No Turning Back

As I showered after walking into the hotel suite with Harold, I felt as if something were chasing me. From somewhere, a voice that might have been my soul or pure instinct whispered.

You can run away this very second. If you want to.

But overnight, I had come to need money. A great deal of money.

I had long since thrown away his business card, so I had to reach Harold through Angela. Soon the phone rang with his call.

His voice sounded pleased.

That excited tone made every nerve in my body stand on end, like a porcupine bristling its quills.

"But how am I supposed to believe that what you're saying isn't a lie?"

Even though I had been the one to call first, the very fact of having this conversation with him filled me with anger.

"What if every word you said was just a ploy to sleep with me?"

For a long while, nothing came from the phone. Just as I was about to check the screen, wondering if the call had dropped—

A low voice broke the silence. He immediately set the meeting place as the bar of a five-star hotel in Knightsbridge.

Maybe it's all a trick. When I get to the bar he might be sitting there with other drivers. If they laugh at me for coming all this way to sell my body… Run. Don't cry on the spot.

After work, steeling myself for mockery, I headed there.

It was the absolute peak of the Christmas season. Christmas decorations filled the hotel from the exterior all the way inside, and the cocktail bar bustled with couples.

In the dim lighting I found Harold through a staff member. He was in a suit, alone, nursing a drink. Every nerve in my body stood on end again.

Harold had started to smile in welcome when he spotted me approaching; then he took in my expression and let out a faint sigh.

"Please, I'm begging you—relax a little."

But how on earth was I supposed to relax in this situation? I sat down, and a staff member approached. I didn't want to drink if I was going to keep my wits about me, yet ordering nothing would have looked strange, so I asked for a martini. The moment the staff left, Harold spoke.

"On the way here I kept turning over what you said, and I realized it's only natural you don't trust me. We don't really know each other… even though we've been running the same tracks for so long. But I thought about this for a long time and made the proposal seriously."

Having said that much, he toyed with his crystal glass before taking a sip.

"But no matter what I say, you won't believe me, will you?"

I answered with silence. Seeing my reaction, Harold sighed again.

"So I was thinking of writing you a check. An advance payment under the name of a deposit. Of course it won't happen, but if I reverse the contract you can keep it as compensation—no need to return it."

He pulled something from the inner pocket of his jacket and set it on the table.

"Or we could draw up the contract today. I've already prepared a draft. I can call a lawyer right now if you want."

It was a checkbook. Harold wrote something in it with the pen he had taken out along with it, then handed me the check once he had finished.

"How's this?"

I checked the amount and stared at it for a long time. As he had said, it was more than enough to serve as compensation.

"I… don't like perverted acts."

It was enough money to put out the fire that had just fallen on my feet.

"No tying up or being tied, no hitting or being hit, no tattoos or piercings, no eating weird things—I can't do any of that. I also don't want filming or adding other people."

At my words Harold flinched.

"I hadn't thought of anything like that at all… For now, I agree. I hate having our time alone interrupted, and filming would be more of a problem for me than for you."

That was true. A photo leak would matter far more to him than to an ordinary person like me.

Just then the staff member returned with the martini and set the glass down. Harold smiled at them. The moment they moved away he spoke again.

"I've booked a room. Want to go up?"

I stopped mid-motion as I was about to drink the martini.

"I want to get to know you before the season."

Everything comes with a price. It would have been a lie to say I hadn't expected this at all.

Showering in the hotel suite, I regretted to death something that had not even happened yet. I felt as if I were losing something.

But having come this far, I could not run. There were also reasons I could not run.

After roughly drying my wet hair and stepping out, Harold—who had finished showering first—was waiting for me. Sitting on the edge of the bed, his muscular upper body showed inside the open bathrobe.

At his gesture I approached him, trembling all over to an unsightly degree.

"Harold."

It would have been a lie to say I was not scared. I had his promise that he would not do anything strange, yet who knew what this man would actually do once we were on the bed? Moreover I had never done this kind of thing—escort service or whatever else one called sleeping with someone solely to satisfy them. My voice shook as I spoke his name.

What should I say? Please don't hurt me?

After that I had no idea what else to add.

"Call me Harry. We're going to get close now, after all."

As I drew near, Harold reached for my wet hair. I flinched. His hand brushed aside the bangs I had let hang to cover my left eye and tucked them behind my ear.

I squeezed my eyes shut tightly, then opened them. His large hand traced over my face—over the nearly invisible area around my eye.

"Take off your clothes. I want to see."

He spoke as if checking the quality of the product he had purchased. I closed my eyes, drew a deep breath, and slowly opened the robe to show him.

"Don't tremble. Can I touch?"

Harold was smiling—at least until then.

I bit my lower lip and nodded. His hand settled on my waist, then slowly rubbed down my lower abdomen and began heading toward my pubic bone.

That movement of his fingers—I squeezed my eyes shut because it was hard to watch what he was about to do to me, yet closing them only sharpened my hearing and sense of touch. His fingers dug into the most sensitive part of my skin.

I had thought Harold would be fast and aggressive in bed the same way he was behind the wheel, that he would focus on thrusting his cock into me and conquering. But he was leisurely—contrary to every expectation.

Was there anyone else in the world who could move their hands as quickly, yet as delicately and precisely, as an F1 driver? Changing a machine's settings with the dizzying array of buttons on the steering wheel according to ever-shifting race conditions was a driver's primary skill. A driver had to keep their eyes on the track, both hands on the wheel, and carefully operate the car while pressing a dizzying number of buttons. And now those same hands moved with exquisite care to handle me.

When Harold's right hand slipped between my legs I flinched.

"Stay just like that."

He covered my sex with his palm and gently found my clit with his thumb, rolling it. For a moment I thought a sound would escape. I locked my legs so I would not stagger. His other fingers, excluding the thumb, slowly curled.

"You know what, Hanna?"

While his thumb rubbed the clit nestled in the mound over my pubic bone, his index, middle, and ring fingers gently stroked my inner folds as he asked.

"I'm glad you accepted the proposal."

In truth his words barely registered. I was trying not to feel the sensations his fingers were giving me, and failing.

Parting the soft, wrinkled inner flesh that hung like curtains split to either side between my legs, the movement of scraping the entrance with his fingertips continued—delicate and relentless. Something began slowly climbing my spine. The stimulation that started from his fingers rose all the way to the crown of my head.

"I've always wanted to do this with you."

With every movement of his fingers the space between my legs grew wetter. Even while his index, middle, and ring fingers worked, his thumb very gently rubbed, pressed, and stroked my clit, delivering a different kind of stimulation from one second to the next. It felt as if every drop of blood in my body were rushing there.

I could feel that place swelling and twitching. Now I had to bite my lower lip hard enough that it almost drew blood—so no sound would escape. My legs trembled; I felt I might collapse.

"Harold."

Before I knew it both my hands were gripping the thick wrist that had dug into me.

"Wait. Harold. Stop…"

Clutching the veined wrist with both hands, I trembled and pleaded for him to pause—just for a moment—so that I would not completely catch fire under his touch.

"Take your hands off, Hanna. Don't interfere."

So that I would not scream.