Chapter 139

I dropped out of school on my sixteenth birthday, as soon as I legally could without question, and never looked back at further education. I played the game and hid what was done to me, what I was being used for. I learned how to make men want me and act as though I liked what they were doing. I learned how to make them come quicker and I became a queen of seduction and sex, made it an art form in a way.

By the age of fourteen, I had lost count of how many men had used me for their pleasure and games, it was just a way of life and some sort of sad acceptance of what I was. I stopped feeling. It stopped being something degrading and wrong and became an act with a means to an end. I learned to lie, hide and manipulate from a very young age, accepted that I was a prostitute no matter how I tried to pretty it up and my days were spent screwing men and being exposed to indescribable acts on my body and soul.

I died a little every second in the early days and never turned to anyone to rescue me, as I knew that was never going to be a reality. There are no knights to come sweep you away from the crap I lived through. You need to rely on you and you alone and that is how you survive in life.

I let myself rely on Alexi and that was stupid. It was my undoing. I broke my own rules of not letting someone close or letting someone else call the shots. I flipped my entire gameplay on its head for him and didn’t even try in any way after my first hurdle to play him to meet my own ends. He was better at it, colder, smarter, and crueller, and I knew I was no match for him. He was a different kind of breed to most men, and I let him lead me by the nose.

I only have myself to blame. I was too weak to deny his touch, too pathetic to keep my heart and head out of this and too in awe of his extreme lack of emotion to try and manipulate him.

Drunk beyond belief and crying myself raw all I can think about is Alexi, that complete arse of a man and how he can discard me this way, treat me this way. For all that I was in my past and all that I am capable of, I did my best to be loyal and fair when it came to him. I never once played him or tried to stab him in the back. I went against all I have been in my life, the person I made to survive ... all for him.

I knew my limits and what side my bread was buttered with the chance he gave me. Safety, security and shelter, that’s what I had by toeing the line in his world and it was all I have ever wanted. So I made sure I didn’t screw it up by being foolish.

Except I was stupid, but not in the way I have been in the past. I was dumb enough to think he meant it when he said sex meant nothing and would not interfere. He lied, he got what he wanted and it changed everything between us. He took everything from me for absolutely nothing connected to the job I did. I excelled in every way at running that club, and he chose to be a petty arsehole and put sex over business. He is the one who wanted sex without effect, and he is the one who let it destroy all he gave me. I deserve an answer for all of that, a reason he changed all the rules. I did all he asked and yet he gets to decide my fate and throw me aside.

Why does he get to choose my future? Why does he get to use me and drop me so easily? Why does he get to walk away as though I meant nothing without any sort of explanation? Why does he get to take away my chance at a safe existence?

He said sex wouldn’t matter, and yet all it did was change everything and push him to despise me. I want to confront him and be angry about all of this, yet I also want that night too. I want that feeling of being safe, of being home finally. He showed me a possibility of another life, in another way. He showed me what loving someone could feel like and it left its mark on me and now I am ruined. He made me love him.

I know that he doesn’t want me near him anymore and I know it’s partly my fault. I made it too obvious that I cared, clung to him. Maybe I was needy or overly obvious about how I felt and it suffocated him. I triggered him, I disobeyed him and I found ways to rile him when I know what he’s like. I told myself so many times to just close my mouth and nod in obedience and yet failed to do so.

Stop it Camilla!

You are justifying his behaviour, accepting his torment because you are weak. Stop being like her, stop accepting his treatment because he has twisted your head to feel like you deserve it. Stop excusing what he is doing to you. He has made you believe it’s what you deserve, and you are so far beyond that. You deserve more. You deserve an ounce of respect for what you did for him!