Wicked Need (The Wicked Horse Series Book 3) (17 page)

Now that is
something that’s
finally clicking with me. I could use a margarita.

Or five.

“So then
everything spills out of my purse,” Sloane says with a gasping
laugh, “and a butt plug rolls out. Right to the foot of the
waiter. He picks it up and just hands it to me with a red face. And
Cain was dying laughing.”

Callie wheezes she’s
laughing so hard, slapping at the table and nearly knocking over her
third margarita. I look back and forth between these two women as I
have been most of lunch… with my mouth hanging open.

Sloane looks up at
me with tear-filled eyes and smirks. “Come
on, Cat. That’s funny, right?”

“She’s
still in shock,” Callie affirms with eyes just as wet from
laughter.

“Maybe we
broke her,” Sloane says thoughtfully, wiping a finger under her
eye to push away the moisture. “Rand’s going to be
pissed.”

I take another
healthy slurp of my margarita, also my third, and mutter with a
smile, “It’s
funny.”

Then I take another
slurp.

“So what’s
your take on anal?” Sloane asks me, and I start choking. “Like
or dislike? Callie still hasn’t worked up enough courage to
take it all the way, but I love it with Cain.”

“I… I…”
I stutter as both of them look at me with mischievous faces. Eyes
shining and happy, and truly, truly not in the least offended by the
presence of a woman such as me. I mean, they seriously look like
they’re enjoying this company and discussion.

Almost like I’d
imagine real girlfriends do.

Resolution
strengthens my spine. I decide to accept the fact that they seem to
like me and are not put out by my past relationships with their
boyfriends. I decide to own it.

“Yeah…
I like anal,” I say confidently with my chin tilted up. “If
it’s done right. And let me tell you, Rand does it right.”

Callie puts her chin
in the palm of her hand and gives a dreamy sigh. “Maybe
one day.”

“Girl,”
Sloane drawls in exaggerated fashion. “You and I can compare
notes later when Saint Callie isn’t around.”

“Hey,”
she exclaims, sitting up straight and glaring at Sloane. “I am
not a saint. I’ll have you know I’ve done a three-way
with Woolf and Bridger.”

My mouth falls back
open again. I decide to fill it with more margarita.

“Please,”
Sloane scoffs and waves a dismissive hand at her. “Who hasn’t
had Bridger in a multiple before?”

My head snaps toward
Sloane. I suck deeper on the straw until the last liquid is pulled up
and the ice rattles in loneliness at the bottom of the glass.

“You’ve
had Bridger before, right?” Sloane asks with a naughty sparkle
in her eye.

“I would plead
the fifth,” I say resolutely, “but I feel like you two
would berate it out of me. So yes… I’ve had Bridger
before.”

“He’s
yummy,” Sloane says.

“Totally,”
Callie agrees.

“And your
dad’s the governor?” I ask with comedic suspicion and a
cocked eyebrow at her. “Because it’s just so hard to
believe with some of the things coming out of your mouth.”

“It’s
true,” she says solemnly, holding up her hand and placing the
other over her heart. “Swear it.”

“And you
really want me to work for you?” I ask, not with any more
doubt, but more in awe because I can’t understand why this
opportunity is being given to me. I did nothing to deserve it.

“I really do,”
she says with a genuine smile. “We help friends around here.
You’re Bridger and Woolf’s friend, and so you are now my
friend.”

“And mine,”
Sloane chimes in.

Callie leans
forward, pushes her margarita glass to the side, and says, “So
I’m offering you the job and I think you should say, ‘Thank
you, Callie, I accept.’”

“Thank you,
Callie,” I say with a nod of my head in gratitude. “I
accept.”

Because I’d be
an idiot not to.

“Excellent,”
she says, beaming me a huge grin, and then she’s shouting
across the restaurant. “Livvy, another round of margaritas.”

“Oh my God,”
Sloane mutters. “I’m going to be so drunk. Cain’s
going to need to come get me.”

“Yeah, I think
our workday got shot to shit,” Callie agrees. “Good thing
I’m your boss.”

My head snaps to
Sloane. “You’re
working the campaign too?”

“Yup,”
she says, sucking down the last of her third margarita. “Only
until I can find something better suited.”

Callie kicks Sloane
under the table. I know this because the table rattles and Sloane
yelps before glaring at Callie. “Ow.
That hurt.”

“Good, because
that was a strike to my heart that you’d even imply you’d
work somewhere else,” Callie says seriously.

Sloane rolls her
eyes and throws a thumb in Callie’s
direction. “I’m a journalist by nature, so I’m
gladly helping Callie out until I can do something more suited to my
degree.”

“Gotcha,”
I say in understanding.

“So, listen,”
Callie says in a low, secretive voice as she leans forward. Sloane
does the same, apparently eager for gossip. “I don’t know
any details, but Woolf shared with us that things with your husband
were really bad. And he said that you’d been kicked out of your
house, left with no money after he died, and that Rand was helping
you out.”

Sloane nods
seriously in agreement. “What
she’s trying to say is, now in addition to Rand, you got two
new peeps who will have your back until you can get on your feet.”

“And you don’t
have to tell us any details, but if you do need to talk, especially
to another woman, you only have to call,” Callie adds on.

Before I can
respond, the waitress returns with a tray loaded with three
margaritas and another basket of chips and salsa. We murmur thanks
and when she leaves, Sloane reaches out to take a chip. How she can
even fit any more food in her stomach is beyond me. She already
killed a large chimichanga.

I take a moment to
let not only what they just said to sink in, but everything that’s
happened in the last seven days. I’ve had apparently five
people step up and go to bat for me, and they hardly know me at all.
It provokes strange feelings within me because I’ve never even
had those closest to me—mother or husband namely—care for
me like this.

For the first time,
I think I start to have a small glimmer of hope that there are good
people in the world, and I don’t
just have to push my way through life in survival mode. I might
actually be able to have fulfillment and happiness.

“I didn’t
marry for love,” I say suddenly, looking up from my glass to
first Callie’s eyes and then Sloane’s. “I’d
run away from home at seventeen, spent time on the streets, and then
eventually became a stripper. Marrying Samuel was my way out of
destitution and back-alley blow jobs so I could afford to eat.”

Callie and Sloane
both wince, but their eye contact never wavers. Their
gazes don’t hold a speck of judgment but are full of empathy.

“He abused
me,” I continue on, and Sloane’s hand shoots across the
table to cover mine. She gives it a squeeze. “Not physically
himself, but to make long, sordid stories short, he farmed me out to
friends and business contacts. Even his son.”

“Fucking
douche-bag, evil asshole,” Sloane growls, and Callie’s
eyes get moist again.

“He made me go
to The Silo, and he made sure I became known as the woman who loved
getting gang banged because that’s what he got off on,” I
say, realizing I don’t have any bitterness about it right now.
It is what it is, and for whatever reasons these opportunities are
being afforded to me, they landed me in a place with good people that
I wouldn’t have met but for The Silo.

“And if you’re
wondering why I just didn’t leave,” I continue, playing
with my straw, “I berate myself over and over about my
stupidity in not. But if I’m going to be honest with my new
friends, I didn’t leave because even though he did those things
to me, my life was still better than what it was before. I wasn’t
handed out often, and I’ll even admit, a lot of things that
happened at The Silo I enjoyed to some extent. I don’t know
what type of woman that makes me… to let her husband treat her
that way… which is why I still find it a bit hard to accept
you want to be my friends.”

“Cat,”
Callie murmurs. “We all make choices in our life that we are
held accountable for later. I can’t see that the choice you
made to stay does anything more than label you a survivor. It’s
just that simple.”

“And I’ll
add on to that,” Sloane says quietly. “There’s
absolutely nothing wrong with liking your time at The Silo. Callie
and I have both experienced it, and we love the freedom it provides.
As women, we need to revel in our sexuality and accept that we are
allowed to have desires and fantasies we want to be fulfilled. The
Silo gives that to us. Find the right man on top of that—who
understands and values your inner kinkiness—and well, hell…
that’s like the best sex ever.”

“Yeah,”
Callie reiterates. “Don’t ever feel ashamed about The
Silo and what you’ve done there. Even with Woolf and Cain.
Granted… we don’t need details, but it’s nothing
that changes our opinion about you.”

“So true,”
Sloane agrees.

My heart swells and
grows warm. It settles in deep and a rush of joy pulses within me.
These women…
two amazing, non-judgmental, caring and confident women…
actually seem to like me.

Accept me.

Want to help me.

Maybe my time at The
Silo was nothing more than fate or pre-destiny. Maybe I had to meet
and marry Samuel, have him debase me and ultimately lead me to The
Silo, so that I could be in this very place at this very moment.

My thoughts turn to
Rand, who has been equally as non-judgmental and caring as Callie and
Sloane.

Actually more so.

I think about what
Sloane just said…
find a man who understands and values my inner kinkiness.

That’s
totally Rand.

From the very start.

An idea strikes and
it might even be fueled by the margaritas, but I know by the time I’m
ready to act on said idea, I’ll be sober. Reaching into my
purse, I say, “I need to send a quick text to Rand.”

“Oooohhhh,”
Sloane gloats with a knowing look in her eyes. “You’re
sexting him, aren’t you?”

“Well, yeah,”
I admit with a sheepish smile as my fingers fumble across the keys.
“Kinda, sort of.”

Rand

I’m
not sure I’ve ever had a day drag by more slowly than today
has. It’s been a long day. Agonizing actually.

It started off with
me meeting Bridger to give him the trust agreement we took pictures
of and that I had printed out early this morning. I left the copy
with him and asked him to look it over, but I talked to him about
what route we should take in the meantime.

On the way back to
Jackson from Vegas, Cat agreed to let me talk to Bridger first. She
wanted to call Kevin right then and there to confront him, but I
wanted to take a bit of a more cautious approach. It might be better
to hit up an attorney first for a legal opinion, but I knew Bridger
always had great advice, so I figured we should wait it out just a
day so I could talk to him.

I had already set up
Callie and Sloane to take Cat out to lunch today. Woolf had texted me
late Monday night after we got back to Jackson and Cat was already
asleep, telling me he’d
talked to Callie and she was going to ask Cat to work for her on the
campaign. This was excellent news and was a job about as far away
from The Silo as I could get her. Ironic since not but a few weeks
ago, Sloane was digging around as an undercover reporter trying to
connect the governor to the sex club.

So while Cat’s
apparently eating burritos, I’m spending a tremendously slow
day at Westward Ink, watching the clock tick down to quitting time so
I can get home to Cat.

And yeah…
weird that I’m thinking words like “home” and “Cat”
almost synonymously, but I can’t fucking help it. The more I
become embroiled in her affairs, the more intrigued I become by her.
The more she starts to blossom and starts to become the confident,
take-control woman I know her to be deep inside, the more attracted I
become to her. The more I get to know about her and the things she’s
overcome so far, the more I become attached to her. The more she
milks my cock, the more I want her to milk it.

Hard and often.

Haven’t
even thought about The Silo once since she and I talked about it five
nights ago.

My phone dings with
a text and I see it’s
from Cat. Callie said they were going to The Merry Piglets, which
always means margaritas with lunch.

It’s
cute and coy, and I never thought I’d use those words to
describe Cat.
Sloane
and Callie think I should own my inner kinkiness. And I’m
kinda drunk.