“But I felt like we were connected. I felt like I did understand him. I feel like an idiot,” I say, then put my face in my hands. “How can I show my face in this town? Everyone knows we were going to get married. It was in the damn newspaper.”
Sue’s hand rests on my shoulder. “It’ll be okay, Jenna. Time will heal you. You’ll see.”
“Come home with me, Jenna. Let’s get you out of this house. It’ll only keep you upset without him here,” Mom says.
“I can’t leave. What if he changes his mind and comes back home?” I pull my face out of my shaking hands and look at her.
“Why would you want to go back to life with him? After what he’s done, why would you do that to yourself?” Mom asks me with a frown.
“I love him. Maybe he got scared. Maybe this marriage thing is too much for him. I never had to have the marriage. He and I had our own thing.”
Then it hits me.
The contract!
I jump off the sofa and run to the bedroom and pull open the drawer he keeps it in. “No! No! He took it! No!” Sue and my mother come into the room.
Mom’s arms come around me. “He took what, baby?”
“Our paper. He took the paper that said we would be together forever. Why would he not even leave that?” I turn to look at them. “Maybe it means for me to wait.”
Sue looks at me with so much sadness in her light blue eyes. “Jenna, you shouldn’t sit around and wait to see. This isn’t right, what he’s done. He shouldn’t even be able to come back and have you again. Your mother’s right. You have to move on. Even if he comes back. He doesn’t deserve you.”
“Sue, you know how much I love him. I can’t stand to move on. I’ll wait. I’ll wait forever if I have to.”
“Did he leave you any money, sweetie?” Sue asks me.
I shake my head. “He kept all the money. He’d give me some when he needed me to buy things. But he kept it all.”
My mother takes me by the chin and makes me look at her. “Sweetheart, how are you supposed to wait for him here with no money?”
“I guess I have to get a job. I’ll get a job and keep this place and when he comes back he’ll know I waited and that I love and accept him for who he is. He’ll know he can trust me to always be his. Then he’ll change for good. Then he’ll know someone cares for him so much they’ll just wait for him.” I look into his mother’s eyes for a sign.
That has to be what this is, a test to see if I’ll wait for him!
No matter how hard they try to get me to leave, I will wait here and keep this home for him until he comes back to me. He’ll see; they’ll see; we will all see then that he does love me and this is just his way of testing my love for him.
I can’t think any other way. It’s what I have to do.
I swallow hard and look back at the women who think they know what’s best. But Rod and I have secrets they know nothing about.
He’s tested my limits before. It may seem harsh what he’s done, but I get it. I get him in a way no one else ever has.
“I can do this. I’m okay now. I can take care of myself. Don’t worry about me. I can handle this.” I walk into the living room and go to my desk. “I’ll talk to you guys later. I have to get my classwork done. I’m starting late on it and I don’t want to get behind. Rod would be disappointed in me if I did that. I want him to come back and see how self-reliant I am and capable of being the woman he needs me to be.”
Sue takes my mother by the hand and pulls her to the door. “Let this settle into her head, May.”
Out of the corner of my eye I see my mother nod. Then she says, “We’re only a phone call away, Jenna. Don’t hesitate to call. I love you.”
“Love you too, Mom. He’ll be back. You’ll see. You will all see. This is just a test. A test I will pass.”
“I love you too, Jenna. I’ll be here if you need me, sweetheart,” Sue says, then they leave.
With a shake of my head, I feel better and clearer about things now. Opening my laptop, I get to work.
He’ll be back. I know he will!
Chapter 11
JENNA
An entire year has passed and still there’s been no sign of Rod Manning.
I moved out of the house when the rent came due and I didn’t make enough money from the tips I made at the very small café I managed to get a job at in Jerome.
After a couple of months living at my parents' home, back in my childhood bedroom, I decided to move to Tempe and go to the real Arizona State University at Reed’s prompting.
He’s called me once a month to see how I’m doing and to check on my grades. He always lets me know he’s proud of my achievements and knows his company’s scholarship money is going to good use.
Truth be told, though, his voice always leaves me full of sorrow. But there’s no way I’d stop taking his calls. Not after all he’s done for me.
But it does hurt when I’m reminded of Rod. I try very hard not to think about him and our time together. And I find I have no trust in people.
No matter how many guys have asked me out, I can’t seem to make myself give any of them a chance. That’s a thing my dorm roommate doesn’t understand about me.
Of course, I haven’t told a soul about what Rod and I did or how much trust I put in him and how badly it hurt to know he did all that to me and left anyway.
Somewhere deep inside me, I know he’s a man with deeper problems than I ever understood. And that alone helps me sleep at night.
Sure from time to time I wake from some nightmare where Rod has shown up and wants me back. He tells me I’m his and drags me away with him.
I’m sure it’s an unfounded fear. But it’s there.
And if I was to have some guy with me when he did show up, I have no idea what he would do to both of us. So it’s best to stay alone.
It seems I have more than a few reasons not to date.
As if on cue, the door to the dorm room opens and my roomie, Lane, comes in. “Still in the same place you were when I left to go out with Jeremy. When are you going to come out with us, Jenna?”
“Never.” I look at her, then back at the book in my hand. “I’m here to learn, not mingle.”
“All work and no play, Jenna. Have you heard that little saying?” she asks as she pulls her tight T-shirt off.
“I have, and I don’t care what others say. I’m on a mission to graduate and get out of Arizona and on to a life far away from my past.”
“Tell me about this past of yours.” Lane drops her jeans, pops her bra off, and climbs into her little bed across the room from mine.
“Nope.” I look at her over the edge of my book. “It’s a boring story.”
“It can’t be. It has you a near recluse.” She pulls her red blanket up to cover her bare breasts. Then she wiggles around and her panties are thrown to the floor.
She likes to sleep naked. Says it’s more comfortable.
I know it is. That’s how Rod and I slept every night for three years. But now I wear pajamas and I don’t sleep that well anyway.
I ignore her and go back to reading. But she won’t stop. “Jenna, you know that really gorgeous guy from our child development class, Cam?”
I nod. “You like him now, or what?”
“Or what,” she says. “No. I saw him tonight at the club and he asked where you were.”
“So?” I say, as I really don’t care.
“So, he asked for your cell number and I gave it to him.”
I put the book on my lap and glare at her. “I gave you that number in case you ever needed me to come rescue your ass from either a rapist or a kidnapper. Not to give out to men. I’m pretty mad at you right now, Lane.”
“You can talk on the phone, can’t you? He’s nice and good looking and I think he’s also loaded. I saw him get into a fancy sports car when we were leaving the club.” She sits up in the bed and the blanket falls off her ample tits as she does.
With a roll of my eyes, I say,
“You know, Lane, it’s chicks like you who give female college roommates the stigma of us all being bisexual.”
I catch her holding her boobs and squeezing them together and shaking them. “Oh, am I enticing you with these little things? Has it been so long since your vag has had any action that you’re getting interested, Jenna?” She laughs, and I look at her with a blank face.
“Really, Lane? Go to sleep.”
She turns over and leans her head on her hand. “Come on, Jenna. Tell me about the guy who ruined you.”
Rod’s face flashes in my mind and I find tears spring forward. She spots them and says, “Jenna, it will help to talk about him. No matter what you believe, it will help.”
I push his face out of my mind. “You have no idea, Lane. Talking about him would only bring up wounds which have closed and rip them open again. I have a hard time even talking to his brother once a month like I have to. Talking will only hurt me, not help me.”
“What did he do to you?” she asks.
I look at the book in my hands, but don’t see the words. How do I explain to anyone what Rod Manning did to me?
How would they ever understand why I’m just so thankful he left and I don’t have to live that way any longer?
“Nothing, really. He just made me believe things that weren’t true. Hence, my issues. Not a big deal. Now go to sleep. You have a nine o’clock class and you’ll be in no condition for the pop quiz I overheard the professor say he was giving you guys.”
“Fuck!” She turns over and pulls the blanket over her head. “Thanks for springing that on me. Good night.”
“Good night,” I say, then put my book away and turn off my lamp and try to go to sleep myself.
But she’s put Rod back into my head and now I’m afraid sleep will be hard to find.
I can feel his rough, calloused hands running over my body as I close my eyes. His hot breath on the back of my neck as he pulls me close to him.
Then I recall the way he’d blow smoke at me when I got onto him about smoking in the house or the truck. The way he’d look at me with no emotion in those steel-blue eyes and make me call him Master.
Even though we had a whole year of not doing any of that, I have this fear that he’s going to come find me, demand I go back to him, and start the whole thing over.
He’ll condition me to bend to his will again. Train me to accept the pain he dishes out. Beat me into submission again.
When I look back and see myself, I shudder, remembering being on my knees in front of him, waiting to see what things he was about to put my body through.
My body jerks as I hear in my mind the sound of the leather belt flying through the air before it slammed against my skin. A sound I’ll never forget.
It’s a sensation which fills me with shame. The burn of the strike would send my body into such an odd state of pain and excitement.
I always became so wet as he hit me over and over. And when he pulled me off the hook and threw me onto the bed or the floor and took me like he owned me, because he did, it made me quiver with desire.
A desire to belong to him. To make him the center of my universe. To hand myself over to him so he could do anything he wanted to me.
And the shame goes all over me.
Why did I allow that?
I wasn’t raised that way. I was a good girl once, and I’m a good girl again. But now I’m one who has these dark secrets.
Secrets of enjoying the pain and the intense pleasure he’d follow it up with. Secrets of feeling elated that he kept me as his own. Secrets of knowing other women wanted him and most times he stayed away from them because I allowed him to do whatever he wanted to me.
I was young back then, stupid, naïve, and thought that was love.
That was control. That was manipulation. And that was unhealthy.
I can see it all very clearly now. Age and getting away from it has helped.
And I do thank God nearly every day that Rod left me. I’d still be right there in that if he hadn’t.
After he left, and when I was anywhere in town, I’d hear people talking about me saying how they thought I was smart and how they never saw me messing up my life with someone like Rod Manning.
I just thought I’d be humiliated by the whole town knowing he left after we were supposed to get married. How wrong I was.
I should’ve been humiliated before that. Once I heard how people thought about me even being with him had me thinking more about myself.
That’s why I decided to get out in the world, go off to college, and try to grow a lot more than I had allowed myself. Or than Rod had allowed, anyway.
And maybe Lane is right. Maybe I should date. But God knows, I’m afraid to.
I’m afraid there’s a weakness inside me I can’t see but others can, a weakness which allows others to control me. A weakness I’m not sure I’ve overcome yet.
Without being sure of myself, I can’t risk getting myself into a similar situation. Alone is best. For now, anyway.
My phone lights up as it buzzes and I pick it up and see a number I don’t recognize has texted me.
Involuntarily, my body tenses.
What if it’s Rod?
I swipe my finger over it and read the message. Hope you aren’t mad. Lane gave me your number. It’s Cam, from one of your classes. I know you keep to yourself and I want you to know I respect that. But I also want you to know I’m a good guy. And I’d like us to get to know each other. So how about I bring you a coffee to our class and afterward we can talk? Just talk, Jenna. I swear. I see a sadness in you that actually hurts me. I don’t think I can fix you or anything. But I’d like to be your friend. You seem to keep people away. As you well know as we’ve learned in our child development class, keeping away from the group is unhealthy. And, as teachers, we’re expected to not only notice these kinds of things but help the person who needs it. I’m here to help, Jenna. That’s all. No pressure. Some coffee and conversation. That’s it. So tell me what kind you like.-
I wait for three minutes while I contemplate this. He is right. We have studied this very thing, and it’s an unhealthy way to be.
Can I believe he wants only friendship from me?
Friends are a thing I let go for Rod. They’d never have understood our relationship, so I cut them off.
It was stupid of me back then. And refusing a friend now is just as stupid. So I text back, Mocha, caramel, and thanks. I’ll take you up on the friend thing.
Great! See you tomorrow.
I put the phone down and feel like I’ve just taken a huge step forward out of this mess I’ve made of my life, a good step toward a normal future.
Rod Manning is my past, a past best left in the dark shadows of my memory. It’s a thing I need to learn from, but not let cripple me.
So I close my eyes and hold my breath for as long as I can as I let the memories flood my mind. This is it. This is the last time I’ll allow myself to be held back by Rod Manning.
His face, his muscled back, his tight abs, his ash blond waves, his steely blue eyes, his smell, his voice, and his essence flash through my head.
They’re all put away in the recesses of my mind, along with the leather belts, the collars, the nipple clamps, the bungee cords, the hook and all the other things I associate with Rod Manning.
No longer will I allow that to be at the forefront of my mind. It’s over. I throw the fear and shame, and the fact there will never be any closure, in there with the rest.
It’s time to start fresh and become who I am meant to be. I want to be a teacher of young children, and I need a healthy mind if I am to be the right kind of influence on them.
It’s a big responsibility, and my college days are nearly over. A year away from graduation and becoming a real teacher, I have to work as hard on myself as I have my studies.
So I’m going to drink some coffee with a member of the opposite sex. I’m going to leave the shit with my first relationship where it belongs, in the pas
t.
I’m going to stop thinking of myself as a weak, idiotic female with no will of her own.
Nope, that young girl is gone. She’s grown up, and now she will be influencing young minds. And with such a responsibility she has to come to terms with life now, not then.
I take in a deep breath to replenish the air my body has used up and stop thinking about myself in the third person.
I am going to be better than okay. I am going to sleep tonight as the Jenna Foster I am now. I am waking up with a new attitude and outlook on life.
All men are not trying to control me. All men are not assholes. All men are not a thing I have to fear.
I will not give power anymore to the man I’ve been so afraid will show up and use a piece of paper to take me back to a place I don’t want to be any longer
Four years is enough!
Chapter 12
REED
The last two years have been hard on my mother. With Rod still missing in action, she’s just not herself. So I’ve taken the summer to come and stay with them and try to bring some kind of normal back into their lives.
The New Year’s parties and Christmas parties were forgotten the last two years. She claimed she wasn’t feeling well for all those occasions. Even the traditional Christmas evening dinners were canceled.
I had them flown into Los Angeles last year and they joined me at my place.
They didn’t ask about how much money I’ve made when they saw the mansion in Bel-Air. I think they understand why I’m not advertising it to anyone.
It’s the first weekend since I came here at the beginning of the week, and I’m going to barbecue for them. I sent them off to the car lot to buy new cars.
I swear they make me insane with wanting to hold onto cars past their prime. I told them you get more for the trade if you do it every two years. But Mom claims a love for her car and so does Dad.
But I made them take them down when I told them the money had already been paid. It hasn’t. I’ll go down and negotiate later, but the sales guy wants the commission, so he lies to them for me.
The tiny supermarket in Jerome always leaves me yearning for something better in this tiny town. The meat looks like crap, and I think I just might make a run to Prescott to get the steaks I wanted to cook tonight.
Rockstar Untamed: A Single Dad Virgin Romance Page 36
