He scripted Marty.
He gave him lines about throat-fucking, and control, and demure women who need to be taken care of.
He knew exactly what would make me wet after six months of no contact.
He knew exactly how to break me down.
And I fell for it.
I actuallyfell for it.
My hands are shaking.
I look down at them spread flat on the table and I don't recognize them as mine.
The pizza sits half-eaten on my plate.
Marty's salad is still there across from me, abandoned.
Five hundred dollars in cash.
You can keep the change.
Like I'm a waitress.
Like I'm something he can tip on his way out.
I don't move.
Can't move.
I just sit here.
Staring at the money.
Feeling the wetness between my thighs start to cool.
Feeling my arousal drain away and leave nothing but hollow shame in its place.
He knew exactly what would make you wet.
And he was right.
Chapter 4
Caleb
It was predictable, this reaction—entirely, completely, boringly predictable.
I didn't choose Marty on accident. Every decision I make is calculated. Weighed and measured against a dozen variables until I know exactly what outcome to expect.
I didn't miscalculate how he would react to his assignment, didn't misjudge his character or overestimate his spine.
He's a twenty-two-year-old Jackson Hole trust-fund brat who spent every single formative year of his privileged little life learning how to roll over and show his belly.
The kind of kid who inherited more money than sense when he turned eighteen and immediately proved he had no idea what to do with either.
What kind of eighteen-year-old buys a pottery business with their trust fund? What kind of kid looks at millions of dollars in liquid assets and thinks, "You know what Idaho Falls needs? Another artisanal ceramics studio."
