Page 36 of Degrading Her

“Why am I even accepting help from you?” she snapped.

“No one else was in the parking lot,” I said.

“Exactly. So why you? Unlessyouwere the one who left the note.”

“Damn it, Fiona,” I snarled. “I don’t care about your degrees.”

“Because you don’t care aboutanything.” she crossed her arms. “I hate people like you.”

We both fell silent. Rage burned in her eyes, but then she sunk down inside of herself. I didn’t care? I had just held her hair while she vomited. For fuck’s sake, if I didn’t care, I would have left her in the parking lot to soak in her own misery. I hated this. Hated that I wanted to help her. Hated that I gave a shit if she got puke in her hair.

I should have pushed her down into her own puke puddle. I should have been spinning this situation until I could use her.

Instead, I had helped her clean up. And now, we were having a damn heart-to-heart.

I took a deep breath and reminded myself that she had to trust me. This was the perfect opportunity to build that foundation.

“I didn’t mean that,” she said.

“I take it as a compliment.”

“What?”

“It takes a lot to get the perfect Fiona to hate your guts.”

“Don’t call me perfect,” she whispered, near tears again. “Maisie used to call me that.”

No one was perfect, but if anyone came close to that, it was Fiona. She may have had some bumps in the road—medical school, owing her parents money for student loans, a crappy car and studio apartment, perhaps even occasionally drinking excessively, like tonight—but she was still somehow working a full-time job, going to graduate school, and spending nights out with her sister.

All while her boss played games with her and made her compete for her dream job, knowing she would fail.

“Aren’t you going to tell me to stop drinking?” she asked.

Her copper eyes bore into me. As much as I would have liked to tell Fiona exactly what to do, when it came to something like this, it wasn’t my call. It wasn’t in my nature to fix someone; I’d rather manipulate them into submitting on their own.

“You can make your own decisions,” I said. I gestured at the door. “Let’s get some air.”

We went to the garden balcony in the VIP section. It was empty, except for a man smoking on the other end. We stared down at the landscaping: lush leaves waved in purple light, pools of water shimmering, a few people spread throughout. When a server came by, I ordered two more bottles of water and a soda water with ginger and lime for Fiona.

“How did you know my order?” she asked.

“I’m good at reading people.”

“But ginger and lime?”

She had ordered the same drink the first time we met. I took a guess at the reasons. “Soda water for the fizz. Ginger for digestion. Lime for flavor.”

“No alcohol?” she asked.

“No alcohol.”

She sighed. “I think I’m done. I end up getting wasted every time. So I never know how much I can drink without getting wrecked.”

That was amusing. “How old are you?” I asked. I knew the answer, but I wanted to tease her.

“Twenty-six.”

“And you don’t know your limits?”

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