Jennifer came out again, holding a picture frame with a livid expression on her face. “Did you just stuff our picture in the trash? Talk about next level immaturity.”
I gaped at her and then at the picture, feeling confused. I hadn’t touched that picture. I didn’t even remember it existed, barely looked at it.
“I didn’t-“
“You know what? I think I’m going to take a week-long break at least and let you sort out your priorities,” she cut in, going over to the dresser and putting the photo back in its place with a thud. “Seriously,” she muttered, shaking her head.
I scowled at her, thinking that maybe she had moved that picture herself and it might have fallen into the trash by accident. She was always placing unnecessary stuff in the bathroom.
“Take all the time you need, Jennifer,” I told her, still icing my knuckles as I sat on the bed. I should have done it right away instead of waiting almost an hour. The swelling was not going down.
“Oh, wow. What a response,” my girlfriend threw at me.
I held on to my temper with a tight leash because I didn’t like fighting but if she kept this up…
Now I knew how Riley must have felt…with the constant criticism and bullying. Just because someone was quiet, it didn’t give you the right to walk all over them. But I waited for Jen to leave, breathing a sigh of relief when I heard the front door close. She had an apartment in the city which she hardly ever used but kept it anyway in case her parents ever decided to visit her. They were pretty conventional and weren’t aware we were basically living together.
A writer’s life was lonely most of the time and I had liked having her around, thinking we would grow together and getting used to the comfort she offered at nights because I wasn’t into casual dating or one night stands. But I was beginning to understand that Jennifer was only good to you as long as you served her purpose. Ella had been the first to point that out to me but I had brushed her off.
My phone beeped in my pocket and I removed it to see a message on my Twitter.
I saw what you did tonight, Jude. It was very admirable. People ignore such things these days because they don’t want to get involved. You were awesome. – @wynnie.
I stiffened as I read the message and stood up to go and look outside the window which faced the street. My home was a little out of the way of other houses in the area but I didn’t see any car parked out there or some figure lurking in the streets. All I heard were leaves rustling in the wind. I wanted to ask her who she was but then, she might get the wrong idea.
I hadn’t even realized that this girl might actually be stalking me instead of just trying to get in touch with me from behind a keyboard. This was kind of serious. I should have felt threatened but I didn’t. It intrigued me that someone might be watching my every move because they admired my talent so much but then again, I had to draw the line somewhere. What if she broke into my house? My bedroom at night?
Jesus. That wasn’t cool at all even if I didn’t receive any menacing vibes from her. I typed out a single message and sent it to her.
Leave me alone.
Then I deleted the messages and prowled the house to make sure everything was locked up properly before taking some painkillers and crawling into bed, exhausted after a long day of writing and my unexpectedly eventful night.
The next morning, I woke up to a call from my agent asking me if I was okay and if I had seen the news.
"I'm barely awake, Phillipa," I grumbled and then hissed when I felt a throbbing pain in my hand. Shit. It seemed to have gotten worse overnight. Was I really this weak? One punch and I couldn't even use my hand.
"Jude, it's bad," she informed me, sounding serious. "Really bad. Especially after all the publicity we got from the show. People are comparing that charming persona you put on during the interview with the man who assaulted one of the city's biggest lawyers in public. We need to do some serious damage control."
I sat up slowly and rubbed my eyes, trying to take it all in. And failing.
"I need coffee," I said to her after several seconds of silence.
"J. R, do you even realize how deep in shit you are right now? People have already made the video go viral. Your publishers questioned me on it first thing today. It gives them a bad name as well. William hasn't pressed charges. Yet."
"I suppose nobody's going to give me the benefit of the doubt and say that I might have had a good reason for punching the guy?" I groused as I trudged downstairs to the kitchen to brew myself some coffee.
Phillipa sighed on the other hand. "I don't doubt it for a second. I'm pretty sure without even asking that you wouldn't do that for kicks. But this is serious, Jude and people are demanding answers. A statement from Hierchay and maybe from you as well on your official accounts or website."
"Okay," I said, still unable to process so much so soon. "I will call you later when I'm feeling a little sane.”
Phillipa hung up and I stood there for a minute, staring unseeingly at the television screen, wondering if I possessed the strength to turn it on. I had really bad anxiety when it came to such things; being scrutinized and criticized or getting backlash for something I had done. I hated those things and tended to stay out of drama but Phillipa was right. William could press charges. I hadn't been thinking and I needed to fix this before it blew up any further.
After gulping down the first cup of coffee, I poured myself another and carried my mug over to the living room where I reluctantly tuned in to the news channels. It was almost eight a.m and there would be an update soon.
I made myself sit through it to get a feel of how bad the situation was. Like Phillipa had said, it was pretty bad. A lot of people had a lot of things to say about me. Especially those who wanted to see me fail, peers who were always envious of my success. Assholes.
I switched off the TV and made the mistake of going online and that was when my phone blew up with all the tags and notifications. News pages, BookTwitter and BookTube. People were surprised by my actions because my record so far had been spotless as an author and as an American citizen.
One internet user, who wasn't a fan, posted something about me being bipolar because ‘who went from having a cheerful discussion on a talk show to this violent display of behaviour in such a public place?’
"It was one punch," I growled and scrolled through some more posts with the tag #jrknight.
What I read made sweat form on my upper lip and I switched off my phone and dumped my coffee in the sink in favor of some wine. I didn't like getting drunk but the occasion called for it. My anxiety was getting worse and so I shut out the entire world, locked myself in my office and dove into my writing.
Chapter 13
Wynter
I walked into a dark, silent house at nine in the morning, looking around me warily while making my way upstairs to the first floor. Jude liked his house to be airy and had to have the windows open and sunlight pouring in during the daytime so this was a dramatic change. I tried the knob on his office door and noted that it was locked so I knocked and called out his name, not wanting to disturb him while he wrote but also needing to see him after last night.
The rumors floating around regarding him had me worried because I’d detected early on how much Jude’s image meant to him. Overnight, it had been tarnished, just like that. The world didn’t even wait for him to explain. The internet could be brutal like that. I should know. My porn video was still circulating. I knew I shouldn’t bother to check but I did and it made me so mad. They’d even made memes out of it and were now putting a picture of a cow in place of my head. Classic.
The door opened and I was relieved to see Jude standing there on the other side, regarding me calmly. He was the only thing, his face was the only thing that made all of this bearable. That made me want to get out of bed and show up to work. I may be an imposter but I did take my job seriously and I was determined to get a lot done today even though it was a Saturday and he wasn’t even expecting me.
>
“Riley,” he said, no…he slurred before tucking his tongue in his cheek and giving me a thoughtful look. “Good morning.”
My eyes went to the wine bottle on his desk and then back to his face. I’d never seen him drinking before and definitely not this early in the day.
“I’m glad you came,” he spoke again before stepping aside and letting me in, strangely unsurprised by my appearance. “The world is out to get me today. Sorry about the alcohol. I have bad anxiety. Please come in.”
I did and dumped my things on my desk before looking at him again as he rounded his own desk slowly and sat down. He was dressed casually in a white t-shirt and grey sweatpants and he hadn’t shaved. Last night he had told me to leave him alone but looking at him now, how fragile and gloomy he seemed, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere.
“Could you come over here?” Jude gestured with his hand and leaned sideways to drag a chair towards him before letting out a hiss. “Just grab that chair, will you?” He winced a little and straightened. “I dictated some stuff today but I need you to look it over. It’s not that good. Mainly because I was slurring my way through most of it.”
Frowning, I went over and dragged a chair to his side, wondering why he wanted me to do that. He didn’t need any help with his writing. Then my eyes fell on his right hand and I sucked in a sharp breath.
“Jude,” I breathed and unthinkingly, reached for his hand. “Oh my god, that looks awful,” I said, studying the bruises and grazed skin on his knuckles.
"Yeah, you'd think I punched a fucking wall or something right?" He removed his hand from my grip. "I should have cleaned it. I don't know first-aid therapy for throwing punches. You should see the other guy, though." Jude paused and then glanced at me sideways. "Or not."
I stood up determinedly. "I'm going to clean that up now and bandage it okay."
"No, Riley. It's fine."
"It's not fine. It's not going to heal like that, Jude. Hold on."
I hurried upstairs to his bathroom to get the first-aid box and then rushed back down before placing it next to the laptop and then starting to apply some disinfectant on his knuckles.
"How did you know where to find the first-aid box?" he asked me with a frown and I stilled, blinking up at him.
"Um...I just...well, I looked around," I replied and he fell quiet, probably too drunk to process my answer.
He hissed when I dabbed at a particularly raw spot and I muttered an apology.
"Riley."
I felt like such a fraud whenever he spoke my name in that sincere and earnest tone.
"I'm really sorry for how Jennifer spoke to you,” Jude told me. “And for William."
I acknowledged his words with a curt nod. I knew he felt bad because he took me to have dinner but he was not responsible for their actions.
"Are you going to make a statement?" I asked him carefully.
He shrugged. "I'm going to have to. William could press charges." He swallowed. "It could get ugly because of how well-known I am. Don't worry. I'll try to keep your name out of the media circus. No one filmed the actual punch but they did record what happened after I hit him."
I wanted to assure him that I would be there to defend him if William did press charges but that would mean coming forward about William's advances and I would make the news again. My cover would be blown. They would take me away for good and Jude would hate me for my deception.
Jude touched his finger lightly to my chin and I stopped dwelling on it to blink at him.
"I won't involve you in this," he said, making it sound like a solemn vow and I hated that I couldn't support him.
"It's all done," I finally croaked and he glanced at his bandaged hand and gave a self-deprecating smile.
"All this fuss over a punch," he murmured and turned to pick up his wine glass.
I studied him as he sipped from it slowly. "Those hands are made for writing, boss. Not for fighting," I told him and he laughed a little.
"Yeah about that-"
"Oh, right." I straightened, put everything away and went into the guest bathroom to wash my hands before returning to the desk. "I'm ready to make sense of whatever mess you created."
"Hey. Careful. That's my sweat and blood on those pages."
Smirking, I pulled his laptop towards me and studied the Google document he had open. He'd been using voice dictation and everything was scrambled.
"I'm not good at dictating," he explained, pouring himself more wine. "You want some?"
I glanced at the wine and then at his face which was completely serious.
"Err...Jude, you're my boss," I reminded him. "Offering me a drink at work is probably a bad idea."
He smiled but said nothing as I started to edit the sentences on the screen and only asked for his input when some of the words didn't make sense. An email popped up twenty minutes later and I peeked at it.
"It's your Dad."
Jude didn't look at me as he swallowed. "Ignore it, please."
I kept looking at his profile for some time before going back to my work. Jude's father was one of the top industrialists in the country with a reputation of his own in the business world and I was pretty sure he had seen the news. He usually called but I was willing to bet Jude had turned his phone off. I felt sorry for him, especially when I remembered his words from earlier.
The world is out to get me today.
"Do you know what this is?" he said to me quietly as he swirled the wine in his glass, sounding more and more depressed. "It's one of the finest Tuscan wines known as Masseto. My father gifted it to me at the launch party of Mercy's End and I kept it with me all these years because the man doesn’t believe in giving gifts. But he was so proud of me that day, Riley. He's been proud of me ever since."
I sucked on my bottom lip and felt like reaching out to give him a hug. "People make mistakes, Jude. It wasn't your fault. Thank you for standing up for me like that. Sure we always think we could've handled it better but...we're all human, right?"
He drank the wine and didn't answer me so I resumed editing. Halfway along the fifth page, I paused. I was definitely confused because the next paragraph was really scrambled, maybe because he'd been slurring it even more by then but that wasn't what gave me pause.
It was...it was...
My attention shifted to him. The fingers of his good hand were curled around the stem of his wine glass while his bandaged hand lay on his thigh. And even though his posture was casual, he was studying me with that sharp blue-eyed gaze of his. Jude hadn't opened the curtains in the office either today and outside, it seemed to be getting cloudy so the atmosphere within darkened even more, shrouding us in intimacy.
"What is it?" he asked me, barely able to string two words together. I should take away that bottle of wine. But I didn't.
"This next scene," I whispered, shifting slightly towards him. "It doesn't seem to make sense."
He shifted closer as well and the scent of him washed over me. I almost closed my eyes and moaned.
"Which part?" he inquired.
I pointed at the paragraph and he narrowed his eyes at it.
"You...you wrote-"
"A sex scene," he finished for me and I felt my face burn. "You're finding that confusing? I was hoping you could go over it for me since you've read so many of them. Tell me what works and what doesn't. Make some changes if you want. This is just a rough draft."
I held his gaze for some time and then nodded, my tongue feeling all tied up because I wanted to ask him if he had done this for me. Turned his suspense thriller into an erotic suspense. But quiet settled in the office as I clicked, typed and read while Jude finally emptied the wine bottle.
My god. He was good. Really good. The words were scrambled but his delivery and style had the same impact on me as usual. An even bigger impact this time because Jude writing about sex was both poetry and filth combined.
I clenched my teeth and folded one knee over the other as I continued to read the scene. Read
just how roughly the surgeon and his stalker fucked each other in various positions in his apartment when she went there under the pretence of getting some medical advice.
Jude's stalker was cunning and psychotic but the doctor, who behaved so respectably during the day, turned into a dirty animal at night and took her in ways he had never taken a woman. And she was old enough to be his daughter.
I ran a palm over my forehead which felt clammy and then adjusted the hem of my skirt, wishing I could open up a few buttons. Also, I could feel his eyes on me and Jude watching me while I read the smut which was a product of his powerful imagination was too much for me to bear.
And the story...the scenario was so similar to my situation right now. Was this all in his sub-consciousness or was he trying to send me some kind of message? I didn't have the courage to ask him but I did glance at him once more in as subtle a manner as I could and yeah, he was still watching me.
No, actually, he was looking at my legs which were crossed and which I had absently been rubbing against each other because I was getting turned on by the mastery of his words. With a shock, I stopped my movements and his eyes lifted to mine again, his drunken gaze filled with arousal.
Was I imagining this? Was my obsessed brain so deep into this madness that I was actually imagining him wanting me back the way I wanted him?
He didn't look away from me so I grew more and more confident that this was actually happening. He was aroused by me. But he was also intoxicated so maybe that played into it to a certain extent.
"Do you like it?" he asked me softly and instead of answering with a 'yes', I wanted to throw myself into his arms and show him just how much I did like it.
How much I liked this side of him which was so relaxed and sensual. How much it meant to me that he had let me read part of his story and had taken my suggestions. How crazy I felt right now in his presence. He didn't remind me of guys like Noah, Joshua or William. He didn't repulse me like them either.
I felt a desire for this man that made me feel almost primal. Like he was mine to claim. And he was obviously tempted so maybe I should claim him. Maybe just for today.
Girl Obsessed: A Dark Romance Page 9
