by Abbott, Alex
That made him groan, and he stroked my back, his hands slipping up under my sweater. Yes. I wanted him to touch me. I wanted him to touch me everywhere. And I knew he wanted it too, because I could feel his erection pressing against my belly.
Oh, god. It felt so good. I rocked against his hard shaft, and I wanted it. I wanted him. I think I’d always wanted him, but never let myself admit how much until this moment.
While our kissing became more frantic, I skimmed my hands down to touch him. Jeremy groaned when my fingertips brushed the hard flesh beneath his slacks. “I love an eager girl,” he said softly, his cock pulsing a bit beneath my hands. But then…then he stopped. He grasped my hands softly by the wrists, and brought them to his chest. “But Kate,” he said, again, softly, staring into my eyes as if to break the spell of dark magic I’d fallen under. “We have to stop.”
“Why? You want me.” I flung it at him, like an accusation.
“Yes,” he said, his pulse beating visibly at his throat. “I do.”
“Then why do we have to stop?”
“Because you don’t want me. You just want it to stop hurting.”
“You’re right about the hurting,” I said, slightly out of breath. Turned on and frustrated all at the same time. But when he nodded softly, and released my wrists, I added, “But that doesn’t mean I don’t also want you.”
His jaw tightened and I saw temptation etched in every line of his expression. “Even if that were true—”
“It is true,” I insisted, wondering if I should tell him how hard my heart was beating, or bring his fingers to my hardening nipples to show him how my body reacted to him. How it had always reacted to him.
“Kate,” he said, as if my name was some kind of defense. “I’m trying to be a good guy here. You don’t want what you think you want.”
“If you were a good guy, you wouldn’t be telling me what I want.” I squeezed his hands to coax them back to my hips. I wanted him to undress me. I wanted to undress him.
He took a deep breath, as if I was somehow putting him to torture. “Then I’ll rephrase it. I can’t give you what you want. I can’t go where you want to go. Not alone.”
Not alone?
What the hell was he talking about?
Then the realization hit me like a glass of cold water in the face. He’d told me, hadn’t he? He’d told me that he only ever had threesomes or moresomes. I hadn’t been able to make any sense of that. I was having trouble making sense of it now. And it made me bitter. “But you’d go where I wanted to go if I let you call some high class hooker that you have on speed dial?”
He winced.
Then I watched some kind of wall come crashing down, and he was as remote and far away as ever. “Please don’t insult my lovers. I may not allow myself to have entanglements of the heart, but I respect the people with whom I’m intimate.”
It was a chastisement. A deserved one, I knew. He’d shared with me private things. I’d insulted him. And I’d insulted whoever he slept with. I should’ve felt guilty about it. But I was too wrapped up in his arms and the adrenaline of being there that I demanded to know, “How far do you go, then? A kiss? More than a kiss? How far before you need someone else to be involved?”
Jeremy broke my gaze. Then gently…very gently…slid me out of his lap onto the bed. “The funeral is tomorrow, Kate. We need to prepare what you’re going to say.”
So that was the end of it. And it left me cold and lonely. “We don’t need to do anything. I’ll write it myself. Thanks a lot, though. You can close the door behind you when you go.”
Chapter Six
JEREMY
“What the bloody hell were you doing with Kate in her room?” Lane demanded to know.
Given that Jeremy had left Kate’s room hours ago, it alarmed him that Lane somehow knew about it. Lane liked technology. And he liked to know what people were up to. It was the most common complaint amongst the employees at Kenyon Industries. Company cars had monitors that reported back everything from mileage to speed and the length of lunch breaks. Company computers were armed with key loggers so that every single word could be monitored. Did Lane have Gloria’s room under surveillance—and if so, wasn’t that as good as an admission of guilt?
“What makes you think I was with Kate?” Jeremy asked.
“Albert told me where you were,” Lane answered, impatiently.
Oh. Of course. It was an answer that put Jeremy at ease. The butler had been with the Kenyons before Jeremy was born and had been, in many ways, a protector and family member to them both.
Albert was always aware of what was going on in this house…so that explained that. “I was helping Kate write the eulogy,” Jeremy admitted. “Not that it’s any of your business.”
“I told you to stay away from her,” Lane bit out.
Jeremy felt his eyes narrow. “Yeah, you did, didn’t you? And why is that, Lane?”
Lane’s nostrils flared. But he didn’t answer. Couldn’t answer, maybe. And why should he? What he did when they were children…no one was supposed to know about it. Certainly, Jeremy had never confronted him about it. And if Lane had blocked it out—like he seemed to—wasn’t that for the better? Because it was a hell of a thing to carry around.
We have to protect your brother, Jeremy’s father had said all those years ago. Kenyons protect Kenyons. To the bitter end. Do you understand me?
Jeremy had understood. He’d gone along with it. Because he’d loved his brother. Because he was scared at what would happen to his family if the truth ever came out. But those family secrets were starting to get too heavy to carry. “I asked you a question, Lane. Why do you want me to stay away from Kate?”
“I’m telling you for your own good as much as hers,” Jeremy’s brother finally said. “You’ve always had an unhealthy fascination with Kate. Ever since the day she came into this family.”
Well, Jeremy couldn’t argue with that. He did have an unhealthy fascination with Kate. So unhealthy, in fact, that he’d just nearly had sex with her. On her dead mother’s bed. In her time of grief. And if that didn’t make him Wanker of the Year, what did?
Still, he was going to give himself points for stopping. Because after a lifetime of stopping sex before it got too intense or personal—before he could arrange it to his carnal satisfaction—he’d nearly cocked this one up.
In all his life, it had never been so hard to stop. He was still a little shaky from the effort, truth be told. And not just from the sexual frustration. There was something about Kate that was so authentic that he’d counseled her to artifice for her own protection. But it was that authenticity that also made him want to bury himself in her…and maybe find himself inside her too.
“She’s only going to be here a few days,” Jeremy finally answered, to reassure himself as much as his brother. “How much trouble can she be for either of us?”
A lot, Jeremy thought. But Lane nodded, slowly, in that infuriatingly opaque way of his. “I should like it very much if we could avoid trouble, Jeremy. And when…when this is over…I think perhaps we should consult a family therapist.”
Jeremy blinked. He couldn’t have been more surprised if Lane had danced before him in a jester costume. “What?”
Lane rubbed at the back of his neck, as if this was the most uncomfortable conversation of his life. “I think Gloria’s death has brought up a lot of bad memories. For me. For you. For our father. Perhaps you ought to see someone about it. And if you’ll agree, I’ll go with you.”
Jeremy started to sputter—not sure if he should be angry, or offended or touched. Mostly, he was confused. Lane was a private man. The whole family was. They’d put what happened behind them. In a vault. With all the emotions that went with it. Now Lane was suggesting opening up that vault, which might be a cry for help.
Jeremy’s guts twisted as he wrestled with his love for his family, and the suspicions he’d had. What kind of shitty brother was he that he could suspect Lane of having an aff
air with Gloria and—what?—stuffing prescription pills down her throat? Dear God. The only excuse Jeremy had was that Gloria’s death really had dragged up a lot of bad memories. And if it’d dragged them up for Jeremy, it must’ve been doubly hard for Lane to deal with.
“Therapy,” Jeremy said, throatily. “Right. We’ll go. Together.”
Lane swallowed. Put his hand on Jeremy’s shoulder. Squeezed. Jeremy was shocked to feel the tremor in Lane’s hand. Shocked to realize that Lane was so torn up. And the show of Lane’s honest upset gutted Jeremy so completely that he threw an arm around his brother’s neck.
Lane returned the embrace, murmuring, “I love you, mate.”
And Jeremy knew it was true. His brother loved him. And he loved his brother. In spite of all the shit between them. Which meant they just needed to get through this funeral and maybe everything would be okay.
~~~
KATE
They’re fucking jackals, I thought, adjusting the grey scarf on my black dress for the tenth time. Outside, by the graveside, a sea of rich strangers were waiting in white chairs waiting for me to eulogize my mom. Theoretically. But I’d already glanced out the window of the limo and seen them talking. Laughing.
Not a teary eye in the bunch.
All except for His Lordship, who seemed to have aged twenty years overnight. My stepfather seemed feeble, bewildered, and I realized that he was falling apart. Oh, sure, my mother had been a trophy wife. And she’d also subjected him to some mockery. But he’d married her anyway. He’d been good to her.
It made me sad to think he might ever find out that she’d been cheating on him. Almost as sad as it made me to realize that my mother had known I was due an inheritance if she remained faithful, and she hadn’t really cared about that either. She’d left me alone in the world. Without resources. And I was just going to have to deal with that and forgive her.
Lane helped his father out of the limo and they went to take their place, but I lingered behind with Jeremy, who straightened the silver tie that went so perfectly with his tailored, jet-black suit.
“I don’t think I can do this,” I said, crinkling the near empty page in my hand. “I don’t think I want to do this.”
“Then don’t,” he said.
My head whipped toward him. “You’re not supposed to say that. You’re supposed to tell me that I can do it. That I have to.”
Jeremy’s eyes met mine. “I seldom do what I’m supposed to do. And I’m not going to tell you that you have to do this. You don’t have to do anything you don’t fucking want to do, Kate.”
I snorted. “If I don’t speak for my mom, then no one will.”
“Does that matter to you?”
Damn it. Why was he so rational? How did he do it? How did he stay so detached all the time? And why did I find it so appealing? “Yes,” I admitted. “It does matter to me.”
“Then find the courage to do it. What would help?”
“I don’t know,” I said, crinkling the page some more. “I guess if I knew they weren’t all judging me. Maybe if I knew some of them weren’t silently snickering behind their hands. Or if they weren’t going to snap pictures for the newspapers. Or if I knew they weren’t all waiting for me to tell them ‘the truth’ about whether my mom’s death was an accident or if she offed herself.”
Or if someone killed her…
“You don’t have control over any of that,” Jeremy said.
“Which is why I don’t want to go out there!”
He turned his knees toward me in the car and stared hard. “What I mean is, the way you find the courage to get out of the car and make this speech is by concentrating on the things you can control. So what else would help you?”
“To know that I’m not alone.”
He took my hand, brought it to his lips, and kissed it. “You’re not. Alone. I promise.”
“Maybe not now. But I will be. The minute this funeral is over. That’s it. We’re not family anymore. I’m just—”
“You aren’t just anything, Kate Ashton,” Jeremy said, very seriously, tightening his grip on my hand. “I realize that we’re not exactly a cuddly bunch. And I’m not the guy you want in your corner. But I am in your corner and I’m not leaving.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re the only woman who would demand to know why…”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Then I was shocked that I laughed. I covered my mouth with the back of my hand, as if it was blasphemy to laugh at a funeral, which I guess, up until a moment ago, I thought was the case. And I felt a little more sympathy for the people waiting in those chairs on the lawn.
“You’re the opposite of me, Kate. You don’t protect yourself with an air of mystery. You just put yourself out there with a promise of a punch in the mouth if someone comes at you. I think that’s very admirable.” He was giving me too much credit, and I started to say so, when he interrupted with, “Foolish, but admirable.”
“You do realize that this is the nicest you’ve ever been to me,” I said, my heart stirring a little with emotions I tried to ignore. “In fact, you’re being nicer now than when we kissed.”
“You’re wrong about that.”
“What if I’d said that I wanted to do it?”
“Do what?” Jeremy asked, with a vague glance at the window, perhaps realizing that there was a whole crowd waiting for us.
“What if I’d said that I was fine with a threesome? That you could call up whoever—”
Jeremy raised a brow. “Call up whoever?”
I felt like an insane person, or maybe I was just delaying, but I wanted to know. “Sure. Who would you have asked to join us? A man? A woman?”
Jeremy raised the other brow, too. “Well, that would depend entirely upon your preferences.”
“I’ve never done something like that before. I’m not sure what my preferences would be. So what would you suggest?”
Jeremy brought my fingertips to his lips and kissed them again. “You really will say anything to keep from getting out of this car, won’t you?”
That almost made me laugh again, but instead I said, “It’s not that I haven’t fantasized about it before. I have. I want to do it. I’ve always wanted to. I just don’t know that it’s the only way I’d want to have sex. I wouldn’t know where to begin. Would you have wanted to share me with another man?”
He blinked. Then he blinked again. I’m not sure he was shocked. Instead, he seemed to be wrestling back some kind of emotion. “You’re not seriously asking.”
“I am.”
He pulled me close, his dark eyes narrowing with predatory intent, as if he might snap. “Well, the answer is that sharing you with another man is one possibility. Probably the easiest one. For you.”
“Why for me?”
“Because you would be the star of the show, as they say in your country,” Jeremy said, and while I nearly whimpered at the thought of being trapped between Jeremy another man, being used for pleasure, my body adored by their lips, tongue, and hands…
But then tipped my chin up. “Kate, you’re not ready for this. You’re not ready for me. You just don’t want to think about your mother. And that’s fine, because this funeral is just a public show. It doesn’t have to be the place you lay yourself bare. And if it helps you to think that you’ll come back when all these people are gone, and then have your private farewell, then think that.”
He was right. He was right about all of it.
He just didn’t know what I was really afraid of.
My mother’s lover. The possessive freak that fucked her and threatened her. He says I’m his now and that he’d kill to keep anyone else from touching me…
Would he be in the crowd? Would I be able to tell with a single glance? And if I did, what should I do about it?
I didn’t know what I’d do about it. But I somehow disentangled from Jeremy and got out of the car anyway. And when I got to the podium, I dropped the crumpled ball of notes I’d made for
my speech, and let it fall to the ground.
“I want to say a few words about my mother,” I began, a quaver in my voice as I looked at Jeremy, who seemed to give me encouragement with every word. “Though I didn’t know her very well. Not when it really comes down to it. I doubt any of you did either. Because my mother never felt safe to show you who she was. And maybe that’s really more of a reflection on how we treat each other than it is a reflection on her…”
Chapter Seven
JEREMY
Kate was bloody brilliant, he thought as her speech wound down. He’d told her to say a lot of words that revealed nothing. Instead, she’d spoken from the heart, laying herself bare for a crowd of merciless strangers who would never appreciate how much it took for her to admit the pain of her childhood, the loneliness of living with a mother who shielded herself in fashion and beauty products and artifice…just like almost everyone in attendance.
Kate talked about the need for kindness. The need to reach past politeness to be earnestly compassionate to one another. The way people can feel completely alone in the middle of a crowd and how we shouldn’t let that happen.
And by the time she was done speaking and laid a rose on her mother’s coffin, there was nary a dry eye in the crowd.
She’d touched him deeply. He wanted nothing more than to grab her and hug her close. She was so fucking amazing he wondered how he could have possibly known her for this long and not realized how special she really was. And he was halfway to his feet to pull her into his embrace when it had happened.
First one shrill beep. Then another sound of a text. The Kenyon Empire was a media empire—and the crowd was filled with people who were alerted to breaking stories—so Jeremy supposed they couldn’t be blamed for falling into an awkward collective gasp.