Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 101561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 339(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 101561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 508(@200wpm)___ 406(@250wpm)___ 339(@300wpm)
“I didn’t know.”
“Clearly.” I sighed. “So, that’s my second dirty fucking secret. You ran, I ran after you. Then I came back with my sorry tail between my legs, and I took your name off the directorship because I was so mightily pissed. That doesn’t make it right, I know, but Jesus, Faye, have a bit of fucking tolerance, will you?”
A tear ran down her face but she brushed it away. “It’s not about that,” she said. “It’s that you didn’t tell me.”
“And when was I supposed to tell you exactly?”
“Before I was in your fucking bed might have been a good time.”
I threw my hands in the air. “Pissing hell, are you for fucking real?”
“You lied!” she hissed.
“We both lie, Faye. We both hide things, we both kid ourselves, and knock heads, and think our hands are sparkling fucking clean.” I paced away from her, only to turn back again. “You’re so keen to know when I would have told you about that stupid fucking form, how about when you were going to tell me why you ran away from fucking Italy? From that fucking tosser?”
Her mouth dropped. “That’s different.”
“Is it? Is it really?”
“Totally!”
“So, you read my secret on a stupid piece of paper, I read yours on Vincent fucking Blackthorne’s website. What’s the fucking difference?”
“His website?”
“Yes on his poxy website. His disgusted fans dissing the cunt for selling his fucking magpie.”
“Oh God.”
“You should have fucking told me.”
“I was going to tell you!”
I laughed. “No, you fucking weren’t.”
She slammed her hands on top of the flogging bench. “I was embarrassed. Humiliated. Ashamed.”
“You could have told me, Faye, I would never have judged you.”
“Now you can piss off,” she snapped. “You were always fucking judging me! Always full of condemnation! I’ve hardly been able to do anything fucking right since I’ve been back.”
“That’s different.”
“Is it? Is it really, Andy?”
“Totally!”
And we’d gone full fucking circle.
I put my head in my hands, exhausted. “He sold you for sex, Faye, that’s a disgusting thing to have gone through.”
“Yeah, well, the whole thing was disgusting. You have no idea what filthy shit went down out there, Andy. No fucking idea. The line between where I wanted it and where I was being whored out is pretty fucking blurry. But he sold me, and that’s disgusting, and wrong, and an absolute betrayal. I don’t like betrayal, Andy.”
“Like anyone does, Faye, get off your moral fucking high horse.”
“You stole from me.”
“I didn’t steal shit from you, look at you, bold as brass in the club you bailed on.”
And then came the tears. Stupid dramatic fucking tears, not about being assaulted, or whored out, or locked in a playroom in her own fucking club, none of that seemed to matter to Faye Devere, because she’s that kind of highly-fucking-strung. No, the tears were about Andy fucking Morgan and what a fucking cunt he was for taking her name off a fucking online register. Typical fucking Faye Devere.
“Stop it,” I said. “Don’t make this a big fucking problem.”
“It is!” she wailed. “This isn’t my club!”
“We’ll fill in the paperwork right pissing now if you want, you’ll be back on there again sooner than my fucking ass stops hurting.” I was hoping for a laugh, but I didn’t get one.
“I want to go,” she said, and she was all sniffly and pathetic.
“That makes two of us,” I said. “Let’s sort this out at home.”
But she shook her head. “Not your home,” she cried. “I don’t belong there anymore. It’s yours, just like this club is.” She stood up, all bloody melodramatic and got her little pout on. “I’m going,” she snivelled. “It’s your club, and you can fucking keep it, Andy, just like you wanted!”
Jesus fucking wept.
***
Chapter Twenty Four
Faye
We gathered up our things and left Topaz and Demelza to lock up. The taxi ride was uncomfortable, at far ends of the backseat while I cried quietly and he kept brooding. I wanted to reach out, wanted to talk it through and unravel the knots, untwist the lies and the secrets and, I don’t know, feel like this mess would somehow be ok again. But I didn’t feel like that. The twitch was already starting, too much pressure, too much awkwardness.
He knew my dirty bad secrets, and I knew his.
How could we look at each other the same way now?
That’s what kept me crying, all the way back to his. And it was his again now, not home, not ours. Nowhere close. I opened the door and left him to pay the driver, then waited while he led the way upstairs. He held the door open and I crossed the threshold of the place I’d come to belong in.
I never belong anywhere for long.
I always have to run away too soon.
I went into the guest room, pulled out my case from under the bed, and he was right there, in the doorway, his hands behind his head in disbelief. “What the fuck are you doing?”