Filthy Rich, Wild with Lust

Chapter 44

“Nope, he’s f*****g them both for certain.” I puff air into my cheeks. “And they are so hot. What are they thinking? Un-f*****g-believable.”

“Ugh... damn it,” Chloe snaps. “I hate that he has enough c**k for two women.”

I roll my eyes.

“Call me back. I need updates.”

“Okay.” I hang up and go to the bathroom and try to calm myself down, and then I make my way back over to the group. Without making eye contact, Henley passes me a drink and goes back straight to talking to Antony. “Thanks.” I fake a smile to the back of his head.

Dickhead.

Damn it, Blake Grayson and his bimbo harem have rattled me. I’m suddenly feeling very naive and inexperienced. I thought he was a nice, respectable, kind doctor. Apparently not.

He’s a porn star with a double-shot c**k.

Stop it.

Just because this night is different does not mean there are problems with Henley and me.

We are fine.

He’s different, an annoying little voice from my unconscious whispers.

He is different today. I can’t deny it, but... ugh, perhaps it’s just because things are going so great between us. Try not to overthink this.

His words from earlier come back to haunt me. Am I acting weird, or are you acting clingy?

Maybe I am being super clingy. I do feel very unhinged today, and I am hormonal.

It’s fine. Everything is fine.

Blake can f**k whoever he wants, and if they want to share his dirty d**k, more fool them.

I can’t let it get to me.

Over the next hour I stand back as a spectator and let the night run its course.

Henley is being his swoony playful self to everyone but me. In fact, he hasn’t even looked my way.

I’m not imagining it. Something is going on.

The music is pumping loud now. You can hardly hear over it. “Dance with me,” Mason says as he puts his arm around me. I edge out of his grip.

“I’m not in the mood tonight,” I call. I’m not even lying. I am so not in the mood to dance. In fact, I think I’m going to go home. Being alone in my bed is much better than being alone here.

Mason looks over to Henley. “She won’t dance with me.”

“Dance with him, Taryn,” Henley calls over the loud music.

Taryn, who is well on her way to Drunkville, holds her hands up in the air and sashays. “Let’s go, baby.”

I sip my drink and look out over the dance floor.

“You should go and dance with him,” Henley says as he comes to stand beside me.

“I don’t want to dance with him, Henley,” I mutter into my drink. “You know this.”

“Why not?”

I frown over at him. “I think you know why.”

“Because of our arrangement?”

I sip my drink.

“I’ve been thinking about that.”

My skin bristles.

“And?”

“I want to explore this thing with Taryn.”

“What?”

Did I hear that right?

“I’m into Taryn,” he calls over the music. “I want to take her home tonight.”

I step back from him, shocked.

I couldn’t have heard that right.

“You want to take Taryn home tonight?” I ask to make sure I heard him right.

“You should take Mason home.” He shrugs casually, as if we are talking about a drink from the bar. “He’d be a good f**k, I imagine.”

Boom, boom, boom sounds my heartbeat in my ears. My stupid eyes well with tears, and unable to even form a sentence, I turn and march toward the doors.

He wants her.

I barge through the crowd, hurt like never before. What the f**k is he saying?

I thought we had something.

I angrily swipe my stupid tears away. “Excuse me,” I yell. “Excuse me.”

I burst out the front doors and onto the street. I look up and down the footpath. It’s sprinkling with rain, and I begin to walk up the road.

I’ve never been so shocked by someone in my life. I’ve got to get the f**k out of here.

“Juliet,” Henley’s voice calls out from behind me.

I keep walking.

“Will you stop?”

I keep marching. Hot salty tears are running down my face.

Stop crying.

“Juliet,” he yells. “Stop.”

I stop on the spot, my face screwed up in tears.

I hate that I’m crying.

“Turn around,” he demands.

I turn, and his face falls when he sees my tears. “I’m sorry.”

My haunted eyes hold his.

“It’s for the best.”

“Why?” I whisper, my heart melting into a puddle out of the bottom of my dress.

How could he be so cold?

“I don’t want this,” he snaps. “This fantasy that you’ve built up in your head is not...” His voice trails off.

“I don’t understand.”

He throws his hands out wide. “I don’t f*****g love you, okay?”

The earth moves beneath me.

“I’m never going to love you.”

Pain lances through my heart.

“We were just fucking.”

“You don’t love me?” I whisper.

He shakes his head.

Adrenaline surges through me. “If you don’t love me... then that’s just sad.” I screw up my face in tears. And I wish I could articulate better words, something to make him understand what he’s doing.

This is a tragedy. We are already in love.

“It’s not sad, Juliet, it’s life,” he spits. “We were f*****g. Just like we talked about, nothing more, nothing less.”

“It was the everything in between,” I sob as my heart breaks.

“I’m sorry. I wish I could say something more profound, but”—he steps back—“it meant nothing to me.”

My eyes search his.

“Go inside and f**k Mason. It will make you feel better.”

Oh...

I sob out loud and drop my head. How could he be so cold?

When I finally glance back up, I see him walking back into the club without a care in the world.

He’s gone.

I stand under the hot water with my head in my hands. I’m crying hard, my heart beating fast in my chest.

Did that really just happen?

I can’t even bring myself to call Chloe and talk about it because if I say it out loud, then it has to be true.

His words come back to me. Go inside and f**k Mason. It will make you feel better.

I put my hands over my mouth, sickened.

Is that what he thinks of me? Is that how he saw us? I sob out loud, the pain in my chest hurting hard.

All this time I thought we were falling in love, he was just having s*x with my body.

Using me to get himself off.

I thought he loved me.

He doesn’t.

I set up this little fantasy in my head where he and I fell madly in love, we fixed up my house, and we lived happily ever after in our perfect little street.

It was all in my head.

Go inside and f**k Mason. It will make you feel better.

I screw up my face in tears and slide down the tiles and sit in the bottom of my shower, under the hot water, alone and heartbroken.

I let myself cry.

Henley

Sunday afternoon

I sit on my back porch and watch the rain come down. Thunder is rolling in the distance, and a storm is brewing.

The day is dreary and dark, like my mood.

I keep going over last night and its events.

Her tears... the way they made me feel.

I can’t even comprehend what normal is anymore.

For a few weeks there, I was kidding myself that things were on the upswing, that everything had finally clicked and the darkness was over.

But reality has set in; it will never be over.

This is it for me.

I am the final product—there is no remodeling from here. Things are set in stone.

Today that’s magnified, and I feel especially unhinged. I haven’t slept. How could I?

The rain comes down hard, bringing me back to the moment. It’s loud and angry. It begins to splash up and get my legs wet.

I see her tears again, and I close my eyes in regret. This is for the best anyway. She’s better off with someone else. Someone who can love her properly.

I hear Juliet’s car start, and I glance up at the fence and then at my watch. She’s leaving for work, doing the afternoon shift.

And if I were a better person, I would go over and apologize, ask her to come back to me and make this right between us.

Beg for a second—no, third—chance.

But what’s the point? I’ll only ruin it later on down the road anyway...

I did do one thing, though; I proved a point to myself.

Now I know.

If the perfect woman can’t save me, nobody can.

Thursday, 4:00 p.m.

I glance at the sign over the door.

A A R O N S T E V E N S

P S Y C H O L O G I S T

With a deep exhalation, I roll my eyes. “Here we f*****g go.” I push the heavy door open and arrive in the foyer.

“Hello,” I say to the receptionist. “I have an appointment at four.”

She fakes a smile. “Take a seat, Mr. James.”

I glance over at the waiting couch. “Actually... I changed my mind. I won’t be needing an appointment today.”

The office door opens in a rush. “Henley,” a blond man says in an English accent. “This way.”