Page 29 of Tap My TOKTIK

HARLAN

This has to be a fucking a joke. I should leave because none of the possible outcomes of this end well. She just sits there, casually drinking her gin like she didn’t describe what we did together in minute detail for the entire world to read. She even described the slight kink in my dick, and anyone who has read the damn book will know I swing to the right. Then there’s the thing about me having an oral conversation with her clit — I think that’s what she called it. She certainly didn’t water anything down.

I’ve never in all my life felt so used or so exploited. I want to grab her by her throat and ask her what the fucking hell she was thinking, but at the same time I want to hear her say those things to me. Read it out loud, speak that filth in my ear. As angry as I am, her writing turned me on, the same way she does. Even now, sitting here beside me looking like sin in heels, I know she’s sweating. She said if she’s nervous she talks and sweats. Tonight she isn’t talking though — she is deathly quiet, watching everything and anything but me. My sister asks if she can take a picture of the three of us together for social media and Olivia politely agrees. She smiles and leans in close enough that I can smell her perfume. It’s the same one. I remember. I remember everything about her, which has been the problem all this time. Now she’s here — and I’m so fucking angry I can’t even look at her in the eye.

“Birdie,” I say to my sister who is over-excited. “That’s enough. Let the lady enjoy her evening. I’m sure she doesn’t want to end up on TikTok or whatever you’re doing.” Olivia makes a small gasping sound when I say TikTok. I know she saw it, and she knows full well that I know it. My sister has already befriended half the guests sitting with us, and easily slides into their conversation, leaving me and Olivia sitting in awkward silence.

I lean over and whisper in her ear. “You wrote a book about me.”

“You read it?” she asks, horrified.

“Not all of it.” She seems relieved by that fact, now I want to go home and finish the thing. “But enough.”

“You didn’t finish it?”

“Not yet,” I reply.

“Don’t,” she whispers. “Please don’t. Just forget it exists. Forget it, forget me. Pretend none of it happened.”

“That’s the problem, Olivia. I can’t.”

“Cecilia,” she whispers back. “I’m not Olivia tonight.” She looks around at all the people.

“I can’t forget, all I’ve thought about since that night is you. It’s a distraction, a problem. You just left — why?”

Her smile is genuine this time. “I saw your sister’s messages and thought you had a wife or girlfriend waiting for you. I’m no one’s other woman, so I ran.” I think back, my sister was being a sassy jackass that day because I missed dinner. Her texts could easily have been misread. It makes sense now, why Olivia just left.

“But you saw her video. You know I’m single. You didn’t even tap like on my TikTok. It was for you, you know. Before I read the fucking book.” Now I’m too angry to even think about why I did that. I wanted to catch her attention, and it seems I had already done that. She needed a muse, and I was it. I had her attention just long enough for her to use me as story fodder and toss me aside. I made a fool of myself on social media — for her. I’m such an idiot and I hate looking stupid. I’m fast starting to hate Olivia, or Cecilia, or whoever the fuck she really is. I don’t think she even knows.

“So now that you read it, you don’t want dessert anymore.” She has the gall to look pissed about it. “Fuck you, Harlan.” She shifts in her seat so she is no longer looking at me, a childish move. I’m not done talking to her. I lean close so I can whisper just behind her ear. “I want dessert, I just don’t want to share it with millions of horny housewives afterwards.” She snaps around, furious, her face the same the color as her hellfire hair. Fuck firetruck red, it’s hellfire. She reaches for her small purse, shoves her chair back with no grace at all, stands up and walks away.

My sister looks at me like I just committed a heinous crime, and most of the eyes at the table are on me. “You said that a bit loud,” Birdie informs me. Looking round us I realize I got carried away. Shit.

Olivia is storming towards an exit, and I watch, trying to decide if I should let her go or I follow her. What do I say to her after that? “Harlan, go get her,” my sister hisses, because everyone is glaring at me now. I stand up, button my suit jacket and walk towards the door I just saw her slip through. By the time I get there I see her going into the ladies’ room. Shit.

I pace up and down in the foyer outside. Two women come out together and look at me like I must be lost, then go back inside. I wait.

And I wait. Patience is not my virtue. I loathe waiting. I’m not waiting any longer.

I shove the door open and stride in like I belong in the ladies’ powder room. “Olivia,” I half-shout, wanting her to know I’m looking for her.

“Go away, Harlan.”

“This is the ladies room, dude. Leave a girl alone,” someone else answers.

“I’m not leaving, so anyone who isn’t Olivia should. I’ll close my eyes for two minutes and you can escape.” There’s a chuckle of laughter and the sound of a door unlatching. I close my eyes, but not all the way. I don’t want her making a run for it. Not again.

“Harlan, please just go away. I’ve called my driver, and I’m going home,” she sniffles. It sounds like she is crying. I made her cry. Fuck.

I knock on the only closed door. “Go. Away. Like away-away.”

“I’m sorry,” I tell her, which isn’t something I ever say. I don’t usually do things I need to apologize for later. “I was just mad. I read that book and—”

“It’s fine, Harlan. No one knew. Well, until now anyway.” She sounds so defeated. “Please just let me sit here and be alone until my driver arrives.”

“I can’t.” I can’t walk away. I don’t want to. I want to break the fucking door down and wrap my arms around her and apologize until she forgives me.

“You can. I promise it’s fine,” she says. I can hear her heels clicking on the floor as she moves around in there.