“The last day of school before Christmas break, I opened the door to walk to the bus stop, and there was a package on the front step. A huge silver-foiled box with a big red bow. I’d never seen anything like it before. Inside, we found the most gorgeous down coat, the same color green as my eyes. I’d never seen a prettier coat in my life. Mama cried she was so happy.”
“Wow. And you never learned who sent it to you?”
“Nope. There was a card addressed to me, but it said ‘from a friend’ and only signed with the letter D. The coat was a little big, but a good fit otherwise, so it had to be someone who knew me. The next Christmas we’d moved to Nashville, so I really didn’t need it. I kept it and used it as a pillow on my bed until it fell apart.”
She lay back on the pillows, enjoying the way he curled against her. Staring up at the pretty lights dangling from the bed, she blinked back tears. “I worked overtime to save the money for the bus fare, and then tracked my father down based on his tour schedule. Thank God for Google. I had to throw a scene at the show, threatening to go out front and find the first journalist and tell them the whole sordid truth. But in his mind, that only confirmed the real reason I’d come to find him. When he saw me, he recognized me. Or at least my mother. People always said I looked like her. But he shrugged me off and told his manager to give me some money and send me on my way. His manager wrote me a check for ten thousand dollars. I tore it up and threw it in his face. I never tried to see him again.”
“What’s his name?”
“Johnny Dalton.”
“Shit. Even I’ve heard of him and I hate country music.” Harvey grinned sheepishly. “Oops, sorry.”
She laughed and combed her fingers through his hair. “Hardly. I hate country music too.”
They lay together in companionable silence, full and sated. He’d endured punishment, satisfying her sadist side. He’d given her more than enough pleasure. Then he’d fed her too. Lying here with him, she didn’t want to think about tomorrow or the day after. She could easily make love to him again, a slow, gentle ride this time. But then she’d want to stare into his eyes and stroke his face, and it was too intimate. Too real. With the secrets lying between them.
“Can we stay here, in this moment?” he whispered against her thigh. “Forever?”
“Are you going to give up trying to win your company back from your aunt?”
He pressed his forehead against her thigh. “You know I can’t.”
“And I still have to tell you why I’m really here.”
He crawled up so he could seal his mouth over hers. He froze a moment, his eyes flaring wide with surprise, wondering what she might do to punish him for taking such liberties. She gripped his hair harder and held him close, taking possession of his mouth. She kissed him until he had to pull away, gasping for breath.
“Tomorrow,” he gasped. “I don’t want anything to spoil this.”
She rolled over onto her back and tucked his face up against her neck. He nuzzled in and relaxed against her. “Is your mind at peace still?”
“Yes. Completely.”
“Good. Then go to sleep.” Tomorrow will come soon enough.
“Kelsey?”
“Hmmm?”
Her eyes were already heavy, and his voice slurred. “Thank you.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Sunlight streamed in through the window, forcing Harvey to wake up much earlier than he’d like. He dragged a pillow over his head and reached for Kelsey, but she was already up.
Another excellent night of sleep. Well, normal people wouldn’t call a mere five or six hours of sleep a great night, but for him, it was a downright miracle. A few more nights like this, and he might be almost back to a normal schedule.
Normal. He couldn’t really remember what that felt like.
Last night would be etched in his memory forever. The shock and reluctant arousal as she’d described what she was going to do. Then his undeniable response. The raw, volatile emotion she’d stirred in him. She’d broken him down to tears, and then built him back up brick by brick into something he could almost recognize as himself again. How could he ever repay that? Thank you, Mistress would never express how grateful he was.
How much he’d needed her and hadn’t even known it. Suddenly the groveling worship on his knees made complete sense.
He couldn’t go back. He refused to go back. He’d never be that lonely and hopeless again.
I’ll win back the company, and then I’ll take her and Maxwell on a trip. I’ll buy a new yacht and we’ll sail to the Caribbean. She won’t have to cam any longer. I’ll buy her that bar she planned to open. Maxwell can retire and play Grandpa if we ever have any kids.
God. Look at me. Thinking and planning for a future.
He dragged his head up and blearily looked around the room. The bathroom door was shut and he heard the shower running. He slid his legs off the side of the bed and sat up, groaning at the pain in his butt. Sitting in his office chair was going to be quite the chore today. So why did he have such a stupid smile on his face?
Shaking his head, he pushed up to his feet and started gathering up his clothes. Maxwell would keel over dead if he saw that Harvey had taken a shower two days in a row. If he was quick, he might even beat Kelsey out of the shower, and he could be back here clean and fresh in her bed. Maybe she’d crawl back into bed and dirty him up again.
A folded-up piece of paper caught his eye. It looked like a check, with a corner tucked up beneath the lamp to keep it from falling off. A check? He cast a furtive glance at the bathroom door, but the shower was still running. He lifted up the corner of the check to see who’d signed it.
Gordon Maxwell.
Stunned, Harvey pulled the check out and unfolded it. He dropped the clothes he’d gathered up and sat down hard on the bed despite his sore backside. Why would Maxwell write Kelsey a check? For fifty thousand dollars?
If she’d been going through hard times like he’d said, Harvey could see giving her some money, even if she wasn’t his niece. But that much money? Dated yesterday.
His stomach churned and bile burned his throat. A payoff. Maxwell had bought and paid for the Mistress’s services.
Don’t jump to conclusions. He clutched the check in his first, rumpling it. Give her a chance to explain.
And hope to God she hadn’t carved and diced his heart like a hunk of meat on Maxwell’s cutting board.
Despite the luxurious bathroom, Kelsey took a record-fast shower. She had to see Gordon. Immediately.
Still towel-drying her hair, she tiptoed back into the bedroom, but drew up short. Harvey sat on the side of the bed, his narrowed eyes locked on her. His face pale, his jaw clenched tight. Nothing like the vulnerable, sexy man she’d taken to bed last night.
Then she saw the crumpled check in his hand.
Her stomach crashed to somewhere in the vicinity of her knees but she fought to keep her face even. “It’s not what you think.”
She braced for an explosion of epic proportions, but he merely replied, “Explain it to me, then.”
At least she’d had the sense to take her clothes into the bathroom, so she didn’t have to explain this naked. She didn’t sit down or try to evade him, but stepped closer, holding his gaze. “I met Gordon on the seventeenth and he hired me.”
Harvey’s eyes fluttered and his pulse thumped so hard she could see the pulse in his throat. “He hired you for what?”
“To see if you might be interested in a Mistress.”
His face twisted in a grimace that made her wince, but he didn’t explode with fury as she expected. Instead, his shoulders slumped and he stared at the check in his hand. His hands trembled. His shoulders shook though he didn’t make a sound.
“He suspected you might be a submissive, but you hadn’t a chance to explore the possibility before the accident.
Maybe having a Mistress could help you get over your grief and start healing again. He made up the whole niece cover story to get me into the house, because he swore you wouldn’t even talk to me any other way. Neither of us expected that…” Her words trailed off because she wasn’t sure what she felt for him. Last night had been wonderful. He’d touched her heart in many ways, and she his, at least she thought she had. But was that enough to say that she loved him? He was too damaged to fall so quickly, and if he did, it wouldn’t be healthy for him, either.
“So he didn’t pay you to have sex with me,” Harvey said in a cold, flat voice.
“No! That was never part of the plan. Harvey, please. I was only supposed to flirt a little as a Mistress. Teach you a few things. Give you the courage to seek out a permanent Mistress on your own.”
“And last night was…?” He jerked his gaze up to hers and she recoiled. He wasn’t angry. His lip curled in disgust. Like he’d never seen anything more repugnant in his entire life. “What? A bonus? A mistake? A fling? A freebie for the poor, damaged rich boy?”
“No,” she breathed shakily. “It wasn’t like that at all.”
He rose slowly, his face darkening. Fists clenched at his side, he strode close so he could glare down into her face. “You really are good. I hoped for another night, but with rates like that, unfortunately, at this moment I’m a little tight on cash, so I guess I’ll have to wait.”
She couldn’t breathe. Her throat closed off and her words came out choked. “I was going to give it back to him. Today.”
“Sure you were.” Harvey whirled and strode toward the door without looking back. “And I was going to ask you to quit camming and sail with me. It’s pretty obvious which one of us is a fool.”
She mustered all her power and control to harden her voice with command. “Harvey. Wait.”
He paused at the door but didn’t turn around. “Yes, Mistress?”
She didn’t have to see his face. The ugly sneer echoed in his tone. “Did I give you what you needed the most?”
“Yes. You’re very good at your job. Now get the hell out of my house.”
“Harvey—”
“Keep the check.” He opened the door and stepped out without turning back. “Once I get the company back, I’ll send you twice as much for services rendered above and beyond the call of duty.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Every bone in his body insisted on going to the kitchen. To Maxwell. It’d always been his safe place, and Maxwell had always been his protector, counselor and confidante.
Now he was the last person who loved him—who’d also stabbed him in the back. No, the heart. A direct hit.
So Harvey retreated to his other safe place: his father’s study. He locked the door and cracked the blinds enough so that he could see the front walkway. He sat in the leather-backed chair, winced, and got up to find a pillow. Better. Now he stared unseeing out at the winter white landscape.
Waiting to see the back of Kelsey Marley.
Someone knocked on the door. “Go away.”
“Harvey,” Maxwell said. “Has something happened?”
“Yes.”
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
Pain laced the old man’s voice, but Harvey couldn’t be moved. Not this time. “Let’s just say your whore earned her money real well last night.”
“Kelsey? How dare you call her that!”
“So you didn’t pay fifty thousand dollars to your niece?”
Several long moments passed before Maxwell responded. “She told you?”
“Only that she wasn’t your niece. Then I found the check you gave her—after I woke up in her bed this morning. I promised her another hundred grand once the company’s mine again.”
“You slept with her?”
“Isn’t that what you intended? Oh wait, she told me you only wanted her to try me out, see if I was submissive. Like Dad. Like you, right?”
Maxwell wheezed on the other side, coughing so hard and so long that Harvey almost opened the door. Almost.
“Can we all sit down and talk this through?” Maxwell finally managed to speak, though his voice sounded like sandpaper. “I’m sure—”
“I’m not leaving this room until she’s out of my house.”
“Harvey—”
“No!” he roared, pounding his fists on the sleek cherry top of his father’s desk. “You stabbed me in the back! The only person—” His voice broke and he forced the sob to sound something closer to laughter. “I was going to tell you this after the Christmas party, but I want you gone too.”
Silence hung between them. He’d thought Maxwell would protest, deny, beg, something. Instead, he finally whispered, “As you wish, Master Caine. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go see Miss Marley out.”
Harvey deliberately ground his buttocks against the chair seat, but the pain did nothing to minimize the ache in his heart. He’d get Caine Enterprises back, and he’d planned on retiring Maxwell anyway. Nothing had changed. Not really.
Turning back to the window, he waited until he heard the door open and shut. Low voices that he couldn’t understand. Then Kelsey walked toward the street. Idiot. Why didn’t Maxwell at least send a car for her? Call a taxi? Instead, she turned and walked up the sidewalk, dressed in a shabby old wool coat that looked like it’d served a lifetime as Maxwell’s kitchen rag.
Harvey closed his eyes, remembering her Christmas coat story. Someone had given her the perfect gift and she remembered it always. While he’d kicked her out of probably the nicest house she’d ever seen days before Christmas in a threadbare coat with snow-laden skies threatening to unload on her bare head.
“It doesn’t matter,” he growled out loud, trying to block out the image of her walking away. She doesn’t matter.
But his heart insisted that without her…
Nothing mattered. Not one fucking thing.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Christmas done Marley style.
Kelsey sat on the floor in front of her tiny tree in her equally tiny, crappy apartment. Why have a nice place when she only needed a bed and a microwave? Her only splurge—she’d bought a real spruce instead of fake plastic crap, though it’d been the last one on the lot because it was so scrawny. She used a string of plain white mini-lights, because the thicker old-fashioned ones she preferred would weigh the poor thing down. No ornaments. Only lights and a little silver tinsel. Mama would have liked it.
She brushed a tear away and turned her attention to the gift box. She folded the child’s coat neatly and laid it inside, along with a book, brand-new crayons and a coloring book. She knew firsthand how special a brand-new box of crayons would be to a needy child who was probably trying to make do with last year’s tiny stubs. This was her Christmas tradition, always donating a coat and a few toys to the Angel Ministries or some similar children’s gift service this time of year. She gave, because someone had given to her when she’d needed it most.
Her cell phone rang, sending her heart racing into overdrive. Maybe Harvey had already gotten over his anger. Maybe he wanted to see her again, or at least be willing to hear her out. She checked the number but it wasn’t a Twin Cities area code. In fact, she didn’t recognize the number at all.
Would a telemarketer be calling so close to Christmas? She almost rejected the call, but finally answered it. “Hello?”
“Is this Kelsey Marley?” a man asked.
“Yes,” she said slowly, trying to place the voice. It sounded familiar, but she didn’t know that many people, other than clients. But they wouldn’t know her real name and they certainly wouldn’t have her cell phone number. “Who is this?”
“Johnny Dalton.”
She opened her mouth but it took her a moment to think of a single word to say. “Is this a joke?”
“Nope.” His voice lightened. “I bet you
get calls from country music stars all the time.”
“Sure. Hell, the President of the United States left me a message too. If you’re really Johnny Dalton, why are you calling me?”
“You came to see me about five years ago.”
“Six years, three months and twenty-three days to be exact.”
“Yeah. And I guess I was pretty rude to you. My manager too. He told me you wouldn’t accept the money.”
“I didn’t come see you for money.”
He sighed. “Yeah, I figured that out when you didn’t come back. I really thought it was all a ploy to get a payout. It happens more than you’d expect if you’re not in the business.”
“Or maybe it happens because you sleep around with a new groupie in every town.”
He laughed but it wasn’t a light, happy sound. “I deserve that. Yeah, back in the good ol’ days, I was a hound dog. But even hound dogs grow up eventually.”
“Or at least get too old to get it up without a little pharmaceutical assistance.”
“Ouch. I see you got your mama’s witty tongue.”
“You have no idea.” Suddenly, tears burned her eyes and her chest ached so badly she rubbed her sternum to ease the pain. “What do you want? I have better things to do than listen to your sob story.”
“Well…” He drew it out as only a Southerner could, making a one-syllable word go on for a mile. “I’d like to see you.”
She choked on the laughter bubbling up. It had to be laughter. Not sobs. “Hell no.”
“It’s Christmas.”
White-hot fury blazed in her and she clenched the phone so hard the plastic case cracked. “Since when do you give a fuck about Christmas? You’ve had twenty-seven Christmases you could have spent with me and you couldn’t even be bothered to call. So what gives you the fucking right to call me now?”
“I’m dying.” He said it so matter-of-factly that her anger dissolved and she slumped on her knees. “I have stage four colon cancer. It spread to my liver. I’ve had two surgeries already, and they’re hoping they got most of it, but we’ll have to see. The prognosis is pretty grim. I might have a few years left, if I’m careful and the surgeon is as good as he promised.”
The Billionaire's Christmas Bargain: Billionaires in Bondage, Book 3 Page 17