Caught Up In You: Edgeplay: The complete serial

by McCormick, Jenna

  The drive back to the Rosemont is only five minutes, but it’s long enough to feed my apprehension. Pops is buried. There’s nothing else to distract me from the stark reality of what I need to do.

  But Connor doesn’t give me a chance. “I have a few calls to make. Why don’t you take a bath and try to relax?”

  He strides off to his office before I can say a word.

  Now you’re just making it drag like a government job, Snarkarella hisses. Go after him.

  Instead of heeding her sage advice, I climb the stairs to the master bathroom. Filling the tub feels like too much effort, so I undress down to my slip and panties and climb into bed. Curling into a ball, I stare out the window at the purpling sky, like a fresh bruise on the world. I need to make plans. My thoughts are still muddy, my commitment lackluster. I’m still holding on to a dream, the promise of forever.

  I hear the door open and Connor comes in. “No bath?”

  Slowly I turn to face him. He’s so glorious, so absolutely perfectly masculine. And he loves me. I have no doubt on that score. He may not have said the words but it’s there in every breath, every sizzle of electricity between us. His consideration is unparalleled, just like his intensity for me. He is my drug of choice and I live for my next fix.

  The truth won’t wait any longer. He may kick me out. Out of his bed, his house, off his property, in nothing but my underwear. I don’t really care. I won’t find a moment’s rest with this awful weight bearing down on me.

  He eases down onto the bed next to me, still fully clothed, concern etched in the tightness around his eyes and mouth.

  The words bubble up from me like lava, too hot and volatile for me to contain. “He was responsible, Connor. Pops told me he helped them take you.”

  The tears come then, spilling down my face in hot, salty trails. The hurt is too great, my sorrow raging through me like a flash flood.

  His arms go around me and he drags me to him, murmuring softly that it’s all right. The words make no sense. Didn’t he understand what I just said?

  I can’t stand his sympathy. His comfort is so wrong. Fighting free of his hold, I struggle to compose myself. “How can you say that? Don’t you hate me?’”

  His navy irises fix on my face. “Of course I don’t hate you, Baily. You weren’t even born when that happened. It’s got nothing to do with you.”

  “How can you be so reasonable about this? Aren’t you angry at all?” I expected a total meltdown, his retribution swift and deadly, focusing on me, for the sins of my mother’s father.

  He looks toward the fireplace. I see a muscle jump in his jaw, and something that looks a great deal like regret passes over his face when he turns back to me, taking my hand in his.

  “Baily, I already knew.”

  29

  I go cold at his words. “You knew?” This can’t be right. Connor knew my grandfather was involved with his kidnapping? “Since when?”

  “I’ve known all along.”

  Yanking my hand back, I shake my head, unable to accept what he’s telling me. “And you never said anything to me?”

  “I didn’t know you at first.”

  I think back over the odd interactions between the two men I love, the seething disdain Connor barely veiled the one time I saw them face to face. His palpable disappointment when he saw how riddled with holes my grandfather’s memory had become. Pops’ insistence that I couldn’t marry Connor. Realization breaks through the haze and I climb out of the big four poster bed. “That’s why you came here, isn’t it? Why you bought the estate. To find answers.”

  “Honey, it doesn’t matter anymore. Get back into bed. You’ll freeze.”

  I ignore him, well on my way to a level five nuclear meltdown “God, how could I be so stupid? How could I miss it?” Is it my destiny to be played for a fool time and again?

  Connor stands and moves to grip my shoulders. “Baily, now is not the time to get into this. You’re grieving and there’s nothing to be done about it. The past is over. We have to move on.”

  I shake him off. “How can you say that? After what happened to you, what you have to live with? I want to know everything you know. Tell me what happened.”

  His expression darkens, eyebrows meeting over his aquiline nose. “Why? To spoil your memories of your grandfather and make you pity me? What purpose will that serve?”

  I stand my ground. “It’s the difference between truth and fiction, Connor. I don’t want pretty little lies. I know Pops loved me, that he worked hard and loved my grandmother. But he was capable of something awful, and I want to help make it right.”

  He approaches, gripping my shoulders tightly. “Listen to me. You do make it right. Just by drawing breath and being here with me, you help me more than any answers ever could.”

  The tears break free once more and I slump onto the antique chaise. “How can you say that? How can you even stand to look at me, knowing that the same blood that wronged you is in my veins?”

  His hands cup my face, thumbs brushing away my tears. “Red, you’re killing me. Please believe me when I say I harbor no ill will toward you, even if you think I should. Please, come to bed, I need to hold you.”

  He looks so vulnerable and I feel selfish harping on this, demanding answers when he has none to give. Unable to deny him anything, I let him lead me back to the bed. We lie facing each other. I find I can’t look at him though, and close my eyes.

  He strokes my face tenderly. “You have nothing to feel badly about.”

  “Then why do I feel so awful?” I whisper.

  “Don’t.” It’s a command, given in his dominant tone, the one that commands respect, but I ignore it. No matter that he owns my heart, or that we’re going to be married. I know he’d move heaven and earth to make me happy, but Connor Edge does not have the right to tell me how to feel.

  He lied to you. Used you, Snarkarella hisses. She’s an insidious bitch, but she’s always there looking out for me, and for once I answer her in the privacy of my own mind, even as Connor holds me close.

  How did he use me?

  Think about it. He came here looking for revenge against Thomas Sinclair. The Alzheimer’s took that from him. He couldn’t punish a man who was already damned. You were the next best thing.

  Do you think he loves me? I need to know. This inner critic is the only person I trust to be honest with me.

  I think it doesn’t matter. Your relationship is built on a web of lies. It’s destined to crumble.

  In that moment I know why I despise her. She may be harsh, a task mistress I can never please, but she always encourages me to do the right thing.

  What do I do now?

  Her words make me shiver, chilling me to my marrow. Leave. There’s nothing holding you here now. Pops is gone. You owe Connor nothing. It’s time to live your life.

  A tear leaks out from my tightly shut eyelids. I’ll tell Connor tomorrow.

  You think he’ll let you go? Come on Baily, use your head. You know this man. Even if Mr. Edge somehow manages to let you walk away, Connor the Dom will come after you. The only way to get away is to do it covertly.

  She makes it sound like mission impossible. Maybe it is. I have to say goodbye to him.

  Snarkarella doesn’t respond, but she doesn’t need to. I already know she doesn’t like the idea.

  Connor shifts against me, his erection prodding my thigh. “I need you. I need to be inside you right now. I feel like you’re slipping away from me.”

  Because I am. Though my heart is willing, my body doesn’t respond to his caresses. Or maybe it’s my mind causing the problem. I don’t want to accept him for what I’m sure will be the last time.

  His lips are on mine in a sweet and tender kiss, full of reverence and love. He’s never made the declaration, and now I don’t want to hear it. Turning my back on all he offers, all the safety and tenderness, is hard enough. I can’t give up his heart.

  My body trembles as his hand skims farther down, not
from lust or need, but from the agony I know is coming. My spine is so stiff it feels as though it will snap in half. A breath bursts from me when he reaches beneath my panties to pet my sex.

  “I’m sorry,” I gasp when his fingers touch my sex lips and find no wetness, no liquid desire. All the moisture in my body is trickling from my eyes in an endless wave of tears. I want this to be special, perfect, but the slickness I’ve started to take for granted when I’m with him is gone. “I can’t—”

  “Ssshhh, you have nothing to apologize. It’s not your fault. I’m a greedy bastard and it’s been days. Let me get you ready.”

  Again his lips take mine, his kiss ravenous. I’m out of breath when he pulls away. He tugs my camisole over my head and tosses it aside. His lips descend on my bare breasts, tight from the chill in the room. My fingers go to his silky hair, trying to memorize the way the strands feel.

  Switching his mouth to the other breast, one hand toys with the wet peak while the other cups my sex. I feel his heat, his warmth. but it doesn’t melt me. I strain for that burning pull, but it’s far away now. I’m already gone. I sob harder. Can’t I just have this one final goodbye?

  Connor eases back, his brows drawn. “Do you want me to stop?”

  “No.” I’m a blubbering mess, frantic at the thought that he won’t continue because I’ve turned frigid all of a sudden. “No, please, keep going. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  The wariness slips away to reveal devotion, tenderness. “There’s nothing wrong with you, baby. I don’t want to push you—”

  “Yes, give me this. I need it.” I claw at his chest, nearly frantic. The urgency drives deeper, like a splinter in my mind. It’ll drive me mad soon if I’m not careful.

  Connor reaches for the bedside table and extracts a bottle from the drawer. I have to wipe my stinging eyes to see he’s holding a bottle of lube. I spread my legs before he can ask, eager to show my compliance.

  Struggling out of his boxer briefs, he pours lube onto his hand and starts massaging my sex. “You’re so soft here,” he whispers as his fingers trace over my folds, leaving slipperiness in his wake. “So warm.”

  “Please.” My fingers curl into his bicep as he eases one slick digit into my opening. The pressure, the fullness is exactly what I crave, and I tilt my hips up, silently begging for more.

  Slowly, my body stretches and prepares for him. The artificial lubrication summons my own, and he slips a second finger inside me while his thumb seeks out the tight bundle of nerves at the top of my sex.

  “Connor,” I pant, closing in on mindless need. “Please.”

  “Tell me what you want.”

  My gaze latches on his. “You. All I’ve ever wanted is you.”

  My words send him into a frenzy. He dumps copious amounts of lube onto his cock, until he’s as slick as I am. Taking his shaft in one hand, he feeds it into my sex, his gaze focused on my face. My limbs go around him, arms encircling, legs twining with his, holding him to me. I revel in our joining, the slide of his flesh against mine, into my aching tunnel.

  “So tight,” he groans, closing his eyes and breathing through his mouth.

  “I love having you inside me.” The words fall from my lips and he shudders above me. I kiss along the curve of his jaw, where his five o’clock shadow peeps out. My fingers dig into the taut muscles of his back. He’s huge inside me, stretching me with every swivel of his hips.

  Though every tendon stands out in sharp relief, he holds still, the head of his shaft nudging the mouth of my womb. I wriggle beneath him, but he’s so large I don’t gain any ground. His arms go around my, holding me to him, and he buries his face against my neck.

  “I love you.” His whispered words pierce my soul.

  No! my mind screams. Why is he making this so hard on me? Sobs break forth again as I clutch him desperately. I have no control over my emotions, my body. He holds me and rocks, joining with me as though he wants to surge into me until we are one.

  Against all odds, an orgasm crashes through me and I scream his name, tears still tracking down my temples. As my sex clamps down on him, his control breaks and he shoves even deeper inside, burying his thick length as far into my greedy sex as it will go.

  We’re both shaking in the aftermath. Sweaty, sticky and shaken to our marrow. The sheets are undoubtedly ruined, and I’m not much better, quivering like a Jell-O mold in turbulence.

  Still inside me, he moves us back to the position where we started, face to face yet now bonded by flesh and spirit. His lips kiss away my tears and he wraps his arm around my neck, pulling me closer still until all I hear is the steady drumming of his heartbeat.

  I can’t do it. It would kill me to leave him after that. He’s everything I never knew I needed, delivered like a miracle into my arms. It’d be sacrilegious to walk away.

  Stop rationalizing, Snarkarella hisses. Remember that he kept the truth from you, is still keeping secrets. It should take more than a decent fucking to blot that from your mind.

  But she underestimates his hold on me—not his arms around me, but the tethers he’s sunken into my heart. He doesn’t want me to go, even if I am the granddaughter of the man who betrayed him. Shouldn’t I consider that in my decision?

  How about what you want? Snarkarella’s question lacks her usual vitriol. What do you want for us, independent of Connor Edge, the Rosemont or anything else? There’s a whole big world out there. Don’t you want to see it?

  Of course I do.

  Even if he let you see it, what would the view be like, behind walls and teams of security guards? Connor will never ease up on the safety measures. Everything will be on his schedule, his timetable, done his way.

  There’s no arguing with the truths she speaks. Connor does sequester me. Sure it’s for my protection, but if not for him, I wouldn’t need protection, would I?

  His breathing has evened out, he’s asleep. Again my heart clenches as though someone is squeezing it in a fist. I can’t just abandon him.

  Who says it has to be forever? Go get a life and if you decide to let Connor Edge be a part of it, then more power to you. Just make sure the choice is yours and that you’re not backed into it or bullied into it.

  Worries abound. Will he wait for me? He said he loves me, and I believe him, but love is not always an endless well. His might dry up if I’m not here to reciprocate.

  But is that fear enough to justify my staying here? I know I’ll never want anyone else the way I want him. And I have no doubt that a fresh start, away from the Rosemont and all the skeletons buried here, will be good for us.

  Connor’s hold on me loosens. This is my moment. Quietly as I can, I slip from the bed, away from his warmth and into the bathroom. His breathing is deep and even when I come back out dressed only in a bathrobe.

  If he catches me I’ll say I’m hungry, that I wanted something from the kitchen.

  The house is silent and I descend the stairs. I know the security procedures by now. The nights when I stay at the main house, there’s no one guarding my cottage. I still need to avoid the security teams sweeping the grounds, but I know something they don’t.

  I move to Connor’s study and my gaze falls on the wall safe where two important documents sit. One is our marriage license. I swallow hard when I think that by leaving, I’m rendering it useless. We’ll have to apply for another one.

  If he still wants to marry me.

  The other is even more troubling. It’s the safe, sane and consensual clause that I signed for Dom Connor. Even if this Connor doesn’t chase after me, I know he will. A thrill shoots through me when I think about him catching me.

  The misery shrouding me squashes any positive feelings. If not for my grandfather there wouldn’t be a Dom Connor, a controlling man with deep-seated issues that stem from three years of he alone knows what. Maybe if there are no more Sinclairs here at the Rosemont, Connor will finally heal his fractured psyche.

  The Connor who just made love to me so exquisi
tely still thinks he wants me. But he doesn’t have the whole picture. He doesn’t know what happened to him after my grandfather’s betrayal.

  It’s Dom Connor who has to make that choice. And I have to look out for myself, because I can no longer trust anyone else to have my best interests at heart.

  The tunnel is as creepy as I remember, worse without Connor’s reassuring presence. Slowly, I make my way through the winding corridor until I reach the root cellar beneath my cottage. Relief fills me but it’s short lived. This is the first place he’ll look when he discovers I’m gone.

  My bedroom looks as though a bomb went off inside. Connor packed hastily before the trip to Dubai. Though it’s only been a week, everything looks different. The space that used to feel snug and cozy now seems chokingly claustrophobic.

  No time to mull things over. It’s pitch black, and turning on lights would alert any patrolling security to my presence. Fumbling in the darkness, I don a tank top and underwear, then yank on the first pair of jeans I find. My black duffel bag is under the bed. A suitcase will be too cumbersome and I need to ditch my truck at the train station. I stuff various articles of clothing into the bag along with a picture of me and Pops at the county fair. It’s the only photo I have of the two of us together. I was about six in the picture, around the same age as Connor when Pops took him…

  Can’t think about it. Though it pains me, I left both my cell phone and Simon, the tablet Connor bought for me, back at the main house. Electronic devices have GPS tracking, and I have to leave everything Connor could use to find me. No trail of breadcrumbs for him or anyone else to follow.

  With one final look around, I turn away from the only home I know and face the future head on.

  30

  I stop at the drive up ATM at the bank on my way out of town. A few hundred dollars and the contents of my duffel bag and purse are all I have to start my new life. But where to go?

  The train station seems the logical choice. I have no doubt Connor could pull some strings with the state troopers and find my truck. But buying a train ticket in cash is harder to trace. Thinking like this could drive a person insane. Especially since part of me wants him to catch me, to haul me back to his bed and keep me there for the rest of my life.