—only it didn’t feel like that kind of anticipation. Not exactly.
Roman was looking his best when he opened the door, dressed in a formal suit, hair lightly gelled. It still sneaked up on her, how handsome he could be. He wasn’t her type, not in looks and not in personality, but maybe there was a type her rational mind chose and... something else.
After complimenting her appearance, not letting his eyes linger anywhere too long, he led her to the dining table, which was set up in front of the penthouse windows and brimming with flowers and lit candles.
He played with his suit jacket button and gestured at it. “What do you think?”
“How does this work? You want me to give you feedback on your choices?”
“Pretty much.”
“Well... it’s very nice.”
“Make you a drink?”
She sat on the couch in the lower, living room area. When he brought the martini to her, he asked, “So this strategy is better than my previous strategy?"
She sipped. “That was... a strategy?”
“No I guess not.” He tugged at his ear. “It was more like desperation. This is the sort of thing I wanted to do all along. But you wouldn’t let me. Drink up, the dinner’s getting cold.”
He sat at the opposite end of the couch and took a large sip of his martini. She followed suit. It didn't matter, they'd be eating right away.
“I have nothing personal against you, Roman. You know that. On the contrary.”
"Yeah, we don't have to talk about that now. You know what we haven't done. We haven't had a good gossip about the whole fucking shit show since we got back from Italy."
Dinner forgotten, they dished the dirt instead, until at last he suggested that they head over to the table. The drink had hit her surprisingly hard, and when she tried to get up, she had to sit back down immediately.
"You okay, Ger?"
She could feel herself sweating, and her mouth was dry. She wondered, suddenly, if she was having a heart attack or a stroke.
“Roman... something’s wrong.”
He was standing next to her, a hand on her shoulder, his expression serious. He met her eyes.
“You’ll be fine. You’re just going to sleep for a while. You need it anyway, Gerr-Bear.”
She knew what had happened, but she couldn't believe it. She tried to get up again, nearly fell over. He caught her, an arm around her waist.
"Take it easy."
“You didn’t,” were the last words she was able to get out before she fell face forward into the velvety darkness.
*
Alice down the rabbit hole. It was her first thought upon waking.
The second was how much she ached. Her head, her limbs. And then she tried to move and couldn’t.
She already knew, from her viewing, what she’d find when she looked down: ropes binding her wrists and ankles together and to each other.
Then the rest of the details flooded in: she was on a bed, in a bedroom; Roman was next to her; she could hear a TV, and plane engines.
Feeling her stirring, he turned on his side, leaning on his elbow, and smiled at her. “Hi, beautiful.”
“This?” she spat. “This is your new strategy?” She started to cough; her throat was dry.
He scooted up, into a sitting position, and poured water into a glass from a plastic jug on the bedside table. It brought a vivid, distasteful memory of hospitals.
“I’m going to have to help you drink this,” he said.
“Or you could just untie me, you loathsome little prick.”
“I would, but that’s not what you want. Besides, I’m afraid you might kill me. So you’d better cooperate, Geraldine.”
He slipped an arm behind her neck to lift her up. She could smell sharp cologne, gingery soap, tangy sweat, feel the warmth emanating from his body.
He held the glass to her mouth and she drank thirstily, not caring if it dribbled.
“That’s it,” he said. He lowered the glass and, still holding her, brought his lips to her hair, not letting them touch her skin, but she could feel his heavy breath against it. “Your perfume is different,” he whispered, inhaling.
“If you kiss me, Roman, so help me God, I’ll kill you.”
He giggled. “I was actually thinking of licking you.” Instead—half to her disappointment—he lowered her back onto the pillow and got off the bed. “But you know, Ger, you are my prisoner, so you should probably stop saying things like that. Because my little dick is working really well right now.”
She was speechless for a moment, uncertain what he was doing. She couldn’t buy Roman as a rapist, but then, she hadn’t imagined he was capable of pulling off anything like this, either. It had to be some kind of roleplay that he thought she wanted. She could tell him to stop, that he was frightening her, and find out.
But she wasn’t sure she wanted to.
Then he gave her his genuine smile, and she felt herself relax. Only for a moment, until the anger returned.
“May I ask where you’re taking me?”
“Mmmm... sure I guess. We’re going to my private island.”
“Your what?”
“What? It's a billionaire thing. I bought it as soon as the deal went through, to take the edge off not having a future. It's got a mansion on it and everything. I figured someday I might live on it with my wife."
“And raise your children on a private island?”
“What children? Do I seem like a person who should have children to you?”
“Where is this island located?”
Ah-ah-ah, Ger. Naughty. I’m not telling you anything like that.”
“You know you can’t get away with this, Roman.” She couldn’t believe the clichés coming out of her mouth, but she couldn’t think of any other way to say it. “We are both very high-profile people. Our disappearance won't go unnoticed."
“Yeah, I know you're an important business bitch, Gerri. And look at you now. Tied up. Helpless. At my mercy. Hot.”
She could see the bulge in his pants, so that part wasn’t playacting.
“My daughters will look for me,” she pointed out. “And if you disappear too, it will be obvious what happened.”
“Will it, though? Are they really going to think I fucking kidnapped you?” He started picking up bits of food from a charcuterie board and either staring at them and putting them back or eating them. “I mean, they didn’t even believe it when I said I jerked off in your bathroom. If anything, they’ll think we eloped. In fact, I may have left behind a few hints to that effect.”
“If my daughters never hear from my again, they will know that something’s happened to me.”
“But will they, Ger? Or will they assume that you found something better to do?”
She stared at him. Felt her throat constrict. “I hate you, Roman,” she said at last, her voice barely above a whisper.
He winced, but only for a moment. “See? I told you so.”
She felt the tear slide down her cheek. In a second he was at her side, wiping it away with a tissue, still being careful not to touch her skin with his fingers. “Don’t cry, Gerr-Bear. I don’t want you to be afraid. I’m not going to do anything without your consent. Well I mean, other than the whole premise.”
Her stomach growled. They both laughed. The hysterical laughter bubbled out of her, fizzing over.
“I’ve got some food over there,” he said. “Do you want me to feed you?”
“Do I have a choice?” she asked.
“Of whether you eat or not, yeah. I mean within reason. Of whether I feed you or not, no.”
“Then yes. Feed me.”
She saw his eyes widen and then narrow with excitement at the words. He leapt off the bed to do her bidding, and the feeling that gave her competed, however weakly, with her hunger and aches and anger.
*
After she’d eaten, she told him she had to use the bathroom.
“No. 1 or No. 2?”
“What difference does it make?”
“Because you probably want a heads-up if I’m gonna be wiping your ass.”
“You will not be doing anything of the kind, Roman. You will untie me immediately and let me use the washroom by myself. Where am I going to go?”
“I don’t know but I want you like this until we get to the island and if I untie you completely I don’t think I’m getting you back into the ropes without a fight, and that’s not the kind of wrestling I want to do with you.”
“Well you’re not helping me urinate so if you don’t untie me, I’m going to piss the bed.”
"Your choice.”
She realized too late that she should have said she was going to shit the bed (or defecate, if she wanted to avoid the joke).
“I’ll do it, Roman.”
He snorted. “No you won’t.” He was leaning against the pillow with the arm that was next to her tucked behind his head. At some point while she was unconscious he’d changed into khaki pants and a black T shirt. She could just see a bit of armpit hair sticking out of the shirt, and she’d never noticed before how strong his upper arms looked. Not that she had many opportunities to see him in short sleeves. Not since he’d become a man, anyway.
“Stare much, Ger?”
She turned her head quickly. “I guess I’m going to need your help,” she hissed.
Once he’d untied her feet and removed the rope connecting her hands and feet, they went into the bathroom, Roman behind her.
She stood by the toilet. He stood in front of her, playing with his ear.
“Uh, so, how do you want to....”
She took charge. “Pull down my pantyhose. And my panties. And I hope you remember what you said about consent.”
She expected him to make some joke, but instead he wet his lips and just said, “I remember,” before getting on his knees. He reached up under her skirt and slid his hands along her outer thighs and hips until he found the top of her pantyhose, then began to peel them down, slowly, with a gentleness that surprised her. His fingers left a trail of gooseflesh where they’d touched, and she had to suppress a shudder of pleasure. When he'd got them down to her calves, he went back for her underwear, touching even more gingerly. Once they were past her ass, he glanced up at her and kept his gaze on her face as he kept pulling.
"Don’t look at me,” she said quietly, and he looked away, off to the side, until they were all the way down. “Now I think you can leave, don’t you?”
To her relief, he let her piss in peace, but of course that was only a few seconds, and then there was no avoiding what she needed him to do.
She called him back in. Again, he just stood in front of her. “Well?” She snapped. “Get some fucking toilet paper. I’ll never forgive you for this, you know,” she continued as he pulled a length off the roll.
“I don’t have a choice,” he said, his voice small. Irritatingly childlike. “I just want you with me.”
Something snapped. She got to her feet, which caused her to fall forward. Roman put his hands on her waist to steady her, then let her go. She brought her bound hands up and threw her arms over his head, resting them on his shoulders. Her breasts were squished up against his chest, their faces and crotches inches apart. She could feel drops of urine trickling down her inner thighs. He didn’t know where to put his hands at first, but they settled on her hips.
“Do you want to fuck me, Roman?” she demanded.
“Yeah,” he breathed. “I do.”
She licked his neck up to his jaw and bit it hard, drawing a moan out of him. Still he didn’t draw her closer, didn’t kiss her.
They’d kissed only once, on the yacht, when he asked if he could see her in her room, where he’d told her how he’d thought about her while he was being held hostage. “I realized I don’t have many regrets. But I knew if I never made it out of there, there’s something I’d regret never telling you.”
“What’s that?” she’d asked, suddenly far more excited than she thought she should be.
“Laird wants to give you cooties. I mean it, he’s angling to be the new Mr. Gerr-Bear, so you’d better keep your minxy charm in check, because you’re acquiring unwanted admirers.”
“I see. Well, thanks for the warning. If there’s nothing else...”
“I want to kiss you, Mole Woman,” he’d said, and it was like all of the air in the room had become electric.
“Under the circumstances,” she replied, “I think that might be permitted.”
It was a chaste kiss, but tender, and afterwards she’d felt such fondness she’d stroked his cheek with her thumb and then wiped her lipstick off his lips. “Now you’d better get out of here, Rock Star.”
All of that seemed like a million years ago.
“What are you waiting for?” she demanded. “I want you. Have I made that clear enough?”
She couldn’t remember the last time she’d wanted to fuck this badly. She wanted it raw, and disgusting, and depraved.
“Gerri.” He pulled her into him at last, letting her feel him hard against her, and pressed his mouth to hers, his stubble digging into her face, hurting delightfully. A few seconds of frantic kissing and he was pushing her away again.
“What’s wrong?”
“Not like this. I don’t want it like this.”
“I don’t understand. Isn’t this what I’m here for?”
He flinched as if she’d struck him. “Gerri, I want you to love me.”
She gaped at him, and then the laughter came out of her again, bubbling up her throat. His stricken expression only made it worse.
He extricated himself from her arms and got back on his knees to put her back together.
“Oh leave the fucking pantyhose,” she told him.
He helped her out of them and she returned to the bedroom, getting back on the bed.
“Do you want me to leave your feet untied?” He was leaning against the bathroom doorway.
“Either untie me or tie me up all the way.”
He came and stood over her, looking her up and down, his face miserable. In the end he got the rope and started binding her feet again. “We’re almost there,” he said. “Another hour maybe.”
“I don’t care.” She closed her eyes, feeling sulky like a toddler, and so tired that despite her discomfort she fell asleep again almost immediately.
*
It was daylight when they landed on the island. Without her phone, and with the time she’d lost while she was unconscious, she had no sense of how many hours had passed since she was in his apartment. It couldn’t be much, since she didn’t eat much but wasn’t that hungry, but then again that could be nerves.
Roman insisted on carrying her to the house.
“I weigh a bit more than a feather, Roman.”
“So? I can lift a bit more than a feather. I can lift a whole fucking basket of feathers if I have to.”
“You have a bad back. That’s visible.”
He gathered her in his arms and lifted her from the bed, trying to suppress his grimace.
“Could you shut up, please? I’ve got this pictured a certain way.”
“You putting your back out trying to carry me?”
“I have a gag and I know how to use it.”
She was surprised by how secure she felt as he carried her down the steps of the plane. She could smell the ocean in the air, the sky was a vivid blue with a dusting of clouds, the tropical foliage radiant. It was the very cliché of Paradise. She and Baird had never been tropical climate vacationers, always choosing Europe—art and history. But this configuration of nature impressed her, she had to admit it.
There was a car parked near the airstrip, and the pilot now assumed driving duties. She wondered what kind of nefarious activities the man had been up to in the past if he could agree to facilitate something like this, and it made her shudder. She turned her attention to the mansion. The Spanish touches made her think she must be in the Caribbean, which made her heart beat faster. She wasn’t that far from home. The pilot/driver/henchman held the door open for them as Roman carried her over the threshold, and as they passed him she managed to spit in his face, which wasn’t bad considering she’d never tried it before.
It made Roman giggle, of course. “Easy now, Geraldine. Save something for the bedroom.”
“Fuck you.” That was as witty as she was capable of being right now, apparently, as she trembled with adrenaline. “We’re inside, now untie me.”
“Not in your mood. Anyway my plan is to carry you to your bedroom, so that’s what’s going to happen.”
“‘My’ bedroom? I get my own?”
“We already talked about that.”
It was like a scene from a movie, being carried up a grand staircase, beneath a chandelier, to her bedroom. Only in this version of that movie, she was tied up like a trussed chicken, a thought that only intensified the arousal that had been gathering all that time on the plane as they lay on the bed side by side, not quite touching. She had found out then what she’d barely suspected before, that he made her body come alive, filled it with longing for him. But there was something else too, a memory: when she was a child, coming home late from a family night out or a visit, and her father would pull her out of the backseat of the car and carry her to bed. She would wake up just a little, just enough to know it was happening, in a twilight state of semi-consciousness. It was one of the best feelings she’d ever had, like flying, and flying in darkness, making a journey through space without any visual awareness of her surroundings. Trusting her body completely to someone else’s safekeeping.
She wondered whether, if he put her down on the bed and tried to have his way with her at last, she’d fight him. Instead he deposited her on her feet next to the bed and untied them, getting on his knees again to do it, and then reached up to untie her hands.
The moment her hands were free, she slapped him across the face, and kept hitting him.
“What did you think you were doing?” She was aware that she was screaming, although it felt like she was standing outside of herself, watching and listening. Who was that unhinged, screaming woman? “You drugged me! What the fuck was going through your mind? Is there any kind of mind in there at all? Are you even real? Are you?”
Roman didn’t try to get out of the way of her blows, just raised his arms in front of his face. They were clumsy blows anyway, her joints stiff from hours of immobility. So she stopped hitting him and grabbed a handful of his hair, tugging viciously, which elicited a satisfying “Fucking OW!” from him. When she let go he fell on the floor, curled up, arms still over his face, and she collapsed on the bed and started sobbing. Huge, gaping sobs that seemed to reach back to the death of her husband, the deaths of her parents, regrets about her daughters, even sorrow at the loss of fucking Waystar Royco. It was more than she’d cried in a decade, and when at last it was over she realized she was alone.
She was lying on cream-colored covers, beneath a canopy, in a room with windows that surrounded the bed in a semi-circle, looking out on the serene blue ocean. A shower. That was what she wanted now. And once she was in the shower, she knew she wanted food next.
The closet was full of clothes. Of course it was. The drawers were full too. Silk panties and bras ranging from the practical to the fanciful, in every color, in her correct size—she didn’t even want to think about how Roman had figured that out, and yet it didn’t surprise her. She wondered if anything would ever surprise her again. There was an array of silk pyjamas (variations on her Tern Haven attire, it didn’t require a genius to work out). There were numerous bathing suits, including a skimpy two-piece that made her gape. What an imagination that boy had.
She selected a simple lounging outfit, also cream-colored, and some comfortable slip-on shoes, and paused to look at herself in the mirror before going downstairs. She looked exactly like a 62-year-old woman who’d just spent 20 minutes crying. But this wasn’t a situation for makeup, which she had long ceased to think of as anything other than a professional necessity, in any case. And she looked pretty. Didn’t she? Or was that only for the young?
She found him in the kitchen, stirring something in a bowl. When he saw her his face tried to light up but then contorted in trepidation. His face was so open sometimes it was like a puppet theatre, watching the emotions on it. There was a mark forming by his eye where her ring must have connected with bone.
She noticed an open box on the counter.
“Pancakes?” she said.
“Yeah.”
“Have you ever made pancakes before?”
“No.”
“Not with your mom or dad?”
“No. Sometimes I’d watch the cook make them, when I was little. There are lots of prepared meals in the freezer, I just thought if I made you something it might make you feel better. Yeah I know, it probably doesn’t make up for... what I did. But you’re hard to figure out, Gerri. I wasn’t getting through to you, so I thought that if I did something for you that no one else would be willing to do... but maybe I was wrong. I don’t know.”
She stepped closer to him. “You’d better give that to me.”
“No. Fuck you. I’m making them.”
“You can help me, Roman,” she said calmly. “But first let me show you how to do it.”
“Fine.”
He handed the bowl to her.
“Have you got a pan ready? And some butter?”
Soon they were seated in the breakfast nook, which also looked out on the ocean, with a stack of pancakes.
“See?” Roman ventured to say after they’d eaten in silence for a few moments. “This is nice, isn’t it? Our own Breakfast Club. We’ve got the ocean, we’ve got pancakes. We’ve got an island to ourselves. We—”
“Is it your plan to keep me here until I fall in love with you?”
He cast his eyes down to his plate. “Well. That would be ideal. I don’t have it all planned, exactly.”
“You seem like you’ve done a lot of planning. All that clothing. In my sizes?”
He glanced up again, and she marvelled, not for the first time, at how quickly he could get aroused. “Did you... look in the drawers?”
She lifted her chin. “Yes, and I put on some clean underwear if that’s what you want to know.” His cheek twitched a little. “Snap out of it, Roman. How did you do it?”
“Your assistant who grew scruples and quit over Cruises—I bribed her.”
“I see. Selective scruples.”
“I guess she didn’t think you deserved privacy.”
“And when did you do all of this shopping. Not in the week after—.” She stopped herself.
“After what?”
“After you found my Letterboxd account.”
The corners of his mouth quirked upward at the admission. “No. I started buying things for you after I bought the place. I had a fantasy of us living here together. But I didn’t know how I was going to make that happen. Until you showed me the way. Or your movies did.”
“Are you telling me you’d never watched kidnapping porn before?”
“I don’t watch a lot of porn. You know, sometimes I just see something on TV, or I hear about a news story, and a thing gets stuck in my head, and it does its own thing with it. That's all I need."
“What would you have done with all of this if that hadn’t happened?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Dress up in your clothes and jerk off until my dick rots off. Become a paranoid recluse who drinks his own wee-wee to neutralize Bill Gates’s mind-control chip and dies with your name on my lips as I drop a Pandora’s box full of dicks. I’m kidding. But. More or less.” He shoved a forkful of pancake in his mouth.
“And if, once we get to know each other, I don’t fall in love with you. What then?”
His face fell mid-swallow, and then became unreadable. It could be that way sometimes too: a mask. “Then I hope that your retirement years are very happy here.”
“Are you serious, Roman? You would keep me a prisoner here permanently.”
He met her eyes. “If that’s the only way you’ll let me have you.”
She glared straight into his eyes, but it was several seconds before he looked away.
“Or, other option,” he said. “If you really hate it here, you kill me in my sleep.”
For a horrified moment, she wondered if that’s what she was really here for.
Then he continued, looking her in the face again, “But that’s probably not a good idea, because I’ve got the only means of communication with the mainland, and I keep it in a safe. We’ve got enough food and shit to last us six months, and no one’s bringing more until I give the word.” He smirked at her and nodded at her plate. “Eat your pancakes before they get cold.”
She was so turned on her mind was paralyzed, but her hand moved automatically to obey him.
“Good girl. I'll take you to the beach after.” He took another pancake from the stack. “I’m dying to see you in one of those bathing suits.”
*
They settled into a routine of lazy, domestic days. Pancake mornings, beach afternoons, movies or board games in the evenings. Roman, it turned out, was a board game collector with a special interest in the 80s and 90s, and they had over a thousand games to choose from. They were usually high in the evenings: Roman had no booze in the place, giving her edibles instead, convinced it was better for her. The prepared meals, she learned, had been overseen by a dietitian who was aware of her age and had designed a heart-healthy meal plan for her. They also had their own vegetable garden, which filled them with consternation, and gardening books to pore over. It made her think, with regret, about Baird signing them up for the community garden, how she’d never gone with him after the first time although he’d planned it as an activity for them. Hannah had loved it, though.
At night she put her pyjamas on and brushed her teeth and got into bed and he tied her up.
“I know it’s irrational,” he told her, “but I get afraid that I’m going to wake up and you’ll be gone.”
“You think I’m going to drown myself in the ocean to get away from you, Roman?”
“No, but I think you might turn into a mermaid and swim away. Turn back into a mermaid, I mean, because I know you’re not human.”
“You always say the sweetest things.”
“You’re a fairy’s child, Geraldine.”
“I’m a filing cabinet. Boring, blah wallpaper.”
“That was your public profile. We’re our true essences now, and yours is mermaid.”
“And what’s yours?”
“You have to decide that.”
The first night, as he was about to leave she asked him to stay with her. “I can’t be by myself like this. I’m too afraid.”
“That’s fine. I’ll sleep on the couch.”
"You can sleep on the bed. I’m not the one being a prude. Or are you afraid I’ll try to seduce you without even moving?”
“You could do it. But okay. I usually sleep in the nude when I’m by myself, with something on if I’m with a girlfriend.”
“What does this situation more closely resemble, in your mind?”
He hesitated a moment, then pulled his shirt over his head.
“By yourself, then? I’ll try to be flattered.”
She kept her eyes on him. He removed his belt, let it drop to the floor, then hesitated again.
“Do you mind?” he said. “You’re staring.”
“Roman, I’ve seen it. Many times. Many, many times.”
“Not in person. And not with the rest of me attached to it.”
“I think that’s much more attractive.”
His face flushed and a little moan escaped from him. She could hear her own excited breathing. He unzipped his pants and let them drop, standing in his briefs with his erection stretching them out so much his balls were visible. It was her turn to moan. He climbed under the covers before pulling them off and tossing them on the floor.
Her movement wasn’t so constricted that she couldn’t manoeuvre her hands into a position that allowed her to slide her middle finger between her legs and rub her clit. But it wasn’t especially effective, on her back and through all of the layers.
“You’re going to have to help me, here, Roman. I can’t come this way. I need your assistance.”
“You can do that tomorrow. I told you, I’m not touching you.”
“I don’t recall you having this many scruples when we worked together.”
“I didn’t have any way to impress you then.”
“And you think you do now?”
“Who else would do what I’ve done for you, Gerri?”
Her cunt throbbed violently in response to that.
“Then can’t you do just this one little thing for me?”
“When your voices gets all girly and breathy like that it drives me fucking crazy. I hope you know that. I hope you know how fucking hard I am right now.”
“Rome. Please. I won’t be able to sleep like this.”
“You can lie awake all night and think about how much you want this cock for all I care.” She moaned again. “Just keep telling me about it. I never thought I’d be lying in bed with you listening to you literally beg me to fuck you. You’re sick, Gerri. Imagine if the shareholders could see you now. Or the board? What would they say if they knew that the only thing that really gets you off is the thought of my grubby little gremlin hands all over you? You’re a classic stuck-up bitch, thinking no one can see how thirsty you are. But I see you. Everyone does.”
She was sweating, not only from arousal, but from the futile effort she was exerting.
“Touch my breast, just a little," she pleaded.
“Touch it how?”
“Put your mouth on it. Just for a second.”
“My mouth? You want me to suck it? You want to breastfeed me, Gerri?” He laughed, and her face burned. “That is truly vile. You want me to call you Mommy too?”
“Do you know how breasts work, Roman?” she snapped. “They’re a major erogenous zone for many women, quite apart from any perverted associations your depraved little mind can conjure up.”
“Yes, Mommy, I hear you, your tits are a major erogenous zone.”
She wished she could slap the smirk off his face, but it didn’t matter because he was unbuttoning her top at last, then pushing it aside. And then he just hovered over her, staring.
He ran a hand through his hair, making a mess of it.
“You’ve got great breasts,” he announced at last. “They’re just... I don’t know how to describe it. Really hot.”
She lost patience. “Hurry the fuck up, Roman!”
He took her nippled in his mouth and shoved a hand down her pyjamas bottoms. She was coming within thirty seconds, the pleasure filling every part of her, chasing away all uncomfortable thoughts and sensations for as long as it lasted. Which was never long at all.
He got off the bed. “I’m just going to, uh, take care of this. In the bathroom.”
“You can do it here,” she said.
He hesitated. “Can I look at you while I do it?”
“Of course.”
He got back on the bed and straddled her legs, at first looking down at her waist, but as he picked up speed and got closer, he pinned his eyes to her chest.
“Hey. Roman. Why don’t you look at my face.”
He looked up, meeting her eyes, then down again. “Um, is it okay with you if I—?”
“Look at me.”
They locked gazes.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” she said, and that’s what pushed him over the edge. Predictably. He covered her breasts in his slime, even managed to get a streak over her bottom lip.
“I’m sorry.” He was out of breath, red-cheeked, stricken, laughing. “I’m so fucking sorry, Gerri. I’ll clean you up.”
“Do that,” she replied coolly, and darted her tongue out to taste him experimentally. “With your tongue.”
*
They didn’t repeat that episode, although he always had an erection and she was always ready to fuck by the time he’d tied her up.
Instead they talked about their families, their childhoods, their past relationships. Voices floating in the dark, confessions with faces hidden.
He told her about how hard his parents’ divorce had been on him. She had known that, of course. She had watched that marriage fail and knew it would be hardest on Roman. Not Shiv, who took refuge in hating her mother, or Ken, who was closer to his father.
“I would have done anything to keep Mum with us. I would have tied her up to force her to stay. Even though I knew they weren’t happy. That didn’t matter to me, just that I needed them both.”
“Is that what this is about?”
“Probably a bit. No one has ever comforted me the way you do, Gerri. Maybe my mum did, before I can even remember. But I doubt it.”
“But you do understand you can’t use another person as a therapy animal. Not even your mother, although God knows she should have been a better one.”
“You say that, but... I’m doing it.”
She couldn’t argue with that.
*
After three months their hair was getting long and her roots were growing out white. The last time she’d seen her natural hair color it had been brown. She liked the way they looked, the white curls. Thought she might grow it long.
Still she said to him, as they lay on their deckchairs on the beach, shaded by palms, “I don’t suppose you’d consider venturing into an urban centre for an afternoon so we could have our hair done.”
“Mm, funny thing, I wouldn't, no."
She’d found herself wondering, more and more, how much of this was a game, and how much of that game was being enacted for her benefit. If she demanded that he let her go, would he? She didn’t want to know if he would, and she didn’t want to know if he wouldn’t.
They were into the rainy season now, downpours at night and sudden showers during the day. The world fresh and glistening and virginal every morning.
“What if there’s a hurricane?” she’d asked him the other day. “Would we leave then?”
“Why? We can hide out in the wine cellar. If Richard Branson can do it, we fucking can."
She hadn't pushed then, but now she felt like it. “You can’t expect us to live here, just the two of us, forever. It’s a recipe for murder.”
“It’s a small island, but it’s a big house. Besides, we get along really well, Gerri.”
She couldn’t argue with that, either. It was frustrating, how little he gave her to argue with, considering that he was a delusional fantasist.
She didn’t miss Waystar at all. It seemed like another world, unreal. She had always thought she’d hate retirement, and probably she would have, but with the choice taken away from her, there was no guilty need to keep busy, to prove herself through achievement. Struggling with the garden, that was enough, just like a real retiree. She couldn’t remember a time when her identity hadn’t been tied up in achievement, but now Roman’s obsession with her justified her existence. And maybe a part of her had been afraid that if she ever stopped being the stone cold killer bitch he’d known all his life, he wouldn’t be interested in her anymore. But it truly was enough for him, it seemed, for her to be near him.
And her life had never felt more meaningful.
“I’m sorry about the dick pics.”
She wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “What?”
“Ever since that morning you helped me with my buttons—I don’t know if you remember that—”
“The buttons made of soap. I remember.”
He glanced at her, evidently surprised that she remembered the conversation in that much detail. “That’s right. I forgot about that. Ever since that morning, or even before that, when you protected me in Japan, in my head, when I talk to myself, I talk to you. I tell you about myself, and I imagine that you think I’m interesting, and that makes me interesting to myself. I want you to know me. And I think that’s why it happened. It was like a wearing-your-heart-on-your-sleeve thing, maybe. I dunno. Only I figured you’d rather see my dick than my heart.”
She tried hard to process all of the meanings and implications of what he’d just said. “Literally or metaphorically?” she asked at last.
“Both?”
She was silent after that, looking out at the sand, the sea, the sky, each a kind of beautiful emptiness.
“And?” she heard him say.
“And?”
“Don’t you also have an apology?”
“For?”
“For not protecting me in Italy.”
“I never did anything while I was working for your father to protect you. That was your fantasy. When I looked after your little rocket ship problem, I was doing my job. When I protected the interests of the shareholders during the sale of your father’s company, I was doing my job.”
“When you told me to come to you for advice, were you doing your job?”
“I wasn’t doing anything that conflicted with it. I did want to help you. I did think you had more potential than anyone gave you credit for, including yourself. But if you want to hear that I did it because I loved you—”
“Okay, okay. Fucking—skip it.”
He got out of his chair, started walking toward the water, pulling his shirt off. She watched him wade in up to his waist, sink down and disappear, then pop up again.
She awoke when his hand touched her arm. “Wake up, Sleeping Beauty.”
He was kneeling next to her, wet hair dripping, a goofy smile on his face. “I dreamt that there was a storm," she told him, half-awake, "and you were swimming far out, like an idiot, getting further and further out and tinier and tinier and I tried to call to you but you couldn’t hear me over the wind.”
“Hmm. Sounds like you like me just a little. Your plausible deniability is wearing thin.”
He reached around to grasp the back of her head and pulled her toward him. His lips tasted like ocean. They opened for her and their tongues touched just for a moment before she pulled away and looked at him.
“Hi,” he smiled.
“Roman, I have to go back. I have to see my daughters.”
She had braced herself for his hurt when she finally said it, but she hadn’t been prepared for him to look angry.
“Really. When is the last time you visited your daughters, Gerri?”
“That’s the point, maybe. That’s the sort of thing I’ve had time to think about here. All the things I should have told them long ago. And I have grandchildren. And Hannah is diabetic, and I haven’t seen my youngest grandchild since she was diagnosed with autism, and I worry about them and wonder how they’re doing.”
He got to his feet, not looking at her. Instinctively, she grasped his wrist.
“But Roman, I’ll come back. I want to come back.” She felt the first drops on her shoulders and chest.
He looked her right in the eyes, his own flashing with anger, sadness beneath. “You won’t, though.”
“I will. I promise you.”
“Let go of me.”
She withdrew her hand and he turned and walked off, away from the house, through the trees, as the rain started to come down. She thought about following him, but decided it was better to leave him alone. He would have to come back soon, if the rain didn’t stop.
That shower lasted less than half an hour, but by 10 o’clock he wasn’t back, and it had started to pour.
Dozens of scenarios flashed through her mind; some of them she developed into full-blown scenes. Suicide? No, he wasn’t Ken. His Charles Foster Kane/Howard Hughes scenario was more likely. More likely still, he’d go back to New York, get over her, and find some other therapy MILF to lavish attention on. Just like he'd said he was going to do.
What then? An accident? Leaving her with no ability to find him, get help for him, or get off the island? The safe with the communication equipment, she was sure that was in his bedroom, but she couldn’t get into it. Wouldn’t that be a fitting end for her, after all of her inadequacies as a wife, a mother, a grandmother, after all of the scruples she’d strangled to become a success in the corporate world: dying alone on an island as the result of a kinky adventure. And of a love (she whispered it to herself) that she had never begun to properly value and had never known how to enjoy—until these past months.
She felt him standing in her doorway before she was aware of his breathing.
“Where the fuck were you?” she asked.
“I came back hours ago. I was in my bedroom.”
“I was scared to death.”
“I’m sorry. I needed some time to myself, I didn’t know you’d get worried. Can I come in?”
“Of course.” She aimed her remote at the TV and turned it off as he came toward the bed. He sat near her feet, facing her.
“I booked you a flight to New York for tomorrow afternoon. A boat’s coming in the morning to take you to the city.”
“Thank you. I’m glad I won’t have to see that pilot again. Igor, or whoever.”
He grinned. “Yeah, I figured you’d prefer to take your chances with the masses in first class.”
His hand moved, without his awareness it seemed, onto her leg, and he took hold of her calf over her silk pyjamas bottoms. But then he did become aware of it, and started to stroke her calf with his thumb, which was soon sending waves of arousal through her. Such a tiny touch, such a dumbfounding effect.
“Are you coming with me?” she asked.
“No. If I do, I’ll probably never see you again. Not like this, anyway. Whereas if I stay here, maybe you’ll think about me waiting for you, and you will come back.”
“That’s emotional blackmail.”
“You’re talking to a kidnapper.”
She wanted to come back. She believed, right now, that she would. But she wouldn’t promise him again, because she was afraid, too. Afraid that all of this would seem as unreal to her in that other world as it seemed to her now. Afraid that she would turn back into that person that she now almost hated.
“I’m going to tell them about us.”
“Going to tell them... what? You’re going to tell your daughters that I kidnapped you as a favor?”
“That might be more information than they need about me. But I’m going to tell them that I’ve been with you. That we’re together.”
He looked surprised, then touched, then contemplative, but he said nothing, his thumb still moving.
“Are you going to tie me up tonight?” Her voice was barely more than a whisper. She wished he would, that he would tie her up and keep her tied up when the boat came for her. Put the gag on her, stop her from screaming until all hope of rescue was gone.
“No. No point, now. Besides.” His hand slid up to her knee. “I was hoping you might still want to. You know. Fuck.”
Her cunt throbbed at the word, but she tried to keep her voice steady. “I thought you had conditions about that.”
“Yeah but there’s some wiggle room. Under the circumstances. You get one for free. Next time you have to love me.”
“Okay then,” she replied. “Next time.”
He looked at her like he couldn’t have heard her right. Then he lowered his chin and gave her his slyest, horniest smile. He let go of her leg and did what she had been waiting for him to do ever since he’d made the idle threat in another epoch...
...he Pounced.
She would think back on that night the next day on the plane, an invisible old lady who drew the gaze of no one unless they were thinking fondly of their grandmother. And again in the rare moments to herself when she was visiting her daughters. Playing with her grandkids, who were happy with any attention, and navigating Hannah’s prickly moods and Abby’s abysses of sarcasm as she made her first, ineffectual attempts to make up for decades of resentment that would take decades to heal. And on top of that, being told that she was choosing Roman Roy over her own grandchildren, being made to feel that she had to stay longer, and stay longer.
She thought back to the way he’d worshipped her with his eyes and mouth, touched her so reverently and gazed at her with such depravity, and how when he was finally inside her it felt so divinely sinful, like they were breaking some unnameable taboo. But all of that started to fade eventually, like a dream in the cold light of day, and she wasn’t sure anymore if she was remembering it correctly, only had a vague impression of his Margaret Keane eyes. Like they'd swallowed up all of the rest of him.
The other memory she went back to constantly was of her final glimpse of him as she left the island. She’d wanted to hug him, or kiss him, or make some gesture, but she was too self-conscious in front of a stranger, so finally she just grasped him by the wrist again.
“Come with me,” she said, putting all of the emotion she felt in the urgency of her voice without raising it.
He shook his head, his eyes concealed behind his sunglasses. “There’s nothing for me there anymore, Ger.”
“But if we—?” If they what? Lived together? Got married?
“It wouldn’t work out there.” He extricated his hand and brought hers to his cheek for a moment.
She watched him from the boat as he got smaller and smaller, waving to her from the shore, until he was a speck. She had to use all of the self-restraint she’d cultivated over the years to keep herself from testing out his mermaid theory by plunging in the water and swimming back to him.
But he didn’t try to contact her after she got back. She checked her phone hourly for the first few days, but there was nothing. And the days became weeks and months.
Until on her third week at Hannah’s, after climbing into the single bed in the ugly, impersonal guest room, she broke down and sent him a text: I’d welcome a dick pic right now.
The dots appeared immediately, and she wondered for a moment just what he had in store for her, but he used his words.
Miss you every minute. Come back to me.
She typed her response immediately, hesitating only a moment before sending it: Kidnap me again.
And then she curled up and drifted into the best sleep she’d had since she’d left the island.