guilty love » joel miller AU ✔️

chapter eight: the toy

When Joel said goodbye to the three men and locked the front door, he noticed noises from the living room.

As he walked into the room, he saw that Ana was watching some true crime documentary on the tv. And when Ana noticed that Joel was standing behind her, she immediately turned to him. By now she was almost sober again and felt a little bad.

"Hi uhm, You were right, I guess sometimes I'm maybe a bit disrespectful, I shouldn't have talked to you like that earlier. I'm sorry" she said and then got a little unsure when she noticed that Joel was looking at her without any facial expressions.

"It's okay. You were right too, maybe I treated you like a kid. Won't happen again. And you know you really shouldn't undress in front of others either. I just hope you don't do that at Zions"

"Okay wait, you want me to respect you? Then you respect me too, okay? Stop shaming me for my job. You do it all the time" she replied and crossed her arms.

Joel sighed and sat down next to Anabella on the sofa, "You're right, sorry"

"What's your problem with Zions?"

"I used to be there a few times when I was younger, So I know how the waitresses are treated there. That's really what you want?"

"No" she replied honestly, "But I'm not going to work there for the rest of my life, you know? Maybe a few more months and then I'll have enough money to rent a small apartment"

"And what do you want to do afterwards? Back to college?"

"I don't know yet, or maybe I'll just keep working at Zions, the tips are really good there"

Joel watched Ana focus on the TV. A few days ago he wanted to suggest her that she could work for him. But he was pretty sure she would say no.

"Well you know, Miller Construction could use a secretary"

Surprised, she looked over at Joel, who was already watching her. "Are you offering me a job?"

"Yeah, I have to take care of all the appointments and customer meetings myself. It would be a relief if someone could help me"

"Well uh, that's very kind of you, but I have to think about it, okay?" she replied, because she wasn't sure if working for Joel was a good idea. She knows Joel doesn't really like her, at least since their argument earlier.

"Sure, it was just an offer. I don't want you to have to depend on the bar"

"Thank you Mr. Miller"

"Oh come on, now you don't have to be respectful either. You really don't have to call me that"

Ana looked over at him with a grin, "You won't mind if I call you Joel? I've called you Mr. Miller all my life"

"No I won't mind, like you said, you're not a kid anymore"

"Okay well, then tell me Joel, didn't you say you want to go to bed early because of your work?" she asked him with a grin.

"Yeah I did. I was about to, but then I heard someone talking about the buried corpses of a serial killer. I wanted to check on you"

"You wanted to check on me?"

"Yeah, I don't want you to be scared"

"Oh" she mumbled and felt herself blush a bit. She wasn't usually shy, but she just didn't expect Joel to be nice to her after their argument. If she were him, she probably would have kicked herself out. But he didn't, and she was very grateful for that. And she was also grateful that it was dark in the room, there was only some light coming from the tv so he couldn't see her blushing.

Joel put his hand on her shoulder for a moment, "Think about the job, yeah?"

"Yes I will, thanks for the offer again" she replied while he got up.

"Sure, but I'm going to bed now, good night"

"Yeah goodnight"

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

When Joel's alarm rang at 5, he realized pretty quickly that he probably didn't have to work today. It was still pouring heavily and that's why he gave his workers the day off. They can't work on the construction site under this weather condition.

But since he still couldn't sleep anymore, he went into the kitchen to make himself a coffee. After all, his body was used to getting up so early.

And to his surprise, Anabella fell asleep on the sofa, again. He tried to make a coffee quietly, but unfortunately the coffee machine woke her up anyway.

"Would I have to get up that early every day if I worked for you?" she asked tiredly with a groan when she entered the kitchen.

"Of course"

"Well that sucks" she murmured and filled a glass with water.

"You get used to it, and you know, your working hours in the bar aren't normal either"

"Yeah I know"

"But we're staying at home today, because of the weather"

"Oh okay, well then maybe you can help me with something?"

"Depends. What do you need?"

"The floor lamp in my room isn't working anymore"

"Ah yeah sure, I'll take a look" he said, took his cup and followed her upstairs.

"I've pressed that button times, but there's no light. And you can't plug it in, right?"

And as the two stood in her room, Joel only needed a second to understand why the lamp wasn't working.

"Yeah, you can't plug it in because it runs on batteries" he explained to her.

Oh, well that's embarrassing.

"Oh. I didn't know that, you have any new batteries in the house?" she asked back.

"Yeah sure, you should have some in that drawer too" he said and went to the night stand.

But before Anabella could realize which drawer he was talking about, it was already too late.

"Wait! Don't open it!" she exclaimed.

But he had already opened the drawer and saw a pink sex toy in a transparent plastic box inside.

"Oh Fuck" Anabella mumbled.