Addicted to Mr Parks (The Parks Series #2)(49)

I smirked, dropping my spoon into the bowl. “Tell me how a man who looks like that is anything but a god in the bedroom?”

Steph tilted her head back and laughed, getting excited because sex was her favourite subject. “I knew it. How big is his dick? Tell me pacifics.”

I raised my eyebrows. “It’s ‘specifics,’ Steph. And oh, he’s big. Really big.”

She clapped her hands in excitement. “Like sore-* big?”

I almost spat out my casserole. “Do I have to ask what ‘sore-* big’ means?”

She ignored me and continued to ramble. “How does he f*ck?”

I loved that she had no shame, and answered honestly. “He f*cks like a real man. He knows what he’s doing.” I chuckled, not quite believing what I was actually admitting.

She nodded, agreeing with a cheesy grin splashed across her face. “Is he kinky?”

“He’s everything,” I swooned.

“Spanking?” she pushed.

“Oh yes.”

She squealed, throwing her legs off the sofa. “Just his hand? Or paddles and crops?”

“He’s only used a crop once. When I was bad.”

She became serious all of a sudden, which made my stomach turn uneasily. “He spanks you for discipline? Not pleasure?”

I pushed to my feet and walked to the kitchen sink with my bowl. It was to avoid Steph’s inquisitiveness, really. “Yeah,” I mumbled, flipping my hair over my shoulder.


“Is there something you’re not telling me?”

I pressed my hands to the edge of the kitchen sink and bowed my head between them. “Steph, I like the discipline. It soothes me.”

“How?”

I kept my back to her. “I don’t know, it just does. Call me crazy, but I like it.”

“Does he hurt you?”

That’s when I turned to her, my voice strong and sure. “He would never hurt me.”

With that explained, I still wasn’t sure whether she believed me or not. “He sounds controlling.”

I knew it. She was a damn worrier. “He is, but I can handle it, Steph. He only controls me when I let him. He calms me down when no one else can. He stops my wayward thoughts getting the better of me. We’re so similar, it’s scary. But we seem to work.”

“Evey, how has this man broken through all your walls within weeks of knowing you?”

“Remember that morning you caught us together?” She nodded sceptically. “Well, that was our first night together. He tried patiently and relentlessly with me. Telling me how much he wanted me, giving me all that sweet talk, and yes, we’d been sleeping together,” I answered the question I knew Steph was dying to ask. “Every time we saw each other, something ignited between us.” I sound a soppy bitch. Steph remained silent, but I could see the surprise lighting up her face as I spoke. “Denying his attempts to get to know me was so exhausting. But I knew I couldn’t let myself feel. God,” I scoffed, “I didn’t know how to; I’m heartless.”

“You’re not heartless.”

Putting my hand up told Steph not to interrupt while I was on a roll. “But that night I finally gave in, because when I actually let myself feel, I realised he made me feel safe and protected. No one ever made me feel that way. Stupidly, I told him how I felt, and in the morning, he went and left me. It just pushed me right back to the bottom, you know?”

“Why did he leave?” Her expression was almost guilty. She knew she was partly to blame.

“Said it was shock when he found out about my addiction. I don’t know.” I didn’t want to tell Steph I really thought he was hiding something from me, because that wasn’t her business.

“So if you showed him your scars, you must have told him about your upbringing?”

I picked a stray hair from my dress to avoid her eyes. “I’ve told him parts of what my mum did to me, not everything. He knows alcohol was my coping mechanism when things got tough and I needed to feel numb. But knowing I can talk to him is refreshing, but also scary.” It was scary because I worried that if I got that captivated, I would pour my heart out and bring down my walls. Completely. “It’s like when I’m feeling angst, paranoia, or anything bad, Parks is the one I want to get to, because all he has to do is open up his arms to me and I’m safe.” Steph didn’t understand the logic of where I was coming from entirely. Didn’t understand how Parks and I became so close and intimate on another level. The good thing was that we didn’t need anyone to get us. We got each other. We didn’t need outside approval.

After a breather, Steph relaxed and fluffed up the cushion next to her. “As long as you know what you’re doing, Evey.”

“I do,” I told her quickly, because I wanted that to be the end of it.

“Listen—” Steph perked up, “—I’m having an Ann Summers party in a couple of weeks—”

I knew she was about to invite me, so I held my palm up to stop her. “No chance.”

“Oh come on,” she whined. “It’ll be fun. If you’re trying to lead a new life, you have to start making friends.”

My groan was palpable. “No. I don’t.”

“Evey, you’re such an unsociable loser.” She laughed.