“So she was victimising you? Is that what I saw?”
“I wouldn’t call it victimising. No, definitely not that…”
“Neither would I. Nobody would call giving a blow job victimising a guy.”
“Amanda, honey… don’t be like this…”
“Well, when else can I talk to you? You’ve moved that bitch Ashley into our flat… the flat we chose together…”
“I didn’t even know you back then Amanda. Come on.”
“Oh, that’s right. You didn’t even know me. Like right now, you’ve forgotten who I am again.”
“Amanda… Honey… How could I ever forget the best lips in in the whole college…?”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Better than that bitch you moved into our home?”
“Better than anyone…”
“You’re all smooth talk and bullshit…”
I heard the rustle of clothing as they embraced and the liquid sound of kisses. Amanda still hated me with a vengeance, but I could see why. Poor Amanda was his second-choice go-to girl. The one he kept on a yo-yo string, and used when he was bored of using me. Even though she had gotten Brandon to diss me, I couldn’t hate her. The girl had a scorpion’s tail because the man had made her poisonous…
I could hear them but I wanted real undeniable proof of their affair. I knew how to get it. I turned the corner and saw them. Amanda’s slender body was engulfed in Brandon’s arms. His hands slid around her waist, over the bare skin of her arms, and down to her butt. His big hands cupped her buttocks and pulled her hips to him. I saw she was holding back, she was hesitant before ultimately she sighed and returned his touch. They didn’t see me at all. I watched them for near on ten seconds before I stepped away, red faced and angry. Amanda was a twisted bitch, but this was down to Brandon, not her. Either way I intended to speak to her to try and snap her out of it.
It wasn’t hard to arrange. Their meeting was clandestine. I knew they would have to leave the scene of the crime separately. Around the corner there was a set of empty book shelves full of student flyers and leaflets. Their kiss had broken apart and they were talking again, making their goodbyes. I pressed into the corner beside the old bookshelf as Brandon made off, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand and straightening out his red shirt. I waited a half minute, and then heard Amanda’s light footsteps following on. As soon as the girl passed me by, I stepped out and called her name.
“Amanda?”
She turned around, spinning on the spot. She looked at me, blushing with an open mouth before she regained control of herself and fixed a serious look on her face.
“Oh, you. What do you want?”
“I know what you want, Amanda. But I want you to know you’re after a bad thing there.”
The girl shifted on her feet and blushed again, her pretty eyes half closing to close me out.
“What do you mean?”
“Amanda, I heard everything. I saw you kissing.”
“Yeah, well, now you know. Brandon was mine long before you ever knew him.”
“But is he still yours? Is he yours when he’s in bed with me? Is he yours when he’s getting his dick sucked by redheads after his readings?”
The girl looked away but I wasn’t going to let her off that easy. “Amanda? I’m talking to you. What does that say to you? Because I know he’s not mine and he never will be. And I’m going to be totally honest with you here, I don’t want to be with a man like that. Neither should you.”
“Good news. Then leave him. Leave us.”
“I feel sorry for you, Amanda. I saw you kissing. But he doesn’t care about you. All he cares about is himself. He’d be happy to keep you and me hanging until the end of time, while he goes on screwing around with every girl he can. Well, I’m not the long suffering type. And neither should you be, Amanda. You’re better than that. Far better…”
Amanda heard me out. She stood looking at me, and I knew something had changed between us, but she didn’t want to voice it. “You finished, Ashley?”
I nodded. “I’m done.”
“Good. I hope that makes you feel better. But there’s one really big problem with all that, Ashley.”
I waited.
“I’m in love with him.”
Amanda walked away. Now I felt for her even more. To love a louse when you know he was a louse, that had to be close to a curse. I had lusted after Brandon. I had enjoyed his body and his fine looks, but the moment he began to dominate me, my feelings stopped inching towards love. I drew back, and looking at Amanda walk away from me, I was so glad I did. I could have been there. Brandon had ruined Amanda, and he had tried to ruin me. I was never going to let that happen. I was angry, upset and enraged at myself as much as him. And I was still alone. But the one thing I had after Brandon had cheated and lied to me yet again, was my ambition – my dream to get my degree and become somebody. Even when I was lonely as hell, I still had my future. Now I had to get free of Brandon before he could stop me from achieving it.
Three
So Brandon didn’t know that I was aware of his second level of betrayal – one which had been ongoing throughout my time in his bed as his number one. It was unlikely that Amanda would say a word about our little discussion. She wouldn’t want a spat in her own living quarters, no matter how obsessed with Brandon she was. No, she was probably hoping I would just up sticks and walk away. But surely she knew about the threat Brandon had made against me… Though maybe not… The girl had her blinkers and could see only one thing. I couldn’t just up sticks, no matter how much Amanda wanted me to. And what that poor girl couldn’t see is that if I left, there would simply be another me to follow. Brandon was 100% pure unadulterated asshole, with some literary cred and a bright future thrown in as window dressing. But I still needed a friend to talk to. First I dialled Cody’s number and it went straight to voicemail. I left a message – my first contact with Cody in way too long.
“Hey Cody. How are you? Long-time no speak. I’m sorry if you think I let you down, but I really didn’t have any choice. I can explain. At least I think I can. I’d like the chance to explain anyway. I’d really like to be able to have a chat and a coffee with you… anyway. I hope you’re okay. Call me soon.”
If he didn’t reply to a message like that, he was never going to do so. I told myself to not contact him again and wait for the result. If he called me, great, if he didn’t, it was his loss. Yeah, right. If he didn’t call me I was going to be suffering, but I needed to put a positive spin on matters. I really needed to. And I still really needed to talk to someone. I endured the seminar and even answered a few questions on the history of the novel, but now I was on automatic pilot. I hoped the Professor didn’t notice.
As soon as I was free I called Penny’s mobile. She was in a different seminar and she’d already left the college building. She sounded in a hurry, but she agreed to meet with me. I moved quickly down the stairs and through a tide of students heading my way. She was outside, with a ready-made smile on her face.
“Penny. Am I glad to see you! I need to talk with someone, as in really talk. Girl talk, you know.”
Penny’s face moved from interest, to concern, to excitement. She loved gossip, but I wanted more than a gossip artist listening to me. I needed a friend. “Let’s go the Union.”
“Let’s not, Penny. Let’s just go anywhere else.”
She gave me a quizzical look, and then shrugged.
We ended up in the vegetarian café. I looked for Cody before we took a table, but he was nowhere to be seen. “A soy milk latte and a…”
“Flat white,” I said. Flat whites were supposed to be the coolest coffees. It was about time I tried one. It was still just coffee, but it was considered cool. Go figure.
“Is this about Brandon?” said Penny.
I nodded, feeling a weird swirl of emotion rise up in me. There was no way I wanted to cry in public over that idiot, so I bit my lip and looked out th
e window to compose myself. “Yeah.”
Penny must have seen my emotion. She put her hand over mine and I looked at her in surprise. “It’s okay, Ashley. You can tell me.”
“Thanks, Pen. Things are going really badly wrong between us. First off… the sex.”
She gave me an eager little nod. She wanted to hear the details. I wasn’t going all the way down that road, but sex was a part the story.
“At the beginning, it was wonderful. It was wonderful, honestly, it was a dream.”
“Are you just here to boast, Miss Pearson?”
“I wish. It was great, Penny. But as soon as I felt like I’d got with him, as girlfriend and boyfriend, he just changed. The next time we were together he was forceful. By the third time it was like he didn’t care, and since then it’s just gotten… samey. It’s like he doesn’t give a shit anymore.”
“That’s how it goes, isn’t it, Ashley? We meet someone. They’re Daniel Craig for a day, and then they transform into Homer Simpson. Surely things aren’t that bad. You’re still screwing the hottest, best looking guy in the whole college. That’s not exactly a hard luck story.”
I winced. There was a grain of truth there. “But it’s not just the sex, Penny. He’s controlling. You know my college debt? He paid that off just so as he could have me in his debt. And you know my job…”
“Hang on. Brandon Lynes paid off your student debt! And you don’t have to work anymore. Ashley, are you complaining? In debt to him? That even sounds sexy. Girl, you better get back to that bedroom and start working off what you owe! Ashley, you should hear yourself, honey, honestly.”
“Penny. I hear you. But there’s the outside view and the inside view. He got me fired from Purdy’s Pen. He lied to them and told them I hated the place, but I loved it.”
“Hold on. You don’t need to work anymore because he paid your debt, am I right?”
“Kind of. But that’s not how this is supposed to work.”
Penny nodded, but she was clearly not buying any of my story.
“Penny. He told me if I left him, he would destroy my college career. He would get me kicked out.”
“So first he’s a jealous lover, guarding his fair maiden. Now he sounds like Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights. You should be swooning that he wants you that badly.”
All of a sudden I wasn’t in the mood to talk literary about my life.
“I always thought Heathcliff was a jerk, Penny. Brandon threatened me, Penny. Did you hear that part?”
“Threatened you? Are you serious? How?”
She said that like I was making this up as some form of revenge. That’s what it sounded like at least.
“I thought I’d told you, Penny. We got together, then he turned bad on me. He paid off the money, but he did it to control me, don’t you see that? He got me the sack from Purdy’s so he could own me. And when he thought he was going to lose me, he literally threatened me in front of everybody. Hell, he even pushed me Penny. He pushed me against a wall in front of the whole Union bar.”
Penny looked at me and started to weigh her words. “Yeah… I did hear a little about that. I heard how you stormed into the bar looking for a big drama with Brandon. I heard you had Cody Barnes with you too. Now, don’t get me wrong. Cody is a nice guy, but Brandon, Brandon is on another level. His six pack has six packs. And you know he is going to be famous, Ash? And he has eyes that melt ovaries at sixty paces. Come on! What more do you want from life, Ashley? One minute you’ve got all the debt in the world, and Dean Mayhew wanted you gone, the next you’re smooching with the number one stud in South London. Most girls - correction - all girls would cut their right arm off to have what you have now.”
“Then all girls need their heads checked. Brandon looks good. He’s a heartbreaker, I get that. He almost broke my heart. I think he wanted to. But I’m not ever going to let him do that to me, Penny. Not ever. Did your sources tell you what happened in Convent Garden? At the reading?”
Her eyes widened with excitement. I knew she hadn’t heard.
“He got wrecked before his reading, so when it was his turn to read, he was dire. I mean in was em-bar-assing. Then he went off. I could tell he didn’t want to see me, so I guessed he was sulking. I gave him half an hour to get his head together, then when I found him in his green room, he was getting his cock sucked by some topless bimbo with pillar-box red hair.”
“No way!”
“Yes way.”
“What did you do?”
“What do you think I did? I went crazy at him, and he begged for forgiveness. Over and over.”
“Yep, that sounds like a man for you. But at least he begged.”
“And what? You think that’s okay? Would you take him back?”
Penny shrugged. “Think about it. Brandon must face temptation wherever he goes. It’s going to happen at some point, Ashley.”
“No, Penny. It’s never going to happen to me again.” Clearly, there was no value in telling her about Amanda. And with Penny’s Gossip-ometer going into overdrive, I didn’t want do any more damage to Amanda. She was in a bad enough state as it was.
I sat and thought for a moment, and sipped my flat white. I looked at Penny and she looked at me.
“What?”
What I said next was pretty difficult because I had to say it without a trace of sarcasm. Penny was in Brandon’s camp. Therefore she was not in mine, and now I knew she never would be. “Thanks. Thanks for listening.”
“That’s okay,” she smiled. “Any time.”
I let Penny change the subject onto the current student gossip about who was screwing who, knowing she had said my name in conversations like this to a great many people. I smiled but I wasn’t listening. I needed Cody more than ever, but it didn’t seem he was ever going to call me again. I was lonely as hell, and I still needed to leave Brandon. I had no allies. Stuck with his lies and under his threats, it didn’t look like it was going to be easy. But there was no way I could stay with him, even without any support I had to leave him. My self-respect was the last thing I had left, and I wasn’t going to surrender it…
Four
In spite of my plan to keep Brandon suspicion free, I couldn’t stay with him anymore. I just couldn’t do it. By now I had around a suitcase of stuff at Brandon’s flat, and I decided to take most of it with me. I left the suitcase of course, and a few knick-knacks that I wouldn’t miss and crammed most of my stuff into a giant handbag I didn’t often use and the rest went into my college bag. I decided to go back to my own flat-share, a small but comfortable place I hadn’t seen in weeks. After that I would go and study at the library. Maybe I’d even catch Cody unawares so I could buy him a coffee.
With minimal fuss I got away from Brandon’s flat. Amanda was in the kitchen drinking milk. I passed her by and called ‘catch you later,’ before she had a chance to check out my luggage. Brandon was still fast asleep, snoring and smelling of too much Armagnac from the night before. I didn’t join him in that drink, and it apparently left him a little too far gone to wake me for the usual. I didn’t mind. If we had sex at all now, it was good, but for me sex was a sensual activity where I could only truly reach the heights if I cared about the person I was with. Now, when I felt Brandon near me, when I felt him inside me, I somehow fought the pleasure and I resisted him in my mind. I’m sure he felt my resistance. Even when I came, it wasn’t with the explosive abandon of our first times. There’s no way he couldn’t feel it, but I was past worrying about that.
My original flat was three storeys above the Loampit Inn, a boisterous pub full of loud Irish music and brawls ready to happen at any moment. I had only been there once, and it seemed like the place had been sucked through a wormhole straight from a mid-twentieth century Dublin. The noise from the pub used to keep me awake for the first night or two, but soon it became part of the background scene, like birds in the countryside.
It was early now and the Loampit Inn was quiet, but still had the aura of last night�
�s drunken party. I walked around the side of the pub to the flat’s entrance at the back of the building and climbed the steps. I took out my key. I felt at peace being in my own space again. Before I went to my room, I went to the kitchen and set about making a strong cup of coffee. I stole milk from a half empty litre bottle with Bess’s name on it - Bess who always had everything. She wouldn’t miss a little milk. Then I slumped into a chair by the foldaway dining table and listened to the silence.
Before I’d drunk a half cup, Bess, came into the kitchen and did a double take. Her hair was a mess, her eyes were all puffy with sleep, and she was in her baggy checked pyjamas.
“What are you doing here, Ash?”
“Good morning, Ashley. Welcome home. Oh, how we’ve missed you,” I replied.
“Yes and of course, but… you moved in with Brandon Lynes.”
“Kind of. For a little while. But not really ‘moved in’ more like, hooked up with.”
Bess rubbed her eyes and grabbed the kettle and took a mug for herself.
“Hooked up, yes. But I got that note you sent last week. Come on, Ashley. You could have just phoned me, for fuck’s sake.”
My heart started to burn again. I was bristling. I downed the dregs of my coffee.
“A letter? Can you show me this letter?”
“Ashley, I’ve just woken up. I’ll get it for you later. But the fact is …what? Why do you want to see your letter?”
“Because I didn’t write one, Bess.”
“You fucking did. You gave notice on your room, Ash. Because you’d moved in with Brandon. That’s what you said. We can’t fund an empty room here, none of us can, so we talked to a few girls in the department and…”
“Bess, you’ve given my room to someone else?”
“Um. Yes. Because of your letter, Ash. You dumped us in it. You moved out on us. We had to move quick-smart or we’d be liable for a month’s rent. You do understand that right?”
Questing Heart: Fighting Heart Erotic Bad Boy Romance Series Book 2 Page 2
