DOTTY (The Naughty Ones Book 3) Read Free

popping.
    They both land on me and wrestle me down to the floor before I can start swinging, and it’s only when I feel ice-cold water land on my face and I start spluttering that the anger fades and leaves me limp and ragged.
                  “Why did I have to meet him now?” I whimper, hating the fact that Percy’s eyes seem to mist before she pulls my sodden self into her arms and squeezes me tight.
    “Because life’s a three-dollar whore who only cooperates when you pay the bitch. Hush now, Dotty, we got you. Just breathe for me and we’ll get through this.”
    I obey and take deep breaths through my nose, blowing them out with a trembling hiccup, just letting the peace and silence around us settle in before nodding at them and letting Indie pull me to my feet.
    “Jesus on a cracker, little girl, that was a doozy. You’re under way too much stress right now it if only takes a few gibes from us to get you this riled up. You need to get away.”
    “How? I have my phone blowing up at all hours and I still haven’t sorted out this mess. Plus, I don’t have much money left after…”
    After I gave my mother and father some of the savings I’ve been squirreling away for the last few months since business picked up. Just about all I can afford lately is rent and groceries, but I don’t want anyone knowing that because it would just solidify the fact that I’m a total asshole who lets my family take me for a ride.
    “Well fuck. Have I mentioned lately how much I hate your parents, Dot? And no, I’m not talking an ‘I’ll punch you in the face’ hate but rather I want to peel them like grapefruit, I hate them so much.” Percy snarls, making me blush and look away.
    “I know. Sometimes I feel the same.”
    “Then cut them loose, babe.”
                  “I can’t, guys. No. Don’t start in on me right now, please. I’ve had all I can take for one day. Just let me think and work these things out in my head and I’ll come up with something. I just need time.”
    I suddenly get the strange thought in my head that time has been running out on me ever since I took my first breath.                                                           
     
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter Three
    Do What You Have To
    Paul
    The view from the seventy-second floor where my office is situated in the building that’s been in my family for generations has always calmed and soothed me.
    Except for today. As I look down and see the traffic cruise by like little dots of color and listen to Alex with half an ear, all I can do is clench my teeth and fists and try to ignore the anger building inside me.
    “And now she’s running around trying to ignore us all while her poor mama is sick and her father’s trying to keep everything together. She’s selfish, man. Honestly I don’t know how I’m gonna handle having a selfish wife, especially when the only thing she’s really got going for her is that meek personality her father’s been telling me about for months.”
    The little shit is so far off base it’s not even funny. Dot has got to be one of the sweetest, least selfish people I know. She’s always doing free benefits in the bad neighborhoods, and getting people to donate food so that her and that motley band of crazy women she calls friends can feed the less fortunate.
    I’ve even delved into her financials, and from what I’ve seen I suspect she’s even been slipping her parents some money too. Not that those assholes need it, so why take from her in the first place?
    And then there’s the stuff that she does in her free time. Just last month she knitted till her fingers bled to help the church with some charity drive they were hosting.
    And what about the way she’s been working herself to the bone trying to keep up her end of the catering business that her and her friends run while also spending some afternoons and mornings with her