Designing Woman (The Sloan Brothers Book 2)

by Willow, Jo

  Deacon hugged Dorothy again and I could hear they were having a mumbled conversation. The only part that was clear was Dorothy saying, “She’s right, you should go. You need this and I’ll be fine. You’re a flight away if I need you babe. Go.”

  Deacon uncrossed his legs and rose without using his hands. I hate people that can do that. I’d face plant if I ever tried that. He crossed the room and knelt in front of me. He pulled me forward and wrapped his arms around me, then kissed me on the cheek.

  “No one has ever given me anything like this before. I know you’ll take good care of her, so I’m accepting for the both of us. Once the baby comes, I’m reciprocating with a trip to Paris for the two of you. If you don’t like Paris, pick an island. Thank-you Mel’. You’re an angel.”

  I let a tear fall and hugged him hard, whispering “you’re welcome”, and he was. He worked harder than any man I knew and he deserved this. Probably more than Anton. Speaking of which, I heard him mutter from across the room, so I knew everyone else heard it too.

  “Angel? Broken angel maybe.”

  I smiled at Deke and then looked at Anton.

  “I’m not too broken to fly over there and fix it so you’ll still be picking plaster out of your ass on New Year’s day buddy. Go with your brother and behave yourself.”

  He never thanked me, but he didn’t return the gift either.

  I bought Ayla her own serger, because she adored the one at work, but was afraid to touch it because Sean hovered over it. She went crazy. I went a little overboard on Grant and Bree’s gift, but I’d had a banner year and it’s only money. The ten acres adjoining their property had gone on the market. They were worried about who might buy it and what they might put there. Grant had always hoped he could plant wildflowers for the bees, but he couldn’t justify buying it because of the upkeep. The boys had offered to buy it for him, but he hesitated and told them no. I suspected it was out of pride. Whatever. He opened the flat box and it was the deed to the land.

  They both looked up thunderstruck and stared at me with eyes so full of meaning and questions, I was starting to squirm. I blushed and said the first thing that came to mind.

  “Plant your flowers.”

  That’s all it took and it was the perfect thing to say. They clutched one another and tears filled Bree’s eyes. It was hard to watch because they’d come to mean a great deal to me. It’s a rare thing that you’re in the right place at the right time for the perfect opportunity, and you have the money to make a dream come true. I’d managed that for them and it was the best gift I’d been given that day.

  I managed total victory and everyone was thrilled with what I’d given them. Then it was Pierce’s turn. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t waiting for this one. My eyes were dancing and it was all I could do to keep still.

  He read the card and grinned at me. I grinned right back. My grin was for an entirely different reason than his, but he didn’t know that.

  He lifted the lid on his flat box, pulled out an envelope and read the gift voucher. His face turned beet red and he narrowed his eyes at me. I kept grinning and then I winked. He quickly put the voucher back in the envelope, put the envelope in the box and returned the lid. Dorothy asked the question.

  “What did you get?”

  “Nothing. It’s a class.”

  “A class? What kind of class?”

  “It’s a six week course actually and it’s private.”

  I started laughing so hard I couldn’t catch my breath. It diverted the attention from Pierce and he used the opportunity to slink up the stairs to hide his gift. Everyone started questioning me, and I held my hands up in a “stop” gesture.

  “Nope. It’s a private joke between Pierce and I. It’s personal and if he wants you to know, he’ll tell you.”

  Ayla looked at me and furrowed her brow.

  “Is it a gag gift?”

  Picturing him learning how to use a ball gag had me howling all over again and I fell to my side, holding onto my waist. They had to stop guessing or I wouldn’t be able to breathe.

  After witnessing Tony in full Dom mode, I knew our Teddy Bear had a lot to learn. I travel in some interesting circles and asked the right questions. A friend hooked me up with a guy that owned a sex club just outside of the city. It was exclusive and two nights a week they ran a two hour course on the proper and safe ways to practice Domination and Submission. They taught you about planning scenes, how to use toys, and how to develop the relationship you needed to have with your Dom/Sub. They took it seriously and I couldn’t help myself. Pierce was signed up to start in March. He started the week the other two left to play Tarzan in Costa Rica. His reaction had been priceless.

  Here I thought Christmas had been rather depressing, New Year’s Eve was turning out to be intolerable. Austin and I rode home from the farm with Deacon and Dor’, Ayla and Pierce rode home with Anton. Our relationship never improved after the first night. He begrudgingly accepted my gift, probably because Deacon was so excited about it. But I received nothing in return and got a brief, “Thanks” for the trip. It didn’t matter. The gift was given because I knew they’d enjoy it and had always wanted to do it. I expected nothing more than what I got. Where Anton was concerned, I was learning.

  Everyone was invited to the Monkey for New Year’s Eve. Austin was having a private party for family, close friends and his regulars, to thank them for a profitable year. He hired a band and a caterer and it promised to be a fun night. I declined. I knew everyone else would be there and that suited me just fine. I knew where they’d be, so they wouldn’t be dropping in on me. I used my foot as an excuse and cited all the activity over Christmas. I poured it on thick and they all said they understood. What they didn’t understand, was that I wasn’t quite ready yet to see Anton there with his latest conquest. We’d been so close to finally getting our act together and he couldn’t do it. He managed to admit his feelings, but I wasn’t sure if he’d ever be able to act on them. I was beginning to lose faith.

  Let me take a moment here to pontificate on something. Everyone always seems to go on and on about “hope”. I’m here to tell you folks that hope is nothing without faith. You can “hope” that the Cubs will finally win the Pennant, but without “faith” in the team, you might as well be hoping for a time machine for Christmas next year. Never gonna happen. Faith in something or someone goes hand in hand with hope. I use to have “faith” that Anton would come around, and I had “hope” that he’d do it sooner rather than later. I was losing the faith, so the hope didn’t matter.

  I put my nest together on the sofa. Nobody was better at nesting than me. If you ever go through a breakup or a failure of some kind, I’m the friend you want to call. I tossed the duvet off my bed over the upstairs railing, along with 3 pillows. I butt-scooted down the stairs, having figured out almost immediately that THAT was the way to get downstairs quickly. I made up the couch using two pillows on one end and one in the middle to prop my leg on. Then I went to the kitchen. I knew that the take-out places would be swamped tonight, so I’d planned ahead of time. I had deli stuff, chips, dips, ice cream and cheese cake. I had my favorite wine, rum, coffee, and soda. I even had three kinds of beer, because Austin still lived there and would eventually be home. Didn’t want to exclude my roomie.

  I made a sandwich, then carried my food, snacks and two bottles of soda to the coffee table. I arranged the food, drinks and remotes where I could reach them from my little nest on the sofa. The snow was hitting the windows and it felt good to be home. The farm had been nice and it would have been nicer if Anton hadn’t shoved his head up his own ass, but there’s nothing like home.

  I powered up the TV for the festivities and my cell rang. I thought I’d talked to everyone. They shouldn’t be calling me, they should be at Austin’s, drinking him dry and dancing their asses off while I watched the rest of the city go nuts from the comfort of my jammies and sofa.

  “Yo.”

  “Mel’, it’s Austin. Want m
e to come get you?”

  “Nope. I’m good babe. I’m hunkered down on the sofa in my p.j.’s with pillows and a blanket, eating myself stupid and watching TV. Everything okay there?”

  “I wanted to thank-you for your gift. They installed them while I was gone and they’re perfect. How did you hear about them?”

  “Some guy on TV. He does a reality show about saving Bars that are about to go under. He installs them in just about every bar. I thought they were cool and something you could use. Taps that fill pre-measured pints from the bottom that fast have got to be handy. Are they working out alright?”

  “My staff and clientele love them. I love them. We’re serving twice as fast and they keep the beer the perfect temp. It’s way too much Mel’. You didn’t have to do anything this extravagant. You didn’t have to do anything at all.”

  “Yeah Austin, I did. You’ve been good to me. More than that, you’ve been patient. I’m thinking after the holidays are over, we should talk if you’re still interested.”

  “So I take it you’re done beating that dead horse?”

  I knew what he meant and although I didn’t totally agree with his assessment of the situation, he was on the outside looking in and I wasn’t. He could easily be seeing something that I was blind to.

  “Let’s say I’m ready to explore my options. There are only so many lottery tickets I’ll buy before I realize that the odds aren’t in my favor. Know what I mean?”

  “I do indeed, only I’d have put it a little differently.”

  “How would you have put it?”

  “I think I would have said that there’s only so many times you can give the same man the benefit of the doubt before you realize there should be no doubt to begin with.”

  “Wow. That’s deep Austin. You should have that put on beer mats.”

  “Are you making fun of me Mel’?”

  “Maybe a little. If I fall asleep on the sofa, turn the TV off when you get home. Okay?”

  “Will do babe. I’ll be late, so I’ll try to be quiet.”

  “Appreciate it Austin. Have fun and give my sister a hug for me.”

  “Hey Mel’? I wish you were here. It’s not the same without you.”

  I felt my eyes start to water because it was New Year’s Eve and no one else had ever said that to me before. No one. Ever.

  “Thanks Austin. You’re the best. Have fun and don’t worry about me, I’m good. Careful coming home.”

  “Will do babe. See you later.”

  We hung up and I muted Bieber on the tube while I took a bite of my sandwich and thought about the Austin situation. I had to be careful. He was my best friend’s brother and nothing kills a friendship faster than playing siblings. If this didn’t go well, one of two things would happen. She’d hate me for hurting her brother, or she’d hate her brother for hurting me. Both scenarios were unacceptable. There could be no hate in this equation.

  Then I wondered if I was even attracted to him enough to be considering the “What If” equation. Were we close because we were currently living together? Would we be attracted to one another if we weren’t embroiled in the same drama? I’d known Ayla a little while now and I’d never met her brother until recently. If I’d had the same amount of time with him as I’d had with Anton, would the situation be entirely different now? Maybe. Then again, maybe not.

  Anton and I fell together because we were basically two heads on the same beast. Neither one of us was ready for a long-term, full-time kind of thing. Our situation was perfect for both of us. We both liked to fight, had short fuses and used sarcasm as a form of communication. There was nothing we couldn’t say to one another and we didn’t hold grudges. At the time, it seemed ideal.

  Now, several months later, I was evolving. I’ll admit that watching my sister fall head over heels for the perfect guy, marrying and getting ready to start a family, was probably part of it. She was so calm and happy now. I was happy for her and I wanted that for myself. Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t quite ready to pop out Anton Jr., but I WAS ready to settle down with one guy and put an end to the dating scene drama. My living situation with Austin planted that seed in my head and it had taken root.

  We lived easily together and it was nice having someone here with me. Someone to talk to and laugh with. My cooking was improving as well. We shared the chore and we’d ordered some cookbooks online to try different things. It was fun. I cleaned the bathrooms and he did the laundry. We helped each other change the linens. We never argued or nagged one another. All in all, he’d slowly changed my mind about settling down.

  Taking all of that into consideration, here was the question: Who did I want to settle down with? The boil on the butt of patient women everywhere? Or the auburn-haired, blue-eyed charmer that waited just as patiently for me. Was I ultimately the boil on his butt for the same reason? I might never know, but for some reason, he seemed to like me. Right now, he seemed to like me a hell of a lot more than Anton, and HE professed to love me.

  Do you see why I’m often mistaken for crazy? I know you’re getting my version of these events, but I’m doing my best to tell it like it is. If you were me, what would you do? Exactly. You don’t know either, so let’s continue.

  I’d consumed a sandwich, a bowl of chips, a scoop of Rocky Road ice cream, two colas and had just opened a bottle of wine, when something familiar came up on the TV screen. You know how you see something on the local news and the location looks familiar, but then again, not quite? It could be that the location is obviously smaller on TV, I don’t know. The thing is, I knew what I was seeing a location I’d been to.

  The local talking head was standing across the street from the place that sat on a corner. They’d interrupted my “Rockin’ New Years Eve” programming for this breaking story.

  Everyone that had been inside was now standing on the sidewalk. They were being asked to “back-up please”, to give the officers and firefighters room to work. Huh. A fire. Not unusual in a city this size, but I was still working on trying to figure out why the damned place looked so familiar. Then I saw it and went numb.

  The camera zoomed in and tried to focus on the door of the place, where black smoke was drifting out. They’d started shooting on the side window first, but half of it was missing. The half of it that remained turned my blood to ice. The picture of the cute monkey and the letters “Chee and Monk” were intact. The rest of the letters forming the bar’s name were gone along with the other half of the window. Something had either been thrown out or in, through that window.

  I turned up the sound. Siren’s could be heard as well as terrified voices mixed with those in authority. Whatever had happened, hadn’t happened too long ago. I listened as the woman with the microphone explained the situation.

  “...the party appeared to be in full swing and everyone was having a good time. There were no fights reported and no problems in the kitchen. One eye witness, reports that there was a large crash as something flew through the window from outside. The object, which could have been a lit bottle containing gasoline, or a bomb of some kind, exploded on impact, sending multiple party-goers to the hospital and injuring several others. The bar, known as, The Cheeky Monkey, was cleared quickly and firefighters were called as well as the police. At this point, the damage appears to be contained and is minimal considering what could have happened. We’ll report back as the situation warrants....”

  The scene went back to the studio which wrapped up the report and went back to rockin’ my New Years, but I’d lost interest. I couldn’t pace or I would have been on my feet. Crutches severely cramp your style when you’re a pacer. I picked up my cell phone and started to dial, but I didn’t want to distract anyone from doing what needed to be done. Besides, as noisy as it had been behind the news crew, I knew it wouldn’t be any better for my friends and family that were actually there. Someone would call me. They all knew I was home watching TV, and they knew I’d worry.

  A little over an hour later, I was laying on t
he sofa, my eyes glued to the television. I was waiting for another update of some kind; anything that might tell me that my family and friends were safe.

  The main living area in my condo is huge. The front door opens into a very small foyer with a view of the space, including the back of the sofa and the TV hanging on the opposite wall. If you make a left, you hit the kitchen and the dining area. If you go right, there’s the hallway leading to our offices and workspace. Ten feet or so to the right of the TV, are the stairs leading to the second floor. Floor to ceiling windows are on that entire wall on both floors. The natural light is phenomenal, the backdrop is breathtaking. Along that wall on the second floor is the door to the atrium and rooftop garden. The walkway goes to the left, and the bedrooms are above the workspace and offices on the first floor.

  I want you to have the layout in your mind for this next part. Because I was lying on the sofa, I was invisible to anyone coming in the front door. The only clue you might have that someone was present, would be the television bringing life to the room. The lighting was dim (I didn’t need much light to watch TV), and the snow falling in the background was easier to watch when the lights weren’t bright and glaring.

  The door flew open and multiple voices, all of which I recognized, flowed into the room. Of course the loudest one, led the pack.

  “...I still don’t know why the fuck we had to come here. Why does SHE have to be included in everything we do and every discussion we have? And why did I have to ditch my date for this?”

  The voice of reason, my brother-in-law, snapped an answer that was loyal and fierce.

  “Because the bitch you were with was getting on everyone’s nerves and after the night we had, she had to go for her own safety. If you keep it up, you can go too. Melody is a part of this whether you like it or not. In case you’ve forgotten, she’s the only one that’s actually laid eyes on the guy so far. Ayla and Austin haven’t seen him in years. He came to Mel’s house you asshole. She’s most definitely a part of this. I only hope she’s still awake.”