AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Ever?”
I shrug. “I’ll die alone if I have to.”
Eli rolls his eyes as if he thinks I’m being overly dramatic. He doesn’t know what it’s like to love someone and give them up. To walk away and have this constant gnawing, empty ache within his soul.
“Maddie, let him go. It’s over and done. Jordan would want you to move on.”
I snort at his stupid ass assessment. “No, he wouldn’t. Don’t even try to act like you know anything about Jordan when you forced him to spend a few days with you as a captive.”
“A few veryintimatedays,” Eli replies, making me grind my teeth together. “Would you like more details of the things I did to him that you didn’t get to see?”
I hate that I consider his question for so long before telling him, “Maybe later.”
“Ah! I knew you were into man on man,” he says too loudly in front of the guards. “You should’ve been there with us, Maddie. It was so fucking hot the desperate way Jordan craved more, begged for it when he finally got what he had wanted for years.”
“Shut up and leave,” I tell him, hating the reminder that Eli could offer the man I love something I never could. “I have to get back to work before I get fired and Daddy finds me an even shittier job to make amends.”
“Fine. But try and cheer up. Yes, you miss Jordan. Hell, I do too, especially him warming my cock in his mouth for hours. But at least he’s not dead or hanging down in the basement. He’s safe and unharmed in Rockland with his mom and biker friends. Missing him is better than actually grieving for him, right?”
Turning away from him, I ignore Eli, sorting through the outfits hanging on the rolling garment racks as if I’m searching for something until he leaves.
He eventually takes the hint. On the way out, he says, “I asked your father to let you get your driver’s license and had him order your baking supplies, you know, in case you wanted to do the cupcake thing here.”
The cupcake thing? I shake my head but don’t respond, surprised he actually cared enough to convince my father to let me get my license and to keep my business going while I’m here.
But once he’s gone, I don’t actually get back to work.
Unable to stop thinking about Jordan, I pull out my new cell phone from my pocket, one that I’m certain Daddy is monitoring. Then, I download a phone app to register for a free phone number to use to call Jordan. That way the call won’t show up under my phone’s outgoing log.
It takes a few minutes more than I have to set it all up, but I need to do this before it gets any later. Virginia is three hours behind Vegas, so it’s already after midnight there.
I’m disappointed when he doesn’t answer.
I guess I wasn’t really expecting him to. I try not to think about him being out with some other woman. Or man.
When his voicemail comes on, I decide to leave one. “Hey, Jordan. It’s me, Maddie. How are you?” I ask before blurting out, “I miss you, and I just wanted to hear your voice. Anyway, I hope…I hope you’re doing okay. You can call me back on this number and my father probably won’t see it. There are no guarantees though so...” Knowing better than to underestimate my father’s surveillance on me, I add, “You know what? Never mind. Don’t risk calling me back. In fact, I’m so sorry I bothered you. I-I promise I won’t contact you again. But…just because you don’t hear from me again doesn’t mean I’m not thinking about you or that I don’t still love you. Because I do, and I think I always will. Bye.”
Once I end the call, I immediately wish there was a way to go back and erase it. I know I just sent Jordan so many mixed signals he’ll probably drive himself crazy trying to interpret my prattling message.
Since there’s no way to take back the call, I slip my phone back into my jeans and find Trisha’s next outfit so I can go help her get changed.
Jordan
“What the actual fuck was that?” I mutter to myself, replaying the voicemail from a Las Vegas phone number for the fourth time. The one from Maddie. Madison, as she signed on her goodbye note to me.
She’s been gone for almost a week andnowshe finally decides to call me?
And her message is so damn confusing.
She reached out and says she doesn’t want me to call her back. Then, she ends the call by promising she won’t contact me again but tells me that she loves me and probably always will.
It’s such a mind fuck that I sit in my empty bed that still smells like her vanilla shampoo for hours listening to her words over and over again, trying to make sense of them.
By the time the sun comes up, I’ve reached the conclusion that despite how stupid and dangerous it may be, Ineedto fly out to Vegas to see her. Just once to make sure she hasn’t been expecting me to show up and beg for her to come back with me.
Or if she wanted to ask me to stay in Vegas with her.
Screw her mob boss father. I can handle him. I can handle anything when it comes to being with Maddie.
