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A Game Of Temptation 64
LAURA“No fucking way.”“Yes fucking way.”“There is no fucking way that happened. Please tell me you’re making this up.”“Girl, does that sound like something I’d make up?”“You’re telling me he had a fiancée the entire time?” Disbelief had Bailey’s voice rising octaves higher.The irony wasn’t lost on me that the massage we’d booked to relax had evolved into story-time for Bailey, which was stressing the hell out of her. “Even I am still finding it hard to believe,” Balery piped in from her table. “And I’ve known for like a week now.”Our massage therapists were for sure getting earfuls and I wasn’t sure I cared if they talked about it amongst themselves later. Let the world know what a class A cheat and player Alex was. I was probably saving some innocent woman by talking about it. Who knew?“But how?” Bailey asked. The confusion was obvious in her tone. “From all what Balery has said, it sounds like this man was truly in love with you.”I shrugged as much as I could without maki
Last Updated : 2024-12-04A Game Of Temptation 65
LAURAAlex pushed to his feet immediately he saw me, dusting off the back of his jeans. It was as though an invisible force glued my feet to the ground like lead because I suddenly couldn’t move. I simply stood there with my purse hanging from one hand and the bag carrying my burger and fries hanging from the other, staring at himOh, I was still holding the pepper spray, by the way. The hallway was not very lit up, but my eyes clung to as much of him as I could see. Wearing a black hoodie and blue broken in jeans, he appeared leaner than he’d been the last time I saw him. The hoodie seemed to hang on his frame and the jeans sagged a little. Still, it didn’t take away from his good looks at all because he was still the most beautiful man I had ever seen. Evidence of that being my heart which was going one thousand miles per minute. This could not be good for the baby. I was not sure how long we stood there staring at each other. Could have been seconds, minutes or even hours, but
Last Updated : 2024-12-04A Game Of Temptation 66
ALEX “My God, he looks so unbearably pathetic.” “Of course he does. He lost the love of his life.” “You mean the same woman he’s been lying to?” “Will you shut up with that?” “What? It’s the truth.” I stared up at the ceiling as my friends let themselves into the house, listening to Drew and Jake argue. Jake, who was usually the emotionally unavailable one out of all of us, was defending me against Drew. That said a lot. One had to have hit an all time low to have Jake standing up for them. I didn’t move from my spot on the couch. Actually, I wasn’t sure I’d left this couch since I got home yesterday. After leaving Laura’s feeling all shades of dejected, I’d come straight here, collapsed on it and hadn’t left it since apart from that one time I went to the bathroom. Three faces appeared above me, two concerned and one scowling. “Hey, man.” Jack gave me a sympathetic smile. “How are you holding up?” “Not at all, apparently,” Drew answered him. And while Drew’s response
Last Updated : 2024-12-07A Game Of Temptation 67
LAURA Ice cream + Good TV = Therapy. At least it used to be therapy. I wasn’t very sure it was working right now. I hadn’t possessed the will to go to work today. Hadn’t been able to summon an atom of strength. So I’d decided to stay home of course, which ended up being even worse because I was left to my own very loud, very chaotic thoughts. No matter how badly I tried, I couldn’t stop thinking about yesterday. About Alex specifically, not the encounter with his fiancée. I wanted to cave in so bad. Anytime I closed my eyes, I saw his pleading face and pain filled eyes. I had never wanted to pick up my phone and call someone so bad. My longing was only held in check by fear. A deep rooted fear of what it would do to me if he broke my heart again. Now, the stakes were higher. I did not only have myself to think of, I also had to think of my unborn child. What if I let him in again only for him to…I don’t know, hurt me in a away I’d never recover from or what if he just upp
Last Updated : 2024-12-09A Game Of Temptation 68
LAURA By chaos, I meant a thousand roses. They were everywhere. Scattered all over the inside of my store and even the store front. They hadn’t been there when Drew and I had come in, which meant whoever had done this, had to have done it when I was occupied with Drew by the hangers. “How on earth did these get here?” I whisper-shouted to Bailey, my voice filled with horror. There were customers in the shop and I didn’t know what the hell was going on but I definitely didn’t want it posing an inconvenience to them. What if they left horrible reviews on the website? Oh my God. Bailey, whom I’d expected to share the same sentiment as me, merely stood there smiling at me. Was she insane? What could she possibly find funny about any of this? Some customers had already paused their shopping to curiously stare at us. Without uttering a word, she gently gripped my shoulders and turned me around until I was facing the entrance of the store where I saw Alex standing there, carrying
Last Updated : 2024-12-10A Game Of Temptation 69
ALEX Drew’s plan had worked. I could hardly believe it. The magnitude of joy and relief currently coursing through my body was sufficient enough to have me levitating off the car seat, but by some miracle, I remained sitting. Pretty sure the only thing keeping me grounded was the woman sitting beside me. She’d forgiven me. Laura forgave me. I’d gone so long without her, it seemed implausible that she was actually here. That she’d entered my car willingly and I hadn’t even had to come up with an elaborate excuse to get her in. I knew I should probably stop turning her way every quarter of a second like a fucking creep and keep my focus on the road, where it should be, but I couldn’t help it. Hell, I was half scared she was going to jump out of the car the second I stopped and never look back. Or that this was another one of the painfully vivid dreams of her that haunted me at night. The ride to her place was quiet. Several times, I found myself wanting to say something to
Last Updated : 2024-12-10A Game Of Temptation Epilogue.
LAURA “She’s still doing it, isn’t she?” “Yeah.” “She’s so goddamn stubborn. She takes after her father, that one.” Voices from my mother’s kitchen drifted to me where I stood by her dining table, setting it. My lips curled in amusement because they probably thought I couldn’t hear them—or maybe they knew I could hear them but didn’t consider me a big enough threat to have them lowering their voices. After all, I was a woman who couldn’t get from point A to B without waddling. I believed I looked like a penguin, but Alex thought it was cute. The same Alex who was currently listening to my mother gossip and contributing every now and then, while he assisted her in making lunch. Like this was something he did everyday. “You shouldn’t be on your feet, Laura,” Mom called from the kitchen, speaking directly to me this time. “Go sit down.” I rolled my eyes. Had she grown tired of gossiping? “Someone has to set the table.” “I’ll do it,” Alex volunteered for what had to
Last Updated : 2024-12-10A Game Of Temptation 01
LAURANo, no, no.Please no.I jumped back to avoid the bouquet falling in my direction, but it still ended up right at my feet. My heart slammed against my ribcage as I stared at the bouquet lying by my feet like it was a ticking time bomb, ready to go off any second.This could not be happening to me right now.Why couldn’t it have landed next to one of the other bridesmaids who looked more than happy to catch it? Why did it have to land on me out of all of them?Maybe because my best friend, the bride of the day, had thrown it right at me and even though I’d stepped out of the way, it still somehow managed to hit its target.Shit.My eyes darted around and I took in the number of eyes on me, watching me strangely, probably wondering what the hell was wrong with me. Well, they could judge me if they wanted. They weren’t the ones that had gotten their fates sealed by a fucking bouquet of all things.Grudgingly, just to get their eyes off me, I bent and picked it up, holding it stiffl
Last Updated : 2023-04-06
Latest chapter
A Game Of Temptation Epilogue.
LAURA “She’s still doing it, isn’t she?” “Yeah.” “She’s so goddamn stubborn. She takes after her father, that one.” Voices from my mother’s kitchen drifted to me where I stood by her dining table, setting it. My lips curled in amusement because they probably thought I couldn’t hear them—or maybe they knew I could hear them but didn’t consider me a big enough threat to have them lowering their voices. After all, I was a woman who couldn’t get from point A to B without waddling. I believed I looked like a penguin, but Alex thought it was cute. The same Alex who was currently listening to my mother gossip and contributing every now and then, while he assisted her in making lunch. Like this was something he did everyday. “You shouldn’t be on your feet, Laura,” Mom called from the kitchen, speaking directly to me this time. “Go sit down.” I rolled my eyes. Had she grown tired of gossiping? “Someone has to set the table.” “I’ll do it,” Alex volunteered for what had to
A Game Of Temptation 69
ALEX Drew’s plan had worked. I could hardly believe it. The magnitude of joy and relief currently coursing through my body was sufficient enough to have me levitating off the car seat, but by some miracle, I remained sitting. Pretty sure the only thing keeping me grounded was the woman sitting beside me. She’d forgiven me. Laura forgave me. I’d gone so long without her, it seemed implausible that she was actually here. That she’d entered my car willingly and I hadn’t even had to come up with an elaborate excuse to get her in. I knew I should probably stop turning her way every quarter of a second like a fucking creep and keep my focus on the road, where it should be, but I couldn’t help it. Hell, I was half scared she was going to jump out of the car the second I stopped and never look back. Or that this was another one of the painfully vivid dreams of her that haunted me at night. The ride to her place was quiet. Several times, I found myself wanting to say something to
A Game Of Temptation 68
LAURA By chaos, I meant a thousand roses. They were everywhere. Scattered all over the inside of my store and even the store front. They hadn’t been there when Drew and I had come in, which meant whoever had done this, had to have done it when I was occupied with Drew by the hangers. “How on earth did these get here?” I whisper-shouted to Bailey, my voice filled with horror. There were customers in the shop and I didn’t know what the hell was going on but I definitely didn’t want it posing an inconvenience to them. What if they left horrible reviews on the website? Oh my God. Bailey, whom I’d expected to share the same sentiment as me, merely stood there smiling at me. Was she insane? What could she possibly find funny about any of this? Some customers had already paused their shopping to curiously stare at us. Without uttering a word, she gently gripped my shoulders and turned me around until I was facing the entrance of the store where I saw Alex standing there, carrying
A Game Of Temptation 67
LAURA Ice cream + Good TV = Therapy. At least it used to be therapy. I wasn’t very sure it was working right now. I hadn’t possessed the will to go to work today. Hadn’t been able to summon an atom of strength. So I’d decided to stay home of course, which ended up being even worse because I was left to my own very loud, very chaotic thoughts. No matter how badly I tried, I couldn’t stop thinking about yesterday. About Alex specifically, not the encounter with his fiancée. I wanted to cave in so bad. Anytime I closed my eyes, I saw his pleading face and pain filled eyes. I had never wanted to pick up my phone and call someone so bad. My longing was only held in check by fear. A deep rooted fear of what it would do to me if he broke my heart again. Now, the stakes were higher. I did not only have myself to think of, I also had to think of my unborn child. What if I let him in again only for him to…I don’t know, hurt me in a away I’d never recover from or what if he just upp
A Game Of Temptation 66
ALEX “My God, he looks so unbearably pathetic.” “Of course he does. He lost the love of his life.” “You mean the same woman he’s been lying to?” “Will you shut up with that?” “What? It’s the truth.” I stared up at the ceiling as my friends let themselves into the house, listening to Drew and Jake argue. Jake, who was usually the emotionally unavailable one out of all of us, was defending me against Drew. That said a lot. One had to have hit an all time low to have Jake standing up for them. I didn’t move from my spot on the couch. Actually, I wasn’t sure I’d left this couch since I got home yesterday. After leaving Laura’s feeling all shades of dejected, I’d come straight here, collapsed on it and hadn’t left it since apart from that one time I went to the bathroom. Three faces appeared above me, two concerned and one scowling. “Hey, man.” Jack gave me a sympathetic smile. “How are you holding up?” “Not at all, apparently,” Drew answered him. And while Drew’s response
A Game Of Temptation 65
LAURAAlex pushed to his feet immediately he saw me, dusting off the back of his jeans. It was as though an invisible force glued my feet to the ground like lead because I suddenly couldn’t move. I simply stood there with my purse hanging from one hand and the bag carrying my burger and fries hanging from the other, staring at himOh, I was still holding the pepper spray, by the way. The hallway was not very lit up, but my eyes clung to as much of him as I could see. Wearing a black hoodie and blue broken in jeans, he appeared leaner than he’d been the last time I saw him. The hoodie seemed to hang on his frame and the jeans sagged a little. Still, it didn’t take away from his good looks at all because he was still the most beautiful man I had ever seen. Evidence of that being my heart which was going one thousand miles per minute. This could not be good for the baby. I was not sure how long we stood there staring at each other. Could have been seconds, minutes or even hours, but
A Game Of Temptation 64
LAURA“No fucking way.”“Yes fucking way.”“There is no fucking way that happened. Please tell me you’re making this up.”“Girl, does that sound like something I’d make up?”“You’re telling me he had a fiancée the entire time?” Disbelief had Bailey’s voice rising octaves higher.The irony wasn’t lost on me that the massage we’d booked to relax had evolved into story-time for Bailey, which was stressing the hell out of her. “Even I am still finding it hard to believe,” Balery piped in from her table. “And I’ve known for like a week now.”Our massage therapists were for sure getting earfuls and I wasn’t sure I cared if they talked about it amongst themselves later. Let the world know what a class A cheat and player Alex was. I was probably saving some innocent woman by talking about it. Who knew?“But how?” Bailey asked. The confusion was obvious in her tone. “From all what Balery has said, it sounds like this man was truly in love with you.”I shrugged as much as I could without maki
A Game Of Temptation 63
ALEXI hung back for a bit, desperately trying to get myself—and my breathing—under control before I followed Laura into the car, but it was all fucking pointless because the second I joined her, I lost my composure. When she gave me her address, I wanted to beg her to keep talking because I’d missed her. I’d missed her voice, I’d missed her scent, I’d missed how I felt when I was with her. Hell, I’d missed the pleasure of merely looking at her. But I couldn’t even tell her that now because I’d lost the right to. Every single second of every single minute of every single hour of every single day since she’d left me, I’d thought of her. I’d told myself that even if she wouldn’t forgive me right away, it would appease something in me if I could just see her. Maybe then my heart wouldn’t feel so fucking hollow. Oh, how terribly wrong I was. It fucking killed me that she was so close to me yet she might as well have been a thousand miles away because I couldn’t touch her. Looking at
A Game Of Temptation 62
LAURA One second Derrick had a blade to my face and the next, his body was flying backwards and slamming into the bathroom door. There was an audible thud and a loud pained grunt as he landed on his ass on the ground, the knife skidding on the floor until it stopped a few feet away from him. My breaths sawing in and out of my chest, I almost burst into tears when I saw the person who’d burst into the room.Hunter. Standing in the center of the room, he was big, intimidating, and he looked so royally pissed, even I shrank back against the chair I was sitting on. I’d never appreciated his size more than I did in that moment because seeing Derrick’s slumped form and then Hunter’s, I knew there was no way the former could face off against the latter. Which meant my unborn baby and I were going to get out of here alive. His eyes made one quick sweep of me. After confirming that I was unscathed—at least physically, he tu
