by Amanda Scott
“It makes all the difference in the world, Ms. Ward.” He moved further away from her and then leaned back in his creamy leather seat. The billionaire checked his phone, and she couldn’t stop staring at him – that strong jaw buried beneath a thin layer of dark stubble, those dark, clear eyes of his, and those full, pink lips…
And then there was his affect; he suddenly acted as if she wasn’t even in the car with him anymore. How could he just tune her out like that? Even more oddly, why was it that the more he acted like an asshole the more turned on she got by him
He was cold, she thought. And he only cared about getting his rocks off. Don’t do this to yourself, Taylor.
“Thanks to you, I don’t have a job,” she said, folding her arms in front of her chest as if somehow that would make a statement.
He laughed and slowly shook his head.
“Why is that so funny?”
“It just is,” he said, grinning from ear to ear.
“You really are sick,” she added. “I wanted to believe the rumors weren’t true, but they are… all of them.”
His eyes flamed red. “All of them? So you’ve done your homework?”
“I know how to read, Mr. Marcus.”
“Do you now, Taylor?” he said, pressing his lips into a hard line as he glanced over her chest.
She tried to cover herself up with her arms, but there was nowhere to hide, and nothing really to hide under. Sure, she could leave, just walk out of his SUV and never look back, but then she’d be out of a job. And it took everything she had, plus a little extra luck, to land her the job as an office assistant at Baldpate, as unfulfilling as it was.
“Yes, I do.”
“And what are the latest headline rumblings saying about me, if you don’t mind sharing?”
She flashed a subtle grin of her own, delighting at the chance to remind him of his soiled reputation. “You don’t know?”
“I don’t bother. If I did, I’d never be able to keep up my production rate.”
“You must know something about what they’re saying about you,” she said, brushing away a stray, curly lock of hair that blocked part of her view of him.
“I think I have an idea, but I bet you could still teach me a thing or two.”
She smirked. “Me, teach you?”
“Why not? You already taught me what a good liar someone can be.”
There is something seriously wrong with this man. She had thought other men in her past were controlling, but Colton Marcus was taking this to a whole new level. Must be the success that’s turned him into this, she thought.
“I… I’m not sure exactly what you mean,” she stammered. But she knew exactly what he meant. She knew he was pissed, because he thought she was a student in Baldpate’s writing department, but she was the furthest thing from it in reality.
He closed his eyes and raised both brows; it was as if he was trying to control whatever rage he’d been feeling in that moment. Then he pinned booth of her shoulders against the car window. She couldn’t move, nor did she want to try for reasons that weren’t clear even to her. “I think one lie in our first twenty-four hours of knowing each other is enough, Ms. Ward.”
She swallowed hard as he held her in place. Not that she was complaining; she had spent every last second since he’d lifted up her dress and had his total way with her in the conference room at Baldpate wondering if she’d ever get to feel his power again.
She knew what she had to do. Her skinny, weathered boss, Rebecca Stein, made that clear to her the moment after she found out she was suspended from her job for six weeks- she was to apologize to him. And even though she’d already tried to do just that, she knew he wanted more of an apology than she originally assumed.
“I should have told you the truth,” she said, her eyes wide and fixed on his gaze. He released her shoulders, one of his hands slowly brushing along her breast as he moved it back to his own lap.
“Which is?” he asked as he held his hand up to his ear as he waited for a response.
She took in a deep breath, swallowing whatever pride she had left. He didn’t deserve this much from her; she’d made an honest mistake after all, sneaking in to hear a man of his stature speak. Who wouldn’t do the same exact thing if they were in her shoes?
And besides, wasn’t the fact that she’d given her body completely over to him enough? What more could he possibly want from her?
“I shouldn’t have been in there. I… I was supposed to be making copies, and I heard you were coming, and I…” Her voice trailed off as she lowered her head, flushed cheeks and all.
“And what made you think you deserved to be in there at all? You weren’t a student there, correct?” he demanded an answer to his question.
She nodded her head up and down one time. “Correct, sir.”
“And you weren’t an applicant to my travelling fellowship award, right?”
“That’s also correct, Mr. Marcus.”
He chuckled so loud it grabbed her attention. She lifted her shamed head and looked towards him. “If this is so funny, then why do I have to beg for my job back like this?” she asked.
He smirked, and then slowly, slowly, slowly undressed her with his gaze.
Dirty pig, she thought. Behind the money and the success, he’s still only about one thing.
But there was a tiny, quiet, twisted little voice in her head that whispered a thank you to him… thank you for choosing me right now.
“It’s not often that I get burned. And when I first laid my eyes on you, I thought you were different from the rest of those kids.” He paused and put his hand on her bare thigh. “And then I found out the truth.” The author pulled his hand away sharply.
“You found out the truth, meaning… you think you know me?” she said.
His eyes narrowed again. He didn’t like to be challenged like this, and yet, he wasn’t exactly kicking her out of his SUV either.
“I know your basic type,” he said.
“Just like the world knows yours?”
“Maybe they do,” he said, catching her off guard.
“So the things in your book, like your character Jenny Bones… you think that stuff’s okay to write about?”
He shook his head, seemingly disgusted with her ignorance. “I write what people want to read. And I make a whole hell of a lot more money at than any other writer alive.”
“And that makes it okay?” she asked.
“No, Taylor. That makes it necessary.”
She was speechless. She’d never met a man like this before. He was a complete egomaniac; a completely sexy, sinfully seductive egomaniac. And she wasn’t stupid, he wasn’t lying about one thing… he wanted something from her for sure.
“What made you want to hear me speak yesterday?” he asked her, shocking her into a long, awkward moment of reflection.
Her cheeks flushed red, and for some reason she was even more embarrassed to say what she was about to say than she was when she allowed him to blindfold her and do what he pleased with her body yesterday. “I guess I always wanted to be a writer.”
She expected him to laugh, or criticize her, or maybe even lecture her on what it took to be a real writer, real like the students that she served in her role at Baldpate University. Real like him.
“What’s stopping you then?” he said simply.
She thought this through. She couldn’t tell him about the brutal voices from her past that echoed through her head every time she thought about reaching for her dream of becoming a writer. Or that she’d been told in high school that if she didn’t get into a really strong undergraduate writing program, she wouldn’t have a chance. Or that she had been damaged so hard on the day of her seventeenth birthday, the day that nearly flattened her soul, that she was no longer suitable for chasing dreams.
She couldn’t tell him any of that. How could she? She didn’t know him from Adam.
So instead, all she
could say was, “I don’t know.”
He squinted as he looked her over, his eyes drenched in suspicion. He knew she was lying, again.
Shit. She thought about how mad he’d gotten about the fact that she already withheld the truth from him, and here she was lying again. But she didn’t have any other choice, right?
Colton Marcus leaned in towards her. He pressed his lips against hers, and she closed her eyes and savored the salty scent that poured from his lips. She turned her head slightly, readying herself for his tongue. But the moment she made herself vulnerable to him, again, he pulled his lips off hers immediately.
“Goodbye, Taylor Ward.”
Her eyes grew wide. Then a surge of adrenaline rushed through her veins. “Goodbye? What do you mean, goodbye?” she asked, stunned.
He looked forward, away from her. Then he tapped twice on the tinted window in front of him. “I mean, goodbye…”
“What?” she said wearing a look of shock across her face. “What about my job? Why did you just kiss me? What’s the matter with you?” She was furious, and even though she knew she sounded like a complete lunatic, she couldn’t stop herself from rattling off questions.
He was evil to kiss me like that, and then tell me off in such a cold, carefree manner.
“You… You can’t do this to me. You ruined my life. How can you do this?” she asked, shaking her head wildly.
“You really want to know?” he asked, continuing to look straight ahead.
She felt a ray of hope as she brushed her scattered bangs away from her eyes. “Yes,” she whimpered. “Yes, please.”
“Then I’ll give you the same bullshit answer you gave to me… I don’t know.” His words clearly cut her deep, but he persisted. “Now get out of my car, I have work to do.”
She squinted her eyes. Who was this man? And how could she be so unlucky to have come across his path like this? Even worse, how could she let him do what he did to her body, just yesterday?
Her voice shook as she spoke, “Thanks a lot, Colton.” She thought she noticed the slightest twitch in his eyes as she reached for the handle on her door. She swung the door open and left, not looking back as tears poured down her face.
Taylor was so totally devastated on every possible level. She was suspended from her job, and now it seemed there’d be no way of fixing that. She needed his permission, after all. But she didn’t know what was worse, the fact that she was out of the only job she’d be able to find in the entire Boston area, or the way her heart ached after everything she’d just gone through with Colton Marcus.
* * *
She spent hours roaming the city, unable to deal with the echoes in her head that would surely ring louder amidst the quiet backdrop of her rural Cape Ann apartment forty miles north of Boston.
When she finally reached the side porch to her apartment, there was a brown box with her name on it. It looked like it had simply been dropped off rather than sent through any actual delivery system.
The box was labeled: CARE OF TAYLOR WARD.
She tore off the single strip of packing tape that had been keeping the box closed throughout whatever path it had taken to reach her doorstep. Her heart felt like it had dropped beneath her stomach when she perused the contents of the box… there was a single framed picture, the one she treasured more than any other possession she owned. Then there was a plastic mug, a purple headband, a mixed assortment of pens, a daily planner, and a small desk calendar.
The box contained everything she had left at her job at Baldpate University, another sure sign that she most likely wouldn’t be returning there, even after her six-week suspension.
She thought about crying, again, but her tear ducts had all but dried out by now. Taylor dropped the box down on the porch as she reached for the key to open her apartment door.
“Perfect timing, Sweetheart,” a gruff, male voice called out to her from behind. “It’s almost rent day, “ he said with a lisp.
It was Brody Sharp, the property manager for her apartment. He had a real knack for showing up when she least expected it, and when she least wanted him to. Like most women, Taylor could smell a perv from a mile away. And whenever he came around, all she ever smelled was perv stew.
She took a deep breath as she turned to face him. He was at least twice her size, with red, thinning hair, and big, beefy arms and shoulders that looked like they were made out of cheap steaks and donuts. He was dressed in his usual attire- an ever-so-flattering wife beater t-shirt to show off the faded shamrock tattoo on his shoulder, a pair of dirty jeans that were conveniently, and disgustingly, torn in the crotch area, and a wonderful pair of brown work boots with black oil splotches scattered about them. And even though there clearly used to be a handsome face beneath his greasy, burnt-out demeanor, this man gave her the total creeps,.
Brody took a long, slow drag from his cigarette as he glanced across her ass that lay hidden beneath her black skirt, then he stomped out the ashy butt on the front step of her apartment with his steel-toe boot.
“This isn’t a good time, Brody. It’s been a really long day.”
He smiled wickedly after quickly gawking at her chest, and then he stepped towards her. He growled, “I’m sorry, Darling. How’s about I help you relax, help you take that tight little skirt of yours off and unwind a bit?”
She quickly surveyed the area only to conclude she was clearly alone right now. Being rather secluded like this was the only major drawback of her living out here. That, and having Brody Sharp as the primary point of contact for all of her apartment’s operational matters.
“You’re gross,” she said before turning away from him and reaching towards the doorknob with her key in hand. Brody grabbed her wrist so hard it was sure to leave marks in her skin.
“I love it when dumb chicks like you try to fight back,” he hissed.
She was repulsed by everything he said and did, and rightfully so. Any woman would feel the exact same way that she did, only most women would’ve dowsed him with pepper spray and called 911 by now.
“I’m not fighting back, Brody. I just want you to let go of my wrist and leave me alone.”
He glanced proudly at his fingers that were tightly grasped around her tender flesh. “Suit yourself, Sunshine. Just make sure you have the rent check in three days, or we might need to work out an alternative form of payment.” Then he released her wrist from his greasy hand.
She quickly reached inside the brown box of her work belongings, grabbed the photo of her and her sister, and then rushed inside of her apartment. After dead-bolting the door behind her, she simply waited until the sound of Brody’s rusty pick-up truck disappeared in the distance as she clutched the photo tightly in her hands.
She didn’t want to move to the city, but she was becoming more and more convinced that maybe she really wasn’t cut out to live on her own in a place like this, just like her father had lectured her so many times before.
But as creepy as her interaction with Brody Sharp was, in a strange way it was somehow less painful than everything that had just transpired between her and Colton.
Locked away in her apartment and out of the only job she’d managed to land, she had very few options. Moving back in with her father would be a disaster. Begging Stein for her job back would be useless, so long as Colton Marcus didn’t authorize her return.
And as she slipped out of her clothes and into a hot shower, she searched every corner of her brain trying to come up with a solution.
Then she remembered the billionaire author’s sage advice about what it took to succeed in this life…
Balls.
She had a plan. It wasn’t much, but it was something.
And right about now, something was everything for Taylor Ward.
As she got out of the shower and dried herself off, she winced from the pain in her wrist. Taylor looked down and noticed that Brody had left marks there for sure, marks that reminded her of just how hard
and cruel this world could be.
There has to be another way, she thought to herself.
Or not. She’d find out soon enough.
* * *
Taylor read through the first three chapters of her story, the one she had spent the past three years of her life agonizing over. She had convinced herself that it was good, maybe even good enough to get published someday, but she allowed herself to fall victim to one of writing’s greatest living myths- writer’s block.
Too bad, she thought. It’s my only chance.
Then she hit send and waited…
Waited for a response from the man who singlehandedly dismantled her life in less than twenty-four hours; the same man, by the way, who was the only one capable of putting her life back together again.
* * *
Nearly three days had passed and not a word from Colton Marcus.
What was I thinking, sending some partial rough draft along to the most prolific writer in the world? Self-doubt began to consume her as she sat waiting in her desolate apartment. She’d wondered if her plan had a fighting chance of working; she thought that maybe, just maybe, she could make a crack in the window of Marcus’ soul.
She should’ve known better, and the lack of any sort of response from him whatsoever was evidence that her plan had failed miserably. Maybe my writing wasn’t what I’d always thought it was, deep down, after all.
Her entire apartment shook as a loud, violent thud landed on her door. Her heart sped up after the second boom came. She tiptoed towards her window and peered through her blinds.
Please no. The instant she noticed the pick-up truck, she felt a stabbing pain form in the side of her abs. Her rent was due, and Brody Sharp, the property manager, was more than happy to come pick it up himself rather than wait for a check to come in the mail like he did for the rest of the units he was responsible for.
Not that she had enough money to send a check to begin with.
