That made me bristle. “I’m not lying. It was technically not sex.”
“Well, whatever you guys did made things worse. And at that point, I wasn’t sure if I could even fire the guy.”
When I gave Preston another blank stare, he shook his head. “Sexual harassment lawsuit. I’m sure you’re smart enough to figure it out.”
“He touched me first.”
“For god’s sake, Eli.” Preston’s frustration was starting to rise again. “Between the comments you made, the way you behaved, and the panties bet, no court in the world would find in our favor.”
Oh.
Preston kept going. “Roman was angry and hurting when he got here and everything I let happen made it worse. And did you know he didn’t even get a talk about why we make new employees sit through a shoot? For some reason, he thought that was just special torture for him and completely inappropriate.”
“Shit, Eli. He probably thought you guys were nuts. I almost didn’t take the job until you explained why you’d had me see a shoot.” Reece’s voice was shocked. “And if you started off trying to get a response out of him, then he would have had a reason to fight back.”
“I got a response, alright. He thought I was a whore who wasn’t worth the time of day to him.”
“Can you blame him?” Houston finally broke in. “He’s a Dom, not a robot. He’d been hurt by someone he trusted and shared very personal things with. Then Roman gets to a new job, and there’s what he thinks is the same type of guy front and center. It doesn’t matter that he wasn’t seeing everything. You never gave him a chance to see the real you.”
“I was called more foul things by that man than anyone I’ve ever met outside the company. These walls were where I felt safe, and he came in with his attitude and judgment, and I was expected to sit back and be nice? Bullshit.” Maybe I should have read those articles, but I wasn’t going to pretend to be someone else because he had baggage and an attitude. “He shouldn’t have taken the job.”
“He probably needed the money.”
“Maybe, but that’s not the point. I don’t have to change my life to make someone else happy. My business, not his. If he was uncomfortable, he should have said something and walked away. Maybe we could have talked it out right then. But with the attitude and the anger, what did he expect me to do? Was I supposed to back off and be this sweet little thing that would make him happy? Hell, even letting him take control didn’t make him happy.”
And that was probably oversharing, but I was past caring.
“That’s because you screwed that one up royally. I came down to check on the nose and arrived just in time for the dramatic ending.” Preston rolled his eyes dramatically. “You got up afterwhateveryou’d done and made it sound like you were more worried about the mess you guys had made and what I would think than about him. Duh.”
Oh.
“Hey, I was pretty lost. When I found my bearings, I was tangled in panties that were entirely too dirty to go back in the collection, and the first thing that occurred to me was that we couldn’t post the pictures on the site, they were too hot. Then he lost his marbles.”
“He thought you only cared about the pictures and stuff and not him.” Preston was looking at me like I was an idiot.
Okay, looking back on it, maybe I could see what Preston was saying. “Roman should have said something.”
Reece broke in. “You two scream at each other, you don’t communicate.”
So maybe he had a point too.
“He’s gone, and the drama is over. It’s not like we were dating.” One jerk-off session did not make a relationship.
“But you wanted one. That’s the problem. You two felt strongly about one another, and the only way you’d let it out was with anger. But now that the anger is gone, all you have left are the softer emotions you were denying.” Houston’s quiet words made me want to throw something at him.
“It’s over.” We all needed to see that and move on. “There’s nothing left to pick up and try to put back together. Hell, there wasn’t anything there to begin with.” As much as I hated to admit it, that was the truth.
“He hates brats and anybody he considers an attention whore, and I’m not willing to change for anyone.” No man was worth that. “I’ve lived that lie, and I won’t go back to it.”
Then, knowing there was nothing else to say, I got up and walked away. I wasn’t going to change for a man who hated everything I loved about myself.
Chapter 11
Roman
“Unfortunately, there is no way to get around it.” I’d tried to figure out one. But every path led me back to the same point.
Calling Eli.
