Bitter Heat

by Mia Knight

  “Polara Maxine,” Jasmine said and shook her head. “Holy shit. She sounds like a terror.”

  “You better believe it,” Lyle said as he took his daughter and began to walk around the room.

  “It happened so fast,” Colette said faintly.

  Colette was emotionally shattered and desperately trying to keep her composure. Jasmine bit back a smile and rubbed her arm.

  “It’s all over now.”

  Colette took a deep, shaky breath and waved her hand in front of her face as her eyes filled with tears. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  “Hormones,” Ariana said sympathetically and handed her a tissue.

  Colette’s eyes followed Lyle for a moment before she said, “Lyle, I want her.”

  Colette, the cool-headed drill sergeant, was desperately in love, and it was a beautiful sight. Ariana stepped out of the room when her phone rang. Jasmine watched Lyle hand the baby back to Colette. He pressed his forehead against hers and whispered to her while he stroked her hair. Jasmine’s heart clenched with painful happiness. She stepped back to give them a moment.

  The past two months had been a roller coaster of trials, but this… This was good and pure. Polara started a clean slate for all of them. She was so caught up in the moment that she didn’t realize Ariana was back until she grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the room.

  “Ariana, what—?”

  “He’s here. I just saw him,” Ariana hissed.

  “Who?”

  “James Roth!”

  The warm feelings in her chest began to dissipate. “He is?” She was hoping he’d left by now.

  “What’s he doing here?”

  She licked her lips. “He… I…” She gave herself a mental bitch slap. “I was on Madison Avenue and ran into him at Black Jade. You know Dai’s shop?”

  Ariana blinked. “Yes, I know it.”

  “Yeah, so Dai and I were catching up, and he showed up, and then I got the call so he brought me here,” she said as casually as possible. She wasn’t lying, just messing with the timeline and not accounting for everything in between.

  Ariana’s brows drew together. “You guys are okay? I thought…”

  “Yeah, we’re fine,” she lied and felt her spurt of joy crumple into a ball and sink to the pit of her stomach. Reality was a fucking bitch. “I didn’t know he was still here. I’ll tell him to leave.”

  Ariana grabbed her arm. “Colette told me Roth’s willing to talk to us.”

  “Yes,” she said cautiously.

  “Maybe I should come with you and see what terms he wants to negotiate.”

  Her stomach lurched. She hadn’t signed the prenup yet. He wouldn’t negotiate until she did. “I don’t think it’s the right time. Besides, Colette wants to be there too.”

  Ariana hesitated and then nodded. “You’re right.” She cupped Jasmine’s cheek. “Thank you for speaking to him on our behalf. You don’t know how much this means to us.”

  She gave Ariana a weak smile as her sister slipped back into the delivery room. She looked through the window at her family before she walked down the hallway. Roth was in a small waiting room by himself. He paced around the room with his phone to his ear. He caught sight of her and paused, watching her through the glass.

  Roth was destructive, selfish, emotionally abusive, and unflinching in the face of unbeatable odds. He wasn’t the same man she married. That man had been reserved but not cold. Had Maximus hardened him, or had he always been that way and she ignored it? The man watching her through the glass had a detached Hannibal-like quality forbidding enough to make any sane person walk away. Instead, she stayed there while he continued the call, eyes fixed on hers.

  They had an unhealthy addiction to one another. It began the moment they met and hadn’t let up even now. Back then, she had given herself to him unreservedly, naïvely believing he loved her. She made excuses for him until that night in London forced her to face the truth. She never planned to remarry. Once was enough. She didn’t want to set herself up for the pain that came with giving herself to someone and coming up short. She didn’t have a filter when it came to those she loved. Case in point, the lengths she was willing to go to for her sisters and what she had given up to be with Roth the first time. She was idiotically loyal and built to protect… but who would protect her from Roth this time?

  He got off the phone and slipped it into his coat. He didn’t come to her; he just waited. He had orchestrated all of this with the precision of a military colonel. What else did he have up his sleeve? An invisible clock was ticking, forcing her to decide. Could she do this? Put herself at his mercy? Did she have a choice? If she walked away, they’d lose everything their father and grandfather worked so hard for. Life would go on, but they’d never be able to rebuild while Roth had a foothold in New York. He had turned the tables on them, and like last time, she was caught in the middle. One year and it would all be over. She would celebrate her freedom at Polara’s first birthday party.

  She walked into the waiting room, which was littered with magazines and had a weird, off-putting smell.

  “I need vacation time,” she announced.

  He frowned. “Excuse me?”

  “Vacation time,” she said crisply. “Everyone gets a vacation while they’re working, right? I want a month of vacation.”

  “If you need a vacation, we’ll take it together.”

  “You? Vacation?” Before he could answer, she waved the questions away. “No, I’m talking about time away from you if I need to… recover.”

  “Recover?” he repeated with a scowl.

  She rolled her hands as she tried to find a polite way to say his presence was suffocating. Not only that, but she was sure she would need time to fortify her walls. “If I need a mental break… or even a physical one if you go overboard.” She’d taken painkillers for two days straight after she got back from Colorado.

  “I’ve never hurt you.”

  She crossed her arms. That was a fucking lie. He destroyed her five years ago.

  “Some work trips you’ll come with me, but others I may go alone,” he said. “Whatever time you want, you’ll need to take around my schedule.”

  She twisted the sash of her coat as she said quietly, “You can’t call me a whore.”

  That was a hard limit for her. She might be one in the Biblical sense, but throwing it in her face when he was blackmailing her… No. He had already stomped all over her pride, but she wasn’t a punching bag. She was a fucking person, and once upon a time, she had been a real wife (in her mind), and he wasn’t allowed to mock her for it.

  He nodded.

  She twisted her hands together as she tried to think of anything else. “You know, if we just said we’re dating, we might be able to get away with it. There’s no need to get married.”

  “Exes don’t date.”

  “Maybe we do,” she argued even though he had a point.

  “People in families like yours don’t date. You date with intention and then marry. Marriage shuts everyone up, and I don’t want anyone questioning our relationship. Marriage is clear cut, legal, and fits in with our prenup.”

  There was no arguing that point, but… “If you get tired of me before the year is up, if you want out, then what happens?”

  His eyes swept over her before he said, “If that happens, you’ve upheld your end of the deal. I’ll still fulfill all of my obligations.”

  “And if you get angry with me,” she said tentatively, “you can’t lash out or threaten to go after my family.”

  He closed the distance between and cupped her nape.

  “Are you planning to make me angry?” he asked.

  “No, but I will. There’s too much shit between us to live in harmony.”

  He buried his face in her hair and inhaled. “You used my shampoo.”

  She gripped his lapel. “Roth, focus.”

  “Once you sign, we both keep up our ends. No reneging, no matter what happens in bet
ween.”

  There was a poster on the wall about antibiotics and asthma. She stared at it for a few seconds and took a deep breath, catching a whiff of him. She turned her face into his neck and felt him stiffen.

  “You smell like me,” she said and tried to move away, but the hand on her nape stopped her.

  “Anything else?”

  She stared at his throat as she tried to think.

  “I’ll make it official,” he rumbled. “I’ll speak to Colette and make her day even better than it already is.”

  “You’re an arrogant bastard.”

  “But I’m right, aren’t I? Your sister lives and breathes business, same as me. She may be a mother now, but she’ll never stop worrying about the company or what people think of her. It weighs on her, having to uphold her reputation as a Hennessy and holding her own against her husband. Maximus chose Lyle to spur her on.”

  She was stunned by his spot-on analysis.

  He massaged her nape as several seconds ticked by. “I know your family better than you think I do. I know how close you are to Lyle, that you used to see him when I was in London. He’s going to be the biggest problem. Your sisters will believe you because they want to, but he won’t.”

  She had been so focused on how this would impact her that she hadn’t considered the fact that she would have to act for the sake of her family and do it convincingly. “Oh my God. This isn’t going to work.”

  “It will,” he said. “Do you agree?”

  She looked up, her gaze colliding with his devil eyes. “Do I have a choice?”

  “No. Do you agree?”

  Her heart slammed against her ribs as she fought against her better judgment and whispered, “Yes.”

  His eyes flicked over her head and came back to hers. “Showtime.”

  “What the fuck is this?”

  She jumped and whirled around. Lyle stood in the doorway, and he looked furious. He advanced into the room and held his hand out to her.

  “Minnie, come,” he said imperiously.

  The hand on her nape tightened, but she didn’t need the warning.

  “It’s okay, Lyle,” she said.

  He shook his head. “No, it isn’t. Roth, let go of her.”

  Roth leaned down and kissed her temple. “You wanna tell him the good news, princess?”

  “Good news?” Lyle spat. “It’s not good if it involves you. Minnie, I want to talk to you.”

  “We’re getting married again,” Roth announced, and her heart skipped.

  “No, the fuck you’re not,” Lyle snapped.

  “You sound like Maximus.” Roth sounded amused.

  She elbowed him in the side.

  Lyle jabbed a finger at him. “Maximus told me if anything happened to him, you’d show up, and here the fuck you are.”

  “He knew no matter how long it took, I’d get her back, and she finally agreed,” Roth said.

  She looked up as he stroked her hair. She didn’t know he was such an actor, but then again, he had duped her before, so why was she surprised?

  “Fuck, Minnie, you know he’s no good for you,” Lyle said.

  His worry was easy to read, and she felt like shit. When she would have gone to him, Roth leaned down and nuzzled her temple and reminded her quietly, “United front.”

  “When did this happen?” Lyle asked.

  “In Colorado and it’s been going on ever since,” Roth said bluntly.

  She wanted to stomp on his foot. Did he have to tell him everything? God!

  “Is that true, Minnie?” Lyle asked.

  The hand on her nape felt like a noose. “Yeah.”

  Lyle ran a hand through his hair. “When’s the wedding?”

  “We—” she began, but Roth interrupted her.

  “Within a couple of weeks.”

  She jerked, but he covered the movement by bringing her against his body.

  “We don’t want to wait, do we, princess?” he asked.

  She opened and closed her mouth and uttered not one word. Wedding?

  “We hope Colette will be recovered by then, so you can all attend,” Roth said smoothly. “We want to include the family this time, and make it right.”

  What the fuck was he doing? Her family wasn’t a part of the deal. They didn’t have a wedding the first time—they had a judge—so why would it be any different this time around?

  “Min, do your sisters know?” Lyle asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Why didn’t you tell us?”

  “I… I knew it was gonna stir up the past, and I wanted to keep it under wraps as long as possible but…”

  “But we’re not hiding like last time,” Roth finished.

  Lyle sighed. “Are you sure about this?”

  He couldn’t hide his skepticism, and she couldn’t blame him. She was in way over her head.

  “Yes,” she said with a confidence she didn’t feel.

  Lyle jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “You better tell your sisters. I need to talk to Roth.”

  “Lyle.”

  “This is man talk, Min.”

  When Roth released her, she walked toward him. Even though he stood like a soldier ready for battle, she wrapped her arms around him.

  “I didn’t want to hurt you,” she said quietly.

  His arms came around her. “You haven’t. I just wish it was anyone else.”

  Me too, she thought. She walked out of the waiting room. She paused in the hallway and looked at them through the glass. They were both watching her, but Roth commanded her attention. He didn’t care that Lyle was about to rake him over the coals. No matter what he was up against, he always stood tall, and he never wavered. Once upon a time, she had admired him for that trait, but now, it made her stomach churn. He would never stop, never give in. This was the only way to protect her family from him. He would spend his lifetime punishing her family for trying to protect one of their own. One year and all of this would be over.

  When she entered Colette’s room, she found her sisters cooing over Polara who was sound asleep in her mother’s arms. She stopped at the foot of the bed and struggled to find the right words.

  “Minnie?”

  Ariana’s concerned tone made her eyes prick with tears. Both her sisters were watching her, clearly realizing something was going on. She wanted to confide in them and blurt out her fears and wants and needs, but they wouldn’t understand. Her relationship with Roth was a tangle of lust, rage, bitterness, and satisfaction wrapped up in a history of blackmail, manipulation, and silence. Even though she hated herself for it, she craved what Roth could give her, and suspected it was the same for him. Neither of them wanted the other, but they couldn’t help themselves. Sex had been a driving force in their relationship right from the start, and seven years later, nothing had changed. Their bodies didn’t care about their bad history. For the next year, they would slake their lust for one another, and hopefully, it would fizzle out and die. In return, her family would be safe, and she would never have to deal with him again.

  She plastered a smile on her face and raised both arms in a guilty shrug as she announced, “I’m getting married.”

  “You’re what?” Ariana gasped.

  The contented smile vanished from Colette’s face. “Roth?”

  She clasped her hands behind her back as she tried to think of something to say.

  “I slept with him in Colorado,” she blurted and instantly wished she could take it back when their eyes flared wide.

  “What?” Colette’s voice was scandalized.

  She straddled the line between fact and fiction. “We’ve been seeing each other off and on since then. He’s been trying to convince me to give him another chance, but I thought it was too complicated to sort out. I didn’t know all of this was happening with Hennessy & Co. He keeps business and personal separate, so when you told me about it, I was pissed. When I met with him, we talked.”

  “And?” Colette probed.

  “He was st
ill focused on paying Dad back for the past even though he’s gone,” she said with a shrug and tried to act like this was normal behavior when it couldn’t be further from the truth.

  “Which is what I suspected,” Colette said quietly. “Dad shouldn’t have gone after his businesses or turned so many people against him.”

  Jasmine blinked. That was unexpected.

  “Now, what does he think?” Colette pushed.

  “He realizes he can’t have me and still seek his revenge so… he’s going to help.”

  There was a buzzing silence.

  “He’ll help you regain your losses and probably let you buy him out for some ridiculously inflated price in future.” She clasped her hands behind her back. “I… I think it’s a good deal, right?”

  Ariana and Colette looked at one another, communicating in their secret language. She couldn’t tell whether they were relieved or insulted.

  “He’s doing this for you?” Ariana sounded dazed. “He must really love you.”

  Her chest ached from holding in all the things she wanted to say, but couldn’t.

  “You’re really going to work things out? After everything that’s happened?”

  She nodded.

  “Why marriage?” Colette asked.

  “He wants to do things right this time,” she said hoarsely.

  “Wow,” Colette said and gave herself a little shake. “If that’s what you want, we’ll support you.”

  Her sister’s easy acquiescence was startling. All her life, she longed to hear those words from her family, and when she finally received the support she craved, it was for a sham. A cynical voice in the back of her mind wondered if they would be as accepting if Roth didn’t have a controlling share of Hennessy & Co. She pushed the nasty voice away as Ariana gave her a hug.

  “Congratulations! We were worried about you living at Tuxedo Park by yourself. I know how close you and Dad were. I hope Roth gives you what you need.”

  “Me too,” she whispered.

  “Maybe your books made an impact on him,” Ariana mused. “Maybe he’s going to do things differently this time.”

  He was definitely doing things differently. He was starting with blackmail. She was relieved when Polara stirred, distracting them from her impending nuptials. She got a turn with the baby and buried her face against the newborn who smelled like new beginnings and sunshine. She had just handed her back to Colette when the door opened, and Lyle and Roth entered.