Irresistible Daddies Series Box Set

by Katy Kaylee

  Preston stood up abruptly. I stood up as well, not willing to let him loom over me any more than he already could with his height advantage. “I would be careful in how you spoke to me, Veronica.”

  “That’s Ms. DeMarcus to you,” I replied, making my voice as chilly as I could. “You’ve got no right to any more intimacy than that. You’ve got no right to me.”

  “Maybe not now, but I will soon. You’ll be mine, if you know what’s good for you.” Preston took a step closer, chuckling when I stumbled back, like it pleased him to have such power over me and to make me so nervous.

  This was just like Chad, only worse - Preston was smarter than Chad, more calculating. I felt like I couldn’t breathe, panic setting in, and I forced myself to keep looking Preston in the eye. “I’m not an object.”

  Preston rolled his eyes as if he was indulging me. “Do yourself a favor, Veronica. Think about it. You’re a smart woman. I’m sure you’ll make the right decision.”

  He buttoned up his jacket, nodded at me with a final smirk, his gaze drifting over me like I was a prize horse and he was already writing the check to buy me, and then he left.

  My legs gave out and I collapsed onto the soft.

  What the hell… what was I supposed to do?

  23

  Ted

  On Thursday, David invited me out for a run, and I said hell yes. I felt like I had all of this extra energy since I was seeing Veronica. Everything felt more colorful. I just… had this new zest for life.

  I hadn’t even realized how much I was just plodding through my days, the mediocrity I was sinking into, the lack of joie de vivre, until I was with Veronica again.

  David took one look at me and rolled his eyes. “I take it things are working out with Roni?”

  “They are.” I grinned and clapped him on the shoulder. “We’ve got to find you someone, man.”

  “Oh, no, I knew this would happen. It always happens.” David rolled his eyes fondly and started jogging. I hurried to match his pace. “One friend gets into a relationship and it’s all sunshine and roses and then they just have to try and get you into a relationship too so that you can see how amazing it is and feel just as good, and blah, blah, blah.”

  “Admit it,” I said, nudging him, “you’re happy for me.”

  “I am.” David flashed me a grin. “I really am. I’m glad that she’s working out for you.”

  “Yeah. She was really… she wasn’t perfect, y’know, I mean, none of us are. But she was really good for me, and she really cared, that’s why I was so surprised when she dumped me just like that. Even with all of the other bullshit, I had my own bullshit too, but I figured we’d find a way to make it work. So now that we’ve grown past all of that… it’s like this was always what it was meant to be. Only now I’m done with the authority issues and my dad, and she’s done with worrying so much about appearances.”

  “Hey, your dad wasn’t your bullshit, though. You couldn’t control that.”

  “Maybe not. But it didn’t help. He was always telling me how worthless I was, what a waste of space, all that kind of stuff. And somewhere inside of myself, I believed it. I believed him when he told me those things and so I had no ambition, nothing beyond acting out through the latest prank or sassing my teachers. Broadcasting my pain to the world.”

  “Maybe you didn’t have a lot of ambition or whatever,” David said, “but from what you’ve told me it sounds like that girl’s parents would’ve found a way to split you two up no matter what. If it wasn’t oh he’s not going anywhere in life then it would’ve been something else. You weren’t from a blue blood, old money family, and that was all that her parents really cared about.”

  “I know, you’re right.” I took a few deep breaths, feeling the wind whipping in my face as we jogged. “I always felt like I couldn’t ever really measure up. And the only time I never felt that way was with Roni. Even now sometimes, these rich people come into my clinic and they talk to me and… well, you know how it is, I’m sure.”

  “Yeah.” David nodded. He had it harder than I did, with the color of his skin. “And it’s nothing that you can pin down, exactly. Nothing you can really call them out for. So they can get away with it, they have plausible deniability. But even if they don’t want to admit it to themselves, there’s something in them that sees you as less, that sees you as almost a kind of servant because you’re doing them a favor, you’re providing a service for them.”

  “Exactly. It would always get under my skin, pissed me off like nothing else. And you know how - sometimes you start to wonder if they’re right.”

  David nodded.

  “But when I’m with Roni, I never feel that way. Even back in high school when everything else was shit, I never felt that way with her. She makes me feel like I’m - like I can do anything, I don’t know, and half the time I wonder how she can see that in me when I can’t see it in myself but I’m not about to give it up. I feel like I could take on the world when she’s with me.”

  “And that’s how it should feel,” David replied. “Hold onto that woman, no matter what. I’m glad that you two found each other again.”

  “I’m not giving up on finding you someone.”

  David sighed. “Look, if this Roni of yours has a best friend? Sure, I’ll consider it, I trust your judgment. But really, I doubt that there’s anyone that I could feel safe being vulnerable with and risking my heart with.”

  “We’ll see about that,” I replied.

  After our workout, I went home and showered, getting ready to meet Veronica for our date. It was one of our more ‘conventional’ dates, just going to get dinner at this new place that had opened up. Veronica had this huge craving for traditional southern comfort food lately, and hey, I was never going to say no to some good classic fried chicken and cornbread, so far be it from me to stop her.

  I still wasn’t picking her up at her place yet, and I was careful about inviting her over to my place. We usually only came here to watch a movie, and she’d admired the furnishings and the backyard. But I wanted to go at her pace, and our homes were, I knew, both intensely private spaces for us, so I didn’t want to try invading her space too much or make her come into mine, not if she wasn’t ready.

  Instead, I met her at the restaurant, where we grabbed a booth in the back. For a lot of couples date night probably meant getting dressed up, but this was a casual place and so we dressed to fit. I thought she still looked radiant, even just in a simple summer dress, her hair in a braid.

  But something was… off.

  We got our menus and perused, and usually I would make jokes about the menu items and Veronica would respond. But today she just smiled at me and nodded.

  After we ordered, I saw she wasn’t drinking, just swirling her straw around. She seemed tense, and she wasn’t reaching out to touch me like usual.

  Something was definitely wrong.

  “Hey.” I caught her hand under the table and rubbed my thumb over her knuckles. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing.” Veronica gave me a bright, dazzling smile. It was her showcase smile, the one that she used at charity balls and the like. I knew that it was fake. “Just had a long day.”

  “Roni.” I kept my voice low and soothing. “I know that something’s wrong. It’s okay, you can tell me. I’m not going to get angry.”

  That was something I would occasionally remind her about. After the way Chad would blow up at her, I understood that she might have an instinctual fear of making someone upset, even if she knew – logically - that I wasn’t going to treat her the way that Chad had. A verbal reminder was a good thing, it could help soothe her.

  Veronica sat there, tight lipped, for about a minute. Our food arrived in the meantime and I thanked the server, then went back to just focusing on holding Veronica’s hand, comforting her.

  At last, she said, “Preston Andrews came to my house.”

  Preston Andrews. Why was that name familiar?

  “He’s a f
riend of Chad’s. Or he was, I don’t know how much Chad will like him after Chad hears that Preston’s been trying to get with his ex-wife.”

  My hand tightened around Veronica’s, instinctively. Veronica squeezed back. “He’s a lawyer, been involved in a lot of high-profile cases.”

  Oh, yes, that was how I knew of him. I’d heard about him from time to time. “I hear he’s ruthless.”

  “He is. I never liked him that much, but I thought he was at least… a little better than Chad. Turns out I was wrong. He’s just as bad, but in a different way.” Veronica took a sip of her drink to steady herself, her hands shaking slightly. “He’s smarter than Chad is, but I think he might actually be more ruthless. Chad is… he’s lazy, almost. I mean, I remember when he would go out to strip clubs and have sex with hookers I would think, God, at least seduce the wives of your friends or something, have an affair with your secretary, have a bit of class, you know?”

  Veronica gave an odd laugh that made my heart squeeze. “But Preston, he’s actually got us… he’s using the law to threaten us. To blackmail me. He’s determined to marry me. Apparently he’s had a thing for me this whole time and I… on its own, it’s not necessarily creepy, you know, we can’t control who we develop feelings for, but there’s a gentlemanly way to handle it and a creepy way to handle it and now - now he’s acting like I’m just some, some property to be passed from one person to another. Like he should get a prize for treating the car better than the last owner did.

  “I’m not a car, or some prize that one man will pick up once the first one’s done with me. I’m my own person. And I’m not going to marry someone just because I want stability or just because they want me to. I’m finished with doing just what other people want me to.”

  “As you should be,” I told her. “Hey, drink some water, okay? It’s all right. You’re absolutely right, he’s being an asshole.” I was seeing red all over again. What did this guy - who did this guy think he was, huh? Who the fuck was he to threaten and blackmail Veronica? That wasn’t how you got a woman to like you and frankly if I were him I’d watch my back if I was married to someone that I got through coercion.

  “He knows about us,” Veronica said, sipping at her water. Her eyes were glittering with tears that she was refusing to let fall. I passed her a napkin and she wiped at her eyes. “He found out about us, somehow, I think he’s been having me followed. He said he was keeping an eye on me.

  “If I don’t dump you, and date him, then he’s going to report you. Sue you, or something, I’m not sure how but he’s a lawyer, I know that he’ll figure out a way to do it. A way to get to you.” Veronica’s brave attempt to stifle her tears didn’t work and she began to cry in earnest.

  “Sweetheart, hey.” I quickly pulled her into my arms. “Just cry it out.”

  “I’m sorry, I feel like all I do with you is cry.”

  “You got out of an abusive situation, a lot of shit’s being stirred up. It’s okay for you to cry and to work out your emotions, all right? Don’t let anyone make you feel otherwise.”

  Veronica nodded against my shoulder. “I never felt like… I couldn’t show Chad how much he affected me. And out in public, you know, my parents always taught me to keep up appearances, to never let anything unpleasant show. But with Chad it wasn’t so much propriety as it was… I didn’t want him to have any more power than he already did.

  “And so now that I’m free of him, I feel like all of those… reactions and emotions that I was holding back all of this time are finally bursting out and I can’t contain them and it scares me, it makes me feel like I’m some stupid child.”

  “You’re not. Far from it. Look you know how my dad was. And I blamed myself for being so emotional about it, too. I always felt like I should be able to handle it better, to be stronger, especially as a boy.

  “My therapist helped me see that when you’ve been imbalanced for so long, it’s like a pendulum. You have to swing back the other way a few times before you can rest in the middle and find that balance. You were incredibly brave, putting up with him the way you did, not letting him break you.”

  “I don’t feel all that brave.”

  “We never do, when it’s us, and we’re in the moment. But you were. You are.” I kissed the top of her head.

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you, when you were going through all of that,” Veronica said, her voice small.

  “You were there for me,” I replied. “You were supporting me, always telling me that I was a good person and not to listen to my dad. You helped keep me… alive, really, until I got to college and could get a therapist. It wasn’t your job to fix me, just like it’s not my job to fix you. But you helped. You made me happy, and you supported me and helped me to feel safe, and that meant the world. It still does.”

  Veronica gave a small laugh. “I just find that ironic, because I’d say the same about you. You helped me feel safe. Taken care of. It’s always been you who did that.”

  I hated to bring up a sore subject, but I had to know more about this Preston issue. “So he’s going to expose me for sleeping with you unless you agree to date him.”

  Veronica nodded, sitting up straight again. “I never meant for this to happen. This is all my fault, I convinced you to break the rules while you were still my doctor. I could ruin everything for you and I don’t want you to lose this. You’ve worked so hard for everything that you have and I just don’t want you to have it taken all away.”

  “I’m not going to break up with you just because some asshole is threatening us. If we break up it’s because it’s the right thing for both of us. Not because someone is pressuring us. I’d be miserable without you, and I like to think that you wouldn’t be too happy either.” I winked at her, and Veronica laughed a little through her tears.

  “You might have come on strong, but I was the doctor. I knew the rules, and I broke them. It’s my own fault for crossing the line. You didn’t brainwash me, I had free will the entire time, and I chose not to do what I knew was the legal thing. I chose to be with you. So that’s on me.”

  “What are we going to do, then?” Veronica whispered. “If we keep dating, then he’ll expose you and he’ll ruin you.”

  “We’ll figure something out,” I promised. “We will.”

  Veronica only started crying harder. My heart went out to her, and I wished I could just straight up cold clock this Preston asshole. That wouldn’t do anything except land me with an assault charge, though, so I kept that thought to myself.

  Our waitress stopped by with our food, shooting us a worried look. “Her grandmother just died,” I explained, pulling a sad face.

  “Oh, you poor thing,” the waitress said. “You take all the time you need.”

  Good old southern hospitality.

  Veronica eventually calmed down, and we were able to eat. I held her hand under the table, since she seemed to need that continual comfort—not that I minded giving it to her.

  “Hey, why don’t we get out of town for the weekend?”

  Veronica looked at me. “This weekend?”

  “Yeah. Nothing big, just go somewhere nearby to cool off and get some space. We can avoid Preston’s spies and have some time to ourselves, and then on Monday we can focus back in and come up with a battle plan. Preston’s a busy guy, right, a successful lawyer, I’m sure he has other things to do with his time and he’ll give you a few days to stew in your nerves. That’s how lawyers operate.”

  Veronica nodded, giving me a tentative smile. “I’d like that.”

  “Hilton Head Island sound good?”

  The island, as it was just called by those in the upper crust, was a beach retreat for wealthy families. There were a lot of luxury homes on there, cute little boutique shopping centers, fancy restaurants, and of course a bunch of golf courses. I had a friend a few years ago who wanted to get rid of her vacation home after her husband had passed—it just had too many memories that she couldn’t handle. I’d bought it from he
r, planning it as a summer spot for my family once I had one.

  Now I finally had someone to bring there, someone who would appreciate it. It wasn’t nearly as fancy as a lot of the other houses that had sprung up on the island, since it was one of the first houses built there. It was smaller, and less decadent, but I liked it that way. No need to be ostentatious.

  Veronica smiled. “I love it. I haven’t been there in years.”

  “Then it’s settled.” I kissed her cheek. “And don’t worry about a thing. I’ll make all the arrangements.”

  24

  Veronica

  I was so glad to finally get to Hilton Head.

  Getting here would normally have been a breeze, but not with Preston’s men following me. I had no idea who these people were, or even how they were managing to follow me, I just knew that Preston wasn’t such a good lawyer by accident. And it wasn’t because he knew the law, either.

  Lawyers could and in fact were encouraged to look everything up when it came to law, instead of just relying on their own memory. Everything had to be backed up by paperwork. No, it wasn’t his using the law well that had gotten Preston where he was today. It was his ability to charm and scare his opponents and juries, and his ability to use his contacts to dig up more dirt on the opposition than anyone. He would even dig up dirt on his own clients so that he could be ‘aware’ of anything that would be used against him by the other party. I’d heard him talking about it to Chad a couple of times.

  Now all of that was being used against me.

  Ted wasn’t the high school prankster for nothing, though. And while he had been a troublemaker, in our senior year after I’d dumped him he had graduated with good marks. He couldn’t have gotten into a good college if he’d had as many stains on his record as he honestly deserved for all the stunts he’d pulled, but he’d been good about making sure there wasn’t evidence. By our senior year everyone would know it was him, but half the time nobody could pin it on him.