AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I already filled your job,” he says.
“O-okay,” I whisper. I can't ask him to take me back. It's just not in me. I can't beg a man I can't stand to take me back. The thought of his hands on me makes the bile rise in my throat, even as I know if I could only get past my pride and beg, I might be sleeping in his extremely nice apartment with all my needs met indefinitely.
He saves me from this groveling.
“I don't have a job at the agency, but you could be my whore.”
The cruelty in his tone makes me want to lash out and spew a string of curses at him. But I bite my tongue just in time. Of course I can't be his girlfriend again. Only his whore. Fuck this guy. I want to slit his motherfucking throat so badly I can barely think straight.
“Kate? Are you still there? I will take care of you. I will shelter you and feed you and clothe you and take you out to nice places. And you will service me whenever and however I like in return. Deal?”
The tears are streaming down my face now, and people are starting to stare. I hate this man so much. It wasn't just that he was bad in bed. It's that he's a first-class asshole. He treated me like shit when I was his girlfriend. How much worse will he treat me now? But I truly see no other options, no other escape. My life has fallen apart so fast I have whiplash from it. I remind myself that I don't have to do this forever, just until I can find another way forward.
I glance over at the woman across the bar, contemplating once again trying to get a job as an escort. I mean, I'll be a whore anyway, so what difference does it make? Would it be easier with strangers or with a man I already know is a piece of shit?
The man she's supposed to go with has arrived. It's clear they've never met before, and he's taking her out of the bar and out of the restaurant. She's got large, perky fake tits, and his eyes are drawn right to them, reconfirming that I could never compete in that industry.
“Kate, tell me where you are, and I will come get you,” Andrew says on the other end of the phone.
Defeated, I give him the address and name of the restaurant I'm in.
“I'll be there in thirty minutes,” he says. He disconnects the call before I can change my mind.
I have a fourth drink because I'll need a fourth drink for this. Then I step outside into the crisp fall air to wait. But the fourth drink was a mistake. I feel woozy all of a sudden and go down like a pile of bricks.
2
My head is pounding when I regain consciousness. I can't bring myself to open my eyes. I'm lying on a hard surface, which seems weird to me. At first I think I'm lying on the ground outside where I passed out, but there are no city noises. Instead, I hear classical music being piped in from a speaker above me.
And I smell... roses. One of those highly fragrant varieties. I must be at Andrew's place. But why the fuck did he leave me on the ground? It's at this point that I realize I'm naked. Also, Andrew doesn't listen to classical music.
Instinctively, I want to bolt upright and cover myself, but I don't have that kind of reaction time. And it’s a real struggle to open my eyes. When I do, I'm momentarily grateful to be in a dimly lit room.
“A-Andrew?” I croak out. I want to scream at him for dumping me on the ground in his apartment, but I can barely choke his name out. I wait for my eyes to adjust. Everything around me is dark gray, and there's no furniture in this room.
Cell, my mind hisses at me. I am in a cell.
I push myself off the ground into a sitting position and wait for my vision to go back to normal so I can get a sense of where I am. Did Andrew put me in here? He's a bigger bastard than I thought. This is when I finally realize I'm not alone.
There’s a large, dark figure sitting on the ground against the far wall.
“Andrew, you piece of shit. What are you doing?”
I probably shouldn't speak to the person who rescued me from homelessness this way, but I don't care. He needs to grow the fuck up. I expect him to yell at me or threaten to kick me out, but what I hear instead chills me.
“Who's Andrew?”
This is definitely not Andrew's voice. No accent. Plus it's deeper and more frightening. Suddenly the adrenaline hits me, and I have a sudden burst of speed. I back as far from him as I can until I meet the opposite wall. I shield my breasts from his gaze and shift to a sitting position where he can't see other private parts—even though I know he's already seen everything. And possibly done more. I was unconscious after all.
As my vision clears further, it seems that the light in the room gets a little brighter. He's wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, no shoes. His dark hair looks a bit disheveled. He's very attractive. Heart-stoppingly beautiful, actually. It's the kind of unearthly beauty that makes me feel relieved for a moment because I know I'm still passed out. This is a weird dream. I just know it is.
It's not a dream, whispers the same evil internal voice that decided to tell me I was in a cell.
It takes several minutes before my mind is willing to accept what has happened. I don't know if someone put something in my drink or if I was just that drunk. I don't know how long this man stalked me before he took me, but I know I’m looking at the man who kidnapped me.
And now the tears come. It takes every ounce of willpower not to break down into hysterical sobs. This reaction is making a lie out of everything I thought I knew about myself. The strength and control I thought I had in my life. Even up to very recently, I thought I was handling things.
But this is the last straw. It's the last tiny push I needed to find myself in a free fall.
