by Stacey Lynn
“I know. I know that in my head, and Courtney had demons she was always running from. She grew up in a really bad, horrific home life. She was never stable, always searching for something, and I missed the signs until it was too late.” I pressed my lips to the back of Haley’s head, needing that connection. Until Haley walked into my life, I hadn’t seen the difference between someone who wanted pain and someone who wanted submission. They were different, really, even when they were so close to the same. “After she attempted suicide, I got her help, sent her to a treatment program, and Meredith has stayed friends with her. I think because Courtney will always listen to her.”
“I’m starting to hate Meredith.”
I was, too.
“Meredith likes being the big fish in a small pond. Courtney trusts her and Meredith will always use that to her advantage. I don’t want there to be any secrets between us, Haley. Not now, not ever. I don’t want you doubting me, what I feel for you.”
It was beginning to be everything. Too soon to admit it but I hoped while I held her to me, told her everything I could, that she’d understand.
“And she’ll be there Saturday?”
“She will along with her dad, but like Gabby said, we can keep Meredith away from you.”
She huffed. “I don’t need protecting from some jealous woman. Not if she knows I’m yours.”
She’d tripped over the word. “You are. Absolutely.”
“Then that’s enough for me.” She was silent for several moments and with more hesitancy, she stated, “I like Gabby’s collar. It’s pretty.”
My cock twitched against her back. “What?”
“Nothing.” She spoke too quickly.
With one hand on her jaw, I turned her to face me and smiled. “You like the collar.”
A blush formed on her cheeks. It had nothing to do with the steam in the bathroom or the heat from the water. “It was nothing, I mean, I liked it, I just thought of it when you said I was yours. I’m not implying—”
I kissed her to silence her, slid my fingers into her hair and held her tight to me, explored her mouth like it was the first time.
Every moment with Haley was an experience I wanted to always feel like the first time.
Images of Haley collared, the ownership of it, flashed into my mind as our tongues lazily swirled together, our lips fused together. Her in a collar, spread eagle on my bed, metal glistening as I took her over and over and over.
“My job is to protect you, to take care of you, to give you what you need,” I whispered, pulling away from her, our lips still touching. “But in my time.”
And it’d be soon. I already knew those images still echoing in my mind would never go away. All of them would become a reality.
“Now tell me about your meeting with Ron,” I said, changing the subject, readjusting us in the tub.
“Timothy’s a prick, basically. He has no case, no legal way to go after the resort. But he’s refusing to drop it. I don’t even want to know how he’s affording his lawyer. Ron says we won’t lose, but if Timothy wants he can make it drag out.” Her chin fell to her chest. “God, I knew he was lazy. I knew he was a loser quickly after I’d married him. I’d wanted so badly to believe in him, to believe he would do what he talked about...his dreams, larger than life, they pulled me in and I thought I was on a pedestal, but I was so wrong about him. So young, so naive.”
She stopped abruptly and I let her wallow in her silence for a few moments until she shook her head, clearing whatever had dragged her down.
“What’s your favorite meal?” she asked just as abruptly as she’d gone silent.
“What?”
“Your favorite meal. Home-cooked. What’s something you eat that always makes you feel good.”
I laughed again, pressed my cheek to hers. My fingers trailed slowly up and down her arms to her abdomen, grazing her skin, her soft flesh above her belly button.
“You’ll think it’s silly,” I admitted.
Her smile went wide and amused. “Then you have to tell me.”
“Ugh. Fine.” I closed my eyes and remembered the small house I grew up in, before my dad’s firm took off, before we had money. They were good days, a mom and dad who laughed and touched each other constantly. A kitchen that hadn’t been updated since the seventies, yellow Formica countertops, brown stove. Whenever I thought of my mom I always remembered her dressed like she was going somewhere even though she didn’t work outside the home. But she loved baking and cooking in that small, dark kitchen.
“Tater tot casserole.”
She was silent for a moment, her lips pressed together until a sound burst from her. “I’m sorry...what?”
“Shh.” I couldn’t help but laugh with her. “I told you, you’d laugh. But we didn’t always have money, not until I was a young teenager and my dad scored a huge case that changed everything for him. Until then, he worked and mom stayed home. And she would cook casseroles, freezing leftovers so we could re-heat them. But there was something about the tater tots—”
“The way they grew soggy?”
“No, smart ass. I was a kid, they were good. It used to be my favorite meal, something mom always made for me. When my youth baseball league won a championship, when my football team lost the sectionals, when I came home with an A...the first time a girl broke up with me.”
She gasped, feigned shock. “No.”
“Yes. It happened. I was fourteen. I won’t discuss it. It scarred me for life.”
“You’re full of shit,” she said through her laughter.
I shrugged against her back before pulling her to her feet, the water was cooling and I wanted to hang out and talk more. Ask her about her favorite foods and movies and memories. There was so much we didn’t know about one another.
“Regardless, when I think of home, think of my mom, that’s always the first thing I think about.”
She turned to me as I dried her, slid a towel behind her back and pulled her against my wet chest. Her hand went to my chest, right above my heart. “I like that you have that.”
So pure. Sweet. God, I hoped I didn’t fuck this up with Haley. I pressed my lips to her forehead.
“I like that I have you.”
Chapter Eighteen
Haley
“Woah! You’re gorgeous.”
I turned to Claire and grinned. “I know, right? Jensen bought me the dress. Had it delivered yesterday.”
Her eyes went wide. “I think I like this new guy of yours.”
I did, too.
Something changed for us the other night.
All over a conversation of tater tot casserole. I still wanted to laugh. Like Jensen told me after he dried us off and we climbed into his bed, there was so much we didn’t know about one another. I had just assumed he was more a “silver spoon in his mouth” baby.
The fact he wasn’t made me like him even more than I already did, which was a lot.
“Yeah,” I said, turning back to the full-length mirror in the entryway of the Inn. He would be here any moment to pick me up for the benefit dinner and I was a ball of nerves.
Not to see him, but to meet his friends and coworkers, and he hadn’t said anything but the way he talked about his parents made me suspect his mom would be there, even if she did live in San Diego.
“He’s all right.”
Behind me, Claire snorted. “Yeah. All right. Hot dogs are all right. Halloween is all right. I haven’t even seen this guy yet and I know he’s about a fifteen on a scale of one to ten.”
I rolled my eyes. She was way wrong. Twenty-five, minimum. “What makes you think that?”
“Am I wrong?”
“No.” I turned to her. “He’s the best man I’ve ever met.”
“You love him.�
��
Did I? I was starting to. I knew that for certain. Hell, I probably already did. I just couldn’t bring myself to admit it. I’d loved and lost once. I wasn’t exactly willing to be that vulnerable to someone again. Not yet. Ironic considering the other positions I put myself in for him.
“I like him a lot.” I pulled my eyes off Claire’s and smoothed out my beautiful, black dress.
It was short, more of a cocktail dress than an evening gown, one shoulder strap was a cluster of what possibly couldn’t be real diamonds but look liked them, with an asymmetrical collar line and a ruffle that started at the other shoulder down to the opposite hip. In silver, strappy heels with an almost deadly-ankle-breaking high heel, I’d never been so beautiful.
Possibly not even on my wedding day.
It was beautiful and classy, but simple and flirty. Jensen said while the event was formal, it wasn’t overly so, and I figured he’d choose something for me that was appropriate.
We were raising money for his friend’s non-profit, and he didn’t want everyone spending thousands on clothes when it could be donated to a good cause instead.
Gosh. Could he be more perfect?
Behind his dark eyes and controlled emotions, Jensen was an undiscovered softie.
I wanted to discover every dip and plane, every valley, every line of his body just as much as I wanted to delve inside of him and discover the hidden corners of his heart.
“Thanks for making sure everything will run smoothly tonight.” I turned around and flashed her a grateful smile. Claire generally only worked during the week. That she was willing to work the late shift on a Saturday when she should have been going out and partying with her friends was a huge favor to me.
And a testament to the kind and beautiful girl she was.
“Wouldn’t have missed seeing you like this, ever,” she replied and stepped forward. “You look happier than I’ve seen you in a long time.”
“I hope I’m the reason for that.”
Both of our heads snapped in the direction of the front door and heat crawled up my neck as Jensen walked in.
“Oh, I think you might be.” Claire grinned as she stepped Jensen’s way, holding out her hand. “And if it’s not you, it’s definitely the dress. Claire Canton.”
“Jensen Rhodes,” he said, shaking her hand, but he didn’t spare her a glance. His eyes stayed trained on me, making my heart stop.
When it restarted, everything felt more vivid, more beautiful...tighter inside my chest.
He was not only beautiful in a steel-gray suit and matching dress shirt, he stole my breath. He stole all my reason and common sense.
“So which is it?” he asked, one brow quirking up to a point. “The dress or the man?”
I grinned and took a shaky step forward. “Yes.”
He chuckled, shaking his head. “Works for me. Should we get going?”
“Don’t stay out too late,” Claire sang, handing me a small, silver clutch. “We wouldn’t want Haley to turn back into a pumpkin at midnight and ruin her fairy tale.”
“Never. That will never happen.”
And the look he shot Claire as he responded, the way his eyes darkened as he looked back at me, swirling with sincerity and lust...
I believed him. Every ounce of my body, heart and soul believed in this man.
“Well,” Claire breathed, clearly amused and impressed, perhaps a little smitten. She turned to me. “You’re going to have to tell me where you found this guy. I want one just like him.”
My memories flashed to Luminous, the woman being flogged, the sex rooms and St. Andrew’s crosses.
No way in hell. She was too young. “Maybe someday.”
As he reached for my hand and slid his fingertips up to my elbow, gently pulling me toward him, Jensen chuckled.
A look of confusion flashed in Claire’s eyes but the phone rang from the desk, breaking the moment. She excused herself and when we were alone, with only Claire’s soft and kind voice flittering in the background, Jensen’s hand continued grazing up my arm, goose bumps prickling in his wake.
“You are beautiful. So stunning,” he said, his hands curving around the hinge of my jaw and pulling me toward him. With the heels so high, he didn’t have to bend to kiss me.
When his lips met mine, all that vivid color, the brightness he brought to my life sparked like fireworks and I melded to him, hands on his hips, holding him close to me while he languidly kissed me senseless.
“We should go,” I murmured.
“If I didn’t have to speak, if this night wasn’t so important to Donovan and Talia, we wouldn’t. The things I could do to...the things I want to do to you.”
“Show me,” I whispered. “Show me all of it.”
Give me all of it. Give me all of you.
He understood my unspoken need and answered me with a promise. “I will.”
* * *
“It’s so wonderful to meet you,” Talia said, pulling me into a hug the moment we met. Her rounded, pregnant stomach made returning the hug slightly difficult, but I didn’t mind.
I’d been in awe of the Art Museum and the way it’d been decorated for the event since the moment we arrived. Jensen had given me a brief tour, and we’d spent the last thirty minutes, wandering the room, making introductions, laughing and talking with handfuls of beautiful and handsomely dressed people Jensen knew while I tried to keep up my end of the conversations.
I was out of my element, clearly, but Jensen made it easy. He made me feel comfortable and confident, taking care of everything from a glass of champagne to whispering people’s names and tidbits about them before we met, to help me feel included.
He was so talented at reading my cues in the bedroom, it shouldn’t have astonished me that he’d take the same kind of care with me outside of it. He’d promised I’d enjoy myself and while I was still a bit overwhelmed, the glass or two of champagne I’d consumed definitely helped.
The fact he continually touched me in one way or another until Talia pulled me into her arms was another reason.
That we hadn’t yet seen Meredith helped. Perhaps she wouldn’t show.
A girl could dream.
“You, too,” I said, pulling back from Talia’s firm hold. “And congratulations on your baby. Jensen hadn’t told me you were expecting.”
“Yes, well.” Her slim fingers went to her stomach and she rested her hand lazily on top of the roundness. “Yes, well, we thought we were happy with the two boys we have, but sometimes life takes you by surprise.”
“Slipped one past the goalie,” a man said. I assumed he was Donovan based on the way he walked up and slid his arm around Talia’s back. “Sort of like my Blackhawks did to your Red Wings last week.”
His eyes flickered to Jensen and he barked out a laugh.
I had a difficult time pulling myself away from the gorgeous couple in front of me. Donovan’s black hair was neatly styled, his eyes crinkling at the edges as he continued giving Jensen a hard time about something hockey-related. Talia was the light to his dark, she was slim and small but no less magnetic with her shining blue eyes and the curve of her lips as she listened to Donovan and Jensen volley back and forth.
She must have caught me watching her because she looked at me before rolling her eyes. “Men. Always with the sports.”
Donovan pulled her tighter, pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Like you and Laurie with your shoes.”
She laughed softly and faced me. “My best friend. But in our defense, shoes are practical. You own them, you wear them, you love them—”
“You hug them,” Donovan finished.
“Stop.” She slapped his chest and didn’t take her eyes off me. “Men and their sports, I mean...they just yell at a television. They get nothing except an em
pty pocket and I swear someday watching football is going to give Donovan a heart attack.”
“Yes, maybe, but in the meantime, I’ll enjoy the bottle of Dalmore Jensen still owes me.”
Next to me, Jensen’s fingers tightened on my hip and I looked up at him in confusion.
“What’s Dalmore?”
His dark blue eyes shone bright, barely concealing his amusement. “It’s a ten-thousand-dollar bottle of Scotch. We bet on the Red Wings-Blackhawks hockey series last week and I lost.”
My eyes jumped open and I mouthed, “Ten thousand?”
“Yup.” He faced Donovan and smirked. “Don’t worry your pretty little head, you’ll get what’s coming to you.”
His threat carried the smallest hint of humor and Donovan shook his head, laughing it off.
“In all seriousness,” Talia said, cutting in and placing her hand on Jensen’s forearm. “Thank you so much for this benefit—for it going to the shelter. It means a lot to us.”
Donovan and Jensen clinked glasses and Jensen looked down at Talia, smiling indulgently. “Anything for you two, you know this.”
Jensen had explained to me that his history with Talia was slightly soap-opera-ish. Talia’s best friend’s husband used to work for Jensen before they moved to Ann Arbor. When Donovan and Talia got together, they needed a lawyer to help them get a teenage boy quickly away from his abusive father. It was then that Talia learned Donovan and Jensen were already friends.
Jensen had told me that since he was always alone, Talia worried about him and constantly included him in family dinners and holidays.
Had he looked like that toward any other woman, I might have been jealous.
I was even able to forget about Meredith for a while as Dylan and Gabby finally joined our small group and the six of us stood in a circle, chatting and enjoying drinks as well as small appetizers servers carried around.
I stuffed myself on bite-sized prosciutto-wrapped shrimp and scallops, taking one every time a server walked my way. Along with a stuffed mushroom ceviche. I didn’t even care if it lacked manners. Those suckers were delicious.