Lanie and I had argued on the ride home. Well, she had argued. I ignored her. Which had only pissed her off more. She wanted me to fuck her, expected it, because that was what we’d always done. Only I hadn’t wanted to fuck her anymore. I couldn’t. Not after everything I’d learned. Don’t get me wrong; I wanted her. Goddamn, did I ever. But I couldn’t do that to her anymore.
She wouldn’t leave well enough alone, though. Nope. Not Lanie. When I’d spurned her advances, she’d bolted from the limousine and into the rain toward the house. I’d followed after her, of course, but she was crazed, spewing anything at all to get a rise out of me.
She hit the proverbial jackpot when she told me if I wouldn’t fuck her, someone else back at the ball would, and one person in particular sprang to mind. David Stone.
My possessive nature kicked in. Admittedly, I was angry, but it was no excuse for what I’d done. None too gently, I’d grabbed her and fucked her senseless, right there on the staircase. I hadn’t cared if it felt good to her. I hadn’t cared if she was uncomfortable. I hadn’t cared about anything other than claiming what I’d considered mine.
Only she wasn’t mine. Sure, maybe I owned her body, but I didn’t own her soul or her heart, and those were the parts of her that I’d wanted the most. Those were the parts of me that I’d given her without even realizing it. And they hadn’t cost her one red penny.
After fucking her like a goddamn animal, I’d finally forced myself to confess everything I’d been keeping from her. I told her that I knew about her mother, about why she had to auction herself off to the highest bidder. And as fucked up as I knew it was, I told her that I’d fallen in love with her. And then I left her there without another word.
To my utter amazement, Lanie had come to find me in the shower. Imagine my surprise when instead of cutting my balls off, she asked me to make love to her, to let her know what it felt like to be loved by me. Just once. That was all she’d wanted. And I would’ve given her anything she asked for, so of course I gave her my heart, bloody but still beating, on a platter.
I’d known while I was making love to her, while I was baring my fucking soul to her, that it was the last time. I’d known it, and still I managed to push all of that to the side and revere her the way she should’ve been revered from day one. I loved her freely and completely, with all of my might and all of my being. There had been no room to doubt how I had felt about her, how I still felt about her.
I loved her. God help me, I fucking loved her.
Afterward, she made it a point to state the obvious, that we needed to talk. But I’d known everything she was going to say already, so I claimed the night and just held her. I knew it would be the last time I’d ever be able to do so. That had been last night.
This morning, it had taken every ounce of strength I had to leave the measured serenity of that bed. It had to be done. So I’d nuzzled her neck and softly kissed the bare skin of her shoulder before whispering one last “I love you” into her ear. She’d stirred and smiled in her sleep, which made it even harder to leave her side, but I somehow did.
The shower was quick, my dressing time even quicker. And when I’d come out, there she was, my million-dollar baby, looking even more beautiful than I’d ever thought her to be before. She’d wanted to talk, but again, I knew the score, and I just didn’t think I could handle hearing her say the words. So I did the right thing.
I ripped up the contract and told her to go be with her family. And then I willed my shaky legs to take me away from her. She didn’t follow after or try to stop me, which was as it should’ve been. The fantasy I’d tried to buy was over, and it was time for me to get back to the real world.
As the limousine pulled away, I refused to let myself look back at the front door. I didn’t want to see that she wasn’t there. It was hard enough knowing she wouldn’t be when I got home. Maybe the day would eventually come that she’d think about me and not hate my guts. Maybe she’d even smile warmly. Maybe, but I wasn’t counting on it. As long as she was happy, that was all that mattered to me.
And so I found myself in my limousine, alone and fucking dying on the inside. I’d turn to the only thing that had gotten me through every other tragedy in my life, Scarlet Lotus.
Lanie
As I watched the limousine disappear from sight, something came over me. I expected it to be defeat, agony, betrayal, or heartache, but it wasn’t.
Rage. Rage and more rage.
How dare he? Stupid man with his stupid big house, and his stupid big ego, and his stupid big head thinking he knew what was best for me. He said it wouldn’t work, but I didn’t believe he meant it. I saw that look in his eyes. It was killing him. So why do it? Why go through all he had the night before to prove how he felt for me only to turn me loose at dawn’s first light? Because he had control issues, that was the reason. Well, he couldn’t tell me what to do. I wasn’t one of his employees anymore. The shredded piece of paper he had discarded onto the bed was the end of that contract.
Discarded … just like me.
I was going to tell him I loved him, too, to put an end to his ridiculousness, but no such luck. Before letting me get the words out of my mouth that were sure to prove him wrong, the control freak told me to get lost.
How was it fair that he got to say all he wanted when I didn’t? I mean, sure, I could’ve echoed his declaration while in the throes of passion, but that passion was pretty epic and I’d had a hard enough time remembering to breathe let alone being able to say anything that would have sounded in the least bit coherent or endearing. Besides, I really thought I had all kinds of time to tell him how I felt. I mean, hello? I told him to call me Lanie, for Christ’s sake. Plus, I didn’t want him to think I was saying those three little words just because he did. I wanted a separate moment to do the whole shout-it-from-the-highest-mountaintop-for-the-whole-world-to-hear thing so there was no doubting the sincerity of my declaration because a declaration of that magnitude was a pretty serious thing. But I was prepared to make that leap—for him, for me … for us.
And then he had to go and ruin it with his caveman crap.
Men are jackasses.
But at least I could do something about my jackass because I really had nothing to lose by confronting him. I was going to make him listen to me, whether he wanted to or not. He was going to know that I loved him, and he was going to feel like a total jerk for dismissing me the way he did, because I was going down to that posh little office of his to demand his attention. He was going to see how wrong he was to make the assumptions he had made, and he would never jump to conclusions again. I was a woman who had given up everything to save her dying mother’s life, and I had a voice that was screaming to be heard. I’d be damned if everything I’d been through since I entered Noah Crawford’s world was going to be for nothing.
Resigned to that plan, I turned on my heel and stalked back into the house with my shoulders back and my head held high. After a quick shower and a tour through Polly’s wonderland of inappropriate clothing, I dressed and grabbed my cell phone from the table before leaving.
I was really quite impressed with myself as I scurried down the stairs, again avoiding a neck-breaking, skull-crushing fall. When I reached the first floor, I heard a car pull up. It had to be Samuel returning from dropping Noah off, and I gave myself a healthy dose of see-this-was-meant-to-be because how perfect was that timing?
And then there was an insistent pounding on the door, followed by, “Lanie Marie Talbot, I know you’re in there! Get your fat ass out of bed and open the door!”
That was my bestie, Dez.
I sprinted for the door and yanked it open just as Dez was about to pound her fist against it again. For a girl she was pretty strong, and I was lucky that she narrowly missed cold-cocking me in the forehead. Like I needed to look like a unicorn when I went to confront Noah.
“Dez!” I shrieked as I ducked her fist. We both took a step back and eyed each other from head to toe.
&nb
sp; “What the hell are you wearing?” we both asked simultaneously. “Jinx! You owe me a Coke!” I yelled at the same time that Dez yelled, “Jinx! You owe me a cock!”
Every time we played this game, I never got my Coke. Dez, however, always got her cock—without my help.
Dez was dressed head-to-toe in black on black. Well, mostly. Black skinny jeans, black turtleneck, black snakeskin boots. One larger-than-life skull belt buckle adorned the center of her low-slung hip-huggers, and she was wearing a black cap embroidered with yet another skull just over her perfectly sculpted eyebrows.
I tackled my best friend, wrapping my arms around her torso and pinning her arms to her sides. “Oh my God! I’ve missed you so much!” It wasn’t until she was right in front of me that I realized just how badly.
“Get the fuck off me! Damn, what are they feeding you here, steroids?” she asked, trying to wriggle out of my hold.
I turned her loose, realizing my hug was probably borderline bone-shattering and stepped aside to invite her in. “What’s with the Mission Impossible getup?”
“I’m breaking you out.” She turned to look me over once again with an approving smile. “Boyfriend sure did trick you out, huh? Look at you with the little red minidress, Slutty McSlutterson.” Then she suddenly gasped, her eyes going wide. “You have been thoroughly scrogged! Spill!”
I felt my face go red. “What? No!”
“Yes, you were, Lanie Talbot! Don’t forget who you’re talking to. I think I know that just-been-fucked look.”
I wanted nothing more than to gush to my best friend, but I needed to catch up to Noah, and Dez’s arrival was keeping me from doing that. Speaking of … “Wait, what did you mean by the whole breaking-me-out thing.”
“I meant, get your shit and let’s go. I’m on a covert mission to bail your ass out of sex-slave prison,” she said, and then looked around in awe. “Although, I don’t think I’d exactly call these digs a prison. This is a freakin’ palace!”
“Okay, seriously. Why are you here, and how did you know where I was?”
Dez rolled her eyes. “You said Noah Crawford bought you, and it didn’t dawn on me at first, but then it hit me like a whore getting bitch-slapped by her pimp in a dark alley: The Noah Crawford of Scarlet Lotus. Right? I mean, because how many Noah Crawfords could there be in the world, much less in this corner of the country and with enough money to pay two million little cha-chings for his own personal little oh-yes-daddy-milk-me-papi?” she asked with all the great acting skills of a porn star destined for the silver screen.
“Yes, but that still doesn’t explain why you’re here insisting on breaking me out. I’m fine, and really, it’s not exactly like I’m a prisoner. Noah treats me very well.”
My best friend took a deep breath and sighed. “I have something to tell you, sweetie,” she started. Sweetie. She never called me that unless she was about to lay something heavy on me. My heart jumped into my throat and tried to claw its way out.
“Faye has taken a turn for the worse. She’s been admitted to University Hospital, and they’ve called in the family. I promised Mack I’d get you there. It doesn’t look good, babe.”
Just then, the front door opened and Polly bounced over the threshold. “Good morning, Lanie!” she greeted me in her usual bubbly voice as if my whole world hadn’t just been turned upside down. The smile immediately dropped from her face once she saw what I assumed was my paled expression. “Oh, God. What’s wrong?”
“Noah was right.” My chest constricted like an anaconda was squeezing the life out of it in preparation to swallow it whole. “My parents do need me more than he does.”
C. L. PARKER is a romance author who writes stories that sizzle. She’s a small-town girl with big-city dreams and enough tenacity to see them come to fruition. Having been the outgoing sort for all her life—which translates to “she just wouldn’t shut the hell up”—it’s no wonder Parker eventually turned to writing as a way to let her voice, and those of the people living inside her head, be heard. She loves hard, laughs until it hurts, and lives like there’s no tomorrow. In her world, everything truly does happen for a reason.
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C. L. Parker, A Million Dirty Secrets
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