Disclaimer: I own Nothing. Everything recognizable belongs to Janet Evanovich.
This story is currently undergoing revision. Bare with me. Once I get all of the previous chapter's edited, I'll start to post new ones.
Slamming through the house I shared with Joe Morelli, my on and off again boyfriend, I felt the need to scream. I wasn't his maid, why was it so hard for him to pick up his clothes? Sighing I picked up the laundry basket and went around the house picking up dirty socks and underwear. I finally reached the bedroom and had a brief thought of saying eff it, but I knew if I didn't do it it'd never get done. I set the basket on the bed and went around the room picking up pants and t shirts. I stopped short at the sight of a plain white dress shirt wadded up in the corner. Joe didn't wear dress shirts, and when he did, he would usually take them to the dry cleaners.
I stooped to pick it up and felt my heart start to race. I could smell perfume wafting off of it and I knew it wasn't mine. It smelt like the cheap knock off stuff that was often sold at the Ninety-nine cent store. I held my breath to keep from coughing and turned the shirt over. There on the collar was a bright pink lipstick stain, nowhere near the color I wore. It was too bright, hot pink and glittery. I felt tears welling up in my eyes. This couldn't be happening. Joe wasn't like Dickie, he wouldn't do this to me after everything we'd been through.
I felt my throat close up when I saw the red wine stain on his front pocket. I dropped the shirt like it had burned me. How could he do this? Better yet, how did I not see it? All those nights he'd sneak in the house around midnight or later. The dates he'd blown me off on, with an 'I'm so sorry cupcake.' The times he'd show up late to my families dinner at my mother's house looking like he'd been running a marathon. I had a very good idea why I had ignored the signs that were right in front of me.
To make my mother happy and avoid criticism from the 'Burg. Well, if Joe Morelli wanted to cheat on me and leave his dirty laundry out for me to find, I'd hang it and him out to dry. I set off to the laundry room and began to carefully clean the rest of the clothes I had collected earlier. Instead of putting them in the dryer when they were done I took them out to hang on the front porch with a makeshift line, placing the dirty shirt with all of the proof of his dirty deeds smack dab in the middle facing the road for all to see.
I turned to go back into the house and poured myself a glass of white wine. Joe should've known better. He thought getting hit by my father's Buick was bad, I was about to run him over with the equivalent of a Mack truck. I headed upstairs and began to pack my things carefully. I planned to have all of my things loaded into my blue Jeep Cherokee by the time he got home.
After all my things were packed and loaded into my car I went through the house carefully. I ripped any pictures of the two of us up and threw them in a pile on the bed. I walked into his closet eyeing it thoughtfully, before smiling and grabbing a pair of scissors. I carefully cut out the crotch and ass of all his pants before hanging them back up. I cut holes in his shirts where his nipples would be. I shredded his favorite pair of jeans and soaked all of his t shirts in bleach. Satisfied with my work I called my best friend Mary Lou and asked if I could spend a night or two at her place. I could've gone to my mothers or called Ranger, but I didn't want pity or sex.
At least not right now. Right now I was going to play my cards carefully and act accordingly to being the victim of infidelity. What Joe had seemed to forget was that while I had hit him with a car for not calling, I had nearly destroyed Dickie's career. Plums were known for being vindictive creatures, and Morelli had just awoken that creature. Mary Lou had agreed to my staying with her for as long as I needed. I smiled bitterly, now to just wait for the asshole to show up.
I set his favorite chair in the foyer, and debated on destroying it as well, but decided to wait until he arrived. For every lie he told me, I'd slash into the chair. I started to sit down but had a flash of inspiration. I rushed to the kitchen and dug into his whiskey cabinet. He had several bottles of aged whiskey he had recieved on different occasions lined up nicely, some of them never even opened. Smirking I opened each bottle and dumped them into the sink, watching the precious liquid flow down the drain.
Satisfied I walked back to the foyer and sat in the chair toying with the sharp knife in my hand. It was a present from Ranger, my last birthday. At least six inches long with the blade opened, a black textured handle and silver filigrree decorating it. I felt angry tears well up. How was it the man who couldn't give me a real relationship was able to show he cared more for me than the man who I was supposed to be in a committed relationship with.
A few hours had passed when Morelli slammed through the front door screaming, "What the fuck is that shirt doing out there Stephanie!" He was doing the arm waving thing. I felt anger start to boil in me but I held it back. Instead I held his gaze steadily.
"You tell me Morelli. You know what that means just as well as anybody else." I felt a sense of pride for the steadiness of my voice.
His eyes widened at my calm demeanor. He knew I was deadly pissed. Good. I flipped the knife in my hand watched in amusement as he noticed it.
"Cupca-" He began, but stopped short when I stabbed the arm of the chair.
"Here's how this is gonna go Morelli, I'm going to ask you a question, and you're gonna answer honestly. If I think you're lying I'm going to destroy this chair. Then the couch, curtains, and beds. Followed by the computer and burning your clothes. Do we understand one another?" At his nod I smiled and said, "Good. Now first question, how long?"
He gulped before sliding down the door, "A month or two. Maybe?"
I raised my knife to stab the chair again and he quickly responds,"Okay! Okay. Two and half months. Happy now?" He snarled, running agitated fingers through his messy hair. Hair that I once loved to pull on in the throes of passion. Now I just wanted to shear it from his head thinking about another woman's hands in it while he was supposed to be with me.
I sucked air through my teeth and have to fight the urge to stab him. We'd been back on for three months. It had started after I had moved in with him. After he had begged me to move in with him. After I gave up my apartment to make him happy.
"Who?" I grind out, trying hard to keep a hold on my temper.
"What's it matter? We can get through this cupcake." He snorted.
My anger reached a new peak at his nonchalance. It mattered! I would not be forgiving him this time. No matter what he might think. I slammed the knife into the other arm and tore through the supple leather.
"God Damnit Stephanie! Why'd you go and do that shit for." Angry arm waving Morelli was back. I leaned forward in the chair meeting his eyes. I supressed my smirk at his gulp of fear.
"Who. Is. She?" My voice held a deadly timbre to it. I knew I looked crazy, but I needed to know who he'd been seeing behind my back.
"Fuck! Terri Gilman, okay? Look you were never supposed to know. I was gonna end it, but you have a tendency to run when things start to get too serious. What was I supposed to do? I didn't want you to find out." He ground out, as if admitting to seeing another woman behind my back was my fault.
I flung the knife at him watching as it barely missed his head before it was embedded into the front door.
I stood up and glared down at him, "You wanted to know what that shirt was doing on the porch? I found it wadded up in the corner of the room on the floor while I was doing your laundry! If you didn't want me to find it you should've hid it in the closet! Or burned it or just lost it! Now though? I'm gonna hang you out to dry just like I did your dirty laundry." I stepped over him, grabbed my knife from the door and walked out not turning back.
I felt hot tears on my face as I walked to my car and resisted running to my car when I heard Joe step out onto his porch and yell, "You're a crazy bitch Cupcake, but you'll be back! You always come back!" I felt my determination turn to steel at his words. Not this time. Never again. I was done with Joe Morelli forever.
RM&SP*RM&SP*RM&SP*RM&SP*
I pulled into Mary Lou's driveway, and sighed knowing I was gonna have to give her as much information as possible, and let her loose on the 'Burg grapevine. It would hurt like hell but I wasn't gonna clean nothing up. Joe wanted to act like a chauvinistic pig and I was gonna treat him like one. If anyone asked me I'd give them all the dirty details firsthand. Let that get back to Morelli.
I walked up the steps and sighed when Mary Lou opened the door, "Oh, Steph honey. Don't you worry about that Morelli. He's a rat bastard, just like all of the Morelli's before him. You deserve better." She murmured as she pulled me into her arms for a hug.
I nodded against her shoulder and wiped the tears from my eyes. She took a step back before smiling at me, "I've got just what you need. Come on." She led me into the kitchen and I laughed at what she had set out, TastyCakes, Ben and Jerry's and tequila were laid out on her kitchen island. She turned and laughed with me and told me to help gather the loot and take it to the living room.
I smiled at her and plopped down onto her comfy couch and giggled when she loaded up "Ghostbusters" For us to watch.
We sat together on the couch eating snack and drinking tequila while I filled her in on what Joe had told me about his affair. I even told her about my crazy antics with his chair and clothes.
She looked at me a levelly as she could with a butt load of tequila in her system and said, "Sounds to me like you were more pissed than hurt Steph. Maybe now you can give Ranger a ride." I pushed her over laughing and it made me feel like we were back in high school. Joking and laughing and helping each other through heartbreaks.
"Thanks Lou. I love you, ya know that right?" I said earnestly.
She giggled and knocked her shoulder against mine, "Course I do! You'd be stupid not to. I'm amazing! I love ya too." She mumbled with a little hiccough. We laid there on the couch until the credits rolled down and stayed there all night.
Too early the next morning I was awoken by the shrill ringing of my cell phone, glancing at the caller ID I groaned. Time to face the firing squad.
I answered my phone with a groggy, "Yeah." And flinched as my mother's shrill voice came through the line.
"Oh thank God! Stephanie, are you alright? Joe came by this morning and said you'd left him, and that he didn't know where you'd went! What were you thinking? Joe Morelli is a very nice young man!" She rambled into the phone.
I groaned and slammed my head against the pillow. Big mistake as a flash of pain caused more groaning, no more tequila for me.
"Ma! Mom. Damnit mother! Joe Morelli is a lying, cheating bastard! If he comes back to the house let dad and Grandma shoot him! He's been sneaking around with Terri Gilman for the past two and a half months!" I shouted back into the phone. I waited for a response and was met with a few minutes of silence until I heard my mother speak again.
"Why that no good rat bastard! How dare he come over here and make himself out to be the victim! I oughta send your father over there to shoot him! I can't believe he'd do that to my baby girl! Just wait til I call his mother! How'd you find out dear?" She rambled.
I grit my teeth and hissed out, "I found his shirt covered in cheap perfume, lipstick stains and red wine stains."
I heard her gasp and begin to curse. I rolled my eyes. At least I knew where my over dramatic tendencies came from.
"Look ma, I'm really not feeling that great. Could you do me a favor and let people know the truth that me and Joe Morelli are well and truly over and why? I just don't have it in me today." I crossed my fingers and hoped my mother would do this for me.
I heard her sigh of agreement along with a mumbled "Sure, love you Stephanie." I responded in kind and hung up the phone. Mary Lou wasn't in the living room so I figured she had been dragged to bed early this morning. I sat up and rolled my neck side to side trying to loosen the tension.
I stood and planned to make my way to a long hot shower when my phone rang again. Ranger. I debated not answering, but that would probably make him send over a team to make sure I hadn't been kidnapped by one of my psycho stalkers.
"Yo." Was the first thing out of his mouth and I smiled to myself, good to know somethings don't change.
"Yo, yourself. Something you need Ranger?" I questioned as I made my way to the bathroom grabbing a set of clean clothes from one of my suitcases.
"Babe." I held back a sigh. That one word could mean so many things, and right now I had a feeling it meant, I know somethings up so go ahead and tell me.
"I'm fine Ranger. I'm staying at a friends for a few days until I can talk to Dillon to see if he has any apartments available. I was actually just about to head into the shower and then go pick up a skip." I intoned.
"Babe, you know you're welcome to my place... and shower." His voice was deep and husky and I closed my eyes to fight off the temptation. Until I got all of mine and Morelli's dirty laundry aired out I wasn't going to give anyone any ammunition against me.
"Thanks, but I'm good. See you around Ranger." I told him before hanging up abruptly. I wasn't going down that road with Ranger again. He'd told me over and over that his kind of relationships didn't come with a ring or any real commitment. Sure he'd be monogamous, but it wouldn't be what I was used to. I knew I would never be able to do no strings attached. So as I was rinsing conditioner from my hair I made a painful decision.
I couldn't be with Ranger in that way, so I'd have to initiate a strict friend's only relationship. That meant no more staying at his place, no more kisses and flirtation, and no more "free" favors. I was going to become independent and learn to stand on my own two feet. No more relying on anyone else but me. Which meant my first order of business was getting an apartment.
A/N: As I stated in the beginning, this entire story is undergoing revision. I'm hoping to make it better for readerrs to enjoy and once I get it up to par I will be adding new chapters. Seeing as I also have four other stories open and being worked on at the moment, it may take awhile, but I have not abandoned this story, nor do I intend to. Reviews are always welcome. Til next time, Lilbit903.