Always Been Mine

by Victoria Paige

  Zach shrugged. “Some other time then. Great meeting. The senator will be pleased.” The senator’s Chief of Staff grinned brightly before heading out to the reception area.

  When he was out of earshot, Beatrice said, “That smile of his gives me the creeps.”

  “Something is not adding up with that guy,” Doug said.

  “Huh? How so?”

  “He’s coming on to you in public—”

  “And?”

  “I was pretty sure he was eye-fucking me three nights ago.”

  Beatrice stilled, her lips were twitching. “Maybe he’s bi. Look, he’s all yours if you’re jealous.”

  Doug huffed. “Don’t be silly. I just don’t trust a guy who does that.”

  “Maybe he’s making you jealous?”

  “Well, he’s not my type.”

  Beatrice had to agree with her assistant there. Doug preferred blue-collar. For all his clean-cut, neatly pressed look, he favored rough-looking guys.

  “I’m heading out. I need to drop a couple of contracts with our attorney for them to look over,” Doug said. “You leaving?”

  “Nah. I need to catch up with Nate.”

  “See you next week then?”

  “Enjoy Florida!” Beatrice stepped toward Doug and gave him a hug.

  He held her tightly. “I won’t go if you need me here, sweetie. There’s way too many things going on with you.”

  “Don’t worry, Nate will take care of me.”

  Beatrice found Nathan Reece going over some building blueprints. He was the other partner in Blake Security Incorporated. Because he had been a clandestine agent with the CIA, he preferred not to be identified with the company name. Nate worked more as a silent partner, having Travis handle most of the face-to-face meetings with the client—or the principal—as was the term professionally used in the security business.

  “So what do you think of Zach?”

  Nate looked up briefly from the prints before him. “Uh . . . seems like a nice guy.”

  “Lame. What is up?”

  “Look, Bee, I don’t want to make an assessment of someone based on one meeting.”

  “Lie. You were formerly CIA, Nate. Rapid assessments are your forte.”

  “He’s our client. I shouldn’t let it affect me.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Nate squirmed uncomfortably. “I think he likes me . . . uh . . . that way.”

  Beatrice burst out laughing. “Oh, God, how could I be so blind in all this? Well, I don’t ever get any sexual vibes from him except his cheesy smile. How come I’m the one getting a dinner invitation?”

  “Search me,” Nate shrugged. “He’s a client. I’ll deal.”

  Beatrice walked beside Nate and tucked her arm into his. “We need to find you a nice girl.”

  “Leave me alone, Bee. You’re the one who needs to get her ducks in a row.”

  Beatrice harrumphed.

  “I wasn’t going to say anything, but you better not consider taking him back.”

  Who was Nate talking about? Gabe or Eric? Had Doug mentioned something to him?

  “Uh, who?” Beatrice hedged.

  Nate rolled his eyes. “Who else? Eric Stone.” Ever the astute observer though, his eyes narrowed. “Why? What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Don’t say anything to Travis yet, okay?”

  Nate nodded.

  “His SEAL buddy, Gabriel Sullivan, is back in town.”

  Nate silently cursed. “You better not consider taking him back either. Is he bothering you? Do you want me to put someone on you?”

  “I can handle myself, Nate,” Beatrice snapped.

  “He’s bothering you.” Her friend’s brown eyes grew cold. “That fucker. You wanna stay with me for the weekend?”

  Beatrice sighed. This was so sad. Before her was the perfect male specimen: tall, a physique that belonged on the cover of a sports magazine, a smile that wouldn’t creep women out, but most likely make their panties drop, and she was friends with the man.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” Nate asked warily.

  “Like what?”

  “Like I was a bug you crushed under your shoe.”

  Beatrice shook her head in amusement. “I’m just pissed that all the reliable men in my life are not relationship material. First there’s Doug. Gainfully employed. I don’t know what the hell I’d do without him. He cares for me, loves me, but he’s gay. Then, there’s you. Women drool all over you, and yet you do nothing for me.”

  “Wow. Thanks,” Nate said sarcastically, but his eyes glinted merrily. “You’re sexy as hell, too, Bee. I see men look at you and it pisses me off.”

  Beatrice raised a brow.

  “Because it’s like they’re ogling my little sister,” Nate chuckled and caught her head under his arm and ground his fist on the crown of her head.

  Beatrice squealed and kidney punched him. Nate grunted, but continued chuckling.

  “Ugh! Stop that. You’re not much older than me,” Beatrice yelled.

  “Okay, okay.” Nate let her go. “What do you want?”

  “Jeez, you really sound like an older brother being pestered by his five-year-old sister.”

  “What do you want, Beatrice?”

  “When will Travis and Cat be back?”

  “You know when,” Nate said, annoyed. “Tonight. What do you really want?”

  Beatrice perched half her butt on his desk, eyeing him knowingly.

  “I’m not giving it to you,” Nate said. “I shouldn’t have told you about the inner room at the Diamond Owl. Why do you want to learn about BDSM anyway? You’re not made for that shit, you know.”

  “Are you?”

  “No.” Nate sat on the chair and leaned back. “It’s not as simple as leather, chains, and whips, Bee. It’s about trust. People think it’s all the rage and think a set of handcuffs translates to BDSM. It doesn’t.”

  “You sound knowledgeable.”

  “I know some folks who are into that lifestyle. Not for me.”

  “I’m curious to know how to control a man’s orgasm. They say—”

  “Christ! This conversation has gotten weird—”

  “I read that there’s this sub-space—”

  “Stop!” Nate growled. He reached for his sticky pad and scrawled a word on it. “Here. It’s Friday night. Now get out of here. I need to get some shit done.”

  Grinning triumphantly at a scowling Nate, and with the password to the BDSM club safely in her clutches, she gave him a quick hug and skipped out of the room. Friday was the day after tomorrow. Caitlin should be back by then, and Emily was easy to persuade. She didn’t need to tell them exactly where they were going. For the first time in days, Beatrice felt more like herself—in control and conniving.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “I know, Mom. I wish I could visit for Thanksgiving, but it’s a bad time for me right now.”

  She also didn’t like the idea of flying to California on the most traveled holiday of the year. Lorraine Woodward divorced her father fifteen years ago when Beatrice was seventeen. It had been an amicable divorce unlike the simmering resentment that reigned throughout their marriage. Any child would be hurt when their parents’ marriage ended, but Beatrice had been relieved.

  “You should stop wasting your life away in that job, Beatrice,” her mother scolded. “Find a nice young man to settle down. You’re becoming too much like your father.”

  She’d heard this lecture before. Her mom had already laid into her about the Eric Stone debacle when it first happened. She was surprised the topic had not come up again. So she said what she always did, “I love you, Mom.”

  Her mother sighed. “I’ll talk to you before Thanksgiving.”

  Obligatory Friday morning call to her mom over, Beatrice switched on the television and set it to the international news channel. She pulled a couple of files on her lap and started working, but her thoughts drifted back to the events leading to the divorce. B
eatrice didn’t remember much from her childhood, except her mother’s constant drinking. Her father was rarely home. There was a point when her mother lost it and just went ballistic and attacked her dad. Beatrice had cowered under a writing desk and heard her mom screaming about her dad’s ambition ruining their marriage. The fight ended with a slamming of doors.

  Beatrice emerged from under the table. She took tentative steps down the stairs and found her mom on her knees, quietly sobbing into her hands.

  “Mom?”

  Her mother looked at her and tried to smile. “I’m okay, bumblebee.”

  “Where’s Dad?”

  A pained expression came over her mom’s face. “I tried, Beatrice. He can’t be here for your birthday.”

  She knelt beside her mother and hugged her. “It’s okay. We’ll be okay, Mom.”

  Her mom only sobbed harder into her shoulder. It was then at the age of almost ten that Beatrice started to shoulder her mother’s tears.

  Despite her mother’s bitterness with the state of their marriage, Beatrice was thankful that during the times she was sober, she performed her parental duties well. But because she’d been drunk half the time, Beatrice had learned to be independent, so she had taken more responsibilities at a young age. She’d forged her mother’s signature on payment checks and on her school release forms. She would race home from school to fix dinner. Some of her friends picked up on her mom’s nickname for her and turned it to “Busy Bee” until it was later shortened to “Bee” and the name stuck.

  Beatrice suspected it was during her high school graduation that her mom had given up on her father when he didn’t show up until weeks later. Her mother filed for divorce not long after.

  Interestingly enough, it was about this time her dad took an active interest in Beatrice’s life. And like a dry sponge starved for water, she soaked up whatever attention he gave her until she was old enough to realize he was molding her into someone like him. Of course she rebelled then, but it was not long after, and with much horror, that she realized she liked the path her dad had carved for her.

  The divorce and the eventual distance did help her mother overcome her alcoholism. She eventually checked herself into rehab where she met her second husband—a popular Hollywood producer. She was now living the life of a Stepford wife in a Beverly Hills mansion.

  Sadly, Beatrice knew her mom was still in love with her dad. That was the reason Beatrice avoided men like Benjamin Porter. She rose from the couch and walked over to where a couple of picture frames sat on top of a mantel. Her pictures with her mom. One with her dad. No one could probably tell, but Beatrice had arranged the pictures in a way that started with her mother at her most vibrant and youngest. It ended with the pictures during her graduation. Her mom’s beauty had faded into a face etched with bitterness, its vibrancy snuffed out by a force other than age—the indifference of a man who was supposed to love and cherish her.

  After Gabe had left her, Beatrice made it a ritual, a therapy, to stare at the photographs first thing in the morning and, when she remembered, the last thing at night. She had since stopped doing it after a year, thinking she had gotten over Gabe. Her breakdown a couple of days ago proved otherwise. So she was getting back into her picture therapy. No way was she going to end up like her mother.

  *****

  Shutting the lid on her laptop, Beatrice sighed in relief. She just finished following up on her doctor’s medical portal regarding her STD tests. She was clean. Health scares like this one should be enough to keep her legs shut, preferably bound together, for the next five years or so. How weird was it that she was going to a sex club tonight? Maybe she should content herself with voyeurism and a dildo for the said five years.

  Her phone chimed with a text message. Caitlin was running ten minutes late.

  She missed those two, Travis and Cat. Caitlin Blake was an amnesiac and hacker genius. She had recently started fielding freelance assignments from the National Security Agency (NSA). Though Travis, in all his caveman glory, wasn’t happy about his wife working for another secretive part of the government, he gave in grudgingly. Caitlin never did remember her past. Any pertinent clue was sealed in CIA-classified files. Caitlin told her that Project Infinity had been corrupted. The mastermind of the cover-up in the agency was still a mystery. The specter agent program had gone beyond the level of top secret and that was all Caitlin knew. A friend and fellow agent, Jase Locke/John Cooper, lied to her about their relationship and tricked her into a life on the run. The truth about her disappearance that night was only revealed through a posthumous letter from Jase. Digging deeper would put herself and Travis in the crosshairs of an unknown enemy, and with Travis and the admiral at odds, Travis was one ally down.

  “I want a clean start with Travis, Bee,” Caitlin said. “I hate that I deceived him when we were married. He loves me anyway. I’m sure my reasons were to protect him. So I’m leaving it alone.”

  If there were two people who deserved a happily-ever-after, it was those two. They had been through so much, especially Travis. To see her friend now so deliriously happy should be nauseating given her blasé opinion on relationships, but Beatrice was genuinely thrilled for them.

  After exactly ten minutes, the doorbell chimed.

  Beatrice opened the door to a gorgeously tanned Caitlin Blake. Her blonde hair was bleached lighter by the sun, and her unusual hazel eyes were sparkling with contentment. In short, she was positively glowing.

  “Don’t you look so sun-kissed and annoyingly beautiful.”

  “Are we doing this mutual admiration thing?” Caitlin smirked and walked in.

  Beatrice snorted. “Nah, my ego is brimming right now.”

  The other woman eyed her outfit. Beatrice was dressed in a mid-length flounce, flirty skirt in a teal color that complimented her red hair.

  “So what am I wearing?”

  Beatrice smiled in feline smugness. “You will love the dress.”

  *****

  They had been in the inner sanctum of Diamond Owl for a few minutes now. Beatrice wasn’t feeling it. No way could she do what she was witnessing to a sex partner. What made her think she was a domme? Those damned erotica books she loved reading in her spare time would be her downfall.

  Caitlin, Emily, and Beatrice managed to snag a good spot near the stage where a barrier kept the crowd at bay. On display was a woman shackled to what Beatrice knew was a St. Andrew’s Cross. Said woman was being flogged and then felt up for her wetness.

  “Oh, my,” Caitlin whispered. “You think you can whip a guy like that, check how hard he is, and then whip him again?”

  “Shut up,” Beatrice retorted, feeling like slinking away and escaping. So much for her big bluster earlier.

  Caitlin whispered something to Emily. Beatrice leaned in to listen to their conversation when a hand gripped her upper arm firmly.

  “Come on, Bee.”

  Nate.

  What the hell was he doing here?

  Beatrice caught sight of Travis’s unmistakable form crowding Caitlin. Uh-oh. Busted!

  She had an uncontrollable compulsion to laugh. Maybe it was the couple of drinks she’d had, or she was just finding the whole situation amusing. The minute she and Nate left the room, she burst out laughing.

  “Oh, my God!” she chortled. “Poor Caitlin. She’s going to get it. Wait until Travis gets a load of that dress.”

  “You are so much trouble, Ms. Porter,” Nate declared.

  “You’re one to talk. You ratted us out again.”

  “Hey, bros before hoes and all that, you know.” He smirked.

  “You owe me a drink.”

  “Come on, then.”

  They both started for the bar when Beatrice stopped in her tracks. Gabe was standing before them, glowering at Nate. Her friend tensed beside her, clocking the threat immediately.

  “Am I right to assume that’s Gabriel Sullivan?” Nate murmured in her ear.

  Beatrice nodded.

  Nate imme
diately stepped in front of her, facing Gabe squarely. Both men were almost the same height, Gabe maybe an inch taller at six-four and definitely bulkier. However, Nate was no slouch with his lean compact muscles either.

  “Turn around and walk away,” Nate growled softly.

  “Nathan Reece, right?” Gabe said with a tight smile. “I guess I don’t need to tell you who I am. You should also know that this won’t end well if you stop me from talking to Beatrice.”

  “So you wanna take this outside?” Nate goaded.

  Yep, time to step in.

  “I got this, Nate.”

  “Beatrice—”

  “He’ll only keep coming back,” Beatrice whispered harshly to her friend. “My problem. My solution. Stand down.”

  Nate’s jaw clenched. Indecision was written all over his face. He nodded jerkily then returned his gaze to the other man. Without another word to Gabe, he deliberately shouldered past him.

  “Hey, poppy,” Gabe greeted her quietly.

  Beatrice nodded to the exit. “Let’s go.”

  *****

  The second they cleared the club steps, Beatrice whirled on Gabe and shoved him on the shoulder.

  “What is wrong with you, huh?” Beatrice screeched. “You keep following me everywhere. Do you know how creepy that is?”

  “Since when have you become so violent, babe?” Gabe mock massaged his left shoulder.

  He wasn’t taking her seriously. Nothing had changed. He could still annoy the hell out of her and at the same time turn her on. Seeing all that hardness underneath his navy blue shirt over jeans that hugged well-muscled thighs sent a palpable twitch between her legs. Hell. No.

  “What’s your game, really? I’m so tired of you popping up everywhere I am—”

  “No game, Beatrice.” His face turned serious. “I wouldn’t say leaving you was a mistake. Saying I had no choice is a lie. I can’t tell you why.”