Legally bound, p.5
Legally Bound, page 5
“What do you need, love?” he asked, reaching his hand across the table to put it atop hers.
“How can you tell if someone is a bad friend?”
Oof. She could never ask the easy questions, could she?
“Hey, y’all, can I get you something to drink?”
Saved by the server gave Freddy some time to think while they put in their orders for both drinks and food since they were ready. Once the server had bustled away again, he met Morgan’s gaze.
“Why do you ask?”
In the beginning, her questions had often been very general, but over time, they’d shifted to become more specific. She hadn’t had any questions about friendship in a while, not since she’d made her first set. Granted, they weren’t the friends Freddy might have chosen for her, but they’d done her good in terms of confidence.
“I’ve been spending a lot of time with Sam and Noelle,” she replied, fiddling with the edges of her napkin.
“I know,” he said, smiling encouragingly and hiding his wince. Her second set of friends wasn’t much better than her first. The majority of her first group of friends were heavily disliked by a lot of the other Stronghold submissives. Carolyn and Marissa were catty and often mean, but Amy was a total sweetheart, so when they’d pulled Morgan into their little group, he’d done his best to counteract Carolyn and Marissa’s influence while encouraging her to spend as much time as possible with Amy.
Lately, she’d been hanging around a lot with Sam and Noelle. Sam, otherwise known as Mistress Samantha when she was feeling her ‘top’ side—as a switch, she both topped and bottomed—was wonderful, but Noelle… he was pretty sure Noelle was going to be more bad news. So far, she’d been on her best behavior at the club, but he could feel tension gathering there like an oncoming storm.
“I don’t think Noelle likes us very much. She does all the things you said a friend is supposed to do, but sometimes…” Morgan sighed. “I don’t know how to describe it. It’s probably nothing.”
“It’s not nothing,” Freddy replied immediately. Morgan was showing good instincts, and he wanted her to trust them. This was definitely growth since she had a tendency to take situations and people exactly as they appeared and not look any deeper. “You should trust yourself. What does your gut say about Noelle?”
“That she’s not very nice. Which is odd because she’s nicer than Carolyn and Marissa are sometimes. All the things she says are nice, but…” Morgan made a face. “It’s… I don’t know. She says the right things, but somehow, sometimes, the way she says it makes it sound like she’s saying something else. I don’t think she likes me very much.”
“Honey, I’m not sure she likes anyone very much,” he said truthfully.
“But Sam likes her. So do Amy, Carolyn, and Marissa.”
Ah, which explained why Morgan was second-guessing herself. She was still learning a lot about friendships and people, so since all her other friends liked Noelle was making her question her intuition. What Freddy found fascinating was she had figured out Noelle but still seemed perfectly happy being friends with Carolyn and Marissa.
“So far, she’s been a good friend to them, so there’s no reason not to, I guess. That or maybe they don’t get the same vibe from her that you do, but that doesn’t mean your vibe is wrong.” In fact, he was pretty sure Morgan was one hundred percent right in this instance, but he also knew he was biased.
He was friends with Noelle’s old roommate, and while Noelle hadn’t been able to evict Iris, she’d done the next best thing and ended their lease without giving Iris any warning. From what Freddy had gleaned, Noelle hadn’t liked that Iris had made new friends. She seemed insecure to the extreme and incredibly selfish.
She was being given a chance at Stronghold, at Iris’ insistence, because Iris was too damn nice.
Freddy often considered himself the protector of the submissives, and he would absolutely protect Noelle from an importuning Dom, but he also wanted to protect the other subs from her.
“She seems very unhappy,” Morgan said after a moment. “It’s sad.”
“You can’t make her happy,” Freddy reminded her gently. “She has to do that on her own.”
“I’ll just hang out with her when the others are there. I don’t have to hang out with her on my own just because we’re part of the same group of friends, right?”
“Right.” The arrival of the drinks caused a minor distraction, then he asked the question he thought he’d be discussing today. “How is it living with Brian?”
“Ma— I mean, Brian,” Morgan quickly corrected herself before calling him ‘Master Brian,’ “has been great. He’s very careful. Too careful sometimes. I’m not going to fall apart just because he has a preference or asks me to do something around the house.” Her brow furrowed grumpily as she took a sip of her water.
“Has he asked you to do anything around the house?” He could understand why Brian would want to be careful with that. Morgan had basically been a twenty-four-seven sex slave and housekeeper to her last master, but she also wanted to do some things for herself.
“No.” She huffed the word out, obviously annoyed. “He keeps trying to do things for me. I am not his babygirl. And if I was his babygirl, I should at least be getting some sex out of it.”
“Uh… here you go.” The server had appeared at their table at exactly the wrong time and was blushing hotly. Putting their food in front of them, she quickly fled.
Morgan looked a bit contrite.
“Oops,” she mouthed, giving Freddy a little shrug. He shook with the effort to hold back his laughter.
“We’ll give her a really good tip,” he reassured her, grinning widely.
She smiled back, her shoulders relaxing.
“That’s the other nice thing about going out with you. You don’t insist on paying like I don’t have my own money or something.” She stabbed at her salad with a fork, spearing the lettuce as though she had something against it.
Interesting. Rebellious Morgan was out in full force today, and personally, Freddy was happy to see it. When Morgan had first joined Stronghold, they’d come up with a ‘cover story’ for her so she could fit in better with the other submissives and because she hadn’t been sure she wanted everyone to know her past. Unfortunately, because she also came with a ton of baggage—not to mention misconceptions about the lifestyle—she’d managed to alienate some of the other submissives.
It hadn’t helped that the Doms were constantly fussing over her and giving her attention the other subs didn’t understand.
Freddy was still annoyed he hadn’t been consulted about that decision. He could have told the Doms it was a bad idea to have all the Dominants clued in and none of the submissives. It set Morgan apart right from the beginning. She’d had some really odd and stereotyped ideas about Doms and subs, thanks to how sheltered she’d been and had been trained to be competitive with other women.
The first time she’d met him and found out he was a sub, she’d assumed he was gay, and when he’d corrected her and told her he was bisexual and preferred women, she’d been utterly confused. It didn’t matter what year it was; in Morgan’s world, women submitted to men.
She’d also made a lot of assumptions about who was what based on their appearances.
Talk about a hot mess. She’d gone along with it because the Doms told her it was the best thing for her. Much more well-intentioned than the previous assholes she’d been involved with but with disastrous results. Freddy was still doing clean-up around that, although Morgan was slowly becoming more open about her past with the other submissives. She wanted to tell them on her own terms, though, which meant there were quite a few who were still in the dark.
“Has Brian been paying for everything?” he asked mildly, doing his best to keep his opinions out of his voice.
“He’s trying to.” Morgan’s eyes glinted and her chin lifted. “I’m going grocery shopping after this. I took the list off the fridge this morning.”
“Good for you. I’m proud of you.”
“Thank you.” She beamed at him. “So… enough about me. How was your New Year’s Eve?”
She hadn’t been at the Marquis party, none of her group of friends had other than Sam, who had come with Q. Caroline threw a New Year’s Eve party every year with her husband, and Morgan had gone to that instead.
“It was great. I actually met someone.” He grinned as Morgan perked up. Despite everything she’d been through, she still believed in love and happy endings. “She’s a friend of Julie’s, and she’s amazing.”
“Is she a member?”
“No, but I think she’s interested in becoming one. Either way, we exchanged numbers.”
“Oooh, have you called her yet?” Morgan’s interest was partly on his behalf and partly because she was still trying to figure out ‘the rules’ of dating.
“No, it’s too soon. Plus, I tend to try to let the Dominant take the lead for the first call.” He grinned at her.
“So, they get all the control over contact?” she asked thoughtfully.
“No.” Freddy shook his head. “I still get to decide whether I pick up or call them back. If they make me wait too long, I might decide they weren’t worth my time, but I would probably answer to find out why it took them so long to call.”
“How long is too long?”
“As a rule of thumb? I know there are some people who think you’re supposed to wait three days. After three days, I start to feel a little insulted.” He chuckled.
“That’s what I read,” Morgan said, nodding happily. She’d been reading a lot of romance blogs lately, trying to figure out the ‘rules.’ Freddy kept stressing to her not to take them too seriously, but as long as she was enjoying herself, he wasn’t going to tell her not to read them. She was probably getting a better idea of what a healthy relationship could look like from the blogs than she had from her parents or her ex.
“I prefer it when people contact me sooner rather than later. If she calls tonight, I’ll be thrilled.” Mentally, he crossed his fingers. With his anticipated afternoon, he would love something nice to end the day, like a call from Mistress Camille.
Even if all she wanted to do was scene again.
They’d been so well matched, he would happily scene with her, though, truthfully, he was already hoping for more.
7
Camille
Today was going to be terrible.
Her year had ended pretty well, and if she counted those early hours of the morning with Freddy, then it had started out pretty great, but everything had been pretty much downhill from there.
Yesterday’s visit with her mom had been fine too, actually. It was work that had frustrated her. Going through the Alexanders’ prenup with a fine-tooth comb had given her a headache. Whoever had given the Alexanders the advice to sign it had been a total hack. More than one section was unclear.
Granted, things could go either way, but she wasn’t sure it would go Mrs. Alexander’s way, even though she was likely the more deserving party.
You’re not supposed to be thinking that way. Mr. Alexander is your client, not her. You’re supposed to be saving him as much money as possible… so that he can pay it all to Donaldson and some of it will come to you.
Right.
Sometimes, she felt like this job was sucking the soul right out of her body.
At least she had something to look forward to for the end of the day. Her reward to herself for getting through this afternoon was calling Freddy. During her lunch hour, she’d also sent in the application for membership to Stronghold and Marquis. In some small way, she was claiming some of herself back.
“Ugh, this is going to be such a waste of time.” Nicholas Alexander III, all six feet of him, was slouched in one of the conference room chairs. At first glance, he was handsome enough. In his late forties, he still kept himself in shape. He had dark brown eyes and matching dark brown hair sprinkled with just a touch of salt. At second glance, it was impossible to miss the petulant set of his mouth and the arrogant unhappiness emanating from him like a bad smell.
Well, it was impossible for her to miss. She knew Rachel, the receptionist who had escorted him into the conference room, hadn’t noticed his flaws. She had been all smiles and giggles as Mr. Alexander smirked and flirted with her.
Thankfully, he didn’t try that with Camille.
“Do you want me to call the meeting off?” she asked. Mrs. Alexander was due any minute, along with her counsel from Addison, O’Shane, and Smith, and Alfred Johan. AOS, as they were known, had a reputation for representing women like Mrs. Alexander, who had ended up married to rich assholes who didn’t want to pay their alimony.
They made a lot of money making those rich assholes pay out the ass.
Personally, Camille would like to see nothing more. Professionally, it was her job to thwart their intentions. According to him, she was supposed to keep him from having to pay anything at all, which was why they were going to court.
She was pretty sure he’d hoped Mrs. Alexander wouldn’t be able to find representation or that she’d decide it wasn’t worth going to court and would just quietly go on her way. Camille had tried to explain to him that wasn’t going to happen as soon as she knew who Mrs. Alexander’s representation was, but Mr. Alexander had dug in his heels, and now here they were.
Which meant trying her best, knowing if she succeeded, she was going to screw some poor woman out of money she was rightfully owed, or her own client, and therefore, her firm, were going to be unhappy with her. This morning, she’d figured out the reason the partners had passed Mr. Alexander off to her. They knew the chances of winning were fifty-fifty, and they didn’t want him unhappy with any of them.
Worried it would ruin their golf game or something.
“No,” Mr. Alexander said after a long minute, straightening in his seat and tugging his suit jacket down so he didn’t look so rumpled. “No, I’m not going to let that bitch get her hands on any of my money. Not when she’s trying to fucking leave me.”
Camille really hoped Mrs. Alexander actually was a bitch. Then she wouldn’t feel so bad about having to represent this asshole. She didn’t bother to point out the reason his wife would get his money was because of the prenup he’d signed.
There was a knock on the door before she could respond. It opened and Rachel smiled as she walked in. The knock had just been to give them a quick heads up that the other side had arrived.
“Right this way. Ms. Sinclair and Mr. Alexander are waiting for you.”
To Rachel’s credit, she didn’t give Mr. Alexander one of her simpering smiles. She just stepped out of the way to let the people behind her walk in.
Halfway to getting to her feet, while Mr. Alexander rudely remained seated beside her, Camille froze when she saw who was walking through the door.
Freddy.
Blue eyes widened, and his gait only faltered for a moment before he moved to the side, holding out his hand for the woman behind him to take it like the gentleman he was. With his blond hair perfectly styled, he was wearing a salmon pink suit that fit him perfectly. Next to her, Mr. Alexander made a derogatory noise even before his wife walked into the room, and she realized it was at the sight of Freddy in pink.
Mr. Alexander was an asshole bigot among other things, and when he saw another man in pink, his toxic masculinity couldn’t take it.
Which was likely deliberate on Freddy’s part.
Finally standing straight, Camille’s gaze dropped to the woman who was clutching Freddy’s hand while doing her best to pretend she wasn’t. Petite with auburn hair, wide hazel eyes, and stick thin other than her breasts, she looked like she was about to have a panic attack or flee the room. When Mr. Alexander made another derogatory noise, she flinched.
No, she was definitely not the snobbish bitch Camille had been hoping for, unless she was also an incredible actress. She looked exactly like what Camille had hoped she wasn’t—a woman who had been beaten down by years of marriage to a self-involved, extremely entitled, abusive dickhead.
I am on the wrong side of the table.
The worst part was looking across and seeing Freddy on the right side, wondering what he thought of her.
They were both just doing their jobs, but… The way he looked at her with his carefully neutral expression… it made her chest ache. She wanted to scream that she wasn’t this person.
But she couldn’t, because she was.
“Mrs. Alexander, Mr. Johan.” She managed not to choke on the words, gathering up the little pieces of herself and going into her carefully rehearsed speech. “Thank you for coming to meet us today.”
Freddy opened his mouth, then closed it and gave her a short nod before pulling out a chair for Mrs. Alexander. The woman sat down, placing her purse on her lap and clutching it tightly now that she no longer had Freddy’s hand for support. Her gaze came to rest on the middle of the table while beside Camille, Mr. Alexander glared across it.
“Can I get you anything to drink?” Rachel asked. “Tea, coffee, water?”
“A water for each of us would be great, thank you,” Freddy said after a moment, giving her a smile. Rachel beamed back at him. Mrs. Alexander kept staring at the center of the table. Mr. Alexander glared.
It was excruciatingly awkward as Rachel retrieved two water bottles from the mini fridge in complete silence. As Rachel left, Camille cleared her throat and lifted her chin, readying herself for the opening sally, but it was already too late. As soon as Mrs. Alexander reached for her water bottle, her husband struck.
“Really, Brittany? He’s the best you can do?” Mr. Alexander sneered, looking between Mrs. Alexander and Freddy. “I thought you must have spread your legs to get a lawyer, but he clearly—”
