Sweet Venom: A Why Choose Romance

It’s 9 pm, and I stayed at the gym late once again. I’m no longer avoiding Ellis per se, but I also don’t care to run into Sebastian, although I haven’t seen him since I returned to San Jose. We either do a great job of missing each other, or he has yet to come home. Ellis requested that I come to his bed tonight, and I fully plan on doing that. We need to talk. Even though it’s late, I hope to beat him home tonight.

Owning a gentlemen’s club, he is no stranger to coming home between the hours of 11pm and 1am, depending on how things are going at work, but I have a feeling tonight he’ll be waiting for me, since he specifically requested my presence in his bed.

As I turn the key and lock the door to Blush, the wind kicks up, and the decadent smells of Roasters fresh coffee assails my senses, tempting me to linger. I’d love to sink into one of the leather chairs beside the fireplace inside and try to free my mind, maybe find a good book on my phone. I’m beyond stressed after spending the day going over my finances. I really should have been smarter when it came to my payback. I acted impulsively and angrily, and now I will pay dearly. The money I have is limited. It’s part of why I went home.

Ellis wasn’t wrong when he said I left because of Sebastian, but it’s not that black and white. Sebastian was a catalyst. His opinion of me mattered regardless of whether he knew the entire story. I saw a side of myself I didn’t like, and that was something I needed to rectify immediately. Sebastian sees me as a spoiled rich girl with no direction and daddy issues that don’t hold a candle to real problems. Real problems like the shit hand he and Ellis were dealt growing up, and while I believe wholeheartedly that mental abuse can be just as crippling as physical needs not being met, the person I became wasn’t one I was proud of when I accepted my trust fund.

I wasn’t raised with money, though my father’s family was extremely wealthy. My father never married my mother and went to great lengths to ensure neither she nor I saw a dime of his family’s wealth. My grandfather left me a trust fund that I knew nothing about until my twenty-first birthday when my grandmother, Indie, presented it to me.

I took it all too willingly, excited to spite my father. For the first year, it brought me joy. I spent lavishly just because I could and reveled in the joy every minute of each new purchase brought. The second I turned twenty-one, the world knew there was an heiress to the Fiori name. Until then, my existence was merely a rumor, one I didn’t care to fuel flames on, for I had nothing to be proud of. If anything, I felt shame because I knew what it really meant to bear that surname.

The local news had a field day with their newly-found local celebrity. Every new foreign car I bought hit the headlines of the local papers, and because I knew somewhere my father was blowing a fuse, I collected them. He could no longer hurt me. The day I turned eighteen, I never stepped foot into his house of horrors again, but suddenly, I had been gifted the power to wound him right where it hurt the most: his ego.

However, it wasn’t until I saw the disgust in Sebastian’s eyes every time he looked at me that I realized in my quest for vengeance, I had become no better than my father. If I truly wanted to step into my own and grow in spite of the toxic roots that stole my youth, I had to let it all go.

Before I head to the parking garage, I try to get a peek inside the space next to mine that currently has brown paper covering the windows. The business that occupied the space next door went under four months ago, and I had hoped to purchase it when I decided to open Blush. It would be my phase two of the gym, where I would add the spa, making Blush a complete wellness center, but for now, that phase will have to remain on the back burner until I can start turning a profit.

Walking up to Ellis’s car, I sigh. I used his car today because I had to pick up things for the gym and needed a trunk. This car only reminds me of the big girl choices I need to start making. I know he doesn’t care that I use his car. In fact, I know that he prefers me driving his car over riding my bike, but the reality is, I don’t like it. If I’m cutting the cords, I need to cut them all. I need to stand on my own two feet.

Opening the door, I toss my bag onto the passenger side and sink into the soft leather seats, letting them hug my tense body. I just want to go home and take a bath. Just as I start the car, I notice the rearview mirror pointing down, which is strange as hell. I know it wasn’t that way when I drove in. Reaching up, I adjust the mirror, tilting it up only to find a set of slate-blue eyes staring back at me. I let out a blood-curdling scream and jump out of the car, my body riddled with nerves.

The second my stalker is out of the car, I immediately start pounding into his chest. ‘What the hell is your problem?’ I yell as I continue to smack and berate him. ‘You can’t just break into people’s cars like some kind of stalker.’

My last punch lands a little harder than necessary, and he wraps his arms around me in a bear hug, pinning them to his front. ‘Stop hitting me.’

‘You shouldn’t even be here. You said you were filling in while the lead foreman had his baby. He’s back now. Don’t you have a job to go back to?’

‘The job has changed,’ he states matter-of-factly without further explanation.

I push back and out of his hold before saying, ‘Don’t lie to me, Tate. Nothing about the job has changed. I’ve done my homework.’

His brow slightly furrows as he narrows his eyes and asks, ‘Oh yeah, and what exactly did you find?’

I did, in fact, do my homework. When I noticed the lead foreman, Jay, returned, I asked Mark if Tatum would be leaving since he was just temporarily filling in, and he said Tate requested to stay on. I have no doubt that has something to do with our little encounter. Crossing my arms over my chest, I say, ‘You requested to stay on. Nothing about the job changed.’

Tongue in cheek, he smirks before stepping into me and saying, ‘That’s where you’re wrong. The job changed the second you showed up to work covered in bruises.’

My eyebrows rise of their own accord as my brain struggles to wrap around his words. How could he have seen my bruises? I’ve covered them up daily. I only showed them to Ellis today, and the door to my office was closed. I go over the last week searching for anything, and my mind takes me to the beach. I swear to fuck that the feeling of being watched is a legit sixth sense.

On Sunday, I rode my bike down to Santa Cruz. It’s a good hour’s drive from Palo Alto, and it helped me zone out and forget about all the crazy threatening to swallow me whole. I packed running clothes in my panniers and stripped down once I got to the trails. I knew some of my bruises would be on display due to the tank top I wore, but because I wasn’t jogging local trails before ending at the beach, I figured the chances of me running into anyone who might recognize me were slim. But as I sat on the beach with my toes buried in the sand after my run, my skin prickled so much that I distinctly remember looking over my shoulder multiple times. With each pass, no one stuck out, but I never did shake the feeling of being watched.

‘It was you,’ I say accusingly before adding, ‘You followed me to the beach.’

‘It’s always been me,’ he says, his tone detached and void of any emotion.

‘What?’ My eyes dart between his before adding, ‘What the hell does that mean?’

‘Get in the car, Vivian.’

‘No, I’m not going anywhere with you. I told you we were just friends, nothing has changed, and—’

He cuts me off, grabbing the wrists of my flailing hands. ‘Wrong; we became more than just friends the second you let me play with that pretty pussy. Now get in the car, Vi.’

The nerve men have. If a guy accepted a blowjob from some rando at the bar that then started trailing him, he calls her a psycho-crazy bitch, but god forbid a woman does it to a man. Apparently, if we accept sexual favors, it means we want more. Fuck that. ‘You’re not going to start bossing me around. I’m not letting you drive Ellis’s car.’

Releasing my hands, he runs his fingers through his hair and lets out a growl of frustration before yelling, ‘This is exactly why I’m doing this, Vi.’ He throws his arms wide and adds, ‘Look around. He’s got you so messed up that you’re not even paying attention to your surroundings. This isn’t you.’

I turn my head slightly, not wanting to be obvious and inadvertently give him more leg to stand on than he already has. I know he’s right. One of the Lykos men has consumed my every other thought outside of opening Blush since I returned. Then, out of my peripheral, his gray Jeep Wrangler catches my eye. ‘Tate, I need to go home,’ I say in a low tone as I try to calmly de-escalate the situation.

But this is Tatum. He doesn’t back down. ‘Who said I wasn’t taking you home?’

I should have known there would be no going back after crossing the line with him. He’s extra. Has been since the day I met him. It is hard to argue with the sweet boy next door, who seems to only be looking out for your best interest. The only problem is that we are not neighbors, and I am not a girl who needs protecting. ‘I need to take the car home,’ I say more assertively as I step around him, but the next thing I know, I’m being thrown over his shoulders like a sack of potatoes.

‘Put me down,’ I demand as I swat his muscular ass that is now right in front of my face. Seriously, a man’s ass in faded denim is perfection.

Before I can argue further, I’m being placed in the passenger seat and strapped in. When I go to grab the seatbelt, he says, ‘Don’t test me, Vi. Not tonight. You don’t know what you’re dealing with.’

Something about the vexation in his tone gives me pause, because he’s right. I genuinely don’t know what I’m dealing with when it comes to Tatum Carroway, but I can’t help but feel like his words were not solely about him. He wastes no time getting to his seat and starting up the Jeep, which is easy, considering he has the doors off. For some reason, the doors being off eases the small amount of panic currently threatening to rise. If I really had to get away, I could drop and roll out of a moving vehicle. Not ideal, but an option nonetheless.

As we pull out of the garage, he must sense the direction of my thoughts because he says, ‘Don’t even think about it, Vivian. I would never hurt you.’

His words somehow settle the small amount of doubt that crept up. While I have no reason to trust him, for whatever reason, I believe them. ‘What is this, Tate? Where are you taking me?’

I study him as he drives, one hand resting on the wheel and the other on the stick. Sure, I’ve seen him at the gym wearing few clothes more than once. His body is covered in tats, but I never stared. Every glance was stolen and discreet, but now that I’m in his car and he’s taking me against my will, I’m taking my fill. My eyes don’t know where to focus first. On his arm closest to me, I can see shaded beams of light with clouds, two doves flying toward the sun, and a bed of roses resting beneath. I’m sure the piece is sentimental because a full rendering of the Blessed Mother Mary is on the same forearm. The art must be an homage to his parents.

His muscles flex in his arm as he shifts to get on the highway, breaking my thoughts, and he notices. Our eyes briefly meet, the direction of my thoughts more than evident. If his clenched jaw isn’t confirmation enough that the piece I was thoroughly dissecting isn’t something he cares to discuss right now, his sudden readiness to answer my questions is.

‘Let’s start with your first question. This is me throwing my hat in the ring. We were never going to be ‘just friends.’ You friend-zoned me because it made you feel more comfortable, but we both know there was always more.’

He glances my way, holding my gaze long enough to confirm what he believes is his rightness in that statement before returning his eyes to the road, which pisses me off. ‘God, you’re infuriating,’ I shout as I pull my hair to one side to keep it from blowing like crazy and whipping in my face while I attempt to put him in his place. ‘I don’t know how I didn’t see it from the start. Like every other guy, you’re just trying to swoop in and lay claim when we’re not looking for it. This is exactly why I’m building the gym, so women can work on themselves without the prying, manipulative eyes of a man trying to get laid. Just because I talked to you didn’t mean I wanted to sleep with you.’

I watch as he rolls his lips, and his hand grips the steering wheel a little bit tighter than necessary. Good. I hope I did piss him off. How dare he accuse me of asking for this? I face forward, feeling somewhat satisfied with my rant, before finding myself irritated that he’s holding back. If I want to settle anything, we need to get it all out now. Lay everything on the table so we can move on. So I say, ‘Spit it out, Tate. It’s clear you have something to say.’

‘So you didn’t want to watch me play with my dick the other day in your office?’

‘That was different,’ I immediately snap.

‘Oh, yeah? And why is that, Vi? It’s okay for you to look and not me? You’re overthinking this. You like me; I like you. Period. There is no ring on your finger. Me and you are happening,’ he asserts as if I do not get a say in the matter.

‘You don’t get to decide that. I have a boyfriend who I have no plans of leaving.’

I’d been so caught up in our exchange that I hadn’t noticed he had, in fact, been telling me the truth when he said he was taking me home. Shocker. Pulling over, he parks across the street from Ellis’s building and says, ‘I’m done watching you choose wrong. He’s not a good man, Vi.’

My brow furrows as I search his expression and I ask, ‘And how would you know that?’

“I want to know who put those bruises on you,” he growls out as his hand tightens around the steering wheel before he finds some level of composure and adds, “I want to demand it, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say Ellis is not the one who put them on you. Because here’s the thing, the girl I know wouldn’t stay with a man who hurt her.”

The words to refute his statement are right on the tip of my tongue. I want to tell him that the bruises are not from the type of pain he thinks they are. That no man touched me in a way that I didn’t allow. In fact, I more than enjoyed earning every one of them, but they spark another thought: would I stay with a man who hurt me? Because Sebastian has been nothing but cruel since the day I met him, yet I allow him to take from me, use me.

When I don’t give him anything, he says, “If I had to guess, the man who put those marks on your body is still walking, and therein lies the problem, Vi. I’m not going anywhere.”

Avoiding that emotional rabbit hole, I refocus the conversation on a crucial topic I’m not sure he has given much thought to. ‘You realize Ellis is going to come for you now. If the way he stared you down this afternoon wasn’t warning enough, you just launched a missile, and Tate, you and I both know you don’t have his resources to win.’

I watch as he sets his jaw and keeps his eyes trained out the front window and not on me. My words may sound condescending, but I don’t mean them to be. I’m not knocking Tate for not having tons of money like Ellis; I’m simply stating the facts. People like Tate don’t win against men like him. Say I did choose Tate. Men with Ellis’s reach would go to great lengths to ensure the option no longer existed. ‘You don’t want to be on his radar.’

‘Ellis Lykos knows exactly who I am…’ he all but seethes before adding, ‘And I’m not scared, but he should be. Now get out of the car, Vi.’

I watch him for a few more seconds as I try to wrap my mind around all that has been said, but I know nothing will be settled tonight. We are too far apart. He said his piece, and while I said mine, he needs time to accept that my feelings for him don’t matter; they don’t change anything. I care for Tatum, but I want Ellis more. So, without another word, I exit the car and hope I can at least save Tate from himself.