Fuck.

I really fucked it up this time.

I returned to my hotel room and raided the mini bar. I needed a drink. I needed several drinks to get over this feeling.

Tonight was supposed to be aimed at one thing and one thing alone—acquiring Elsie as an employee. Instead, we had sex. We broke a ten year hiatus in our relationship by breaking through all personal boundaries.

We grew up together. She used to be my best friend. Now I’d seen her naked. I’d been inside her. I came on her face!

I drowned myself in whisky after whisky. This was bad. Really bad. I’d ruined all chances of convincing Elsie to join my team. I could just call up Ralph and tell him it was a no-go. He was good at his job. He’d find someone else who’d be perfect for the team. I could just leave Chicago tomorrow and forget this even happened!

I wanted her though.

Now that I’d seen Elsie again, I knew she was the one we needed in our team. She was strong-willed and determined and would get the job done. I was hungry for success. We would make a formidable team. If Elsie and I started working together, we would be unstoppable.

I stared out of the window of my hotel room. Chicago at night looked beautiful. All these years and I had no idea she’d been living here. Not like I tried looking for her. Once I left Madison Green, I never looked back. I pushed Elsie to the back of my head and forced myself to stop thinking about her.

It was the right thing to do.

I was drunk within the hour. My head was swimming with thoughts of her long chestnut hair in my hands. Her small, delicious mouth on my cock, the tip of her tongue wreaking havoc on my body. All those teenage years of fantasizing about my best friend had come true tonight.

I didn’t have to imagine Elsie naked anymore. I’d seen the swell of her breasts. I knew the exact shade of her rosy nipples. I now knew what her mouth tasted like and the sound she made when she came.

She hated me.

Like she had every right to. But that wasn’t the point of tonight. I was supposed to be on a mission and I ruined it. I shouldn’t have gone back to her apartment. I shouldn’t have kissed her.

I wasn’t lying when I told her we could never be friends again. It was over between us. Ten years was long enough for us to drift apart. I didn’t want to be friends with her. That was the reason I left Spring Green. To get away from Elsie.

But I’d hoped that we could at least work together. That I would be able to convince her to give up her job and come work for me.

I considered calling Ralph, but I was too drunk to do it.

Instead, I loosened my tie and sank down to the carpeted floor. The glass of whisky dangled from my right hand. My eyes were bleary and I could feel my throat burning with the alcohol.

I was seeing images of my childhood. Elsie living next door.

Our families were so different. Elsie and Mona grew up in a wholesome, loving family, with parents who were attentive and worked hard and gave their children the best childhood they could afford. My family, on the other hand, was the polar opposite.

I was the only child, thankfully, of parents who were dysfunctional and had screaming matches every night. My dad was an alcoholic and violent—towards my mother and me. My mom had a different boyfriend every few weeks and didn’t try and hide it from us. The TV was constantly on in our home, my dad was always on the couch. Neither of them worked and I was forced to skip dinner every other night.

Most of the kids in our neighborhood didn’t play with me. Even Mona turned her nose up at me. Although I was a little older than Elsie, she was the only one who smiled or talked to me. As a child, I longed to be included. I knew what the other kids thought of me, that their parents warned them not to mix with a boy like Jared Morin.

I used to watch Elsie and Mona leave for school, hand in hand. I’d stare at them from my bedroom window, too ashamed to go to school myself. I skipped school a lot. It wasn’t a world of learning and education for me, but one filled with ridicule and bullying.

That all changed when I turned fifteen and I realized that I didn’t have to be the bullied one. I didn’t have to skip dinners because my parents couldn’t afford it. I could just steal food from gas stations. I could just drop out of school. I could get a job at a garage fixing cars. I didn’t need to rely on my parents anymore.

Most importantly, I realized that girls were interested in me. For some reason, the neighborhood loser had turned into the neighborhood bad boy. And finally, I had the confidence to talk to Elsie. The girl I’d grown up staring at from my bedroom window.

I didn’t think she would be interested in talking to me too. Wouldn’t she think I was a weirdo? She lived right next door. She knew exactly how viciously my parents fought every night. She knew I had no friends.

But Elsie talked. She talked a lot. The first time we had a conversation, she couldn’t stop talking! Within fifteen minutes—the time it took us to walk back to her house from the grocery store—Elsie had told me pretty much everything there was to know about her. The bits I didn’t know just from staring longingly at her everyday.

It was crazy, but it had seemed like she always wanted to be my friend too.