Page 59 of The Deal
“I know,” says Stella in a grim voice. “But there’s more.”
The second clip is worse. I’m in a man’s lap, facing the camera, and the look on my face is pure bliss—cheeks flushed, lips parted, hair sticking to my sweaty skin. Once again, I’m buck-naked, with my giant tits and pussy on display, my ivory curves gleaming in the low lights. The man holds my hips while I lower my asshole onto his cock, whispering praise in my ear as my anus is stretched wide, my moans low and throaty. I can almost hear it, the fake me begging for it, saying, “Mmm, Daddy, yes! My butt, my butt!”
What the fuck?!?! I’ve had anal sex with Kent, but I’d never say “my butt, my butt” like that. But the video loops, and every time, the look on my face seems to get more and more ecstatic, like my only purpose in life is to be used as a man’s sex doll.
Stella doesn’t say a word. She just watches me, her lips pressed together so hard they go white.
I can’t breathe. My hands are shaking so bad I can’t even reach for the phone. I swallow, then look up at her.
“That’s not me,” I say. “You know that, right?”
She nods, quick and desperate. “Of course. Anyone who actually knows you knows it’s fake. But—” She looks down, ashamed. “But a lot of people don’t care. They see the video, they believe it. Or they want to.”
A wind cuts through the alcove, sharp and bitter. It stings my eyes, but I’m not crying. Not yet.
“Who did this?” I whisper.
Stella shrugs. “No one knows for sure, but you know how people are. There are about a dozen guys claiming that it was them in the videos because the men’s faces are blurred, and you know guys don’t give a shit about their reputations. All they care about is being known as the dude with the big cock, and the dudes in those videos aresporting monsters.”
I close my eyes. I think hard. My mind is a mess as I try to fight down the panic in my chest, but I have to do better. I try to piece things together in order to figure out what’s going on. Suddenly, I know. It’s the spangly boots that clue me in because I saw them at the Sigma Epsilon Chi party long ago. The one where the boys hired two working girls, and were having group sex in the attic while filming the whole thing. Sure, the girls got paid. Sure, the girls didn’t care that they were being recorded. But why the fuck did someone putmyface onto the women’s bodies?
Then, I see Clay Newell’s face, the way he looked at me at the party, the way he tried to force me into his bedroom, the way he acted like the world belonged to him and everyone else was just a prop.
I see Kent’s face, too—the flash of anger, the fist, the way he dragged me out of the party like I was breakable, precious, his,while Clay whined and cried like a baby calling for his mom. It has to be Clay Newell who created the deepfakes. He must be jealous and hurt and enraged by what happened at the party, and he’s doing this as some sick act of revenge.
I open my eyes. I look at Stella, really look at her, and see the fear and the pity in her eyes. I hate it. I want to scream at her, or maybe hug her until my ribs crack, or maybe both.
“Can you send me the videos?” I ask, my voice steady now. “I need to… I don’t know. I just need them.”
Stella nods, and does it. My phone buzzes in my hand a few seconds later, and the files show up in my texts. I open one, just to be sure, and watch my lips part as I’m fucked from two angles at once, my mouth stretched wide, my curves moving with impossible hunger.
I feel nothing. Not anger, not sadness, not even embarrassment. Just a cold clarity, like the moment before you pass out or throw up.
“I’ll be okay,” I say, and I almost believe it.
Stella hugs me then, so tight I can’t move, and for a second I let her. I let myself be held, let myself be small. But then I pull away.
“I have to go,” I say.
She doesn’t argue. She just stands there, arms wrapped around herself, watching as I walk away.
I stalk back toward the parking lot, past the boys at the bike rack, past the silent girls at the library, past the quad where the wind rattles the bare branches and the sun is already half gone. My phone is heavy in my pocket, and every step echoes with the words I heard and the ones I didn’t.
Slut.
Whore.
Fake.
I keep walking, boots scraping on the ice, and promise myself that next time, I won’t be the one on my knees.
Not ever again.
20
A SECRET REVEALED
KENT
