by Ali Parker
“You have a brother?”
“Uh huh,” she said. She was about to speak, but our server returned with our beers. Piper reached for hers as we put in our orders, both of us opting for the fish and chips special. Then, when the server left, Piper sipped her beer and licked foam from her lips. “His name is Phillip. He’s younger than me. We used to bicker a lot as kids, but now we’re really close. All this stuff with my parents would have killed me if it wasn’t for him keeping me sane. I owe him big time for holding down the home front while I’m—you know—gallivanting all over the world with extraordinarily rich bachelors.”
“And handsome. You can’t forget handsome.”
The corner of her perfect lips twitched. “You’re right. How could I have forgotten handsome?”
“Beats me. You’re looking right at it.”
She giggled. “Thanks for this.”
“For what?”
“This.” She gestured back and forth between us. “It helps. With the guilt of abandoning them.”
“You didn’t abandon them.”
“It feels like I did,” she said.
I shook my head sternly. “No, Piper. You simply put yourself first. And this crippling guilt you’re feeling right now tells me that’s not something you do very often. Am I right?”
She rolled her shoulders. “Who are you? My shrink?”
I’d have taken any job title if it meant I could earn a spot in her life. “I’m whatever you want me to be. I’m just saying, parents have a way of making us feel like we’re being bad people when all we’re really doing is trying to plant our feet and make choices for ourselves. We’re just fighting to get out from under those soul-crushing helicopter blades.”
Piper laughed. The sound was like jingle bells on Christmas Eve, and it lit me up like the tree my family put up in the ballroom every year.
Wondrous.
Magical.
“You might be onto something, Asher,” she said before taking another sip of her beer.
I lifted mine as well in a toast. “Here’s to kids finally having the nerve to make a stand.”
She clashed her glass against mine, and beer and foam spilled over both our rims. “Cheers to that,” she said.
And then we started drinking.
By the time our meal arrived, we were two full glasses of beer in. Piper’s cheeks had a rosy glow to them, and she nearly poured an entire six-ounce bottle of white vinegar on her chips. Then she added a dash of salt and smothered them in ketchup.
I watched in horror as she popped it in her mouth. “What the bloody hell is wrong with you?”
She blinked. “What did I do?”
“What normal human being uses that much vinegar? Can you even taste anything else?”
She looked down at her plate. Vinegar had literally pooled beneath her French fries in a lip-puckering puddle. She giggled. “I like them like this.”
“Sociopath.”
She scowled playfully at me. “To each their own.”
I grunted in response as I dug into my perfectly dry and nicely seasoned chips.
“Tell me about Antoni,” Piper said.
“What about him?”
“The two of you are friends, right? But he works for you?”
“For my family,” I said.
“What does he do?”
That was a good question. How could I properly sum up Antoni’s role? “Well, I don’t know if he has a precise job title, really. He’s more of a guy you can put anywhere you need him. The best part about Antoni is you can trust him to get the job done and to get it done right. Even if he has no clue what he’s doing, he kind of has this way of coming up aces.”
“Definitely a good person to have in your corner. Does he know about your wild, soup-kitchen rebellion against your family?”
I laughed. I liked the idea of her thinking my deviancy was worthy enough to be called a rebellion. “He does, yes. He covers for me a lot. Weekly, almost. To be honest, I don’t know where I’d be without him. I probably would have caved under the pressure my family puts on me if I didn’t have someone sane to ground me. Does that make sense?”
Piper nodded vigorously. “It absolutely does. My best friend is the same for me.”
“Janie?” I recalled her name from Piper telling me about her pushing her toward joining the club.
Piper’s smile was like the sun peeking through the clouds on a gloomy day. “Yep. Janie. She’s my Antoni.”
“Then we are both very lucky.”
Piper gazed into my eyes, and I sat in the moment, gazing back, admiring the length of her lashes and the dash of freckles across her nose. I’d never met a woman like her. She’d hopped to work at the soup kitchen without batting an eyelash, had no complaints over the hairnet she had to wear, and quickly made friends with people that took me two months to get them to talk to me.
She had all the qualities I wanted in a woman—and all the qualities the women my mother wanted me with didn’t have.
I had no idea that was what I was looking for until today.
Chapter 10
Piper
Asher and I half walked, half stumbled out of the pub just shy of nine-thirty in the evening. I’d had maybe two or three too many beers, and so had he, and we staggered with his arm over my shoulders and my arm wrapped around his waist. If people recognized him on the street, they didn’t say anything, and that was probably a good thing because his sarcasm was off the charts with the alcohol in his system.
“What are we going to do about your car?” I asked, craning my neck to peer up at him.
Asher shrugged. The gesture pulled me in closer to his side with his arm wrapped around me. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll send Antoni for it when I get back to the house. He always likes taking it out for a joy ride.”
I couldn’t blame him. Had I been given the chance to drive a supercar like that around London, I would have. Then again, I might decline the offer. Putting me behind the wheel of a car with that much power, in general, was probably a mistake. Add in the fact that I’d be sitting in what I was used to being the passenger seat, as well as having to drive on the left side of the road, and it would be a perfect recipe for chaos and disaster.
Asher would probably be exiled from Sutton Place if something like that were to ever happen.
“You’re not worried about leaving it in the alley?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Nope. Not at all. If someone really wants it, they can take it. But chances are, they’ll know who owns the car, and they’ll leave it well enough alone. Besides, I have friends all over this city. I bet someone has eyes on my baby right now.”
“Your baby?”
“Don’t judge me, Piper. That car is a beauty, and you know it.”
“Oh, I sure do. It has a really humble owner, too.”
Asher cracked a wry grin. “Has anyone ever told you how absolutely delightful you are?”
Only every guy for the past nine months. “I’ve heard it once or twice,” I said.
“Once or twice,” Asher mused. “Lies. I’m sure you hear it all the time. Just like I hear how dangerously good looking I am.”
“Right.”
“You disagree?”
I made a show of studying his features, his jaw, his nose, his sharp brow, and soul-penetrating eyes. “You’re handsome all right. I don’t know if ‘dangerous’ is the right adjective, though.”
He scoffed. “You have a better one?”
I began counting on my left hand, raising a finger with each word. “Dashing. Dapper. Charming. Classic. Sophisticated. Should I keep going?”
“You think I look sophisticated?” Asher pressed a hand to his chest as we came to a stop near the edge of the curb.
I looked him up and down. “Yes. The suits. The nice shoes. The expensive watches. The clean-shaven jaw, the hair, the—”
“My hair?”
I laughed. “Yes. You have a clean-cut, sharp look about you.”
“Sharp
,” he said, adjusting the collar of his shirt and lifting his chin. “Looks like I got six adjectives instead of five.”
“I’m not complimenting you anymore,” I said. “Aren’t you the one who’s supposed to be blowing smoke up my ass?”
His laughter was contagious. “I don’t get enough attention, apparently.”
“You? A royal? Please.” I pushed him playfully.
Still laughing, Asher slid his hands into his pants pockets. “I like spending time with you, Piper. You make me laugh a lot. It’s a refreshing change of pace. I’m glad you decided to stay.”
I licked my lips. They still tasted like salt and vinegar. “Me too.”
At that natural end of the conversation, Asher leaned off the curb and threw one hand in the air to hail a white taxicab coming down the street. The car pulled into the open space at the curb, and Asher opened the back door for me. I greeted the driver, a middle-aged white man with frizzy gray hair and thick black-framed glasses, and then Asher slid in behind me.
“Where to, folks?” the driver asked.
“The Dorchester,” Asher said. “And then Sutton Place.”
“You got it,” the driver said, sliding the shifter into first and pulling back out onto the street. We were honked at six times within the first four minutes of the drive, and I found myself clinging to Asher’s arm in the backseat.
He leaned in close so the driver couldn’t hear him. “Don’t tell me this is worse than a cab ride in New York City. I’ve been in the back of a cab in that crazy place. They’re infinitely worse. Everyone’s in such a rush to get where they’re going.”
I turned my head so my lips lined up with his ear. “It’s jarring being on the wrong side of the road.”
He smirked. “Wrong side? Piper, I regret to inform you that you are mistaken. It’s you Americans and Westerners who drive on the wrong side of the road. Maybe that’s why your cabbies drive like such lunatics.”
He was so close I could smell his cologne and the lingering scent of the pub on him. French fries, beer, and then the sharper richer scents: fresh rain, mint, and citrus. Unwittingly, I inhaled a deep breath of him before realizing what I was doing. I relinquished my grip on his arm and forced myself to sit back in the seat and rest my hands on my knees.
Asher wasted no time in putting his hand on mine. He ran his thumb over my knuckles, and my body responded to his touch in a way I hadn’t expected.
My tongue was swollen. My heart fluttered in my chest. I knew these were all telltale signs of attraction, and it blew my mind that I could be feeling them again.
Asher was looking at me. I could feel the heat of his gaze, and I dared not look over. I kept my gaze trained out the windshield from my spot in the backseat and did my best not to waver.
Then Asher’s hand slid from mine to rest on my knee.
I drew a sharp intake of breath and tried to play it cool as he ran his palm up my thigh to stop about halfway up.
“What are you doing?” I whispered.
“Do you want me to stop?”
That question was a hell of a lot more complicated than he might have realized. Did I want him to stop in this moment? No. Did I wish this wasn’t happening? Yes.
This felt like a betrayal. Correction. It felt like another betrayal. This year had been full of them. But with all the men being in the know of how the Casanova Club worked, it wasn’t dishonest. It wasn’t cheating. It wasn’t wrong.
All this was was a chance to find out which man was right for me.
Asher’s touch was warm and confident.
I forced myself to look up at him. His cool gray stare was hungry. Needy.
The tightness in my muscles told me I felt the same way, and I might very well have been returning his look of greedy lust.
Suddenly, before I had a chance to comprehend the moment, Asher put two fingers under my chin and lifted my face so he could press his lips to mine. They were so soft, so warm, and so gentle. He slid his fingers down to cup the side of my neck, and I leaned into his chest, bracing myself against him with one hand on the swell of his peck.
I hadn’t been sure what kind of body lay beneath his perfectly tailored bespoke suits, but I had a better idea now.
His chest was rock hard and swollen. He was strong.
Maybe he’d been right to call himself “dangerously” handsome.
Although handsome didn’t feel like the right word anymore.
Sexy. Yes, that was it.
My breath hitched in my throat as the kiss deepened and Asher’s tongue slipped between my teeth. I hoped I didn’t still taste like vinegar. His other hand on my thigh gave a gentle squeeze, and I smiled into the kiss before pushing both hands lightly against his chest.
When he pulled away, he was a little breathless. He ran his fingers through his hair. “Is everything all right?”
“I need to slow down.”
He nodded. “Okay.”
“I’m sorry,” I breathed. “I just… I need to take it slow. I can’t skip steps.”
“I understand.” His hand was still on my knee, and he squeezed again before pulling away. “Slow is good. And the best things are worth waiting for, right?”
I nodded. “Right.”
The cab dropped me off at the Dorchester. Asher got out and walked me to the front doors. He offered to walk me to my room, but I insisted that I was capable of it myself. He kissed me on the cheek, said goodnight, and told me we would speak soon.
Tomorrow, hopefully.
I stood outside and waved goodbye as the taxi pulled away, and then I went through the lobby, stopped at the lounge for a cocktail, and brought it up to my room with me. Once inside, I decided to call Janie and get her up to speed with everything that had been happening here in London.
“How was the kiss?” she asked after I told her how my night ended with Asher.
“It was good. Really good.”
“Like butterflies in your stomach good or just good?”
I didn’t want to admit aloud that there’d been a little something stirring inside me during that kiss. “It was our first kiss. It was good.”
Janie laughed knowingly into the other end. “All right, I’ll butt out. What else is new? What’s his family like?”
“Crazy,” I said instinctively. Then I proceeded to tell her all about his parents and the pressure he was under and how much he and I actually had in common in that regard. Once I’d exhausted that topic, I finally worked my way up to asking what I’d been itching to ask since the beginning of the call half an hour ago. “Hey, Janie? Can I ask you something?”
“Of course, babe.”
“Um. Okay. Have you—I don’t know—by chance heard anything about Levi?”
“Sure have. I did some digging.”
“You did?”
“Yep, I figured you would ask about him sooner or later, and I wanted to be prepared. That’s what friends are for, right?”
“You’re amazing.”
“I know,” Janie said simply. “There’s good news. Levi checked himself into rehab the day you left Malibu.”
All the words I wanted to say got stuck in my throat.
Janie laughed on the other end. “I know. I was surprised too. I think you did a number on him, Piper. A guy like that doesn’t make such a huge change without some real motivation. He’s only been in there for what, a week or so? But it looks promising. And the fact that he took the step means a lot, right?”
“Y-yeah,” I stammered.
“Are you okay?”
I nodded past the tightness in my throat. “Yes. More than okay. I’m relieved. He needed this. I’m so happy he did this for himself. Can you do me another favor?”
“Of course. Name it.”
“Can you send him a book for me?”
“Which one?”
“It’s in the apartment. On my nightstand. Write a sentiment on the inside cover from me to him?”
“What do you want it to say?” Janie asked.
> I didn’t even have to think about it. “Tell him I’m thinking of him. And that I’m proud of him. And that the book will help on the harder nights.”
“You got it, Pipes.”
Chapter 11
Asher
Piper shielded her eyes against the sun as she craned her head back and stared up at the two towers on either side of the entrance to Westminster Abbey. Her lips were slightly parted in awe, an expression I’d seen on many tourists’ faces as they gazed upon the architectural masterpiece for the first time, and her dark eyes glittered with a sense of wonder.
Slowly, she turned her head to look at me. “It’s magnificent. The pictures—”
“Don’t do it justice,” I said. “Yeah, I agree.”
“When was it built?” Piper’s voice was full of awe as she turned her eyes back to the abbey.
“1245. By Henry III. His shrine is inside.”
“I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s so…” She shook her head. “I don’t know the word.”
I smiled and tucked my hands into my pockets. I’d stood on this pavement a hundred times over and stared up at the abbey’s wonder. It never lost its sense of gothic grandeur, and I knew it would be a place I returned to time after time.
“It’s almost otherworldly,” I told Piper.
She nodded. “Yes. Yes, that’s it. Like you can’t quite believe it’s here in the middle of the city. Was it really built in 1245?”
I shook my head. “That’s when Henry III began turning it into the church we see today. But it was actually founded by monks almost three hundred years before that. It’s still an active Christian church for worship.”
“You can go to church here?” Piper asked incredulously.
“Sure can.”
“Wow,” she breathed.
I put a hand in the small of her back. “Do you want to keep standing here, gawking at it, or would you like to go inside?”
“We can go inside?”
Laughing, I nodded. “Yes, of course. Come on, sweet Piper. Let’s go exploring. This place is going to knock your socks off.”