by Vivian Wood
I yawn again and scoot over on my hospital bed, pulling back the blanket. “You can sleep with me.”
Kaia’s eyebrows leap up. She licks her lips and casts a hasty glance at Lucas. “Calum, I want you to get some real rest.”
I feel my eyelids growing heavy. “Knowing that you’re safe in my arms will help me sleep. Lucas won’t mind. Will you, brother?”
Lucas shrugs, retreating to a chair in the corner. “I have work to do.”
“Come on, don’t make me beg. I just took a bullet for you. Quit being so stubborn.”
Kaia blushes, picking at a thread on her scrubs. “Well, if you insist…”
She climbs in bed beside me. The second I feel her body against mine, I turn so that I’m on my side facing her. She turns too and I pull the blanket over both of us.
I close my eyes, sheltering her body against my own. My shoulder throbs but it seems faraway; someone else’s shoulder, someone else’s pain.
I drift for a long time. When I wake again, the sun has gone down. Kaia still sleeps peacefully beside me. I feel a little guilty knowing that she could have been taken from my arms while I was asleep and I likely wouldn’t have even noticed.
Using my uninjured arm, I reach over and brush a strand of her hair back from her face. God, I really love this woman. Now isn’t the time to tell her… not with my brother here.
But I think I knew when Crispin fired the bullet. My exact thought process wasn’t fear-based.
It was that Kaia was worth being shot over. I knew I loved her.
And I’m going to find a way to tell her, sooner rather than later.
“Are you awake?”
My eyes open. I find Lucas leaning against the wall, his expression unreadable. I grimace, shushing him.
“Shhh, Kaia’s still asleep. I would rather not wake her yet. What’s up?”
His gaze tightens on me. “I’m glad you’re not dead.”
I rub my face, a little taken aback by that. “Me too.”
He tilts his head to the side. “I think we need to talk after you get out of the hospital.”
I yawn. “About how I’m not dead?”
Lucas flushes. “About contingency plans, yes. But more than that. We have never quite finished our conversation about Kaia. Or Anita, for that matter.”
Hearing Anita’s name is like a lash of ice water in my veins. I scowl, dropping my voice even more. “This is not the place or the time, Lucas.”
He sucks in a breath, his expression pinching. “I just almost lost you, Calum. If we leave things unresolved for another week, another month, another year…”
I wince, gently sitting up in bed. My shoulder aches so badly that I grit my teeth, willing the pain to pass. “You have my word. Okay? We will talk about whatever you want.”
“Yeah?” He looks a little surprised.
“I promise.” I move my legs over the side of the bed, looking at all the tubes in my arms. “Do me a favor? Get a nurse. I’ve got to piss and I don’t want to be hooked up to all this fucking plastic while I do it.”
His lips twitch as he pushes himself off the wall. “The nurses already hate you.”
“Seriously. Go quickly.” I flick my fingers at him a few times and Lucas heads out of my room.
His simple request, that we sit down and talk about everything, sticks in my head though. After I’m disconnected from all the IVs and I’ve finally taken the most satisfying piss of my whole life, I turn that thought over as I close my eyes again.
3
“Are you sure about this?”
Calum looks up at me, his expression brooding as he finishes getting dressed. “I make it pretty clear that I was leaving today, beauty. I’ve already had all the doctors and nurses try to talk me out of it. But you? You’re supposed to be on my side, always.”
My lips tip upward in a smile. “Is that right?”
He shoots me a glare as he tugs a loose sweatshirt down over his head. “Yes.”
I cross my arms and lean against the wall. “You are so damn stubborn.”
“That’s awfully rich coming from you.” He stands up, wobbling for half a second before getting his bearings.
I shake my head, but I’m already pushing off the wall. Lunging forward, I grab his uninjured arm and help balance him.
“This would mean way more to me if you could walk without assistance.”
There is a determined look on his face. “If you can resist making any more jokes for the next few hours, I’ll take you to Paris.”
I smile ruefully. “But then who will I make fun of?”
Calum starts walking toward the door to his room, repressing a sigh. I take his elbow, entwining our arms. To my surprise, it seems like he hardly needs me.
We step out into the busy hospital hallway. No one makes eye contact with us. Calum threw an enormous temper tantrum about not having enough pillows in his room last night and apparently it had lasting effects.
I look up at him as he maneuvers along the hallway. His posture is stiff, his expression dead serious. It is obvious that he’s in a great deal of pain.
Another decision that he insisted on making early this morning. No pain medication. Apparently he doesn’t want to feel foggy, whatever that means. The hospital staff were less than thrilled about that one.
“You can lean on me if you need to, you know.”
He smiles coolly but doesn’t look at me. He just stares straight ahead. “My legs work fine. I just have to make it to the limousine.”
We work our way down the hall, moving slowly. Once we hit the big sliding doors of the hospital and the limo comes into view, I swear he looks relieved.
“Almost there,” I coax Calum quietly.
His disgruntled look is more than enough for me.
Our driver opens the door and Calum jams himself into the car, sagging the second he’s in. “Ow. Fuck. God, why does everything hurt?”
“Because you eschewed those little white pills that the doctors were begging for you to just take?” I answer.
He glares at me but doesn’t retort. What would he say? I just told him the truth.
I run around to the other side of the car, climbing in. The driver shuts the doors, sealing us in. Smiling a little, I scrunch my nose up at Calum.
“You’re just an elevator ride away from a buttery soft couch.”
He looks at me, his expression unreadable. A few seconds go by. “Thank you for putting up with me. Even Lucas walked out after I got a little tetchy last night.”
A laugh bubbles to my lips. “Yeah. You were in fine form yesterday. But… you know. You did literally get shot by my… well, to call him my admirer doesn’t quite seem right.”
One side of his mouth lifts in a faint smirk. “Are you just being nice to me because I took a bullet for you? I mean, I’ll take what I can get—“
I cut him off. My heart pounds. “Stop talking. I may be a fool for saying it… but I love you. Even more than I did before, if that’s possible.”
He grabs my hand and gives my fingers a tight squeeze. “I would do it again in a heartbeat. A thousand times, a thousand bullets.” He sucks in a quick pull of breath. “I love you, Kaia.”
My heart slams against the wall of my chest. I lean in and kiss him hard. Then I pull back, looking into his eyes. “Say it again,” I whisper.
“I love you, beauty,” he says. “I didn’t think I could fall in love. I thought I was too broken. I felt like a stone on the beach. Unchanging, unmoving, destined for the water to wash over me again and again. And yet, somehow, you shifted something essential in me. You’re so young and talented and bright… and you brought that into the dark cave that was my life. So thank you.”
I’m utterly shocked. Calum isn’t really one for long-winded speeches. Nor is he the type to heap praise on anyone’s head, not even the girl he’s sleeping with regularly.
So for him to come out with his feelings and for them to be so intense… My eyes mist over.
�
��Oh Calum…” I whisper. “You don’t know how much it means to me to hear you say that.”
His mouth twists bitterly. “I know I’m not the easiest person to date. I’m often cold and merciless because I feel like… like people would treat me that way if the situation were reversed.”
“I’m not just anyone. You know that, don’t you?”
He grabs my hand and brings my knuckles up to his mouth for a quick kiss. “I swear I’m learning.” He sucks in a breath, looking me dead in the eyes. “I can feel myself changing, Kaia. Getting softer. Adapting. But there are going to be some growing pains. I feel like I should apologize for all the things that I’m probably going to fuck up in the future. I don’t want to hurt you.”
I lift up on my tiptoes and kiss the corner of his mouth. “Tell me again. I can’t get over hearing you say it.”
“I love you, Kaia Walker.” One corner of his mouth curls up intro a smirk. “I hope you don’t have lofty plans, because I want to anchor you to my side and never let you sail again.”
My lips twist in a moment of sadness. “Yeah? You mean it? You’re not just going to get tired of me?”
He slowly shakes his head. “I don’t think so. I think you’re stuck with me. Hell, I’d get down on one knee and propose to you right here and now if I thought that I could get up again.”
My eyes widen. For several solid seconds, I am dumbstruck. “What?”
Calum glances away. Maybe he just revealed too much and is now rebuking himself. I don’t know for sure, because he’s doing an excellent job of keeping his face blank.
But a muscle does tic in his jaw.
“Isn’t that the dream?” he asks. His voice sounds a little testy.
“Hey.” I give his fingers a tug, When he looks back and me, I smile. “We’re already living the dream. Okay? Every time you say I love you, my heart lifts. I can’t ask for anything more than that.”
He looks away out the window for several seconds. My heart seizes up.
“Did I say something wrong?” I ask, touching his arm.
Calum looks at me, his eyes sparking so blue that for a second, I can’t breathe.
“Move in with me,” he says.
I bring my hand up to my thudding heart. “What?”
The corner of his mouth lifts into a smirk. “Move in with me. I mean, we can bring the stripper pole too, if you want. But I love you. I want to have you around. And I think that moving in together is the real next step for us.”
I blow out a breath and shake my head. “Calum, maybe we should wait until you’ve really thought about it. I mean, I don’t want to move too fast and have one of us end up getting spooked.”
He cocks a brow. “You had better be talking about yourself. Because if you’re talking about me… I’m not scared. And I don’t want to wait. I know my own mind.”
My lips tip up at the corners. I grip his hand, interlacing our fingers. “You always seem so damn certain.”
“Certainty is very easy to come by when you’re worth over a billion dollars.” He shrugs. “Now are you going to make me ask again?”
I lean close, kissing him on the lips with a deliberate slowness. He tastes familiar now, comforting. Who would have thought that I would ever be comforted by Calum’s taste?
When I finally pull away, I smile at him a little ruefully. “I’ll move in with you, if that’s what you want.”
He shifts closer to me, bring his hand up to cup my cheek. I let him kiss me, give him all the control he wants. He slides his fingers into the hair at my nape, tugging my head back and kissing the exposed column of my neck.
I can’t help the fact that I breathe a little harder and faster at the feeling of his lips as they trace my collarbone and the gentle swell of my breasts.
“Calum!” I warn him. “You’re hurt—“
He growls somewhere low in his chest. “So?”
“So… I asked the doctor when you’ll be able to have sex and she told me it will be at least a week.” The last of my sentence comes out breathy because Calum tweaks one of my nipples.
“Come on, beauty,” he grits out. “I need you.”
He manages to lift me halfway onto his lap with one arm. I shift to face him, straddling him.
“You’re impossible.”
He presses me down against his body. He grinds his erection against me. I’m surprised, though I shouldn’t be.
Calum is pretty much always horny.
Sucking in a surprised breath, I find my body responding to his. My breasts tighten, my pussy grows damp, I find it hard to catch my breath.
“Calum,” I whine. “You’re going to bust a stitch and send us back to the hospital.”
He eases back, his eyes sparkling. “What if I promise not to move too much?”
I squint at him. “How about you just relax for two more days… and then we will see?”
His mouth twists. “You’re really going to go by the book?”
I snort. “I would hardly call three days of rest after getting shot being a strict rule follower. Just… please, Calum? Please take this seriously. Then I swear, you can take me from every angle, every single dirty thing you can think of. My body is yours.”
His eyes tighten on my face. He sighs, grinding against me again. “You’re lucky that I love you.”
My lips twitch. I lean forward, pressing my lips to his. “Funny, I was about to say that same damn thing.”
Calum releases my hair and runs his hand down my back, cupping my ass. He buries his face against my neck, his lips shaping lazy kisses against my sensitive flesh. “Do you have any idea how fucking ready I’m going to be in two days?”
I shiver and shake my head. “No. Tell me.”
He chuckles evilly. “Oh, beauty…”
Calum flexes his hips, grinding against me again. His thick cock is right there, ready for me. I just bite my lower lip and try not to groan.
It’s going to be a long two days.
4
I slip out of bed just before dawn, careful to softly kiss Calum on the cheek. Even in his sleep he frowns and looks fierce. I pull up the soft black comforter and scurry out of his bedroom.
Calum may be laid up, but I don’t have such an excuse. Which means today, I have to return to the New York Ballet.
God, I haven’t even been on a run for two days. My body will protest the entire ballet class, I bet.
I shower, get myself dressed, and drag myself and my duffel bag to the NYB building. It’s past dawn when I climb the familiar broad cement steps. A gust of cool wind makes me realize that autumn is not very far off.
I settle my bag on my shoulder as I open the huge glass door. Looking straight up the massive stone stairs, I spot Ella at the very top.
“Hey!” I call to her.
She turns around and looks surprised to see me. “Hey! I wasn’t expecting you for at least another day or two.”
I trot up the stairs, ignoring the twinge of protest of my legs. “I wasn’t shot, so I figured that my presence would be noted.”
She pushes up the sleeves of her huge sweatshirt. “Yeah. Is Calum doing okay?”
I start heading down the hallway toward the dance studios. “He is.” I scrunch up my mouth for a second. “He told me that he loved me.”
Ella flings her hand out, hitting me on the arm with a thwack. “Seriously? He did?”
Smiling a little, I nod. “Yep. And he asked me to move in. I mean, I lived on the same floor before now. But he asked me to like… sleep in his bed and move my stuff in his room.”
Ella gives me an owlish stare. “Whoa. You guys are moving fast. I mean, after fucking around for three months.”
Bobbing my head, I hold open the door to one of the dance studios. Ella exhales loudly as she steps inside.
“That’s insane. I mean, the next thing you know, he’ll be asking you to marry him.”
My cheeks flush as I set my bag down and kick off my shoes. “We have a long way to go. I’m barely nineteen�
�� and we’re still dating on the down low for the moment. Don’t forget, no one at NYB can know about us.”
Ella frowns at me. “Umm…”
I pull off my sweatshirt. “I don’t like the sound of that. Who did you tell?”
“Me?” Her eyebrows rise. She presses a hand to her heart. “I’m the soul of discretion. But you might want to check out the Times. Their arts section is…” She pauses, cocking her head. “I think you should see it before anybody else gets here.”
I shoot her an odd look as I bend down and retrieve my cell phone from my bag. “That’s awfully cryptic.”
Ella stays silent, her brow puckering. She sits down and starts lacing up her pointe shoes.
It only takes a minute for me to find the article that she means. At the top is a photo of the New York Ballet’s stage. Two dancers that I don’t recognize are in full costume, their poses inferring movement.
The title stuns me. Are we doing enough to protect our dancers?
Scanning the article, I notice that my name and Calum’s name do not appear together. However, there are several references to ‘highly wealthy patrons who have morphed into hands-on dance instructors’ and implied that there was a young ingenue being coerced into sex. Emma is quoted as saying that she was dismissed and she thinks that was the reason.
My jaw drops.
The worst part of the article is the interview with Basil, where he tells the story of Honor and the previous instructor. Basil doesn’t conflate Honor’s situation with mine… but he does label both situations as being ‘perplexing’.
“Fucking hell!” I say. I look up at Ella. “Bas knows about Calum and me? I mean, I know we had a couple of close calls, but…”
She shrugs a shoulder. “It definitely seems that way to me. He obviously knows something.”
I shake my head at Ella, who is looking at me quite carefully while she warms up at the barre.
“This… this is like half lies and innuendo.” I shake the phone at her.
She squints and plies. “I figured as much. Although you didn’t tell me that Emma had been fired, so… it was news to me.’