CHAPTER 16

WILLA

“We need to wait until we’re married,” I demanded as I stopped Devin’s fingers from exploring as we sat on my sofa watching a movie.

“So, let’s do it already,” he whined. “How long are you gonna make me wait?”

“Give me a few more weeks to get my head around marriage, okay?” I petitioned.

Then Captain Kirk, also known as Pastor Samson, popped into my head. His counsel was to wait a minimum of several months, and marriage only if Devin became a genuine believer. At the time I felt like Devin was one of the most straight forward, honest men I had met. I also believed he was on his way to becoming a believer, despite his willingness to engage in premarital sex.

That was another thing I felt the pastor didn’t understand, our desire to be intimate. And for that to happen, I needed the bonds of matrimony sooner rather than later. Devin didn’t realize how close I was to giving in to temptation as we cozied on the couch. Also, forgive me for this immature thinking, but I figured if it didn’t work out, we wouldn’t be the first couple to divorce.

We were at my place watching a movie. It was one of the Fast and Furious flicks, so I was pleasantly surprised that Devin was more interested in me than the action on the screen.

“You don’t want to wait a few more weeks,” he said seductively as he ran a finger down my cheek and waggled his eyebrows.

“When we’re married,” I said with hesitation.

“Let’s pretend we’re married,” he said as he quickly leaned in to kiss me.

His sudden move took me by surprise. Reflexively, my hand went over his face, and gripped it like a volleyball as I shoved him away. My pinky snagged his mouth, and the nail tore his lip a little, making it bleed. I didn’t mean to be so rough; it was just a reaction to his aggressive move.

“Seriously?” he barked. “You used to be a whore, and you can’t even satisfy your boyfriend with your… Never mind. But you know. Just like you’ve done hundreds of time for money!

I stood and slapped him. “Get out!”

“Oh, do you want me to leave Willa?” he said with clenched teeth as he also stood.

“What’s gotten into you?” I asked as I placed my hands on my hips.

“You,” he said as he gripped my upper arms, pushing me against a wall. His mouth pressed hard into mine, and I could taste the blood from his cut lip. Once again, I reacted without thinking, as my knee connected hard with his crotch.

Dirk collapsed to the floor, groaning, and clutching himself.

“Stay away from me, you jerk,” I spat. A couple minutes later as he shakily got to his feet, I pointed at the door, and demanded “Get out!”

Dirk stepped away from me with a cocky smirk. What had gotten into him all of a sudden?

“The wedding is off, I take it?” he asked.

“Is that what this is about?” I asked with hands on hips.

“What do you mean?” he asked with a frown.

“You want to end it with me,” I told him. “But instead of just being a man and telling me, you act like an animal, so I’ll break up with you?” His frown deepened, and he looked at his feet before he looked me in the eyes. To my surprise his eyes welled with tears.

“I don’t deserve you, Willa,” he lamented quietly. “Have a nice life.”

He turned and walked to the door. I watched him, stunned. What had just happened? One minute, we were contentedly watching a movie as a sort of engaged couple. The next minute, we were breaking up. I would have given him his ring back, but he hadn’t given me one. So good riddance!

At first, I felt a strange sort of relief. But then it was quickly replaced by a fear of loneliness. No, it wasn’t loneliness, was it? After all, I had my best friend and housemate Zella LaStella. Yet my newfound faith had somehow caused a divide between her and I. Was it longing for romance? Me, who was fiercely independent?

“Devin, wait,” I heard myself say.

He stopped and turned. My thoughts raced. Did I even love Devin? I liked him. Or had until what had just happened. Would I love him, could I trust him? The man I know I loved was marrying another woman. I didn’t want to be alone.

Something about giving up my self-centered life created a void that I seemed to want filled with a male companion. I didn’t understand why, but it was there. Maybe unbeknownst to me, my clients over the last half decade fulfilled this desire in a twisted way. As a former prostitute, what Christian man that I found desirable would even want me?

“Come back in and let’s talk,” I told him.

“Willa,” he groaned, twisting his handsome face in anguish. “I’m starting to think we’re not right for each other. It’s probably best if we both just move on.”

“Well, if you’re only starting to think that let’s talk about it,” I replied. Devin shuffled back in as I shut off the movie. “Let’s start with why are you acting so weird?”

“I want sex,” he blurted.

“Tell me what you really want,” I said with a coy smile, following my lame joke.

“I just did!” he barked. “I can’t stand being around you anymore. Even dressed like an Amish woman you’re sexy as…”

His next dozen words, although I suppose flattering, were vulgar.

“I don’t know what it’s like for you, but I can’t go without,” he concluded.

“I don’t want to either, but…”

“I didn’t say want,” he interrupted. “I said can’t… Look, I’ll be committed to you, but I don’t understand why you can’t at least do for me what you did for your clients. I know you didn’t go all the way with them, and I respect that, I really do. But you did give them release, and that’s all I’m asking until we decide it’s time to marry.”

I’m not gonna lie. Carnally speaking, I wanted Devin big time, but I was determined not to give in. Yet, given our pasts, maybe a compromise was in order. As a prostitute I had never had intercourse or oral sex with a client. I was lucky enough, and I guess hot enough, to find a niche with guys that wanted to be with a dominatrix.

 But I did satisfy my clients in less compromising ways. Wasn’t it only fair to compromise, and satisfy my boyfriend? My sort of fiancée? The man I sort of intended to spend the rest of my life with? What I didn’t understand then was that one should never compromise spiritual principles.

I sauntered toward him, as I smiled with a much-practiced seductive countenance. “All right, big fella, you win.”

To my chagrin, he looked startled rather than pleased. Yet I still reached my arms out to loop around his neck. Then to my utter surprise, he caught my wrists in his hands. “Willa, wait.”

I took a step back after he let go of my wrists, dumbfounded. He looked even more confused than me, as well as anguished. “Listen, Willa, there’s someone else.”

We stared at each other as his words settled in. Then I asked, “Did you sleep with her?”

He paused, as if the question baffled him, before replying. “Yes.”

I was stunned at first. Then I was strangely relieved, for I hadn’t stopped desiring Billy Bob. I didn’t want to be a hypocrite, but then a little defensively I asked, “So you lied about your willingness to commit?”

“I guess I did.”

“No guessing about it now.”

            “I’m sorry.”

            I shrugged. “Thanks for coming clean before I gave in.”

            “Gave in to what, sex or marriage?”

            “That’s for me to know,” I replied a bit snootily.

            “I better go.”

“Look, Devin,” I said, touching his arm as it reached for the doorknob. “You’re right, we should just end this. Our spiritual bond is not strong enough to endure the physical wait to make sure we are compatible.”

He frowned, but then smiled sadly, nodded, and walked out of my life forever. At least as a romantic partner.

The day after Devin and I ended our brief relationship, I went on an overnight horse-riding camping trip. There were about a dozen people going, and Billy Bob was one of them. It was just what I needed after the end of my very brief relationship with Devin. What made this extra special was that Carly didn’t like horseback riding and wouldn’t be coming. Pretending Billy Bob was mine for a weekend was just the salve my lonely heart needed.

Then to my dismay, Billy Bob didn’t want me to ride with him to the campsite. He even told me because of the friendly kiss I gave him the last time we were together that he didn’t think we should be alone anymore. This ironically hurt much deeper than just losing Devin. Yet I only had myself to blame. I couldn’t hide that there was more than friendly behind the quick kiss.

Forgive me for embellishing, but I used a broken heart over Devin as leverage for a ride with him. Even though my heart was maybe just cracked a little bit. I was actually more heartbroken over Billy not wanting us to be alone together anymore. I also suggested that there would be a dozen of us riding, thereby making us not alone, and that we’d be chaperoned to some extent. So he agreed to pick me up.

However, the usually calm, even-keeled Billy Bob seemed subdued, even angry when he arrived. It was a bad day for me to turn rebellious. Although a long shot, it was an all’s fair in love and war moment, and I intended on a last-ditch effort to win Billy’s affection. Not only that, but to steer him away from what I believed to be a terrible mistake by marrying Carly.

Unfortunately, I reverted just a little bit to my old ways. Billy had the best character of any man I had ever known, and he was very principled. But saint though he may be, he was still a male human being, and I knew men. I also knew, although he made a valiant effort to turn away from it, that he found me desirable. So I intended on one last sales pitch that my product was better than Carly’s. Lord forgive me!

Since I started attending Cotton Creek Cove, I had begun to dress conservatively. But on this fateful trip, I decided to wear my shortest jean shorts and a cherry red bikini top when he picked me up for the excursion. When Billy Bob looked at me, he snorted and shook his head. I felt the not-so-subtle rebuke keenly. However, it only intensified my orneriness. Once in his truck, I kicked off my shoes and propped my legs up on his dashboard as sexily as I possibly could.

“My goodness, Willa,” Billy Bob said with a frown. “It looks like you’re just wearing a bra. Are you seriously going to wear that around the others?”

“I’ve got a T-shirt that I’ll putting on,” I whined. “But it’s almost ninety degrees, and your decades old truck doesn’t have air conditioning.”

I noticed his jaw muscles clench, and his knuckles turned white because he gripped the steering wheel so hard. As we drove away from my place, he told me that we needed to swing by Lyle Lake’s house to pick up his propane-fueled hot plate. Lyle lived in a mini mansion. His yard had to be at least two acres.

Billy Bob tried to ring the doorbell, but to no avail. “I told Lyle his doorbell doesn’t work weeks ago. I guess I’ll have to scale his privacy fence.”

We walked to the rear of the home. With surprising agility for a big guy, Billy Bob made his way over the eight-foot fence. A few seconds later, a gate opened, and I walked through.

“How come there’s no latch on the outside?”

Billy Bob shrugged. “I guess Lyle likes his privacy.”

We stepped onto a large patio and made our way to a sliding glass door. Billy’s hand rose to knock, but he froze. “Holy cow!”

He tried to stop me from seeing why he declared that a bovine was holy, but curious, I looked past him. Lyle and Devin were on a large sofa and wearing only their birthday suits. Let’s just say Lyle was going way farther with Devin than I ever did. After my jaw dropped, I was paralyzed for several seconds.

“Oh no! Oh no!” Devin said, his eyes wide and startled after he spotted us. He flung himself over the back of the couch, grabbed an arm full of clothes, and fled to what I assumed was a bathroom, slamming the door.

Lyle looked at Billy Bob sheepishly. Lyle knew that I knew intimate details about him and had kept client confidentiality. To what extent Billy Bob knew Lyle’s secrets, I did not know. I did notice that after the initial surprise of seeing the two men, Billy Bob rather quickly developed a matter-of-fact demeanor over the situation. I would have expected him to be stunned for a longer period than he was. I suspected he knew something; I was dying to know how much.

As Lyle hurriedly dressed, opened the glass door, and barked, “Why didn’t you use the front door?”

“I told you weeks ago the doorbell didn’t work,” Billy said testily.

“Sorry,” Lyle said as he averted his eyes. “How embarrassing.”

Then he tried to explain. We politely listened, even though we wanted to flee. He apologized to me for stealing my boyfriend. I accepted and reassured him I understood. Then he asked us to keep what we discovered a secret.

“No worries. Willa and I can keep a secret, right Willa?” Billy Bob said.

“Of course,” I replied with wide innocent eyes as I studied Billy Bob.

Lyle immediately diverted the subject to our camping trip. We talked for a couple more minutes, and Devin never left the bathroom. Then Lyle retrieved the hot plate and subtlety seemed to usher Billy Bob and me off as quickly as possible. So quickly, I ended up twisting my ankle as we rapidly left.

After Billy Bob and I reentered his truck, he looked at me cautiously, knowing I had just broken up with Devin. I looked at him cautiously, wondering if he knew his best friend was attracted to more than just the opposite sex.

“Sorry you had to see that,” Billy told me.

“Did you know about them?” I asked.

“Lyle yes, Devin no,” Billy replied. Then he gently asked, “Did you?”

“Lyle yes, Devin no.”

“How did you know about Lyle?”

“I can’t divulge that. Client and massage therapist privilege. How did you know about Lyle?”    

“Not long after Carly and I broke up, he was in his cups. He confided his secret that he liked both guys and gals, and then he propositioned me.”

“Did you?”

“Of course not. Then when he was sober, I had a lot of reassuring to do with him.”

“About?”

“Mostly that our friendship would remain intact.” Then he eyed me sympathetically and asked, “How do you feel about Devin?”

I winced because of my ankle, and Billy Bob patted my knee, and said, “Sorry.”

I giggled. “No, I wasn’t bothered jealousy wise. I winced because I twisted my ankle in our haste to leave. I’m actually more bothered by something else.”

“What’s that?”

I shrugged and eyed him seductively. “I’m in love with someone else.”

He looked at me with what I hoped was longing for a few seconds. Then to my surprise, he gently pulled my ankle onto his lap, removed my red converse sneaker, and rubbed my ankle. Then he quietly said, “Me too.”

I watched him carefully massage the pain away. My mouth was parted in awe. But then my mind scrambled with the question. Did he mean me or Carly?