He pulls back, rests his head on my shoulder, and sticks an arm out toward the nightstand, blindly searching for the light. When it turns on, I blink away the bleary-eyed brightness and let my eyes focus on him.
He has a ring in his hand. A massive princess cut diamond on a simple band. It’s perfect.
“Emery Winthrop,” he begins, but I’m already shouting yes, unable to hold in my excitement.
As soon as he slides the ring on me, I fling my arms around him and refuse to let him go.
Mine.
* * *
Nash Prescott
Two Years Later
* * *
My mother-in-law is whispering in the corner with my mother. Their eyes keep swinging my way, flickering between me and Emery.
“They’re totally planning something,” Emery remarks, resigned to their scheming.
“Like you don’t like it.”
She can’t hide her grin as she nods. “Yeah, okay. It’s the best.”
Emery always credits me with helping rebuild her mother’s reputation, but it wasn’t me. Mrs. Winthrop is genuinely a nice person. It just took the town a little bit of time to see that again. But now that they have, she’s a town treasure, running bake sales, volunteering anywhere she can, and waving at everyone with the widest genuine smile they’ve ever seen.
“We should probably hide,” Emery suggests as our moms make their way to us from across the living room. She’s picking at the food on her plate, which has me worried because she hasn’t eaten a full meal in at least a week.
Our son Kayden clutches onto my leg, holding me in the spot. He’s been begging us for a sibling, and we’ve been trying. It just hasn’t happened.
“Too late,” I say when Mom and Mrs. Winthrop are in front of us.
There are ridiculous smiles on their faces as they pull out a small gift-wrapped box and hand it to Emery. She takes it cautiously and unwraps it on the spot. It’s an unwrapped pregnancy test. One of the expensive ones that look like they’re the most accurate because the price tag is highest.
“Mom,” Emery says. The word starts as an admonishment but quickly turns into excitement as we both piece together Em’s behavior over the past few weeks.
I turn to her. “You don’t think…”
“I missed my period yesterday, but it’s one day…”
“Think what?” Kayden asks.
“You’re gonna be a big brother!” Mom answers for us, even though Em hasn’t taken the test yet.
“YAY!”
Kayden runs around Reed’s birthday party announcing the news as my wife laughs and says, “I’ve never been more excited to pee.”
I carry her into Reed’s childhood bedroom, but instead of dropping her off in the tiny en suite bathroom, I lift her onto the bed and kiss forehead, her lips, then her belly. Ten years ago, I stood inside this room and thought I deserved penance. That I didn’t deserve happiness.
But now that I have it, now that I know how real and natural it feels, I know it’s meant to be. I still carry the weight of the lives lost, and Emery still aches for her father’s victims, but the fact that we built the happiest life out of pain has only made us thrive.
We are better.
We are happier.
We are so damn imperfect, it’s perfect.
* * *
Want to read more from Parker?
Bastiano Romano, a standalone mafia romance novel, is available to purchase or borrow!
Also by Parker S. Huntington
Asher Black
Niccolaio Andretti
Ranieri Andretti
Bastiano Romano
About the Author
Parker S. Huntington is from Orange County, California. She has a Bachelor’s of Arts in Creative Writing from the University of California, Riverside and is currently pursuing a Master's in Liberal Arts in Creative Writing and Literature from Harvard University.
* * *
She was the proud mom of Chloe and has two puppies, Bauer and Rose. She also lives with her boyfriend of six years—a real life alpha male, book-boyfriend-worthy hunk of a man.
* * *
She is the author of The Five Syndicates series. You can check out book one in the series, Asher Black, here.
* * *
Join her mailing list here!
Join her Facebook Fan Group here!
Click here to see exclusive teasers!
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
About the Author
Also by Ella James
* * *
VANCE
* * *
“You good?”
She looks up from re-tying her bikini bottom, smiling with her teeth pressed to her lower lip. She lifts her dark brows. “Yeah.” The word is a little growl. Her eyes are still hot as they look me up and down one more time. “So…can I get your number?”
I’m lost in thought—so much so that I don’t realize she asked a question until her cheeks redden. “Only for the cruise if you want, but…” She does that little laugh—the awkward one that women do when they’re self-conscious.
“But you want my number.”
Another giggle. “Sort of.”
“How old are you, sweetheart?”
She straightens her shoulders, making her tits jut out. “How old do you think?” It’s sultry, but she can’t keep the smooth seductress act up. She smiles, pink-cheeked and cheery, her blonde pigtails making her look all of eighteen fucking years old.
“I’m twenty-four. Just a paralegal from Alameda cruisin’ with my squad.” She steps closer to me, making the small island hut feel smaller as her finger traces my pec. “What do you do, cowboy?”
Huh? Oh, right. I was wearing a straw hat back on the catamaran, before our group went snorkeling.
I run a hand over the soft mound of her breast, tweak her nipple gently with my fingertips. “You.”
I give her a numb, drunk grin. She laughs. Her brown eyes move over me again. Then she reaches up to gather her pig-tails in one hand, lifting her pale hair off her sun-kissed shoulders. When it’s fastened back with a hair band she had around her wrist, she kneels before me on the hard-packed sand. She tilts her chin up at me, and I think she’s pretty. It’s true. Still, though, the thought is like a pep talk. Fuck her, Vann. Just fucking fuck her already, and get it over with.
I reach for the tequila bottle on the scarred wooden table, tip it back, and take a long pull.
* * *
* * *
Just fuck her…
The words bob to the surface of my consciousness, swirling there as I try to make sense of them. My jumped inner monologue is slow and hazy. I try to latch onto a single thought, but my head’s pounding.
Shit.
I crack my eyelids open, squint up at the shifting blob of black and gray above me. It’s swaying. Or…I am?
I hear the ocean, but— Confused, I turn my head a little. Ow. Still wearing swim trunks. I shift slightly in the hammock, and the canvas stings my sunburned back. Fuck. I must be on that little island. Why’s it dark?
I try to swallow as I look around, but my mouth’s dry. Like…really dry. My head spins as I sit up in the hammock. Nighttime. What happened? There’s a shine of moonlight on the flat, black ocean, glinting off the waves as they roll to the shore.
I step out of the hammock on unsteady legs, feeling like I might be sick. My right heel comes down something cold and hard. Yeah, that’s a bottle. My eyes throb as I shift my gaze down a bottle of tequila, empty and half buried in the sand.
“Oh yeah, cowboy. Ride me!”
We fucked in the hammock. I remember now. Pig-tails. I’m on the backside of the island—just a little crumb of sand we came to with the cruise’s Sunday afternoon catamaran excursion. She and I—what was her name again?—we grabbed the bottle of tequila and cut through the vegetat
ion at the island’s center. Sneaked around to the back side, where these huts are. My eyes move over the one she blew me in—they’re just these little, round, palm-frond things, kinda scattered throughout the palm trees.
Shit. I’ve gotta get back to the other side, fast. I’m surprised the snorkeling has run this long, but maybe they did some kind of kitschy bonfire thing.
I must have passed out hard if Perky Tits left me here. What was she…a CPA? Something responsible. Woman like that wouldn’t let them leave without me.
I ignore the moon’s position in the sky as I dig my flip-flops out of the sand and slip into them, then start toward the island’s center. One deep scratch on my ankle from the underbrush, and I’m angling back toward the beach. Too dark for that shit, and I’ve gotta move fast.
I swallow against my dry throat as I squint at the water. What time is it? I realize…my phone. Where’s my fucking phone? I whirl back toward the huts, patting my pockets. Then I remember: I left it on that boat. The catamaran. I found this little nook that seemed dry and—
“Oh, fuck.”
The moon—near full, and beaming stark white light down from the center of the sky—is saying “hey asswipe, it’s midnight.”
Maybe shit is different in the Caymans, I tell myself. Star shit changes with your latitude, right? Still, I start to jog over the hard plane of sand right by the water, my heels tossing surf up behind me as I make like goddamn Road Runner.
What if the bonfire’s almost over? What if that damn boat left me? I tell myself it doesn’t matter. Not like no one’s ever coming back. They’ll be back tomorrow, probably. Another day, another group of dumb fuck tourists.
My head throbs as I lope over the sand. The pale shore curves slightly, and I pick my pace up. Please be there. Please. Yeah, there’s no way they left me. Head counts. Lawsuits. Nah—just wouldn’t happen.
Finally…the moment of truth. Sweat rolls down my back as I round a grove of palm trees. Then I’ve got a straight-shot view down to the big hut where they had the open bar set up.
The stretch of beach is bare, the sparkling water out beside it empty.
Holy fucking hell.
They left me.
I got fucking left behind.
I think of Lana in her all-white sitting room back in Tribeca, glancing up from her glass of green tea she was holding the night she cut me loose.
“Just go on the trip alone, Vann. You have a client to meet with. Have a great time.”
And I laugh.
* * *
LUKE
* * *
It’s been too long since I kicked back with my favorite scotch. Good ole Bunnahabhain 25. It’s too expensive to drink publically. Which works out fine—since publically, I don’t drink.
I take a tug straight from the bottle and fold one arm behind my head. I’m lying on my back atop a towel. I could be chilling in the captain’s seat or lounging on the padded benches back in the boat’s cockpit, but tonight, it’s the front deck for me. I don’t know why. I guess because I don’t want to be comfortable. Make it match up: mind and body.
Anyway, from up here on the bow, I can see everything—the whole sky. I have another swallow and look for the sea goat. According to my office manager, I’m Capricorn—the zodiac’s power hungry control freak. Her words. Tonight, the sea goat is nowhere to be found.
I let my breath out…rub my eyes. The idea was to get away. This is my favorite secret: Sea-3PO. She’s a 40-foot sailing yacht. About as much boat as most sailors can manage without help. I like to keep her down around here; in the Caymans, not as many people know me. Usually.
Another swallow, and my head starts sort of drifting with the tide. My eyes feel heavy. That’s what I need, right? A little R&R so I can go back…healthy. Time alone to make some headway on my new book. I’ve got twelve weeks left to analyze one of the most poignant moments in ancient philosophy—or human history, depending on who you’re asking—and my mind is a dry well.
Usually there’s something in me, something I can kind of juice—his thing I use to build thoughts and ideas. Books. Films. Lately I’m not myself…and I know why.
I lift my phone from where it’s resting face-down on my abs, peck in a web address. I’m already hard when I reach into my swim shorts and wrap my palm around my dick. I shut my eyes and work myself from tip to base. Then I squeeze there and stroke upward.
Something shifts—it feels like the boat rocks—but my head is spinning. Probably just a gust of wind. I breathe deeply, focus on the explicit images on my phone’s screen. I need this—badly. Some release while I’m here, and I can risk it.
I’m lost for some time. Lost in fantasy, in pleasure. I’m panting, close to coming, when a drop of water hits my foot. I look up, and my heart trips. Someone is standing over me—a large, shadowy form I realize is a man.
As I scramble to up, he darts back toward the rail, heavy footfall rocking the boat.
“Who are you?”
When he starts toward me, I react on instinct, grabbing my scotch bottle and hurling it. I watch in horror and sick satisfaction as it strikes his forehead, sends him staggering. He grabs the boat’s rail, then straightens and fumbles with at a thick steel hook that’s hanging off the railing.
Before he can unfasten it and throw it at me, I rush him, head-butting his middle so hard that it topples him backward over the boat’s railing. He hits the water with a big splash. I watch as he comes up gasping.
“HELP! There’s fucking sharks!”
What the what?
He’s flailing all around, like someone who can’t swim. “I got left! By a cruise ship!”
My gaze shifts behind him, to the sandy little island maybe fifty yards out. I dropped my anchor near it for some shelter from the wind, but I didn’t want to bring the Sea-3PO too close.
“I need some water. Please!” His voice cracks, and I step a few feet to a seat that’s got a life preserver tacked onto the back. I pull it off and toss it to him. The guy swims a few strokes to it, throws an arm around it. His head bows for a second before he looks up at me. “Let me back up—please, man!”
I look around the water, then back to the island. Nothing looks amiss, but it’s dark. Why should I trust this guy?
I lean on the railing. “How’d you get left?”
“I don’t know. Got drunk and passed the fuck out.” I think I hear a hollow laugh, but it’s lost in the music of the water lapping at the boat’s hull.
“What ship was it? Which cruise ship?”
“Sierra of the Seas.”
“They don’t get up close to islands like that.”
“I went on a snorkeling thing.”
That rings more true. “And you said you passed out?”
“I’m an idiot, okay? Let me up—please. It’s nighttime, and I’m fucking bleeding here.”
I rub my hand back through my hair. I am, of course—going to let him up—especially since it’s likely my fault he’s bleeding. Just not quite yet.
I fold my arms and look down at him for a second, trying to gauge his build and age from just the swatch of shoulders I can see. Up here on the deck, he seemed big. I get the sense he’s younger than me, too—but that’s probably because of the profanity.
“Were you traveling alone?”
This time, there’s no mistaking his hoarse chuckle. “Booked the trip with my fiancé.”
“So where is she?”
“New York.”
I wait a beat for him to say more. When he doesn’t, I ask, “What’s your name?”
“Hey, wait…you got the internet? Google me, man. Vance Rayne.”
It takes me a second to find my phone, lying face-down where I dropped it on the deck. I shut the porn window and search the name he gave. The first thing that pops up is an article from Page Six where he’s pictured at a red carpet event with a blonde woman in a blue dress. Prickling heat spreads over me, starting in my chest and moving through my arms, down my torso, as I look at h
is picture. I skim the article, which says he was engaged to Lana Ellison, a New York City socialite, but they broke things off. The story refers to him as an artist. I click on another link.
“Hey, man—please?”
“Give me a minute.”
I blink at a mural depicting a blue-haired woman. It looks like it covers the side of a tall building. Interesting. I set down the phone and search the deck for my Bunnahabhain. I find it beside the rail and scoop it up.
I’m still warm and fuzzy from the scotch, so I splash my face with some water from an Evian bottle before stepping back to the railing.
“Meet me at the stern, Vance.”
He’ll know how to get up. He’s already done it once.
This time, I drop the ladder for him, and I watch him ascend. I was right about his build. He looks lean but broad. Moonlight shines off his impressive chest and shoulders. Water rivulets twine down his legs, dripping from swim shorts that cling to him like a glove.
When he steps onto the deck, he pushes his hair out of his face, and I realize it’s shoulder-length. I look him discreetly up and down. Dude works out. Probably not every day, but with some regularity. I can’t tell who’s taller—him or me—but I think I’m definitely bulkier. I’m an every-day kind of guy. Got the home gym thing going.
Vance Rayne, long-haired artist, wipes a palm over his face, and I see that he’s classically attractive. He’s got a Matthew McConaughey vibe going.
His eyes find mine.
“Water. Please.” His voice is rough. His face, all Adonis lips and cheekbones, looks suspended in the moon glow. He’s half swallowed by the inky darkness—not quite corporeal. And yet his realness drums through me.
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