Free Double Dare by Karin Tabke Page A

finger around it and gently pulled. The balls slid out.
    “Oh, my,” she gasped. The quick subsidence of the pressure the balls were almost as stimulating as the pressure they created. She had hoped for a better end, but in light of the conversation and the company, she was safer without them reminding her of who gave them to her and how he could shatter her body just by looking at her. Wrapping them in tissue, she slid them into her robe pocket, washed her hands, and walked purposefully back into the living room to find Simon standing by the window and gazing out at the illuminated bay.
    “This is a great view,” he said absently.
    “There’s an even better view from my rooftop patio,” she replied, hoping to change the trajectory of their conversation.
    She walked up behind him as he turned to face her. His dark brows jammed together, his full lips tightened, and his eyes narrowed. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life, Cinderella, some more than once. I’ve hurt the people I love, and been hurt by them. I’ve done some shitty things and probably will again, but one thing I have never done is blackmail anyone who wasn’t a criminal. Certainly not anyone I care or cared about. If you can’t trust me to at least not use your words, texts, confessions, or whatever you divulge to me in private against you, then there is no point in continuing this conversation or anything else.”
    He strode past her, grabbed his cell phone from the coffee table, and slid it into his trouser pocket. He stared at her, waiting for her to do—something. Words caught in her throat. What? Was she supposed to confess that she was going to go to trial and could possibly go to prison for supposedly stealing something she’d developed herself? That two of her former colleagues had filed sexual harassment charges against her? Or the really scary stuff—that she was sexually fucked up, couldn’t trust anyone if her life depended on it and she had abandonment issues? She couldn’t tell him any of that because he would look at her with disgust and walk out the door. She was a monumental failure and so very ashamed.
    He stepped toward her. “C’mon, sweetheart, give me something.”
    Crossing her arms over her chest, she shook her head and looked past him to the hallway.
    “Okay,” he said gently, “I get it.” And walked past her, his fingertips trailing the wisps of her long hair around her waist.
    No!
she screamed in her head.
You don’t get it! It’s not you, it’s me! You don’t want a woman like me. I’ll just give you a million reasons to walk out the door.
At least this way it was her doing, and more importantly, her heart was still intact. Mostly. As he walked by, he disturbed the air around her, leaving behind his male scent, taunting her with the fact that if she let him walk out the door she would never see him again, and with him would go the best thing she would ever have. All she had to do to make him stay was throw him a bone.
    But she couldn’t.
    As he reached for the knob, she opened her mouth. As he turned to give her one last chance, she slammed it shut. And then he was gone.
     

     
    She didn’t remember how long she lay on the floor curled up in a ball and sobbing. She didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything except that because of her stubbornness and shame, she would never see Simon again. Her heart ached. It ached in a way it had never ached before.
    She cried until the sun came up. From her fetal position on the floor, she watched the sun set from swollen eyes. By the next morning she was shaking with fever. That night she called Rosie. Her dear, dear friend didn’t ask questions. Staying by her side, she took care of Katy as a mother would her child. Something Katy’s own mother had never done.
    “Rosie,” Katy sobbed. “What’s wrong with me?”
    “Nothing is wrong with you, sweet pea.”
    “Something’s not right. Men use me. My high-school boyfriend used me for writing his