He waited and watched for several minutes and finally the return call came.
“Ms. Lavender is in her apartment, and all is well, Mr. Parker.”
“Did you speak with her?”
“Yes, sir. I told her it was customary for us to check in when someone has been away for a few days. That I just wanted to make sure all was well with her place. She said she was fine.”
Gage closed his eyes. “Good. Please keep an eye on her and her place. If you need to hire more security, call me.”
It was all he could do. He could have her tailed again but thought better of it. Emma would be fine. And Amanda shouldn’t be a problem in a few hours.
He started the engine and left. Before he rolled into traffic, he punched a number into his cell phone. When the answer came, he said, “All right. You win. Meet me at the ranch in two hours.”
He clicked off. “Fuck.”
****
An hour later, Gage pulled up to the barn and parked. He got out and went directly to the tack room, unlocking it and throwing back the door. He charged in like a bucking bull and pushed over the spanking bench. He kicked at the cabinet that held his floggers and whips, and then picked them up one by one and whirled them toward the other side of the room.
Slap. Slap. Slap.
He growled and yelled as he approached the St. Andrew’s cross, and with several aggressive jerks, ripped it from the wall and toppled it to the floor, shackles and hooks rattling and bouncing against the plank wood floor.
His anger boiling over now, he rapidly crossed the room to the wooden chest where he kept his toys. He pulled out drawer after drawer and flung them. Vibrators, dildos, cuffs, clamps, chains, ties, ropes and more flew.
He was getting rid of it. All of it. Never did he want to cross the threshold of this goddamned room again.
Out of breath, his chest heaving, he bent at the waist and put his hands on his knees. For several minutes, he stayed bent over, just trying to breathe, feeling like he’d just been sucker-punched with the wind knocked out of him. Feeling like the burning ache underneath his breastbone was going to eat right through him like acid. He heard footsteps and slowly lifted his gaze to the door, framed with the morning light. The silhouette of a man moved toward him.
He shielded his eyes against the light. “Cole?”
“Yep. Goddamn man. You feel better?”
Gage stood up and exhaled. “Not sure yet.”
“Bad day already?”
“Yes.”
“Emma?”
“Yes.”
“Then what are you doing here, when you should be off fixing things with her.”
Gage sucked in a breath and pulled the back of his hand across his forehead, wiping away the sweat. “Trying to figure out what in the hell I am doing with my life. Got a minute?”
Cole stepped up and Gage could more easily see his face now. His friend smirked and tipped back his hat. “I think that’ll take more than a minute. Coffee?”
Gage agreed.
They left the tack room, and Gage locked the door behind him. Silent while they walked to the house, they went inside and Cole tended to the coffee-making. Gage just paced and washed his hands over his face. He was antsy and irritated, anger still curled up inside him like a snake coiled to strike.
But more than that, he was hurting. Hell.
He rubbed his chest, trying to push out the ache. It wasn’t working.
Cole looked at him. “You’re too young to have a heart attack, but if you don’t let up, you’re going to have one. Tell me what’s going on.”
Gage just shook his head. He couldn’t look at Cole. “Not sure if I can.”
With the coffee made, Cole poured a mug and sat it on the side of the table closest to where Gage stood. “Sit down, Take a sip. And then let it go, brother.”
“I need to fuck something.” Gage pushed away from the kitchen counter and headed for the coffee. Immediately, he regretted saying that, thinking of what Emma had said earlier. “No, I don’t. I need to figure out how to handle my problems without fucking anyone.”
Cole whistled through his teeth. “Now, that’s a revelation if I ever heard one. What made you come to that conclusion?” Cole sat across from him at the table, his coffee cup warming his hands.
Gage sat and closed his eyes. “Emma.” He rapidly drummed his fingertips on the table.
“Man, you gotta talk before you drum a few holes in this wood table and notch the floor with your boot heel where you’re shaking your leg. What the hell happened?”
Gage inhaled and let out a long breath. “I’m trying not to explode.”
“I thought you already did in the tack room.”
“That was just getting started.”
“Well holding it in isn’t going to help. Maybe you need to try a different tack. Instead of throwing things, how about you just talk. I’m going to sit here and listen. You hear me? I don’t want to put you in a grave. You’re worrying me.”
Gage looked as his friend. “I’m worrying myself.”
“It’s not a weakness to ask for help.”
“Don’t need help. Maybe advice.”
“That’s good too. Now talk.”
Gage exhaled again. Where to start? Just anywhere, he guessed. “Amanda got to Emma.”
“Is she okay?”
“Emma is fine. She’s back at her apartment.”
“I thought she was staying with you?”
“She left. She left—me.”
Cole’s head dipped in a slight nod. “Okay, so Emma is out of the picture now.”
“I want to fucking kill Amanda.”
“No you don’t. You want to get her out of your life. You want to yell and scream at her. Hell, you might even want to take a whip to her. But you don’t want to kill her and you won’t. That’s crossing the line. In fact, taking a whip to her is crossing the line, too, because you want nothing to do with her right now that is sexual. Do you hear me, Gage Parker?”
Gage stared at his friend. “Yes. I do. You’re right and I know it. It’s just how I’ve dealt with things for so long and right now, I’m feeling pretty much out of control and I am fighting to get control back.”
“Fucking Amanda isn’t it. You learned that lesson a couple of weeks ago.”
Gage nodded. “You’re right. I actually don’t want to be anywhere near her.”
“Then don’t.”
“But I have to, at least one more time. I’ve called her and told her to meet me here.”
“Ah hell, Gage.”
“I need her off my back, Cole. She threatened to expose my lifestyle. She threatened to hurt Emma, and goddammit, she got to her today. I can’t let that happen again, and I don’t know how to stop her.”
“What is it that she wants? Besides you, that is.”
“Nothing. She wants Emma gone, and she wants me to be her Master. Hell. Subs don’t act this way. She’s acting more like a Domme than a—” He paused, thinking. He caught Cole’s gaze. “She doesn’t know what she is, does she? Hell, she’s probably a switch or a Domme. Why in the hell has she submitted to me all these years?”
“Because she loves you, Gage. She always has.”
Gage shook his head. “No. She’s like me. We’ve talked about it. We both wanted nothing to do with love or relationships. That’s why for a lot of years we were good together in a D/s way. She doesn’t love me.”
Cole picked at something on the table. “Gage, Amanda has always been in love with you. She learned to take whatever it was that you would give her. She always hoped you would somehow realize you could love too. But you never learned how.”
Gage stared off. He was silent for a minute, and then said quietly, “Yes, I did.”
“When?”
“This week.”
Cole stared back. “You’re in love with Emma?”
“I think I’m trying to learn how to be in love with Emma.”
“Then that’s what you have to tell Amanda.
”
Gage slowly returned his gaze to Cole. “It can’t be that simple.”
“Try it. Set her free, Gage.”
****
Amanda McIntyre’s smile stretched from one cheek to the other as she exited her old pick-up truck. She leaped forward, her face aglow, then caught Gage’s stern face and her smile fell. She stopped up short.
“Why the business face, Gage?”
“Because we have some serious business to discuss.” Gage stood on the porch, waiting. “Let’s go inside, Amanda.”
She turned and glanced back at the barn. “But what about the tack room?”
“We’re not going there.”
“Not at all? Gage, you said—”
“I said nothing to indicate we were using the tack room. We are going to talk. Get in the house. Now.”
He figured she’d respond best, at least right now, with him taking a dominant stance.
She moved up the steps and across the porch. He followed her into the kitchen. “In the great room,” he told her.
“Fine.”
Amanda plopped on the sofa and crossed her arms. Gage sat in a wingback leather chair across the room.
“Pouting is not going to get you anywhere, Amanda.”
She sat up. “Did you get rid of her?”
“She’s gone.”
“Back to wherever she came from?”
“No. She’s back at her apartment, and what she does from here on out is up to her. We are not together.”
“Good.” The smile was back.
“You have been way out of line the last week or so. The pictures, approaching Emma, threatening to expose me. It stops now.”
“Good. She doesn’t deserve you, Gage. I’m the one who knows you and has put up with you all of these years. I’m the one who knows what you like and how you like to get off. I can take it. I was doing her a favor by showing her those things.”
“What did you show her?”
Her mouth clamped up tight.
“Amanda.”
“Video of a scene in the tack room.”
He exploded up off the chair. “Shit, Amanda! When in the fuck did you do video? You know that violates everything we’ve agreed on!”
She waved her hands about. “Calm down. I turned on my cell phone one day and just let it run. It was perched against something and caught a scene on the cross. I just wanted to be able to relive what you were doing to me. It was for me, nothing else.”
“Where is it?” His blood pressure was shooting up again.
“In my phone. I haven’t done anything else with it, Gage, and I don’t have any more.”
“Better not. Delete it, Amanda. Better yet, give it to me.”
She sighed and handed her phone over. He scrolled through all of her media and found the pictures of him and Emma in the truck and the video. He looked up at her. “I should throttle you.”
“I would enjoy that immensely.”
Gage stuck the phone in his pocket. “This phone is lost. I’ll buy you a new one but you’re not getting this back, and I need to know exactly how that video and the pictures are stored.”
“They are not backed up anywhere.”
He had to be certain, though. Of course, could he ever be certain?
“Amanda, I’m only going to say this once. If you approach Emma again, I’ll have you arrested, and I don’t care if it exposes my lifestyle. If you attempt to show any of those pictures or video to the media, or the authorities, or anyone else you are thinking of bribing me with, I will fucking see that you are put behind bars for extortion.”
She laughed. “You can’t do that. I didn’t demand anything in exchange for not releasing those.”
“The hell you didn’t. You demanded me. You want to hold me hostage in order to save my business and protect Emma. That is not happening. You have no power over me, do you understand? Make no mistake, my network is wide. If you pursue any of the things you threatened before, I will ruin you. I will take every last cent and every inch of land your daddy left you and then some.”
She stood up and approached him, fiddling with the buttons of his shirt. “You’re not serious, Gage. That’s a bunch of shit.”
Gage grasped her by the biceps and set her back a few steps. Her eyes went wide. “Like a heart attack.” Better get on with it, he thought. “Sit back down, Amanda.”
She did. “You know I would never have gone to anyone,” she said. “Those were just words.”
“You got to Emma. That’s bad enough.”
She shrugged. “She needed to know what you are all about, Gage.”
“I’m not going to honor that with a comeback. Look, you and I are not ever going to be together. We will never have a relationship beyond being friends.”
“So no more friends with benefits? I find that hard to believe.”
“No. And you need to get that through your thick head. I am not your Master and you are not my submissive.”
“That’s what you think.”
“That’s what I know. And for the record, I don’t love you, and you don’t love me.”
She laughed. “Gage, we’ve had this conversation a hundred times. We don’t love people, we fuck them. Fuck is love, remember? The only relationships we have with people are one-on-one in a scene. That’s it. It’s the only kind of love we need.”
She went on. “We’re two peas in a pod, you and me. We share history—the shit you went through with your birth mother and the crap my dad put me through. So we need to be together.”
Gage fell silent for a minute, letting her words soak into his head. “No, Amanda. That’s where you are wrong. We’re not the same.”
She stared at him. Denial?
He stood. “Amanda, I was wrong all those years ago. I can fall in love, I think. I am trying to fall in love with Emma.”
She shook her head. “Gage, what happened to you?”
Emma happened. “I just want to be with Emma. No more sessions, ever, with you or anyone else. I’m changing.”
Amanda stood, her eyes wide. “You’re shittin’ me.”
If someone had told him he would have said that today, he would have called them a liar. But nothing in the world felt more right.
“She’s not woman enough for you, Gage. You’ll be back begging me for a fuck within six months.”
“I don’t beg, Amanda.”
He got up and crossed the room. He didn’t want to touch her because he didn’t want to lose control. He peered down into her eyes. “All of this stops now. You need to figure out what you need from your own life. You don’t need me any longer. You can stand on your own two feet. You are a strong, independent woman with a ranch of your own to run, and you’ve been leaning on me for way too long.
“You’re stronger than most men I know, Amanda, and you’ve been giving yourself over to me as a sub for way too long. It’s time for you to stop vying for my attention, and go out and build a world of your own.”
As he stood there looking into her face, Gage realized his words were likely going right over her head. For a while, she just stared back.
“I’m not sure I know how to be anything other than what I have been to you, Gage.”
He shrugged. “Then there is another reason why we need to cut it off completely. You need to figure out who you are.”
She sighed, her chest heaving. “It will be hard.”
He agreed. “Yes.”
****
Gage stood outside the barn and watched Amanda drive away. He knew immediately he was saying goodbye to a past he needed to let go of. He hoped at some point in the future, when Amanda got her shit together—and well, when he did too—that they could be friends again.
He doubted if that could happen, but it would be nice to think that.
Cole stepped off the porch opposite the barn and slowly made his way across the lot toward Gage. His amble reminded Gage of what life often was like out here. Lots of work to do, but at a slower pace than what he was u
sed to back at the office.
“Maybe I should stay out here for a few days,” he told Cole.
His friend nodded. “Might clear your head and help to think things through. You’ve stirred up a lot of shit in that head of yours the past couple of weeks.”
“True.” He watched the dirt trail of Amanda’s truck. “Work me hard,” he said.
“The new barn isn’t finished yet and there are some fences that need mending.”
Gage grinned. “That’s an understatement.”
Cole watched the thinning dirt trail. “How’d it go with her?”
“We came to an agreement.”
“Good.”
Gage knew they didn’t need to say more than that. “I hope she gets her life back on track.”
“I hope you get yours.”
Gage stared out over the ranch. “That’s exactly what I intend to do.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
I pace my apartment, wandering aimlessly from room to room. My cell phone is off. The landline is unplugged. My laptop is back at the office. I want no connection with the outside world. All I want is to wallow in my misery. And think. Process.
I am bored, frustrated, and restless.
And worried.
Hurt.
Confused.
Snatches of dialog and bits of conversation roll through my head. I try to pigeonhole them here, and there, and still end up with a mish-mash of words and thoughts that make no sense, and emotions I can’t get a handle on.
Somehow, I get through the day, although I cannot say it is without a fair share of grief and ugly crying. My eyes swollen, I take some allergy medication and then a shower, hoping the combination will help me drift off to sleep. I go to bed early, curling up into my comforter. I attempt to watch television and find it a useless task. I try to sleep but wake with fitful dreams.
Too many faces circling.
Gage. Amanda. Randy. My damn junior prom date.
I squeeze my eyes shut at the pain that shoots through my head. I hadn’t wanted Gage to know about any of that, especially the prom date fiasco. I need to be free of that sexual past so I can explore my sexual future.
Looks like there is no future. At least with Gage.
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