The Arrangement

Chapter 2

"Hey, are you going to be home soon?" the text from Autumn appears as I pull up to our apartment community's gate.

I roll my eyes. I hate it when she waits up for me.

I walk up to our door and open it.

Sure enough, there is Autumn awake, watching some soap television series on my faux leather couch at 3 AM.

I love my apartment, I've decorated it with all my favorite things. Purple neon lights strung on the floorboards, a collection of art made by local artists that fit my goth and rock and roll vibes, and a pole set up in my living room to practice my dancing on.

"I've told you not to stay up for me. You need to rest, baby, you gotta work in the morning!" I say to her, dropping my backpack on the floor and audibly sighing with relief that this shift, while lucrative, is over.

I sit on my couch and Marie Antoinette, our pampered grey tabby rescue cat, jumps up on my lap to be petted like the princess she is.

What happened with that celebrity couple sticks with me. It's not everyday you get offered four hundred thousand dollars by a super hot celebrity guy to do something for four months that you know you would truly be a good fit for.

Still, I'm pretty sure I made enough money tonight to pay my rent the next couple of months regardless. It's become addictive. Probably like how a gambler feels. The high of coming home with cold cash in the thousands within hours. Some nights I barely break even, but what if tomorrow night it's just as good, if not better?

"You make good money tonight, Evie?" Autumn asks, without even bothering to acknowledge my scolding of her.

"Here, you count it," I say, grinning at her and throwing my heavily bedazzled money bag at her.

Autumn counts the money and starts bouncing up and down on the couch. "I won't have to work tomorrow morning, Evie."

"No way, lazy ass, you're working tomorrow morning," I tell her. "You earn your keep around here."

"I got a call from Mom tonight," Autumn says, she closes the money bag and hands it back to me.

"And?" I ask, taking the money bag from her. I'm learning to watch my emotions around this kind of stuff. Our mom is super up and down. Rehab and relapse are constants with her. It's been a horror story to watch, this disease of addiction. I'm ten years older than her, and my dad was still around when I was a kid, so I'd had one sober parent growing up. For most of Autumn's childhood, it was just her, me, and Mom.

"I'll take care of you. I promise. Your little sister too. You all deserve better," Mac had said, "meeting you changed me, Evie." While I was laying with my head in his lap, hanging on every word.

A moment, mere words uttered, that I'd clung to for seven years too long. It pains me to recollect biting so hard into his BS: hook, line, and sinker.

It's done. He's gone now.

"She's getting temporary housing, she's clean, she says she thinks this time she has it beat, she says she'll be able to celebrate the fourth of July with us probably," Autumn says, her tone is so hopeful. I both admire and pity her hope. After everything she's been through, Autumn holds on to hope. "Toby says he doesn't believe her." Toby is Autumn's boyfriend. He's very understandably mad at our mom, but Toby also doesn't get the nature of addiction because he didn't grow up in that type of household.

"I hope she gets right," I say, the words hurt. "But don't tell her where we live yet."

Autumn turns off her television series and begins getting the couch ready to pull out to sleep on.

"Baby, I'm going to shower off the club and go to bed. I'm so tired, I've been dancing all night," I tell her, stretching and yawning. I wrap my arms around her in a hug.

"Oh, ew, you stink," Autumn says, wrinkling her nose. "How did you earn all that money smelling like this?"

"Eff you too, kid," I mutter, squeezing her harder.

I imagine a life where I could buy a home, pay off my car, and help give Autumn a starting chance. All of that would be possible if I play the submissive to Theo Thatcher for four months.

I wonder what it will all entail? I ponder, as I slip out of my clothes and under the lovely stream of my shower. The longer I let the water pour over me, the more I think it might be a good idea. Besides, I miss having someone to play a submissive with. I wonder if he likes submissives who are a bit masochistic? Would he spank me? I do love spankings.

I recall the movie I'd seen with him in, Dangerous Deceptions. He'd been a secret agent. There was a scene he'd gotten entirely shirtless for where he'd fallen off a cliff and landed in the ocean.

Those arms look so strong, I bet he's good at spanking.

Mmm, what a thought... I close my eyes. I'm picturing that handsome actor, Theo, bending me over his knee and spanking me, fingering me, and then spanking me again. My fingers dip down between my legs at the thought.

My eyes fly open. Tabby had said no sex. So that fingering bit wouldn't happen even if I agreed to be his submissive.

Thinking of Tabby is turning me off. What had she meant about them being best friends and how it was unfortunate she wasn't a submissive? What kind of vanilla girlfriend tried to find a submissive partner for her Dominant boyfriend anyway?

That sounds like a complicated situation. A situation maybe it would be best I avoided.

Still... four hundred thousand for letting heartthrob Theo Thatcher take me over his knee for four months?

You're toeing a dangerous line, you adrenaline junkie, and for all you know they were not even that serious, you'll probably never see them in the club again, I tell myself as I turn off the water and wrap myself in a towel.

However, to be on the safe side, it won't hurt to spend the rest of the night researching everything the internet has to say about Theo Thatcher, right?

I pick up my phone and put his name in the search engine.

Someone has some major Daddy energy. Yes, Sir.

There. He. Is.

Images pop up. So many gorgeous, sexy, images. And now that I know he's into submissive women it only makes him even more enticing.

What kind of submissive does he like? When is this audition? Now I'm wishing I'd not have let my nerves get the best of me and I'd given them my What's App, or my Dancer Instagram so they could at least communicate with me.

Hmm.

I get on my Instagram and follow his page and follow Tabby's page. I send a message to both of them saying, "Hi, it's me, Sugar."

They probably won't respond.

I brush my teeth and slip into a pair of panties and a t-shirt for bed. My phone buzzes.

Theo has followed me back and replied with a fire emoji to my story I'd posted of a selfie I took at Kittens today.

Thank you for reading my very first contemporary romance/erotica. Please vote, leave feedback, and share as I'm just starting on this journey! This is the story I'm writing for Wattpad and will be finished by April 2023. Posting on Tuesdays and Thursdays.