Chapter 5: Chapter 5

To her immense relief, as soon as she opened the door, Missy saw that Lucy Sinclair, Emily Gray and Angela Harris were standing in front of Simon's desk, talking animatedly with him. The four waved as soon as they saw her for her to come over, which Missy did immediately. Her friends were always the best company and if she wanted to dispel those disturbing thoughts, they would certainly help her a lot.

- And then? Knight asked you to turn his entire office into a computer so he could work an extra 28 hours a day? Lucy asked with a mocking laugh as she approached.

- I hope not. – Simon sighed, running his hands through his dark hair – Or that means I'm going to have to work too, if I want to keep his schedule organized.

- I don't know why they criticize so much the fact that Mr. Knight being a workaholic. – Angela laughed – It could be worse: he could force us to be too.

- Oh, come on... Was he more Miranda Priestly or the demon from the Conjuring today? - Lucy encouraged Missy to speak, but her girlfriend interrupted her, with a disapproving grimace.

- Stop talking about Mr. Knight as if he were a monster, Lucy. He just started acting weird in the last few years. I'm pretty sure he has something in this building that triggers him in some way and makes him act like he's walking on nails all the time. – Emily pondered with determination and Missy knew she must be right, since she was one of the models that had been with the agency for the longest time.

She had been attacked by a wolf when she was still a child and unfortunately, in addition to the deep scars that would cover her body forever, doctors were also forced to amputate her right arm to save her. Therefore, Emily had traveled a long and arduous path until she finally got an opportunity at the Knight Agency and thus managed to follow her dream of being a model and gain prestige in that profession. And, having become good friends with Logan over all those years as co-workers, of all people outside the Knight family, she was perhaps the one who praised him the most and led Missy to believe that he really was. she must have been a very different person with others – in other words, with everyone who wasn't her.

- I'm telling you, it's overwork. – Angela shook her head, agreeing – I bet if the poor man slept an hour more a day, he would worry a lot less. Usually, he is quite considerate. I'll never forget when he personally defended me against a photographer who made horrible comments about my body. And I hadn't even talked about it with him, just with Diana. But still, he made sure to put the scoundrel in the right place for offending me and the other plus-size models before firing him. – Angela was one of the highest paid plus-size models in the entire agency and Missy knew that she not only took her work very seriously, but also did not accept any kind of disrespect that, unfortunately, sometimes still came. Fortunately, none of the Knight brothers would allow that sort of thing to be done to their agents, either, something Missy greatly admired.

- Oh, sure, you should see how considerate he is with Perky-Nose-Foster and Newton. Last week the two irresponsible ones were late for a rehearsal they didn't know he would be supervising and I swear I thought they were going to piss their pants because of his lecture... - Noticing the death glare that Emily was giving her, Lucy gave a smile yellow towards Missy. “I mean, Foster and the lovely future Mr. Sutton... Who should still learn to take constructive criticism and not be so overbearing... Ouch! Emily! - Lucy was completing quickly, when she was interrupted by an elbow in the arm coming from her girlfriend.

With a sad little laugh, Missy just shook her head, letting Emily know that she wasn't upset by that comment. Lucy just had a strong personality and almost no filter between her thoughts and her mouth, and yet she was one of the nicest people Missy had ever met. She worked as a stuntwoman and actress and developed incredible work with Emily in favor of the visibility and cultural pride of the indigenous reserve where the two were born. Missy had even given them a little help already, reconfiguring the reserve library's computer system and introducing some faster, more efficient educational games and research tools that had, fortunately, helped to increase the library's popularity among children and young people, which had made not only Lucy and Emily elated, but Missy as well.

And, frankly, Missy also knew that Lucy was a little bit right about her boyfriend. When she'd first met Liam, shortly after getting her office in that building, he had struck her as nothing more than a nice, gallant guy who had invited her out for a sweet treat at a cozy coffee shop nearby and who loved to talk about his work as a photographer. At first, she'd found the confident, euphoric way he talked about his profession cute, but it didn't take much time with Liam to realize…that he didn't take criticism very well. But she tried to be understanding about it. I mean, he was passionate about what he did and she understood that, therefore, it must be a little difficult to hear that something he had created with so much dedication had some mistake or something that needed to be improved... Even if it was a criticism constructive.

Liam had mentioned several incidents involving Logan's charges, which he simply hated. And he made a point of badmouthing the boss's temper to everyone who would listen... Except for Mr. Knight, of course. In fact, as soon as they'd started going out, he'd even asked her to put in a good word for him to Logan, hoping he'd leave him alone and "realize what a genius photographer he was." But, as soon as she explained that Logan didn't like her very much either, Liam seemed to identify a lot... Or, at least that's how she had interpreted it, since, lately, he had started complaining about the fact that Logan was treating her even worse... And that maybe it was his relationship with her to blame, since they were now a two-person combo that Mr. Knight despised.

She'd been a little speechless the moment he told her that theory, especially since, even though he certainly hadn't done it on purpose, his tone seemed to suggest that it was her fault. As if she had somehow made the relationship between him and his boss even worse, which she found hard to believe, because given that reasoning, it was to be expected that Logan had also started to treat her with even more rudeness. However, what had happened was exactly the opposite: she had been feeling that he was less and less averse to her presence – which also included the big breakthrough of that day. Still, even if Liam's theory was true…well, there was nothing they could do about it.

To be fair, in the vast majority of cases, even though she knew that Mr. Knight could be quite intimidating... He kind of... He was right. Liam wasn't exactly punctual, he often made a few ill-timed comments, and she was far from being a professional photographer or understanding anything about camera angles in general... But she couldn't remember a photo taken by Liam and fiercely criticized by Mr. Knight who really wasn't... A little weird. At least in her layman's eyes. But after the first time she'd tried to kindly point that out to Liam, he'd reacted with such hurt that she'd just decided not to do that anymore. After all, Mr. Knight already seemed to criticize him enough. He didn't need his girlfriend to lower his self-esteem either.

Sometimes, she even thought it better to refrain from making any comment that wasn't a compliment, because she knew that even if all her words were handpicked, he would still be upset with her, as he had happened a few times during his nine years. dating months. Not that it was a big problem. Liam was human and he had his faults. She also had a lot of weaknesses and things that she got hurt when he accidentally mentioned them. And even though Liam wasn't very pleased when she did that, Missy always liked to sit and talk with him when one of them got upset about something the other had said.

And, heavens, more than ever, they really needed to talk.

I swear I've never met anyone more frigid!

She knew it hadn't been his intention and that he was very frustrated at the moment, but still... Those words had been bouncing around her brain for the past three days, slowly creating a wound inside her that Missy feared she had. became very deep. She knew she was shy and Liam was the first boyfriend she'd allowed herself to try and explore her sexuality with, but... Was she really frigid? She had just been scared. Liam had been so insistent that they needed to have their first time to seal their relationship, that she would love to find out what sex was, that her first time would be magical...

But once the kissing and caressing had progressed a bit, she started to feel very uncomfortable. And that feeling only grew unbearable. Until the moment when, when he was about to take off his underwear, she had asked him to stop. Taking that whole scenario into account, she knew that Liam had gotten so mad and yelled at her like that because he had been waiting almost a whole year for some intimacy between the two of them and she'd stopped it, technically, when they were almost at their peak, but still... Something had felt so wrong. She wasn't feeling well. I mean, she was a complete newbie when it came to sex, but even so, she knew that some parts that should have been wet were…well, very, very dry.

That's why she had asked them to wait a little longer... And, after many insistences that were even sweet, but which she still had to refuse, Liam had become very irritated. Angry to the point of screaming louder than she'd ever heard him before. It was almost frightening, even though he hadn't become truly violent. She had been trying to explain herself, to tell him that she wasn't feeling what she should have, that the fear of hurting her was making her anxious, that she had realized that she wasn't ready for this... That, instead of being excited, she felt ashamed. , strange and uncomfortable. But Liam seemed to be so immersed in what they were doing that he didn't seem to notice any of it. Therefore, she thought she should tell him. In fact, she thought he would understand. After all, if they continued, it probably wouldn't have been good for her and neither of them wanted that, would they?

However, even when she tried to sit down and talk about it, he dressed quickly as he continued to repeat that she was a cold girlfriend, a frigid woman and that she didn't love him enough even to give him "one truly good night". She had even tried to ask him to stay so they could work this out, but Liam had snarled that “if talking was all she knew how to do with her mouth, then she could go fuck herself” and just walked away, slamming her head. door to her apartment so hard the hinges creaked. Since then, they hadn't seen each other in person for the next three days. She had tried texting him, but Liam had remained cold and distant, giving monosyllable answers and ignoring her whenever she asked when they could see each other again. And that was starting to worry her more and more.

It was odd because she didn't feel like she should apologize, but if he was that pissed off, maybe, who knows, she shouldn't? Her relationship with Liam had always been pretty smooth and, after that first fight, Missy was a little unsure of how she should proceed. Normally, she would ask Megan, but the thought of telling her sister that her first attempt at sex had turned into such a disaster made Missy feel her face burn with embarrassment. And then there was the fact that Megan would certainly be pissed to learn how badly Liam had reacted and especially about the horrible things he'd said to her. Not that Missy hadn't been pretty hurt too, and even a little angry, after the shock of seeing him scream like that had worn off, but it was normal for couples to fight, right? It would be silly of her to want everything to always be a bed of roses and for them to never have conflicts.

After all, her entire relationship with Liam had been pretty smooth up until that point. Of course, it wasn't a magical, fiery, incredibly intense love story like in her favorite novels. But she knew that real-life relationships were much different than they were in the pages of her books. Her parents' marriage had been happy, for example, but it had its complications, like any other couple's: they had very different personalities, and disagreements were sometimes difficult to reconcile. In that respect, she considered her relationship with Liam to be a bit like that of Victoria and Jonathan: as her mother, he loved to talk about her achievements and her aspirations. She, like her father, was a good listener.

Of course, sometimes Liam got a little bored listening to her talk about her day, but that was perfectly normal, right? Not all couples had affinities in 100% of their interests and she understood why he didn't like to hear her talk about her work, her books, her movies and series, her anime, her dog... Well, at least they still they had a few interests in common, like comic books, although Liam hated that she mentioned that taste of his in public. “This is a child's thing! I don't know how you manage to admit to everyone that you still like that kind of thing as an adult! I know I don't have that courage.”, he had told her once, in the middle of a laugh, when she had presented him with a Spider-Man shirt. She had been looking for that specific pattern for weeks and had paid a bit too much, thinking it would be a special gift and that he would love it... But Liam had just laughed at her choice and made it very clear that there was no way he could wear something like that in public.

However, there is no reason to her being hurt by that incident. He really shouldn't have forced himself to wear something she didn't like and she should have asked him before she bought it. It wasn't because she had... Guts... To wear her clothes with her favorite characters in public, what boyfriend of hers should do the same, right? He didn't have to do something that made him uncomfortable just because she wanted to.

And that was why she had stopped him that day. Why was she uncomfortable. And, in his mind, just as she would hate feeling like she was forcing him to wear that shirt, he wouldn't want her to have her first time being so scared either. It was probably the frustration of the moment that made him act so rudely.

Maybe he just hadn't realized it was a somewhat similar situation...

With the difference that, in her situation, or so she believed, there was a slightly greater degree of seriousness...

- Missy? Missy! - Lucy's exclamations brought her back from her long reverie, making her focus again on the confused expressions of her friends - We're talking to you!

- Oh sorry. - She laughed, awkwardly, struggling to remember what the subject was - Hmmm... In fact, Mr. Knight was very kind to me today. – Missy decided to comment, knowing that that was something remarkable – With luck, you won't have any extra work today, Simon. - She saw a wide smile light up her friend's face - He said he's going to the party tonight.

- At the Mummy's party...? There! – Lucy started to ask, stunned, but her girlfriend elbowed her again, this time harder-What is it, Emily? You said yourself that the woman looks like Norman Bates' mother in Psycho. And, just to clarify, I'm talking about the skull in the wig! - Turning to Missy, she rolled her eyes - I don't know how you put up with that woman! All she does is try to pretend to be rich and her son can barely buy a subway ticket... No offense! - Lucy hurried to say, as soon as Emily threatened to raise her arm again.

- She's not that bad. – Missy tried to defend her mother-in-law timidly, even though, again, her friend was a little right in what she was saying; in fact, Lauren had a certain fascination with wealth and high society that Missy didn't find very healthy, but still, she tried not to misjudge her. However, thinking about her reminded her that, even though she had warned him by message that she would be spending the whole afternoon in his office and looking for him everywhere, she still hadn't seen her boyfriend that day – Could it be... Have you seen Liam around?

Her friends looked at each other for a moment and Emily looked ready to say something when a voice interrupted them.

- Oh, look who's here.