Page 7 of Mister St. James

Then, in the spill of the overhead, she appears.

She’s in the corner of my vision, a flash of red at the center of the stage. She wears a mask of blackout lace with a shell underneath, lips painted a matching red so perfect it could have been applied by a laser. Her hair is pinned up, but I catch the glint of a curl escaping, the only disorder in an otherwise predatory package.

I run an algorithm in my head, hair color, height, posture, the exact angle at which her spine curves when she laughs. It fits, but the probability is less than fifty percent because the features of her face are more angular. My palms sweat, but I do not move.

Her corset is a lattice of satin and metal, so tight I can see the pulse in her neck from three tables away. The skirt is nothing, a handful of tulle strips that barely conceal the red high-cut panties underneath. She stretches her neck and I follow the motion of her hand as it slips down her throat right past a perfect, asymmetric heart, the color of weak coffee.

Recognition detonates in me. It is not slow, not even a process. It is a bullet to the fucking chest, a zero-day exploit that no firewall can hope to repel.

I nearly drop the glass.

It’s her. Catalina Vaquer. My assistant. The single most dangerous person in my life. The only one with root access to my routines, my habits, my fucking headspace. I replay the last six months of office interaction at ten thousand frames per second. Every arch of her brow, every flick of her pen, every time she smoothed her hair with the back of her hand. It all matches. Not just in movement, but in intent. I know it’s her because I know how her mind works. Because she makes it her job to know how mine does.

She doesn’t see me, not yet. Her focus is on the crowd, her body language telegraphing to every set of hungry eyes. I watch the performance with the same attention I give to complex code audits. Every gesture is a layer. She undulates her hips, but the real story is in her arms, bent, unbent, hands flexing in time with the music. When she kneels at the front of the platform, she lingers in that position, spine arched and head back, for a full five seconds. Long enough to make the crowd squirm, to make them ache for the next movement.

I feel like I am suffocating. I can’t breathe. I realize I’ve stopped, holding air in my chest as if I’m afraid of making noise. My heart pounds in my ears, in my fingertips, in my cock. The very place where hunger starts and ends. I run a hand over the rope at my neck. The touch grounds me for half a second, but it’s not enough.

My mind splits down the middle, logic and lust at war. I imagine her in my office, on Monday, tapping out memos and cross-referencing my schedule. I imagine her here, now, in this mask and nothing else, the taste of sweat and lipstick and the near-silent gasp of her breath when I wrap a rope around her wrists.

The crowd responds in waves. They clap, some shout. One asshole actually howls, but she ignores him, keeping her gaze locked on her own reflection. I watch as she slides a hand up her thigh, the slow drag of nails leaving red tracks. She’s good, better than anyone I’ve ever seen here, and that is saying something. But the act is not just for them. It’s for her. And, if she knew I was watching, maybe for me.

She moves to the front of the stage and starts the unlace. The audience holds its collective breath. She works the corset’s laces slowly, letting the tension mount. As the last loop gives way, the corset slips, baring the swell of her breasts, nothing vulgar, just enough to ignite the room. The crowd erupts. She keeps her head high, chin out, a challenge in the way she stares down the masked faces below. Her head turns, scanning the crowd, reveling in the attention, and then she looks directly at me.

My pulse flattens and my brain glitches. I feel exposed, like every part of myself that I usually keep locked away can suddenly be seen. My body wants to move, to act, claim and fuck her into next Tuesday. My mind wants to run, to compartmentalize, to stuff this experience into a folder and encrypt it. Neither wins.

I am rock hard, and it takes all my willpower to stay in my seat. This isn’t exhibitionism for me. It’s violence. I want to stand, to storm the stage, in full view of the other voyeurs and claim her, right here, right now. My grip on the whiskey glass is so tight my knuckles burn.

A voice intrudes, low and androgynous, the kind designed to melt resistance. “You’re just about drooling, Weaver.”

I look up, not startled but prepared. It’s the MC for tonight, a lean figure in a metallic catsuit and a mask shaped like a moth’s face. Their eyes are brown, wide, and, if I’m not mistaken, entirely sober.

“Don’t worry, she loves it,” they say, glancing sidelong at the stage. “Still, it’s more fun when you’re here. Are you working or playing?” They smile, a flash of teeth through a cutout in the mask.

I never answer questions directly, especially here. I tap the mask close to my eye.

Their gaze flicks to my hands, then back to my face. “Ahh, just observing for the night then.” They smile and reach out to touch the red rope around my neck. “If you change your mind and need a rope model, just say so.” I nod, and they drift off, hips rolling with the beat.

The only thing I can think about is her.

Catalina, with her perfect posture and her fuck-you lipstick and her mind like a bear trap. The Scarlet Muse, with her body on display and her soul just barely shielded by a sliver of red lace. The woman who, for nine months, has been outmaneuvering me at every turn, and who now has the receipts to prove it.

I finish the drink and leave, exiting through the same service corridor I used to enter. I don’t know what tomorrow will bring. I don’t know what it means to have found her here, or what it will cost to keep the secret between us. But I know this, I fucking want her, in every sense of the word. I want her tied, I want her untied, I want her in my bed and in my head and in my world.

I get home, strip off my clothes, and toss them in the hamper with a violence that surprises me. I stand in front of the bathroom mirror, hands braced on the sink, and try to see myself the way she might have seen me tonight: not as her boss, not as the man who pays her salary and signs her vacation requests, but as a peer, a predator, a partner.

My cock is still hard, still angry. I jerk off in the shower, fast and mean, biting down on my lip to keep from shouting her name. When I come, it’s explosive, splattering the tile, the spray of it almost enough to wash away the shame.

But the hunger remains.

I towel off, crawl into bed, and stare at the ceiling for a long time. Sleep doesn’t come easy. Only the memory of her, the impossible, undeniable fact that Cat, my Cat, is the Scarlet Muse.

I know what I have to do next.

I will reach out. Not as her boss, but as the Weaver. I’ll leave her a gift. An invitation. A test.

And if she’s as brilliant as I think she is, she’ll know exactly what it means.

Chapter five