by Linnea May
"You're ridiculous!" I yell back at him. "How fucking petty can you be? Are you seriously spreading disgusting rumors like that about me because of your damn hurt ego?"
"True or false, Ann?!"
Fuck. I can't take this. Tears are threatening to run down my face. Again. Since when have I become such a crybaby? How can I allow him to hold such power over me?
Everybody is staring at me, most of all, Brandon, who's fixating on me with an evil grin, feeling superior as he humiliates me in front of the entire office.
I need to get out of here.
"You're a pathetic asshole, you know that?" I hiss at him, before jumping up from my seat and darting away, before I can give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry.
"You still need to clean out your desk, whore!"
I don't stop. I don't even look back for one second, but I do have a reply for him before heading out the door.
"Fuck you, Brandon!"
Chapter 31
Jared
Things are going great in every aspect. Of course, I can't trust the current ease with which everything seems to be developing in my favor.
Button looks perfectly chic and smart in her new outfit, a pencil-shaped dress in a vibrant purple that hugs her frame without showing too much skin, looking perfectly tame and conservative, but so fucking hot at the same time.
I wanted to yank it up and bend her over to have my way with her when she came down the stairs, casting me a coy smile and winking seductively. She knows how to carry herself in a way that drives me insane, and she seeks to gain my attention in any way possible lately. She's been deliberately misbehaving, literally asking for punishments. I know there's one thing she seeks the most: my hand clutched around her throat. I've never had a submissive who got off on being choked as much as she does.
But as much as I enjoy it, too, I can't follow either of our desires as much as I'd like. I have to be careful. She bruises too easily and she cannot be seen with any marks on her skin.
It would ruin everything.
The dirt that has been spread about me years ago may have been proven false and dismissed, but even then, a bad rumor always leaves its stain on you. Even the smallest hint could bring me down. I'm not running against any particularly strong or powerful opponent, but even without such opposition, there's always someone out there who wants to hurt a man like me. Journalists, mostly. That sneaky brand of media whose entire profession is focused on snooping around and getting their noses into things they have no business in.
I can't risk feeding them anything.
So I restrained myself and stayed away from her throat as much as possible. There are other ways to leave my mark on her, other ways to make her scream out my name, to make her squirm, wail and moan in a blend of agony and pleasure. It's the most beautiful sound, the most beautiful sight. No one can see the blue and purple marks beneath her dress. Her ass is so bruised up that I'm sure she won't be able to sit without contorting her face in pain. I'm looking forward to that, to watching her process the sting while she's so eager to hide it to the outside world. The knowledge that she's carrying my marks on her skin, still feeling the leathery blows I granted her this morning, is a big turn on.
She was shifting on her seat in the car, casting me playful looks as we were on our way here. I didn't say a thing about it, and neither did she.
Today is the last of three events we had to attend this week. Button has accompanied me every time, and while we've been doing this for a while now, I can't help but be impressed with her more every time. It's hard not to fall for her; close to impossible, I'd say. I never tried to prove anything to myself since that incident a couples of weeks ago. I may be a fool for this, but she's managed to bewitch me. There's no denying it anymore.
However, I'm painfully aware of the fact that she's only with me because of the contract. She never said anything to contradict that, but her actions show that she's in this for more - just like me.
Be careful. Be very careful.
I can't get that damn voice inside my head to shut up. It's still there, every damn day, every time I look at her the way I’m looking at her right now.
The event has just started and we are chatting with people as they arrive. Usually I'd always make sure that Button was right at my side, making sure that she's not doing or saying anything to jeopardize my campaign. But with every new event we attended, every conversation we've had, and every short interview she took part in, I’ve grown more confident in her abilities to play this game. She's familiar with my platform and knows how to forego unpleasant questions and evade uncomfortable situations.
I watch her from afar, observing her as she engages in small talk with an elderly couple I know to be long-term benefactors of the Lion's Club. All three of them are smiling, apparently having a good time.
I was just about to tear my eyes away from them when I see another guy joining the conversation. He's rather young, probably about my age. My pulse accelerates when I see the press tag hanging around his neck. I told Button not to talk to the press when she's not with me, and to turn them away if they ever approach her when she's alone.
The way this guy pushes himself between her and the couple she's been talking to gives me reason to worry. He looks a little too eager to talk to her, his eyes flickering with excitement when he addresses her. He's sneering as he talks, nodding and motioning in a very pushy way. I can tell right away that he makes her uncomfortable. She moves away from him, raising her hand up in defense as if he was attacking her.
I want to step in, but something is holding me back. I remain in my spot, frozen like a statue, watching how she handles the situation. He's talking to her, puffed out and eager, but she's shaking her head repeatedly.
Then, something changes. He finishes a sentence, leaving room for her to react. She stares at him, her mouth partly opened, slowly lowering her hand. Whatever he just said to her, it must have left an impact.
"Mr. King!"
My attention is pulled away from her when I hear my name called out, and it’s accompanied by a strong hand on my shoulder. I forcefully tear my eyes away from her to face the idiot who has the audacity to just barge into me like that. Unfortunately, he's not just anyone, but the organizer of this event, a leading figure in the prestigious Club and tonight's host.
"Good to see you!" he says, shaking my hand with such strength and excitement that it's impossible to ignore him.
I allow him to engage me in a senseless conversation about the proceedings of the next couple of hours, nodding and smiling at the right places, while my mind is hooked on Ann and the menacing reporter who crept up on her.
What the hell did he want from her?
And what the hell did he say to cause her to react like that?
Chapter 32
Ann
"Who was that guy?"
His question catches me off guard. We just got into the car, both exhaling from exhaustion after enduring another draining campaign event. Jared loosened his tie and turned to me just a second after the driver started the car.
"What guy?" I ask, even though I'm pretty sure I know who he's talking about.
He must've seen it. The guy - who introduced himself as Stewart - approached me right at the beginning of the event. I wasn't prepared for him at all, and especially not for his insistent and forward approach. He appeared out of nowhere, seemingly materializing out of thin air, abruptly ending the conversation I was having and pushing himself and his agenda between me and Mr. and Mrs. Baumgartner, a wealthy couple who both play a significant role in the club whose event we were attending. He spoke fast, pushing out as many words as possible, as if he was running on a timer. I guess in a way he was because there was no other chance for him to get back to me during the entire evening. As soon as the official part of the evening started, it was close to impossible for any journalist to get close to me, just as it had been planned. Jared always insisted that press was only allowed to take pictures and conduct pre-schedu
led short interviews at these events, but no impromptu attacks like the one Stewart orchestrated.
I was so overcome by his sudden charge at me that it took a while for me to process the short but confusing interaction we had. His face didn't seem familiar to me, but he said that he had seen me earlier that day at the co-working space. The day when Brandon blared out his suspicions about me becoming a high class call guy. He's a freelance reporter, just like I used to be. And he's after something big, he said. His big hit, an honest and raw exposure piece on Jared King and the so-called skeletons this successful business prodigy and politician-to-be might be hiding in his closet.
Lovely. Just lovely.
This guy, Stewart, said that he had done some digging in Jared's past that might be of interest to me. He didn't even make a big deal about Brandon's accusations. To me it sounded as if he just assumed they were the truth. He called me a concubine. Why on Earth he chose to use that word is beyond me. Did he think it would sound better than calling me a whore?
My heart aches when I recall the quick, short conversation I was forced to have with him.
"As his closest confidant, I'm sure you could add some valuable insight into this," he said to me. "This could be a great piece and worth a lot of money!"
I shook my head and assured him that I wasn't the right person to talk to. I was also disgusted at the fact that he just ambushed me after witnessing that horrible exchange between me and Brandon. I hate being reminded of it and have tried everything I can think of to forget about the day that was supposed to bring me closure with my old life, but turned into something ugly instead.
“Button?”
Jared’s voice is probing, his eyes fixating on me with dark, concerned intensity.
I don't want to tell him, but I know I should. After all, he doesn't need to know the entire story, just parts of it.
"He was a reporter..."
"I know that much, Button," Jared says, impatiently. "What did he want from you?"
Our eyes meet, locking onto each other in a silent stare, me nervously biting at my lips while he awaits an explanation.
"I didn't tell him anything," I assure him. "I swear! You have to trust me, I-"
"Button," he says, reaching for my hand. "Please, what did he want from you?"
"He said he's working on an expose on you, trying to dig up dirt," I begin, watching as his eyes flicker in warning. "And he wanted me to contribute by telling him... I don't know, about your... dark secrets?"
Jared looks at me with a tense expression, processing what I just said while beckoning me to continue. "What else?"
"He said that he's been digging into your past and..."
I hesitate. It's hard to give voice to that man's allegations. I know they're not true, nothing but a huge misunderstanding. Hardly anyone can know that as well as I do.
But still.
"And?" Jared urges me to continue speaking.
"He said there were rumors about you... about you… hitting women," I blurt out, praying to God that the driver can't hear us behind the glass screen at the front. "He said that you were known to be a 'bad man', violent, capricious, and cunning. He said that there were women who showed up with bruises and said that you raped and beat them up and that it was a huge scandal a few years back. Something that could really hurt you now if it gets brought up again."
Jared sighs and diverts his eyes from me, staring to the front with an apathetic expression for a few moments before he rubs his temples as if he's being tortured by a strong headache.
"You know that I don't believe it, right?"
My voice is trembling, delivering a tone of insecurity and doubt that feels out of place. "I mean, I have bruises all over my body, so even if there's a woman who..."
My voice breaks, as I can't bring myself to say the words. The thought that he has done these things with other women before me, that he has been just as intimate with them as we are together… it simply hurts too much to give voice to it.
"It's okay," Jared says, squeezing my hand in his.
"I didn't tell him anything or even acknowledge his ridiculous accusations or anything, you have to believe me."
He smiles at me, and it’s a somber smile.
"I believe you, Button," he says. "I truly do. I trust you."
My heart stings at the impact of his words.
He trusts me.
"Why did he say those things?" I want to know. "Is it true? I mean, the part about there being rumors about you?"
He takes a deep breath and evades my eyes, nervously playing with his fingers before he continues speaking.
"There's something you don't know about me," he says. "And I guess it is time to tell you, if only to have you better prepared for the next time this happens."
I hold my breath.
"When we're home," Jared adds in a whisper. "I'll tell you everything once we get home. I may need a drink for this."
I nod. "Sure."
It felt good to tell him. Paper may be the most patient listener, but it fails to provide the comfort that honest communication can provide.
But my heart is still heavy with guilt. I'm torn between feeling relieved and feeling like the biggest traitor on Earth.
Because I haven't told him everything. There's one particular detail about my encounter with that guy Stewart that I kept to myself. No, two things, actually.
First, I didn't tell Jared about the offer I received. I didn't tell him that Stewart has a lot of power and money behind him. If what he said is true, he's way more than just an average freelance reporter. He offered me money to sell my inside story about the most private aspects of Jared's life, a lot of money, an amount bigger than what I'm promised for my current contract.
An amount that was hard to say decline.
I know I have the kind of private details that Stewart is after. Beginning with the fact that Jared bought me to be his personal call girl, to the things he did with me, to the things he tried to do with me but failed to go through with. I could lie. I could turn all of this into a fucking gold mine for myself and never have to worry about money ever again. If I played my cards right, I could make a fortune that trumps Jared's offer by far.
I have the words for it, pages and pages full of notes and anecdotes of what has happened between us since I moved in with Jared. I could sell all of it.
But I can't tell Jared about this offer.
And I also can't tell him that Stewart gave me his business card, and that I not only took it, but kept it.
I just don't understand why I did it.
Am I actually considering this?
Could I really be that evil?
Chapter 33
Jared
It all started when I was young. Very young.
My parents died when I was still a toddler, too young to remember either of their faces. I was sent away to be raised by my only remaining family - an aunt who already had three children of her own, all of them girls. She and her husband thought that I could be the son they never had, the missing boy in the family, and despite not being their own, I was at least blood-related.
But I wasn't the boy they were hoping for.
I was a troubled kid, always angry, always testing limits, mine and theirs. They were highly religious people and thought that God could be the answer to my plagued nature, if only I was willing to listen to Him. When I didn't comply with their approach and my temper only worsened by the month, they were convinced there was something inherently wrong with me. My aunt swore that she saw the devil in my eyes, a curse left on me due to the early and tragic death of my parents.
In the end, it was nothing else but her excuse to give up on me. If the devil was involved, there was nothing she could do for the kid her sister left behind. Raising me was beyond her abilities. She couldn't give me what I needed. Yadda, yadda...
Thus began my journey from foster family to foster family. A new home every few years, sometimes every few weeks or months.
I was
n't a bad kid, I really wasn't. I never got into serious trouble, hardly ever got into fights, never sank to drugs or theft or any other kind of crime.
But I wasn’t exactly a good kid, either. I was a challenge, always questioning everything, struggling with authority, and defying rules that everybody else just took for granted. I wasn't the kind of kid you could just tell that things had to be done a certain way because that is just the way they had to be done. I always needed to know why they couldn't be done a different way, and I hated to go along with rules that I couldn't understand or agree with, something that was mistaken as disobedience.
I never wanted trouble. I wanted truth.
But my aunt wasn't the only one who swore she saw the devil in my eyes. She was the first to say it, but not the last who swore it was true.
I'm not going to lie: it was tough. Growing up was tough for me, but it wasn't all bad. In between, I had foster families who genuinely cared for me, who taught me well, who didn't grow tired of my thirst for knowledge and truth and my constant questioning. With them, the hardest part was being taken away and shoved into a new home.
I was sent to my last foster family at sixteen, and that is where I met her.
Elsa.
She was part of the family I lived with, not my designated foster mother, but her younger sister. So, in a way, she was like another aunt to me. She was just a few years older than me, in her mid-twenties when I first met her. There was an instant attraction between us, an attraction that shouldn't exist between a foster boy and a woman who was supposed to take care of him. She also saw something in my eyes, but it wasn't the devil. Not until later.
She was an attractive woman with a lush body that she regularly flaunted in front of my horny teenage eyes. It was great and tormenting at the same time. I laid awake all night, thinking about all the things I wanted to do to that incredible body of hers, agonizing over my strong yearning while she made it worse every single day. She seduced me, using all the little tactics available to a woman in her situation, leaving her blouse unbuttoned, using the summer months to run around wearing as little as possible while getting as close to me as she could, randomly touching me when no one would see.