Rock Bottom (The Gifted Realm #4)

by Jillian Neal

  He captured her lips with his own. It was the only thing at that moment that made sense to him. The night had depleted them both. She was standing before him with her gown drooping and her make-up worn, yet she was still the most beautiful thing he’d ever laid eyes on.

  Dan kept his lips soft and lush. He consumed her slowly, and allowed his tongue to hesitantly explore her mouth. He tenderly cradled her head in his powerful right hand and drew her body closer with his left.

  She trembled in his arms. Her breaths came in quick pants of hunger. She pulled away. Her body shuddered; it seemed to argue contentiously with her mind.

  Dan watched her graceful neck contract as she swallowed down her need. The tip of her tongue traced over her kiss-swollen lips. Dan knew she could still taste his rhythms there. He groaned from watching her.

  With a knowing grin, she straightened his tie.

  “You change and go play pool. We’ll be right here waiting on you to get back. Maybe we can sleep in tomorrow and just hang out here all alone,” she gestured around the large room they’d been assigned.

  “You’re sure you want me to go?” Dan reached to touch her hands. The electricity and heat that rose under her skin, in a storm of passion that quaked at his touch, drove him wild. He was quickly becoming an addict that wanted no reprieve.

  “I don’t want you to go, but I really think you should.”

  Dan nodded and began pulling off his tie. Lucas had informed everyone that casual dress would be expected for billiards that evening.

  After making certain that Fionna and Emily were ok with their leaving, Rainer and Dan made their way back inside the palace, and followed Lucas’s instructions as to how to reach the billiard room on the basement level.

  Neither spoke on their walk. Dan wondered momentarily if Rainer had as difficult a time leaving Emily somewhere she seemed uncomfortable, as he’d had leaving Fionna. Their conversation lacked focus, so they went without.

  A set of cherry-wood French doors led into the large room, which appeared to have not one billiard table, but seven; along with a vast bar area, leather couches, and huge flat-screen television sets mounted on the walls.

  One door was opened enough for Dan to make out the landscape of the room but no one noticed them in the hallway. Lucas and his older brothers were talking with the Caliph.

  Dan halted Rainer from entering, placed his finger to his lips, and edged them out of sight.

  “How were we to know that you’d bang up a whore on your first go? My word, your stuff must be built like a shit brick house.” Lachlan laughed. Dan could see Lucas through the small gap the open door allowed him. He rolled his eyes.

  “I don’t regret anything, except the way the poor girl was raised. Did you hear her say she was starved, abused? I can’t believe this.”

  “She’ll be apples. Logan seems to have her settled,” the Caliph scoffed.

  “Is he coming to play?” Ethan asked.

  “No,” Lucas shook his head. He sounded annoyed. “He’s honeymooning my daughter, I’d say; certainly told me where I could go when I suggested he play.” He took a sip of a stout drink from the bar.

  “Aww, come on, Luke. You’ve been a dad for half a night, and you’re already whining about her husband,” Lachlan chuckled.

  “He’s obviously wild about her, and she him,” Ethan pointed out hopefully as he began to chalk a few cues.

  “I’ve been a dad for twenty-one years. I just didn’t know it.”

  “So, you’ll settle her up now, and go see her whenever. You’ll eat it in the papers for a while, but it’ll blow over,” Lachlan assured him. “Caliph Nguyen’s youngest son meets his daughter and her mother, Molly, for the first time,” he laughed.

  “All I’m saying is did either of you see the lollies on their head officer’s arm? She is abso-bloody-lutely beautiful. I’d be up her like a rat up a drainpipe. In fact, I plan to be.”

  Dan’s blood boiled. His jaw clenched. His eyes flashed furiously. Visions of his hands wrapped around Lachlan Nguyen’s throat filled his head.

  Rainer grasped his forearm and shook his head. The frantic gesture was all that kept Dan from busting into the room and beating Lachlan into one of those pool tables.

  Lachlan kind of creeped me out. That’s precisely what Fionna had felt. Bitter gall and rage fought for dominance in Dan’s chiseled body. Utter hatred filled him readily. It always did.

  “Lach, you’re forty years old. Do you ever plan on growing up? I can’t imagine why you’ve never married,” Ethan rolled his eyes.

  The Caliph laughed. “Yes, and I imagine Officer Vindico packs quite a punch. He can shoot a blowfly off a bull’s ass, and has a bloody temper to boot, so I wouldn’t let him hear you talking about Miss Styler quite like that. I think if he’d asked her at dinner, she’d have dragged him to a chapel straight away. ”

  A cocky half-grin formed on Dan’s face, but Rainer stared up at him in abject panic. Dan shrugged. He had no idea why Rainer was angry. He was the one who should be furious.

  “You really gonna give her part of your estate?” Ethan quizzed Lucas.

  “Well, she’s my daughter. She looks just like me, and I felt her energy as soon as I laid eyes on her. I didn’t even have to be in contact with her. Our patterns are almost identical.”

  “Well, yeah. I mean, her mum’s not Gifted, so she’s all you,” Ethan explained.

  “I just feel wretched. An Australian Realm Princess, and she’s terrified of everything including me.”

  “She’ll come round, son,” the Caliph assured.

  “Did you see her at dinner? She has to draw from her husband to speak,” Lucas bemoaned.

  “Well, be glad he’s there then,” Ethan pointed out.

  “She’ll come on; just like Dad said. You have to let her get to know you. Of course she doesn’t trust anyone; she was raised by a bloody wench whore,” Lachlan huffed.

  “Yes, well, I plan to do just that.”

  With that, Dan knocked on the open door, and he and Rainer entered the grand game room.

  62

  The Wrong Men to Billiards

  ~Logan Haydenshire~

  “Thank you,” Logan offered the maid who insisted on unpacking his and Adeline’s things. “Could we just have a few minutes?”

  “Certainly, sir. Mr. Nguyen alerted the staff. He explained that you’d be spending the rest of your honeymoon here, so I’ll only come if you call.”

  Logan sighed.

  “Thank you.” He sincerely wished that Lucas would stop informing the vast staff of their honeymoon status. Adeline wasn’t quite as comfortable discussing it as her father seemed to be.

  With a quick curtsy that Logan found disturbing, the maid left. She closed the door to the guest suite on her way out.

  Logan made it to Adeline in two long strides. He pulled her to his chest and wrapped his long arms around her.

  “You ok?” He felt her draw from him. It always shocked Logan; after all the years they’d been together and all that he’d shared with Adeline, her drawing from him still felt just as incredible as the first time she’d done it.

  “It’s just so surreal. I keep thinking this is some kind of bizarre dream. I can’t seem to figure out if it’s a good dream or a bad dream. You’re here, so it must be a good dream,” she declared all of this while talking into Logan’s chest.

  A broad grin spread across his face as he kissed the top of her head. “I know it’s been a lot, but I think so far it’s gone pretty well, all things considered.”

  Adeline nodded against him. She was suddenly quiet and introspective.

  “Hey,” Logan pulled away from her just enough to stare deeply into her onyx eyes, the very same as her father’s. “What’s going on in that pretty head of yours?”

  “I don’t know,” she was suddenly overwhelmed. She drew a deep breath. “This just isn’t normal. People don’t live like this, Logan,” she gestured at the affluent room they’d been given that was surrou
nded by a palace. “It’s just too much, the maids and butlers. Everyone keeps staring at me.” She let Logan wrap his arms back around her as she tucked her face deeply in his chest. The world was just a little too much right then.

  “I guess if you’d grown up with all of this, it would seem perfectly normal,” Logan tried to keep his tone steady and smooth, the way Rainer always did with Emily.

  “I would’ve still found you,” Adeline vowed as tears began to spill from her eyes.

  “Baby,” Logan hugged her tightly as he choked out the word. The thoughts of whether or not they ever would’ve met if she’d been raised as an Australian Realm princess had terrified her as well.

  “I would’ve,” defiance perforated her words. She began to sob. After swallowing down the all-consuming emotions that threatened to overwhelm him, Logan drew a steadying breath.

  “Listen to me, Adeline….” he tried to formulate what to say.

  “You are the only good thing in my entire life, and I don’t deserve you,” she declared through her sobs. Her pain stabbed him deeply.

  “Shh,” Logan soothed. “Ok, just listen. I know this is scary, and new, and just a lot to take in, but I’m right here with you. That’s the only place I will ever be. And I’m not the only good thing in your life, Adeline. You love your job, and everything you’ve accomplished with your work and in school. That was all you, sweetheart.”

  “What I told you all those months ago in your mother’s apartment is still true. My life without you isn’t worth living, so it’s me who doesn’t deserve you.”

  “But you can have good things, baby. You can have a dad who wants to be part of your life, and you can be the princess that I’ve always known you were, and you can have me, and everything we have back on the other side of the world.”

  Adeline’s jaw clenched tightly against Logan’s sternum.

  “I don’t want to think about not meeting you,” her exhaustion and terror had finally gotten the better of her.

  “Ad, I have always wished, more than anything, that you hadn’t had to grow up the way you did. As much as I despise Candy and the way she treated you, I do understand what you’re saying, sweetheart.”

  “I could never ever say that I was worth what you went through growing up. Never.” The very idea made him feel ill. “I guess you don’t get to be a kid again and try it another way. We get this one shot at life, and I’m just so thankful that I somehow got lucky enough to get to have this life with you.”

  She broke down in his arms.

  “Logan,” she convulsed.

  “Shh, baby. It’s ok.”

  “Can you cast me please?” Her body trembled against his.

  “Come here,” he took her hand, kicked off his loafers, and threw the silk coverings and the dozens of decorative pillows off of the bed. He leaned back against the pillows that were meant to be slept on, he hoped, as he pulled her onto his chest.

  She had to step up on the stool on the side of the bed just to join him. Logan decided that she was right; this was just too much.

  It wasn’t her, and it certainly wasn’t him. In that moment that he wrapped her up in his body and set his shield firmly around the two of them, what he wanted more than anything was to take her home.

  He understood that her plea was so much more than a need to feel safe. She wanted to be surrounded by something familiar, something that was all him, a place where the two of them could exist all alone without the world intruding and keeping up it’s relentless assaults.

  ~Rainer Lawson~

  Lucas and Lachlan looked startled as Vindico and Rainer entered the game room.

  “Welcome, gents,” Ethan smiled and gestured around the room. “Shall we play English billiards or American eight-ball?”

  Vindico chuckled and kept up steady, warning glares at Lachlan as he shrugged.

  “I’m no good at either, so your choice.”

  Rainer chuckled and nodded his agreement.

  “Ah, I think we’re being bagged, mates,” Lachlan challenged Vindico’s threatening glares.

  “No money changing hands here. I don’t gamble. This is just a friendly game, right?” Vindico stared Lachlan Nguyen down. “I have a beautiful woman waiting on me in the bed you’ve so kindly offered us, so I don’t plan on staying down here too long,” his tone spoke volumes that never took on words.

  She was his, and he’d not only fight for her, he’d kill over her. As he stared Lachlan down, it was very apparent to everyone in the room that it would be an extremely poor decision on Lachlan’s part to try and use all of his power, all of his money, and his playboy lifestyle to try to woo Fionna Styler.

  Everyone laughed, though Rainer saw realization settle in Lachlan’s eyes. It didn’t seem to bother him for long. He slapped Vindico on the back with a nod of defeat.

  “Don’t blame you, mate. Let’s just rack ‘em up, have a go, and a drink. I mean, we’re all friends here, right, or, hell… family,” Lachlan laughed as Lucas shook his head.

  “Let’s pour up something impressive,” the Caliph ordered. “I have a feeling Officer Vindico knows his way around a Scotch bottle.”

  Vindico shrugged. “I’ve had a few in my day,” his slight admission thoroughly delighted the Caliph.

  Rainer was instantly in awe of how cool Vindico was, and how he never allowed anyone to see the hand he’d been dealt.

  His advice from the night before was precisely how he played the game of life. He waited and watched until he knew who held the aces, and then he strategically took them all for himself.

  Rainer gave Vindico an admiring smile. Vindico chuckled and slapped Rainer on the back encouragingly. The gesture spoke volumes as well. There were very few people that Vindico allowed close enough to really know him, and over the past six months or so, with all that they’d been through, Rainer had become one of the closest.

  Caliph Nguyen moved to one of the four liquor cabinets situated on either side of the bar. Several taps of Australian beer were on the bar, along with mugs permanently casted to stay cold.

  “How about I pour you up glass after glass of, say, this fifty-year old Dalmore, in exchange for the story of you in the German senate, Officer Vindico?” the Caliph bargained with a goading grin.

  Vindico chuckled. “You drive a hard bargain, Caliph.”

  Rainer noted that he still hadn’t accepted the bargained price for his story.

  “Well, I considered opening with a forty-year Macallan, but I want to hear the tale.”

  “It’s really just a narrative of my temper getting the better of me. Like I told Lucas, it certainly wasn’t my finest hour.” Vindico nodded his acceptance of the Scotch that the Caliph poured and handed to him.

  “I know some men rattle off drivel about men losing their temper losing their worth, but I’ve found in my vast experience, Officer Vindico, that men who are soft and easy are of very little value.”

  Rainer was handed a glass of the same Scotch.

  “That Scotch costs more than you make in three months’ time. Drink it very slowly, and enjoy it,” Vindico instructed under his breath.

  Rainer hesitated. He didn’t want to cough and make a fool of himself.

  “That’s outstanding,” Vindico delighted the Caliph. He gave a somewhat abbreviated version of just what he’d informed the German Crown that he could do, and what he’d called the Governing board at large.

  The Caliph and his sons roared with laughter as more liquor was passed around. Everyone engaged in a round of eight-ball, and Vindico hadn’t been lying; he really wasn’t very good but, as he pointed out somewhat bluntly, he’d never really seen the point to the game.

  “All right, mate,” Ethan goaded him with a grin. “Now let’s have the story of what brought on your bailing up the German Governors. There’s got to be more to it than you getting madder than a Baptist in a brothel.”

  Vindico bristled and shook his head.

  “Not enough Scotch in those cabinets, gentlemen,” his to
ne dared anyone else to ask.

  Lachlan laughed and shook his head. He shot a smirk at Lucas.

  “Hey, Luke, maybe you should go lob in on your house guests. Make sure they got tucked in all right.”

  Lucas rolled his eyes. “If it’s all right with you, I’d rather not think about it,” he hemmed momentarily as he set up his next shot. “‘Spose I should be thankful he makes her so happy.”

  Though he’d remained quiet and let Vindico, Ethan, and Lachlan keep up most of the evening’s banter, Rainer stepped up on Logan’s behalf.

  “Probably a lot you should be thankful for on Logan’s account,” Rainer stated firmly. Vindico offered him a broad grin and an appreciative nod.

  “I know, mate. It’s just been such an odd night. You understand, I’m certain. I mean, marrying the Crown Governor’s daughter, you must know that thinking about my daughter on her honeymoon is a bit odd.”

  Lachlan laughed as he continued his teasing.

  “I was telling Luke earlier he’s been a dad for a few hours and he’s already cranky about her and her husband having a naughty. Geez, mate, he married her; what more do you want?”

  Everyone chuckled, but Lucas remained concerned.

  “I just hope they married for love, and that he didn’t take advantage of the fact that she needed a last name,” he finally stated his concern out loud.

  “Trust me, she adores him and he her. They’ve been together for years. He stuck by her through everything her mother did to her. He took care of her, and he always will.” Rainer felt fury course through his veins. Anyone who attacked Logan’s character infuriated him more than if someone attacked his own.

  “Rainer and Logan have been best friends, quite literally, since birth,” Vindico smoothed over Rainer’s irritation

  “Adeline and Logan are one of those couples that are meant to be. They stuck together when the entire Realm tried to pull them apart. I have nothing but the utmost respect for Logan and for Adeline. So, if you’re looking for someone wishing to come up with Logan’s flaws, then you’ve invited the wrong men to billiards.”