Page 33 of Cage of Thorns and Blood

I can’t say anything because my mind is still stuck on being spanked and fucked out of my need to be on the board.

His phone rings, jolting me out of my meditation on his words. A number flashes on the car screen. He clicks a button on the steering wheel and connects to his phone. A woman's voice rings out in the car.

“Hey, handsome, how are you?”

“I'm good, thanks.” His tone is clipped and businesslike. “Are you okay?”

She laughs softly and then says, “I would be better if you were here. My place is feeling rather empty tonight.”

Holy fuck. I can't believe this douche. He just took a booty call on speakerphone when he's driving me home.

“I'm out, and tonight is not good for me.” His tone has turned positively annoyed.

“It's never a good time for you these days, Matteo,” the woman whines.

“You know what?” He drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “I do believe that you're correct. So why don't we call off this charade right now. I won't take any of your calls. I won't be texting you. Don't call or text me. Have a nice life.”

“Wait, what?” She practically screeches down the phone, and the sound is jarring.

“You heard me.”

“Screw you, Matteo.” Her yell makes my ears hurt.

“Not anymore you won't be.” His tone is still calm but utterly final.

I stare at his profile, trying to figure him out. That was cold and harsh, and worse, he did it in front of me.

“Nice,” I say softly. “Is that how you end all your relationships?”

He laughs. “It wasn’t a relationship. It was a friends-with-benefits arrangement. No, scratch that, we weren’t friends. She was married. It’s ended.”

“Very much so, and decisively by you.”

He shrugs. “I haven’t seen her for months.”

Oh, okay. “Yet, you took her call with me in the car.”

I can't keep the annoyance out of my tone.

“I didn't know it was her,” he says. He points at the screen. “A number came up, and normally it's people's names. I can only imagine she must have changed her phone. I had already answered before she spoke, and when I realized who it was, I tried to keep it short. I should have ended it months ago, but I haven't heard from her and just figured that she'd come to the same conclusion.”

This puts things in a slightly different light. I don't say anything more and consider things for a while. So he was seeing someone, but he hasn't for months. And now he’s ended it. Is that because of me and our one date? I don't even dare to presume that could be the case. I'm still considering things when he pulls up outside my apartment building.

“Here you go,” he says.

“Thanks for the ride,” I reply.

That twitch of his lips tells me he's taken that entirely the wrong way. I roll my eyes but can't help my smile. “I'll pick you up on Sunday,” he says.

So it looks like I am cancelling my family dinner, bossy bastard.

He watches as I head into the building, and he's still watching as the elevator doors close on me.

I fall back against the walls with a sigh the moment I have privacy.

This is not going the way I had planned. If I thought I could do this and keep my feelings out of things, then I was mistaken.

This is going to be much harder than I realized.

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