My phone began to ring,
disrupting my thoughts and making me slightly irritated. It was a call from David. I answered quickly because it was rare for David to call me in the middle of the day.
"Boss, you're not going to like this." His voice sounded frantic and I almost didn't want to hear what he was going to say.
"What is it?" I kept my calm. Panicking just as much as him was going to help nothing at that moment.
"That lady who has been chasing you down for years says she's coming after the girl and it’s not going to be pretty."
"The girl ...what girl?" I asked in confusion.
"The one you went out with the other night, you know? The one who found out about us," he said. There was a silence on the phone after that as I took a minute to think.
“How’d you figure that out?” I asked.
“She sent me an email from her husband’s account that he had with us and said these words exactly.”
Dear David and crew,
Since Arsen stole the love of my life from me, I guess I'll have to take something from his as well. That girl—his new arm candy. My daughter has been telling me she’s seen them around town together and it’s more than just taking her out to make himself look good. He has feelings for this girl and this is the perfect time for me to come in and make my move. I just hope you guys get a hold of her before I do.
“It’s crazy, boss,” David spoke. “This woman is absolutely out of her mind.”
“Oh, this isn’t good …this is not good, David.” I found myself panicking just as much as David. It was bad enough that all of the guys hated her. Now this random lady was after her because she saw us at dinner one night together. Who was her daughter and why was she watching our every move?
“What, do you love this chick or something?” David asked in an almost disgusted tone.
“Just find out where that lady is and handle her,” I spat and hung up the phone.
Love? Pssh, whatever. Sure, I was fond of her, but I was most certain I didn’t love someone I barely knew. My jaw clenched and I stormed out of my office. Maybe I did love her ...but how? I’ve barely known her for that long. How could these feelings for her be so strong?
I decided I was going to go home early. After taking my keys from the assistant, I made my way out to my car. Hopefully the ride back to my place would calm me down. I turned on some soothing music and took in the beauty of the city.
I inhaled the fresh air that blew through the window as I drove up the driveway of my home. When I made it inside, I completely ignored the workers there for the weekly cleaning and went straight to my bedroom. I took off my shirt and tossed myself back onto the bed, feeling more comfort than I expected.
I began to think about Lola and how much her personality reminded me of my ex-wife. Yes, the shy and innocent girls were fun to toy around with every now and then, but the open and hardworking ones were the type of girls I’d considered actually being with.
My ex-wife was a lawyer, and very loud and opinionated. We met at a convention for young innovators when we were in our early twenties and fell in love. We had an unbreakable bond up until a couple of years after our first daughter was born. She became a different person, and I knew that being a mother and raising a child could change you in some ways, but she didn’t even try to do anything the same anymore. She completely shut me out when we were supposed to be a family. Where she crossed the line is when she cheated on me.
It would have made sense for me to be the one who cheated, since women had been throwing themselves at me since my ex-wife and I met, but, no. She fell in love with someone new, and in the back of my mind I always beat myself up about that. I wondered what he did for her that I hadn’t, or what I had done wrong in general. Everyone told me that it was all her, but I just felt that I had some responsibility with that.
Being around Lola brought back those feelings that I had with my ex-wife, and that’s another reason why I couldn’t bear to be around her for so long. I didn’t want to fall for the wrong person, thinking that I could get back what I used to have. I guessed that kidnapping her next Friday would actually help me find out if she was the one or not.
“Hey, boss. I just got a call and you’re not going to like this,” one of the members in the back spoke up.
“What’s up?” I asked, not really ready to hear what other bad news had to be stacked on top of the situation at hand.
“Ronnie, down at the harbor, says the new guy got away with a couple of boxes of the drugs. He says he didn’t notice a few of the boxes missing until the car was speeding off and he saw them in the back seat.”
“What fucking new guy?! I didn’t hire anyone new! It should only be the five men that I sent down there originally.” I slammed my hands on the desk. “We let some random get away with a few boxes of our product?”
I couldn’t believe this was happening. First, my life's in danger because an outside knows my illegal source of income and now a large amount of my product has been stolen. I picked up a bottle of beer and launched it across the room. It shattered as it hit the wall and beer went everywhere.
“Clean this fucking mess up,” I spat. “And come up with how we’ll find this son of a bitch by morning or things aren’t going to be pretty.”
Lola
Great! An entire week without Arsen after he kissed me like that. I laid in my bed, staring up at the ceiling. I had no classes or finals to take that day, so I had nothing better to do. I sat up, grabbed my laptop from my bedside table, and opened it quickly. I thought, what better to do right than continue to read where I left off from Arsen’s book, ‘The Midnight Hour.’
I began reading from page thirty-six. The main character, Arthur, had just awakened from a long, steamy night with his lover. It was like Arsen described his character’s feelings almost as if they were his own.
Have you ever looked at someone? Like really looked at them. Did you take a minute to admire the beauty that lays upon them?
I have. I do it every day.
Looking at Sarah is a pleasant moment I experience every day. Taking even the slightest second of the day to admire her inspires me so much. She's so deep-rooted into my poetry that I could write about my love for anything in the world and still find a way to reference my feelings for her.
She and I are meant for each other. I know this because our souls vibrate on a higher level together. Without her, I would probably be an old man down in the dumps every day because I haven’t found my true love.
My favorite part of the day is watching her. She’s my favorite movie. I like the way she lotions her legs, mimicking rich and fancy women. I love the way she laughs at the littlest things I do. I love the crinkle in her nose when she giggles, and most of all I love the way she loves me.
Despite the age difference, she and I truly love each other. And, no, we aren’t accepted in society, but we are going to continue to let our love grow strong. We’re both grown and consenting adults and we should be able to love each other without any judgment. Sadly, this isn’t how the world works.
Fuck what the world thinks. I am in love with Sarah Hughes and nothing’s going to change that. The way she moves when she dances, the look on her face when I tell her she’s beautiful, and how she’s so carefree with whatever she’s doing. And that’s why I’m writing this right now, because the feelings I have for her are too strong for just a short, simple poem.
She changed my life so much that there has to be another way to show that I really care for her. I love her and I’ll love her until the day that I die.
I sighed and smiled to myself. What if Arsen thinks of me the same way Arthur thinks of Sarah. I must’ve said that aloud, because Anabella let out a loud laugh as walked past my room.
“Yeah, right.” She snickered as she walked down the hall.
I quickly stood from my bed, tired of her attitude, and walked down the hall into her room where she’d just entered.
“And what exactly is y
our problem, Ana? You’ve had an attitude since I met Arsen. Why can’t you just be happy that I actually like someone?”
She turned her back to me and sat on her bed. “You dumb, silly, little girl. You’re sleeping with the enemy.”
“The enemy?! What are you even talking about, Anabella?” I asked, genuinely confused about what exactly she meant by Arsen being the enemy. “And I’m not sleeping with Arsen. Let’s make that clear.”
“Wow,” she scoffed. “Some best friend you are.”
“What, are you jealous?”
“Of what?” she laughed harshly.
“The fact that I’m out having fun without you? Or maybe even the fact that you can’t hold on to a man, but now that I have one it’s rubbing you the wrong way? Is that it?!”
“You’re trash, Lola! How could you say that to me? Are you really going to let some random man come between us?” she screamed. We were now standing face to face and she was on a verge of tears.
“I should ask you the same thing, since you’ve been acting as if I'm nothing to you since Arsen and I met!!”
“If you don’t remember one of the biggest things I’ve ever told you, things would be better off if we didn’t talk anymore.”
“But Ana! I’m so confused. What are you talking—“
“Just go, Lola!!” She cut me off and I threw my hands up in defeat.
“Whatever, Anabella. I guess I’ll see you around.” I had no choice but to go back to my room, disappointed and confused. There I was trying to resolve the issues between us and she couldn’t even tell me what was going on so I could fix it. Why did she believe Arsen was ‘the enemy’ and what was the big thing that she mentioned?
A couple of days passed slowly but surely. Class after class, final after final, and I had to do it all on my own, without Anabella there to tell me that I’d do fine or to let me know that she’d be there for me. I felt empty. I tried making small talk with the other students and even the professors, but it just didn’t feel right. I hadn’t been alone like that in a long time.
On the bright side, I had been working on my novel. It’s based on a teenage girl who has not a care in the world. She goes by herself on an adventure through different states and learns a lot of life lessons along the way. Being who she is, the trip through various cities and areas full of nature help heal her. It gives her closure from past struggles and a sense of relief from the issues she faces in the present, making her outlook for the future positive.
There was a spin on the story, though, to keep it interesting. The reason this girl went on an ‘adventure’ was to escape from the weird guy who had been stalking her for months. I finished up the remainder of the draft for my story intro.
"It's like boys are manifested with trouble," I sighed as I laid back onto my bed. I could feel the cool breeze from the air vents cause goosebumps to swell all over my arms and legs. My silk gown wasn't doing much to cover my body.
"Oh, girl, I'm sure it's just someone playing a joke on you," Shandy said, smiling.
"No! This is serious, Shandy!" I half-yelled angrily. "Do you know what it's like to be stalked? I'm always being watched. It's scary and it's getting in the way of my job, new relationships, and just everything in general!!"
Shandy bit the inside of her cheek gently and her eyes widened slightly. "What are we going to do about this?"
"I don't know." I closed my eyes tightly and took a deep breath. "I really don't know. I just need to get away."
It’s all a big representation of who I am, who I used to be, and who I’m becoming. It’s my life experience dramatized through a life I wish I lived—a life that I will live after my dreams of becoming a best-selling author comes true. The way that Arsen’s favorite book made him feel was exactly how my own novel made me feel. As though, even if the character was fictional, there was still someone out there who I could connect to. I was often guilty of getting lost in my own writings.
I would usually have had Anabella critique my writing, but after the situation between us, it was like living with a stranger. We didn’t acknowledge each other anymore. The worst part about it all was that I was starting to see her hang out with a new group of friends. I just wanted to know where we went wrong.
I let my English professor look over my work instead. She gave me a couple pointers on how to go about writing certain things and just scanned through a few of the pages that I had already written, but overall, she said it was a pretty cool story. The words ‘pretty cool’ made me uncomfortable. I didn’t want my story to be seen as ‘pretty cool,’ but rather spontaneous, refreshing, or life changing.
Random thoughts of how my work could possibly not make it far in the writing business flooded my head. I knew that I was a great writer, but the weight of everything happening plus the “compliment” I had just received from my teacher made me think otherwise. I knew there had to be a way to get myself back on track.
I shook the negative thoughts from my head and started to walk back to my room from class. As I approached the building, I spotted the lady who had attacked Arsen at the restaurant. She was leaving the building that I lived in and seeing her in broad daylight, she looked strangely familiar. I walked with my head down until she was out of sight so she wouldn’t see me and assumed it had something to do with Arsen murdering her husband.
I started to think about how messed up that situation actually was and I felt horrible. I couldn’t imagine that happening to me or my family, if I had one. I finally made it past her without her noticing and caught the elevator up to my room. When I made it inside of my suite, there were about four or five other people sitting on the couch watching TV. Ana was sitting in the middle of them.
Seeing her doing something that we always did together with some random people made me feel less important—like this entire relationship actually ended over something that I wasn’t completely aware of. I stormed into my room and lay out on my bed, burying my face into the pillow. I let out a muffled scream of frustration, then sat up straight. I just wanted everything to be back to normal.
It had officially been an entire week since the kiss with Arsen and the argument with Anabella, and I hadn’t talked to either of them since. I didn’t talk to many other people on campus, so when it came time for me to rant about anything, I could only talk to myself. It felt like I was going crazy. It was definitely not fun being the only person I could talk to.
I had just finished my last final of the school year and decided to get a cup of coffee to wake myself up. Everyone must have really been in a hurry to get home because the line for coffee wasn’t as long or as slow as usual. The campus was almost empty. It was finally summer.
I got a cup of coffee and a danish. This was the only thing that had been able to put a real smile on my face for the last couple of days.
The walk to and from the coffee shop, and the actual coffee itself, was what I needed to clear my mind from everything that had been going on lately. Though I felt pretty bored and alone, these were the moments that I needed to keep myself sane. It was always good to take the time to reassure yourself that everything was going to be all right and that you could always move forward in any problem as long as you worked hard enough.
I took a seat on a bench next to a girl with sandy brown hair. I wanted to see if my attempt to make small talk would work because, quite frankly, I was tired of talking to myself.
“Hi.” I looked over at her. “I’m Lola. What’s your name?”
“Daisy.” She smiled and looked over at me. “I know who you are, Lola. I’ve always wanted to hang out with you.” She laughed nervously.
“Why didn’t you say anything?” She just looked at me and I caught on. “Let me guess. The email that I sent to the entire school claiming I didn’t need distractions from my work?”
“You’re right,” she laughed. “What made you want to talk to me?”
“Just decided to be social for once.” I smiled slightly. “I thought it’d be cool to actually h
ave fun once in a while.”
“I understand,” she spoke.
“So, do you have any plans for the summer?” I asked.
“Well, yeah. There are tons of flyers going around for some upcoming parties and bonfires.” She began pulling out pieces of folded paper from her bag. “You can have these. I already have the information on my phone.
“Thanks, Daisy!” I smiled big and put the flyers inside of my bag.
“A couple of friends and I are hosting a big ‘end of the semester’ party event tomorrow. You should come out.” She mimicked my smile.
“I’ll definitely keep that in mind.” I stood up and waved. “See you around!”
Did I just make a friend? The end of my junior year of college and I was finally making a friend other than Anabella. Why did this feel so great? Was it because I had found someone who could fill this empty part of me or because I just missed the feeling of having multiple friends when I was younger? Who knows. I was just glad that I didn’t have to be alone anymore.
As soon as I got back into my room, my phone rang. It was Arsen. After this long period of not speaking, I thought I would be the one to call first. I answered and put the phone up to my ear slowly.
"Come over tonight." Those were the only words that he spoke. His voice was deeper and darker than usual. It sent chills up my spine.
"What time? I thought I was meeting you at the coffee shop."
"You know what ...just come over now."
"I—is there anything that you need in particular, Arsen?"
"Stop talking and come over now," he demanded. I'd never been more attracted to him than I was that very moment. He hung up the phone and I sat there speechless. I decided to slip into something more appealing. I took a quick shower and threw on a dress similar to the one I wore when we first went out, with fishnets and a pair of nude heels. Little did anyone know, I was hiding a beautiful set of red lace lingerie underneath. I put loose curls in my hair and wore no makeup, except for my favorite burgundy lipstick and a little mascara. I was sure I knew what he wanted, but if things went a different way I wasn’t so sure how I’d feel.
His Beautiful Revenge: A Bad Boy Billionaire Romance Page 54
