Chapter 2

Crystal Pierson sighed in frustration as she walked away from a second day at her new job at University of Daemon in St. Nicholas' gym. She was also frustrated by St. Nicholas’ heat and fanned her face with the gym brochure as she crossed the parking lot to her car.

The job was just not for her but she needed it. She helped people sign up to the gym and welcomed customers each time they walked in--the worst kind of job for a shy person. She hoped she’d get used to it before she got fired like what happened at her last job at Fetchmart, one of the biggest shopping chains in the world. She'd just been a cashier but the mistakes she made eventually earned her the boot. She wasn't starting this new job well either. She wasn’t much of a people person and had a bad case of nerves and that made it hard to interact with others.

Crystal’s thoughts were interrupted by loud music bumping by. The rap song with lyrics along the lines ‘Photoshop, Photoshop, girl give me that Photoshop’ made Crystal confirm that music was officially dead. The sound got louder, vibrating the ground Crystal walked on. She suddenly heard a loud while she looked over her shoulder, wondering what obnoxious human being would be playing such annoying, degrading music at deafening levels. She spotted a huge gray asparagus pick-up truck driving by with a muscular arm hanging out the door and a dirty blond hair bobbing to the music. She rolled her eyes, not even sparing the culprit another glance. She’d seen that car on campus and it was one of the many that drove around playing either noisy southern rap or country music. She imagined it belonged to one of those preppy guys that thought they owned the place.

Glad to be in her car, Crystal turned the air on and checked her phone out of habit like she always did before driving. Her heart fluttered and a shiver went through her when she saw who sent her a text.

Hey babe

Crystal rolled her eyes and threw her phone to the passenger's seat. Never in a million years did she think she’d be in the predicament that she was in.

But time has a crafty way of making a fool of us all. One never saw what was coming.

All these thoughts ran through Crystal’s mind when another text came. She fumed at her phone, telling herself she wasn't going to answer it. Then she helplessly gave in and read the text.

Talk to me…

She let out an annoyed sound for nearly swooning. Just as Crystal debated whether to call him or not, her phone began to ring and it was him. During their small argument through texts the previous night, Crystal told him what time she’d be off work today and was surprised he remembered. She wanted to ignore him but she also wanted him to know how upset she was with him.

“Hello?” she greeted as dryly as possible even though her heart was racing a hundred miles a minute. It's like he was the only person that could and would ever have this effect on her.

“Hey. What’s up?” Vincent's smooth voice came through the phone.

Crystal closed her eyes as her senses reacted strongly to his voice. The effect this man had on her was enormous.

Normally she’d just let him slide because she was happy enough just to receive his call, but she needed him so much the previous night to help calm her nerves about the new job only for him to ignore her.

“Nothing other than the fact that you blew me off last night,” she began hesitantly. She was normally not one to tell anyone let alone Vincent off, but she wanted to have a stand in something. She had to be pushed really far to react and he’d gone too far.“I thought we were supposed to hang out? You’re rarely here and mom works today and you know how that is.”

He sighed heavily. “I know. I’m sorry. Something came up.”

“Like what?”

Crystal felt his hesitation and she knew it was because he hated being questioned, what man did? He also wasn’t used to it from Crystal because she’d only questioned him once before. She nearly backed down and told him to never mind, but she tried her best to stand her ground and waited for a response. Vincent remained quiet as though waiting for her to renege, but when she didn’t, he said, “My friends were hosting some party and made me go.”

“Oh…I hope you had fun,” she said bitterly. These were friends he’d never introduced her to.

“Of course I didn’t,” he said miserably. “I drunk texted you the whole time, remember? I wanted to be with you but my friends aren’t as understanding as you are. They’d have bugged me about it for weeks.”

“I guess," she said stubbornly, refusing to fully give in.

“Come on, Crystal. Don’t be like that.”

“I’m not,” she said, holding on to her last ounce of strength for dear life. He was already starting to work his charm on her.

“What you doing tonight?”

Crystal’s cheeks became warm. The last time he asked her that she ended up letting him do things to her that still made her blush. She wasn’t used to screaming so loud out of pleasure without any inhibitions. The thought alone made her feel guilty as much as it excited her.

“Nothing…” she said sheepishly.

“I need to see you.”

Crystal blushed profusely. “Vince…”

“Don’t call me Vince, Crystal. You know what that does to me, especially when there’s nothing I can do about it,” he muttered in deep sexual frustration.

“Stop Vincent. We’ve already discussed this. I’m not doing anything until I’m sure we’re official and you said we can’t do anything till marriage.”

“Hmm, I could always do what I did last time…” he said in a thoughtfully sultry tone that heated Crystal up.

Crystal nearly shrunk into her blue work shirt.

“Stop it Vince. You make me too shy...” And horny, she was about to add, but was too scared to. She didn’t want him to think she was a whore but ever since he went down on her a month ago Crystal had become a horn ball and a half. That was as far as they’d ever gone and they were both slowly losing their resolve. They wanted each other badly and talk of being ‘official’ and ‘celibate’ was becoming useless.

‘God I love this girl,’ he muttered under his breath to himself with a heavy sigh and Crystal tried her hardest not to grin from ear to ear. She was not used to feeling so special or being the center of someone’s attention. Already she was forgetting why she was annoyed with him in the first place.

"Stop…I'm blushing too much…"

Vincent laughed. “You are shy regardless of what I make you do.” He paused. “Could you meet me at Palm Inn? I have something for you.”

The strange feeling she’d been having lately in regards to their relationship seeped back to her; that feeling of demoralization. She tried to ignore the debasing feeling but in truth she was getting tired of ‘meeting him at the usual spot’. Why couldn’t they just meet at normal places? For so long she accepted being kept a secret, because she generally had to live her life under the radar, but that strange feeling was taking over her being so much.

Instead of doing the right, mature thing, she regressed to that young girl that was always afraid of making others upset and always trying to please people. So she didn’t tell him what was truly bothering her. She just wanted to be touched and dotted over by him, so she foolishly went along with him.

“Okay.”

“Hey,” he called out haltingly before she hung up.

“Hmm?”

“I love you, okay? Don’t doubt that for a second. K got to go." He hang up. r32;
Crystal grinned giddily and that debasing feeling deep within her started to fade away. How could she deny him in the first place? This was true love, was it not? She finally had the one thing she never thought she would.

She felt like, with this relationship, she was finally moving on and having what most women her age would call a normal life.

Even though their relationship was anything but normal.

Crystal was getting ready to leave when she received a call from her job.

“Hello?”

“Crystal dear, have you left yet?” her manager's anxious voice came through

“No actually I’m still in the parking lot.”

"Yes!" she yelped in excitement. “Could you come and help me? I have to go do some stuff upstairs and Jenna isn't here yet. I'll let you clock back in."

"Sure!" As much as she hated these jobs, she needed the money now more than ever.

She was thankful for the blast of cold air that met her once she was back inside the gym.

"Thank you so much. I'll be right back," Vicky said as Crystal relieved her.

It always got a bit slow before the five o'clock rush, so Crystal had her back to the entrance as she picked up some freshly folded hand towels for the customers. When she turned to place them on the grey counters at the front desk, she saw a tall, broad shouldered man almost walking through the turnstile without checking in.

“Um, excuse me," she called out to the back of his head were gold and bronze locks peaked from under a black fitted cap. That couldn't have been the same guy that was hollering at her in his truck, could it? When he turned and she noted the tribal tattoo on his arm, she concluded that it was him.

He didn't stop and Crystal panicked because if he went through without her scanning him in, her manager would review the security cameras and see that she easily let someone through. She did that on her second day and already got called out for it, told that if she made it a habit, she would get a warning.

She cleared her throat and tried to say as loudly as possible, “Excuse me!”

The man stopped and Crystal held her breath. Just the previous day she received a cursing out from one of these frat boy looking guys and she didn't like them. She just wasn't amused with anything about their package at all.

She'd seen his face a couple of times and just from one look she could already tell she didn't like him. She remembered him as one of the jocks in highschool and those were the worst. She was almost biased with how much she despised that kind.

“Oh, was that little voice yours? I wasn’t sure if I heard something or not," he smirked as he sauntered back.

Crystal was caught off guard by the instant friendliness in his eyes that she lost her train of thought but quickly recovered. The friendly eyes didn't mean he wasn't making fun of her voice.

"There a problem?" he asked.

“Um, do you have a log in card?”

He lifted his eyebrows and inclined his head forward as he stepped closer. He hadn't heard her. Trying not to fidget nervously, Crystal repeated the question.

“Oh, not with me.” He started backing up again towards the turnstile. “But it’s cool.”

She couldn’t believe his audacity, then again, she could. He did walk in like he owned the place, so why not continue acting like he did? Normally Crystal let things pass her by, but this would cost her job, so she mustered as much guts as she could and asserted.

“N-No it’s not. You can’t go in without one.”

He smiled reassuringly. “Trust me, it’s fine.”

She clenched her teeth from spewing out all the names she wanted to call him. She was so annoyed with guys like him acting like they could do as they pleased, and she'd seen a lot of them since she started working here. They acted like the rules bent for them. She couldn't stand people who didn't go by the book. She resented them actually.

For very good reasons.

“I’m sorry, but you can’t go in.”

He stopped. Crystal waited for him to roll his eyes and burst out of the gym the way most of his kind did when they were told no. Instead, he smirked in amusement. Then he walked to the counter in front of where Crystal stood and spoke sarcastically out the side of his mouth, “Someone’s serious about their job.”

There it was: the debasing she would have expected from him. Crystal’s annoyed expression turned into one looking at him like he was crazy as he got comfortable and folded his arms on the counter in front of her. Crystal would have stared at his nice looking arms if she wasn’t so nervous and annoyed.

“So, how do you plan to stop me Miss,” his eyes trailed down unhurriedly to her chest where her name tag was. “Crystal? Never heard anyone with that name before.” He looked up at her with a sweet smile that she found to be extremely irritating. “Pretty.”

“The name is not that unique and lying won’t get you in,” she nearly hissed, her blood boiling. That condescending tone, that overconfidence, she hated it!

His eyes lifted in surprise and he laughed. “In where Crys? Where is your head really at?”

Crystal was stunned. She opened her mouth to speak but no sound came out. Her face was a furnace and she wanted to hide. How uncouth of him.

“Did you go to Granick’s High?" he asked suddenly as he tilted his head and looked her over inquiringly. "You look very familiar.”

He looked familiar too, but she never looked people in the eye too long to remember many of them. He might have gone to her high school, but what did she know? She was so isolated she could barely remember many of the faces she attended high school with. That was five long years ago anyway.

She shifted uncomfortably then added, “I’m afraid I just can’t let you in, sir.”

“The name’s Seth.”

Crystal could have said ‘I really don’t give a damn’ but didn’t. Seth’s widening smirk showed he read it all over her face. She wanted to slap that very smirk off. Who did he think he was? Why couldn’t he just go away? She wasn’t going to let him in.

“Seth?!" Suddenly a voice echoed throughout the large lobby and they turned to find a slender woman in UND gym’s custom blue employee shirt and khakis. “Hey!”

“Hey Vicky what’s up?” he greeted her.

"Not much how are you today?"

“Good. Can’t get through though.” He motioned towards Crystal and the mortified look on Vicky's face made Crystal feel like she'd broken probably the biggest rule of all time.

“Oh, I'm so sorry. She’s new," She said in embarrassment and turned to Crystal, saying hurriedly. "He’s fine.”

“But he doesn’t—“

“It’s okay." She cut her off and impatiently waved him over. "Come on in Seth”

By the tone in Vicky's voice Crystal knew no more questions were to be asked and she simply nodded before murmuring an apology to him.

He smirked as he stepped back. “I told you to trust me Crys.”

She tried not to show her annoyance and didn’t like that dumb nickname he thought he had the authority of giving her. He sounded so sure of himself he was sickening.

When he was finally out of earshot, Vicky spoke to Crystal in hushed tones. “He’s allowed to walk in and out as he pleases. No questions.”

“But you said no one--”

“He’s not just anyone. Don't you know who Seth Alexandre is?"

Crystal stared at her manager blankly. Was she supposed to know? She was sure she'd heard the name before, she didn’t know but she honestly didn't care either. Maybe they did go to high school together. He did look like one of those typical high school jock douche bags that used to run in packs terrorizing the school. She couldn't tell them apart honestly. They were all carbon copies of each other with no individuality.

"His great great great grandfather built this school and his parents basically own this gym. He can pretty much do whatever he wants, when he wants, on this property. Don’t cause him anymore trouble next time, okay?”

Crystal nodded but waited till her manager was back in her office to roll her eyes.

So he was a good case of the privileged and the entitled. How original.

She just hoped she never crossed paths with him again.

People like him were the worst. They had no boundaries and thought the world belonged to them often not caring what their actions did to others.

She knew that was a pretty deep assessment of someone she’d just met, but she’d learned a long time ago, the hard way, that it was best to profile people upon first meeting them.

It could save you a lot of trouble in the end.