Corruption - Leigh Lennon Page 0,33
really. I feel so stupid. I left my phone at the club, and as I got to the front door, someone was leaving and it hit me smack dab in the face. It hurts like a mother effer.” This has always been the extent of my swearing when I’m super mad or hurt.
“Do you need to go to the doctor? Fuck, are you back at your friend’s?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. The manager and the other one you know, who’s in charge of the floor, drove me back.”
He’s quick on his feet. “You can’t say dungeon master, can you? Someone is in the room, right?” he asks with a chuckle.
“Yes, you are right but one drove Tori’s car and the other followed us.”
It’s his time to take in a long breath of air. “Okay, I know you’re not mine, but next time that happens, please call me. If we’re going to do this, we need to go through all the things couples do. Don’t make me have to wait on you like this, do you understand?” He’s direct, and his words have a tone of domination. But unlike a couple of hours ago, his demands do nothing to me. Not since Maddox spilled his guts.
But he has a point. “Yes, you’re right, and I’m sorry. It just happened so fast. I have it iced. I’m sure I’m going to be in quite the conundrum tomorrow with my father.”
He clears his throat on the other end. “You say the words, sweetheart, and I’ll come get you and start the beginning of us. You hear me?”
The same tone that made me clench my legs together earlier in the evening now makes me feel like I’m dead down there. And I certainly know I’m not, not with the direct words of Maddox. But it’s so much more. He opened up to me, explaining to me why he’s the man he is, and why changing is most likely not in his cards.
“Yes, Sir, I hear you.” The second I say the word sir, Tori shoots her gaze to me. “But I’m back at Tori’s so much later than I was expecting, and I have to get to bed. I’m sorry, I wish I could talk to you more.” It’s more like I wish I could talk to him and have the same tingly sensation take over my mind and body as it had yesterday.
“Go, sweetheart, get a good night’s sleep and be sure to text me tomorrow. I need to see you as soon as possible.”
“Yes, Sir, I will.” I say one last goodbye to him, then end the call. I wonder if that’s the last time I’ll speak with him.
I start to send a text to Maddox when Tori sits down in front of me, taking my phone away. “Okay, I’ve let you be long enough without making you tell me what you are doing in clothes that would induce a heart attack in your father if he ever caught you. Now you call this man on the phone sir. Please tell me what the flippity flop is going on because my imagination is going haywire.”
And because my friend isn’t playing around, I begin from the very beginning, sharing my kink with her, and as her mouth gapes open, and I reveal how I lost my virginity along with going out tonight with Drake, she sits in silence, and I wonder if I’ve caused my own friend to have a heart attack.
I don’t know how I do it, but I pull my rear out of bed in order to walk in the house by ten a.m. I can’t hide the black and blue bruises cascading down my face, though. There’s no use. “Juliana Faith Atkins, what in the world is wrong with your nose?”
I laugh it off as this will have to be a performance of the century. “Yeah, I was walking out of Tori’s room as she was walking in, and the door slammed in my face. It looks worse than it hurts.”
My mother has me by the hands, pulling me to the little table in the corner of our kitchen. “Heavens to Betsy, child. This looks horrible. Are you sure it’s not broken?”
I’d googled broken noses earlier, and if I had one, it would have been more swollen. “Yeah, I’m sure, Mom.”
She pushes to her feet, and I know exactly where the woman is going. If there’s ever a question, her first response is a medical book from thirty years ago her mother