decision, a
vision of her tied up on my desk flashed into my mind, my hands grabbing her
big tits while I fucked her.
But I forced myself to put it out of my
mind.
I needed to take care of her.
And if that meant denying myself, that’s
how it would have to be.
AVERY
Kalia was a brat.
She’d spent the whole morning blowing up
my new company cell phone, asking me when I was going to be done filling out my
HR paperwork so that she could start training me.
It wasn’t my fault I’d spent all morning
in the HR offices filling out forms, taking surveys, and getting my picture
taken for my employee ID. It was a
long process, and her bothering me every two seconds wasn’t going to move it
along any faster.
By the time I was done in HR, it was
lunchtime. For a moment, I was
afraid Kalia was going to insist I come back downstairs anyway, that she’d make
me work right through the break. But
apparently she coveted her own lunchtime and thought it was more important than
torturing me, because at noon on the dot she sent me another text.
“Lunch
for one hour. Please be back here
by one sharp, as we have to prepare for the photo shoot.”
I frowned. Photo shoot? What photo shoot? I wanted
to ask, but something about the way the text was worded made me feel like Kalia wanted me to ask for details so she
could act all annoyed that I didn’t know anything. It was like something from The Devil Wears Prada.
But Kalia was no Miranda Priestly. She was just an assistant, like
me.
And I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of thinking she’d gotten to me, even a
little.
So instead I just wrote back: “Sounds
great! Looking forward to working
with you.”
I couldn’t understand what Cole saw in
her. Was it just because she was
blond and skinny and pretty? Was
that enough? Jealousy burned through
my body, hard and deep. The thought of him kissing her, his mouth on hers like
it had been on mine last night, made my stomach turn.
They
weren’t together anymore, I told myself as I slid my phone into my bag and walked out of the HR office. Of
course, Cole wasn’t with me, either. There was nothing stopping him from being with someone else. And he probably would be. If there was one thing I remembered
from growing up with Cole, it was that he grew bored extremely easily, always ready
to move on to the next woman without a backward glance. Eventually, he would grow bored of me.
Which is why it was so infuriating that
he thought he could treat me like some kind of slave, and keep me locked up in
this office building without even having to explain the reasons why. He didn’t
have a right to do that. He didn’t
have a right to tell me who to talk to or who to hang out with. He wasn’t my father, he wasn’t my
husband, he wasn’t even my boyfriend. I wasn’t a child.
So I told myself I shouldn’t feel guilty
as I got onto the elevator and rode it down to the lobby and then stepped out
onto the streets of New York. Things
were even busier and more hectic now than they’d been this morning, and I
marveled at the fact that so many people could fit into such a relatively small
space.
I glanced down at my phone, scrolling to
the text Jeffrey had sent me with the address of the restaurant where we were
supposed to meet. The place wasn’t
far from the office, which actually made me slightly nervous. The last thing I wanted was to run into
Cole, for him to find out I’d defied him. The more distance I could put between us, the safer I’d feel.
The restaurant was called RIDE, and it
was trendy and upscale, the kind of place I would have been intimidated to even
walk into by myself. The space was
done in a bicycle theme, but it had an industrial loft feeling to it, with metal
beams criss -crossing the ceiling and dark grey
walls. Black and white prints of
bicycles were hung up all over, and the high-top tables were made of
vision of her tied up on my desk flashed into my mind, my hands grabbing her
big tits while I fucked her.
But I forced myself to put it out of my
mind.
I needed to take care of her.
And if that meant denying myself, that’s
how it would have to be.
AVERY
Kalia was a brat.
She’d spent the whole morning blowing up
my new company cell phone, asking me when I was going to be done filling out my
HR paperwork so that she could start training me.
It wasn’t my fault I’d spent all morning
in the HR offices filling out forms, taking surveys, and getting my picture
taken for my employee ID. It was a
long process, and her bothering me every two seconds wasn’t going to move it
along any faster.
By the time I was done in HR, it was
lunchtime. For a moment, I was
afraid Kalia was going to insist I come back downstairs anyway, that she’d make
me work right through the break. But
apparently she coveted her own lunchtime and thought it was more important than
torturing me, because at noon on the dot she sent me another text.
“Lunch
for one hour. Please be back here
by one sharp, as we have to prepare for the photo shoot.”
I frowned. Photo shoot? What photo shoot? I wanted
to ask, but something about the way the text was worded made me feel like Kalia wanted me to ask for details so she
could act all annoyed that I didn’t know anything. It was like something from The Devil Wears Prada.
But Kalia was no Miranda Priestly. She was just an assistant, like
me.
And I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of thinking she’d gotten to me, even a
little.
So instead I just wrote back: “Sounds
great! Looking forward to working
with you.”
I couldn’t understand what Cole saw in
her. Was it just because she was
blond and skinny and pretty? Was
that enough? Jealousy burned through
my body, hard and deep. The thought of him kissing her, his mouth on hers like
it had been on mine last night, made my stomach turn.
They
weren’t together anymore, I told myself as I slid my phone into my bag and walked out of the HR office. Of
course, Cole wasn’t with me, either. There was nothing stopping him from being with someone else. And he probably would be. If there was one thing I remembered
from growing up with Cole, it was that he grew bored extremely easily, always ready
to move on to the next woman without a backward glance. Eventually, he would grow bored of me.
Which is why it was so infuriating that
he thought he could treat me like some kind of slave, and keep me locked up in
this office building without even having to explain the reasons why. He didn’t
have a right to do that. He didn’t
have a right to tell me who to talk to or who to hang out with. He wasn’t my father, he wasn’t my
husband, he wasn’t even my boyfriend. I wasn’t a child.
So I told myself I shouldn’t feel guilty
as I got onto the elevator and rode it down to the lobby and then stepped out
onto the streets of New York. Things
were even busier and more hectic now than they’d been this morning, and I
marveled at the fact that so many people could fit into such a relatively small
space.
I glanced down at my phone, scrolling to
the text Jeffrey had sent me with the address of the restaurant where we were
supposed to meet. The place wasn’t
far from the office, which actually made me slightly nervous. The last thing I wanted was to run into
Cole, for him to find out I’d defied him. The more distance I could put between us, the safer I’d feel.
The restaurant was called RIDE, and it
was trendy and upscale, the kind of place I would have been intimidated to even
walk into by myself. The space was
done in a bicycle theme, but it had an industrial loft feeling to it, with metal
beams criss -crossing the ceiling and dark grey
walls. Black and white prints of
bicycles were hung up all over, and the high-top tables were made of
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