Flesh: Part Ten (The Flesh Series Book 10) (3 page)

There's nothing
wrong with him.
Janice's
words echo in my head. If nothing is wrong with him though, does that
mean that there's something wrong with me. Is it messed up that I
want to be with him, that I keep trying to force him to be something
that he's not? Just thinking about it makes me want to cry some more.
I'm done crying though.

With a sigh, I pick
my dirty clothes up off of the floor and open the bathroom door.
Janice is on her way to her bedroom, and we nearly bump into each
other. I gasp, accidentally dropping my skirt.

She picks it up,
then notices my pajamas. Sympathy contorts her previously blank
expression, but there's something else mixed in with it. Something I
can't place.

“
What
did he do this time?” There's so much annoyance in her voice
that it causes a pang in my heart.

“
How
do you know he did anything?” I practically rip my skirt out of
her hand, scowling all the while.

She straightens
herself and puts her hands on her hips. Then she gestures at my
pajamas.

“
I
could have just had a bad day at work.” I turn to continue to
my room.

“
But
you didn't, did you?” She follows, and the hard edges in her
tone begin to soften as if she might actually be concerned.

“
You
don't want to hear me talk about it, so I won't.” I toss my
dirty clothes in my laundry hamper and sit in front of my computer,
trying to ignore the fact that she's standing in the doorway. I would
have slammed the door in her face, but I don't want the tension
between us to get any greater. The last thing I need right now is to
fight about something stupid and lose her as a roommate.

“
Amy.”
She rests against the door frame. “That's not what I meant.”

“
Well,
it sure seemed like it.”

She swipes her
tongue over her top lip before drawing her hand up to her face in
frustration. “Look, he put you in a bad mood again, right?
Don't sass me, just tell me if I'm right or not.”

I huff, turning to
face her. “Alright. He put me in a bad mood. What of it?”

“
This
isn't the first time. It isn't the second time. And it won't be the
last time.” The way she's holding her forehead suggests that
it's taking everything in her to be patient with me. I'm not dense
though. I know what she's getting at.

“
This
is my choice, Janice. I know it doesn't agree with you or Derrick,
but...” I sigh. “Look, maybe you're both right. When I
finish with his interior design project, he might kick me to the
curb. I don't know. I just...” A plethora of emotions flood
through me. It feels like my hope of eventually being with Lucian is
quickly being siphoned away by Janice's presence. The way she looks
at me when I talk about Lucian. The way that Derrick looks at me when
I talk about Lucian. “I just like him. Okay? I can't...I don't
even understand it myself. This isn't like me at all.” I slump
forward and cradle my head in my arms on the desk.

Seconds later, I
hear the soft padding of footsteps and then feel Janice's hand on my
back rubbing it soothingly. “I get his appeal, Amy. I really
do. The guy is fucking gorgeous. I can't even imagine what it's like
to sleep with him.”

“
It's
amazing,” I grumble, my thoughts drifting back to that night in
Lucian's bedroom when he made love to me. It's a good sign that
that's what my soul really needs. Not these crazy compulsive
sexcapades in random places where I feel nothing from him at all.

“
If
you want to keep seeing him, I'm not going to argue with you. And
I'll be here when it all comes crumbling down and you need my
support. It's just hard to watch you being depressed like this.”
She kneels down beside me, leaning over to peek under my arms.

I exhale deeply and
sit up, twisting my body to face her. “You're a good friend.”

“
So
are you.” She takes my hand and squeezes it. “And you
don't deserve this.”

I smile weakly at
her before threading my fingers through my hair. “I just wish I
knew what to do. Wish I had some definite answer about how he really
feels about me.”

“
Have
you asked him?”

“
No,”
I smirk. It seems like the simplest of things, but yet it's so damn
difficult.

“
Maybe
you should start there.” She straightens herself to go sit on
my bed.

“
I
don't want him to think that I'm desperate though or trying to force
him into anything.” I shake my head, knowing that I'm just
making excuses.

“
You
are trying to force him into something though. He just might not know
it.”

“
I
think he knows it at this point. I mean, I've been pretty clear about
the fact that this isn't something I normally do.” I screw my
face.

“
Well,
I've got an idea about how you can find out how serious he is, but
you're probably not going to like it.” Her eyes widen as if
she's about to suggest the scariest thing in the world.

“
What?”
I ask apprehensively.

“
Go
back to Flesh and ask for him.”

“
What
will that prove?” I quirk an eyebrow.

A mischievous grin
plays across her lips. “Go back to Flesh. Fill out a new form.
Use a different name. Mark off sex on your list and see if he still
takes you as a client.”

“
It
would be bad enough if I could just get him as a Dom,” I
mumble. The thought that Lucian might be pleasuring other women in
any way makes me feel sick. “What about when the guy at the
front desk runs my credit card? What if he asks about the different
name?”

“
Just
tell him that you want to remain anonymous to your Dom. It's not an
unreasonable request. I'm sure a lot of clients do it.”

While I highly doubt
that, it does seem like a perfectly allowable thing to do.

The thought of going
to Flesh to see if Lucian is sleeping with other women makes my
stomach turn, mostly because I'm pretty sure that he is. There's a
part of me that has enjoyed being blissfully ignorant. That's the
part of me that has continued to pine for him. If I go to Flesh and
see him there, maybe my feelings for him will be squashed out.

“
I
don't know, Janice. That would seem really shady.”

“
Do
you want to know or do you not want to know?” Her expression
indicates that the answer is obvious.

“
There
have to be better ways of finding out than...spying on him.”

“
It's
not spying on him if you go in as a paying client.”

“
I
suppose not.” I wrap my arms around myself, trying to stifle
down the nasty feeling inside of me that's insisting she's right.
“Still, I don't want to do it.”

“
Well.”
She stands, obviously tired of trying to talk sense into me. “I
think you know what you have to do. Either ask him straight out or go
to Flesh and find out for yourself. And even if you do ask, I would
still go to Flesh just to make sure. Fetishes run deep, and a guy
doesn't give up being a Dom for just anyone.” She casts a
sideways glance at me as she walks out of the room.

The way she
suggested that I'm 'just anyone' to Lucian hurts. He told me about
his wife and son and parents. I doubt he would have opened up to
'just anyone'. He could have avoided the topic. Then I would have
left and he never would have seen me again. Clearly, he didn't want
that. That has to mean something.

With a sigh, I
immerse myself in surfing the internet for several hours before I go
to bed. I need a distraction. Any distraction. Of course, that only
works when I'm doing something. The second that I crawl under the
covers, my mind is back on Lucian Reddick and all that Janice said.

Should I go to
Flesh? It seems like such a childish thing to do. Like I'm an angry
girlfriend trying to catch him cheating. I want to give him the
benefit of the doubt though. I want to wait for some type of sign.
Maybe I'll just try to hold on until his project is over. That will
be the test as to whether or not he has legitimate feelings for me—if
he wants to see me after our business is concluded. Who knows how
long that will be though? His project has already taken an
exceedingly long amount of time. We've only just purchased the
furniture for his bedroom and the guest bedroom. There's still the
rest of the house to go. Judging by how slowly we've made progress,
it could take another week or two before his project is finished. I'm
not sure that my heart can handle much more push and pull without
breaking completely. I feel like I've already emotionally stretched
myself to my limits. I want off of this rollercoaster ride of ups and
downs, highs and lows.

There's only one
way. Well, two ways, technically. Ask and take the chance that he
could be lying, or go to Flesh and find out the truth. If he's
sleeping with other women, it means that he's not really interested
in me.

That thought is
incredibly painful. Too painful. A large part of me doesn't want to
know the truth because logic tells me that he's not as invested as
I've led myself to believe. I'm terrified of getting hurt again. And
so I decide to do the naive thing. I'll wait until his project is
over and see where we stand after that.

CHAPTER THREE

It seemed like a
good idea at the time, waiting for the project to end. I was sure it
would go without a hitch, that things would progress at the same pace
that they had been. There are only two more stores to visit. Even if
we only visit one a week, that means I'll have my answer in two
weeks.

Work is
excruciatingly boring, and the tension hasn't let up between Derrick
and I. Tyra has caught onto it, the lingering distance between us.
She stops by my desk one day to casually discuss it though I know
she's more concerned with how it's going to affect the project—if
it's affecting it at all.

“
What's
up with you and Derrick?” She nods over at his desk,
nonchalantly fidgeting with the petals of a flower pen that's sitting
in my pen holder. My eyes fall to it, and I have to fight back a
frown.

Derrick gave me the
blue daisy pen as a welcoming gift shortly after I started working at
Environ Design. I've used it until it ran out of ink, but I still
keep it as a memento of those first few months when I was getting my
feet wet and Derrick was patiently showing me the ropes. God, I miss
talking to him.

I'm not sure how
much I should tell Tyra, or if I should tell her anything at all.
It's obvious that things haven't been good with me and Derrick since
that day we were caught arguing outside. I want to smooth things over
with him, but it just seems like it's too soon. Maybe I should wait
until the Reddick project is over for that too.

“
We
had a personal conflict of interest.” It's vague but the truth.

“
Hopefully
something that will be settled soon.” She lets her long,
blood-red nails fall from the petals of the flower pen and taps them
on my desk, making a clicking sound that sends a shiver down my spine
and draws my attention to her hand. Always superbly manicured. Her
fingers are long and dainty, and she seems to have a knack for
picking out the perfect colors of nail polish to accent her chocolate
skin. She's a beautiful woman.

I shrug. “There's
no way of knowing, honestly. We haven't talked about things since it
happened.”

“
You
should.” She glances over at Derrick's desk where he's
pretending to work on the layout of the furniture in Derrick's
bedroom. It's a job that would usually only take a few minutes, but
he knows that Tyra has a good view of his computer from where she's
standing.

“
Maybe
next week.” I offer her a weak smile.

“
Well,
do it soon. I'm sure it's stressful working together when there's so
much tension between the two of you.”

“
Yes,
ma'am.” I nod before she walks away. As soon as her back is
turned, I frown, then glance at Derrick. Nothing would please me more
than to smooth things over with him. Hopefully, he'll be ready to
talk soon.