Sexting My Ex’s Dad (Forbidden Silver Foxes)

28. Stella

28

STELLA

M y thoughts drift back to Elio, like a moth helplessly drawn to the flame. I’m completely and utterly helpless. I can’t shake the memory of our last encounter—his touch, his scent, the way he’d binded me up and screwed me right on his desk.

I never thought I’d be into something like that – then again, I never thought I’d sleep with him again either.

I’m constantly surprising myself, and I’m beginning to wonder whether it’s a good thing or bad.

Why hasn’t he called? It’s been a couple days now, and I should have gotten something, right? A call…a text. It shouldn’t matter to me, but it does. It’s consuming my thoughts.

“Hey, Stella,” Marnie’s voice cuts through the haze. She leans against the edge of my desk, frowning. “You’ve been staring at that same file for the past ten minutes. What’s going on?”

I blink, forcing my attention back to the present. The words on the screen blur together, taunting me with their refusal to make sense. “Sorry, just...lost in thought.”

So lost in thought that I’d somehow forgotten I was still at work.

“Clearly,” Marnie says, her brows knitting in concern. “Look, you’ve been off your game lately, and it’s not like you. If something’s bothering you, you know you can talk to me, right?”

Has it really been noticeable? I mean I knew my thoughts kept drifting back to Elio – ever since we slept together and he hasn’t reached out, but I didn’t know it was affecting me that bad.

I nod, touched by her concern. But opening up about Elio feels too raw, and I’m not ready to face the possibility that I might have made some mistake. Instead, I force a smile and lie. “Honestly, I’m fine. Just a bit tired, I guess.”

“Stella,” she sighs, clearly unconvinced. “If you can’t focus, maybe you should go home. Take some time for yourself.” Marnie places a gentle hand on my shoulder.

Home is just going to give me more freedom to think about him . But, I doubt she wants me on her clock without my head in the game…I can see how that would be a waste of money. And Marnie doesn’t like to waste money. It’s something I like about her.

“Maybe you’re right,” I admit, swallowing the lump in my throat. The truth is, I don’t trust myself to concentrate on work right now. Elio—his silence, his sudden withdrawal—has become a splinter in my mind, burrowing deeper with each passing moment.

How do we have sex like that, and then he falls off the face of the Earth?

Or maybe it’s on me for thinking I was any different than his other girls. That first time, he’d practically told me I wasn’t. So why did I think that changed just because I’d made myself easy enough for him to stick it in a second time?

“Alright,” Marnie says softly, giving me a reassuring squeeze. “And when you come back next week, you’d better have your wits back!”

“I promise,” I reply, laughing.

The drive home is a blur, the road slick, but I do manage to finally make it home.

I drop my purse onto the kitchen counter and pour myself a glass of wine; one thing becomes crystal clear: there was never anything real between Elio and I.

And how could there have been when he was my ex’s dad? And even though he’s sexy as sin, it doesn’t change the fact that he’s twice my age and probably doesn’t want some college dropout as a romantic partner. It’s not like I could blame him when he’d been upfront from the beginning.

He’d wanted sex, and when he’d gotten it - he probably moved on to the next.

I needed to do the same, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t get the closure I wanted.

I stride over to my laptop. It’s time for me to take back control.

I open a new email, my fingers hovering over the keyboard for a moment before the words begin to flow.

My heart races quicker with every sentence, but I don’t stop until I’ve typed the final lines. For a moment, I simply stare at the screen, the cursor blinking in time with my heartbeat. This is it –

Dear Mr. Lombardi,

After these most recent events, and the lack of communication, I have been brought to the conclusion that it would be best for whatever ‘relationship’, if I can call it that, between the two of us cease to exist. I’m sure that you can understand given the circumstances, that it would be best that neither of us ever think about the very forgettable encounters that occurred between us and refrain from ever contacting one another again. I hope you have a good life.

From, Stella.

“Goodbye, Elio,” I whisper.

With a deep breath, I hit send, watching as the email disappears into the void.