by Zuri Day
She responded to his brusque, taut tone with succinct directions, and Luc lifted his head in thanks. Too tense to wait for the elevator, he found the stairwell and ran up to the third floor, slowing down at the top of the stairs to rake his hand through his hair, to smooth down his tie. He was the medical professional in the family; if his mother and siblings saw how worried he was, they would lose it. It was better that he appear calm, that he pretend that their world hadn’t been tipped upside down, that he establish the facts and plan a course of action. All he knew was that his father had been in a car accident, that he was coming out of surgery and would be moved to the ICU shortly. He needed more facts, and it was his job to translate the medical jargon into words his family could understand and then guide them as to what to expect. To do that, he needed to detach, to be a doctor, to temporarily forget that the patient was his father, his role model, his flawed hero.
Luc took a deep breath and pulled open the door to the waiting room just outside the ICU, immediately noticing that Rafe stood by the window, staring down at the parking lot below. Rafe looked as if he’d just rolled out of bed—his hair was mussed and his jaw was heavy with stubble.
“New car?” Rafe asked, not bothering to turn around. “Your Tits and Ass practice must be doing well.”
Luc jammed his hands into the pockets of his suit pants and tipped his head back to look at the ceiling. He knew Rafe was trying to act normally—he jabbed Luc about being one of the best boob surgeons in the state and Luc mocked him about his inability to commit to anything—but today he couldn’t summon the energy to step into the ring with his younger brother.
“Not now, Rafe.” Luc said. He looked toward the closed doors leading to the entrance of the ICU. “Is he in there yet?”
Rafe lifted one shoulder. “They won’t tell me or Mom anything. She got so angry that she went outside for some air. Maybe you can find out.”
Luc nodded his agreement. He walked away from Rafe and crossed the room to the nurses’ station. Explaining who he was, he asked the duty nurse to page Harrison’s doctor, his doctor-in-charge voice suggesting that she not argue. The doctor was paged, and Luc was told to wait. He placed his hands on the counter and straightened his arms, looking down at the floor below him. He should join Rafe, should try to comfort his brother, but he needed a minute—or ten.
It was at a time like this that Luc wished that he and his brother were closer, that Rafe was someone he could lean on, who could sometimes support him instead of the other way around.
But, God, they were just so different and always had been. He was, on paper, the perfect child. He was everything his father had wished for in a son—handsome, brilliant, the top of his field—but not the field Harrison wanted Luc in. Instead of following his dad into the family business, Luc had followed his passion and become a doctor. Luc often wondered if Harrison ever looked beyond what he did to who he was. Luc had done everything right—he’d been a varsity athlete in college, a brilliant student in med school. Still, Harrison seemed to love him but didn’t know anything of the man he was beneath the model-son facade.
Luc felt his cell phone vibrate in his pocket, and he pulled it out, glad for the distraction. Relief turned to disappointment when he saw the name on the screen. His girlfriend Rachel wasn’t the person he most wanted to talk to. Luc knew that wishing she’d call him was like waiting for a boat at an airport—consistently futile. Luc let Rachel’s call go to voice mail and immediately regretted the decision. Rachel, and her father, Congressman Nicholas Franklin, would not appreciate hearing the news about Harrison via a friend or a news feed. Not up to talking to Rachel, he sent her a quick text message updating her on the situation. Luc stared down at his phone, resisting the urge to make another call...
That way madness lay.
She was out of his reach. He should accept that and move the hell on.
Luc heard hurried footsteps approaching and snapped up his head. He straightened as he watched the lanky frame of the middle-aged doctor approach, his tie askew and his eyes sunken from exhaustion. A hand was thrust in his direction. “Dr. Grant. You are Dr. Marshall?”
Luc shook his hand and folded his arms across his chest. “What’s the status on my father?” He saw and appreciated the respect that flashed in the older doctor’s eyes at his unwillingness to be mollycoddled.
For the next ten minutes, Luc listened to Dr. Grant detail his father’s injuries, the steps they’d taken to treat him and his prognosis. The explanation was full of technical and medical terms, but it was a language they both understood. Joe had passed on the information he’d gathered from talking to the cops about how the accident happened—too fast, car flipped, Dad was thrown through the windshield—but now Luc had solid and concrete information about Harrison’s prognosis.
“So, basically,” he mused, “I need to tell my family that Dad’s brain smacked against the inside of his skull on impact with the steering wheel or the windshield. After hitting the front of the skull, the brain probably bounced back and slammed against the back of the skull. Major forces were involved. There is tissue and blood vessel damage. And swelling. That’s why he had to be rushed into the OR to relieve the pressure, but the trauma has caused him to slip into a coma.”
“You know this,” Dr. Grant added. “If he survives the next two nights, he’s got a fighting chance, but the chances of him making a full recovery are—”
“Minimal at best.” Luc finished the sentence for him.
Dr. Grant nodded. “Yeah.”
Luc sent him a hard stare. “We’re not going to give up on him. Our family has resources...”
Dr. Grant sent him a sympathetic smile. “You and I both understand that there are some situations that money can’t fix—only time and luck can.”
Luc closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, Dr. Grant was striding away. Luc threw a quick glance across the room and noticed that Rafe hadn’t moved from his position at the window, his bottom lip between his teeth.
God, Rafe. It was easier to focus his attention on his brother than to think of his father hooked up to machines, bruised, bloody, broken.
Damn, his brother annoyed him. Luc didn’t give a shit about his sexual orientation, but Rafe’s lack of motivation, his aimless life, irritated Luc. Like him, Rafe was naturally talented at pretty much everything, including sports and academics. Everything Rafe touched turned to gold. He could be anything he wanted to be and be the best at whatever he did, but instead Rafe dabbled, moving from one interest to another—interior design one week, furniture design and landscape gardening the next. He was the dilettante Marshall, helping Mariella design and stage their bigger catering events, and he also worked as a consultant when one of the many Marshall hotels or restaurants needed a design revamp. From what he’d gathered, Rafe strode in, tossed his ideas around and left as abruptly, fully expecting the minions to implement his ideas. Rafe didn’t believe in getting his hands dirty.
Luc, as artistic as a lettuce leaf, knew Rafe was talented. He could see his distinctive signature all over the Marshall properties. He could be an amazing architect, interior designer, set designer, artist—he was that talented. He just had the attention span of a puppy. God, what a waste of that phenomenal brain.
Luc flicked a glance at the doors leading to the ICU. Harrison appreciated Rafe’s talent, but he related better to Luc, who was, he supposed, the more “conventional” of the two. Rafe had once told Luc, in a moment of rare, deep conversation, that he’d never lived up to Harrison’s expectations and walking in his macho older brother’s footsteps hadn’t helped. Of course, some of Rafe and Harrison’s emotional distance could be blamed on Rafe’s sexual orientation. Harrison paid lip service to the idea that it was fine that his younger son was gay, but the truth was that Harrison, a man’s man, wasn’t quite sure how to treat, or interact with, Rafe.
But if there was a
chasm of misunderstanding between Rafe and their father, the same could not be said for Rafe and Mariella. Their mother and Rafe were exceptionally close, able to communicate with a look or a laugh. Of all of them, Mariella loved Rafe with a depth of feeling she’d never quite managed with him or their sister, Elana. No matter how much Luc tried to impress his mother, from exceptional report cards and success at any sport he tried to defending his brother from schoolyard bullies and his sister from bad boys—or any boys—Mariella never looked at Luc the same way she looked at Rafe, or even Gabe, his cousin.
He wished...oh, hell, he wished for so much. That his family was normal, that Rafe could find something or someone that made him happy, that Elana wasn’t such high maintenance, that the love of his life would...
Luc scrubbed his hands over his face. No point in going there.
Knowing that he needed to be strong, Luc pushed his shoulders back, walked over to Rafe and placed a hand on his shoulder. Rafe turned his head to look at him, anguish in his face and his eyes. “And?”
“He’s in a coma. He has a traumatic brain injury and a bruised spleen, various broken bones. It’s the TBI the doctors are most concerned about. The surgery relieved most of the pressure, but they have to wait for the swelling to subside before they can make a judgment call on his future. All I can say is that he’s in very bad shape and the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours are crucial. If he survives the night and tomorrow night, he has a slim chance.”
Rafe swore, and Luc caught the shimmer of tears in his eyes. “Goddammit,” he whispered.
Luc turned as the door to the waiting room opened. A nurse dressed in scrubs held a clipboard and sent them a quick, distracted smile. Luc frowned and looked around. “Rafe?”
“Yeah?”
“Where the fuck is Elana?”
Chapter Two
A good orgasm was when her vision started to fade, her head spun and her body shook. It was a blend of bungee jumping and skydiving, hot and sexy, heart-stopping, body-melting volcanic fun. Jarrod Jones, Elana decided as she floated back to the earth, gave her the best, and the most intense, orgasms. Ever.
It was no wonder that she was addicted to him.
Ignoring her ringing cell phone on the far bedside table, Elana yawned. Fighting sleep, feeling like he’d turned her inside out, Elana watched as he pushed himself off her and stalked, bare-ass naked, toward the en-suite bathroom across the room. Idly wondering if she should follow him into the shower and go another round—they seldom needed much time to recover—Elana looked upward and smiled at her reflection in the newly installed mirror above the bed. She looked good, she decided, dreamy and well loved. Very well loved. In her opinion she never looked better than she did when she still radiated that orgasmic glow. That was saying something, since she looked pretty damn fine all the time.
Long dark brown hair, huge expressive brown eyes, a peachy glow to her flawless skin. A body that rocked...
Her looks and body were her greatest asset, closely followed by her charm. She might not have Luc’s brains or Rafe’s talent, but she looked spectacular and she could, as her mother frequently commented, sell ice to Eskimos. That was why Mariella tolerated her presence at MSM Event Planning, where she worked as a party planner. She wasn’t as dedicated or enthusiastic as her co-workers and didn’t put in the hours like her colleagues. Instead she took on projects that interested her, worked only with people whom she liked, and she did a fantastic job, if the project ran smoothly. If not, she relied on Gabe, her cousin, to keep her on some sort of track. She also relied on him to pull her admittedly delicious ass out of the fire when she lost track of a detail or a deadline.
Gabe was smart and focused and dedicated. So Elana didn’t have to be.
Elana bit her bottom lip and stared at her orange toenails, her thoughts a million miles away from the expensive pedicure she’d acquired the day before. Looks and charm were all good and well, but she’d swap them in a heartbeat to be more like the rest of her high-flying family. The reality was that she was the family screwup. Like her world-famous chef and hotelier father and her ridiculously accomplished and smart mother, Luc, Rafe and Gabe made success look so damn easy, they’d never had a moment’s doubt that they’d conquer anything they turned their attention to. She hadn’t been that lucky.
Elana’s ringing phone pulled her out of her introspection. She rolled over, scooped up the flashy red device and looked down at the screen. Ten missed calls—Luc, Gabe, her mother, Thom. Gabe and Mariella were, no doubt, calling her to complain that she was late for work, and Thom would want to know where she was and what she was doing. Who knew what Luc was calling about. Elana winced at the number of text messages; she wasn’t in the mood for an ass-kicking from anybody. She needed another bout of fabulous sex and two cups of coffee before she could face the world that existed outside this luxury apartment.
Being with Jarrod was an integral part of her fantasy world, one she needed as much, or possibly more, than her real world. Damn that ringing phone! Elana saw that Thom was calling her—again—and let the call go to voice mail. Besides, she’d far prefer to think about her very sexy lover.
It had been a couple of months since she’d laid eyes on Jarrod at a party in Beverly Hills. From the moment their eyes met, electricity had crackled between them. He’d introduced himself, and Elana instantly knew that it wouldn’t be long before they saw each other naked. Jarrod was involved in the film industry, and there were rumors about a casting couch—or desk—and about his voracious sexual appetite. Elana listened to the gossip and immediately shrugged off the comments. It meant nothing to her—she wasn’t an actress looking for a break or a paycheck, and she obviously didn’t need his influence or money...
Jarrod was her fantasy man, a way for her to step out of her increasingly complicated life. He was her escape, her dalliance, her drug...
The phone in her hand rang again, and Elana grinned when she saw the name on the display. Yeah, Cassie was the one person she could talk to. Unlike her family and Thom, Cassie didn’t nag.
“One word, a simple hello, and I can tell that you’ve had a fabulous night. Where did he take you, what did you do?” Cassie drawled. “El Acantilado? The Polo Club? Swoosh?”
“Nowhere,” Elana answered. “We stayed in and screwed each other stupid.”
“I’m so jealous,” Cassie answered on a forlorn sigh. “Listen, I need to know if you’re going to come with me to Mark and Alex’s fashion show in New York next week.”
“I don’t know yet.” Elana shrugged. “I’m waiting to hear whether Jarrod has plans with Finola.”
“Does the ever-so-beautiful, stupid-talented and intellectual Oscar winner know that you are having an affair with her husband?”
Elana shrugged. “Jarrod doesn’t seem to be worried, so I’m not. Besides, I’m playing with fire, too.”
“Don’t get burned,” Cassie said, uncharacteristically serious.
“You know me, Cass, I’m fire and bombproof. I always land on my feet,” Elana assured her before disconnecting the call. She didn’t like intense conversations that made her examine her life or her motivations. She liked to keep her affairs simple.
And it was simple: Finola was Jarrod’s sun, and Elana was his moon. She and Jarrod saw each other when they could, and they were completely sexually compatible. They had fun together—she was allowed to have some fun, wasn’t she?
Jarrod walked back into the bedroom, a blindingly white towel wrapped around his hips, artfully tied to show off the ridge of abdominal muscles. Broad shoulders, long legs, slicked-back hair and predatory eyes. Damn right, she could have some fun! God, he was hot, and he had a way of looking at her that sent bolts of power to her core. Elana wiggled against the silk sheets, and passion flared in Jarrod’s eyes. His towel started to tent.
“Your phone is ringing,” he said, arms
over his chest, one dark eyebrow lifted.
“Yeah, I know.” Elana shrugged. “I’m ignoring it.”
“It might be your fiancé,” Jarrod said, his tone amused.
“And do you take every call of Finola’s?”
The corners of Jarrod’s sexy mouth lifted. “Point taken.”
Elana tipped her head upward and dragged her fingernail over her right breast, watching, fascinated, as her nipple pebbled. “So, tell me, what does Finola think of the mirror?”
“Dunno. She hasn’t seen it yet.” His voice dropped an octave, and sex coated his words. “Do you like it?”
Elana’s core throbbed, and the moisture in her mouth disappeared. “I love it. I love watching you slide into me.”
“You up for another round?” Jarrod asked.
Elana nodded. “I haven’t seen you for two weeks, so we have some lost time to make up.”
Jarrod tipped his head to the side, his eyes narrowed. “Do you want to try something different?”
Elana’s heart stopped, stuttered to life again as adrenaline flooded her system. She’d heard rumors about Jarrod’s dark side, about his taste for certain practices, and she was intrigued, and curious, enough to find out what he had in mind. Her phone rang again, and she released a harsh curse. “This damn thing won’t shut up.”
A quick glance at the display told her that it was Thom. Again.
Elana slapped the phone upside down to silence the ringer. Annoyed, she opened the heavy bedside drawer and tossed the phone inside. Whoever wanted or needed her could wait.
Jarrod, and what he wanted and needed, came first. Or, as her previous experience with Jarrod had taught her, she would come first. Multiple times.