by T. E. White
“You father won the election. There was no way to tell you about a sister, for fear you would slip up and mention that fact to someone else.”
“And when I got old enough, you moved me to England to ensure that I wouldn’t run into her.”
“You have to—.” Dad started.
I stood in days-old clothes that could have probably stood on their own if I stepped out of them. “I don’t have to do anything.”
He got to his feet and pulled something out of his pocket. “These are the annulment papers I had drafted up. We managed to silence the reporter, but it’s only a matter of time.”
“I’m not signing that.” I glared at his hands like they were covered in the Black Death.
“I’ve talked to her mother. She says Caroline’s willing to sign.”
I was caught off-guard by the knowledge they’d had that conversation with her family, while I still hadn’t heard from her. I snapped, “Don’t call her that.” But I was angrier with Reagan that she’d agreed to something without even talking to me.
“What about the baby?” I asked a moment later, my voice barely a whisper.
“She’ll do the right thing,” Dad announced.
“Right for who?” I asked. “This isn’t about your campaign. What do you think the voters would say if they heard you suggesting Reagan end a life? Should we take a poll?” There might as well have been a fork in my tongue, with the amount of venom I spewed out with my words.
“You can’t possibly continue this relationship. It’s preposterous.” He chuffed like that was the end of it.
A hardy chuckle left my lips. “If you’d never been here to tell me she was my sister, then what? We would have gone on with our lives blissfully ignorant. You caused this and I can’t stop loving her just because you were forced to come clean. You need to leave my house.”
“This is my—”
“Tate,” Mom snapped. “It’s been his house more than it has ours for a long time. We don’t even come here. It’s his if he wants it. It’s the least you can do.”
Dad, properly chastised, placed the envelope on the table and left out the door. Mom came over and hugged me. When she said she was sorry, and her voice was filled with as much pain as I had, I patted her back before releasing her.
She left only because she understood that I needed time, and I loved her for it. When the door closed behind them, I went for my phone. It was time to stop waiting for Red to call me.
33
Days lingered into night. And nights slowly tumbled into days. I’d almost given up on the idea that Red would return my numerous calls and messages. In fact, I turned away from my liquid diet and drew myself vertical, to reacquaint my limbs with gravity. Yeah, I’d gotten up for the occasional bathroom run, but I finally stepped out into the sunlight, holding a hand against the brightness of the sky marred with intermittent clouds.
The boat was just where I left it, beached on the sand with a layer of rainwater that filled the bottom. I turned it over and watched the liquid rush free to find the rest of its kin at the waterline. I pushed the boat out into the water, getting in as my muscles protested movements they’d forgotten over the last week or so. The calluses flared in my palm as I took the oars in a painful grip.
Rowing had always put things in perspective for me. The tranquil waters offered me time to catalog my thoughts. After a number of times around the lake, I’d come to certain conclusions. One, I still loved Red. Two, I was more than a little angry with her. Three, none of it mattered if she came back to me.
On my next pass by the house, I glanced over my shoulder, my trajectory towards the short pier that jutted out at the end of the path that led to the water. I did a double take before I believed my eyes.
She was all pale and lovely with nothing but her hair and lips in red to give her color. The white dress began to float as she stepped in the water. Her face held the expression of a puppy found by strangers after a jaunt in the woods. She never looked at me. A sick feeling crept up my throat, then I stood and dove in the water just as the boat tipped.
I pushed my way through the water, opening my eyes in the murky depths, searching. My heart thumped in my chest as the worst emotions filled me and dread threatened to take me under. I surfaced within feet of her, gulping in air. Her head rested on the water as if she planned to take a nap.
The day she left, my heart had been frozen, unable to beat without her. The cool water did nothing as heat flooded my senses. I reached for her and she for me.
Glassy eyes framed in blue met mine and I tried to be brave for what she was about to say. It felt as if my life teetered on the edge of an abyss.
“They tried to keep me away from you.” Her voice was a whispered caress on my eardrums. She blinked, letting the tears fall. She took a step closer to me and I dared to toss my doubts about what she felt for me out the window.
“But I couldn’t stay away.”
Rain that had only been a mist while I rowed turned into a steady fall, drenching us. We ignored it as I matched her steps in the shallow water, finding distant strength in my weak limbs. My hand found her cheek to thumb away her tears. They scalded my skin as my heart broke again, this time for her. “Then don’t.”
She moved with fortitude in her eyes. Her hands cupped my face, pulling me to her and I didn’t resist the pull I’d felt since the first day we met. When our lips collided and her mouth parted for me, she felt and tasted the same. Nothing had changed. The taint of revealed secrets had done nothing to tamp down what I felt for her.
“I need you.” Her eager hand was down my pants before I had a chance to agree. She climbed me and wrapped limber legs around my waist. She knew what she wanted as she lined herself up before impaling herself on my shaft. I took us into deeper water to hide what we were doing from potential onlookers.
There wasn’t any hesitation on my part. We’d been together for what felt like a thousand times before and it never got old. I wanted her just the same as I had before.
“I—”
My words were cut off as she placed a finger on my lips. Talking was apparently over. I dug my hands in her hips and rocked up my length. I pistoned my hips in and out of her tight sheath, groaning as I got closer. When her nails dug into my back and her pussy clamped down on my dick, I let loose a strangled cry of my own, emptying myself inside her.
I briefly glanced around to see my boat capsized and drifted near the shoreline. I considered rescuing it, but opted instead to carry Red up the incline with my dick still inside her. My body shielded her bottom and the dress had turned opaque from the water and rain.
Once we made it to my room, I set her down, allowing my semi-hard cock to pull free from her. Our twin expressions showed equal dismay by the loss of contact. We shifted gears as I matched her moves when she began to undress me. The plop of my t-shirt hitting the hardwood floor was only the first of such sounds as we undressed each other, never unlocking eye contact.
She led the way to the bathroom where we tumbled into the shower to stand under a blast of hot water that heated our chilled skin. We became one in the best possible way, my dick defied the need for recovery time, bouncing back to quick stiffness just from her soapy hand on my skin.
I allowed her the time for silence. We communicated to each other through touch and taste. I poured out my heart in long strokes and demanding kisses. There was time for talk later. The need for each other was foremost in our hearts and minds.
The bed hadn’t enticed us to sleep. There we relearned each other slowly. I found a hidden freckle between her parted thighs and spent a long time there making up for not noticing it before. When sleep finally claimed us, we didn’t go willingly. I was certain I went to sleep still inside her.
When the sun rose the next day and laid a warm hand like a stripe across my skin, everywhere else felt cold. Red was gone. In her place was a note, pressed against the indentation in her pillow.
It was short and to the point.
We can’t do this.
I’m sorry
Sadness and disappointment were first up, until anger set in. I bombarded her phone with messages like what the hell, and don’t I deserve a conversation. The last two messages I sent were what happened to for better and for worse, and unconditionally.
After I hit Send, I chided myself for being such a pussy. Why was I fighting for a woman that didn’t fight for me back?
I called Gavin. “Are you up for hanging out?”
“I was wondering when you’d call. I heard about the breakup.” Which meant that he and the blonde were in contact. I didn’t comment on that. The last thing I wanted was to talk about relationships.
“Are you going to head up here or what?”
“If you called me yesterday, I might have. But I’ve got something going. How about next week?”
“Sure.” I felt dejected. Gavin was it as far as a real friend on this side of the pond, but I could go to England and spend the summer there. I did have old friends from school, though I’d barely kept in contact with them.
I tossed the idea until I could hear from Red. There was at least one important question I needed an answer to before I headed anywhere.
34
The soft knock could barely be heard over the sports reporters on the screen. I stood and stretched, not really thinking about who was at my door until I got there. Could it be her? She hadn’t called since my deluge of messages a couple of days ago.
She stood hugging herself, as if it were winter, not the humid air of summer. I stepped back and allowed her entrance, keeping rein on my need to touch her.
Her hair was pulled back and away from her face. Her mouth was missing the red paint I loved her lips to be colored in. She strolled into the living room, and sat curled up cat like in the chair my father had sat in several days before. Her legs were pressed firmly to her chest as if she wanted to be as small as possible. She rested her chin on her knees and waited.
I paused before sitting, unsure of what to do or say next. What would be the right approach so that she wouldn’t go running?
The sound the cushion made as I dropped into its center couldn’t have been louder than an exhale of breath, yet it was like thunder in the heavy silence of the room.
We played the staring game until she said, “You wanted me here. I’m here. Now speak.”
Her petulant tone almost had me hurl out an ugly epithet. Instead, I said simply, “I love you.”
“I’m your sister.”
Without a pause, I said, “You’re my wife, and besides, nothing changes the fact that you are the love of my life.”
Her eyes looked as desolated as mine felt. “I’m the bane of your existence.”
“Never,” I nearly shouted.
She blinked rapidly as I sat forward with my forearms on my knees, glaring at her.
“Tade, you have to stop. This will never work.”
“Why? You stopped loving me?”
“Of course not. But don’t you see how pointless this is? What we have goes against nature.” She sounded like my Dad, and that didn’t sit well with me.
“Do you really believe that crap? Who is feeding you lines? It never felt wrong to me before or after the revelation about my father’s sins. We are innocent in this.”
“Yes, we were innocent. But what we did the other day after learning the knowledge belongs solely on our shoulders.”
“I meant my vows about better and worse. And I remain true to my words about loving you unconditionally. I’d rather spend an eternity in hell for loving you than to end up in heaven without you.”
She sucked in a breath and I knew I had her. “Tade—”
Whatever she was about to say wouldn’t get us anywhere, so I interrupted her. “Did you sign the papers?”
“I…” she stammered, unable to meet my gaze. “They told me your father drew up the papers and you were prepared to sign.”
“See, they’re manipulating us. They told me the same thing.”
“It’s probably for the best.”
“Why are you letting them get to you? If you haven’t signed, that means you don’t want to.” I pointed to her finger. “And you’re still wearing my ring.” I held up my hand to show her mine.
I pressed forward. “Maybe we should feel differently about knowing that we share some DNA. But I don’t feel any different. I still see the woman I fell in love with.”
I had another important question to ask. “Our baby.”
It may have been phrased as just two words but when she stared at me shock-faced, I knew she’d gotten my meaning.
“I would never,” she said, with more force than she’d spoken anything since she’d arrived.
“Dad seemed to think you’d be on board.”
Her jaw was tensed. She gritted out, “Your father doesn’t know me.”
I couldn’t have been more pleased that she distanced herself from her sperm donor. He didn’t deserve her recognition, nor mine at that. But conditional responses had been ingrained in me. It would be hard not to call the man Dad after so many years.
“But I do, because I never once thought you’d do such a thing. He’s wrong, you know.”
“About what?”
“He thinks there might be something wrong with the baby.” He hadn’t said it in so many words but I knew how he thought. “I’ve done a lot of research and siblings sharing partial DNA have a low rate of parenting children with birth defects.”
“Siblings….”
Her horrified expression wasn’t unwarranted. “It happens more than you think. In fact, years ago, royal bloodlines often married siblings and half siblings on purpose. Keep it in the family, I guess. But that’s not us, Biscuit. We didn’t even do this on purpose. We didn’t choose to fall in love knowing what we know now.”
“I know but—.”
“But what? You’ve admitted that you still have feelings for me, and I would guess they aren’t the brotherly kind.”
“Tade, you’re not making this easy.”
“Of course I’m not. I’m IN. LOVE. WITH. YOU. And you can’t wish it away.”
She sprang to her feet finally finding fight within her. “The only thing I wish away was this knowledge that we share a biological father.”
“Then forget you ever heard it. I have. If my father wasn’t around to spoil things, we would have been blissfully ignorant. And ignorance is bliss.”
“I can’t, Tade. I love you, but I can’t.”
She moved to the door and I hopped to my feet and raced after her. She had the door partially opened when I closed it and caged her in. I nuzzled her neck and felt her tremble beneath my touch.
“You have to stop because I’m powerless against you.” When I kissed her ear, she said, “This is wrong.”
I sang in her ear, “If this is wrong, I don’t want to be right.”
“Please let me go,” she begged.
“Tell me to stop. Prove to me you’re not as wet as I am hard.” I ground my length against her ass. When she didn’t speak, just angled herself to give me more access, I crept my finger up under one leg of her shorts. I quickly found her center and dipped my finger under the lace of her panties and into the slick creamy heaven that said she was just as turned on as I was.
I didn’t waste time with words. She knew she could stop this with one poignant word. I kissed her shoulder as I unsnapped her jean shorts. They fell to the ground without help. I yanked at the lace and tore it off her freeing my cock in the process. I thrust into her without a single complaint. I fucked her hard against the door. Her cries of pleasure were my trophies for a job well done. We exploded in combined orgasms, having chased our passion all the way to the floor. I lay on top of her as we sprawled in the entry way. I pressed soft kisses to her nape before I rolled off of her, panting, trying to catch my breath.
She reached for her shorts and put them on, scrambling to her feet in the process.
“That can’t happen again. Yo
u need to move on. Find someone else to love. I want you to be happy.”
And before I could stop her, she was out the front door and in her car. I watched her ride off in a white convertible BMW in a blaze of fire and ice. Her hair flamed behind her from the wind of her retreat. I leaned against the doorway, wondering if this was really it for us.
35
It may not have seemed like it, but I did have pride. When I texted her again, it was business-like. I simply asked to be at her doctor’s visits. It was my kid too. I had a right to know what was going on. Her reply informed me that her mother would let me know when her appointments were.
I received my first text from an unknown caller the following week. I was given an hour’s notice of the appointment time, and barely made it there before her appointment was over.
My hands were fists and my jaw was clenched as I watched the young male doctor between my wife’s legs. It didn’t matter he was there for clinical reasons. His professionalism had better remain intact or I would be up for murder charges. Apparently, he felt the waves of my displeasure because he kept tossing fear-filled glances my way. That was a good thing, because even if he would be called cute by some women, he was of slight build and I could easy take him down.
The frown I sported reversed when we listened to the heartbeat of our child. It was strong in rhythm and beat to its own drum. After the doctor left, having spewed out information I’d already researched, I got shocked when Red’s mother asked me to leave the room so her daughter could get dressed.
I wanted to protest, but Red’s eyes pleaded with me not to. As I wanted to continue to come to these visits, I dropped what I brought on her pile of clothes for them to see. It was part of the reason I almost didn’t make it. But it was worth it when I spied Red’s tears, having caught sight of the single water lily I’d left her just before I closed the door.
In the waiting room, I paced, needing to talk to her again. I’d given her space and clearly us being apart was hurting us both. After twenty minutes, I asked the nurse where my wife was. She and the other staff up front traded glances, before she said, “She left a while ago.”