What a Rich Man Wants by Billie Summer (self help books to read .txt) 📗

It had almost been a week since Eric had left on his all important business trip and boy! hadn’t she been tense waiting for the other shoe to drop. Knowing he should be home within the next few days. Cat had let the answering machine take all her calls to her landline and had blocked his number on her mobile, not that Eric had been calling her much during his business of late. Part of the reason Eric probably didn’t call her as much in the beginning was because she tried to play it really cool on the phone at the start of their relationship ..... affair, trying not to put to many demands on him. Cat had wanted to seem independent and not at all clingy but she soon wish that she hadn’t played it so cool because Eric had stopped calling her, unless he had something to tell her. Work had been really tough this week, hard to concentrate. She only had tomorrow to get through before the weekend started and after this shitty week she thought about going to visit Jack and Dawn in Cowra and hoping she got the chance to catch up with Julie who within in weeks of Cat starting her new roll, Julie and David had ended up moving home and she really missed spending time with her friends. Cat was also really excited for them, Julie had found out last month she was pregnant and was over the moon, total not planned baby, she said but not an unwanted surprise. She would really look forward to seeing them both and share in their happiness, they were going to make great parents. Cat got off the bus after work that afternoon, having had a car removal company pick up the BMW last week and drop it off at Eric’s country home. she now used the bus to get to and from work. She had told herself that a clean break was a clean break, no matter how much she missed the car. Walking the few blocks to her townhouse took only a few minutes and as she was putting her key in the lock, her mobile phone started to ring, she tensed, like she did every time it rang. Swearing she swung her bag around digging her mobile phone out, trying to get it before the ringer stopped, seeing Jo’s office extension number on the screen she answered straight away, putting the phone to her ear and opened the front door at the same time stepping into the lounge room of the townhouse saying into the phone “ Hi Jo! why are you working so late? Don’t you have a new husband waiting for you at home?”  The other end was quiet for a few moments, making Cat frown “Jo! Are you there, hon?” “Yes I’m here, Cat I think Eric might be on the way to your place” Cat could hear Jo take a deep breath before adding “I gave him your letter Cat, I can tell you he wasn’t happy with what he read, he got  a thunderous expression on his face and stormed out of here swearing. Please take care I haven’t seen him this angry before. Do you want me to come over?” Wow she hadn’t thought he would be so angry, Cat started to feel sick and she didn’t know if she was ready to face him yet.... did she need Jo here? She had to face the music sooner or later, maybe sooner than she had first thought but it was always a possibility he would return sooner than first thought and that’s why she had become even more tense as the week went on. Saying into the phone “No Jo, thank you for the offer but I don’t need you here, I’m ok please go home to your husband, Eric will not hurt me. I do have one question though! How long ago did he leave the office?” Jo replied quickly “Just before I called you, I only waited long enough for the elevator doors to close before picking up the phone to call you. I wanted you to have enough warning in case.” Joanna really did sound worried. Cat looked at her watch so she had 20 to 25 minutes until he got here, depending how fast he drove and traffic, if here was the direction he was coming, she tried to reassure Jo on the other end of the phone  “I promise Eric has never and will never physically hurt me.” Laughing bitterly she added “Eric wars with his words not his fists, as you should know seeing him in action at the office.” Jo replied still sounding uneasy  “If your sure.....” her sentence just fading off  “Honestly, I’m good! go home.” Cat said her goodbyes and thanked Joanna for letting her know, then hung up the phone..... Shit! Shit! Shit! Cat looked around her quickly locked and dead bolted the front door deciding in that moment she needed more time before facing Eric. Not because she was worried about what he might do to her, Cat real concern was her ability to say no if he touched her. It was something she wasn’t willing to put to the test, not yet anyway. Soon but today she was going to be a coward. She pulled the shade at the front window down and then headed straight for her bedroom as far away from the front door as possible. Distance she thought not a lot but enough for now closing the bedroom door after she entered. She looked around her white bedroom with antique furniture and trim items in a teal colour here and there to add some drama to the room, it help brake up the white coverlet and throw pillows, the room wasn’t huge but it fit a queen size bed and two bed side tables and with the large built in wardrobe she really didn’t need anymore room living by herself The en-suite was the only other door in the room and she didn’t know if she should lock herself in there before Eric arrived... because let’s be honest, here was exactly where he was heading. Cat gave a sharp laugh, why was she worried like she had told Jo, Eric wouldn’t hurt her. He never had physically, the hurt he had Inflicted had never come from any bodily harm. Just her own stupidity. Sit on side of her bed, she laid back and stared at the white ceiling thinking back....... When she had first met Eric she had been a twenty two year old virgin totally not the norm in today’s world. She had stayed away from men and sex because Cat had a very colourful history with her birth mother, who had bounced from one man to another including a string of one night stands never thinking of the damage she was doing to her young daughter only caring about her own satisfaction and enjoyment. Some of the men.... most of them, hadn’t been very nice using physical and verbal abuse on them both. One had even tried to sexually assault, her after her mother had passed out drunk on the couch, Cat wasn’t even sure her mother would have cared. Instead she had to look after herself, Cat had bitten the man then kicked him in the nuts before running out the door to a neighbours, the neighbour had been so worried about Cat safety, she had called social services and after investigating her mother and current boyfriend they had removed her from her mothers care, Cat’s life had then truely started. After the experiences of her past Cat hadn’t really gotten over her trust in men and had stayed away. Plus the values Jack and Dawn had then installed in her.  For weeks after their first meeting Eric kept trying to get her to have dinner with him, in these few weeks Cat had found out some things she liked about him, his humour, his boyish grin and laughter when he was teasing his mother, how he knew everyone’s first name who worked for him no matter their position. In a company this size that was impressive. “So are you going to have dinner with me tonight?” Eric asked out of the blue as she was about to leave one afternoon. Looking up in surprise she started to say “l don’t think.....” Eric interrupted her before she could say more “I’m going to keep asking Cat, so you might as well say yes, I’ll wear you down eventually.”  “I...” Cat started to give a negative answer again, then stopped. It was only a dinner date not sex, so she said instead “only if you never ask me again,” Eric leaned against the office door frame looking her straight in the eyes before saying “Never is a very long time, but alright I’ll agree only if you don’t want me to ask you out again.” Cat laughed at that replying “ Are you always so sure of yourself? And how would you know if I did want you to ask me out again?” “Trust me Cat I would know.” Then adding “ Yes, I’m always sure of myself.” He said in a serious tone. Cat wrote down her address handing it over “here is where I live, what time?” She asked  “Seven o’clock” Cat said one last thing before she left “ Eric, I really don’t want to see my face in the paper tomorrow if it ‘s all the same to you, can we go somewhere low key.” Surprising Eric with her request........ She sat up on the bed when she heard someone try and push a key into the lock, when it didn’t work the door was rattled, then even from her bedroom she heard Eric swear when the key didn’t work. “Cat open the door, sweetheart.” Eric knocked on the door. Cat didn’t move or make a sound just waited, moments later “Kitty, come on open the door.” Cat heard him rattle the door again. She got up from the bed, walking to her bedroom door, opening the door slowly she took one step into the lounge room so she could watch the front door making sure that Eric wasn’t getting in with all the noise he was making, silly really with the work the locksmith had done. “Katherine! stop acting like a child and open this door now!” Eric was getting angrier with every passing second. He couldn’t truly be sure she was here anyway because there was no car in the driveway. Cat again said nothing, silence being the best way to deal with Eric right now. Cat turned away from the front door and reentered her bedroom, laying down she curled into a tight ball and did the one thing she said she wouldn’t do anymore..... cried, the first sob rocked Cat’s body before Eric even turned away from her front door.