Ashley's Bend (24 page)

“It’s you!” I barked. She startled back from me, gripping her shirt tighter around her body in protection. I laughed internally. She needed protection...from me.

“I don’t understand,” she said sounding defeated.

“I don’t want love, I don’t want a relationship. I fuck and fuck hard, Ashley. You just witnessed evidence of that. I don’t have time for or want any feelings or emotions, but every time I am with you they seep in. Hell, when I’m not with you, you invade me! It’s like you are a fucking virus that has made its way into my system and I cannot make myself clean of you!”

She said nothing. Just stood there as I attempted to make her understand what I was going through. Her eyes darted from side to side looking everywhere in the room but at me, so I continued.

“I don’t fucking think straight when you are around. I didn’t use a condom, Ashley. Fuck! We didn’t use protection! I have never had sex without a condom, ever. I don’t do shit like that. You are fucking me up and I don’t know how to handle that!”

I was unleashing my frustrations and fears on her all at once and all she did was stand there.
Did she not understand the consequences of the mistake that we just made
? I had no doubt in my mind that she was clean, but what happened if she got pregnant? The last thing I wanted to do was bring a child into this fucked up world so that the child could be fucked up just like I was.

“I...I’m on the pill, Dominic. Jared didn’t want kids and...I have just continued to take them even after the divorce. You don’t have to worry about me getting pregnant. And I am clean. I went and got tested after I found Jared fucking his secretary,” she explained.

“I’m glad to hear that, but it still doesn’t excuse what happened. When you’re around, all my control, all my inhibitions go out the fucking window. This is not me, it’s not who I am.” I walked over to the couch in my office and slumped down onto it allowing it to absorb my body. I was out of control. I was losing it! Ashley and her fucking sorceress pussy had me not thinking and acting clearly. I needed to cut that shit off.

“Look, Ashley, I’m sorry. I’m just...hell, I don’t know what I’m thinking. You have a job here if you want it. But right now, I think it’s best if you leave.”

She nodded, but hesitated just before she left to walk out of my office. The sight of the tears streaming down her face as she walked out fucking wrecked me to my core.

Having Dominic fuck me on his desk was probably the best sex of my life. It was carnal, raw, and just the memory alone had the wetness between my legs building. The connection between us couldn’t be denied and I knew Dominic felt it too; otherwise he wouldn’t have gone off on me like he did.

I walked with my arms wrapped around my waist to keep my shirt closed as I made my way out of Dominic’s office. I turned the corner to head downstairs and was taken by surprise when I collided with a solid mass of muscles.

“Whoa, there, sweetheart. Where are you going in such a hurry?” The familiar sound of Knox’s voice said as he grabbed ahold of me to keep me from catapulting down onto the floor. When I looked up and met his eyes, he sighed deeply. His eyes drifted behind me to Dominic’s office door before looking at me again and taking in my torn shirt and disheveled appearance.

“That fucker did it again, didn’t he? He pushed you away again.”

I tucked my chin into my chest. I didn’t need to answer. It was a rhetorical question anyway.

“Of course he pushed you away. That’s what he does. That is what he is good at.” A small sob broke from my lips and Knox pulled me into his embrace giving me a hug. There really was a sweet, caring guy underneath the Goliath of a man and his dominating attitude. If I had a brother, Knox was what I imagine he would be like. Rough, tough exterior, with a caring, devoted interior.

“Listen, Ashley. Don’t let him push you away,” he said unabashedly. “Toughen up. Fight back. When he pushes you, you push back. You are good for him. Dominic has found something in you that he never has with any other girl and it is scaring the shit out of him. Just don’t give up on him, ok?”

“I−I’ll try,” I replied with a muffled voice into his shirt. Pulling back from his embrace, I wiped at the wet spot I left on his shirt before wiping my own nose in an unladylike fashion.

“I lost my job−jobs today. Someone told them that I was connected to the club and they fired me,” I sniffed. Knox’s eyebrows rose in disbelief as he took in my words. A look of slight anger and confusion marred his face as he furrowed his brows.

“How the hell could that even happen? All members sign NDA’s and the files are only accessible to Nic and me.”

“That is why I came here to talk to Dominic. I was mad at the fact that the information could be leaked and I wanted to know if he knew who could have done it.” Knox nodded before placing his hands on top of my shoulder to look at me. His expression was serious.

“I promise you that neither Nic nor I released that information, Ashley. We keep matters at this club
private
for a reason.”

“Who could have told them then?” I asked him with even more question.

“Could have easily been that asshole Asher or your ex,” he shrugged. I was stunned by his insinuation briefly until my thoughts drifted back to yesterday when Jared visited me at the diner.

How would your bosses like it if they knew their sweet, innocent Ashley was actually a fucking whore with a sex club boyfriend?
You deserve to know what it feels like to lose everything just like I have
.

“Oh my God!” I gasped when the realization hit me. “It was Jared! He made a threat to me at the diner last night, but I just brushed it off as him being pissed off at me for not taking him back.”

I watched as anger grew in Knox’s face as I told him about my conversation with Jared the day before. I was startled when the door to Dominic’s office opened and he paused as he took in the sight of Knox and me standing in the hallway. He approached us with caution before he looked at his friend. I noticed that he avoided my gaze, and I knew he must still be feeling the effects of his outburst from only moments earlier.

“What’s going on?” he asked as his eyes stayed intently focused on Knox.

“Ashley was telling me about losing her jobs today,” Knox replied before I could. Dominic seemed to relax and his posture slumped slightly after Knox told him we were discussing my firing. He was probably worried that Knox and I were talking about what happened between me and him in his office moments before.

“She also thinks she knows who ratted her out to her employers as well,” he added. I lifted my gaze to look at Knox and I silently begged him with my eyes not to tell Dominic. I knew he would go ballistic if he found out that Jared came to work harassing me again. Especially since I hadn’t gotten a restraining order on him like Dominic all but demanded that I did. He was already riled up from his outburst toward me, I didn’t need him to get even more upset.

“Really? Who?” he asked as he finally met my eyes waiting for me to answer.

“No, Knox,” I stated firmly only my sternness was brushed off by Knox who chose to ignore my request. My heart rate accelerated and my fingers dug into my shirt as I fisted the material in my hands pulling it tighter around my body like it would protect me. Knox looked down at me with a look of apology before returning his attention back to Dominic.

“It was her ex.”

I squeezed my eyes shut waiting for Dominic’s reaction, when I all I heard was silence, I risked opening my eyes to brave the sight. Dominic’s jaw was clenched and his hands were balled into fists at his sides. He said nothing as I watched about four different features cross his beautiful face, most of them were looks of anger. Time passed by while I stood between those two men who seemed to be silently communicating something between them.

“I’ll take care of it,” Dominic said before he looked at me one more time and took off down the stairs leaving me standing with my mouth open next to Knox.

“Dominic, wait!” I shouted as I broke away from Knox to go after him. Knox grabbed my hand before I even made it two steps away, stopping me in my tracks.

“Let him go, Ashley. You don’t want to be around him when he is like this, trust me.”

I glared down the stairs at Dominic’s retreating form. What the hell did he mean by
I’ll take care of
it? Turning back around to face Knox, I sighed.

“I’m going to take the job Dominic offered to me.”

Knox’s mouth split into a wide, satisfied grin. His eyes followed the same as mine did moments ago to look down the stairs toward the path that Dominic stormed off in before looking back at me, his grin growing even wider.

“Good.”

If I said I didn’t enjoy working at the club, I would have been lying. I performed many of the jobs at the club, but mainly I bartended and worked the floor as a server since that is what I was most experienced at doing. I had made more money working at the club in the past two weeks than I did working at both of my other jobs in an entire month. The staff were all friendly and welcoming to me and everyone seemed to get along well, no doubt that everyone knew I was on friendly terms with Knox and Dominic. We stayed pretty busy since the club was so popular and membership was at its maximum, which didn’t leave a lot of social time, but I was ok with that.

When I became an employee, Dominic withdrew me from the sub training program and forbade me to take part in any of the activities unless it was during the nightly lesson in which he used me to demonstrate to the audience should it require one. Those were my favorite times of the night, because ever since that day in his office, Dominic had not touched me unless it was during a demonstration. He didn’t use me every time, and it was the times that he didn’t that I was insanely jealous when he used one of the house subs. My body missed him with a fevered yearning. I missed the way I tingled all over from his touch, but most of all I missed the connection I felt with him. It wasn’t that he ignored me completely, it was just more of a professional relationship as opposed to—well whatever the hell we were.

Having to watch his hands on another woman sent fiery rage drumming through my body. The green-eyed monster would rear her ugly head every time I had to witness another woman having the pleasure to have Dominic’s hands on her. I knew what those hands felt like when he touched and teased me. It was those same skillful hands that had my body thirsting for more, a craving that never seemed to be satisfied.