Countdown to Midnight

by Katy Regnery

  “How about a toast?” asked Merit.

  “Sure,” said Amity with an edge to his voice. “I’m happy to make one.”

  “Oh! Great!” said Merit.

  They stood in a small circle with glasses raised, and Amity locked eyes with Jane. “To fate. To finding what you always wanted standing right in front of you. And to having the courage not to run away from it over a misunderstanding.” He paused, then added, “Cheers.”

  Jane had averted her gaze halfway through the toast, and now a blush rose in her cheeks. Ah. So she was running away. He was right.

  Just then, Elizabeth’s phone rang, and she pulled it from the pocket of her skirt, grimacing at whatever she found on the screen. “I have to take this. Excuse me.”

  As Elizabeth hurried away, Merit turned to his brother and Jane. “Why don’t you two go without us? We’ll catch up with you”—he chanced a look at Elizabeth, who was making her way onto the snowy deck—“or not.”

  Merit moved to follow Elizabeth, and Amity turned to Jane, who looked a bit like a deer in the headlights. But for Amity, who wanted time alone with her, their siblings’ absence would be a godsend.

  “Shall we?” he asked.

  Chapter 5

  Merit and Elizabeth

  “Hello?”

  “It’s your father.”

  A chill went down Elizabeth’s spine. She’d never heard such contempt in her father’s voice, and that was saying something.

  She hurried across the living room to a sliding glass door, opened it quickly, and stepped outside. Hearing footsteps follow her, she found Merit standing behind her. He reached for her free hand, lacing his fingers through hers and holding it tightly. Gulping softly, she met his eyes, and the same eyes that had sparkled with laughter all day now held hers gravely, offering support and encouragement.

  She lifted her chin and spoke. “Hello, Father.”

  “You had me fired, gal.”

  “I did,” said Elizabeth softly.

  “Deceiving, conniving bitch. You’re no daughter of mine!”

  She winced at his words, and Merit squeezed her hand, stepping closer to her, the heat from his body warming her and letting her know that she wasn’t alone.

  “I am more your daughter than the other four, sir. I learned how to be ruthless from you.”

  “You learned how to be a goddamned, good-for-nothing cheat and a—”

  “I didn’t cheat you out of anything,” she bit out. “You left the states. You stayed away. You gave me power of attorney. All I did was use it for the good of Story Imports.”

  “The good of Story Imports,” he sneered. “We’ll see about that! I’ll get my lawyers on this first thing Tuesday morning. It won’t stand up in court.”

  “You forget, sir, I’m a lawyer too, and I was well within my rights to sign that deal.” She took a deep breath. “You’re welcome to fight me on it, Father. That’s your right as a shareholder in Story Imports. But you won’t win.”

  “The hell I won’t.”

  “You won’t. You gave me power of attorney to do whatever was sensible and reasonable. This merger with Alice—”

  “Another goddamned disappointment, that one!” he bellowed. “Well, as president, I will—”

  “You’re not president anymore,” she cried. “Alice is.”

  “We’ll just see about that,” he growled, “won’t we?”

  “It’s done,” said Elizabeth, holding Merit’s eyes like a lifeline as he slipped his arms around her and held on. “It was my mother’s company, not yours. You changed the name from Morrow Imports to Story Imports. You kept Alice, Margaret, and Pris from getting ahead, but in the end, you lost. You lost, Father. And I’m sorry it had to happen like this…but why not walk away with dignity?”

  “Don’t you dare give me advice on my goddamned comportment, gal. I’ll see you in court…or in hell!”

  “So be it,” said Elizabeth, still holding the phone to her ear. Should she wish him a happy New Year? Should she say good-bye?

  “Father?” Nothing. “Father?”

  Her eyes burned with tears as she lowered the phone from her ear and looked up at Merit. “I guess he hung up.”

  “You okay?” asked Merit, his concerned gaze scanning her face.

  Clenching her jaw, she dropped her cheek to his chest, resting there as she closed her eyes. “Tell me I did the right thing.”

  “I don’t need to tell you that,” said Merit gently. “You already know. You tell me.”

  Elizabeth took a deep breath, but her voice was shaky and small. “I did the right thing.”

  “Say it again.”

  “I did the right thing,” she said, her voice steady if unconvincing.

  “One more time, Betsy.”

  “I did the right thing,” she said firmly.

  “For whom?”

  She felt her strength galvanizing. “For the company. For my sisters. Because…because it was the right thing to do, even if it meant hurting my father.”

  “See? You don’t need me to tell you anything.”

  She dropped the phone into the pocket of her skirt, then looped her arms around Merit’s neck. “How’d you get so smart?”

  “Years of listening,” he said, leaning down to kiss a tear that had escaped from her eyes. He groaned softly as he leaned away from her. “You taste delicious.”

  Her laugh was low and throaty. “Think Jane and Amity would mind if we stayed home tonight? I mean…instead of going out to dinner with them?”

  “Hmm,” he hummed, pretending to think it over. “Wrong question, Bets.”

  “What’s the right one?”

  “What do we want?”

  “I can only speak for myself,” she whispered, her heart thrumming as she looked into his dark eyes.

  “So speak,” he said, letting his forehead fall gently to hers, creating a little haven, a little paradise or mingled breath, between them.

  “You, Merit,” said Elizabeth. “I want you.”

  “I’m yours, baby,” he murmured, just before his mouth landed on hers. “I’m all yours.”

  ***

  Merit knew that their lips would be red and swollen when they walked back inside. Betsy’s lipstick was smeared, and he was definitely wearing it. With Amity and Jane gone, and as long as she wanted the same thing he did, Merit planned to take Betsy Story to his bed and have her at least twice before midnight. And after they toasted the new year, he’d have her again.

  For months now, he’d assumed that the hollow place in his heart was his lack of family in Philadelphia. But now? As he contemplated returning home to the same city with Betsy? He started to understand that the emptiness he’d felt had a different shape than he’d first assumed.

  Merit wasn’t the type of man who spent hours reflecting on his feelings, so he was jolted and rocked by the sudden and crystal realization that it might not be the love and company of his brothers that he’d been missing but the love and company of a woman. Perhaps it wasn’t his birth family that he yearned for but a family of his own to care for and nurture. Maybe the future he longed for was in Philadelphia, after all: a woman to love and someday a home and kids.

  Strong, rowdy sons and smart, redheaded daughters.

  The thought skipped through his head like a flat stone on a glassy pond.

  It was just a fantasy right now, of course. A daydream for someday.

  They walked back inside, hand in hand, the only sound the crackle of the fireplace.

  “Jane?” called Betsy. “Janie?”

  “I told them to go to dinner without us.”

  “You did?” she asked, a sexy smile forming on her lips. Her eyes were dark and simmering. “Aren’t you hungry?”

  “Not for dinner,” answered Merit, glancing disdainfully at the couch between them. “You’ve been the stuff of dreams for over a decade, Betsy Story.”

  “Good dreams?” she asked.

  “Sweet dreams,” he said, stepping closer. “Hot drea
ms,” he whispered, holding out his hand to her. “Filthy dreams,” he half murmured, half growled, tugging her against him. He looked down into her almost-black eyes. “I’m sick of dreaming about you, Bets.”

  “What do you want?”

  “The real thing,” he said, devouring her lips with his.

  Sliding his hands down her back to her ass, he cupped it greedily, boosting her into his arms, his blood swelling his cock as she wrapped her legs around his waist.

  Still kissing her, Merit turned around and beelined for his bedroom, kicking the door shut behind them just in case Amity or Jane decided to return before midnight. Backing Betsy against the wall, he ground into her, kissing her madly as she unlocked her legs and slid down his body. Her hands dropped to the waistband of his pants, clawing at the bottom of his shirt and yanking it free.

  “Take it off,” she breathed between kisses, sliding her hands beneath his undershirt and smoothing them up over his abs.

  He kissed her hard, then reached behind his neck and pulled both shirts over his head, tossing them aside to the click-clack of buttons rolling across the floor. Grabbing her face, he pulled her lips to his, hungry for them after ten seconds lost. He slid his hands through her hair, suddenly recalibrating his feelings about redheads and deciding that he’d always loved fiery gingers after all.

  Feeling for a zipper at the neck of her dress and finding none, he growled with frustration. “How does this thing come off?”

  Betsy reached for his hands and guided them to a line of buttons that started at the base of her throat. “Hook and eye. It’ll take forever.” Her voice was like gravel when she demanded, “Rip it.”

  He looked down at her almost-black eyes and smeared red lipstick, positive he’d never seen anything or anyone as hot as Elizabeth Story in his entire life.

  “Sure?”

  “Do it.”

  Holding her eyes as he tucked his fingers into either side of the dress’s neckline, he tensed his biceps, then yanked, his eyes widening and mouth watering as the dress tore open to reveal creamy skin and a black lace bra.

  “You’re a fucking masterpiece.”

  Her laugh was low and so sexy, his cock doubled in size. “Glad you approve.”

  The dress slid down her body and pooled around her sexy black stilettos, leaving her in the bra and a matching black lace thong. “Damn, Bets.”

  She reached for his belt and dispatched it quickly, then unbuttoned his pants, shoving them over his hips without touching the zipper and gasping at what she found bulging behind his boxers.

  “You want it?” he asked, loving the wideness of her eyes and O shape of her sweet mouth.

  Looking up at him with drunken eyes, she nodded slowly. “I need it.”

  He took her hand and led her to the bed, sitting down on the edge and drawing her onto his lap, her knees flanking his hips. She shoved down his boxers just enough to expose his cock, and he reached forward and ripped her thong open. She leaned forward on her knees, then resettled herself on him, sliding slowly down his length until she was fully impaled.

  “I know it might not seem like it,” panted Merit, “but I don’t do this with everyone I meet.”

  “Neither do I.” She leaned forward, her breath choppy as he reached behind and released the clasp of her bra. “Truth? I haven’t done it in years.”

  His neck whipped up to look at her. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.” She nodded as she slid her bra slowly down her arms to reveal tan nipples, stiff and swollen. Leaning forward he took a puckered bead into his mouth, rolling his tongue over her warm skin as his cock massaged the ridges of her inner wall with every roll of her hips. He licked and sucked her turgid flesh until she cried out softly, and suddenly it occurred to him that if she was serious, which he believed she was, he should slow down.

  “We can,” he groaned as she rocked back and forth on his cock, “go slower. If you need to. I don’t want…to hurt you.”

  “I don’t want slow,” said Betsy, her eyes rolling back in her head as she arched her back and cupped her naked breasts. “I want hard. I want this.”

  “I’ll take my time after this,” he said breathlessly, reaching for her hips, driven insane by the tight clutch of her pussy around his throbbing cock. “I promise, Bets.”

  Looping her arms around his neck, she rubbed her erect nipples against his chest as he pounded into her, both of them moaning with every thrust until she tensed and cried out, the silken walls of her sex trembling around his pulsing cock. Panting, she dropped her forehead on his shoulder, moaning softly through her orgasm.

  And then Merit took his own extreme pleasure, thrusting into her and shouting her name when he came, incredibly grateful to Betsy Story for the second best day of his whole life.

  ***

  “It’s almost midnight,” said Elizabeth, who slipped back into Merit’s room after running upstairs to fetch a pair of pajamas.

  Jane and Amity still weren’t home, and if she didn’t want to have breakfast in her shredded cocktail dress, she figured she’d better grab something else while she still could.

  Merit, half covered by the comforter, was naked from the waist up—And hopefully the waist down, thought Elizabeth, drinking in the sight of him.

  She’d felt the strength of his body pressing hers into the bed while they’d made love, so the ridges of muscle on his chest didn’t surprise her, but she lingered on them for a moment, her fingers twitching to touch them again.

  “Gym?” she blurted out, feeling her cheeks heat as her eyes skated up to meet his.

  “What?”

  “Do you go to the gym?”

  “Nah,” he said, flexing his chest on purpose before chuckling. “But I have a bench press in my apartment.”

  “Well, whatever you’re doing,” she said, unbuttoning his shirt, which she’d borrowed for her errand, “keep doing it. You’re cut.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Whatever you want.”

  “I want,” she murmured, shrugging the shirt over her shoulders and letting it whoosh to the floor, leaving her naked in the moonlight.

  “Me too,” he said, the words gravel as his eyes feasted on her body.

  She slipped back into bed, happy to find him as naked as she. Resting her head on his chest, she sighed with pleasure as he wrapped his arms around her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.

  “Are you okay?” he asked.

  “Mm-hm,” she hummed, feeling happy despite the ache between her legs.

  “Was that okay?” he asked. “All of it?”

  She smiled, nodding against his chest. “Mm-hm. More than okay. Especially the third time. That was…perfect.”

  She wasn’t lying when she told him she hadn’t had sex in a long time. In fact, it had been two years, while she worked her ass off at Story Imports. She’d refused to be sidetracked by romance while she waited for the right moment to reclaim what had belonged to her mother and restore it to her daughters.

  And now that she found herself here, tangled up with Merit, she was grateful that she’d waited. It had been so long that sex felt new, that Merit felt new. She liked feeling that they were embarking on a journey together. Like a fresh start to an old story. Like despite the fact that they’d hurt each other so long ago, they’d found their way back to one another. Like somehow, they were simply meant to be.

  “Hey, Bets,” he said.

  When he paused in his speech, she leaned back to look up at him. “What?”

  “I don’t—I mean, I don’t want to freak you out, but I want to be honest with you.”

  She tensed as old insecurities rose quickly to haunt her. Was this the part where he said he liked to keep things loose? Where he thanked her for a good time but said something noncommittal to temper her expectations of the situation? She searched his eyes, holding her breath, waiting for him to continue.

  “I just—I just want to say that I don’t feel casual about what just happened between us. Tonight meant something to m
e. You mean something to me.” He held her eyes, scanning them anxiously for several seconds. “Can you say something?”

  She was so relieved, all she could do was prop herself on his chest and smile, drinking in the sight of him, hopeful, then relieved, then happy. There was no need for words. He smiled back at her, reading her face like a book. And she knew that they were on the exact same page.

  “I’m no good at bullshit,” he said simply. “I say what I mean. I mean what I say. I don’t play around.”

  “Thank God,” she said, resettling her ear over his heart. “It meant something to me too, Merit.”

  He threaded his fingers into her hair, pulling back from the roots at her crown to the tips and then back again. It was soothing and heavenly, and Elizabeth’s eyes started to close.

  “I’m not trying to rush things, but I want to see you when we get home.” He cleared his throat. “A lot.”

  She was still smiling, but now she couldn’t help the tears that welled up in her eyes. She was draped across the man she’d kissed as a girl, and a thought shot through her head like lightning: that maybe—just maybe—he would end up being her last kiss too.

  She put the thought aside, knowing it was too soon, and swallowed over the lump in her throat so she could respond to him.

  “I’m okay with that too,” she said softly, pressing her lips to his warm skin. “Remember last night? When I told you that I didn’t believe in fate anymore?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m not sure I stopped believing. I think I just forgot how to believe…for a little while.”

  “And now?”

  “It’s all coming back to me.”

  “While you were upstairs, I poured the rest of the champagne,” said Merit, grabbing two mugs from the bedside table.

  Elizabeth rolled to her side and leaned up on one elbow. “Bubbly in a mug. Fancy.” She grinned at him over the rim of the cup, taking a sip. “Decision—let’s always have our champagne in coffee mugs. Deal?”

  “Deal.” Lying on his side to mirror her, he took a sip and nodded. “I’ll order an extra dozen for each of my bars so I’ve always got two on hand.”

  As they smiled at each other, they heard the dull roar of people all over the resort cheering. Glasses clinked, voices were raised, and the strains of “Auld Lang Syne,” no doubt playing at the restaurant, found their way on the breeze to Elizabeth Story and Merit Atwell.