Chapter One
Finally. My own place.
Cali Charleston looked around the tiny apartment. The move had taken less than an hour, from start to finish, including drive time from her cousin’s house. She didn’t have much, mostly clothes, a bed, and a secondhand couch.
Fucking asshole.
That would teach her to trust someone. What’d it get her?
A big fat nothing, after nearly eight years of being faithful and loyal.
She slumped onto the couch and Baxter, her two-year-old cat, jumped into her lap. She’d adopted the black-and-white tuxedo when he was eight weeks old.
Ironically, from the animal shelter where she now worked.
“Hey, buddy. At least you can’t screw around on me. You’re neutered. I should have neutered Shane.”
On the other hand, she’d gotten custody of all their mutual friends, who were outraged on her behalf over Shane’s betrayal. They’d tried to offer her assistance, wanted to help her furnish her new place, all of that.
Other than accepting help moving the bed and the couch, which she’d picked up at a thrift shop for twenty-five bucks, she’d declined.
Cali was one to stand on her own feet. Always had been. Yes, she’d accepted the spare bedroom at her cousin’s house for six months, until she’d saved up enough money to pay the deposit, first, and last month’s rent on the tiny apartment, and knew she could make enough every month at her new job to cover her expenses.
But her cousin Ellen’s baby was due in a few weeks. While they hadn’t asked her to move out, Cali knew she couldn’t stay there.
Hope you’re enjoying Miami, asshole.
She knew she shouldn’t wish revenge on the guy, but she hoped Shane’s new squeeze gave him something an antibiotic couldn’t take care of.
Like maybe an exit wound from a large-caliber firearm.
Eight damn years, doing his accounting and bookkeeping for his business, and now all she had was a job at the animal shelter. Fortunately, they were able to pay her a little more than just a kennel assistant’s pay rate, since they needed a new webmaster and she could do other office duties. So it wasn’t just cleaning cages and caring for animals.
It was a job, and she knew she was damn lucky to have one in the first place.
Still, it stung.
Moving on…
Her best friend, Essie, and Essie’s men, had helped with the short move. One trip with all their vehicles, with plenty of room to spare.
Note to self, next time I get a boyfriend, all the shit stays in my name.
She’d originally moved into Shane’s house with him. She’d met him through friends at school. At the time, she’d been sharing an apartment with a friend.
Shane was the kind of guy she’d always dreamed about having. In business for himself with a landscaping and lawn care business, there was no shortage of work for him in the Sarasota area. He was self-employed, making decent money, and one of those sees it, wants it, gets it type of men that melted her panties.
And he’d melted them right off her body, all right.
Along with her brain.
When he’d asked her to quit her design job and come to work for him as his bookkeeper and office manager, of course she’d done it. They were making better money anyway.
Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Not so stupid for him.
I need a shower.
She shared her bathroom with Baxter’s litter pan. Essie, Josh, Mark, and Ted had talked Cali into coming with them that night to dinner and then to Venture, the BDSM club they were all members of. She’d wanted to save the money, but Essie wouldn’t take no for an answer and told Cali that dinner and her entry fee were on them tonight. To consider it a housewarming gift since Cali wouldn’t let them buy her any fancy luxuries, like dishes, utensils, or pots and pans.
Or groceries.
As Cali stripped and stepped under the spray, she thought about coincidences. How funny it was she had reached this point.
Funny of the sad and strange variety, not funny ha-ha.
Wasn’t anything the ha-ha kind of funny about her life now.
Two years ago, Shane had discovered the BDSM club and wanted to go. It didn’t take Cali long to figure out she was a masochist, but in no way, shape, or form was she a submissive.
When Shane dropped the bomb on Cali six months earlier that he was selling the business and moving to Miami to be with his new slave, going to work for her father at a car dealership over there, Essie had been Cali’s first call.
Unfortunately, the law had been on Shane’s side. She could have fought to stay there, but he was going to move in a week, and she couldn’t afford to keep the house by herself. Not to mention she didn’t have the money to pay for a lawyer. If she’d fought it, Shane threatened to drag things out until she was absolutely broke. Nothing was in Cali’s name, except her car. Fortunately, it was paid off.