Abandoned Girl (Neighpalm Industries Collective, #1)

by Winston, Lexie

  Table of Contents

  About the Author

  Also by Lexie Winston

  Abandoned Girl

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Guardian | Collectors Division

  Candy Conniptions | Arbor Vitae Coven

  About the Author

  Lexie Winston has been an astronaut, rock star, princess and time traveller. In her dreams. But none of the dreams have lived up to what becoming an author has been like. She gets to live in a world of pure imagination, and her heroines get to do the things she’s always wished she could.

  When not writing books, Lexie is a mother of two gorgeous teenagers and the wife to a patient and understanding man. They live in Western Australia and are lorded over by a black toy poodle. She loves camping, reading and if her iPad was stolen, her world would explode. (It has the kindle ap on.)

  Follow Lexie on

  https://www.facebook.com/groups/1068846123323085/?ref=group_header

  https://www.facebook.com/lexie.winston.925

  https://www.instagram.com/lexiewinston77/

  https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/19437270.Lexie_Winston

  https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B07XCL5VNK

  https://www.bookbub.com/authors/lexie-winston

  And check out my website at https://www.lexiewinston.com/

  Also by Lexie Winston

  The Collectors Division

  (Reverse Harem Series)

  Guardian

  Guardian’s Blood

  Guardian Ascending (Dec 2020)

  Arbor Vitae Coven

  (Paranormal Romance Series)

  Candy Conniptions

  Dreamy Delights

  Fangtastic Fireworks(Oct 2020)

  Neighpalm Industries Collective

  (Adult Bully Reverse Harem)

  Abandoned Girl ( July 2020)

  Glorious Gluttony

  Standalone Reverse Harem.

  (previously published in the Leaving Eden Anthology

  Abandoned Girl

  Neighpalm Industries Collective

  Lexie Winston

  First published by Neighpalm Publishing in 2020

  Copyright © Neighpalm Publishing 2020

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity, in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Abandoned Girl: Neighpalm Industries Collective

  Mobi format: 978-0-6487933-2-8

  Print: 978-0-6487933-3-5

  Cover design by Infinity Cover Designs

  Edited by Inked Imagination

  To Mollie, Leslie, Laura and Ashley.

  Thank you. You guys rock!!!

  Chapter One

  Harlow

  “Harlow! Are you up here?” My best friend Maxine’s husky voice carries up the stairs to my apartment above the barn. She claims the huskiness is due to all the dust and hay from working with the horses every day, but she's had it for as long as I’ve known her, and that's from before both of us could talk.

  “Yeah, come on up,” I call back, my eyes glued to the TV in front of me, the noise of her feet on the stairs getting louder the closer she gets. She bursts into the room, and I can see and smell that she’s showered. Unlike the smell of horses and hay, which my apartment and I both usually smell like, her scent is spicy and sweet. Probably some expensive designer fragrance that costs a gazillion dollars a bottle.

  Looking her up and down, I can tell she’s here to harass me to join her for a night on the town. She’s wearing a black bodycon dress that hugs her curves in all the right ways. Her dark blue eyes are accentuated by her smokey eyeshadow, and her burgundy lipstick and perfectly tousled pixie cut make her look like Tinkerbell gone wild. Five-inch heels boost her short frame, and you would never know this girl wears boots and jeans most days, handling horses that could easily kill her if things go wrong.

  “What are you doing? You want to hit a club?” she asks, going to my fridge and grabbing a bottle of beer for herself. Flipping the bottle top onto the counter, she takes a long pull before heading back over to the couch.

  Taking a sip of my own beer, I watch, smiling, as her nose wrinkles when she looks for a clean place to sit. Not that my apartment is dirty, but I’m not great at picking up after myself, and books and magazines are lying all over every surface. I’ve been so busy since I finished college, and I’m too freaking tired to pick up after myself by the time I get home. Also, if they’re lying around, well, they’re easy to reach when I do want to read something. Reading is the perfect way to escape reality and my drug of choice.

  She glances at the TV. “You’re not watching those damn abandoned videos again, are you?” she asks, disgust nearly dripping from her words.

  “Check this out,” I say to her, pointing at the television. “They’re visiting this abandoned zoo in Detroit!”

  “Huh?” She looks at me, confused, while finally moving some of my vet journals out of the way and taking a seat.

  “I don't get it. Why do they leave all these buildings abandoned? Why don't they repurpose them? The zoo would make a great animal sanctuary for the animals that idiots buy but can't manage. Like big cats and huge ass snakes and things.” Shaking my head, I take another sip of my beer. “All these places in the world, houses and hospitals and shit, that people have just picked up and left abandoned for various reasons. It's fascinating. And these guys go around checking them out and filming them, discovering all the history. How cool is that?”

  The incredulous look on Max’s face almost makes me snort my beer through my nose. “Fucking hell, Harlow, you need to get laid. Your obsession with abandoned things is disturbing. Isn't your little menagerie downstairs enough?” Her tone is disgusted, and it’s funny in a bit of a sad sort of way. When we were younger, she used to be just as excited as I was to rescue abandoned animals, but as she got older and tried to fit in better with the other kids at school, she slowly lost interest. Whereas mine just grew. Animals were my safe haven against the bullying. Don’t get me wrong, she tried to stop our peers’ taunts, but in the end, her need to be accepted by them often won out against protecting me. I understood, but that didn’t stop me from sometimes resenting her back then. If I’m being honest, some of that lingering resentment flares in and out even now.. She doesn't understand my lack of care about social status,
and I don't understand her need to fit in.

  “We’re going out, and I won't take no for an answer. How long do you need to get ready?”

  Looking down at the dirty jeans and fuzzy wool socks that I haven't bothered getting changed out of, I shrug my shoulders. “Nah, it’s been a long day. You go and have fun; I’m going to stick to my abandoned, lonely buildings.”

  The look she gives me is borderline homicidal, but I’ve faced Max’s wrath before, and compared to my mother’s hurricane of violence, she's a fresh summer breeze. I’m not scared at all. “Is that supposed to be some kind of metaphor for your life? Because, bitch, I've got no sympathy.” She chugs her beer down in one go, dropping it down onto the table in front of her with a dramatic clink. “You’re no more abandoned and unloved than I am. My parents think you walk on water, and I would pick you over my own siblings every time.”

  I roll my eyes at her dramatics, another thing I’m used to. “You have no siblings, you spoiled, rich princess. So there is no competition.”

  “Who cares? It’s the thought, right?” She waves her hand. “I’m giving you half an hour and then calling the car around. If you’re not ready, I’ll tell Mom that you’re up here crying.” Christ, Melinda would be up here in a flash nagging me to go out and have some fun. No one ever listens when I explain that this here, what I’m already doing, is my idea of a perfect night. Then she’d sigh and be all disappointed in me, and I’d feel guilty and still give in.

  I shudder at the thought and decide to skip the guilt trip, quickly standing up and flicking off the television. “Damn, you don't play fair,” I snap at her and stomp off to the bathroom to have a quick shower. “You better be buying the drinks. You know I hate spending money in those pretentious fucking clubs you drag me to with all those damn stuck up people you call friends.” I think about the last time we went somewhere. The club was as pretentious and lame as her friends are, and we stood around with drinks in hand while she made catty comments about the rest of the patrons with her friends. I had never been so disappointed with her in my whole life. There are two very different sides to Max, and I really don't like the person she is when she’s out with her socialite pals. She shows a side that I know is not her, that I know is all an act.

  Maxine is what you would call uber-wealthy. She comes from old, established money and probably has every right to be as stuck up as the rest of the patrons, but her parents raised her to be down to earth and to work hard. There isn’t usually a snobby bone in her body unless we’re with her friends. Well, not too many, anyway. I’m hoping one day she’ll come to realize her own worth and not measure herself against those assholes because if she was real, she’d win hands down.

  Max’s snort brings my attention back to her.

  “Bah, if you didn’t keep giving money to that crack whore who gave birth to you, you wouldn’t have a problem. You know she's just going to snort it or shoot it up.”

  Closing the door to my bathroom, a bone weariness crosses my body at the thought of my mother. Never has she been responsible or even partly concerned about my welfare, but I still make sure she has a roof over her head, her bills are paid, and she has money for food. Though Maxine is right; most of the food money goes to drugs.

  I peel off my dirty work clothes, leaving them where they fall, and turn on the shower. The bathroom’s not huge and is slightly outdated with its tiles from the eighties when it was originally built and its mud brown vanity and sink. The shower cubicle has a curtain that I picked, covered in mermaids, and you would be hard pressed to fit another body in without it being a tight squeeze. But it’s mine, and I don’t have to share it with anyone, and that’s all that matters. Hot steam fills the small bathroom, and I step under the sharp spray, groaning when the heat hits my body. I’ve been going since very early this morning and basically been in the saddle all day, and my body just isn’t used to the grueling hours anymore. Being at college has made me soft, and today was the first day since I graduated that I didn't get a break from riding. Usually, it’s only one or two horses a day, but Chuck had us going all day. He’s got a few young ones that he’s started breaking in basic riding, plus a few that he’s been hired to train.

  I’m just feeling so tired, and Max’s throw away comment about my mother is hitting at nerves that are exposed due to the weariness. Standing there, with the water and steam blocking out the outside world, I give myself five minutes to wallow in sadness.

  My mother used to be a personal assistant for Maxine's parents, and they were beyond thrilled when she announced her pregnancy at the same time as Melinda, Maxine’s mom. I was an instant playmate for their daughter, and we lived on the estate, so we’ve been inseparable since birth.

  Unfortunately, while pregnant with me, Mom fell in with the wrong crowd. After I was born, Maxine’s parents kept her on for as long as they could, but by the time I’d turned two, she was doing hard drugs and not showing up for work. On the occasion she did, she stole from them to feed her habit. They let her go but allowed her to continue to drop me off to be looked after by the same nanny who looked after Maxine while she tried to keep one crummy job after the other. By the time I was five, she was permanently unemployed.

  Moving from couch to couch of one sleazy boyfriend to the next or begging her druggie friends to give us a room for the night had child protective services stepping in when Melinda decided enough was enough. I was promptly removed from my mother's care and moved directly into Maxine’s bedroom, with a perfectly pretty princess bed to call my own, and welcomed like I was one of them.

  Melinda and Charles were everything a girl could want in foster parents, but the children at the schools they sent me to never let me forget where and what I had come from. Maxine was my staunchest supporter, but deep down, a simmering resentment brewed toward the one who should love me above all else; my mother. It wasn't until my late teens, when I did some lashing out of my own and Melinda and Chuck sent me to a therapist, that I came to realize that none of it was my fault. My mother had her own deep-seated issues and was way too selfish to be putting the well-being of a child before her own. That's on her, not me.

  The one thing I’ll always hold against her though is the fact that she would never tell me about my father. She would use the secret as a way to manipulate me, promising to tell me things in exchange for some favor or other, and one day I realized that every story was different every time, so nothing ever added up. That was when I decided she probably didn't know who he was and let go of the thought of ever being rescued. It wasn’t long after that that I went to stay with Maxine permanently and tucked that dream down into the recesses of my soul. Mom’s always been a stain on my life; on visitation nights, she would drag me down to whichever bar or strip club she was working in at the time, and I would sit in the corner, coloring while she tried to find her next fix. Later on, I discovered she was also finding her nightly meal ticket.

  I never told Melinda or Chuck where we went; Mom, or Diane as I try to call her now, took care of that by threatening Maxine with harm if I ever told anyone. It wasn't until I was about fifteen and the men she was trying to score with started to hit on me, that she finally declared our fortnightly visits done with. I didn't see her for three years after that until I had finally graduated high school and was awarded a scholarship to the local university. By then, I was working for Melinda and Chuck on their horse farm and had been for years, being paid decent money. That's when the guilt trip came raining down, and I started paying her money to keep her away from Maxine and her family.

  “Hey, what are you doing in there? You didn't fall asleep, did you?” A thump on the doors makes me jump even though I should’ve been expecting it. Maxine’s patience has never lasted long.

  Grabbing the soap, I shout back, “Sorry, I was daydreaming! I’ll be fast.” Making quick work of cleaning myself and my hair, I’m out and drying off when I hear her shout through the door again.

  “I’ve put a dress on the bed. Wear it,” she d
emands, and I groan to myself, but she must hear it. “No, don't complain! I know if I leave you to it, you’ll throw on a pair of ripped jeans and a fitted shirt or something. We’re clubbing, not heading down to the local bar.” Sniggering to myself, I wipe the condensation away from the mirror and study my reflection. My skin is sunkissed from all the time I spend outside, but, as yet, no fine lines are developing. I’m careful to religiously apply sunscreen if I’m going to be outside for any length of time. Using my towel, I rub at my natural sun-streaked blonde hair to stop it from dripping before wrapping it around my body. I grab out the blow dryer and blast the long length until it’s almost dry before running a brush through it. It has the windswept tousled look, and I figure that's good enough. I put a hair tie around my wrist in case it gets too hot in the club, and I need to tie the whole lot up.

  Unlike Maxine, I apply minimal makeup. Just some shadow, liner to my eyes to make the hazel stand out, and mascara to darken the blonde lashes. A bit of lipstick to my full lips and I’m good to go. Blowing myself a kiss in the mirror and rolling my eyes when Maxine shouts at me again to hurry up, I leave the bathroom in search of what horror she’s placed out for me to wear.

  Her text notification sounds while I’m stuffing myself into the tight blue number, and it’s lucky my work is physical and I’m in great shape because there isn't an inch of my silhouette that this dress doesn’t show off. But once it’s on, the stretchy fabric allows easy movement, and I don't feel uncomfortable at all.

  “That's the car,” she tells me, looking up from her screen and giving me a wolf whistle. “Girl, you clean up hot.”

  Rolling my eyes, I grab my phone and hold it and my wallet up. “Where exactly am I supposed to put these?” I ask her sarcastically. “The dress doesn't have pockets. Why don't they make dresses with pockets? Designers really are letting the female species down.”