Denial (Careless Whispers #1)

by Lisa Renee Jones

  Kayden pumps into me, deeper, harder, and I explode, spasming around him, clinging to him, as he drives once, twice, and on three his body shudders and shakes. Time swirls in and out, and the muscles in my body ease, in his too. “What are you doing to me, woman?” he whispers near my ear, nipping my earlobe. “Don’t go away.” He pulls out of me and rolls to his side, and, I think, takes care of the condom. Before I can figure it out, he’s returned and he’s pulling me against him, my back to his front, the warmth of the fire and his body sending me into a deep, drugged state of satisfaction. “You tried to take my gun when you felt trapped. You aren’t a wilting flower.”

  My chest tightens. “I might be a little too comfortable with guns.”

  He rolls me onto my back and pulls me around to face him, grabbing a blanket and draping it over us, his hand settling possessively on my hip. “Any idea how you know how to shoot?”

  My mind flickers to that image of myself at a gun range. “I remember going to a gun range. I was younger, so I think I learned young.”

  “So maybe your parents were in law enforcement?”

  My mind produces an image of a man in a uniform. “Military,” I say. “I think my father was, or is, military. I’m not sure if he’s alive or dead.” There’s an image of a woman in my mind with red hair like mine, and the idea of her hurts my heart. “My mother’s dead.”

  “You’re sure?”

  My eyes pinch. “Yes. Thinking of her makes me sad. And my father feels distant. Out of my life or dead.” I swallow hard. “I’m alone. That’s why no one came looking for me.”

  His hands settle on my face. “You’re not alone. Not anymore.”

  “I might be a killer. You sure you want to keep me around?”

  “You are not a killer.”

  “I know what I remember.”

  “Which isn’t killing someone, unless you’ve remembered something you haven’t told me.”

  “No. No, I haven’t, but Kayden—”

  “You aren’t a killer, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t kill him. Surviving is human nature.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut, and an image of me naked and tied to that bed flickers in my mind. “I was trying to survive.”

  His finger slides under my chin and I look at him. “Can you talk about it?” he prods softly.

  My chest tightens again and I roll to my back, facing the ceiling. “I know I lost my passport and money. I met him and I have no idea where or how. I just remember he let me stay with him. He gave me my own room and I ended up in his.”

  “I do not like how familiar that sounds.”

  I roll to face him again, curling my fingers at his jaw. “It’s not. I mean, it is, but different. You’re different. What is between us, whatever it is, isn’t like what I had with him. I’m not infatuated with you and you don’t treat me like you’re on a pedestal looking down on me or that I’m your subject who should be so very pleased to have your good graces. You’re real in a way he never was, and I know that I’m real with you in a way I couldn’t be with him. Maybe … I’m able to be real because I don’t know what to hide.”

  “We all hide from things.”

  “Including you?”

  “Yes. Including me.” I want him to go on, to explain the torment I sense in him, but he doesn’t. He draws my hand in his and asks, “When I turned your back to me, you had a flashback. What was it?”

  I press my hand to my face, the demons of my past clawing at my mind.

  “If you don’t want to tell me—”

  “I do,” I say, dropping my hand to look at him. “He wins if I hide from this. And he can’t win.” I draw in a breath for courage. “He started out like a Prince Charming, until he wasn’t. You know he offered me a place to stay. I thought it was a fairy tale. But I remember the day it changed. I went out when he told me not to. When he returned home he was displeased. He stripped me naked and tied me to the bed and just left me there for hours. When we were … when you turned me around, I remembered another time when he turned me around and tied my hands behind my back.”

  He drags me closer, his leg twining with mine. “I’m sorry,” he says, his hand slipping under my hair, at my neck. “I won’t—”

  “Don’t say you won’t. Please. He wins again if you treat me like a delicate flower. And you’ll make me feel like I can’t tell you what I remember. You have to be you with me. That’s what I respond to. That’s what feels right. I mean, assuming you want—”

  “I do. Very much, Ella. I think you know that, and I won’t coddle you, but you have to promise me you’ll tell me if I hit a trigger.”

  “I did tonight. I will. I promise. Kayden, when he tied me up, he said it was punishment for not listening to him, but also said that he is very powerful and that his enemies would kill me because I was his. He sounds like Niccolo, doesn’t he?”

  “There are many men who have money and power. Just know this. Whoever he is, he’s not ever going to touch you again. You have my word.”

  For just a moment I’m back in that alleyway, and he’s leaning over me, the only good thing in the midst of the pain, with his spicy raw scent and those blue eyes. Don’t leave me, I’d whispered.

  “I remember you that night in the alleyway,” I whisper.

  “What about that night?”

  “I begged you not to leave me. You promised you wouldn’t.”

  “Yes. You did, and I did.” He brushes hair from my eyes, the touch tender. “And won’t. We’ll figure this all out together.”

  “I may never get to be Ella again.”

  “You are Ella.”

  “Ella lived in San Francisco, and I fear I will never fully remember her unless I return. But more so, I fear returning and putting others, like my friend Sara, in danger.”

  “If we need to go back for answers, we can do it without anyone knowing you’re there.”

  “We?”

  “I told you. We’ll figure this out together.”

  You are not alone, he’d said, and I think … I think he’s been alone a long time and I want to know why. “Where were you from before you moved here?”

  “Houston.”

  “Do you remember it?”

  “I remember it. I’ve been back. But mostly I remember my father. He is Houston to me.”

  “Your dad was a Hunter, you said?”

  “Yes. That’s how I started.” He gives a sad laugh. “And a regular cowboy. Boots. Jeans and pickup trucks. I still listen to country music.”

  “What country music?”

  “Jason Aldean. Luke Bryan. Keith Urban.”

  “Those people are fairly new on the scene. Well, not Keith Urban, but Jason Aldean and Luke Bryan.”

  “You know your country music.”

  My brow furrows. “I guess I do. Hmmm.” An image of my father working on a pickup truck, with music playing in the background, comes to me. “My father liked it, I think.” I shake off the thought that for some illogical reason makes me uncomfortable. It’s just music. I happily, eagerly refocus on Kayden. “We were talking about you. You’re more biker than cowboy.”

  “Biker.” His lips quirk sexily at the corners. “A few motorcycles does not make me a ‘biker.’ ”

  “Okay, maybe that was the wrong choice of words. Rebel is more like it. Or wild card. Very dangerous.”

  “Dangerous? Is that what you still think of me?”

  “Your own words.”

  “Yes,” he agrees, his voice tight. “My own words.”

  I wait for him to explain. He doesn’t, but nor do I sense the wall between us as I have in the past, so I cautiously push for more. “And your mother. What did she do?”

  “Music teacher.”

  “Music teacher?” I whisper, a shadow of a memory stirring in my mind.

  “Memory?”

  I shake my head. “No.”

  “You don’t sound certain.”

  “I get feelings sometimes but I don’t know what they mean.” I refocus on
him. “I don’t know why, but I’m afraid to ask the next question.”

  “You want to know about my sister?”

  “Yes.”

  “She was eight. We’d had a fight right before they were murdered.”

  “All siblings fight, and you were kids.”

  “But most of them don’t have to remember that as the last moment the other was alive.” He shuts his eyes a moment, the lines of his face harder now, tighter, and when he looks at me again, he’s done talking. “Let’s go to sleep.”

  “Did I upset you?”

  “No.”

  No means yes. I feel it. “I’m sorry.”

  He rolls me to my back, leaning over me. “You’re the one who’s dangerous. You make me—”

  A loud buzzing sounds from the corner of the room and Kayden stiffens, cursing under his breath and throwing off the blanket. He is off the bed and pulling on his jeans by the time I sit up, clutching the blanket to me and noting the sound seems to be confined to a corner of the room. “What is that?”

  He shoves his legs in his pants. “Security system. Someone breached the castle perimeter.”

  I glance at the clock, realizing it’s three a.m., and I’m suddenly afraid that I’ve brought trouble to Kayden’s doorstep. Maybe he’s right. Maybe I am dangerous.

  thirteen

  The alarm continues to sound, a constant buzzing contained to this room. “Does that mean someone’s breaking into the castle?” I ask as Kayden yanks his shirt over his head and I scramble to the ground to snatch up my own and slip it on, reminded I have no buttons or panties.

  “They aren’t inside yet,” he says, grabbing his black lace-up boots and walking to the fireplace, where he punches a button by the mantel. To my shock, a panel beside it opens. He disappears inside and the alarm stops, assumedly by his hand. I quickly follow, entering what appears to be a surveillance room, to find him sitting at a long, built-in desk in front of a row of monitors showing various parts of the castle.

  He curses and scrubs his jaw, his urgency turning to agitation.

  “What is it?” I ask. “What’s happening?”

  He indicates a monitor showing a woman hunched over by the front door. “It’s Adriel’s sister, Giada. She appears to be at the front door of the west tower, throwing up, when her passcode is for the east tower.” Relief washes over me that it’s nothing more serious. “Adriel’s off with some woman tonight, so she clearly didn’t want to call him. I told you. She’s a mess.” He stands. “I need to go get her.”

  “Should I come? Maybe a woman can help?”

  “She doesn’t know you and she’s prone to outbursts, so stay put.” He grabs me and pulls me to him. “And be naked when I get back.” He kisses me, hard and fast. “Understand?”

  I smile, pleased that he wants me to stay. “Yes. Understood.”

  His lips curve. “Good.” He releases me and exits the security room, and I claim the seat in front of the panel to discover Giada sitting with her knees at her chest, rocking back and forth. My heart aches for this young woman so obviously heartbroken; she really is “messed up,” as Kayden had called her. The bedroom door opens and shuts, signaling Kayden’s departure. I glance at the various views of the castle and back to Giada, and immediately get to my feet at the sight of a man rushing toward her.

  “Gallo,” I whisper in shock. I yank my shirt together and dart across the bedroom. I pull open the door and start yelling, “Kayden! Kayden!” I’m at the top of the stairs, looking down over the railing, as he starts running back in my direction.

  “Gallo is with Giada.”

  He stops in place. “Holy fuck. What the hell is he doing here?” He points up at me. “Stay where you are.” He turns and takes off down the stairs and I stand there a minute in stunned disbelief. What the hell is Gallo doing here? And why am I standing here when I could be watching the action on the monitors? I take off running again, my feet brutalized by the cold, hard stone floor, but I don’t slow. Finally, I’m in the bedroom and back at the monitors, letting the shirt gape as I watch what is happening.

  Giada is still on the ground, on her knees, and I watch Kayden reach the porch. She starts screaming at him, but Kayden doesn’t react, focusing solely on Gallo, the two men stepping toe-to-toe, looking like they are about to come to blows. I reach for the keypad to the MacBook connected to the cameras and try to figure out if I can get volume, with zero success. Gallo waves a hand at Giada and then points at Kayden, and I’ve heard enough of the war between these two men to know Gallo is blaming Kayden for the mess that Giada is in. I hold my breath, fearful of how this will end. While I am certain Kayden is a man of control, not easily rattled, I am equally certain this trait will infuriate Gallo and drive his actions to who knows where.

  As if proving I am right, Gallo throws his hands in the air and starts walking away. Kayden watches him until he is long gone, only then focusing his attention on Giada, who either starts screaming at him again or never stopped. Thank goodness the place is too big for next-door neighbors to hear. Not even Marabella has surfaced with the disturbance, though I’m fairly certain that will change once they enter Giada’s tower. Kayden reaches for her and she starts kicking and punching him. Lord help that man, she is testing him, and still he doesn’t become rough with her. He patiently snags her arm, I’m guessing to wait for the effects of the alcohol to deplete her surprising supply of energy.

  I stand up, wanting to go to him and help, but I know better. He’s right. She’s a mess and I very well might make it worse. Still, she is kicking the crap out of him and my fist goes to my mouth as I watch the hellish struggle he’s having with her, until finally, he’s had enough. He picks her up and throws her over his shoulder and enters the house. I switch to another screen to watch as she continues to punch at his back, brutalizing him as he punches in a code for the east tower, and the dungeon door seems to take forever to open. Apparently impatient—and who can blame him?—he ducks under it and I sit back down and wait, and wait some more, but he doesn’t exit. Activity appears on one of the monitors as Adriel’s Rolls-Royce pulls into the drive, and I’m wondering if Kayden called him on the way downstairs or if Adriel’s in for a fun surprise. Either way, I have a feeling Kayden isn’t going to be back anytime soon.

  My mind goes to Gallo, who was surely watching the house, and I’m not sure if he’s protecting me or stalking me. I’m not even sure this is about me at all, but rather about hurting Kayden. His hyper-focus on either one or both of us scares me and, while I know he’s whatever Italy’s version of a detective is, something feels off. Very, very off. Kayden was worried about insiders working for Niccolo in the police department. Could Gallo be an insider? Surely not, or Kayden would be more worried about him. Still … maybe Kayden doesn’t want to freak me out, so he hasn’t expressed that concern.

  I grab the pad and paper sitting on the desk and write Gallo on it. Then I underline it. I’m not sure why. I just need to make my mind work. Then I write Niccolo. I underline it as well and wait for either name to really mean anything to me, but they just don’t. Niccolo can’t be him. I don’t know his name or his image. I start writing again and the name I end up with on the page is David.

  “David?” I whisper. “Who the heck is David?” Images start to flicker in my mind and I see myself standing in a hotel. I write down Hotel and underline it. It feels important. I’m in a hotel, and this David person is there. He’s tall, blond, refined, and good looking, but he’s not him. I write that down: Not Him. I shut my eyes. I see him and his face clearly. I’m yelling at him. “We were supposed to elope and we can’t even legally get married here.”

  My eyes pop open. Elope? My hand goes to my throat. How many men were in my life? I didn’t even love that man. I force myself to think, closing my eyes again. We keep fighting, but this time I can’t hear the words we’re speaking. I just see and feel the anger between us, my hands swiping in the air, his jabbing at his hips. He takes a call, as though it’s more impor
tant than our conversation, and he ends the call and leaves. Just … leaves. My mind tracks forward in time, and I have a sense of hours having passed. I’m pacing the room and he hasn’t returned. Something isn’t right. He’s not who he says he is.

  I open my eyes and write that down. Not who he says he is. I stare at the paper. “He wasn’t who he said he was,” I whisper, and one certainty comes to me. David is how I ended up turning to him for help. I went from one evil to another. David left me. He betrayed me, but I don’t know how or why. I blink, and I’m drawing another butterfly. Why am I drawing another butterfly? It’s ridiculous. No wonder my head is starting to hurt, an unwelcome reminder that I need to go to my room and get my pills.

  I push to my feet, closing my shirt around me, and exit the security hideaway to enter the bedroom. Pausing in the archway, I stare at the room that is as masculine as the man who owns it, replaying the way he’d touched me. The way he’d kissed me. The way he is somehow demanding and controlling, and yet gentle, even tender. What he makes me feel is the polar opposite of what the man in my flashbacks does, to the point where I don’t know how I could have ever considered them to be the same. I’m not sure I really did. The two of them create intense feelings in me. But David? No. I don’t understand how I let him into my life.

  My eyes catch on my hoodie and I pull it on, zipping it up to hold my shirt shut. Next come my slippers, and I hurry to the door, eager to take my medicine before I end up in troubled waters again. I hurry to the door and crack it open, listening for any activity, disappointed to find only the same old moans and creaks, now becoming as familiar to me as Kayden has always been.

  I step into the hallway, the chill of the castle touching my bare legs, urging me to double-step toward my room. Once I’m inside, I rush to the bathroom and grab my purse, opening it and staring at that damn gun again. “Glock 41 Gen4,” I whisper. “My father’s favorite handgun.” My hand presses to my forehead. He loves guns. Or he loved guns. I don’t know which for sure. He was—is?—a gun enthusiast, of that I know, and he expected me to be as well. He made me go to the gun range. I have a momentary flashback of myself at a target range, and him yelling at me for my horrible shooting. He got angry when I couldn’t hit the targets. Very angry, and so I got very, very good with a gun. A wave of nausea rushes over me and I double over, grabbing the edge of the sink. I start breathing hard, sucking in air with effort.