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Home / Werewolf / Worthless In Their Eyes, Perfect In His / Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

All Chapters of Worthless In Their Eyes, Perfect In His : Chapter 61 - Chapter 70

78 Chapters

Chapter 61

Ruby's POVI could not sleep properly. I kept waking up and then lying there staring at nothing and then almost falling asleep and then waking up again. By five in the morning I gave up and just got out of bed. I sat on the edge of the mattress for a while doing nothing. Then I got up, brushed my teeth, put on my gym clothes and decided to just go. The gym was quiet that early. That was the thing I liked about going before the rest of the world was awake. There was nobody to look at me. Nobody was doing that thing where they glance over and then look away too fast. It was just me and the equipment and whatever was playing through my earphones.I started on the treadmill. I was not pushing it, just a steady walk to get my body moving. I had my playlist on and I was looking at the wall in front of me and trying not to think about the email I had sent last night.I had quit a job I actually liked after one day because a man I was contractually tied to did not approve of it. When I put

Chapter 62

He smiled at that. "If I were you, I would still chase my dreams. Contract or no contract. Whatever arrangement you are in with whoever you are in it with, that is separate from who you are as a person and what you want for yourself. You should not have to shrink what you want because someone else is uncomfortable with it."I did not say anything."That is just my opinion," he added."I've heard you," I said.He nodded and then reached into the bag he was carrying. He pulled out a folded piece of paper and held it out to me. I took it and unfolded it. It was a flyer, printed on good paper, not the kind people made on a home printer. It had a photo of a large open gallery space at the top and bold text underneath.ARTISTS CONNECT. ANNUAL ART EXHIBITION AND COMPETITION.I read further down. It was an open competition for artists at any level. You submitted a piece or a series of pieces. A panel of judges reviewed them. There were different categories—Painting, sculpture, mixed media, di

Chapter 63

Ruby's POVI drew for a long time after that.I was not thinking about what I was making. I was just letting my hand move and seeing what came out. That was always how the best stuff happened for me.I was maybe thirty minutes in when I looked down at the page and stopped.I had drawn a girl. She was tall. She had slim, long legs and a small waist and the kind of proportions that people described as willowy without making it sound like an insult. She was standing straight with her chin up and her arms loose at her sides like she was comfortable just existing in her own body. I stared at her for a while.She did not look like me, or she did not look like the me I saw when I looked in the mirror. She looked like the me that sometimes appeared in my head when I was not paying attention. The version of me that I defaulted to when I was imagining myself doing things, taller, thinner, taking up less space.I had read about body dysmorphia once. About how your brain could show you a version

Chapter 64

Ruby's POVI did not know what to say to that so I did not say anything. The room was quiet for a moment. Then Malcolm's eyes dropped to my wrist. He looked at it the same way he did before. That focused, still look that lasted just a moment too long.I had been waiting for the right time to ask about it and I decided that the right time was probably not going to announce itself so I might as well just do it now."Why does the mark bother you so much?" I asked.He looked up at me."Every time you see it you get this look," I said. "You went through my room because of it. You have been staring at it since you first noticed it. I want to know why."He exhaled slowly. He looked at the mark again and then back at my face."Do you know what it means," he said. "To be marked by a man."I blinked. "What?""When a man marks a woman it means something. It is not casual. It is a claim. It is saying that she belongs to him."I felt something go cold in my stomach. "And you thought someone had ma

Chapter 65

"What is funny?""You," he said and kept a straight face. "The way you said that, like you were bracing for a fight."I said nothing."Ruby." He said my name in that way that he stressed on the last syllable, "I am not a dictator.""You made me quit my job,""I handled that badly and I already apologized for it. That is different. I had reasons for that. An art competition is not the same thing."I looked at him. "So you are not going to tell me not to enter.""Why would I tell you not to enter a competition?" he said. "You want to chase your dreams, chase them. Enter as many competitions as you want. If you win, even better."I sat there for a second not sure what to do with that response because I had genuinely not prepared for it."Okay," I said."You seem surprised," he said."I am a little," I said."I do not have a problem with you having ambitions," he said. "I have a problem with you being unprotected in situations where I cannot account for your safety. Those are two differen

Chapter 66

Ruby's POVThe boutique was exactly what Malcolm had described, small, well lit, and very organized. The woman who had spoken to me on the phone was already at the door when I arrived. Her name was Diane and she was brisk and efficient and did not waste time.She had pulled eight options, all gowns, all in my size range. She had laid them out in a private fitting room at the back and she stood to the side while I looked through them without hovering too close.I ruled out three of them immediately. One was too stiff, one was a colour that did nothing for my skin tone, and one had a neckline that I just did not feel comfortable in. The remaining five were all genuinely good options. Diane had done her homework. I tried on four of them.The one I picked was a deep burgundy. Floor length, with a fitted bodice and sleeves that came to the elbow. It had a small slit at the side that stopped just below the knee. Nothing dramatic. It fit well across the shoulders and the waist and did not pu

Chapter 67

Third Person POVMalcolm got Ruby out of the car carefully. She was not completely gone but she was not steady either. She was somewhere in between, where her body was moving but her coordination had mostly checked out. She was drunk from all the alcoholic wine consumption.He kept his arm around her waist and she leaned into him without seeming to notice she was doing it. He got her inside and up the stairs. His room was closer than hers. He made the decision quickly and practically and pushed the door open and brought her in and sat her on the edge of the bed."Okay," he said. "Let me get you some water."He turned to go to the bathroom."Malcolm," she called out.He turned back. She was looking at him. Her eyes were half lidded and her lipstick had faded and her hair had come down slightly from where it had been pinned. She looked at him in a way that was different from how she usually looked at him."Come here," she said."Ruby.""Come here," she said again.He came back to where

Chapter 68

Ruby's POVThe first thing I noticed when I woke up was that the ceiling was wrong. Not wrong in a bad way. Just different from what I was used to seeing when I opened my eyes in the morning. The ceiling in my room had a small water stain near the left corner that I had gotten used to looking at. This ceiling had nothing like that. It was plain and clean and higher than mine.I lay there for a second without moving.Then I turned my head slowly and looked around. This was Malcolm's room. I sat up fast and immediately regretted it because my head started pounding the moment I did. I pressed my hand to my forehead and sat very still and waited for the throbbing to settle into something manageable.I was still in the burgundy dress from last night. It was creased and the zip had come down slightly at the back. My shoes were on the floor beside the bed. The covers were pulled up to my waist. I looked at the other side of the bed.It was empty but the pillow had an indent in it like someo

Chapter 69

The room went very quiet. Malcolm understood what I meant "Did he touch you?" he asked. His voice was even but there was something under it that was not even at all.“He tried to once.”I was crying properly now, not loudly. Just tears running down my face that I was not stopping anymore because I was too tired to stop them.Malcolm got up from the chair. He sat on the edge of the bed beside me and he put his arm around my shoulders and I did not pull away. I leaned into him and he held me there and I cried for a little while. He did not say anything while I cried. He did not tell me it was okay or that things would get better or any of the things people said when they did not know what else to do. He just held me there and let me finish.When I pulled back and wiped my face he reached over to the nightstand and handed me a tissue. I laughed a little at that which surprised meI wiped my face and took a breath.He was still sitting beside me and he was close enough that I could feel

Chapter 70

Malcolm's POVShe was asleep. I could tell by the way her breathing had evened out and her eyes were closed and she nestled in my arms. She looked different when she was asleep.I was on my back with her curled into my side and my arm around her and I was looking at the ceiling.I had not slept. I was not tired. My mind was doing what it always did, which was process everything and turn it over and look at it from different angles. I could not turn it off. I had tried for years.I looked down at her. Her hair was loose across the pillow and her face was pressed lightly against my chest and one of her hands was resting on my stomach. She looked ethereal in her sleep. She had fallen asleep fast, which told me how tired she actually was, or maybe it was just an aftermath of the sex.I thought about what she had told me earlier about her mother. The things she had said to Ruby as a child. The way she had watched another woman's daughter get everything Ruby had been told she could not have.

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