by Piper Knox
“Goodnight, Hailey.” She looked like I had slapped her in the face. Only I couldn’t sleep when I went to bed. I kept tossing and turning. My mind was filled with the images of one person and she was only a few steps away. After torturing myself with salacious thoughts, I whipped off the bed sheets and went to her room. The door was unlocked. She was awake. She got up as soon as I opened.
“Cai—”
“Don’t speak.” I strode over to her and opened the sheets. Her glorious body was illuminated by the moonlight. My body instantly responded to the sight of hers. I had to touch her. I got onto the bed and got on top of her. My hand went from her neck down to her arm. She reacted as if she had been electrified, arching her back as I moved from her arm to her breast.
“Do you always sleep naked?”
She gasped and shook her head.
“Or were you playing with yourself?” I twisted her nipple lightly.
She moaned.
“Were you?”
She nodded her head.
I laid to the side, “Continue.” She looked a little surprised, but her hands slowly went down to her pussy and she began stroking it. I still had my hand on her breast and I was rubbing it in time with her stroking.
“Open your legs.” She did so. My cock further hardened. Seeing the tent in my briefs, her hand dove into them and stroked me. Pre-cum spurted, and she used it to rub the head. I swallowed a sharp inhale. If she continued like this, I would burst in my pants like a teenager. I removed her hand, removed the rest of my garments and went back to sit on the bed. I took her into my arms and gave a deep kiss. She wrapped her legs around my waist and began humping my cock. It was too much. I grabbed both her thighs, lifted her and sat her down on my cock. It felt so good. We both groaned. I lifted her up and down my cock like a piston. After a while she got into the rhythm and I let go of her thighs and watched as her breasts jiggled as she moved. “You have the most beautiful breasts.” I took hold of one and I flicked the nipple. She moved even faster. “You feel so good.” She did. I don’t think I had ever felt like this with anyone before.
She kept going. I was close to climax, and so was she. I brought my hand down to her clit and pressed down, then began to rub. The friction of my hand and my cock must have been too much for her.
She screamed her orgasm, and I took hold of lips and kissed her deeply as I bucked and drained myself into her. We both collapsed onto the bed.
Hailey spoke, “That was—”
“I said no talking, remember. I’m not done with you yet.”
26
It was my turn to wake up to an empty apartment the next day. I went downstairs. He wasn’t around. He had left a note in the same place I had left a note. It read, “gone out of the country. Will be back in three days.” That was it. It didn’t even state where he had gone to. I called his phone. Nothing. I sent him a text.
Where are you?
No response. Mind-blowing sex followed by epic ghosting. I could still feel the delicious soreness and the—I shook my head of the memories and came back to the present. His moods were difficult to interpret. He was hot one moment, then cold the next.
I showered and got ready to go to work. There was a ton of stuff to do at work now that we had a lot more money. We were even hiring more social workers to work on the ground. After I was done and ready to go, I checked my phone, there was still no response. It didn’t seem like he had read it. Another text popped up. It was Bryce again. Threatening the same thing. There was no way for me to get what he wanted. But then, Caiden was gone. For three days.
I replied to him.
I will try to get you something today.
I was feeling more and more against the idea of me helping my brother as time went on, but I figured I had to give him something to get him off my back. It didn’t have to be anything substantial.
The elevator dinged. Bailey walked out. He was wearing his regular black suit and white shirt with a black coat over it. “Good morning, ma’am.” He said in a thick Irish accent.
“Morning. Caiden is not here, he flew away early in the morning,” I said. God knows where he flew to.
“Yes. He told me ma’am. I’m here to take you to work.”
“It’s fine, I’ve been doing well on my own until now.”
“He left explicit instructions that I was to take you to work.”
I tilted my head to the side.
“And wherever you want to go.”
“Your services are not needed.”
“Ma’am,” he sounded a little impatient, “he was very clear on this. I really don’t want to lose my job if he finds out that I didn’t do what he told me to do.”
The thought that Caiden would fire him because I refused to let him do his job sounded preposterous, but at the same time, I could see it happen. The man could be ruthless.
An idea popped into my head. There was nothing wrong with a woman visiting her husband’s office and I doubt Bailey would see it as suspicious. I let out a deep exhale, “Fine. I need to go to KMVH first.”
His shoulders slumped, and he seemed to relax. I hadn’t noticed that he had been slightly stressed about it. During the ride to the offices, I leaned over and asked him, “why?”
“Why what, ma’am?”
“Please call me Hailey. Ma’am makes me feel old.”
“Sorry ma—I mean, Hailey.”
“So why did he insist you drive me around? He never cared before.” I said the last sentence to myself rather than to him.
“He said nothing to me. He only said that I should make sure you had transport.”
“Don’t you think that’s weird.”
“No.” He said it so definitively that it wilted my concerns and made me feel like I was over-analyzing.
I got out of the car and went over to his window, “I’ll call you when I need you. You can do whatever it is you do,” I waved my hands about, “you do when you’re not driving.”
“I work part time as a getaway driver.”
“No way!” I said in mock shock.
He chuckled, “Sure do.”
Of course, he has jokes. The man had been stern the entire time I knew him and chose this moment to be funny with me. I smiled at him and went into the office.
◆◆◆
The two assistants were there. They looked busy as hell and didn’t act like their boss was away. I smiled at both of them when I reached them and went to the one with a desk plate that read Layla Shand. She was the one I had heard Caiden refer to on his phone a lot. “How are you? I just wanted to check something in Caiden’s office.” I tried to think what it was he would leave, that he would ask his wife to bring it to him when he wasn’t around. “A sweater.” That sounded less convincing, but Layla, who barely glanced away from her computer, said, “sure you can go.”
I was inside. I had only been here one other time and spent little time too. His desk was directly facing the glass doors. Anyone could see me rummaging through them, but there wasn’t anyone coming and the two assistants were out of view. I searched over the desk. There were some printed reports, but I wasn’t sure there was anything on them that Bryce would want. I sent him a text.
Me: what do you want exactly?
It took him little time to respond.
Bryce: We need data on their newest line of jewelry.
I looked at the reports. They were all titled with the name of the jewelry division. Most of them were about what KMVH planned to do with it. Some were sales and financial reports. No data of the line until I saw a mockup book lying under some papers. I flipped through it, and my heart skipped a beat as I went through the sketches. It was exactly what I was looking for. The next line. I took out my phone and just as I was about to take a picture, an overwhelming rush of guilt washed over me. This felt like betrayal to him. To Caiden. Part of me couldn’t do it. Then I thought of the house. If I do this, I could get my inheritance back. If I do this, I would be free. Free from Dad, Bryce, Caiden. All of th
em. This could be my salvation. I took photos of some of the sketches. The ones that looked like they would not be showpieces. I sent him those and hoped it would be enough. He responded immediately.
Bryce: Is that all you could find
Me: I had to jump hoops to get this info to you
Bryce: Thanks. It will do for now. By the way, do you have any idea where the Emerald mine deed is? Dad’s looking for it.
My heart skipped a beat. I did know. It was with Caiden.
Me: The what now?
Bryce: Never mind, you wouldn’t have a clue, anyway.
Me: Will this be enough?
I was referring to the photos I had just sent.
Bryce: I don’t know, you’ll have to ask Dad.
I thought he was done, and I was about to put my phone back into my purse when it dinged.
Bryce: If I were you, I would do better than this. But, in the meantime, it’s going to have to do.
What a dick.
27
Three days later was when I finally got a response from him.
Caiden: I’m coming back today.
That was it. That was the entire message. Nothing about where he had gone to or why he was there. The asshole sure liked to keep it short. I thought of questioning him and remembered the status of our relationship. We were husband and wife, but he seemed to think he didn’t owe me much of an explanation beyond what he had already given me. After all, would I have bothered to wonder where he had gone, if this was a few weeks ago? A firm no resounded in my head.
I was in the middle of checking my phone when I heard Alicia say, “Gosh, what is he doing here?” I peered through the window and saw my father speaking to Rachel. “Did you invite him?” Alicia asked. She knew that dad and I didn’t exactly gel.
I shook my head. I looked back again and saw the two of them coming over to our office. Rachel was in front of Julian when she peered through the door and said, “Your father is a crack-whip with jokes.”
Dad marched in with a polite and plastic smile on his face. He greeted Alicia, who responded in kind. The veiled anger he had was obvious to no one else but me. There was no way he would come to where I work unless something had gone terribly wrong.
“I was just telling her about your little childhood antics. They jokes write themselves honestly.”
“You had a more than interesting childhood I have to say.”
“What a neat little place you have here,” he said to Rachel.
“We do try,” Rachel said beaming. I thought it funny that a few months ago she didn’t want to be associated with my family and had almost forced me to change my name, but now that my dear husband had brought in a large donation, all of my relations were perfectly fine to associate with now.
“Is there some place I can have a private word with my daughter?” He sounded taut. It was an instruction to boot Alicia out of the office. I didn’t want her to. She, however, understood him and made an excuse of needing to send some documents to someone and left with Rachel. When she was gone, I got up ready to greet him, but he gripped my elbow hard and said, “where is it?”
“Let go of me,” I wiggled, but it was useless. His grip was tight.
“Did you give it to your husband?”
“What are you talking about?”
“The deed. You fucking stole it and gave it to him, didn’t you? Why else would he marry you if not to use you in his scheme?”
“You mean the deed to the mine you stole? All I did was return it to the rightful owner.”
His eyes narrowed into slits. His face was red, boiling with anger. “You’ve destroyed me. Do you understand that? You’ve destroyed us all.”
“It’s funny, I thought I was a Scott now?”
“Where is it?”
“I don’t have it.”
Twisting my arm, he said, “Fine, then let’s go speak with the man himself, shall we?” he said as he dragged me out of my office.
“You can’t. He’s not in town!”
“A little birdy told me he is back. Let’s go.”
When we got to the parking lot, my father practically threw me into his car and a somewhat bewildered chauffeur drove us there.
“I’m telling you he’s not there. You’re wasting your time.” I said when we entered the elevator. We arrived on Caiden’s floor. He hadn’t let go of me yet, so it was a shock to the assistants to see me being held by the elbow as if I was some petulant teenager. They said nothing when we burst past them and Julian pushed through the door. To my surprise, Caiden was there sitting in his chair looking a little amused if I may say. His gaze went to the vice grip dad had on my arm. His eyes flared, and he stood up and went around his desk, “Julian. To what do I owe the pleasure?”
Dad stepped forward and whirled me in front of him, but he didn’t remove his hand. I stumbled at the unexpected movement. “Is this why you married her? To use her against me!”
Caiden’s voice was calm, “Let her go and then we will talk about this civilly.”
Dad scoffed. “There’s nothing civil about your underhanded tactics.”
“Let her go, Julian.”
He pushed me forward, and I stumbled again. This time, Caiden caught me as I was about to splatter to the floor.
“You little thief. Had I known; I would never have you marry into the family.”
“Are you going to tell me what I did wrong or are you going to keep hurling accusations?”
“The deed. You stole it.”
“To the emerald mine? If I remember Julian, it was part of Celeste’s assets, which I acquired in its entirety.”
“Just know that this is not over. That little wife of yours holds more secrets than you know.”
“Can you leave?”
“This is not over,” he fumed, “It is not over.”
“I don’t know. I think it is. The mine is no longer yours. Get over it. I won.”
Dad’s lip curled. I could feel the anger radiating from him.
“That’s what you came to hear, isn’t it? If you must know,” he cradled my head, brushing my hair, “she helped.”
“I knew you weren’t to be trusted.” He spat at me. I searched for guilt, but I felt none. He measured us both up and down before storming out of the office.
When I felt my heart slow down, I tried to break away from Caiden, but he held me to him. He lifted my arm and tilted it gently to look at my elbow, “Did he hurt you?”
I snatched it away and rubbed it, “No. I’m fine,” I stepped away from him, “When did you come back?”
“A few minutes ago.”
“You should have said. I didn’t know where you had gone.”
“I didn’t trust you enough.”
I was a bit taken aback by his direct response.
“I didn’t know how loyal you were to your father.”
“And now?”
“I trust you a lot more. And if you must know, I was returning the deed to its original owners.”
I frowned, “Shepard’s relatives?”
He laughed, “Shepard hated his relatives, and they hated him in turn. No. The true owners. The people of St. Nebula.” When he saw my frown he added, “A little island of the coast of Madagascar?”
“I know where St. Nebula is.”
“So, you do care about the family business.”
“How can I ignore what has been described in the news as close to slavery.”
He strolled over to the liquor cabinet and poured a drink, “Want one?”
After being man-handled by my father, I needed one. I nodded. He poured the same drink into another glass and handed one to me. I took a sip and savored the taste of the golden liquid as it coursed down my throat. He strode over to the sofas. I followed him and we sat down.
“Julian,” he drawled, “was the latest in a long line of business men taking advantage of that island. A long time ago Julian and Shepard, back when they were still friends, bought prime property on the island with the hopes th
at there would be a discovery. For years there wasn’t and then they had a falling out and your father still had the deed. Shepard wanted it returned to the locals. Your father didn’t. Then the emeralds were discovered and the rest is history.”
Hearing the story from another angle was a revelation.