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And as much as she wanted to hate herself for it, a darker, larger part of herself was enjoying it. It was wonderful to realize she could experience a healthy sex life. She had gotten to the point where she didn't even recognize she was a sexual creature anymore. It was easy to forget after a while. But when someone comes around and brings that part out of the dark, it was all-consuming.
She wished he wasn't her boss. A little voice even suggested she quit just so she could enjoy him without having to worry about the consequences. If there was ever a man she wanted to spent a night staying up and doing nasty things with, it was none other than the impressive Elliott Michaels. He was the perfect lover, giving but also very demanding.
Apparently all those things she had read about female orgasms and how long they take and whatnot- were not entirely true. She just needed someone who knew how to work her body. She was sure that if she spent a full night with Elliott, he would make her orgasm enough times to make those sex scientists tear up their papers.
Hannah climbed out of the shower, wrapping herself tightly in a towel and carefully drying her hair just enough so that it didn't drip all over her. She walked out to the kitchen, grabbing the tea kettle and putting it on the stove before rummaging around in the refrigerator for something to eat. Suddenly she was ravenous. She forgot she even had a appetite lately.
She sat down and plowed through two yogurts and a bowl of sugary cereal. It was pretty much all she had left in the house to eat that was any good.
Hannah sat down with her tea, cradling it between her hands and considering her situation. She didn't want to stop sleeping with Elliott. But she also knew it was bound to blow up in her face if she didn't put a stop to it. She wondered if maybe she and Elliott sat down and talked about it if she would feel better. He had to value her as an employee. And he obviously wanted to keep having sex with her too.
Maybe they could be two rational adults about it.
Hannah felt satisfied at that idea, though she knew she would lack the courage to ever bring the subject up to him. She glanced up to the counter, expecting to see Ricky running around his cage.
But something was wrong.
She didn't see Ricky at all.
She got up quickly, turning the light up, walking up to his cage and looking in. He wasn't there.
But there was something in his place.
A picture. Hannah picked it up and felt everything she just ate rise up in her throat. It was a picture of her sleeping naked on top of Elliott in the office. Someone had gotten into her apartment and actually taken her guinea pig. What kind of lunatic did something like that? Hannah turned the picture over and sprawled across the back in angry red lipstick was one word: whore.
Hannah dropped the picture, rushing to the bathroom and barely making it before she started throwing up.
She sat there on the cold floor after, tears drying on her cheeks, feeling hot and cold at the same time.
What the hell was she going to do?
Why the hell would someone take her pet? What kind of message was that supposed to be? Leaving the picture was one thing. It went along with all the notes and emails and all that nonsense. But to take Ricky?
Hannah felt a pain in her chest. She knew it was stupid, but she really loved that guinea pig. He wasn't much to come home to, but he was something. He had been a constant for almost four years. And she could have accepted if he had somehow died of sickness or old age, but to know someone just... took him?
That hurt more than she thought it could.
She had to do something. She had to put and end to this somehow.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
He walked onto the floor almost a full hour earlier than usual. He wanted to be sure he caught Hannah before the office filled up. Judging by the time stamps on many of her emails, she was almost always in around six in the morning. It explained how she managed to get so much work done. Though he wasn't sure how she managed to not burn out. It also explained the dark circles under her eyes all the time.
Elliott filled the coffee pot and switched it on. It occurred to him that it was the first time in many years that he actually handled the task himself. Sometimes he got so wrapped up in everyday work and future work plans that he didn't realize how much of his life was taken care of by other people. He had spent his entire young life taking care of everything. His father had been a deadbeat who walked out one night without warning when he was seven and James was just an infant.
And his mother had had nothing. An apartment she couldn't afford, a high school diploma, and two small children. He remembered the look on her face when she sat down at the dining room table the next morning, staring into open space. Even as a young child, he had recognized the hopelessness and misery, but the intense set of her jaw that suggested she wasn't defeated.
They had packed up everything they owned with James crying on and off in his carseat, loaded up her old car, and drove for hours into the night. They had ended up in a congested neighborhood, lower income housing in a sturdy brick building that was never quiet.
James got carted off to a downstairs older lady with too much makeup, deep voice, and a kind heart for most of the hours of the day.
His mother would wake him up early, putting together his breakfast and packing his lunch, and send him to the bus stop as she got dressed for work. He would come home to an empty apartment and quietly do his homework and chores without having to be told. Around four in the afternoon, she would come breezing through the living room door all dark hair and shadows under her eyes.
He always had the coffee pot brewing before he heard her keys in the lock. They would sit and talk about their days for a while before she would slip into a hideous pink dress with a yellow apron and shuffle off to the diner where she worked dinner shift before rushing off to clean office buildings at night.
She always came in well after bedtime, James in her arms with leftovers from the diner she would put in the fridge for the next day. Then she would lay James in the crib and crawl into bed next to him, falling asleep almost instantly.
By the age of twelve, he had become the man of the house. He met James by his kindergarten class at the end of the day and rode the bus with him home. Then he would help him with his homework while trying to do his own, make dinner, clean, do laundry, go grocery shopping. He handled everything while his mother slaved away doing twelve to sixteen hour days to make the ends barely meet.
