Free Sweet Seduction Sabotage by Nicola Claire

shift planned for tomorrow night. So we arranged to meet at Sweet Seduction at four, just before he'd head off to work. Not the best idea, but I was getting a little frantic, and the need to clean house was all that I could see.
    If I could just simplify things, if I could just pare it all back to the basics, then maybe, just maybe, I'd be able to make sense of all the mess that was me.
    I threw myself into work on Monday morning, sure that by that evening I'd be down to three in my little sex-team. Gen kept sweeping concerned looks my way, which made me jumpy and twice I dropped a tray of drinks Lucas had given me.
    I was meant to be making things better, getting my life on track. But I just seemed to be making things worse.
    That blackness inside was about to swallow me whole, I just knew it.
    But at ten to four on Monday, it wasn't Dan who walked through the door, but Kane.
    Ever seen a possum staring dumbly into the oncoming headlights of a car, knowing they're about to be squashed to smithereens? Well, that was me. Kane was the headlights, and in ten minutes, Dan would be the car.
    "Hey, babe," Kane said, as he approached my stunned body at the chocolate counter. I just gaped.
    Part of it was the no nookie at work rule I'd always had. And the guys had always been aware of that fact. Dan coming this afternoon would have already guessed something was up. But Kane? Why the fuck was he here?
    "Wondered if you'd had your afternoon tea break yet? Wanna come check out my new wheels?"
    I blinked slowly, looked at the sexy smirk that graced his plump lips. The glint of mischief that threaded through his deep blue eyes. He was dressed in his signature torn, faded denim jeans and muscle shirt, showing off a glorious set of biceps and about twenty hours worth of ink on his arms. His chin length, rock-star black hair curved at the ends, framing a young-boy face; quite apt for a man who had never grown up at all.
    "You sold the Holden?" I asked, dumbly. I'd liked the Camaro, I'd particularly liked what we'd frequently done in there.
    Kane's thing was the back seat of muscle cars. Who was I to deny him? It brought back some of the happier memories of my teenage years.
    "Picked up a sweet ride at the market on the weekend, wanted my girl to christen it with me."
    I glanced over my shoulder to see if anyone had heard Kane's words, but Gen was serving and Lucas was banging the portafilter; no one paying attention to us.
    My eyes swung back to Kane's. Any other time, at any other place in my fucked up life, I would have jumped on the suggestion, already envisaging how Kane would make me feel alive . Even knowing I had another hook-up in ten minutes time, I would have grabbed Kane's singlet, and hauled him out that door. But I just stood there, staring. Didn't even ask what type of car he'd bought. Just stared. Numb on the outside. Numb within.
    This was my life? This is what I had become? One quick hook-up before another quick fuck? I'd thought I was being carefree, so vibrant and full of life. Alive.
    But what I'd been could not be called alive .
    I frowned down at the floor and ran a hand through the curls on my head. I was drowning here. I was neck deep in self-recriminations and self-doubt. Who am I?
    What colour am I?
    Black or red?
    My eyes came up to see Kane's brows furrowed. He'd expected me to behave like Kelly Quayle always did. Sure, Kane. Let's go steam up the windows. Christen your sweet ride.
    "Babe?" he said, as the worst possible thing that could happen happened.
    Dan walked in the door.
    Followed by the ADK team. Dominic waving out to Gen behind the counter. Finn Drake, one of his partners, smiling a mile wide and a grey eyed, suit wearing Drew.
    Oh, fuck.
    My hand covered my mouth and my eyes darted from one man to the next to the next.
    I have hard and fast rules within my free and easy lifestyle. No nookie at work. I never meet up with one of my guys here. They never visit. Except Drew. He can hardly get out of