“Where have you been Dad? Mom has been worried sick! Are you angry with me?”
“I am sorry, Poppet. The trip took slightly longer than I anticipated. Don’t ever think you are to blame for what happened! You were the victim and all we have to do now, is to look forward and forget about this episode.”
He stroked her hair, his eyes on Amber who stared out the large bay windows towards the sea, her arms wrapped around her waist. She looked so fragile and … alone.
Zoey unwrapped herself from Damien and looked up at him, her expression stern.
“You should have phoned, Daddy. You should not let Mom worry so much. I heard her walking around the house every night instead of sleeping.”
Damien noticed Amber start, clearly not realizing Zoey was aware of her worry.
“Dad, what happened to your hands?” Zoey gasped in shock and grabbed his hands in hers. Amber spun around and even over the distance noticed his bloodied and swollen knuckles.
“It looks worse than it is, poppet. Now stop worrying and go and get ready for the yacht. Remember to wear those special sneakers we bought.”
She nodded and with a quick glance at her mother, she ran upstairs. Amber stared at his hands, her heart thumping wildly in her chest. Her voice sounded husky in the quiet room.
“What did you do?”
He looked at his hands and only then realized how bad they looked. He ran his hand over his face, then found her eyes. He looked dead on his feet and Amber was relatively sure he has not slept for four days.
“I lost my temper.”
“Did you at least feel better from it?” She gestured to his hands.
“Slightly.” He had a wry smile on his lips.
“But at a guess, I would say you still did not get the answers you were seeking?”
The tightening of his lips and chiseled jaw was answer enough and she sighed.
“You look tired.”
“Yeah, I am tired. I have not slept for four days.”
“I am sorry, Amber. I should have phoned.”
“Yes, you should have, but I guess the fact that you didn’t tells its own tale.”
“Are you making assumptions again, beautiful?”
She just shook her head and went to fetch the first aid kit in the hall cupboard.
“Sit down and let me look at your hands.”
“It is not necessary.”
“Sit down, Damien.”
He glowered at her, but went to sit down on the couch. She went down on her knees between his and took out disinfectant and cotton wool. She cleaned his hands very carefully, noticing he did not even flinch once even though she was relatively sure it must sting like crazy.
She blew on his hands to dry them. She looked at the swollen knuckles and shook her head. She leaned down and kissed his knuckles with warm lips. He sucked in his breath and closed his eyes.
“What does his face look like?”
“Let it go, Amber.”
She looked into his eyes and smile wanly. She tenderly smoothed antiseptic cream on his knuckles.
“I should really wrap your hands, but I guess that is not going to sit well with you?”
“No, it won’t. Go and change. You don’t want to keep Zoey waiting.”
Amber pushed to her feet and carefully repacked the first aid kit.
“I am not going with.”
“I really don’t want to fight with you this morning, Amber.”
“Nor do I, but you need to spend some time alone with Zoey. Set her mind at ease. I have a suspicion she thinks you are going to leave us now that Paul is back.”
“Where the hell would she get that idea from?”
“She’s ten years old, Damien. She has been asking so many questions about him and us … she must have overheard something somewhere.”
“Then we deal with it together.”
“I really am tired, Damien. I would rather just sleep.”
She replaced the kit in the cupboard and went upstairs. By the time Damien went upstairs to change, she was fast asleep on the bed. He stood looking down at her, noticing the black circles under her eyes. He sighed, leaned over and kissed her softly on her brow. His hurt and hate all nearly dissipated for her and transferred fully to his brother. A brother that was still adamant they had sex the whole night of her prom and that she was most definitely not drugged. Even beating him to a near pulp did not get him to change his story.
“Aunt Mia! I am so happy to see you! Are you staying with us for a while? Please say yes. Please, please!”
“Hello darling girl! I missed you so much! Just look at how tall you got.”
“Tsk, don’t be silly, Aunt Mia. It’s only been a few months! Mom, can she stay with us? Please?”
Damien sat down next to Amber and kissed her softly on her cheek. He leaned over and pulled Zoey’s ponytail.
“Of course she is staying with us. For a few days at the very least.”
“Yippee! Come see my room. Mom and I re-did it and it looks way, way cooler than it did when you were last here!”
The buzz of the gate bell interrupted their track upstairs and she ran to the intercom unit.
“Jordan residence. How may I assist you? Uncle Rory! I’m buzzing you in!”
She skipped back into the room, smiling broadly.
“Uncles Rory and Ashton is also here!”
She could not contain herself and waited for them at the door. Amber sat back against the couch and Damien put his arm around her shoulder and drew her closer. He kissed her on the top of her head and asked softly.
“Are you feeling better?”
She nodded and turned slightly into his body, snuggling closer to his hard body, gently stroking his swollen knuckles.
Rory and Ashton walked in with Zoey swinging on their arms between them. After the greetings everyone took a seat. Ashton gestured Mia to follow him to the kitchen. When they came back, Mia cajoled Zoey to show her the redecorated room. The moment they disappeared upstairs, Ashton turned to the couple on the couch.
“Is Paul still kept at the FBI jail?”
Amber lifted his hands and showed them Damien’s knuckles. Ashton and Rory looked at each other.
“We just spoke to Sheldon. We need you to come with us to see him.”
“I don’t think that is such a good idea.”
“We insist. Look Damien, we know he insists they were together on Amber’s prom night. So, we had a long chat with the Locke brothers as well as James Stuart.”
“What does the Locke twins have to do with this and who is James Stuart?”
“They were Paul’s best buddies during that time. They agreed to come out in the open and is willing to do so in front of Paul.”
Amber started to tremble and Damien tightened his arm around her.
“Is Mia aware we are leaving?”
“Yes and we already ordered pizza.”
Damien rose and drew Amber with him and looked into her eyes.
“Maybe you should stay here.”
“No, I need to hear this first hand … even if … even if it is not what I want to hear.”
They arrived at the FBI regional office just after the Locke twins and found James Stuart already waiting inside. Each of them greeted Amber with reservation and could not look her in the eyes. Her trembling increased, not knowing if that was good or bad.
Sheldon arrived and they all trailed after him to the jail cells on the underground level. Before they entered the main interrogation room, he turned to Damien.
“Will you be able to contain yourself this time, Buddy? Whatever the provocation I can’t allow you to beat him again … that goes for all of you.”
“He won’t. Right honey?”
He looked down at her and could do none other than nod.
Sheldon opened the door and they all filed in, one after the other. Paul looked up and smirked when Ashton and Rory walked in behind Damien. His face looked terrible and he was hardly recognizable. The others were to
ld to wait outside until they were called, but they could see and hear everything through the two way mirror.
“So brother dear, you needed some back up. Do you really think beating me to death is going to change the truth?”
“That’s just it, little brother. I think you have become so demented you don’t even know what the truth is anymore.”
He shrugged and leaned back in the chair, crossing his legs in front of him.
“So … whose turn is it this time?”
Ashton ambled closer and sat down on the corner of the table across from him.
“Very well, let’s talk about the Prom night, where it all supposedly ended. Do you remember that clearly, Paul?”
“Of course. You have a hot sister!”
Sheldon had to hold Damien back.
“So hot you had to drug her to have sex with her?”
“Bullshit! I did no such thing!”
“Really? She was so out of it, she did not know where she was or how she got there. You drugged her so much that I had to carry her out of there the next morning because she still had no control over her muscles.”
“So that’s where she disappeared to. Pity, I would have been able to get another quickie from her!”
This time Sheldon was too late and Damien’s fist connected Paul’s chin so hard he toppled from the chair. He screamed when he was held back by the cuffs around his wrists, fixed to the horizontal bar on the table. Both Rory and Sheldon had to hold Damien back. He chuckled through his pain.
“I still had her that night, brother dear. Over and over! Her lying there like a bag of potatoes did not matter! She was still hot!”
“No … please don’t say that! You did not! You are lying! Stop lying!”
“As your brother so nicely pointed out, my dear. You were out of it and had no way of stopping me, nor would you remember what happened. I gave you a double dose of Rohypnol. Pity I was so drunk! I could have really had some fun for days with you!”
This time Ashton and Sheldon let Damien loose and he laid into him. His face was a mass of blood by the time Sheldon and Ashton pulled him off Paul. He half hung half sat against the table. Sheldon plucked him from the floor and dumped him back on the chair. He groaned and spit blood on the table in front of him.
Amber felt cold, her body shivered and she stared with hatred at the bloodied man. Damien was livid and his voice was so rough and deep it didn’t sound like him at all.
“You’re a vile bastard!”
Amber gasped when she saw what additional damage he did to his hands. She walked to him and glowered at him when she took his hands in hers.
“Ahh … look at the sweet couple! Pity he would never be able to forget that I had you too, Amber darling. I would always be there between you!”
The door opened and the Locke’s and James Stuart strolled in. Paul visibly started and his lips tightened, even noticeable through the swelling.
James Stuart was the first to talk. His loathing for the beaten up man clearly visible on his face and in his voice.
“You know for the life of me, I can’t think why I ever called you friend. Your brother is right, Paul. You are totally demented. But here is the truth, you were too drunk to do anymore that night but caress her …”
“Bullshit! I had her! Over and over!”
“You forget, we were there as well. All three of us. I manned the video cam and these two idiots entertained the other girls you used to make the full video with afterwards. You were so drunk you passed out before you could do more than stroke her body.”
“Is that the truth, James? Is it?” Amber nearly shouted at him. He turned to her and smiled sadly.
“I am so sorry for the roles we played in this. I went looking for you after Paul’s death to make it right, but you were gone. Yes, Amber, it is the truth … he never had sex with you. I was still in that room when Ashton came for you. I was ashamed for the part I played and pretended to be passed out as well.”
“Oh thank God!”
Amber was so overwhelmed she just had to get out of the room and ran outside. For the first time in eleven years it felt as if she could breathe. Really breathe and she gulped in deep breaths, threw her head back and looked at the black night sky, shimmering with thousands of small stars.
“Amber.”
She turned and looked at the man she has loved for so long. Knowing that it would never be … and now … she still did not know. The look in his eyes did not bode well and she knew she did not want to hear what he had to say. She walked into him and wrapped her arms around his waist and clutched him tight.
“Please just hold me, Damien. For tonight, let’s just please forget about everything and just be together.”
He wrapped his arms around her and lifted her feet from the ground he hugged her so tight. Their lips mashed together without them realizing the intent. The kiss was wildly passionate and when the familiar heat of her arousal flooded her core, she allowed the full effect to engulf her completely for the first time since he came into her life again.
Chapter Eighteen
Amber was on the verge of committing murder or just give up. Now that the truth were known about her prom night she expected her relationship with Damien to improve. That they would be the happy loving couple they were before all of it started.
Unfortunately, Damien Jordan was a very complex man. His sense of integrity and honesty drove him. His actions against the one person who was totally innocent in his demented brother’s game, tore at his soul. Every time he looked at her, he remembered nearly choking her, how violently he took her and his heart cringed. He ached to hold her in his arms, to love and kiss all her hurt of the past eleven years away, but guilt drove him further and further apart from her.
They slept in the same bed, but with a grand canyon separating them, it could just as well have been two different ones. He smiled, kissed and hugged her only when Zoey was in the vicinity, but once she was gone, he withdrew from Amber. He knew she was hurting, he saw the pain in her eyes every time he pulled away from her, yet he needed to give her space. No matter what reasons he gave her, he still forced her to marry him. Now that all those reasons did not exist anymore, what did he have to keep her with him? He had made up his mind about what to do and nothing was going to change that. Zoey was spending the night at a sleepover party which gave him the ideal opportunity to set the ball rolling.
He winced, relatively sure Amber was not going to readily agree with him.
“Daddy, where are you? You promised to drop me at Anne’s. We’re going to be late! Daaaddy!”
He got up from behind his desk in his study and met her at the door, tenderly returning her hug. She looked up at him and frowned.
“Why are you so sad, Dad? I’m only going for two days!”
“It’s not that, Poppet. I just have a lot on my mind, is all. So, where is your stuff? Let’s get going.”
He helped her carry her bag and she skipped ahead of him to the front porch, where Amber sat working on her laptop.
“What are you doing, Mom?”
“Oh … I am just going through listings to see how many wedding cake bakers there are. I was thinking of starting a small exclusive store, specializing in wedding cakes.”
“Wow! That will be so cool! What do you think, Dad?”
“Amber, you know you don’t have to work.”
“I also know I can’t sit around doing nothing. It is already driving me up the wall. Come say goodbye. If you don’t leave now, you’ll be the last one to arrive.”
Zoey ran into her arms to hug and kiss her and stood back, waiting expectantly for Damien to do the same. He leaned past her and kissed Amber briefly on her cheek.
“I won’t be long.”
Amber sat looking after them, holding hands and Zoey skipping happily next to her father. She knew Damien well enough to know he has come to a decision. His ‘I won’t be long’, translated to ‘we have to talk’. She dreaded that talk. Somehow she just knew
it was not in the same direction her thoughts have been driven.
He walked back onto the porch less than an hour later and took a seat across from her, his elbows on the table. He looked tired and worn. He stared out to the sea for a long while. He sighed heavily and turned to her.
“This is not working, Amber. I have fooled myself thinking everything is automatically going to be the way it was. Yet it is only getting worse. I am … lost in how to … be with you now. For years, up to four weeks ago, all my actions against you were driven by hurt, loathing and hate. It became part of my life. Now … I just question myself all the time.”
“Question about what?”
“Why you are still here. Do I still want you here or is it only because of Zoey that you remain? I can’t answer any of those, while I am trying to work through the maze of emotions running through me. Regret, hate and the hurt … Paul … what he did to you because of me. I still don’t know if I should tell my parents about him!”
“Wha … what are you saying, Damien? Do you want a divorce?”
“No!”
“Then what? You are right, this is not working and if we continue like we are now, we are going to destroy each other.”
“I … shit … I think it would be best if we are apart for a while. I need to sort my mind and emotions out. You need to know if you really want me … and not only because of Zoey and me … I need to know the same thing about you.”
“I see. What do you propose?”
Amber sat looking down at her hands and Damien saw her swallow painfully. His hands tightened into fists.
“There is an assignment job available at the LAX airport. A special project to identify controls and protocols at the Finance Division. You do not have to work and I have already set up an account for you in any case, but somehow I think you would rather work.”
“In Los Angeles. You want to send me away to Los Angeles?” Her teary eyes rose to his.
“I have to break away, Amber. If I could have gone, I would have, but I have an Airline to run, investment companies.”
His Vengeance, Marriage and a Baby: He hated her for cockolding him with his brother. Now he wanted vengeance. Page 16