by Layne, Ivy
Sex.
Now I only had one goal: Get her so addicted to me she couldn’t walk away. I could do that. I had to. Now that I’d had a taste of her, all I wanted was more.
Chapter Six
Cooper
Axel, Emma, and my mother arrived at lunchtime. With my brother, Knox, out of town with his girlfriend and my other brother, Evers, in the field for the day, it was up to me to greet them.
I hit the front office to find Alice standing behind the desk, her palms pressed flat to the dark wood. Her lips were a red line, her face set in an icily polite expression as my mother harangued her.
“It’s not an appropriate way to dress in a business office. You should know better. I don’t know what Maxwell was thinking hiring you in the first place. Go upstairs and—”
“Mother, drop it.” Axel glared down at my mother, the flat look in his eyes telling me he was officially out of patience. My mother had been living with Axel and Emma for weeks. I imagined he’d been out of patience for a while.
Standing beside him was my sister-in-law, Emma, normally one of the kindest, friendliest people I knew. Giving my mother the same flat stare as Axel, she said, “I think Alice looks both professional and very pretty.”
Turning her eyes to Alice, she smiled before rounding the desk and giving Alice a warm hug. She whispered something in Alice’s ear that had Alice’s eyes warming as she hugged Emma back.
Emma ran her hand down the arm of Alice’s sweater. “I wish I could pull this off. You look fantastic. On me, it would be too much.”
Emma was a beautiful woman in her own right, far taller than Alice, with full curves. She knew how to dress, her clothes elegant while making the most of her natural assets, but she was right.
Alice’s look was perfectly suited to her more pixie-like frame. On Emma’s rounded curves that dress would turn her into a bombshell. Despite her eye-catching red hair, or maybe because of it, Emma tended to go for understated vs. in-your-face.
My mother gave a disgruntled harrumph, smoothing a strand of her frosted blonde hair behind her ear. Her eyes only slightly bloodshot from the drinks I’m sure she’d consumed on the plane, she looked the picture of the society matron she was. Or had been before she left Atlanta for Florida.
I moved to stand behind Alice, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Mom, it’s good to see you. I’m glad you’re here, but I need to be clear. Alice is an essential part of this company. We wouldn’t make it through a day without her. I happen to think, and everyone else agrees, that her work attire is perfectly appropriate.
“However, if she wanted to show up in her gym clothes or wearing a clown suit, none of us would give a damn as long as she kept doing her job as well as she does it now. If I catch you talking to any member of our staff with anything other than appreciation and respect I will bar you from the office. Are we clear?”
I hated setting my mother down like that. If she hadn’t asked for it, I never would have done it. But I knew her, knew her competitiveness with other women. Knew she’d always disliked Alice. If I didn’t make myself clear she’d be unstoppable, bitching and complaining, digging at Alice when no one else was around.
Hell, she’d probably do it anyway, but at least it would be clear to Alice whose side I was on. I love my mother, but I know her.
If Lacey Sinclair excelled at one thing, it was being a bitch. A hard thing to have to admit about my mother, but I didn’t get where I am in life by lying to myself.
The look she gave Alice was heavy with venom. As if the previous conversation had never happened, she said, “Is the apartment ready? I can’t imagine none of my boys have room for me but—”
“Mom,” Axel said on a sigh, “we’ve already explained. Emma and I are taking the only room at Evers’ place. Knox’s house exploded—”
“Only the garage,” my mother cut in.
“It’s not habitable,” Axel went on, his temper barely leashed, “and Cooper doesn’t have a guest room set up. Why would he when the on-site safe house is right here? We need you in the most secure location possible. The safe house is it.”
The part about the guest room was a lie. A necessary one. My mother was not staying in my place when I had a perfectly secure apartment on site.
My mother held her hand out to Alice without a word. Alice placed the key in it just as silently. My mother turned on her heel, wobbling a little before regaining her balance and striding out the door.
It shut behind her with a decisive click. With a sad laugh, Emma said, “That went well.”
I moved to give her a hug of welcome before doing the same for Axel.
“Good to see you, man.”
Axel looked past me to Alice. “Sorry, Alice. That was way out of line.”
“Don’t worry about it, Axel. I’ve been around long enough. I know your mom.”
Enough said. If I could have put my mom anywhere but in the apartment across from Alice’s, I would have. Hell, if I could have talked Alice into moving in with me I would’ve done that, but there was no way.
One step at a time. Moving her in after one weekend of sex was too fast for her. Patience, I reminded myself.
“You guys had lunch?” I asked Axel and Emma.
“No, and I’m starving,” Emma said. “Do you have to jump in to work right away? Can we go out or do we need to order in?”
She leaned around me to catch Alice’s eye. “Can you come to lunch with us? I want to hang out while we’re here. Everything is always so busy I never get to talk to you.”
Alice’s face fell with genuine regret. “I’d love to come to lunch, but I fell behind getting the apartment ready for Mrs. Sinclair and missing most of work on Friday. I have too much to do here. Rain check?”
With a grin, Emma confirmed, “Rain check. Definitely.”
Unnecessarily, I said to Alice, “Call me if anything comes up while we’re out.”
“Will do, boss,” she said, no hint things were anything other than business as usual.
That turned me on more than if she’d made a lascivious comment or winked. Alice. So fucking proper and efficient. I couldn’t forget the feel of her under me, the spill of erotic, dirty, desperate words from her lips as I’d moved inside of her. The end of the day couldn’t come fast enough.
As we left, Emma hooked her arm through mine, looking from me to her husband. “Except for the eyes, you two look so much alike, you could be twins. I don’t know if it’s scary, or hot, or both.”
From behind us, Alice decisively stated, “Both,” and Emma’s laughter filled the room.
Lunch with my brother and his wife was almost enough to take my mind off my mother’s arrival. Almost. She’d declined lunch but demanded we join her for dinner.
The evening meal was a roller coaster. The high of being with Axel and Emma as well as my youngest brother, Evers, and his girlfriend, Summer. Only Knox and Lily were missing, but they’d be home soon enough. Then all the Sinclair brothers would be together. I was proud of Axel and the job he was doing out in Vegas, but I liked having him home.
The low part of dinner was my mother. Watching her consume glass after glass of wine, ordering another bottle after Evers told the waiter we were done. The list of complaints about the safe house apartment, all bullshit considering we’d designed the place for high-end clients.
Unlike Alice’s apartment, which was functional but basic, the apartment my mother was using was plush. From the thousand thread-count sheets and custom-designed furniture to the chef’s kitchen and Italian marble bathroom, every inch of the place was designed to keep our top clients comfortable and entertained.
No one stayed there unless they were under a significant security threat, often unable to leave the building for days at a time, so we’d gone out of our way to make sure the apartment had a top-of-the-line entertainment system stocked with movies,
books, music.
Everything but an open Internet connection. What there was, we kept strictly monitored. Bored clients can be trouble. After a few days in the apartment, sometimes they needed to be protected from themselves as much as any external threat.
I was good at tuning out my mother’s complaints, but this time it was what she didn’t say that dug under my skin. In all of her bitching, she never mentioned our dad.
Our dad, who’d cheated on her repeatedly, driving her deeper and deeper into the bottle. Our dad, who’d faked his own death five years before after stealing from the Russian mob.
Our father had been running a side business with that same Russian mob for years. A side business my mother hadn’t been too surprised about. No, her relocation from her condo in Florida to Axel’s place in Las Vegas and now back home to Atlanta—that was all our fault. We’d failed to clean up my father’s mess for him. We were the fuckups, not dear old Dad.
Never mind that we didn’t even know he was alive until six months ago. Never mind that he’d left us with nothing to go on, no clue what he’d been into until everything went to hell around us.
It blew my mind, her loyalty to a man who’d done more to ruin her life than any of her sons ever could have. We were the ones taking care of her, doing our best to keep her safe and comfortable.
Listening as she made a snide comment about Emma’s career and the babies she hadn’t given Axel, I wondered how my brother and his wife hadn’t killed her in the last few weeks. Based on the set of Axel’s chin and Emma’s sigh, they’d come close.
Summer’s eyes were wide at her first exposure to Lacey Sinclair. I’d met Summer’s mother, knew she adored her daughter and was always there at the other end of the phone with love and support. She’d been here a few weeks before after Summer’s father had been killed, another casualty of my dad’s ties to the Russians.
After meeting Paisley Winters, I knew Summer wouldn’t be prepared for the woman who would one day be her mother-in-law. Evers, as much to preempt criticism of Summer’s career as to defend Emma, said, “Mom, maybe you got confused by Alice’s outfit earlier, but this isn’t actually the fifties. Emma worked her ass off to get her MBA, and now she’s got the job she’s always wanted. And they’re not ready for kids, not that that’s any of your business. Why don’t you just lay off and enjoy the fact that your son is in love and happy and has a good marriage? That’s a fucking miracle considering the example you and Dad gave us.”
Shit. I’d love to blame Evers’ outburst on too many drinks, but, like the rest of us, after watching my mother slide into the bottle none of us had a taste for alcohol. We’d have a beer or a glass of wine, maybe a mixed drink, but never enough to lose control.
Evers’ outburst wasn’t fueled by alcohol. It was fueled by stress and fear. We’d shielded my mother long enough. Way too long considering that, in all of this, her sympathy was with our dad.
She drained her glass and glared at her youngest child. “Don’t you talk to me like that, Evers Sinclair. If it weren’t for me—”
Summer closed her hand over Evers’ and squeezed in support as Evers shot back, “If it weren’t for you, what? We wouldn’t be here? True enough. Thank you, Mom, for giving birth to all four of us.”
“Ev,” I said, shaking my head at him. I wanted to tell him to lay off. Leave her alone.
I wouldn’t. He’d almost lost Summer because of my father. After seeing Alice on the floor of Knox’s basement in a pool of blood, I knew how he felt.
We were out of patience with my father’s bullshit. With his crazy, co-dependent relationship with my mother, who’d stayed with the man even as he drove her to the bottle and then defended him over her own children.
I loved her with the helpless love of a child for his mother, a love tainted with hope. Hope that she would change. Hope that she’d give a shit about her children.
I couldn’t help but love her, couldn’t help but want to keep her safe, to hope that someday she’d want more from life than bitterness and her endless glasses of wine.
I could hope and I could love, but I was not going to put up with this bullshit.
I signaled the waiter for the check. I was done.
Emma exhaled in relief. Axel’s tight jaw unlocked a fraction. Even Evers relaxed. Only my mother was annoyed the dinner was over. Why, I couldn’t imagine. My mind was already racing ahead to home, and Alice.
I texted Alice after walking my mother to her door, my ears still ringing from her list of complaints about dinner. Ungrateful children. Inadequate lodgings. Etc, etc.
With another warning not to test the bounds of her security, I closed her door and knocked on Alice’s.
Chapter Seven
Cooper
No answer. I knew she was home. After the incident at Knox’s place on Friday, I’d put a tracker in her purse. Paranoid, yes. But as we’d all learned the hard way, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you.
If any of Tsepov’s men had seen my mad rush to get Alice to the hospital they knew they could get to me through her. I’d needed to know she was safe.
During dinner, my phone had beeped with an alert that her car had left the garage. I didn’t need to track it to know she was headed to Zumba, or dance class, or one of the varied things she did to have fun and stay in shape. A second alert came an hour and a half later when her car had reentered the garage.
She might already be asleep. Neither of us had gotten much of that over the weekend. Just because I was half desperate to get inside her again didn’t mean she couldn’t use a break. She was probably sore. Exhausted. And I was a thoughtless asshole. One night away from her wouldn’t kill me.
My cock insisting that a night away from her would definitely kill me, I went back upstairs to my place. I debated texting but couldn’t think of anything to say that wouldn’t sound desperate or stalker-ish.
I thought about watching a movie or going to bed early. Instead, I wandered my place, restless and out of sorts. I wanted Alice. Her smile. Her laugh. Her way of putting everything in perspective, so all of it—the dinner with my mother, problems with my father—didn’t seem as overwhelming.
I picked up my phone and pulled up her name in the messaging app and stared at the screen. She might be asleep, but if she was awake, I just wanted to see her. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d struggled with what to say to a woman. Junior high, maybe?
Alice wasn’t just any woman. She was Alice. I knew her better than anyone. This should be easy.
As I deliberated, my phone vibrated in my hand. An alert from the tracker in Alice’s purse. Her car had just pulled out of the garage.
What the fuck? It was almost eleven o’clock. Alice didn’t go to bed early, but neither was she a night owl. Too many nights I’d come home late and her car was always tucked into the garage as it should be.
So what the fuck was she doing leaving at eleven o’clock at night?
All thoughts of not seeming like a stalker fled my mind as I hit her contact on the screen. When she answered, her voice was cautious. Careful. “Hey.”
“What the hell are you doing? It’s after eleven.”
“Yeah, Dad, I know that. I have a clock on my dashboard.”
“Cut the sarcasm, Alice. Where are you going at eleven o’clock at night? Until we know for sure that Tsepov has backed off, I don’t want you out there on your own, especially this late at night.”
“Are you going to send a guard with me to dance class?”
“I’m considering it,” I admitted, “but there’s a difference between dance class at six-thirty and heading out to—where the fuck are you going at eleven-fifteen at night?”
“Look, it’s not a big deal. I’ll be back before you know it.”
“Alice,” I ground out. “Talk.”
A long exhalation before she s
aid gently, “I ran into your mom in the hall. She asked me to go pick some stuff up for her. I knew you didn’t want her driving around so—”
I didn’t need Alice to explain. I already knew her story was a whitewashed version of the truth. She hadn’t run into my mother in the hall. My mother had banged on her door and demanded that Alice go out, not to get her stuff, but to buy her alcohol. Because, apparently, the six bottles of wine in the pantry of her apartment weren’t enough.
“You’re going to the liquor store, aren’t you?”
Another sigh. “Coop, it’s okay. I know how she is.”
“You’re not an errand girl, Alice.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s actually part of my job description,” she said, trying to infuse humor into the conversation. I wasn’t in the mood.
My mother had been drinking all night. I didn’t have to imagine the way she’d probably spoken to Alice, treating her like less than the dirt under her shoes. I knew why my mother hated Alice, even understood it, but that didn’t mean I’d let her get away with it.
“I’ll see you when you get back,” I said. “Stay alert. So far, I think Tsepov is on the level and this is all about Dad now, but I don’t want to take any chances.”
“Got it, boss.”
When she called me boss in that saucy tone it went straight to my cock.
The half-hour it took for her to hit the liquor store and get home stretched far too long. I went downstairs the second her car hit the garage. Alice walked out of the elevator, her arms loaded with two bulging brown paper bags. Seeing me, she stopped short. “Cooper. It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay.”
Striding ahead of her, I knocked lightly on my mother’s door and stepped to the side, out of view. The door swung open so fast my mother must have been standing there, waiting. The look on her face sliced into my heart. Disdain at the sight of Alice. Relief at the heft of those brown paper bags.
“It took you long enough.”