The Club Sin Series 4-Book Bundle

by Stacey Kennedy

  She drew in a deep breath, her eyes blazing with ire. “I’m so damn tired of Doms always thinking they know what is right for me. I don’t need you telling me who I am or what I am. I know who I am. I know exactly what I’m doing.”

  He arched a brow. “Do you?”

  “Yes, I do.” She glared. “I have been very clear with you that this is a casual encounter.”

  A muscle in his jaw flexed. “Charles is dead.” His voice sounded ice-cold even to his ears. “I’m here.”

  Big tears filled her eyes, and he didn’t know if those were out of anger or sadness. “You’re right, Charles is dead. Yes, I thought of him when I was with you, because it’s all I know. If being with me, in a casual way, isn’t enough for you, then that is your problem, not mine.”

  Those words nearly sent Elliott to his knees. The force of them struck him right in the chest. In part for sadness for her, because it only showed how grief still affected her. Here was something so damn special between them, a connection that she had clearly experienced with Charles now had been repeated, though she couldn’t see past her pain. She couldn’t see that Elliott made her feel something that was as perfect as what she’d experienced with her husband. She didn’t think she deserved to be loved again, or that it was her right to.

  The other reason his muscles quivered was because he didn’t deserve those words. He’d been nothing but caring toward her. By all appearances, he was disposable to her. “You’re right, Mary, that is my problem.”

  He grabbed his blazer off the chair and then approached the door. His hand grasped the brass handle and he drew in a long breath before he turned to her, seeing tears rolling down her cheeks. “A problem that I can choose not to have in my life.” Then he whipped open the door and walked out, ignoring his heart, which begged him to go back to her. With each step he took he remained unsure whom his anger was directed at.

  Mary, for letting him taste the life he’d longed for.

  Or himself, for believing that he’d actually found it.

  —

  Just before eleven o’clock, Mary entered the busy restaurant in Times Square, spotting Cassie sitting at a table near the window. The sun shone through, lighting her daughter up, and only seemed to grow deeper when her daughter smiled.

  But Mary couldn’t find her smile, as shame spread through her for what she’d done to Elliott. Mind-numbing confusion raced alongside of it. She felt right in her choice to keep things with Elliott casual, yet, at the same time, it also seemed so very wrong.

  Mary watched Cassie rise from her seat, and she leaned in to kiss her daughter’s cheek. “How was the partying last night?” she asked.

  Cassie rubbed her eyes, which had dark circles beneath them, and dropped back into her chair. “Exhausting, but fun.”

  Mary took her seat. “Tired nights usually are the best.”

  Before Cassie could reply, the young waitress strode over and asked, “May I get you drinks?”

  “I’ll take a tea,” Mary replied.

  Cassie added, “A Coke for me, please.”

  When the waitress left, Cassie pushed out of her chair. “Okay, I’ve smelled that buffet since I walked in. I’m starving. Let’s eat.”

  Mary followed her daughter to the buffet, and took a plate off the warmer. She grabbed a cucumber sandwich and added some summer salad. As Cassie took anything that wasn’t nearly as healthy to her plate, Mary finally smiled. Her daughter ate like her father had, a lover of meat and anything deep-fried. “At some point, you are going to have to eat healthy,” she said.

  “I’ll eat healthy when I’m old and can’t enjoy food like this,” Cassie mused, grabbing a few desserts. “Right now, my body lets me devour junk without putting on weight, so why not enjoy it while I can?”

  “You’ll regret that line of thinking when you’re older and have formed terrible eating habits.” Mary remembered a time when she could eat whatever she wanted without having to care, but now things were different. She needed to watch what she ate and also walked as much as possible.

  When she thought about it, it was so crazy how fast time went by. Too fast to let time just pass one by, she thought. As she strode toward the table, her steps faltered before she righted herself; she used to live by the live-life-to-the fullest philosophy.

  In her younger years, she even got into an erotic lifestyle because it made her happy. She went into medicine instead of law when her father would’ve preferred law. Doing everything and anything she had wanted to do, on her terms.

  Mary was like her daughter, vivacious.

  With a heavy heart, she realized now how much she’d changed from that vibrant woman she’d once been. Her body felt weighed down as she returned to the table and took a seat.

  When Cassie joined her, her daughter asked, “Have you heard from Christian at all?”

  Mary nodded, placing her napkin on her lap. “He sent an e-mail yesterday and they’re in Egypt, traveling there for a couple weeks.”

  “He’s so lucky,” Cassie said, cutting up her fried chicken.

  “You could join him.” Mary picked up her cucumber sandwich. “Now that the show is done, why don’t you go away for a couple weeks to see him?” She took a bite of the sandwich and relished the sweet mayo.

  Cassie shrugged, talking with her mouth full. “I considered it, but the director is doing another show in a month and has offered me one of the roles in it.” Continuing to chew, she added, “It’s too good of an opportunity to pass up.”

  Mary smiled in understanding. She was proud of all her children, as all three were doing so well in life. While Christian hadn’t set down roots, he was madly in love with his girlfriend. They’d saved for three years while working at the casino before giving up their jobs to travel for a year. It wasn’t the traditional way, but if Mary wanted anything for her children, she wanted them to be happy and doing what they loved.

  Charles wouldn’t have agreed, of that Mary was sure. She suspected he would’ve wanted Christian to go into a traditional job, as was Calvin’s path in life, following in his father’s footsteps toward business.

  Charles isn’t here.

  Life is so damn short.

  Having her kids living out their dreams was all that mattered anymore. Now Mary wondered why she hadn’t thought of doing that for herself. She wasn’t sure when she’d decided to stop living or, more to the point, to live only for other people.

  Her thoughts oddly went to Elliott. He’d given more to her life in just a couple weeks than she’d received in the last four years. What he told her last night echoed in her ears: “You’re too personable to be spending so much time alone, darlin’. Others are missing out, not having you in their lives.”

  The old her was that woman.

  She pondered now how Elliott had seen that side of her, when she was anything but that woman anymore. She had gone to his play party to connect with that side of herself again, and she realized now she had. Even more so, Elliott had helped draw that woman out.

  Dark sadness overtook her, making her swallow deeply. God, how she’d treated him with such disrespect when he’d been nothing but caring toward her. And it was exactly that—entirely disrespectful that she’d thought of another Dom in his presence.

  Elliott hadn’t deserved that, and a soul-crippling sadness stormed into her.

  Mary blinked out of her thoughts as Cassie asked, “So, what did you do after the show?”

  She took a sip of the tea the waitress had left and didn’t enjoy the thought of lying to Cassie. Her lifestyle wasn’t something she and Charles had shared with their children. No one knew what they’d enjoyed in the bedroom. Some things were not for children to hear, no matter how close they were. “I went back to my hotel.”

  “Oh, wow, you are full of excitement,” Cassie muttered, rolling her eyes. “You come to New York City and hide away in your room. You need to get a life.”

  “I have a life, thank you very much,” Mary retorted in her defense. “A goo
d life.” Though Mary didn’t even believe herself now. Her life wasn’t as good as it could be, she knew that.

  Cassie raised her brows. “A boring life.”

  Mary ignored her daughter’s dig and asked, “This new show you’re going to be in, tell me about it.”

  Cassie examined her mother, then tightness formed in her expression. “Mom, why don’t you date?”

  “Cassie,” Mary grumbled.

  “No, seriously, why?”

  “Because I love your father,” Mary replied. “I have no interest in dating.”

  Cassie’s eyes turned bleak. “Aren’t you lonely?”

  Mary stared at her daughter, unsure of what to say. Cassie didn’t understand how deep her and Charles’s relationship was. The ownership it stood for. What it did to Mary when Charles died. “I am lonely sometimes, yes. But I have you three kids, which also includes a meddling daughter.”

  Cassie barked a laugh, though the deep sorrow in her gaze remained. “A daughter who loves you and thinks you shouldn’t spend your days alone. I know Dad wouldn’t care about that. He’d want you to be happy.”

  Mary again stared at her daughter, trying to find the words to explain. Absentmindedly, she touched her diamond necklace. She had pledged herself to Charles. She couldn’t imagine herself offering that vow to someone else. Her loyalty to Charles knew no bounds. “What your father and I had happens once, and I feel blessed I got to experience it.”

  Cassie’s eyelids lowered and she looked so much older and wiser than her years. “But if it happened once that means it can happen again.” She placed her hand over Mary’s, softening her voice. “If it was me in this situation, what would you tell me?”

  Mary hesitated, and then begrudgingly admitted, “I’d tell you that life is too short to spend it alone.” Her throat began to tighten as she added, “I would also tell you if you find someone who makes you feel loved, you don’t ever let them go, and to always keep living.”

  Cassie nodded. “Sounds like some good advice that you need to listen to.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  In Antonia’s, an upscale five-star Italian restaurant located in the Aces casino, Elliott shifted in his seat as the young man at the piano played a lovely tune. White linens covered the tabletops. Small candles gave the room a warm glow. Even though soft conversations were going on around him, he stayed more in his head than in the present.

  Four days had gone by in a blur since Elliott had last seen Mary. As the long days and nights passed, his mood had darkened with each minute drifting by. He leaned back in his chair and sipped his wine, frustration drowning him. He couldn’t decide if he’d done the right thing or made a terrible mistake by walking out on her. It seemed that having a piece of her was better than having nothing at all.

  Someone clearing her throat drew his focus. Elliott lifted his head to his sister, Ana, frowning at him from across the table. “Care to tell me what is wrong with you?” she asked.

  “I really must work on not being such an open book,” Elliott grumbled, playing with the steak on his plate that he always bought at their weekly Thursday-night dinner.

  “You haven’t said a word in five minutes.” Ana placed her elbows on the table, examining him with a long look. “What’s going on with you?”

  Part of him didn’t want to get into this with his little sister, but he also was damn tired of being in his own head. “I met someone.”

  Ana’s brows rose. “I take it from your mood that it hasn’t gone well.”

  Elliott had never shared details of his lifestyle with his sister. It was a conversation between family that wasn’t appropriate. “Clearly not.” For once, he thought his submissive had finally come to him. That he had found the perfect someone for him that he would always protect, but Mary didn’t belong to him.

  All that he’d witnessed was Mary’s love for another man. He saw what Charles had seen and what Charles had had in his life. What Elliott desired. He cursed fate for bringing him and Mary together. For showing him what he longed for, but keeping it out of his reach.

  Ana cocked her head, her eyes searching his. “So then, if you are this unhappy alone, why are you sitting here with me over dinner and not with this magical woman who has wooed you?”

  Elliott snorted. A very good question indeed. One he’d constantly asked himself over the last few days. He wanted to go to Mary, but he knew the reasons she’d shown him the emotional connection she had.

  What he thought was real between them was anything but.

  She remembered her love for Charles—her submission to him.

  Elliott knew he deserved to be loved and for a woman to be honest with him. Mary couldn’t possibly give him that. He was well aware that he had exploded out of anger and, more so, out of hurt that she hadn’t denied his accusation. “You can’t conquer a woman who has a broken heart from the death of her husband.”

  “Ah, yes, women are complicated beings,” his sister said with a small smile. “Yet we are also emotional creatures, too. Perhaps she is simply scared of a new relationship. Have you talked to her about that?”

  Did I?

  No, he’d lashed out in anger, he realized. He hadn’t asked Mary what she was going through, he only got angry that she didn’t see him, that she saw only Charles. “Perhaps I haven’t said as much as I should have.”

  Ana sipped her wine, then gave a firm nod. “Talk to her. Do what you do, learn about what the trouble is and fix it.” She grinned, tipping her wineglass at him. “Then I can have my brother back, instead of this miserable man.”

  His sister’s words instantly brushed across him. Ana had him pegged right down to the heart of it. In his professional life, he lived and breathed taking things that were broken and fixing them. His anger had made him see red. Now his thoughts cleared, and he was past that what Mary had done was insulting, it was quite possibly the best thing he’d ever seen.

  He wondered now if their connection could be faked, or did she simply feel something she had before? Something undeniably sensational. But he also considered if maybe she hadn’t truly mourned the loss of her husband. Perhaps she was confused, and that’s why she couldn’t admit she had feelings for Elliott. He even speculated now that her loyalty to Charles—a submissive’s vow to her Dom—might have made it impossible for her to move on, even if it was what would make her happy.

  Possibly it was exactly as Dmitri had said, “I think Mary has gotten so used to not thinking of herself, she forgets the way life used to be.”

  Though Elliott had seen the Mary that Charles had known, maybe Mary couldn’t see herself that way anymore since Charles had passed away. With stunning clarity, he realized that he couldn’t possibly be angry over her loyalty to her past Dom; he actually loved this trait in her.

  Elliott longed for Mary to show that type of loyalty to him.

  He recognized, a little foolishly, that Mary simply needed to put Charles to rest, but she didn’t know how to make that happen. He stared down at his plate, knowing he was too consumed by his emotions to realize all of this was about her. She was conflicted between the woman in the past to the woman he could see now. And, as she’d done from the first time he touched her, she needed him to guide her.

  Lifting his gaze to his sister, his lips parted to reply when a high voice cut in. “Hello, Elliott.”

  He glanced up and controlled the frown fighting to be unleashed on his face. “Kate.” His ex-wife was scantily dressed in a skintight dress that showed off the cleavage that he had paid for.

  Kate turned to Ana, giving a tight smile. “How are you, Ana? It’s been too long.”

  “Not long enough,” his sister replied, with hatred dripping off her voice. “You don’t look like you’ve aged much, but I see that your face isn’t moving. Has my brother’s money paid for that Botox?”

  Kate scowled.

  Elliott chuckled, unable to hide it. His sister had never liked Kate, not from day one. After their divorce and Kate’s fight to get j
ust about everything he owned from him, that loathing only worsened. Kate hadn’t been happy with a halfway split. She wanted everything he had. In the year after his divorce, since he became consumed with his work and had doubled his worth, Kate had attempted to get more.

  She hadn’t succeeded in her fight of greed.

  “Kate, our table is ready.”

  His ex-wife turned to her boy toy, who had to be at least twenty years younger, and she wrapped her arm in his. “Wonderful.” She glanced at Elliott and stared daggers at him. “I wanted to say hello. Enjoy your dinner.”

  “Be well, Kate.” Elliott had no love in his heart for the woman anymore. She was selfish and greedy. Worse than this, she branded herself as a submissive, but she was anything but that. She simply didn’t have a heart to give herself over that way.

  Not in the way that Mary had.

  As Kate left the table, Ana scoffed. “Still a bitch. Still after anything and everything to make her cold heart happy.”

  Elliott gulped his wine, not needing the reminder of Kate tonight. At fifty years old, his personal life was so off from what he wanted it to be. The clear-cut reminder that he was still very much alone.

  Ana finally sighed, flicking her long hair over her shoulder. “You know, no matter how miserable you are right now, things could be a lot worse.”

  Elliott arched a brow. “Worse how?”

  Ana gestured toward his ex-wife. “You could still be with that bitch.”

  His gaze slid to Kate and he watched her fawn all over her toy. He didn’t miss her, or what their marriage had been. Yet it was as if he stared at his life, which was so empty. Nothing had changed since he ended his marriage with Kate. He might be wealthier, but that was all he had to show for it.

  At one time that would’ve been enough. It wasn’t any longer.

  Elliott wanted more. He needed the woman who burned under his touch. “You’re right,” he said, turning to his sister. He raised his wineglass, tilting it toward her. Nothing like his sister putting things into perspective. “That life would be worse.”