34. Addison
34
ADDISON
“I found her waiting outside my house, soaked,” Piper said just beyond the bathroom door. “I think she needs some cheering up.”
The hot water from the shower did good work drowning out most of their conversation, but not all of it. They dropped it down to a whisper, but their words still slipped through the gaps in the door.
“... break up ?”
“... bastard… hurt her …”
Showing up at Piper’s house probably wasn’t my best idea, but I didn’t want to go home to an empty house and feel the weight of my loneliness.
The house, one I had been to many times over the last few years, was about the size of Warren’s. It was a hard reminder that we were now in two different worlds.
Maybe coming here was a mistake.
Their voices now echoed in the gold-accented bathroom.
“If that’s true… contract… lost it ? —”
I placed my hands over my ears, using the hit of each water droplet on my back to center me. I didn’t want to listen anymore. My head was pounding, and my skin was pruning. I knew I should get out, but my body wouldn’t get up, so I stayed stuck on the shower floor as water poured down on me.
He just kicked me out. After everything, Warren kicked me out.
The weight of losing the two million dollars was heavy.
I needed that money, and it had been so close, but I lost sight of it.
But his rejection hurt more than anything else.
I had banked on him wanting me, whenever, wherever, and somehow it had turned into a conversation I didn’t want to have. One I couldn't have.
I didn’t want to confide in him. Didn’t want him to see the mess I had become.
And I couldn’t deal with the things he was saying. Like he had… feelings for me?
Warren is not what he seemed to be. What I thought he was.
Yes, I was still hurt about what happened to my father. His suicide was a permanent scar on my psyche… but the stuff he’d done? Like my mom, I started to feel like I should have stopped him. Should have seen just how bad it was instead.
But I had been blinded by the money. By the lifestyle. Na?ve.
I saw what my father wanted me to see. Even when he was trying to pimp me out to his friends’ sons.
The most shocking was how similar Warren and I were. Two people, out for revenge. For their fathers. Willing to do anything to get it.
Except, in the end, my father killed his.
The muttered whispers continued, and I figured I couldn’t stay in the shower much longer before one of them decided to break the door down.
When I finally got a towel around myself, I opened the door to see Piper and Violet huddled together just outside.
Piper was holding not one, but two bottles of wine, while Violet had a bunch of candy in her arms.
God, what did I do to deserve these two?
I couldn’t help but crack a smile.
“Hey, girl,” Violet said with a hesitant smile. “Tough night, huh?”
Finally, the weight of it all came crashing down. I couldn’t stop tears from falling from my eyes.
“Why did you do that?” Piper hissed, shoving her lightly. When the sob finally tore itself from my chest, they both rushed to my side, trying their best to console me while having their hands full.
I’m not alone.
Finally, I had two people by my side. Instead of racking my brain trying to fix everything, I could rest. With them. Lean on them.
Warren showed you you could lean on him too.
The thought alone had me crying even harder.
“I ruined everything,” I whispered, forcing out a pitiful laugh between my sobs.
Piper let out a hiss.
“You mean Warren did,” she corrected. “I knew the bastard would hurt you.”
Violet shot her a hesitant look before turning to me.
“How can we help?” Violet asked.
I wish they could. Wish they could help me turn back time. But I’d already fucked it all up.
“It was me,” I said, looking at them. “I lost the money. All two million of it.”
Piper’s face twisted, and Violet sucked in a quick breath.
“That much?” she whispered. “You don’t even get, like, I don’t know… a prorated version of it?”
I shrugged.
“I don’t remember reading it in the contract, and at this point, I doubt he’d give me anything.”
They gave me pitying looks.
“I think that calls for a The Notebook rewatch,” she said.
“Add The Time Traveler’s Wife, and we have ourselves a cry fest,” Violet added.
“That technically has a happy ending,” Piper noted.
“Don’t you bullshit me.”
This got a true laugh out of me. I let them lead me to the couch to drown my sorrows.
* * *
The girls fell asleep well before me, and I sat there watching the end of The Notebook all by myself.
I’d already been a crying mess, but the ending had it starting all over again.
I can’t believe I fucked up so bad.
I tried to remember the contract, but I hadn’t read it through. I was too blinded by revenge to even think of protecting myself.
That Addi didn’t care about herself, but if this experience taught me anything, it was that I needed to get my fucking shit together.
But first, I’d allow myself to wallow.
Allow myself to cry. To throw a fit. To mourn what could have been.
Over the last eight years, I never allowed myself the time to do it. I’d been too busy working, trying to fix things.
All while my mom hid the money.
I told her I’d be back for her, but the more I thought of it, the harder it became to face her.
That money could have solved all our problems before they even started.
I wouldn’t have had to work so hard. Wouldn’t have a lien on the house.
Wouldn’t have had to sell my body at that goddamn auction.
I had willingly opened my legs for him. Begged for him. And somehow… I didn’t regret it.
Tears welled up in my eyes again.
And you and I both know there’s more here than the contract.
He tried to say it at the end. To tell me that this thing that was happening between us was more, but I wouldn’t hear any of it. In fact, I threw it all in his face because I was hurt.
It wasn’t just sex between us. It wasn’t just a fucking contract.
He meant something to me. So much more than he should.
I am in love with Warren King.
Maybe from the very first moment I saw him at my father’s company. Maybe I forgot about it in my quest for revenge.
But there was no denying it. Not anymore.
When my phone buzzed, I picked it up, thinking it could be the hospital, but when I saw the notification, my heart dropped.
Bank transfer notice: $2,000,000.00 to account ending in…
My mind couldn't compute the number on my screen. And then, all at once, more sobs broke from my chest, jolting both Piper and Violet awake.
They scrambled to see what had happened, but when I showed them my phone, they went silent.
“Did your pussy brainwash him or something?” Piper asked.
“Nah, he’s in love,” Violet replied. “The look he gave you makes perfect sense to me now.”
“Warren King doesn’t know how to love ,” Piper shot back, but she was wrong.
I knew she was wrong. And I wish I had listened to what he tried to tell me back at his house instead of fucking all this up so badly.
And even though I hurt him, he was still trying to take care of me. Even now. Even back then when I hadn’t known…
Fuck.
“Addi…”
Piper’s hand was warm on my back as she rubbed slow circles over it.
My resolve hardened.
“I need your help,” I said, looking up at her. “I don’t have the connections I used to, but I need information.”
“Tell me what you want to know,” she said.
I swallowed thickly.
There is no going back after this, but I don’t care.
“There was something Warren left out of his reports about my father, and I need to know more about it.”
And in the meantime, I would click those fucking links. And I would find out just what my father had done.