Page 31 of Such A Filthy Girl

TWENTY ONE

LEO

I paced the floor, trying to figure out where I’d gone wrong.

Estella had been in my arms. It had been everything I’d longed for. And then her shutters slammed down and locked me out.

‘Fuck!’ I shouted, knocking the long-cold hot chocolate over, watching as it seeped into the drying cum still marking the floor.

We’d been perfect together. Fucking perfect.

Milky chocolate splashed over my feet as I trod through it, wanting to go after her, but knowing she’d hate me if everyone found out what we’d done.

The screens still flashed with images of her.

They were nothing but pixelated lies. They didn’t bring me closer to her. They were a pale comparison to having her in the flesh, having her perfection moaning in my arms.

I had to talk to her.

She lay curled on her bed next to a snoring Graham, arms wrapped around her, still wearing the dress I’d torn off of her.

Pressing myself against the peep hole, guilt hit me. Watching Estella sob, knowing I’d made her feel like that, cut deep.

Fuck, what could I do?

Let her go?

Let her live her life with boring Graham who would share a mortgage and take her to the theatre and work to build them a perfect, boring home.

Did she want that?

No.

She couldn’t. The way she’d responded to my kisses, the way she’d looked into my eyes, it couldn’t have been fake. It had to mean more.

I had to get her on her own.

After the party, she’d be gone. For good.

The floor grew wet, my salty tears puddling, making the peephole blur.

Estelle looked up as the blur cleared, one warm tear dripping down and hitting her chest, right over the heart she wouldn’t let me keep.

She turned, pulling the blanket over herself, and Graham rolled with her, looping his arm around my girl.

TWENTY TWO

ESTELLA

The house bubbled with excitement, my mother and Jack swanning through their loved ones with glee.

Music swept through the room in a swelling jazzy wave, neatly suited waiters bobbing through the swarms of people offering teeming glasses of champagne and fancy hors d’oeuvres.

My stomach churned. I’d felt sick since leaving Leo’s room the previous night. I’d come home for three days and Leo had upturned everything. All the feelings I’d worked so long to suppress. Those heady, illicit kisses of our teenaged years that I’d told myself were nought but experimentation. He’d drudged it all up with his relentless pursuit.

And worse…I’d never felt more complete than when we’d been together. When the societal barriers had been removed and there was nothing but raw, primal humanity between us.

But it was Leo.

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