WORTHY

by Lexie Ray

  “Hey,” I said. “It wasn’t your fault. I told you. She’s a grand manipulator. I’m just happy that we’re finally free of her. I don’t blame you. You were just trying to do what’s right by giving her a chance. She’s the one who took advantage of you.”

  “I’d like to take advantage of the rest of our day together,” he said, soaping my body up and massaging away all the aches and pains. “Are you all right with that?”

  “Oh, yes,” I breathed, leaning into him as he kneaded my shoulders and back before moving down my spine to my buttocks. He kneeled behind me, caressing my thighs and calves, then lifting my feet one by one and rubbing them thoroughly. I either wanted to collapse on the floor of the shower and take an immediate nap, or pounce on Jonathan and have my way with him.

  Some late burst of energy made me choose the latter, and I sank to my knees, hugging Jonathan to me.

  “Make love to me,” I whispered, not sure he’d hear me over the patter of the water falling around us.

  He heard me, all right, leaning me back until I was half reclined against the warm tile floor, propped up on my elbows. From there, he drew my legs up and around his waist and positioned the tip of his hardening member just at my entrance. Jonathan locked eyes with me before plunging slowly in, way too slowly for what I wanted. I moaned out my arousal and my discontent, hoping I could egg him on.

  But Jonathan was not to be rushed. He built a leisurely pace, quickening only after every ten strokes or so, drawing out my pleasure, forcing me to be patient.

  “Fuck me,” I groaned, trying to grind my body against his fruitlessly. My position made it hard to contribute to the momentum, and Jonathan only grinned at me as he continued his slow, torturous onslaught.

  “I want to have sex for the rest of the day,” he said, dragging his tongue over my collarbone. “Do you think we can manage it?”

  “I might have to take a nap at some point,” I moaned, staring at him from beneath my heavy eyelids. “And if you don’t fuck me hard and proper, I might just do so right here.”

  “Language, language,” Jonathan tittered, slamming into me just as hard as I’d been wanting him to do all along. “If you keep that up, you’re going to get punished.”

  “Is that what I have to do to get a good lay around here?” I teased. “You should’ve told me the rules to this fucking game a lot fucking earlier.”

  If I hadn’t already been so turned on, the next few thrusts would’ve been brutal. As it was, I was ready for them, mewling and crying out and squeezing Jonathan’s rib cage between my sore thighs.

  “You’re a naughty girl,” he said, grinning lecherously before kissing me deeply. The warm water felt so good—like we were having sex in the summer rain. I hoped that, one day, we would be able to actually do that back at the cottage. Here, the shower was the next best thing.

  I lost track of just how long Jonathan had been pumping in and out of me. The one good thing was that the water stayed warm. I imagined that the water heaters for the Whartons’ house were enormous to the point of never ending.

  But we couldn’t do this forever. One of us had to quit.

  In the end, it was me who gave out. After one particular thrust sent me flailing over the edge, everything seemed to fall into place. I had a long, rolling, screaming orgasm that went on and on for so long that Jonathan finally saw fit to cover my mouth with his hand, even as his eyes rolled back in his head and he shouted his release.

  We rested together, limp, with fingers and toes wrinkled, as the water continued to fall.

  “Well, I think everyone in the house knows you’re taking the rest of the day off,” I said. “Sorry about that.”

  “Never apologize for how awesome our sex is,” Jonathan said, kissing me before staggering to his feet and turning the shower off. “There is absolutely nothing to be sorry about.”

  I struggled so much to get up that Jonathan finally scooped me into his arms and carried me to the bed. We napped and made love for the rest of the day, a gentle rhythm that healed all wounds. Around dinnertime, Jonathan called down to the kitchen and had them prepare dinner in bed—a luxurious affair that led to drinking wine and even more lovemaking.

  If only every day could be like this. We’d never leave the room, never see anyone, never get anything done, but remain in utter bliss.

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Time moved strangely when I didn’t have a lot to mark it with. About a month had passed from the last stand I’d taken with Jonathan and Violet. It was hard to believe that any time passed at all. I still woke up, ate breakfast, and struggled to fill the hours of my day until Jonathan came home.

  One afternoon, I was signing up for online classes at Northwestern on my iPad. It was quiet in the house that day—too quiet, I realized, as I looked back on it. For a change of scenery from Jonathan’s floor, I was on the first level, draped over a couch in the same game room we’d retired to after the disastrous Wharton family dinner. The room didn’t hold great memories for me, but with Violet out of our lives, I was willing to look past the room’s weaknesses. Its biggest strength was that it was quiet during the daytime, and hardly anyone went in.

  After I finished registering—I’d start the classes after the first of the year—I purchased the course materials that would accompany them and checked my email. There were tons of messages from the store that usually kept me in groceries and various other things I needed around the property. Most of them were promotional newsletters and coupons, but there was one personal one.

  “Michelle, I hope this finds you well,” it read. “We were wondering why you hadn’t ordered anything in a while and we hoped you were doing well. Please get in contact with us if you need anything. In fact, just get in contact with us. We want to make sure you’re all right.”

  I fired off a quick email, apologizing that I’d caused them any concern and wishing them well. I explained that I’d moved out of the cottage for a while, but would certainly employ their services again when I returned.

  Not “if.” “When.”

  I was puzzling out my choice of wording—did I really think that, even now, I would be returning to the cottage?—when the atmosphere in the game room changed.

  I glanced up at the entrance to the room and jumped, gasping and covering my pounding heart with one hand.

  “Amelia!” I cried softly. “You scared me.”

  She was standing at the entrance with her arms crossed, staring at me. I hadn’t heard a sound amid my own deep thoughts. Puzzled, I watched her face wrinkle into a scowl.

  “It’s Mrs. Wharton to you,” she informed me. “What are you doing, girl?”

  I tried to convince myself not to be stung by her tone or her formality, but I was failing completely.

  “I’ve just signed up for classes at Northwestern,” I said, holding up the iPad. “I’ll start after the new year. I’m taking five totally different ones to see what I’m interested in. It was so helpful for Jane to recommend environmental science when we first met. I’m most excited about that class.”

  “And how are you paying for it?” Amelia inquired in that same high, cold tone.

  “Jonathan is insisting that he pay for it,” I said, frowning. I didn’t like this line of questioning; it felt like an interrogation. “I have some money, too, but he wouldn’t let me use it.”

  “Don’t pretend you have money like Wharton money,” she snapped, sharp as the edge of a shard of glass. “I know that you’re just here to freeload.”

  I paled. What was Jonathan’s mother getting at? “I have an inheritance from my parents’ passing,” I said, trying to stay as calm as possible. “And I’m not here to freeload. I agree, though, that I have been idle for too long. That’s why I’m excited about taking these courses. I’m hoping that I’ll extend my circle of friends and develop hobbies, as well.”

  “I have some ideas for you to help occupy your time,” Amelia said, glowering.

  I swallowed. “I would love suggestions,”
I said, trying with all my might to retain a positive tone of voice. “You know, I really admire you for all of your event planning and service work. If there was anything you ever needed in that realm, I would be more than happy to help.”

  Amelia shook her head. “That’s not the kind of work I had in mind for the likes of you,” she said. “I’ve heard that you’re close with one of the staff members here at the house. Is that true?”

  Where was this going? “I really like Lucy,” I said slowly. “She’s been very kind to me. I don’t know that we’re close, but I do really appreciate her—and everything she’s done.”

  “Well, why don’t you help out around here, at the house?” Amelia said. She framed it as a question, but I heard it for what it was: an order.

  “I have, several times, offered to clean up Jonathan’s floor and put things together for us in the kitchen,” I said haltingly. “Everyone is usually very surprised when I try to do something and refuses me. Know this: I am more than capable of doing things myself. Do I need to remind you that I lived out in the wilderness—by myself—and thrived?”

  “I don’t take that tone from anyone, least of all my own staff members,” Amelia said. “You’ll start cleaning my area of the house, effective immediately, from nine until noon. That way, you’ll stay out from underfoot and still have time to do whatever else you might to ward off idleness. You will answer to me, and only me.”

  I wasn’t sure that I was hearing the words coming out of Amelia’s mouth correctly. Did she just make me her servant?

  “I appreciate your concern for my time,” I said.

  “I hope you do,” Amelia said. “Another staff member lost their position to accommodate yours.”

  “Who?” I asked, feeling terrible and guilty. Why was Amelia doing this? Did she thrive in evilness when she wasn’t doing charity?

  “Why, Lucy,” Amelia said. “I thought she’d appreciate the break after running around and doing things for you all the time.”

  My whole body went cold as Amelia watched me expectantly, waiting for my reaction. It was all I could do to remain seated. Lucy had been my friend here. She’d been my friend from the first, and she’d gone above and beyond the call of duty to help me adjust to life at the compound. Was she paying for that now? Was Amelia punishing her just for being friendly to me?

  “Well, you’re getting a late start today,” Amelia said, glancing at the fine watch around her wrist. “But I bet you can have my quarters cleaned before five. Second floor. Go on.”

  What could I say to the woman who was going to be my mother-in-law? Should I tell her to go to hell? What evilness would she concoct if I did? Who would she sack next? Would she tell Jonathan that I was being rude to her? Who would he believe?

  “Winston has your cleaning supplies ready for you,” Amelia said, raising her eyebrows at me. “Are you really going to put this off any longer? I don’t think it would be wise.”

  I clamped my mouth shut and set my iPad aside. I didn’t want to give her any more material to throw back in my face. I would clean Amelia’s quarters—whatever that entailed—and then decide what to do. It wasn’t as if I was offended by being asked to clean. I’d wanted nothing more than a task to do to contribute ever since I’d arrived in the city. But the fact that she’d fired Lucy was a personal jab at me. This was meant to anger and humiliate me, so all I could do was keep my face as placid as possible.

  I walked out of the game room, Amelia following me closely, and found Winston in the foyer by the stairs.

  “Miss Michelle,” he said, holding his hand out to a small rolling cart. “This is your cleaning station. Within it, you will find everything you need to see to Mrs. Wharton’s quarters.”

  I looked at him, but his face betrayed no emotions.

  “Thank you, Winston,” I said.

  I pushed the cart to the elevator and got inside. Amelia remained outside.

  “I don’t ride elevators with the help,” she said. “I think it breeds familiarity.”

  The doors rolled shut, and I let my shoulders slump. Had I pissed in Amelia’s cereal in some way to invite this kind of attack? What was I going to do to respond to this?

  I didn’t have much time to ponder as the doors rolled open to the second floor. I’d never been on this floor and had to admit that I was a little bit curious about it. But even that emotion soured when I saw Amelia, smiling tightly as she waited for me. Had she taken the stairs in twos just so she could be there when I rolled the cleaning cart out of the elevator? If she’d belonged to a different generation, she would’ve been taking video with her smartphone.

  “You’ll start by picking up and straightening up,” Amelia said. “Then you will clean. And I mean clean every surface. I want it to sparkle, and if I find a speck of dust, you will do everything again.”

  I didn’t honor that with a response. I was an excellent cleaner. I cleaned my cottage every day.

  Of course, my cottage wasn’t draped with designer clothes on every surface. My cottage wasn’t even as big as the second floor—where Amelia and Collier coexisted.

  I started picking up the clothes and moving them to the closet, hanging them up as I went. Had she emptied her closet—or had another staff member do it—just so I would have more work to do? I decided to be as boring as possible. Maybe Amelia wouldn’t take as much pleasure in watching me if I kept my face calm, still.

  It took me a good forty-five minutes before I had all the clothes put away.

  “I expect clean sheets on my bed every day,” Amelia told me, so I immediately stripped the bed and bundled the linens in the basket on the cart. After I remade the bed, I remembered that Lucy had brought us fresh towels every day. I took the towels in the bathroom and replaced them before cleaning every surface with a bleach solution. I scrubbed the tiles in the shower until they gleamed. The mirror sparkled with nary a water spot. I organized and arranged the assortment of toiletries spread over the counter, then moved back in to the bedroom to dust, sweep, and mop.

  Amelia looked bored—good—and I had no problem completing the tasks she’d set out for me by four. I loaded up the cart, took it back to the first floor, and left it with Winston.

  “Very good, Miss Michelle,” he said, taking it from me.

  “I’ll admit that you did better than I thought you would,” Amelia said from the second floor landing, making me look up at her. “But I hope you know that no son of mine is going to marry a glorified cleaning lady.”

  She vanished from view, but it was just as well. My face contorted in fury and angry tears welled in my eyes. No. No. She wasn’t going to make me cry. If she made me cry, she’d win.

  I took the elevator up to Jonathan’s floor and stripped off my clothes, wondering who was cleaning the area now that Lucy was sacked. That was really the worst part of this situation—that Lucy had been fired because of Amelia’s hatred for me. I could deal with picking up the old woman’s messes. But that someone else should suffer? That was so much worse.

  I was showering when I decided not to tell Jonathan. It would stun him to realize what a shrew his mother was. I wondered if the old him—the one with full possession of his memories—had ever realized the truth. Amelia hid this side of herself well with all of her giving back to the community and charity events. But now I knew, and I wasn’t sure what to do with it.

  “Hey, baby.”

  I jumped as Jonathan popped his head into the bathroom.

  “Hey,” I said. “You home early?”

  “It’s just after five,” he said, checking his watch.

  I realized I had been standing under the water of the shower for more than an hour, and hurriedly turned it off.

  “How was your day?” he asked as I wrapped myself in a towel.

  Horrible, I could’ve said. “Fine,” I said instead, giving him a peck on the lips, mindful of my dripping hair. “How was yours?”

  That was usually enough to distract Jonathan. He was trying so hard to get back int
o the swing of work, and, to hear him tell it, he was making great strides. People were working harder because he was, and the extra boost really had helped with productivity. They were back on track with projects and initiatives that had fallen by the wayside during Jonathan’s absence. If only I could convince him to disappear again. Maybe we could escape his vindictive mother.

  “Hey, are you there?” he asked, smiling at me. “I was asking if you wanted to go out somewhere for dinner.”

  I shook my head free of my thoughts and forced a smile. “Sure,” I said. “Anywhere.”

  Jonathan had enough on his mind. He didn’t need to worry about how his fiancée and his mother were getting along on top of all that. I’d deal with this.

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Every day that I cleaned Amelia’s quarters, there seemed to be a new indignity to suffer. I knew she and Collier didn’t live like slobs, but it appeared that she was trying to make my job harder. An entire month passed of me acting like Amelia’s servant in the morning and pretending that nothing was happening in the evening when Jonathan got home. I felt like it gave me whiplash part of the time. I was really desperate to keep Jonathan from knowing. He didn’t need this drama in his life.

  One morning on the second floor, there was mud smeared all over the tiles in the bathroom. Another day, there was a long line of red lipstick across the mirror. The worst part was that Amelia always watched me like a hawk, smirking whenever I happened to glance at her on accident.

  Finally, when she actually laughed the day she—or someone—had scattered crumbs of dirt across every inch of carpeting in the bedroom, I snapped.

  “Why is this so entertaining to you?” I demanded. “Unlike some people, I don’t mind a little hard work, a little hands-on labor.”

  “That’s what the lower classes tell themselves as a comfort,” Amelia shot back.

  I bit my tongue. I wasn’t lower class, not that there was anything wrong with that, but it wouldn’t do to let her rankle me even more than she already had.