Page 32 of Forbidden Desires

I tried to concentrate on the book I’d recently bought to distract me, but my thoughts had a mind of their own and kept circling back to the questions I had no answers for.

Had I done something wrong with Eric? Or had I done exactly what he’d wanted from me, and he no longer needed me anymore?

These were anxiety-ridden worries I wasn’t accustomed to having when it came to clients, and I hated that they sprung up so easily for me as the weeks after visiting Eric’s parents passed by, and I heard little to nothing from him.

What was truly embarrassing wasn’t just the fact that I kept obsessing over the situation. It was the way all that vulnerability had funneled down into that morning sex that we had before we came back to Florida. It had felt different, because what thattrip had entailed was something different, and now I felt myself regretting ever giving in to the feelings that had allowed Eric to see me so damn vulnerable.

In the last few weeks since returning from New York, I’d had no communication with him, and any of the events I was supposed to accompany him to had been changed or cancelled in the joint calendar we both had access to. There had been no explanation, and honestly, as a paying client, he didn’t owe me one. I had to remind myself, numerous times, that our arrangement wasn’t the type that I could just pick up the phone and demand answers like I was his girlfriend—and honestly, if it had been any other client I would have been thrilled and relieved to have a month to myself, paid in full.

I had to keep reminding myself that Eric and I had acontract, not a relationship. Ours was an “as needed” business arrangement, and up to this point my fee was still being promptly deposited into my bank account like a retainer, so there was no reason—business-wise—for me to be as upset as I was. Eric had no obligation to me, other than financially, which he’d continued to fulfill.

Emotionally, however, was a whole other story because the truth was, I was disappointed by him essentially ghosting me, and that fuckinghurt.

“Stupid, stupid,” I chastised myself, not for the first time in the last few weeks.

I was still stewing on the entire scenario on the way to Florie’s later that day, where I was meeting Dominque for an afternoon lunch. I needed her advice and wisdom, because I had no idea what to do about the predicament I’d found myself in, or what to do next. I had every reason to end the contract on my end, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Not without some kind of explanation from Eric.

Which left us at a stalemate.

I arrived in my Uber just as Dominque stepped out of her car, an elegant brow raised as soon as she saw me. “You look like you’re ready to skin something alive, dear.”

“I just might,” I muttered, stepping in beside her to walk into Florie’s.

We didn’t say much until we were seated, orders for our drinks and meals taken, and then we were left to our own devices.

“Alright, spill,” Dominque said once our wine was poured and the waiter left our table. “I thought we were just going to have a lovely, uneventful lunch, but that look on your face tells me that something more is going on than just you wanting to have tea time with your favorite old madame.”

I didn’t hold back. I explained the situation with Eric from start to finish, from him calling me to take the trip with him to visit his mother and father in New York, to me telling him everything about my own parents, and even the intimate level of sex we’d had before we left. I didn’t leave out any detail, mostly because Dominique could smell omission from a mile away, and partly because I wanted to know that I was one hundred percent vindicated in my feelings that Eric’s silence was bullshit. Or at the very least, have her put her foot down and tell me that I definitely crossed a line, and I should never do it again because remaining impersonal was the nature of the work that we were involved in.

To my surprise, she did none of that. She was quiet after I was done speaking and sat there in thought, her fingers trailing along the line of her jaw, which she did when she was in a particularly deep state of thought.

“I see,” she finally said after our lunch orders were delivered to the table. “So, basically, Eric needed you, you answered the call, and it went better than the two of you expected. You were both vulnerable, and you indulged it despite your better instinctstelling you that it was something that you wouldn’t be able to take back. Now, he’s stopped talking to you, but hasn’t ended your contract. Has he continued paying you?”

“Yes, and that’s the part I don’t understand!” I said, bristling all over again as I pushed my salad around on my plate. “Why won’t he just cut me loose?”

“Hmm.” Was her only response.

I sighed, annoyed. “So, what’s the verdict? Do I need to start looking for another long time client? Was the whole thing just really stupid of me? Because that’s what it’s starting to feel like. I don’t understand what I did wrong.”

Dominique took a bite of her grilled salmon and tilted her head. “What makes you think that you did anything wrong?”

“He’s not talking to me?” I waved a hand in the air. “He’s cancelled all of our plans?”

Dominique laughed, even though I found absolutely nothing humorous about the situation. “Jas, had you done something wrong, you wouldn’t still be on his payroll for events that he’s cancelling himself. Tell me something. When you were returning to Florida after that intimate night together, how did everything feel to you as it was settling in?”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what were the emotions you felt when the high of needing to provide for him, and the euphoria of finding someone who you could relate to, started to wear off?”

I was silent. Dominque raised her brow. “Well?” she prompted. “Don’t keep me in all of this suspense, my dear.”

“It was kind of terrifying,” I admitted truthfully. “All of this shit we unloaded with one another, it’s a lot to process, you know? I didn’t know what he was going to think of me once it all settled in. I worried that maybe he’d pity me for the choices I’d had to make to survive, or how sad it was that I couldn’t get my shit together after my parents died. Maybe he’d think Iwas…” I shifted in my seat, hedging around what I wanted to say, but forced it out anyway. “That he’d think I was emotionally easy, and I didn’t want him thinking of me that way. It’s fucking embarrassing.”

Dominque clicked her tongue. “So the problem is that you opened up far more than you ever had with any other client, and you were fearful of being judged for it after the fact? Especially with a man you’re only with because of work.”

Well, when she put it like that, it only made the situation worse, didn’t it? Either way, I nodded. “Yeah. That, exactly.”

Dominque chuckled. “And you’re under the impression that you’re the only one who’s feeling that way?”

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