One Night Stand With My Daddy's Best Friend

1 PROLOGUE ELLA Paul sat on the couch, flipping through the channels as I slipped into something a lot sexier than jeans and a t-shirt. His roommate had left for the evening, and Paul had hung the obligatory sock from the doorknob to indicate we wanted privacy. It had been six months that we’d been seeing each other. Things really heated up over summer quarter when the majority of the student body went home for summer break. Paul and I stayed behind to f**k like horny teenagers while taking skeleton classes to give a credible reason for being there. The emerald-colored satin contrasted with my ginger hair and the touch of ruby lipstick I put on—which would soon stain his d**k—only made the ensemble hotter. The slinky negligée hugged my curves like a glove, boosting my self-confidence. I adjusted my breasts, making sure the cleavage revealed was just enough to tease him, without being so much that I revealed my world to him all at once. I brushed my thumbs across my n*****s until they hardened, showing through the fabric. After fluffing my hair for added volume, I pinched my n*****s one last time—for good measure—and opened the door of the bathroom. Paul sat with a video game controller in his hands staring at the TV. He seemed pretty invested in the game, so my sexy pose against the door jamb was wasted. I scowled, remembering that 20-year-old men were really just boys in larger bodies. They hadn’t even grown into their full potential. And Paul, despite being on the football team, heavy weightlifting and fit, was no more grown up than my brother Alex—who also sat playing video games 5 hours a day, ignoring his studies. The floor creaked as I walked closer to him, the squeaky floorboard always an indicator that someone was using the toilet in the middle of the night. I’d spent enough half-drunken nights at his place to know exactly where the loose board was, but I stepped on it on purpose. Still, he did not look up at me. My n*****s were starting to go soft again, but I didn’t want to stir them up in front of him, so I ditched the idea that he’d see their outline and get turned on. Instead, I stood next to him, striking my sexiest pose. With a hand on my hip, lips pouted out perfectly, I cleared my throat. He shouted some obscenity at the TV and punched the buttons on his controller harder. His face deepened into a scowl, and he leaned around as if he were avoiding the monster—whatever the f**k it was—that he was fighting in the game. Frustrated, I decided to take things into my own hands. He wasn’t paying attention to me, but I had things I wanted to talk to him about. And after that, I planned to f**k his brains out better than I ever had. He was so distracted by the game; it was like he had forgotten the reason I came by. So, I reminded him, forcing his controller out of the way as I slid onto his lap, straddling him. He leaned to the side, punching away at the buttons. I’d never had to beg for his attention before, and I shouldn’t have been begging now, but this was important to me. I pushed my hand down the front of his pajama pants and took hold of his flaccid d**k, gently massaging and stroking him. After shouting out a few more obscenities, he tossed the remote onto the couch cushion beside him and grabbed my hips. “f**k, you made me lose.” Paul’s hands slid up my sides to my breasts, and he gave them a squeeze. “You gana f**k me good, huh?” He started to get hard in my grip, and it brought a smile to my face. “Yeah, but can we talk first?” I tucked him back into his pants and watched the desire in his eyes flash to annoyance. “You got all sexy like this, interrupted my game, and now you want to talk?” His head flopped back like a ragdoll, his eyes rolling. “Yeah, well after we talk, we fuck.” I shrugged and watched him shake his head. “Get it over with. You got me worked up now.” Paul rested his hands on my thighs, sliding one up my nightgown until his thumb pressed between my legs. “So, we’ve been together for six months. Yesterday was the six-month anniversary of the day we hooked up the first time.” I drew a line down the center of his chest with my finger as I talked. “And well, I’m ready for the next steps. You know?” “Next steps?” He looked confused, his hand slid away from my groin, resting on my knee. “Yeah, like making this official. We f**k a lot; I help you with your studies. But I want to tell people we’re seeing each other now. You know?” I held my breath, hoping he was as happy about the move as I was, but he scoffed, laughing at me. It took me by surprise. “Why are you laughing?” “Ella, is that what you think this is?” He laughed harder. “You think we’re in a relationship?” I swallowed, my confidence deflating like a cold balloon. My heart hovered somewhere between helplessly in love with him, and terrified he’d smash it with a hammer. I felt the emotions stirring, and it wasn’t a good feeling. “This is literally just f*****g. You wanted to help with my English, so I let you. You wanted to tutor me in math, so I let you. You wanted to sleep over and get all snuggly in that tiny-ass bed, so I f*****g let you. But that does not mean we’re dating.” I felt like I’d be slapped. I scrambled off his lap, running to the bathroom to hide the tears I knew were coming. I had never been more humiliated in my life, not even the time when I was 12 and I started my period on a day I wore white pants. Paul had never been so callous to me, and he had never let on that this was just s*x. I dressed in record time, calling an Uber as I did so. I was hurt. I didn’t know what I had expected him to say, or how I thought he’d react, but that certainly wasn’t it. I only wished I’d have been dressed when I started that discussion, because now I had to walk out the door of the bathroom and past him before I could leave the dorm. I braced myself and slipped out, hoping he was absorbed in his video game. He wasn’t. “Ella, we can still f**k. You don’t have to leave.” Paul gave me a genuine expression of shock and disbelief, and I could have slapped him. “I didn’t come here to f**k. I came here to talk to you.” “You don’t have to rush off. We can talk.” He grabbed my wrist and I jerked away from him. I didn’t want to talk anymore. “Paul, you don’t get it. I’m in love with you. I wanted to tell you that I want to make it official, and you laughed in my face. This isn’t a game to me.” Turning the deadbolts on the door, I let the tears fall. He didn’t deserve my explanations or my heart. “You’re the one that got all cuddly and f****d it up. We had a good thing. Now you want to get emotional? This was always just s*x and friendship. Always. I never led you on.” I whipped around and glared at him. “You’re right. You didn’t. But you never gave me any indication that we couldn’t be more either. Asshole.” I slammed the door behind me, hopefully to never see him again. The Uber driver was a typical, “turn your radio up and ignore the passenger” type, so the 45-minute drive home from UM to Weston wasn’t awful. Mom and Dad wouldn’t be expecting me, but I couldn’t go back to my dorm room. I shared it with Wendy Romer—daughter of billionaire David Romer, hedge fund manager. She was the most superficial person I’d ever met, and half the reason why I refused to continue living under my father’s shadow. I just wanted privacy tonight, not a lengthy lecture on how crying would make my face pucker when I was older. Wendy was good for that. “Here?” The Uber stopped in front of my father’s house; the gate locked. “Yeah, sorry. I have to type in the code. Thanks for the lift.” I was out of the car and sneaking in the back of the house before he was even at the end of the street driving away. I thought I could get to my room unnoticed, because Mom and Dad had given me the only bedroom on the ground floor of the fourteen-million-dollar home. But Mom and Dad sat snuggled up together on the sofa in the media room, eating popcorn and watching a movie. The minute the door slid open; Mom sat up. “What’s wrong, Ella? What are you doing here? Your face!” She left dad in a pile of popcorn and walked over to me with arms outstretched. “Did something happen? Are you okay?” I pushed her away. “I don’t want to talk about it.” “Oh, dear. Did someone hurt you?” She hugged me and pushed a few strands of hair behind my ear. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed they had mascara streaking them. “No, Mom. I just tried to tell Paul I loved him, and he didn’t feel the same way.” She hooked her arm around me and refused to let me leave. Because April in Miami was already sweltering, the air-conditioned temperature of the room made me shiver. It was no wonder they were under a warm blanket. “Dear, you should just focus on your studies. You have too much going for you to let it get screwed up by puppy love.” Mom tried to guide me to the couch, but I planted my feet. “What you should really be doing is not wasting your time on boys. You should be working for me. The business is really doing well, and I could really use your skills in our accounting department.” Dad set the half-empty bowl of popcorn on the table and shook out the blanket after Mom’s spill. The housekeeper would be irritated she had to clean up after that mess, and he seemed not to care. “I don’t want to work for you, Dad. I want to make my own way.” It was the age-old argument. Every time I came home, he reminded me how bad I was screwing up and what I should be doing. Still easier than Wendy Romer. “The path you’re on right now is destructive, Ella. You are playing with fire. Your future is only a breath away and you’ll destroy it by the partying you’re doing. Mark my words.” He pointed his finger and shook it and I rolled my eyes. My bed, a bottle of gin, and a good night’s sleep were calling to me. As I slunk out of the room, I called, “Good night.” I just couldn’t win.