Page 76 of Knots About You
That earned me a little snort laugh.
‘She said that you were lying about everything between us. The way we met, the things we do. That you did the same to her. That it’s all a ploy to make women do what you want.’ Claire’s sniff interspersed her words.
Biting down the rage that bubbled up, I ran a thumb over Claire’s hand. Trying to ground myself. Because this disconnect is exactly what Becky would have wanted.
‘She’s lying to you.’
‘But she wasn’t angry, or mean. She was so…nice.’
‘Even vipers can resist biting if it aids them. Trust me, Becky has no good intentions here.’ I slid to the floor, kneeling in front of Claire and taking both of her hands in mine. ‘Do you trust me? Or did you?’
‘Yes,’ she breathed.
‘Do you trust Becky?’
‘I don’t know Becky.’
She had a point.
I squeezed her hands. ‘Right.’
I pulled my phone out of my pocket and found the folder in the cloud. Emails. Texts. Images. It was all there like a hidden bruise.
‘Becky made me believe she loved the power games. But I think she really thought she could win me over and then mould me into the perfect man for her. It wasn’t me she wanted, but the idea of me.’
Claire swallowed and looked at the phone I was tightly gripping.
‘The last six months, she wasn’t really into any of it. Not even regular sex. Which was fine. But she’d use my kinks to get me to comply with what she wanted.If you do X, I’ll do Y.Birthdays. Anniversaries. Making me wear something I didn’t want to. I told myself that was a compromise. Turns out the only person compromising was me.’
Claire made a small face on my behalf. ‘Well, that sucks.’
‘I know. And I just went with it.’ I said. ‘Then I found out she’d cheated. Had been cheating for a long time. But had wanted to wait out our relationship until I married, so she could try and get half of the house. Or the distillery. She’d bragged about it one drunken night to Eilidh. What I didn’t know was that the week before, she’d filmed and screenshotted a particularly kinky scene between us for leverage. We had the row to end rows.’
I clicked on an email. ‘And when I didn’t come after her, she sent this.’
She read quickly, her eyes narrowing.
‘I never coerced her,’ I said, meeting Claire’s eyes. ‘If she said no, we stopped. Half the time, she didn’t care either way. I tried to make it mean something by trying harder, when I should’ve ended it sooner. I didn’t. That’s on me.’
Claire’s shoulders dropped as she finished reading the blackmail email. Thankfully, one I’d kept cropped without the images there. Claire shouldn’t have to see me with someone else, no matter how long before.
‘How did you meet?’ There was still a hint of hesitation in her voice.
‘Karaoke night. She and Eilidh were friends at the private school a few towns over. A few of them met up at the Tipsy Otter to celebrate the beginning of their thirties. Kenny’s cousin had food poisoning, and I got drafted in to pull pints. Badly, by the way. All head and no body. Becky bought me drinks, and I ended up going to her B’n’B. And then she just kind of never left.’
Claire traced my hand with her thumb as she handed my phone back. ‘So you didn’t rescue her and seduce her like you did with me?’
‘Did I seduce you?’ I asked.
‘Hell yeah, you did. Very well, might I add.’ A glint returned to her eyes before a seed of doubt returned. ‘Becky made me feel small about the things we do.’
‘We’re adults. We have fun. Who is she to tell us it’s wrong?’ I said. ‘Kink gets a bad rep by people who don’t understand it, but it’s just a way to heighten pleasure.’
‘Then why tell me any of this at all?’ she muttered. ‘She can’t think you’ll take her back after what she’s done.’
‘Maybe it’s not about me,’ I said, penny dropping like an anvil. ‘She’s been seen talking to Marty. It might be about creating a crack that he can slip into.’
Claire flopped backwards like a tragic seal. ‘I hate that I let her in my head.’
