Debt

"Couldn't have eased her into it?" He asked. Aaron, always the bleeding fucking heart. It was a strange quality to find in a security manager, but somehow he made it work.

"No," I said, leaning back against the counter and rolling some of the tension out of my shoulders. First, because of all that shit that went on out on that catwalk. But also because I'd fucking had her in my bed, hot and willing, when the God damn call came in.

"Going to explain?" Aaron asked, raising a brow, leaning back against the door jamb.

"She's so fucking repressed. Everything she does or says, save for fucking snapping at me, is calculated, thought out. She doesn't do shit in the heat of the moment. She needed to get upset and then she needed to immediately take that and direct it where it belongs."

"At her father."

"His daughter is living under my roof like she's in some kind of fucking debtors' prison from the nineteenth century and he still can't keep his ass from my tables? Fuck yeah, at her father."

"Alright, By," Aaron said, carefully choosing his words. "What the fuck is it with you and this girl?"

"There's nothing with me and this girl. She's living in my house. Her father owes me a fuckton of money..."

"Yeah, exactly. Her father owes you a fuckton of money and yet she is living in your house. And you're staging a fucking impromptu intervention? What is that all..."

"She told me you said I was a nice guy."

"Yeah, maybe that was a bit of a stretch," he admitted with a small, evil little grin. "You can be a ruthless, heartless bastard, but usually only when it matters. And you don't just fucking... take women in exchange for debts owed to you. So, I'll repeat: what is it with you and this girl?" He paused and when I didn't answer, shrugged a shoulder. "She's pretty. I'll give you that. But not drop-dead gorgeous. Very girl next door which has never been your thing. She's got a nice body, but again... you've had better. And, well, she hates your fucking guts, man. Nothing about getting her seems like it would be easy."

"Maybe I'm getting a little old for easy," I said with a shrug.

To that, Aaron's confused face broke out into a shit-eating grin. "You're not serious. You can't be thinking about trying to... date her?"

"Don't be ridiculous," I said, shaking my head. "She's in my house, parading around in barely more than underwear, spitting fire at me all day and night..."

"So you just want to fuck her and brush her aside. Classy, By."

"How the fuck is this news? Ever know me to parade around with the same woman on my arm week after week?"

"So you're gonna get her in bed then keep forcing her to wash your sheets?"

"Something like that."

Probably.

I just needed to get her out of my system. That was the problem.

I hoped.TENPrueI won't lie.

It hurt.

Every word out of my mouth was forced, was like ripping a layer of skin off. It burned. It made me choke on my words. It made me cry so hard that I couldn't even get coherent words out at one point. And every single one I did get out seemed to pierce my father's heart. His usually jovial, kind, loving face simply... crumpled. It was like I reached out, grabbed him, and wrung every last drop of happiness from his body.

But, I realized, as I finally got it all out and cradled my face in my hands, trying to pull it together, it made me feel lighter, like a weight was lifted off my chest and shoulders, like I could breathe again and walk without feeling like I was going to collapse under the burden of everything I had never said.

"Where's the list, Dear Prudence?" my father's small voice asked through my sniffles. Small. My father's voice always burst out, like his body wasn't strong enough to hold it in. It was always larger than life, filling the room. To hear it shrunken made me have to fight another wave of tears.

But I blinked it back and looked around Byron's desk, realizing he hadn't given me any kind of instruction on where to find that information. His desk, like his desk in his home office, was orderly. Everything seemed to have a place and be in it. The drawers had files that I didn't dare open. I swiveled the chair and looked on the cradenza, finding a metal file holder with labeled folders. One was for car companies. Another was listed 'others, x'. And, finally, a folder with 'rehabs' written on top. I grabbed it, pulling out a sheet of paper and handing it to my father, barely able to meet his eye.

"I've never done in-patient," he told me unnecessarily. No one knew that fact better than me. "They're expensive."