All Out Of Love

Chapter 2: Oxymorons & Opportunities.

Writer's Note

I really didn't like how fast I sped through the first chapters of All Out Of Love. It felt like the storyline was jumpy and rushed. So I slowed it down. A LOT!!! I hope you enjoy the new update

Madison hated the oxymoron she had become.

In the space of a few short months (two to be exact), she had gone from a social pariah to a reincarnation of Maya Angelou somehow becoming the voice for every hopeless single woman in America.

Immediately after the finale aired, the media circuit beckoned. In the blink of an eye, she had a publicist, agent and all the perks that came with becoming an overnight celebrity.

All because she had decided to slap Ethan Wright into the next galaxy.

Even now, as she prepared for yet another meeting with her publicist, memories of the man she had believed was her soulmate swirled in her head like a handsome Santa Ana wind.

In the months since the show had wrapped, her heart still hadn't gotten the memo that the life she had envisioned just wasn't meant to be. Even now, wearing a dress that cost more than her entire salary and rent combined, the tears flowed freely ruining the carefully applied makeup she had gotten done for her latest television interview earlier in the day.

The pains that tugged at her heart were intense bordering on painful.

"A pretty girl like you shouldn't cry," Duke, the pleasantly plump driver of the stretch limo her publicist hired each time she was in Los Angeles spoke, drumming his long manicured fingers on the steering wheel.

With a watery smirk, Madison studied the man. Although he seemed well put together now, the tattoos told another story of a past that the man had long forgotten. The only sign of rebellion was a long overgrown beard and a slicked back ponytail that obviously had seen better days.

"I'll try not to,"

The words lodged in her throat, like a painful pill she couldn't yet swallow.

"You'd better. Any man who makes a pretty girl cry isn't worth the tears," Duke replied, meeting her eyes in the mirror.

The words replayed in her mind as the city whizzed by. She had learn in the early on that Duke was a man of few words. With each trip, she had slowly broken down his defences until they had gotten past the initial grunts and somehow graduated into sentences.

Still, she knew when Duke began blasting rock music and drumming on the steering wheel to relive his glory days that their conversation was over.

Stubbornly she patted her eyes, curling up against the plush leather seats feeling foreign in the glitz and glamour of it all. Eventually, her eyes drifted shut, lulled by Duke's loud offkey singing.

Way too soon, the limo jerked to a stop in front of the office that felt more like a home than the one she had grown up in.

"We're here!"

Slipping her feet into the strappy heels, she slunk out of the car with a heavy sigh, mentally preparing herself for whatever news couldn't be delivered on the phone and required her to leave her tiny studio apartment in Atlanta.

"Don't forget to give 'em hell. You got this,"

Duke's encouraging smile and thumbs up seemed to cast a glimmer of blue skies over her down-in- the dumps mood.

After saying a hurried goodbye to Duke who as usual gave his signature grunt, Madison entered the building willing herself to be alright. She was about to enter the shark infested waters with publicists swarming the building to sell stories to the tabloids.