Total pages in book: 25
Estimated words: 23425 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 94(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 23425 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 117(@200wpm)___ 94(@250wpm)___ 78(@300wpm)
I glance down at the address, then grin up at Eric and return him a hearty slap on the shoulder, similar to the one he gave me earlier. “Don’t worry, buddy. Your secret’s safe with me.”
* * *
I can actually say I’m nervous as I pull up to the address Eric gave me to Alyssa’s apartment, but I waste no time getting out of my car. There are two units, but it’s pretty clear which one is Alyssa’s – unless Unit 1 with the large framed Rambo picture on the door and the large set of steel balls on the knocker is somehow hers.
So, I go ahead and knock on the door to Unit 2, and after a few seconds, it opens to reveal Alyssa standing there, arms crossed, looking seriously angry.
“So, a fiancée, huh?”
My heart sinks. I brace myself against the wall and look down at my feet. “Oh my fucking God,” I mutter. “So that’s what she told her...”
“You know, I actually blame myself for this,” Alyssa says. “If I hadn’t gone to the bar that night and talked you into getting together with Nikki–”
“I’m not engaged, Alyssa,” I say firmly, raising my eyes and looking at her with every ounce of persuasion in me.
“Oh, bullshit!”
“It’s not,” I reply. “That was my ex-girlfriend. She came over to see me. I couldn’t tell you why, but I was at work, and she ran into Nikki and clearly made up some sort of bullshit about us.”
“Why would she do that?” Alyssa asks.
“To fuck with me?” I shrug. “I don’t know, but I need to talk to Nikki. I don’t want her hurting over this, Alyssa. Please.”
Alyssa chews her lip for a moment. I can see her contemplating. I just want to rush past her into the apartment, but I feel like that would only make things worse right now.
“Come on, Alyssa. You seriously think that’s the kind of man I am?”
“How the hell did you even get here?” she asks, but before I get a chance to respond, a look comes over her face. “Ah…Eric.”
“Five minutes, Alyssa,” I persist. “If she doesn’t like what I have to say, I’ll leave, okay?”
Alyssa thinks again for a moment, then shrugs with a sigh and moves aside. “Okay, but I don’t think…well, I don’t think this is going to go like you think it’s going to.”
I smile and step past her. “Thank you!”
As I enter the living room, I notice a man, middle-aged, completely passed out on the couch. His greasy hair is matted across his face, and he has a beer bottle clutched to his chest and is gently snoring.
I move quickly past him to the bedroom, where I find Nikki standing with her back to me. My chest swells, and my heart fills with happiness – that is until I see what’s happening.
Nikki is wearing gorgeous, clearly expensive lingerie, and is facing a large mirror where she’s doing her makeup. Her hair is already done, and there is a selection of heels on the floor beside her.
There’s only one reason she would be getting all dressed up like this, and that’s to be going out for the one job she told me she would never be doing again: working at the mansion.
“What – what are you doing, Nikki?” I ask, my voice low.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” she replies, not even turning to look at me. “I’m getting ready for work.”
I don’t even know what to do. The reactions that come over me are almost impossible to process at once.
My heart sinks yet fills with anger and jealousy at the same time. My stomach twists and fills with knots. I experience a massive adrenaline dump and am overcome with such confusion, but at the same time, I feel as though I’ve just been stabbed in the heart with a serrated dagger.
“Work?” I somehow manage to say, forcing the word from my lips. “But I thought…I thought you were all done with that?”
“Yeah, well, my dad”—she points over her shoulder into the living room, and I immediately put two and two together. The man on the couch is her father—“put himself into debt again and needs more money, so…”
“Nikki, that’s not your responsibility–”
“And I thought you were single.”
“I am single!” I blurt out, the words spilling from my lips accompanied by an ocean of pain and rage. “Cheryl is my ex-girlfriend!”
“Uh huh.”
“She ran off on me with my lawyer,” I exclaim, doing my best not to shout the words as the emotion builds and builds within me. “I haven’t even been with a woman since her.”
I don’t have a clue what girls do to do their makeup, but I do see her hand briefly pause before she goes back to whatever it is she was doing.
“Why would she lie to me, Russell?” she asks. “She doesn’t even know me.”