A Betty's Pledge: Volume One (20 page)

“I can grab something.”

“I got it,” he told me, turning his back on me and heading in the direction of the
others. He didn’t meet my gaze nor really acknowledge me standing there at all except
for his simple words of dismissal. Actually, he hadn’t even really looked at me at
all since I arrived. I stood there dumbfounded for a minute, watching him as he walked
away.

“Hey,” I said abruptly, my voice loud and echoing across the silent driveway. Isaac
stopped and turned toward me with an apathetic attitude. “What’s wrong with you?”

“What do you mean?”

I gestured at him as if it was obvious. “Well, I seem to remember the last time we
were alone together you had your fingers halfway up my cooch. What gives with the
attitude?”

He didn’t answer and I rolled my eyes and pushed past him toward the house. I found
Diane laughing with the girls. She took in my expression but didn’t comment on it,
which I was incredibly thankful for. My tactless best friend, however, was not that
kind.

“What’s wrong Mady?” Mina said from her lounge chair, pulling up her sunglasses to
get a better look at me. Some of the girls turned toward me at her words.

“Nothing.”

I didn’t want to get into Isaac’s cold shoulder and how it made me feel. Instead,
I popped a piece of food into my mouth from the table to cover my blatant lie, hoping
that no one would question me further about my apparent discomfort. I was glad when
Diane handed me a margarita.

I felt a heavy arm drape around my shoulder, and I turned to see Carson standing next
to me, a warm smile on his face. “She’s just glad to be here, right Mady?”

I smiled. “Sure am.”

He pulled away from me and turned toward the table, taking an empty glass and pouring
himself a hefty drink. I took a moment to observe him from behind. I got to see a
peek of his sculpted form the night of the party due to the way his long trench coat
barely covered his bare chest. But now that he was fully nude from the waist up, I
couldn’t help but let out a little girlie sigh.

He turned and caught me staring at him, smiling and giving me a little wink of approval.
I blushed, turning away to see Nate heading in our direction.

“Move over, I’m hungry,” he ordered, shooing the girls away from the table. The other
guys were joining us near the food, each of them grabbing for plates and drinks for
their much-deserved lunch break. Except for Isaac—he was the only one missing. I thought
perhaps he was dropping off my bags by my room, and I growled internally at that thought.

Not because he wasn’t present, giving me a chance to get to the bottom of his sour
attitude, but because he was probably in my bedroom. Initially, that thought would
have made me smile, but now with him acting like a stuck-up asshole, I didn’t want
him near the place.

“Hey Mady,” Trent said as he joined the table, a black T-shirt draped across his shoulders.
His muscled chest was as nearly perfect as Carson’s was. A large tribal tattoo graced
his right shoulder and upper arm, and some lettering in a language I didn’t know trailed
down his side. “How was your drive in?”

“Good,” I replied warmly. “Not too long. The traffic wasn’t all that insane this morning.”

A couple of conversations sparked in the large group, some laughing and others obviously
flirtatious. I stayed quiet, just casually observing the relationships in the group,
old and new, and gaining a sense of familiarity with the people around me.

I felt someone watching me as time went on, and I turned to see Isaac, sitting alone
on the steps leading from the house and staring at me intently. Deciding not to give
his behavior any more of my attention, I turned away and enjoyed present company.
It was bad enough that I seemed to have developed an odd interest in him that differed
from the other men; I didn’t want to do anything to feed into it.

After lunch, the guys went back to unloading the trucks, leaving us women alone to
enjoy our great view of the copious eye candy. We laughed and talked about the party,
each sharing little stories about what had happened. It didn’t sound like any of the
other Betties had broken the rules like I had with Isaac. Either that or they weren’t
revealing their actions, keeping it to themselves for the time being, just as I’d
done.

Eventually the trucks were unloaded, and our picnic outside complete. We all headed
inside and adjourned to our own rooms in order to prepare for the formal dinner the
owner was hosting. I took a long shower, thinking over my mixed emotions of the day.

I couldn’t help but feel disappointed by Isaac’s behavior. After that night, I wanted
so much to delve deeper into that part of him, hoping that his sensuality I’d discovered
in that bathroom only held a glimpse of what he could offer me. Part of me started
to believe that maybe he could be that one I craved—the man who’d bring me pleasure.
But I guess after a week to think it over, I just didn’t measure up in Isaac’s opinion.
Perhaps his attitude today had been his way of closing himself off to me. Or maybe
it was something more. Either way, I was done worrying about it. Tonight, I officially
would become a Betty, and it was with an anxious heart that I donned my black cocktail
dress and headed downstairs for dinner.

The Meltdown

~ Isaac Wilson ~

“Why the hell are you sitting over here, fucker?” Carson said, sitting his large ass
down next to me on the porch steps.

“Fuck off,” I told him, picking at a chip of paint on the side railing. I didn’t meet
his questioning stare, not wanting to begin to justify my chosen solitude.

“Shit, brother. I was only asking.” He held up his hands in surrender, and I realized
that my behavior needed to be checked before I made a bigger cluster-fuck of the situation
than it already was.

“I’m just thinking.” I still didn’t feel like being friendly, by any means, but a
flat response was all he was getting from me.

“Dude, the program hasn’t even started. What in the fuck do you have to think about
now, you spazz? Are you still acting all emo from this morning?”

“Fuck you,” I replied with a little chuckle, realizing that I had carried over my
attitude from this morning. I didn’t give a fuck, but Carson’s comment made me think
about how he’d tried to make me laugh by putting pancakes on his chest and then walked
around the kitchen singing like Katy Perry. He’d always had a way of making me laugh,
and when he and Nate ganged up on me, I couldn’t stay in a bad mood for long.

I’d been a moody bitch, I knew it. I didn’t need Carson to point it out for me to
realize it. Despite his efforts to cheer me up, I’d remained resolutely pissed and
I didn’t see that changing in the near future.

I could say that it was just a bad day or perhaps that I was PMSing, as Carson had
joked, but I knew the source deep down.

It was her.

Nate had let slip last night that Diane said Mady had received two motherfucking invites
for a scene play next weekend. I knew that one of them was mine, but I didn’t know
who would’ve sent the other one. Technically, we weren’t supposed to send them until
after today: Moving Day. But after that time at the party when I’d had my fingers
deep inside her, I knew I had to have her.

So now that my douchebag brother had told me someone else in the house seemed just
as eager as I’d been, it made me think that perhaps Miss Mady was putting her cookies
in a lot of other baskets. Maybe she’d made the same impression with the other Consorts
as she had with me, and I didn’t like that theory one damn bit.

Thinking about it made me incredibly angry, and I wasn’t sure why. I’d like to say
it was because I felt I’d been lied to in some way. I’d seen the way she looked at
me after I’d made her come on my hand. It was like she was witnessing the second coming,
and I was her freakin’ prophet and guide. She looked innocently amazed that her body
could have that type of response courtesy of someone else, and if I was honest with
myself, that fact made her even more desirable. Like a flower that hadn’t been picked.
Perfect. But to think that it was all staged just to get a reaction out of me, that
she might have had that look of rapture for someone else that night . . . I was a
fucking bona fide mess.

I glanced up toward the group. There she stood, among her avid admirers as they enjoyed
a lunch break, eating up their affections like it was candy. Better yet, like it was
some sort of powerful aphrodisiac, making her turn from a curious observer into a
viperous sex goddess. And why did I care so much that she seemed to be enjoying her
time, only sparing me one cursory glance as I sat sulking on the porch steps?

It was because Jackson’s words had set my curiosity aflame.

“I can see it,” he’d said to me with that all-knowing smirk he always wore when he’d
bestow me with his supreme knowledge. Like having gone through the same damn program
as me—fucking the same amount of pussy as I had—made him this wise and blessed elder.
In fact, since I’d actually been a Consort for a longer period of time than him, up
until his mating, I’d venture to say that I had more experience taming the Betties.
That should have made me more seasoned than him, right?

But no, he’d gone and made some off-handed comment that had my mind pondering its
implication ever since.

There had been a jumbled mess inside my head, constantly reevaluating everything he’d
said to me in the past as I’d gone through the tedious rounds of pledges. Had he ever
said anything like that to me before? Had he made any kind of implication that he
saw something more between a Pledge and I at any point during this whole damn time
that made me think he felt I shared some cosmic connection with someone? I would be
lying if I said I’d hoped he had. But the fact was . . . he hadn’t. So what did that
mean?

Did he see something happening between Mady and me other than lust? Could he tell
that she had this pull about her that sparked my curiosity? And if he did, how was
his presumption any more than a simple guess? He hadn’t even seen the two of us interact.

These were the questions nagging my brain, keeping me in a constant pissy mood because
I didn’t know what it all meant. So, taking that into account, why did I offer to
go with Mady to get her things? Because I was a fool, that’s why. Because there was
something about Mady that I seemed to desire.

Because deep down inside me, I wanted Jackson’s suspicions to be correct.

But as I went with her to grab her things, I caught the covert glance she’d shared
with Diane. Immediately my mind flashed to the Observation Deck last week, where I’d
witnessed Mady being intimate with Diane and my brother. She was so sensuous that
day, assertive, taking her pleasure into her own control. Those memories immediately
brought a cacophony of combating thoughts to my mind, none of them good, leaving me
bitter and angry.

Why did I care? Wasn’t that what every man wanted: a woman who knew her body and acted
on her desires? And didn’t the fact that she was willing to play with another woman
in the bedroom add a sultry bonus?

Watching her interact with everyone by the lunch table, I realized that she’d ended
up being just like the other Betties after all, only here to sate her own lust and
desire and nothing more. She’d put up this innocent front, but it was all just an
act. She’d obviously made an impression on the Consorts at the party, evidenced by
the multiple invitations she’d received before the games were even meant to get started.
It was a harsh reality and I found it upsetting.

And there it was: the reason for my sour mood. I was disappointed.

Being so close to her now, it was hard for me to ignore the plain reality. Deep down
inside, two parts of myself were warring against each other: hope for something more
versus lust to slake my body’s selfish needs. One part wanted to keep the status quo
and have my time with each Betty. Another part of me wanted to explore the new feelings
I was having for Mady.

But seeing her standing there acting like what we shared in the bathroom meant nothing
more to her than just a casual thing was a harsh reality. Not because I was hurt or
upset, but because unbeknown to me, the hopeful side of me was more in control of
things than I’d realized. Maybe it was because I’d started to let my emotions get
involved, but I wanted to think it was because of Jackson’s claimed observation last
week that had my thoughts so skewed. It was his fault, his rationales that he’d implanted
in my mind, poisoning me.

Well, fuck that shit.

Fuck the mind games and the foreign feelings of jealousy.

I was over it.

From that moment forward, I was resolved to forget it all and enjoy my last round
with the program. It was poisoning my mind. Obviously, I needed distance from the
Grants.

So I was rude and short with her, and she called me out on it. Could I have been cordial
to her, have my time with her and move on? Sure. In fact, that probably would’ve been
the smart thing to do. But instead I was an ass, and in true Isaac Wilson fashion,
made a complete dick of myself, which led me to my current position—sulking on the
porch steps staring daggers at the object of my obsession.

Eventually Moving Day had ended. I thought it best to stay distant from everyone while
I was pissed off. The last thing I needed was to anger any more Betties inadvertently;
that would really sour up my stock of pussy. So I remained distant.