Carnage: Book #1 The Story Of Us (Volume 1)(51)

Steve appears with the keys to the office and a pile of papers. “You have a pile of messages Cam, most of them from Tamara but there are a couple that are business and one from Tory”

He takes them from him, puts the keys in his pocket and looks through his messages, shakes his head and shoves them all in his pocket. “Sorry about that.”

I shrug. “Not a problem, business is business.”

“Sure is,” he says with a smile.

He swirls his drink over the ice in his glass and says, “Well Georgia, you dragged me here, are you going to talk to me or what?”

I smile inwardly at his cheek but again say anything; I don’t want him to know I’m amused. “What would you like to know, Cam?”

He raises his eyebrows, obviously surprised that I know his name. “I’d like to know about you Georgia. Where were you born? Where did you grow up? How long have you been manager of the shop over the road?”

I correct him. “I’m not the manager of the shop over the road.”

“Oh sorry, I just thought the way you spoke to the girls, you were their boss.”

“I am.” I reply. “I own the business that owns the shop, over the road.”

He leans back on his stool, studies me for a moment and then knocks back all of his drink and puts it down a little too hard on the ledge. What’s his problem I wonder?

“I thought Frankie Layton’s Misses owned that place.” How does he know that?

“She does, I’m her business partner.” His frown disappears. What! Did he seriously think that I was married to Frank, to my Dad? “And I’m her daughter.”

His mouth actually drops open, oh f*ck, this news does not please him. “You’re Frank’s daughter?”

“I am.” He sighs deeply and runs his big hands through his hair.

“Oh f*ck,” he almost whispers as he once again shakes his head.

“Is that a problem?”

“Drink your drink Georgia, I have work to do.” He pulls the bits of paper out of his pocket and starts looking through them again, totally ignoring me.

Instant rage takes over; I stand from my stool and throw my drink in his face. “Fuck you!” I say, turn and walk out of the bar.

I don’t know what happens to me that night, I lost my grip on my own self-worth, I assumed. Cam didn’t want to know because of some piece of gossip he’d read in a Sunday tabloid, regarding me and Sean. There’d been a few spiteful stories about underage sex, drink and drugs, all involving me, once again. Sean and that band had interfered with my life and I was so sick of it. I went out on Saturday night and celebrated my birthday by snorting a couple of lines of coke, popping one ecstasy tablet and going back to the flat of a bloke named Tom in Lewisham and f*cking his brains out, it was awful but he loved it. When the cab pulled up outside at ten on that Sunday morning, he was begging me to stay and he was begging for my number, so I gave it to him, I saw him five times over the next two weeks and on the fifth date, he told me he loved me, so I ended it. I absolutely loved the power I felt, so much so that for the next six months, this behaviour became a habit; I would be off my face Thursday till Sunday, meet a bloke, spend a couple of weeks giving them the best sex they’d ever had, doing everything I possibly could to get them to say those three little words and as soon as they did, bang, I dropped them like a sack of shit. The other thing I liked to do was to take my dates to Kings, the wine bar Cam owned, I always waited until I knew for sure that I had them by the balls, that way they would always be all over me and I always made sure that I sat or stood right in full view of Cam.