Kept

by Jami Alden

  He watched, enthralled, as she repeated the sequence three more times, wondering how he could be so turned on watching Alyssa do yoga when he’d fucked her six ways to Sunday less than eight hours ago. But watching her bend, stretch, twist made him think of a thousand other ways he wanted to fuck her. From behind, with that surprisingly round ass of hers bouncing against his hips. Her on top, her strong, flexible legs spread wide as she rode his cock to oblivion.

  Derek grimaced as his cock thickened behind his flannel pajamas. What the fuck was wrong with him? He’d scratched the itch that had been nagging him since Alyssa Miles had been thrown back into his life. Finally confirmed that, yes, sex with her was as good as—no, better than—his fevered memories had insisted.

  But now the itch was scratched. Case closed. She’d gotten what she wanted—another tumble with a guy who wouldn’t sell her out. And he’d gotten what he needed—a good lay to hold him over for the next several weeks.

  So there was no reason in hell he should be popping wood all over the place and calculating how long it would take him to retrieve a condom from the bathroom, strip off those pink pants, and have her spread-eagled on the nearest flat surface.

  Derek struggled to wipe his face of expression as Alyssa straightened and turned to come into the house. If she had any inkling that he’d been watching her like a dirty old man at a peep show, it didn’t show in the wide smile that encompassed the entire bottom half of her face. She stepped through the sliding glass door, the mist floating in behind. Her long hair was caught back in a ponytail. Derek tightened his hand around his coffee mug as he fought the urge to smooth his fingers over a damp tendril that had escaped to curl next to her ear.

  Her cheeks were flushed from exertion and the damp, cold fall morning, and she smelled like fresh rain.

  “Good morning,” she said brightly as she breezed past him into the kitchen. “You found the coffee—I hope it’s okay. I don’t make it a whole lot, so I sometimes make it too strong.”

  “It’s fine,” he said, studying, watching her for any signs of discomfort or morning-after awkwardness. He was surprised when he saw none, especially after he had basically rolled off her and beat feet to the guest room for the rest of the night. When she’d asked him sleepily where he was going, he’d muttered something about sleeping better on his own.

  The truth was he’d needed to get out of there, away from her soft skin, tight body, and insane pull she seemed to have on him. Needed to breathe and convince himself she was, as she’d put it, just another woman he’d taken to bed.

  She seemed to have taken it all in stride, judging from the way she bopped around the kitchen, putting a few dishes in the dishwasher in between bites of a banana. Then again, he thought as the pit in his stomach made another unwelcome appearance, maybe she was used to fucking guys like it meant nothing and didn’t care one way or the other if they spent the night or not.

  The thought stuck in his throat, choking him with a knot of things he had no business feeling.

  “I’ll be back in forty-five minutes,” she said and tossed her banana peel in the garbage.

  Her pronouncement jolted him from his jealous musings. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

  Her eyebrows shot up at his harsh tone. “I’m going for my morning run.”

  “Alone?”

  “Is that a problem?” She was already lacing up her shoes.

  He put down his coffee cup as it became evident she was going whether he liked it or not. “Hang on, I’ll go with you.”

  “You don’t need to,” she protested. “It’s totally safe up here, and no one knows who I am anyway.”

  Her voice trailed him down the hall as he quickly pulled on the workout clothes and running shoes he always carried with him. She was right. He didn’t need to go with her, not for safety reasons anyway.

  “It’s not like I’m going to try to escape on foot,” she said testily when he emerged from the guest room.

  “I’ll feel better if I keep an eye on you.” Watching her little pink butt bouncing down the road wasn’t going to do anything to quell his libido, but at least he couldn’t do anything about it for the next five miles or so. Besides, despite her protestations, he still didn’t trust her not to try to ditch him again.

  They ran in silence for ten minutes or so. She was surprisingly swift, her strides long and even. He didn’t have a problem keeping up with her, but the pace was fast enough to get him breathing hard. The road they ran along paralleled the beach, offering glimpses of crashing waves and craggy rocks through the thick coastal fog. The houses dotting the coast were similar to the one where Alyssa was staying, sprawling, wood-shingle structures designed to make the most of the dramatic views. Nice, but not the kind of five-star resorts where Alyssa was known to frolic.

  “So, how do you know Raj Gupta?”

  Her stride stuttered, and she shot him a surprised look. “How did you—”

  “Once I knew where you were, it wasn’t that hard to track down the owner. So, tell me, how does someone like you hook up with one of the greatest technology innovators of the last decade?”

  Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Haven’t you ever seen that show Beauty and the Geek? Every nerd in the world wants a piece of airhead arm candy like me.” She tried to surge ahead, but Derek was right beside her in a single stride.

  “That’s not what I meant. And, anyway, Gupta’s gay, so I know it’s not about trying to nail you. But you have to admit it’s an unlikely friendship.”

  Her ponytail swished across her shoulder as she gave a little shrug. “I met Raj in rehab, and we hit it off. He’s been there for me ever since. So now when I need a place to escape, he lets me use his place.”

  The only sounds were feet hitting the dirt trail and waves crashing in the distance as Derek let that digest. “This place doesn’t seem your speed.”

  She slowed her pace to a walk, stretching her arms above her head as she looked out to sea. “I can breathe up here,” she said, taking a deep inhale. “No one has any reason to think I’d be up here. No one recognizes me. No photographers waiting behind the bushes to catch me doing something stupid.” She started jogging back the way they came. “No one slipping me drugs and trying to make me look like I’m a mess.”

  He could hear the tension in her voice, mixed with something else. Fear? “Alyssa,” he began but didn’t know what else to say, didn’t know which way was up. Something in him—instinct? Gut feel?—told him she wasn’t lying. She had a terrible poker face. He’d seen that already. If she were lying, he’d know it.

  But he also knew what addicts were like. Remembered what his mother was like before she’d taken off. The secretiveness. The manipulation. Hiding liquor and pills all over the house, making it look like she was in complete control.

  It hit him in the chest like a bullet. Was he following in his father’s footsteps? Falling for an emotional wreck of a woman? An addict who would wring him dry and leave him empty? Even now, nearly two decades after his mother’s disappearance, Derek’s father was still obsessed with her, desperately following any lead that might explain her abrupt and complete disappearance from their lives.

  “I know you don’t believe me,” she said tightly. “You can search my stuff when you get home. I don’t care. I have nothing to hide.”

  He didn’t tell her he already had. And, just like in her apartment, he’d found nothing stronger than a half bottle of red wine and the ibuprofen tablets scattered all over the bathroom floor.

  Her shoulders stiffened and she picked up her pace as if running away from old demons. “I won’t lie. Several years ago, I went through a really bad time. I started dating a guy who used a lot. It just seemed a way to escape.”

  “So you blame the boyfriend?” Derek asked.

  “Not at all,” she said, staring straight ahead as she ran down the path, her stride steady and sure. “I did it because it made me feel good. When I was high, I felt invincible. I didn’t care what any
one thought about me, what anyone wrote about me, what anyone said about me. But then it got out of control, and it wasn’t so much fun anymore.” She sprinted the last few yards up the path to Raj’s house.

  “And then you almost died,” he said, telling himself the tight feeling in his lungs was from that last sprint. Not because the thought of her hurt or dying left a giant sinkhole in his chest.

  “Yeah,” she said, slightly breathless as her chest rose and fell. “I was lucky.” She regarded him, her gaze steady and grave. “I didn’t die. And my dad got me into one of the best rehab centers in the world. I spent three months dealing with my drug problem, and I’ve never relapsed.”

  He listened to her words, stared hard into her eyes. He was trained in interrogation, was able to pick up a lie before it was uttered. Everything about Alyssa reeked of truth and conviction.

  Was it possible she was telling the truth? Or was he so far gone he was seeing only what he wanted to see? He followed her up the stairs and into the house, wondering which fucking end was up.

  “Aren’t you tempted?” He’d go with this, keep her talking, seize on the first sign of a lie.

  She went to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water. “Not really.”

  “Never?”

  “I’m not around it anymore, which helps a lot. And three therapy sessions a week really helped. I had a therapist I loved in LA,” she rambled on almost as though to herself, “but I never found anyone after I moved. Have you ever been?”

  “To LA?”

  She laughed like it was his fault for not following her curving line of conversation. “No, to therapy. Like after your mom disappeared.” She stared at him expectantly.

  “No,” he said.

  “Seriously? I can’t believe your dad didn’t throw you and your brothers into counseling after something like that.”

  “He had other things on his mind.” Derek turned his back on her to retrieve a water glass from a cabinet.

  “You should go,” she said, not taking the hint. “I mean, I have trust issues with my mother and abandonment issues with my father, but I can’t imagine what it must be like for you.”

  No wonder she got in trouble with the press. After everything, she was still so open, so willing to talk about her personal problems to anyone who would listen.

  He avoided women like Alyssa like the plague. Women who wasted time analyzing their feelings inevitably wanted to analyze his. The mere thought made his skin crawl. “I don’t have any issues.” She could only choke out a scoffing sound before he cut her off, needing to nip this conversation in the bud. “Back to what’s important. Say you’re right. Someone is slipping you drugs. Why would someone want to do that?” He pulled back, tried to cast an impartial eye on the situation. She’d been publicly intoxicated twice in the past several weeks. In the week he’d spent with her, he hadn’t seen any evidence of drug use, other than the night of the benefit. There were no drugs here in the house. If she’d planned to be alone, would she have worried about hiding her stash?

  Uneasiness clenched at his gut. As crazy as her story sounded, he had to entertain the possibility that she might not be lying.

  “I have no idea.” That helpless look was back, the one that made him want to pull her into his arms and tell her everything was going to be okay. “But if I don’t find out soon, Uncle Harold’s going to cut my salary completely, and then I’ll really be screwed.”

  “And so will all the shops on Union Square.”

  “Don’t treat me like I’m a spoiled little brat,” she snapped and slammed her water glass on the counter. “I have bigger things to worry about than my shopping budget.”

  “Right, the chemo,” Derek said, feeling like an asshole. He pinched the bridge of his nose. “Who would be out to get you like this? Any ex-boyfriends? Ex-employees you’ve pissed off?”

  She shook her head and tugged the fleece pullover off. Derek tried not to notice how the T-shirt underneath rode up and bared a creamy swath of skin. “Andy is my only employee other than the cleaning lady, and she’d never do anything like that. And I told you I haven’t dated anyone for over a year.”

  “What about Abbassi?” He immediately wanted to call back the words and the naked jealousy that dripped from them.

  Alyssa rolled her eyes. “I never dated Louis.”

  “Press says differently.” Why was he pushing her? He shouldn’t give a flying crap who she slept with.

  “I’ve met him a couple of times, and now that he’s involved in the business, we end up at a lot of the same events. The press likes to photograph us together and insinuate that we’re sleeping together. It’s not true.”

  “He wants it to be.” His lips curled into an involuntary sneer, thinking of the way Abbassi’s dark, covetous eyes ran over Alyssa’s body.

  Alyssa didn’t deny it as she shot Derek a knowing smile. “That’s his problem. Right now I’ve got my hands full.”

  Her phone rang, preventing him from digging any deeper, and she turned away with a sassy twitch of her hips. Her smile faded as she stared at the display. Her shoulders tensed, and her fingers tightened around the small red phone, but she didn’t answer it.

  “Who was that?”

  “Can you trace anonymous phone calls?”

  He walked over to her, hand held out. She handed it over without a word, and he thumbed through the call list. “Is someone threatening you?”

  “No. I never answer anyway, and the person always hangs up. But I did get this weird text message.” She took the phone from him and clicked open a message.

  If u want to no the truth ansr ur fon.

  The message had come in the day before.

  “Truth about what?”

  She shrugged. “It’s probably just a prank, but I’d rather find out who it is and make them stop. I’ve had to change my number, like, four times in the past year.”

  “I’ll take a look at your phone records and see what I can find.”

  Another ring pierced the air, this time from his phone.

  He let it ring a few times as he watched Alyssa walk through the sliding glass doors onto the redwood deck.

  Might as well get this over with. He flipped his phone open, and Danny’s voice ripped through the static. “What the fuck is going on with you?”

  “Everything’s fine.”

  “Your locater shows you in the same place for over twenty-four hours. Have you found her or what?” Ever since they’d started Gemini, Derek, Danny, and Ethan kept track of each other with tiny GPS locaters implanted in their watches. No surprise, Danny had been keeping tabs on Derek while he searched for Alyssa.

  “Yeah, she’s fine.” He didn’t tell Danny he’d spent the last twenty-four hours with her in a billionaire’s beach house, knowing he’d never hear the end of it.

  “I just got off the phone with Harold Van Weldt, and he ripped me a new one about you not returning his calls. I assured him you have the situation well in hand. Tell me I wasn’t lying.”

  “You weren’t.” Alyssa was squatting next to the sunken hot tub, sitting back on her heels as she struggled to remove the padded cover.

  “Then why haven’t you updated Van Weldt yourself? Why isn’t her ass on its way to San Francisco as we speak?”

  “She needed a couple days to chill out,” Derek said. “I told her I’d keep quiet for a little longer.” He knew how stupid he sounded even before the words left his mouth.

  He was met with dead silence on the other end of the line. He could picture Danny holding the phone away from his ear, staring at it in puzzlement. “What the hell is going on between you two?”

  “Nothing,” Derek replied, trying to keep the defensive note out of his voice. “She’s under a lot of stress and needed a little time away. No big deal.”

  “Since when do you care so much about her mental state?”

  “I don’t.” Steam billowed up from the uncovered hot tub, mingling with the salty ocean mist until Alyssa was rendered ne
arly invisible.

  “Yeah, well, I shouldn’t have to remind you, Van Weldt is our client, not his mess of a niece.”

  Derek bit back an angry response, knowing it would only ratchet up his brother’s suspicions another ten degrees. “We’ll be on our way first thing tomorrow,” he said evenly. “In the meantime, I need you to look at her cell records. She’s been getting some anonymous messages.” Before he could stop himself he said, “And find out everything you can about Louis Abbassi.”

  “Why do you give a shit about her boyfriends?”

  “He’s not her boyfriend,” Derek snapped. “And something about him bugs me.”

  “You know why I put you on this case, right? Because you were the only one I could count on not to get starstruck by a whiff of celebrity pussy and start thinking with your dick.”

  Derek watched, his mouth going dry as Alyssa peeled off her long-sleeved shirt, followed by her jog bra. Yoga pants were next, landing in a puddle on the deck. “You have nothing to worry about.” The bitter taste of the lie flooded his mouth as his cock thickened, tenting out the front of his running shorts. As he watched, Alyssa pulled her hair out of her ponytail, sending it tumbling down between her slender shoulders as she stepped down into the sunken hot tub.

  Naked skin. Hot and silky wet.

  Danny’s voice faded into the background. Derek registered a fraction of it. “…too close…too personally…need to back off.”

  It all faded into the ether because right now all he could think about was Alyssa, naked and wet and waiting for him in that damn hot tub.

  “You may be right,” Derek admitted. But right now he really didn’t give a shit as he throbbed insistently with the need to get inside Alyssa, feel her envelop him in her molten heat. “I gotta go.” He cut Danny off midsentence and tossed his phone onto the coffee table, ignoring it when it immediately began to ring again.

  He made a quick detour to the bathroom and the giant box of condoms, dumping a fistful on the table next to his phone, saving one to take with him.

  She glanced back at him at the sound of the sliding glass door opening. Her pink mouth stretched in a knowing smile when she saw his cock straining the front of his shorts. She gazed at him from under her lashes, a siren inviting him to smash himself against the rocks of his own need.