Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 68354 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 342(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68354 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 342(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 228(@300wpm)
Still purple in the face, he suddenly realizes I’m firing him. “You’re—you can’t—Liam, for God’s sake,” he goes on.
“Get. Out.”
I wait until he’s gone, cursing myself for giving Mandy the day off. I want her canceling my meetings for the rest of the day and checking security footage to make sure Jake’s truly out of here. I spend about ten minutes flipping through email. I want this off my plate before I discuss things with Cora.
“Cora?” I call out. “Get in here. I need to talk to you.”
No response. If she’s going silent on me now…
We need to talk. This is not the time for her to clam up.
“Cora?”
I walk into the other room and come to a halt a few steps in but I can’t see her. Hell, she’s nowhere to be found and there aren’t many places to hide in here. The door’s left open.
Jesus.
She’s gone. I can’t believe she left like this, so soon.
I stand and shake my head. I warned her. I thought I’d subdued her and broken through, but maybe she does need a session with leather.
“Cora?” I call, but there’s no response. I can’t believe she took off without even talking to me and hell, we have shit to talk about. After all this time, she’d run?
I go back to my office and pick up my phone, scowling at it. I’ve been too easy on her. We’ve scened, and she knows what I expect, but she’s never really earned herself a proper punishment since that brief caning when we first began. Tonight, we’ll have a good talk about running.
With my belt.
I call her, but it immediately goes to voicemail. I send a text and I’m not surprised when I don’t get a response.
You do not ignore my calls and texts. You know better than this.
My phone sits, mute. I try to think of where she’d be right now, so I call Manuel.
“Where’s Cora?”
“School, sir. She’s at her morning class,” he says, though his voice is hard and distant, and this is not the easygoing person who works for me.
“I’ll be right down. Take me to her.” I don’t bother to listen to his reply. I’m already heading downstairs.
Nineteen
Cora
God, I’ve fucked everything up. When I heard his lawyer tell him how I’d messed up his deal, and Liam said the contract was void… I couldn’t listen for another minute. He must know I’ve fallen in love with him and breached the contract.
I had to get to school and make this better. He isn’t the man I thought he was.
He’s so much more. So much better.
And he doesn’t deserve a girl like me, who doesn’t have two pennies to scrape together. We’re four days away from ending the contract, and for a moment there, I actually convinced myself that maybe we’d transcended the ridiculous agreement we signed weeks ago. That I meant something more to him than a hard fuck. But how could I? He’s so out of my league we’re not even in the same stratosphere. I need to get that damn petition taken down and stop making a mess of Liam’s life.
I came into his office this morning fuming because someone had put the petition on my Instagram page without my permission, and we didn’t get a chance to even talk about it.
I almost skipped the ride to school today, but when I got downstairs, the sky had turned a dismal, ominous gray. I slid into the car just before the skies opened and rain slashed down in torrents. Manuel asked no questions but took me straight to school.
“I’ll get myself home today,” I told him, and he didn’t much like that idea. But I insisted.
“It’s been great getting to you know,” I tell him, which sounds super lame, but I have to say good-bye. “Thank you for everything.”
He looks at me curiously, then frowns at the torrential downpour out the window.
“Are you going to be okay?” he asks.
No. Hell, no, I’m not going to be okay. I fell in love with a man I cannot have. I dragged my brother and sister through this, and now I need to end it. Say good-bye. But I know Manuel is only talking about the rain, so I lie.
“I’ll be fine but thank you.” And I leave before he can say another word.
I head to the journalism office first, because I want answers. Someone put a petition up on my page, and that someone was not me. The rain beats down on me in cold sheets as I run to the office, and I can almost hear Liam chiding me for letting myself get cold and wet. But what does it matter? I push the door open and slam it behind me. Four wide sets of eyes blink up at me. I don’t even bother with formalities.