Accepting their money would be accepting that life I struggled so hard to shed. I couldn’t do it. And I couldn’t ask for help with Fin. This was my life, these were my problems. If I had any hope in hell of figuring out who I was and what I wanted out of life it started now, it started with these things.
“Thank you, really,” I gave them a sincere, adoring smile that I actually felt. “I don’t need it though. I’m going to get another roommate before the end of this month and I already picked up a sEcond job with flexible hours that is paying great.” It’s also not paying me in cash, just erasing a debt I shouldn’t owe in the first place. But those were small, minute details. When my mom opened her mouth to object to the idea of me working more I quickly cut in, “Actually the work load is really easy and I can do a lot of it throughout the day so I’m not cutting into study time. Plus my boss is really understanding when things come up. If I need time off, he will give it to me.”
“Where is it?” Grayson asked, his eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“What?” Not the cleverest response.
“Where’s the job?” Grayson demanded.
“Why?” I sputtered, not at all liking the angry glint in Grayson’s eyes.
“I think what he’s trying to ask, Els, is what is the job?” Lennox asked from across the table, his arms still folded, his biceps bulging and straining.
“Yes, honey, what is the job?” My mom asked, still sounding concerned.
I felt the color drain from my face and my hands start to tremble under the table. I was in no way prepared to lie to my family about this. I didn’t even have a good lie to deliver. And while I stared back at all their intensely concerned faces my brain struggled relentlessly to come up with an excuse that would both check out and not require them to actually check up on me!
Which meant I was so screwed.
Beckett jumped into my rescue, “What they want to know is if you’re stripping for your education?” I gave him a blank look to both appear innocent and buy myself a little more time. Was that our waitress carrying a huge tray of food our way? “Did you resort to becoming a stripper, Ellie? To pay for school? No job is as easy as you described and pays well, so give up the details. What’s going on?”
Saved by the waitress. And lots and lots of food.
Silence reigned as she deposited plates in front of us and gave last minute instructions. This was followed up by grunts of satisfaction from the men and an “Mmm-yummy” from my mom. I cut deep into my chicken…. whatever I was having and stuffed the steaming hot piece of poultry into my mouth before I was required to answer the question.
Also, was stripping technically prostitution? Because if so…. I probably didn’t need to repeat myself, to myself.
“It’s not stripping,” I mumbled through my food, rude as it may be. “Do you all really think I would do something like that?”
This was met with a chorus of, “Of course not!” or, “We’re just worried about you, that’s all.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m so not brave enough to take my clothes off…. on stage. I would bolt the minute I was reduced to pasties and a g-string. Besides my boobs are way too small to bring home any money and don’t even get me started on the kind of grooming it would take to get camera ready so to speak.”
The table fell into another one of those stunned silences, but this one was well orchestrated on my part. My father actually dropped his fork, sending sauce splattering. My mother’s face turned purple, but not nearly as purple as my brothers. Ha! Take that, suckas! When in a pinch with my brothers, always bring up girl problems. My go to was my period but small boobs and waxing worked equally as well.
“I’m going to use the lady’s room.” I announced demurely. “If the waitress comes back, could someone get me more water? Thanks!”
And then I slipped away, forcing myself to walk casually until I was out of sight. Then I practically sprinted to the bathroom, unable to stop the evil grin from twisting my mouth. They deserved that! And it kind of felt good to dish something out, instead of just taking it all night.
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and noticed two missing text messages from Fin and three notifications on his Facebook account that was still live on my phone. I clicked to his Facebook first, anxious to see if any developments were being made on the message-front.
Two notifications were tagged pictures of him with some of his track teammates goofing around at their last meet. But one was a message from the girl that was supposed to show up at his apartment tonight. She sent a consolatory message since Fin was “sick” tonight. She felt awful about his “sudden” and “violent” food poisoning and assured him if he needed “anything” she was more than willing to provide it.
Uh, oh, I hoped he didn’t get food poisoning from Baileys!
Ha!
I so wished I could have been there when Ms.-I’m-a-Sure-Thing showed up at Fin’s tonight. Ah, well. There would always be the unlikely chance he would vent about it at our next scheduled indentured-servitude-gathering. More than likely Cassie would message again and then I would get a sEcond chance at this.
Just for good measure I clicked on her profile. She was definitely gorgeous and not nearly as skanky as the girls that usually hung around Beckett. She was also a senior, so she had probably known Fin for a while.
I had to wonder why he shot her down….
Maybe, besides all rumors, evidence and lack of pictures in his apartment, he had a girlfriend?
Except then why was he pushing so hard with me? I was the kind of situation that would piss of any kind of girl.
A girl that owes your boyfriend gobs of money and has to do whatever he says until the debt is paid? A girl he is practically stalking and most definitely harassing and possibly even flirting with? Yep, sounds like a trip straight to couples counseling.
So what gave then? Why had Fin taken himself off the market?
I would investigate this. Soon.
Right now, I had to make sure his morning quickie was still on for tomorrow.
Once I decided he hadn’t actually been on his account in probably two days or more, I felt a little more relaxed.
And brave enough to check his texts.
Why did you leave work early? Was Ty mean to you? I can beat him up if you want me to. Although… he would probably kick my ass. But still, just say the word. Nobody messes with my slave.
I laughed out loud at that. And then I looked around quickly, not wanting to be caught laughing at his jokes. He sent that shortly after I got here. The sEcond message was sent just ten minutes ago.
Usually when I text a girl, I have to turn off my ringer because she won’t stop texting me back… You should text me back so my self-esteem doesn’t start to suffer….
I tried really, really hard to stop smiling at that, but it was a useless effort. With a quick click of a button, I turned the screen of my phone off and decided it was probably a good idea to let his self-esteem marinate, especially after he just had a pretty co-ed banging down his door to give him whatever he “needed.” Obviously, it was for the good of humanity that I let him wait this one out.
I eventually returned to my now cold meal and settled into the remaining minutes of the family dinner. My parents were headed back home tonight, and Lennox to his apartment halfway in between. We kissed and hugged and promised to miss each other in the parking lot and then off they went. I wouldn’t see my mom and dad again until I went home for spring break in three weeks. Which was fine with me.
They however, weren’t as accepting of the idea, begging me to come home this weekend and when I declined because I had to work, they tried to shove cash into my hand.
I eventually let them. My dad only had sixty dollars to give tonight and I was seriously starting to worry about my cholesterol after the sheer amount of cheap food I’d been consuming. Maybe I would buy some fruit. Some…. canned fruit. Plus I could see my brother’s eying me like vultures waiting for their prey to die and I didn’t want to stick around this parking lot longer than I had to.
When my parents were waving goodbye from the street I turned to sprint to my car, but Lennox intercepted me with his arms crossed again.
“Ellie, we want to talk to you,” Lennox said.
Beckett and Grayson closed ranks behind me so I was effectively trapped. Oh gosh. “About what?” I asked innocently.
“First, your roommate leaves. And there are definite rumors about some kind of addiction. Now there’s talk of you and Hunter spending extended amount of time together,” Beckett explained, his gray eyes cold and dangerous.
I held up my hands in a sign of surrender, deciding if I acted like this was a big admission on my part, they might actually believe me. “My roommate did leave. And I can’t say her reasons for sure, plus it’s not my place. All I know is that she’s gone and I’m happy for it. You guys decided it was a good thing she’s gone, too. Remember? And fine, Fin and I have a project we are working on. I saw him twice yesterday, on campus. We talked about the project and that’s it. So stop bothering me about him. We are in no way dating. I’m not interested in him at all. And that’s the end of the story.”
I let out an aggravated sigh, while they stared at me with their narrowed, scrutinizing eyes. SEconds ticked by while they collectively decided whether to believe me or not. The thing was, it was mostly the truth, but my brothers were born with a strong sense of distrust when it came to everything about me. Not that they didn’t trust me, just that they didn’t trust anyone else when it concerned me. I could kill Colton right now for bringing me back into their overprotectiveness.
“We will find out if you’re lying,” Grayson growled.
“Gray,” I pleaded, in my sweetest voice. “Why would I lie about that? If I was dating Fin, don’t you think I would believe he could take care of himself?” Mostly that was a lie. In no way did I think any male alive could hold his own against these three.
They all three grunted in response. I should probably tell them how tough and strong I thought they were, but I was their sister…. I wasn’t supposed to build them up. It was my job in life to dish out as much as I took.
“Besides,” I continued soothingly. “You were all on your best behavior with Colton. It’s not like I’m scared to bring a guy home.” I was totally scared to bring another guy home. And they were in no way on their best behavior.
“Only because he was a tool,” Lennox stated matter-of-factly. “And we weren’t really on our best behavior, we just allowed him to live because we all knew it wouldn’t last with you two.”
Before I could ask any questions about that, Grayson continued, “But you still let that go on way longer than it should. And you got hurt in the end. Ellie, we won’t make that mistake again. You better choose your next boyfriend carefully.”
The three of them nodded their heads in unison and then Lennox added, “And it better not be Hunter.”
Time to defuse this unnecessary tension. I went up on my toes and gave Lennox a quick kiss on the cheek. I felt his shoulders relax and then he pulled me into an affectionate hug. Next was Grayson and I didn’t even wheeze when he squeezed me too tight. Finally Becket, although we just did the side hug thing. We were too close in age to be overly demonstrative.