His Pawn

by Emily Snow

  “I was drinking,” he starts, and my eyebrow jerks up. For someone who’s been drinking, he looks perfectly composed, dressed like he just stepped out of a board meeting instead of a bar. He reaches up and loosens his blue tie, drawing my attention to his long fingers. “I was drinking because I was pissed you wouldn’t answer. And then this song came on—something about Malibu—and I thought of you. Of that night you were telling me about taking photos on the beach there.”

  My posture stiffens. “You remember me telling you about Zuma Beach?”

  The smile he offers me is forced and almost pained. “I remember everything you’ve said to me, dove.” When I lean in close to him and inhale, he relaxes and lets out a soft chuckle against my face. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  “Wishing I had a breathalyzer.” He brushes his hand across my cheek and guides my focus up to his again. My lips twitch at the confusion on his bronze features. “You’re listening to Miley Cyrus and thinking of me, so you must be drunk.”

  He says nothing for a long pause. His lips move just slightly, the merest tremor that sends butterflies spiraling through my chest. Finally, he scowls. Feathers his thumb over my cheek. And then, he slides away from me, putting several inches of space between our bodies as he zeroes in on the wrapping paper on my coffee table. “Do I want to ask?”

  Standing, I grab it and toss it into the coat closet in the front entrance. When I close the door, he angles me with a sharp look. “My brother is fostering a little girl. I bought a gift this evening to send him and his husband to congratulate—”

  As I swallow the rest of my words, his dark head jerks back. He follows my movements as I walk back across the room, curiosity tugging at his expression. “Your brother and his husband?”

  I flinch. I get foolish when Graham’s around, but tonight it’s worse than ever because he caught me so off guard. I feel bare in front of him, completely exposed, and I cross my arms over my chest and glance down at my pale toenail polish. “Yes, that’s what I said.”

  He steeples his fingers against his mouth. “Hmm.”

  “If you have something negative to say, I’ll have to ask you to go. I’m sorry, but—” As I walk past him, he stops me, hooking his hands behind my knees. He yanks me down to him, knocking the breath right from my body as he straddles my legs on either side of his waist.

  “Does it look like I give a fuck what your brother does and who he does it with?” he demands, his lips so close they softly skim mine with every syllable he speaks. I give a helpless sigh, and he groans. “But I think I’ve figured it out. What happened with your father. Why he reacted so … aggressively to that family issue you told me about. Have I, Elle?”

  “Yes,” I whisper. “I support my brother’s choices and my dad wasn’t happy about that. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn’t change a thing. I love Zach—everything about him. My father’s anger doesn’t mean a damn thing to me where my brother is concerned.”

  Closing his brown eyes, he rests his forehead to mine and exhales. “Please, dove, never stop doing that.”

  “Doing what?” My throat hurts just saying it.

  “Pissing your father off. Being a goddamn decent human. It makes you so…” He leaves the rest of his sentence dangling, reminding me of the Graham I sat across from while a pianist played renditions of Rod Stewart and Madonna songs. But tonight is different. Tonight, there are no dirty innuendos or sinful stares.

  “It makes me so what?”

  Opening his eyes, he gives me a feral look that reels me in. Captures me. And refuses to let me go. “So you, dove.” He reaches around me on the coffee table, grabs the small white box he was carrying when he came inside ten minutes ago, and then presents me with it. “Flowers seemed too cliché,” he explains.

  “Graham—” He stops me from protesting, closing my fingers around the corners of the flimsy cardboard. Glaring at him, I open it, half-expecting more expensive Agent Provocateur lingerie for him to rip off just because he can. But I soften when my gaze lands on the small container of fruit at the bottom of the box. “Miley Cyrus, rule-breaking, and blackberries, all on the same night.”

  “An apology.” He drops his mouth to my neck, blowing against the sensitive skin just beneath my ear. “For that last night in New York.”

  That last night in Manhattan has bothered me for days—has haunted me to the point of contacting my father. Once I knew her name, it hadn’t taken much effort to discover that her last name was Strickland, not Stryker. That my dad was right, she is gone, though I wasn’t able to find anything more than a short obituary. I have a million and one questions, all of them about her, but when Graham releases a warm breath into my skin, and I peer down to see his eyes are closed, I realize they’ll have to wait.

  Again.

  “You’re still here?” Blake’s eyes pop wide when I creep into the kitchen shortly after midnight. She’s digging around in the refrigerator and shuffling her bare feet. “Figured you took off with the Bathroom Bandit to go to his place.”

  I jerk my head toward my bedroom. “He’s … asleep.”

  “Oh.” Grabbing a container of leftovers, she closes the fridge with her hip and cranes her neck toward the hallway like she expects him to come strutting down it, naked, at any moment. “You were quiet.”

  She sounds impressed, so I quickly shut down her assumptions with a brisk head shake. “He was drunk.” I grab a bottle of water and slide next to her on a barstool, wrinkling my nose as she dips a leftover quesadilla in salsa. It’s been in the refrigerator since the night I returned from Manhattan, but I don’t bother to point that out since she won’t listen. “He brought me blackberries in lieu of flowers, and then he passed out on my shoulder.”

  “At least he didn’t vomit on you.” She nibbles on the edge of her quesadilla, makes a face, and tosses it back into the Styrofoam to-go box. “That’s disgusting.”

  “Well, it has been in there for days.”

  She shoves the container over the side of the counter where it tumbles into the trashcan. The stench of tomatoes and onions penetrates the air, but she doesn’t seem to notice as she places her elbow on the counter and rests her chin in her palm. “So … Graham Delaney. I don’t know whether to point out that I was right or hate your ass for pussy-whipping the sexiest man in Congress.”

  “Blake,” I groan. She playfully bumps my shoulder with hers.

  “Sorry, I’m trying. He really is gorgeous.” She casts a look toward my bedroom again and clears her throat. “I’ll never look at him the same on the news again. You know that, right?”

  I do. Because I can’t see his face or read his name without thinking of his dirty mouth or cocky smirks. It’s been that way for me since the moment I met him in person. I scoot off the barstool, holding my water close to my chest. “Thanks for not making a big deal.”

  “Honestly, I’m still recovering.” She grabs a paper towel off the holder on the counter and wipes her mouth, making another face as she smacks her lips to get rid of the old quesadilla taste. “From the shock and the hotness.”

  Leave it to her to lighten a tense situation. Offering her a grateful smile, I leave the kitchen, water in hand, and return to my bedroom. I freeze in the doorway when I see that he’s awake. Sitting up in my bed. Eyes narrowed down at my phone on the nightstand. I nudge the door open with my hip and he snaps his gaze up at the creaking noise.

  “You’re looking through my phone,” I say in a dull voice.

  The corners of his mouth twitch into a sardonic smile. “I haven’t touched it. Your father texted, by the way. That’s what woke me up. He wants to know if you’ve given up on the Charlotte bullshit and if you’re ready to focus on what’s important.”

  “Graham,” I whisper, but he’s already out of my bed, jerking on the white button-up I’d shrugged off him earlier as I coaxed him into bed. I knew how stupid it was for him to spend the night, for him to invade my space, but I hadn’t had it in me to bother him.
And now, he’s glaring at me like I’ve just shot him in the chest. “Please … just wait.”

  He goes still when I cross the room and my hand falls on his arm, but he doesn’t push me away. He only stares down at the backs of my fingers, the veins in his neck taut. “I’m a fucking idiot. You say please, you look at me, and I don’t think right.”

  “I shouldn’t have looked her up, I should have—” He turns into me, cutting me off by slanting his lips over mine. He still tastes like bourbon, but it doesn’t matter as his hands splay over the small of my back, crushing me to him. His kiss is angry and brutal, and when he’s done, when the warmth is gone, I stumble back, bracing my hands on the dresser behind me. “I’m sorry,” I say despite the lump in the back of my throat.

  His laughter is harsh. So rough my chest caves like I’ve just been punched. “You shouldn’t be.” He raises brown eyes to mine, and I drag my hand over my throat. “You’re not the one who did anything wrong. That blame is on me and your father.”

  My heart jolts. “What?”

  He stalks closer to me, catching my breath with every step. “You want answers.”

  “Yes. No filter.”

  He rakes his hand over his face and breathes heavily into his palm. “Charlotte was my fiancée.” A moment of silence passes where painful electricity sparks between us and his gaze holds mine hostage. My stomach burns, my legs shake, but I hold steady. Waiting. Always waiting with this man. “My mother said it wouldn’t have lasted—she would’ve paid anything for it not to last—but it’s not like I’ll ever know that.”

  Bile rises in my throat because I know where this is going. “What did he do? My dad, Graham … what did he do?”

  He drops his hand from his mouth and closes the remaining space between us. I cry out like a wounded animal when he pulls me into him, hands on my waist, mouth lowered to my hair. “He threatened her into doing what he wanted. She wasn’t like us, Elle. She didn’t come from empires, so she believed he was powerful enough to hurt her. That he’d ruin her career if she didn’t fuck him and she’d never stand a chance in this town.”

  “Graham,” I whisper, but he continues, tearing me apart with each and every word.

  “Your father is a hypocrite.” His voice hitches on that last part, emotion breaking through the hard facade. “He got her pregnant, told her to get rid of it, and then did his best to ruin her life when she wouldn’t. Your father did that, Elle. The future of this goddamn country.”

  I squeeze my fingers into his upper arms, closing my eyes as I struggle for breath. I wish I could be shocked. I wish to God I could be horrified and defend my dad, but no words come when I open my mouth. Because I can still picture Dad’s reaction to Charlotte when I asked about her. Because I know what kind of man my father can be. Because I believe Graham.

  “When she told me, the only thing I could think of was my ego. That my fiancée was knocked up by some other motherfucker. I didn’t think about what she was telling me or about anyone but myself to ask what had happened. Typical Graham. If I’d asked, I would’ve known that it was one time. That she let him get into her head and scare her. Instead, I told her to get the fuck out of my face because I couldn’t—and wouldn’t—waste my time with a cheating bitch.”

  A shudder ripples through his body and echoes through mine. He draws in his cheeks, nostrils flaring, face contorted in pain. When he says it, I already know what I’ll hear, but it doesn’t rock my world any less.

  “She killed herself a week later.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  He buries his face in my hair, inhaling me deeply as I repeat over and over how sorry I am. At first, he doesn’t say a word, doesn’t even move. Once his breathing slows though, he pulls away from me. In a split second, he goes back to looking at me like the politician—not the man—and I lift my hand to his face. He curves into my palm, releasing a harsh breath against my skin.

  And my heart, oh my heart, swells.

  “Please don’t go, Graham.”

  When those four words leave my lips, when I hear my voice, I realize that I’ve violated another rule of our arrangement. That four-letter word he told me had no room whatsoever in our relationship.

  I am in love with Graham Delaney.

  THIRTY-ONE

  ELLE

  Graham is gone when I wake up the next morning. I’m not surprised—I had drifted to sleep expecting this to happen—but my chest still twinges the moment I reach behind me to discover he’s left without saying goodbye. Squeezing my eyes, I turn over, facing the empty side of the bed. I skim my fingertips over the rumpled sheets, drinking in the scent of cedar and sandalwood that washes over my senses. When I reach the pillow, my heart seizes as my hand brushes over the note.

  Opening my eyes, I stare at it, pressure throbbing behind my temples because I’m certain that this is goodbye.

  It’s written on the pale blue cardstock I keep on my desk, in that same thick handwriting that was on the note his driver had given me on my first trip to Manhattan. My fingers quiver as I snatch it to me, rolling onto my back and holding it above my face. I expect I won’t see him again. That, after last night, we’ll go back to being nothing to each other.

  But I guess Graham is capable of shocking me today.

  E,

  I apologize for leaving without properly waking you. I promise that won’t happen again. I have work then an appointment with my D.C. accountant tonight, but I want to see you. I’ll call.

  -G

  I glare at his note, reading and re-reading, until the words seem to collide together and blur. The heavy weight in my lungs, on my chest, lifts slowly. It’s replaced by something else. Blind, stupid, aching hope. When I hear water rushing from the pipes in the bathroom down the hall, indicating Blake has beaten me to the shower, I finally get out of bed. I leave Graham’s note face down on my nightstand. And I know what I’ll have to do next.

  It’s usually a twenty-five minute trip from my apartment to my parents’ home in McLean, but my life moves in slow motion today. Forty minutes after I leave my place, I sit outside the gate at the edge of their property, cold air whipping my hair around my face when I lower my window and reach for the keypad. I pause. Have a moment where fear tightens my gut.

  I won’t be able to undo this. And there will be no coming back once it’s done.

  But Charlotte Strickland won’t come back either, and someone has to give her a voice. If it has to be me, then my father can hate me a little more than he did yesterday. I’ll welcome that hatred.

  Pushing my shoulders back, I type in the passcode and the wrought iron gate swings open. My heart is a heavy drum as I drive between the dogwoods lining the driveway, their winter red a startling contrast against the white colonial where I grew up. By the time I loop around the driveway and park next to a van—a cleaning crew, judging from the cheery pink branding on the side of the truck—my chest is close to exploding.

  I make myself get out of the car. Force myself to push down the panic and unlock the front door with my key. And when my knees buckle in the foyer, I tell myself what a disappointment I’ll be if I don’t do what I came for.

  My mother’s not in her garden or the kitchen, but I find her quickly in her first-floor office. It’s just across the hall from my father’s study, and my muscles tense when I glance at his closed door. “Focus,” I whisper. “Fuck him, just focus.” I rap the backs of my fingers on the French doors separating me from my mom. She looks up from her planner, blue eyes narrowed because she hates distractions, but her expression immediately softens.

  She mouths my name and motions me inside. As I walk across the reclaimed wood floor, she swallows down the bite of scone in her mouth and pats her lips daintily with an embroidered linen napkin.

  “Why didn’t you call to let me know you were coming?” While she doesn’t sound angry, there is a note of impatience in her voice. She taps the end of her monogrammed pen on a page of her opened planner. “I have lunch sched
uled with friends, but I can cancel—”

  “No.” My voice is as intense as the weight on my stomach. “I-I won’t be here long.”

  Her brow knits, but she nods in understanding. “At least sit down. You know it bothers me when you pace around while we talk.” She gestures to the pink floral upholstered chair across from her. “Do you want some coffee?”

  “No. I already had a few cups this morning.”

  “A few cups already? You must have been up for hours.” For the first time since I walked in, she takes in my attire—a gray and blue GWU sweatshirt, leggings, and tennis shoes. She’s immaculate, as always, in a pink oxford button down and gray wool trousers, not an auburn hair out of place. She runs her tongue over her teeth and wrinkles her nose. “Did you come here from the gym?”

  I cross my arms over my chest as I sit down. “No. It’s cold out, and this was comfortable.”

  “I see. You haven’t been home since Thanksgiving, and you’ve never come without calling first. Not since you moved in with Blake.” She fidgets with the pearl stud in her left ear as she flicks her gaze over my sweatshirt. I know that she wants to complain about it, but she forces a polite smile before asking, “Is everything all right?”

  God, I wish it were. Following Graham’s admission last night, the first thing I did this morning after showering was call my father. Dad had gone silent the second I told him I knew what had happened with Charlotte. And then, he hung up on me. When he called back five minutes later, out of breath like he’d just walked ten stories of steps to find a private place to talk, he hadn’t explained. Hadn’t denied anything.

  The first words that fell from his lips were a promise. He would cut me out of his will, out of his life, for good if I dared to tarnish his good name and career.

  “I haven’t tarnished anything. Not yet,” I’d told him as my heart sank to the pit of my stomach. I’d wished and hoped like a fool that his response would be different. That maybe—just maybe—I was wrong about him. “I just want the truth. No filters. No bull, Dad. I want to believe you’re not capable of anything like this because … because of me. Because you have a daughter and a wife, and you can’t imagine someone taking advantage of either of us that way.”