by Christa Wick
Then came phase two of Shayna's attack -- Michael Strake confessed.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Working on the scarlet gown from her Fatshion folder that Declan had drooled over, Melanie glanced at her vibrating phone to find that her mother was calling. The satisfied smile from doing something she loved flatlined, her involuntary response followed by an immediate flood of guilt.
There was no denying their relationship had grown exponentially closer in the last two weeks, her mother finally discovering a more emotive side of herself that existed outside of the feelings that she experienced in the books she read. But Melanie couldn't quell the anxiety every time she saw her mother's number flash on her phone's screen.
Bracing herself, she took the call.
"Hi, mom."
"Sweetheart," Nancy began, her voice already infected with the warble Melanie only associated with the rare bat in the Colorado house. "Are you okay?"
Nancy wasn't screaming in between her words, so it wasn't her phobia triggering the thin warble. Had Roger proved himself a scoundrel somehow? Was he hurt?
A hollow burn pierced Melanie's chest as she remembered the distracted voice in which her mother had delivered the bad news about George Archer's death.
"I'm fine, mom," she answered after too long a pause. "You're upset, please tell me why."
It was better just asking Nancy outright than guessing at the mystery that was her mother's mind.
The warble grew thinner as Nancy tried to answer. "I know you told us to turn off those alerts."
Melanie's cheeks flash cold as the blood drained from her face. Had the world turned its fickle heart in another direction already?
"But the news had been good, like those lovely dresses. I wish you'd shown me those before."
Certain her mom never would have done more than glance at the pictures in the past, Melanie tried to keep Nancy focused on the reason for her call.
"Mom, if you can't ignore the nasty comments, you need to turn the alerts off again, okay?"
An icy tickle at the back of Melanie's neck told her the problem wasn't that simple. Her mother sounded like she was on the verge of tears -- tears she was apparently ready to cry on her daughter's behalf.
"Roger doesn't think it's true." Nancy continued with her half finished thoughts.
Roger didn't think what was true? He didn't think that Melanie was a rolling lump of lard who wasn't even fit enough to grease Declan's dick before he stuck it into some runway waif as CZ's Corbin Dash had suggested?
"There's so much floating around out there and I'm not looking at it," Melanie patiently explained as her cheeks started to heat, anger at all the comments she'd been trying to ignore forcing blood to the surface of her skin. "So I don't know what you're talking about. What's not true?"
"I don't know, sweetheart...are you okay?"
Putting the phone down for a second, Melanie covered her face and blew into her hands, the warm air relaxing muscles that had grown tense. Picking the phone back up, she forced a smile to her face and hoped it softened her voice.
"Just tell me what you read, mom."
"An article on that awful Celebrity Zone website."
Melanie sighed. Of all the warnings she had given her mother, staying away from that digital rag mag had been the one she had repeated most often.
"He said he attacked you -- sexually."
A wave of dizziness slammed into Melanie. Her grip tightened on the phone a microsecond before it would have slipped out of her hand.
"I assure you," she growled at the accusation. "Declan has done no such thing."
"Strake," her mother corrected.
Melanie heard what sounded like mouse clicks and then her mother repeated the name of the executive. "Michael Strake. He said Declan...well, he claims that Declan arranged the whole thing to get you into bed."
Melanie's nose began to sting, her eyes blinking rapidly in response. Switching the phone to her left hand, she woke her tablet and opened its browser. As soon as she put a "c" in the URL field, the software filled in the website address for the tabloid.
She tapped the address and was immediately punished with a headline that ran all the way across the top of the screen and felt like a knife sinking into her gut.
STRAKE ADMITS TO DECLAN BAIN'S SEX ASSAULT SCHEME
Bile filled her mouth and she choked it down. There was no way she could click the link and read it while her mother was still on the phone.
"Are you okay, sweetheart?"
She wasn't. Her stomach churned with acid and the light breakfast Declan had prepared them of salmon and melon. She felt dizzy and wanted nothing more than to slide off her chair, onto the floor and spill her guts all over the expensive white tile.
"Michael Strake is a psychopath," she answered evasively. "He is pissed off at Declan, who rescued me from Strake getting too handsy."
Her cheeks heated at the ridiculous word, a word that tried to make it less than what it was. She wasn't sure why she was trying to lessen the reality of the attack.
For her mother's benefit or her own?
She sucked a raw breath in, her control of her emotions tenuous. She needed to get her mother off the phone before the facade of being okay slipped completely.
"Mom, please stay off these sites. If something happens, I'll tell you--"
"You didn't tell me about this," Nancy softly accused.
Another raw breath, this one more ragged, preceded Melanie's answer. "It was complicated."
"I see." Nancy paused, a belabored, motherly sigh escaping her before she abruptly switched the subject. "I sold the house. I wanted to make sure you haven't changed bank accounts before I transfer your share of the proceeds."
"You don't need--"
Nancy cut her off. "Don't make me send two hundred thousand dollars to the wrong account, Melanie Lee. Getting it back would be...complicated."
Ouch.
Melanie smiled. Arguing with a woman who read as much as her mother did was like facing off against a trial attorney or interrogator. It was rare that Nancy pulled her head out of one of her beloved books, but when she did, she definitely was a force to be reckoned with.
"The account is the same," Melanie relented. "But that has to be more than half, mom. I can check the listing record online, just in case you were thinking of fibbing."
"It is a little bit more, but I don't need half."
The urge to argue evaporated. Melanie would accept the money, but would not touch her mother's portion.
"Fine," she caved. "Thank you. And, please, don't worry about me."
Nancy was slow to respond. When she did, it wasn't with assurances that her mind was at peace after their talk. Quite the opposite.
"Roger's offer still stands," she said. "He's very well connected in London, including fashion. You could have a new life there, sweetheart."
"I want a new life here," Melanie confessed, her voice turning wet and embarrassing her. "Whatever you've read to the contrary, Declan is amazing. Almost too perfect."
Fear flashed through her as the words rolled off her tongue. What had her father always said? If something seemed too good to be true, it was false. Melanie chewed at her lips and hoped her mother didn't throw George Archer's wisdom in her face.
"I'd say he gets that from his father, but they are strangers to one another. Something in the DNA perhaps."
"Perhaps," Melanie agreed, finally clicking the headline's link as she sensed the conversation dying down. "I'm going to go now, try to get a handle on this nonsense. I love you."
Another long pause from Nancy, her voice teary when she replied. "I love you, too, Melalee. Don't forget London."
"I won't. Love you," she repeated then hung up.
Taking a few seconds before trying to read the ridiculous article, she let the emotion she had restrained during the call leak out, her shoulders lightly trembling as she tried to bring it all back under control. Finally, with no tissues in the room, she cut a piece of
fusible interfacing and blew her nose then wiped the last of the wetness from her cheeks with the stiff material.
Picking up the tablet, she began to read, the muscles of her stomach and chest tightening with each outrageous claim. There, in pixelated print, Michael Strake admitted to attacking her at the production studio. Only he claimed Declan threatened to back out of the film if he didn't. He also said Declan promised he'd make sure Melanie didn't press any charges or speak to anyone about the attack.
There were pictures, too. Not of the assault but of Strake's face after Declan had roughed him up. Strake claimed that he had agreed to the first punch so Declan could look like a hero, but something snapped in the actor and Strake had feared for his life.
Melanie's stomach curled at the images. Three large, bluish black bruises dotted his ribcage. His left eye was a thin slit away from being swollen shut, the skin a mottled mix of purples and blues and greens. His lips looked like fat sausages upon which some medical student had practiced his sutures. When Strake pulled back the lip, two teeth were chipped.
The last assault on Melanie's senses was an audio recording, Strake supposedly having the presence of mind to switch on his phone recorder once the conversation setting up the attack turned to Declan threatening Strake.
She pressed play, turning the volume down low and holding the tablet's speaker close to her ear.
No doubt it was Declan's voice, but something felt off about the cadence. Hell, something was off about the accent. Around the house and on the set when the cameras weren't rolling, Declan lapsed into his South Boston roots. Here, his tone was crisp.
I want her in my bed...and you're going to help me.
The deal's off if you don't.
Strake objected that Declan pulling out of the movie would bankrupt the production company. Melanie's ears strained. Was there an audible shift in background noise just before he spoke? Raising the volume slightly, she backed the audio up a little and pressed play again, uncertain if she was hearing any change in the transition from Declan to Strake and back to Declan.
I don't care what happens to you, or her. Do this or I'll ruin you.
Shift, no shift, filter effects? She couldn't tell. She wanted more than anything for this to be a lie. Declan would have to be a sociopath to have arranged this.
Her heart squeezed around its core at the prospect. She shook her head. Declan wasn't cruel. Strake wasn't anyone's victim. This was all a lie and she wasn't a fool for disbelieving the audio.
Leaving her tablet behind, she left the sewing room in a daze, her ample hip bumping against the stack of bins that held the room's prior contents. She wandered the first floor, looking for him, but not sure what she should say when she found him.
Looking in the kitchen as the last room of her canvassing the first floor, she found him standing, another express envelope and a single sheet of paper dangling in his hand. She took the paper and envelope from him. A single paragraph informed him that any and all offers regarding the proposed film with the famously plump comedienne had been tentative, with no consideration offered or received. The discussions were null and void and Declan should make no attempt to contact her or her representatives -- ever.
The letter was signed, not by the comedienne, but her attorney.
"What do you think happened?" he asked, his Southie accent particularly thick as he stared at Melanie with a stunned gaze.
She knew he had only been politely considering the project, but the abrupt nature of the withdrawal was like a sharp slap to the face.
"Strake gave an exclusive interview to Celebrity Zone." She mashed her lips together for a few seconds as she parsed through what she wanted to say, and how. "It's a revenge piece, pure and simple."
Dipping into the pocket of his running pants, Declan pulled out his phone, called up his browser and tapped through to the website. The banner headline in the mobile view streamed across the device's screen. He scanned the page, reading with the speed of a lead actor who was used to getting dozens of pitches a week, then tapped at the link for the audio.
The lightly tanned skin grew pale for a second then red hot as anger fanned across his cheeks. He stopped the playback halfway through Strake's phony protests.
"That's edited from screen reads for his piece of shit movie before I forced line changes. I still have the old script. I can show you."
She shook her head, perhaps a little too quickly. "Strake's a psycho. I don't need or want you to prove that he's lying. I believe you."
His expression turned stubborn. "I don't want there to ever be any doubt between us, Mel."
Taking the phone from him, she placed it on the counter and captured his hands. Drawing their bodies closer, she repeated her faith in him, her voice breaking as she spoke.
"I believe you. And if you do something to prove it to me, there will be doubt. You will doubt that I can trust you fully."
Freeing his hands, Declan cupped her face.
"I love you, Mel."
Chapter Thirty-Four
I love you, Mel.
Her heart seized at his words and the soft sparkle of truth in his eyes. Her mouth pinched forward, the proclamation almost painful to hear. He hadn't said it before. Neither had she. She blinked, felt her own gaze turn sparkly. Her mouth collapsed and her body with it. She threw her arms around his neck before her legs could betray her.
Declan held her, let her sob for a ridiculously long time against his chest without prodding her for the cause. He just soothed her, his hands rubbing calming patterns against her back and along the drape of her hair down her neck and shoulder.
When she finally looked up, she saw the pain her little breakdown had caused him.
"It's okay, Mel," he said, his voice barely audible. "You don't have to respond. I mean it, but I picked the wrong time to say it."
"I mean it, too," she whispered before burying her face against his chest once more. She couldn't stand to think she was hurting him.
Another sob tore its way up her throat.
Declan squeezed her to him, his lips pressing hard against the top of her head. "Did you just say you love me, too?"
His throat had as tight a hold on the words as his arms had around her body. They scratched and grated their way out, their sound stretched so thin that it almost evaporated upon hitting the air.
Forcing a little distance between them, she bobbed her head.
"I love you," she said, her smile offside and trembling. "I wish I'd said it sooner. I wish I had trusted myself enough to trust that you wouldn't pull away when I told you."
His hands cupped her face, and then his lips moved against hers in reply. Slowly, he teased her mouth open, his tongue slipping inside to caress the line of her teeth before stroking deeper.
For almost an hour -- since that moment her mother's name had flashed on the screen of her phone -- tension had been wringing its way through Melanie's body, twisting her muscles, making her ache. She couldn't defend herself against the kiss, didn't want to.
She melted against him, her body no longer capable of supporting itself, not when he was kissing her like that. Sensing her approaching collapse, Declan scooped her up and carried her out of the kitchen.
They didn't make it out of the formal dining room with its long table and dozen plus chairs. Kicking the end chair out of the way, he sat Melanie on the table. His hands dipped under her blouse but he didn't pull it off, not yet.
His mouth fastened on her neck as she wrapped her legs around his lean hips. Sweet mercy, her blood felt like it was on fire, like it would burn its way through her flesh. Her hips thrust upward, goading him into squeezing her closer to the thick erection bulging at the front of his running pants.
Biting at her bottom lip, she maneuvered her hands between them, her fingers plucking at the waistband of his pants to free the fat crown of his cock. It was a dining room, and she wanted to feast right there, to push him away long enough to get on her knees on the marble flooring and suck him until he h
ad climaxed so many times he was squeezed dry.
Growling, he grabbed her hands and forced them behind her back.
"Behave, Mel."
Still biting her lip, she shook her head, her brows dancing upward with a mischievous need.
Faster than she could counter his movements, he stripped her blouse off and quickly turned it into a makeshift binding for her hands so that they remained behind her and tied together. Leaving her bra on, he stripped her pants and underwear off next, then the compression shirt that hugged at his muscles and the hard points of his nipples.
She wanted to suck those, too, her mouth puckering with the need to do so. Her pussy rebelled, twisting and squeezing so that a fresh pulse of cream left her, slicking her thighs and the surface of the table.
Declan pushed her legs apart and groaned to find her so wet. He hurriedly pushed his pants down his hips, just far enough to free his cock and cum-heavy balls. Wrapping his hands around her bottom, he jerked her toward the edge at the same time he speared into her aching pussy.
Melanie shuddered, the first wave of a climax trembling through her. Declan found her neck again as he thrust a second time. He bit lightly, then sucked hard, his pace furious.
"I'm going to fuck this sweet pussy into a coma, baby."
A giggle-moan slid up her throat as her insides curled around the invading cock. He was so thick, stretched her so wide she felt at times like she would tear. But as thick as he was, she was equally wet, her pussy creaming harder with each thrust he delivered.
She groaned, teeth gnashing and her head thrashing as the bulk of her orgasm seized the rest of her body, forcing her muscles to tighten and strain closer to her lover. She shook, cried out, cresting in her release.
"More," she begged, her insides knotting around his cock as the rest of her spasmed with release.
"Fuck, Mel..." Declan grabbed the sides of her head, hands threatening to crush her skull as his mouth slammed against hers, devouring her lips as his thrusting grew merciless.