Page 29 of Crashing Without Justice

As soon as he hung up the phone, I dialed Trista, and the second that she answered, I lost it. “That fucking bitch called ourpastorand told him that we were having marital problems because I wasn’t performing in the bedroom.”

“Jesus Christ,” she sighed tiredly.

“Now he’s expecting us to attend church together this Sunday, so that we can stay over for some spiritual counseling to repair our marriage.”

“What are you going to do?” she choked out, and I wasn’t sure if it was from surprise or if she was trying not to laugh at me.

“I’m going to find another fucking church,” I snapped, half-serious and half not knowing what to do. “Either that, or fucking kill her already.”

“I rather you find a new church,” she said quietly. “I’d hate to have to go visit you in prison.”

My shoulders sagged like a deflated balloon, Trista’s words making me laugh, even when they shouldn’t. This shit was serious, uncalled for, and simply getting out of hand. Paige was all over the fucking place with her social media posts, her behavior, and her claims of wanting to repair our marriage, and I honestly had no idea what I was supposed to do next. Dragging our pastor into this was a move that I hadn’t seen coming, and I wished that the police would hurry up and speak to her already.

“Fine,” I chuckled humorlessly. “I’ll refrain from strangling her.”

Trista let out a heavy sigh, and this shit was getting old, though only a week had gone by. “Maybe you shouldn’t have deleted those pictures, Harding. I mean, it’s starting to feel like you might need all the help that you can get when it comes to that woman.”

“I don’t need them,” I told her. “I guarantee you that Paige still has the video, so I could always subpoena them if things get ugly enough that we’re at that point. After all, nothing ever disappears for good, whether on your phone or on the internet.”

After a few seconds of silence, she asked, “Are you still coming over later?”

Before the phone call from Pastor Truby, I hadn’t wanted to go over. I’d wanted to take a shower and lose my thoughts to some sports. However, all I wanted to do now was lose myself in the woman that I had come to care about. Trista had her kids Sunday night through Thursday morning, and Frank had them Thursday evening through Sunday night, so it would be just us, and that sounded perfect right now.

“Yeah, I’m coming over.”

“Good,” she replied, a smile in her voice. “We could both use a fucking break.”

Chapter 20

Paige~

Iwalked into the house, thankful that the week was finally over. With work out of the way, I could dedicate my time to my next move. While I was looking forward to meeting Kirk, to hold me over until then, I had sent Trista a text message earlier today, describing all the ways that Harding used to make love to me. I’d gone into detail, and I’d done it just to prove a point. If she thought that she was special, she wasn’t. Harding was probably doing the same things to her that he’d done with me, and I felt as if she needed to know that to deflate her ego a bit, if nothing else.

Heading towards the kitchen, I thought about what to make for dinner, and even though I was only cooking for one now, I didn’t have a problem with leftovers. Plus, it’d be a shame to let all this food go to waste just because Harding wanted to act like an asshole by not coming home. I wasn’t sure how long he was going to be able to stay at the hotel, but it was costing us quite a bit of money. Because I wasn’t stupid, I’d been checking our bank accounts every day to make sure that he wasn’t secretly cleaning me out. Now, while I didn’t think that he would do that, I also didn’t trust that his whore might not try to talk him into it. I was also checking his credit card purchases.

As I pulled a couple of steaks out of the freezer, my phone rang, and when I pulled it out of my pocket, I saw Harding’s name flashing across the screen, surprising me a bit. All week long, he’d been ignoring my calls and texts, and it would actually serve him right if I didn’t answer. Nonetheless, my curiosity was too great to ignore his call.

“What do you want?” I asked as soon as I answered.

“Paige, you have got to stop this,” he said, instantly annoying me with how victimized he sounded. “This has gone too fucking far.”

“Awe, did your girlfriend get upset when she found out hownotspecial she is?” I taunted.

“Paige, this isn’t funny,” he snapped into the phone. “You’re becoming destructive.”

“Oh, I know this isn’t funny, Harding,” I shot back. “I know that more than anyone.”

“What are you trying to accomplish here?” he asked. “What do you think calling our pastor is going to accomplish? What do you think harassing people is going to do for the situation?”

“You know, you promised to fix the showerhead in the guest bathroom,” I reminded him, realizing that if he didn’t fix everything that he’d said he would fix, I’d be stuck with the bill.

“What?”

“You said that you were going to fix the showerhead in the guest bathroom, and you haven’t,” I repeated. “You also said that you’d replace the light switch in the garage.”

“Are you drunk?” he choked out, and he really did have a lot of fucking nerve.

“No, I’m not drunk,” I bit out. “But dipping your dick in another woman doesn’t absolve you of all your responsibilities here, Harding.”

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