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Releasing her hair from the confining clip as she went down the hallway to the master bedroom, Ally tried to put Travis out of her mind. They’d argued during the day, and he had fired her…yet again. Not that she took that threat seriously anymore. Travis Harrison fired her on a daily basis, and then proceeded to pile a bunch of work on her to complete the next day. But that part of her day was over, and she needed to get to Sully’s Oasis, her evening job. And she was already late, and Travis was irritating as hell every single day. It wasn’t like that was anything new, or something that was going to change anytime soon.
As Ally approached the bedroom door, she heard voices—one male voice she recognized very well, and a female voice that she didn’t. She heard a passionate groan from Rick, a sound she’d never heard before, and a responding husky female moan. The door wasn’t completely closed, and she nudged her foot against the wood, swinging the door wide open.
There, in the middle of the brand new king-sized bed that she and Rick had slept on for the first time just the night before, was her fiancé. His head was thrown back in passionate abandon, a look of ecstasy on his face that she’d never seen before. The woman, naked and on her hands and knees in front of him, moaned again, the couple oblivious of her presence. Obviously, Rick hadn’t planned on her coming back to the house before she went to her second job. She usually didn’t, going straight from Harrison to Sully’s.
Ally stared in morbid fascination, watching as the man she’d been involved with and had trusted for the last five years, killed her devotion with every thrust of his hips, every slap of his groin against the woman’s bare ass. And as every bit of her love for him drained away, so came the realization that even after five years,thisRick was a complete stranger.
Who was this man, and what had happened to her solemn, quiet fiancé who made love to her infrequently because he was always too tired? She hadn’t gotten much more than a peck on the cheek from him for the last two years. And even when they’d actually had a sex life, it wasn’t one with this kind of furious frenzy that appeared to transform him into a man she had never known.
She’d always made excuses for the reasons why their relationship wasn’t great. It was just that they were both working so hard, and things would change once they’d gotten through this difficult portion of their lives.
I never knew him.
Ally walked forward in a daze, tearing her eyes from the sight on the bed, crossing the room to pick up the jeans, t-shirt, and sneakers that she wore for her job at Sully’s.
“Ally,” Rick gasped heavily, finally noticing she was in the room.
Ally held up her hand. “Don’t mind me. I just need my clothes to go to work to support you while you’re screwing another woman. Do proceed. I’ve heard coitus interruptus is terribly uncomfortable.” And she should know. How many times had Rick either stopped or left her unfulfilled back when they’d actually had sex? More times than she could count, but she’d always made excuses for his actions before. After seeing the sight she’d just observed, she knew what an idiot she’d been. It wasn’t that he hadn’t wanted sex; he just hadn’t wanted it withher.
Ally didn’t look in Rick’s direction again. She didn’t want to see him or the slender beauty he’d just been screwing. Her clothing in hand, Ally walked out the bedroom door, closing it behind her. Tearing off her conservative daytime attire as fast as she possibly could, she yanked on her bar attire, gathered her dirty clothes and dropped them in the second bathroom hamper on her way to the stairs, her sneakers in her hand.
“Ally, wait.”
Ignoring Rick’s voice as he shot out of the bedroom, she quickly pulled on the comfortable canvas shoes in the foyer.
“You can’t just leave like this. I can explain,” Rick yelled desperately from upstairs, hanging over the railing.
Like there was reallyanyreasonable explanation for what she’d just witnessed? Raising her voice just loud enough to be heard, she answered, “Get out. I want you gone by the time I get home from work. If you aren’t, I’ll call the police.”
“We’ve been together for five years. That has to count for something,” Rick appealed.
It did count for a lot, and none of it pleasant. Ally had worked her ass off every day, and had missed her chance to finish college because of those five torturous years spent working to make sure Rick had a career. She’d made a plan, stuck to every single thing she vowed to do so she and Rick could have the perfect life together. She’d always told herself if she could just hold things together while he was in school, she would have her chance. And now, that carefully planned outline had been erased like it had never happened, leaving her nowhere. Just years of empty space.
Ally didn’t respond, nor did she look up at the man to whom she’d given five long years of her life. He didn’t deserve it.
I have to keep moving. I’ll survive.
Exiting the house, she closed the door behind her. She was in her car and on her way to Sully’s before she could see Rick come bursting out the front door in only a hastily donned pair of jeans, cursing because she was already gone.
Ally arrived at Sully’s ten minutes late for work, but she did her job, no one even suspecting that her entire world had just tumbled down around her, her plans for her future gone.
When she arrived back home, exhausted, Rick was gone. She dragged her tired body to one of the extra bedrooms, her body and mind completely drained. Ally knew if she stopped for even a moment to think about what had happened, she’d lose it entirely, and that wasn’t something she could afford to do right now.
Blanking her mind, pushing all thoughts of the past aside, she let her worn-out body succumb to a mind-numbing sleep.
One Month Later
Ally Caldwell never needed to actuallyseeher boss, Travis Harrison, to know he was making his way to his office. He was like a force of nature that everyone shied away from, the whole upper floor of the luxurious high-rise Harrison building going from a buzz of activity to absolute silence wheneverTravis the Tyrantentered the top floor from the elevator, every employee freezing like a deer in the headlights until he passed, each one breathing a sigh of relief as he moved by them without acknowledging their presence. Nobody wanted to be singled out by Travis Harrison, because it usually meant trouble.
Ally sighed, beleaguered. Most days, she thrived on doing verbal battle with one of the most obnoxious men on the planet. But today just wasn’t one of those days. Since her world had collapsed last month, she didn’t have the energy or the desire to do battle with Travis anymore, but she did it anyway, just because he could be such an asshole.
Pushing her glasses back onto her face and turning back to her computer, she murmured to herself:
“Five…
“Four…
“Three…