Christmas Pet by Jamie Knight
Chapter Four - Pearl
We were an hour into the drive. The wipers worked hard but were failing to keep the windshield clear of whipping snow.
Like a petulant child, I sat in the passenger seat with my arms crossed. This wasn’t how today should have ended. It should have ended with me at my mom’s getting drunk, eating my weight in sugar, and belting out karaoke songs.
I blew out an exasperated breath. I’d bitten my tongue for too long. “If you know where they’re going, I don’t see why we had to rush there tonight. We could have left in the morning, or on Sunday when the blizzard had passed.” James shot me a look, but when he didn’t say anything, I continued ranting, “I could’ve gotten Sophia’s phone number from her grandmother. I could’ve called her and made up some bullshit story like how I was worried when she left suddenly, and I wanted to make sure she was okay. But instead, here we are driving into a blizzard so you can serve divorce papers.”
“I’ll do what it takes to get this over with. The ass has been avoiding me for too long. It’s not like he’s madly in love with Erin. Playing games like this gives him a thrill.”
“Does anyone else on the team know the depth of your hate towards him? What about Mr. Taylor or the Davies brothers?”
“Grant and Jake know. I don’t give a fuck if anyone else does. I despise the cocksucker. I can’t understand why any woman would fall for a man-child like him. You would think by now, he’d have grown up. Not a chance. Ruining lives gives in a boner. Daniel’s a sham. Everything from his smile to his down-home-shucks-ma’am accent is a lie.”
“Bitter much?” Something about what James said didn’t sit right. Something deeper was at play. If he didn’t want to tell me, I wouldn’t pry. “If he’s as bad as you say, someone would’ve outed him by now.”
“Money talks. That’s why I want all of his.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Sophia seemed happy and glowing. Love does that to people.”
James snorted. “She might be. He isn’t. Believe me. Love is just a four-letter word to him.”
“Have you ever been in love?”
“No, and I don’t intend to be.”
“What? Really? I feel sorry for you if that’s the case.” I hadn’t meant to say that, but it was too late to take the words back. To silence myself, I rolled my lips between my teeth.
He huffed out a laugh. “Save your sympathy. I’m more than happy with my life.”
“But what about companionship? A relationship? Human contact?”
“That’s something I don’t have to worry about. And by the way, don’t talk to me about human contact. I recall you saying you only needed your vibrators.”
My nostrils flared, and I sucked in a breath. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. “Stop the car and let me out.” He’d heard every single word of my conversation with Bella. I was going to throw up. I was going to pass out. Or maybe I was going to throw up then pass out.
“You’re not going anywhere. We’re in the butt-fuck of nowhere. If I leave you here, it would be like a scene from Deliverance. I can already hear the banjos playing. If you want to end up locked up in a cage in someone’s basement, be my guest.”
I kept my eyes straight forward, ignoring the amusement in my boss’s voice.
“Unless getting locked up in someone’s basement is what you’d like. To be someone’s plaything. What was it you said to your friend? Something about Santa bringing you a Dom who’ll introduce you to the world of BDSM.”
I took several deep breaths and resisted the urge to open the door and throw myself from the car. “You’re not funny, Mr. Matthews. Why did you pretend you hadn’t heard my phone conversation when you had? It was personal. Why not keep pretending you hadn’t heard a word?”
“I don’t like getting lectured.”
“And how am I lecturing you?”
“You’re lecturing me about relationships when you said you don’t have time for one.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I don’t, huh? I know more than you think I do.”
“Like what?”
“Like you get a thrill out of making people happy. You’re a people pleaser. Their happiness makes you happy. A sub lives and breathes to make his or her master happy, did you know that?”
Heat fired my cheeks, and I clenched my fists, thankful we were in a dark car. “Save me the psychoanalysis.”
“Not psychoanalysis at all. I’m calling it like I see it. You’re a natural-born submissive.”
I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of answering.
“I saw how you shivered when I said how delicious your cookies were. How it thrilled you.”
I still said nothing.
“Tell me about the fantasies you have about me? Do they involve me bending you over my desk? You told your friend you wanted me to throw you over the conference table and eat you out.”
“Stop talking right now. You’re acting like a jerk.”
“Are you sure I’m not acting like a narcissist?”
His deep laughter echoed around the car. I was not only embarrassed that he’d heard every single word I’d said to Bella, but I was angry that he saw right into my heart and soul. How did he know me so well?
***
James hit his palms against the steering wheel. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
I didn’t want to say I told you so, but I glanced over at him. “Told you so. We should never have attempted to drive into the Appalachian Mountains of Pennsylvania at night when a blizzard was forecast. There’s no way we’re going to get anywhere near Daniel’s cabin in your car.”
He pulled over and nodded grimly. “We can’t turn back because we won’t make it. We have to find somewhere to stay.”
I took my phone from my purse and opened Waze. “My family has a trailer on the edge of Lake Mirror. It’s a summer community about forty-five minutes from where we are and about an hour and a half from where Daniel and Sophia are. I don’t see that we have any other choice. We won’t find anywhere else to stay.”
“It’ll have to do.”
“Listen up, Mr. Matthews. We can stay at my family’s trailer or try to get back to New York. There isn’t a gas station for miles. Like you said, we’re in the butt fuck of nowhere. If you’d listened to me, we wouldn’t be in this mess. I blame you.”
He gripped the steering wheel. “If anyone is to blame. It’s you. You let Sophia go.”
“What did you expect me to do? Lock a pregnant woman in the bathroom so we could serve her papers? Tackle her to the ground? You can’t possibly blame me for this. It was your impatience that landed us here.” I grabbed his phone from the dashboard and typed in the trailer’s address.
He didn’t say another word, which was fine by me.
I was a little excited to go to the trailer. Every summer before the real world took over my life, my mom and I would drive to what we called our happy place. We shared the trailer with her three sisters and brother. That meant there were always cousins coming and going, and I always had someone to spend my days with.
Fall breaks were spent there and also a few weekends in winter when the weather allowed. The snow-peaked mountains always took my breath away.
But as my mom got older and my cousins moved away, the trailer sat unused and unloved. There was talk about selling the land. I would sell my soul before I allowed that to happen. Grandma had left the land to all of us, so we all had a say in what happened.
During lazy summer mornings, my mom and I would walk the almost two-mile loop around the lake talking about nothing and everything, or my cousins and I would go to the manmade beach and giggle about the hot lifeguards.
On calm days, before the kayakers and boaters got on the water, the surface appeared like glass — hence the Lake Mirror name.
It wasn’t a palace or a grand log cabin, and while everything needed updating, the walls did what they needed to do — they remained standing.
As luck would have it, my mom and I had spent Labor Day weekend cleaning out the cobwebs, and we’d paid to have someone weatherize the place for winter, but it wouldn’t take long to turn on the gas and oil and get the heat blasting.
And now, two-and-a-half months later, I would be spending the night with my boss, and not in the way I’d once fantasized.
He thought I was a ditzy idiot, and I found him insufferable and infuriating, and a self-absorbed ass.
And to think, I’d had a crush on him. Well, no more.
We were going to have an incredible night.
