Page 29 of Good Girls Beg

"What are you doing, Teddie Ward?" I asked myself.

I swung my bag down off my shoulder and placed it on the bed, opened it, and pulled out a plush teddy bear my fathers gave me when I was a kid. Purple with pink paws. I'd left her at their house when I moved in with Lyra, but I decided I wanted to have her here with me. For some reason, she made me feel less alone.

I placed her on a table beside the bed where I could see her. She could watch over the room. Watch over me.

I wandered around, taking in everything, before I stopped in front of the window that overlooked the ocean. The waves crashed against the sand like nothing in the world was amiss. Like I wasn't standing here in a stranger's house, with a closet full of new clothes and a computer I wouldn't have been able to afford to buy for myself.

I wasn't naive to think there wasn't a long list of things they wanted in return. This wasn't me continuing to live my life, but under a different roof. No, these three men would come to claim their debts, sooner or later. Try to, anyway. I wasn't going to make it too easy on them. In fact, this could be interesting.

Why shouldn't I enjoy my time here? When would I ever get to live in a place like this again?

Chances were they'd expect me to leave the laptop here when I left. All the clothes, too. In the meantime, I might as well enjoy them.

I walked back over to the closet, and started to rifle through the clothes inside. Chose a pair of dark jeans that would hug my ass, and a black tank top that would make my breasts look amazing.

I tied my hair back in a curly bubble, then stepped out of the room and headed back downstairs.

My feet made no sound on the floor as I stopped outside Hel's office. Voices came from inside. I recognized him and the guy I now knew as Fade.

I shouldn't be listening. It sounded like they were talking about work, but I was curious. What did Fade look like? Where did I know him from?

I leaned in and listened.

"Yeah, I know the account is important," Fade was saying. "Sometimes we have to make tough decisions."

"You think I don't know that?" Hel snapped. "I've built this business making tough decisions. This is another one. We'll keep working for them for now, but keep an eye out on…" He dropped his voice and said something I couldn't hear.

"How is the…" His voice was louder, but trailed off. The sound of a chair scraping on the floor was followed by footsteps.

I started to move away, but Hel looked out at me before I made it more than a handful of steps.

His expression softened. "Teddie, come in."

"I didn't mean to interrupt," I said.

"You're not interrupting." He gestured for me to walk ahead of him into the office.

I stopped a couple of steps in.

Stared.

One of Fade's eyebrows rose. "You look like you've seen a ghost," he drawled.

"I didn't recognize you without a book in front of your face." I dropped into the seat beside him. He smelled as good as he did when I met him at college. Right before I slipped into the restrooms and got myself off. I remembered thinking he'd been watching me. If he had, his expression gave away nothing.

"Looks to me like you recognized me just fine," he said, sitting with his elbow on the back of the chair, a hint of ink at his sleeve.

"It's hard to forget someone like you," I said, giving him a scathing look.

He grinned. "Of course it fucking is." He seemed impressed with himself. Prick.

I wanted to kick myself. I should have identified his voice immediately. On the other hand, it was a good thing I hadn't. He seemed to have a healthy ego without me knowing who he was by his voice alone.

No, he was going to have to work a lot harder than that to impress me.

"You two know each other." The expression on Hel's face was as tight as his voice, but his irritation seemed to be squarely aimed at Fade

"She bumped into me at college," he said, as if it was all my fault.