Maybe she went to the beach. I started in that direction, then halted, staring.
My truck was gone.
Chapter Seventeen
Hayley
I stole his truck.
Okay, it’s more like I borrowed it without asking. He’ll get it back, undamaged, tomorrow morning. Meanwhile, I needed to find a hotel room, then in the morning buy my own means of transportation. And a place to live. Then start looking for a job again.
Alaric’s callous disregard for me cemented my decision to make our break clean and immediate. I’d lain on the couch beside him, listening to him snore, and recognized that lust and love are two vastly different things. He may lust for my body, but he’ll never love the rest of me. The parts of me that I considered important. Such as my mind, my heart, or my soul.
After finding and checking into a decent hotel, I showered off Alaric’s scent, his still sticky seed between my legs.Everything down the drain. Like my life.
My hair wet, garbed in the hotel’s fluffy bathrobe, I called down for a burger and fries with wine from room service. I ate and drank mechanically, hardly tasting anything. It’s as though all joy, even the simple flavor of a good meal, had been sucked out of my life.
Perhaps it had.
Maybe I’ll never get over him.
***
“I’ll be paying by electronic transfer,” I informed the salesman. “No haggling, no additional options, the manufacturer warranty is enough. Make the deal or I’m gone.”
He eyed me with a mixture of respect and disillusion, then left me to inform his sales manager of my demands. While sitting at his desk in the Honda dealership showroom, I pondered my new found confidence. Not long ago, I’d have caved in to the salesman’s manipulation and let him ride roughshod over me.
Not anymore.
I found a Honda sedan I liked with the color, blue with a gray interior, and the interior options that were both practical and yet luxurious by my standards. Roxanne would sneer at my choice of a vehicle that didn’t stand out among the BMWs and Mercedes in this city. Alaric would likely sneer as well.
Too bad. I’m not like either of you.
“Congratulations,” the sales manager said, shaking my hand when the deal was completed. “Let us know if there’s anything we can do in the future.”
“Thank you.”
I accepted the set of smart keys, my copy of the paperwork, and left the showroom to drive away in my new car.Now for a cell phone and an apartment. On my way to sweet independence.
Using my bank’s card, I bought a smart phone, activated it, then sat in my new car smelling new car, and searched for apartments. That took nearly as long as it did to buy the vehicle, but by the late afternoon, I put down the needed deposits and rent on a fairly nice and already furnished apartment not far from the downtown area.
With all the money I’d spent that day, it hardly put a dent on the amount of money in my account.
“Maybe I should take a vacation before finding another job,” I told myself while eating a late lunch/early dinner at a diner. “Get away for a while.”
Though I did my best to ignore it, my conscience demanded I inform my sister of my new number and address. Blood ties and all that rot. Should Roxanne have an emergency, she had the means to get a hold of me.Not that I should care. I had an emergency, and she blew me off. If I’d died, she’d never have known. Or bothered to come to my funeral.
Still, Roxannewasmy sister.
I felt some familial loyalty, even if she didn’t.
Dusk encroached over the city, turning the sea into a dark indigo shade. Street lights popped on as I drove through the city’s center toward Roxanne’s McMansion. I had no idea if she was at home or not, but strode to her door in the near darkness.
I rang her doorbell twice before she slowly opened it to peer around the edge.
“Roxanne!”
I instinctively reached for her, dumbfounded at her disheveled appearance. Not even when we were kids did she not bathe twice daily, style her hair, or splash her face with makeup. Even from a few feet away, I caught the unpleasant odor of body sweat and booze. Her hair hadn’t been washed in I didn’t know how long, and hung oily and limp against her neck.
