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If you’ve read the story starter – a very long Chapter 1 – and you’re ready to dive into the story with me, please continue reading.

About the story: (short description. Click here for longer)

“Let Me Love You” is not just a tale of love and sacrifice but also a poignant story of self-discovery, celebrating the human capacity to find love in the most unlikely of circumstances.

Please enjoy the current WIP of Iris and El. This will be published freely up to a point… like the old days and then the entire book will be posted for the full download. I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. And don’t forget to check out the companion stories. (Wicked Chances, Dreams of Reality, The Convenient Wife & Ravenous)

Enjoy, Your Author, Sylvia Hubbard

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Read more: Let Me Love You – Chapter 6✍🏾📚❤️ #SylLit #WIP #livestory 📖💓 #marriedwife #demandedconsensual #darkromance

Author’s Note: I should let you know there is a triggering episode of almost SA, so you aren’t all up clutching your pearls. There! I’ve warned you!

Upon entering, Dwayne woke everyone in the house at three in the morning. 
“Why the fuck is all this shit in the fucking front room?!” he bellowed. 
Iris heard something break and a lot of stuff hitting the walls. 
Clem sleepily came out in the hallway, and she urged her nephew back into the room to try to get some sleep until it was time to get up.
Getting her nightgown from the bathroom, she walked into the front room. As soon as she spotted Dwayne standing on the couch peeing on the clothes she had set out, she screamed.
“What are you doing?!” 
Dwayne laughed maniacally, stumbling off the couch towards her. “You think you can talk to me like that ’cause you got Mr. O on your side?”
She backed away, holding her nose from the cheap liquor and the smell of piss he reeked. “Dwayne, you’re peeing on the couch.”
He grabbed her by the front of her clothes and yanked her to his face. “It’s my motherfucking couch, bitch! All this shit is mine! Even you.” He shook her a little. “And don’t you fucking forget it.” 
Almost vomiting at the smell of regurgitated food and alcohol on his breath, Iris tried to turn her face away as he spoke more.
“And I can do whatever the fuck I want.” He licked her face. “And I can do whatever the fuck I want to you.” It was as if he had just discovered this and tore off her bathrobe.
She tried to stop him and push herself out of his grip. While backing away, Iris tripped over a chair and fell hard on the ground. Dwayne fell on top of her, knocking the breath out of her body. Before she could recover her equilibrium, he’d ripped her nightgown off her body.
“Stanky leaky tits,” he growled and practically chewed on her nipple. Yet, although his verbal had been with disgust, he moaned as if he was enjoying something good to eat.
In agony, Iris struggled to break free as he restrained her wrists and inflicted unbearable pain on her chest. 
“Dwayne, stop!” she screamed, struggling to throw his body off her. 
He gurgled lasciviously, and his free hand dug down between them to open his pants. 
Panic filled her, and she struggled more, bringing her knee up and hitting him in the stomach as he was trying to open his pants. Dwayne immediately froze and then threw up on the side of her face. His entire weight collapsed on top of her, and he didn’t move.
Dwayne had passed out.
With all her might, Iris pushed him off her body and sobbed as old food and stomach contents dripped all over her hair, face, and shoulders. She walked backward out of the room, glaring daggers at Dwayne’s loud, snoring body, and went to the bathroom. It took three hours to get every particular food out of her hair and get the smell of vomit off her body. She was glad she had several types of soaps in the bathroom she had been testing, including one that removed the smell of onions. This worked best on her skin, but the tea tree oil and honey were great for her hair, stripping the smell and softening the particles to rinse out. Lastly, she scrubbed her skin with a stiff brush until it felt like she had removed a layer.
By the time Iris was done, it was time to wake up Clem. She found his extra uniform in his backpack and dressed him in his room. She had to dig down in Violet’s clothes to find a creamy salmon skirt, but Iris could barely walk in it with her extra rear. The skirt had a matching silk tank top, and Iris added a white casual sweater to cover her arms and shoulders where old bruising could still be discovered. 
She was returning to the bedroom to get dressed when she heard Dwayne moving around in the living room. Immediately, Iris bolted inside of Clem’s room, where she knew Dwayne wouldn’t come. 
They both were quiet as they listened to Dwayne trudge past Clem’s door. Dwayne groggily called out for Iris, and when she didn’t answer, he sneered, “Stupid raggedy bitch. Fuck! Why she gotta smell so damn good?” 
Clem frowned disappointedly, and Iris only mouthed an apology.
When they heard the bedroom door slammed, they relaxed. 
Giving her his back, Clem said, “You can dress in here.”
“Thanks, Clem,” she said gratefully and quickly put on the clothes. All their other items were in the front room, waiting for them. She wouldn’t wear ruined shoes, so she grabbed the ugly, uncomfortable tan shoes she’d worn yesterday.
“I’ll drop you at Aunt Rose’s house,” she said because they were running late, and she didn’t want to walk in late on her first day at the job.
The school was right across the street from Aunt Rose. With her aunt’s agoraphobia, Clem understood being independent, and Iris was glad her nephew could take care of himself. 
Detroit was a city where one had to grow up very fast, and surprisingly, with everything Clem had been through, he had been able to roll with the punches. Her aunt would watch Clem cross the street to school, and with there being a light on the corner, Clem was actually old enough to cross the street by himself with the added benefit of a crossing guard there. 
Clem grabbed their lunches, and she grabbed two granola snacks for them to enjoy on the bus for breakfast. Right before Clem was to get off the bus, he dug down in his bag and handed her his digital pad. “You should take this, Aunt Iris.”
“But you won’t have anything to play with when you return home from school,” she said.
“I should be fine, but you don’t have anything electronic, and when you get around all the other adults, you’ll look out of place,” Clem pointed out. “They might make you feel weird, or bully you with your notebook and pen.”
Iris chuckled at his young observation. “Alright, Clem,” she responded and put the device in her large messenger bag.
The bus she had to catch actually went right by Aunt Rose’s house and Clem got off and ran to the porch. 
Aunt Rose opened the door before the bus took off. 
Perfect. 
This was the brightest thing that had happened in her day to her so far. 
When she got to the office, Iris had to sign in like a visitor, but surprisingly, they expected her and gave her a guest pass to get in the elevator by herself. The night guard was still on duty and remembered her from all the times she’d come over to meet Dwayne at the office.
“Working in the daytime now, Mrs. Folsom?” the guard asked. 
“For now,” she said, not getting her hopes up. What if her new boss hated her? What if this was a silly ploy to get into her pants, and when she didn’t give him what he wanted, he’d fire her and ruin her career by telling everyone what she had done?
She remembered how he looked at her in the rain. She remembered how he looked at her when they were alone in his office. 
He was a different man than the boss he became when work was involved. Yet, she was positive she had not dreamed anything more, except she wasn’t sure how to bring the other man to the surface again and would want to do so with him being her boss.
Iris wasn’t foolish, yet she admitted he had piqued her curiosity momentarily and desired to uncover more about him. Yet, when he discovered what he desired about her, maybe that fascination would turn to annoyance, and he’d fire her, and, as usual, her flights of fancy towards any man would turn to crap.
Yet, why did she want more? Why did she need more? What happened in her life that made her finally wish to release Iris from the box? Because he gave her a look of interest? Because this man had been nice to her for the first time in her life?
From more research on him last night, Iris read that he rarely kept a private personal assistant. In fact, his life was private. He’d refused awards for recognition and turned down opportunities to have a public life where people could find out more about him.
She arrived on the top floor ten minutes to seven-thirty, but her guest badge didn’t get her through the glass doors that would allow her into the executive area.
Sitting on the chair in the lobby area, she waited patiently for someone else to come. 
When seven-thirty came, but no one had come off the elevator, she began to worry. Fifteen minutes later, with no phone, she felt cut off from the world. There was no phone at the lobby desk or any other public phone she could use. 
Remembering the digital device her nephew had given her, Iris pulled it from her messenger bag and was glad she could use the building’s public Wi-Fi.
Upon checking Clem’s email, she found two emails from Eledumare Olorun, which surprised her. The first one was sent at seven-fifteen when she had initially sat down in the executive lobby. 
The tone of the welcome email was rather formal. There were three documents attached for her to fill out, but inside the email were instructions to bring a tall Matcha Green Tea with oat milk from the lobby’s coffee shop by seven-thirty to his office so they could get down to work. 
The following email contained nothing except the subject line, which stated, “You’re late. You’re fired.”
She replied to the last email, saying, “I’ve been sitting in the lobby since seven-fifteen.”
Two minutes after she sent the email, and no one came out to the glass door, she slumped her shoulders and went to the elevator. As she waited for the elevator to come up, she refreshed the screen, but nothing was updated in the email, leading her to surmise that she really was fired.
Dealing with Eledumare Olorun in real life it was either a dream or a nightmare.
Stepping into the elevator car and glancing at the glass door, Iris was almost about to cry, but as usual, she kept her emotions in check. 
When Iris got to the lobby, she remembered to return her guest badge. Her hand trembled a little as she relinquished the badge to the security guard, and it was getting harder and harder to fake like she was okay with everything.
Heading toward the exit, she kept her back straight. The heels hurt, the skirt felt ten times tighter, and she removed the sweater because she started sweating from the emotional adrenaline running through her body. 
It was her first and only opportunity to sustain herself, and she’d just lost the opportunity. Maybe she was always meant to end up with the short end of the stick. This was probably Karma again, fucking up her life for the life she took. 
Maybe Eledumare Olorun didn’t want a baby murderer in his presence, and firing her through email would be better than saying, “You’re fired” to her face.
Just as she was about to go out of the exit, she heard someone screaming her name behind her.
Turning around, the skinny, beady-eyed Lester was panting through the morning crowd, trying to get to Iris. 
“Wait!” he yelled, coming up to her. “Can’t you hear?!” 
She frowned. “I only just heard you.”
Lester raked his eyes over her attire distastefully. “I’ve been screaming your name for the last two minutes, dammit.” He leaned over, resting his hands on his knees, trying to catch his breath. “Damn. Imma ’bout to have a heart attack. Where the hell do you think you were going?”
Remembering the warning Dwayne gave her about his man, she wasn’t about to tell this man any of her business. “What’s it to you?”
He stood up, looking annoyed. “I’m not the one asking. Mr. O just bellowed at me to get my ass to the executive lobby to get you.”
“I just turned in my badge, so what’s it to him? He fired me,” she said, trying not to sound bitter. “Are you here to ensure I turned in my badge so I can’t return?”
“No, silly girl. He said you’re supposed to be in his office at seven-thirty. I don’t read my emails until eight, so how was I supposed to know?” Lester had the audacity to sound like this was all her fault as he handed her ten dollars. “Get his order from the coffee shop and get upstairs. I’ll print off all the paperwork you need to fill out, and there will be a pen and pad outside his desk in the chairs for you to use for notes. Under no circumstance do you cross the tape line around his desk. Don’t forget to get your badge back.” Lester flitted off as he saw someone he knew.
As she stared at the money, she felt inclined to toss it on the ground and walk right out. First, she was hired, then fired, and now hired again. Eledumare Olorun sent her on an emotional rollercoaster. How could she even think of wanting to work for him? 
Getting into the long coffee line, Iris took fifteen minutes to get the Matcha Green Tea with Oat Milk, grab her guest badge again, and head back up to the administrative floor. 
She would do this job as professional as possible, get Dwayne’s debt paid off and then get a recommendation from this man so she could work somewhere else. Anywhere else!
Life gave her another chance, and by the good Lord, she would dedicate the best of herself and use this opportunity to take herself to the next level.

End of This Chapter | Post your thoughts in the comment | Let the author know what’s going on in your head

Let Me Love You (c) 2024 Sylvia Hubbard All Rights Reserved

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual person, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.
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