His Property (Book Four)

by Hannah Ford

  The way Liam had driven here – fast and reckless -- had guaranteed that we would be here before they were.

  But Vienna and Drew were there, standing by the railing that curved around the entire boat.

  Vienna looked like a goddess, in a long white dress spun through with gold strands. Thin, braided gold straps rested against her shoulders, her body elegant and sanguine, like a gazelle.

  Drew stood next to her, strong and intimidating in a dark tuxedo, his hand resting on her hip.

  “There you are!” Vienna said, her eyes lighting when she saw Liam. “I was texting you.”

  She was texting him? I glanced at Liam, anger flooding through me at the way he could text whoever he wanted, and meanwhile, my conversations with Maddie, who had been my friend forever, were monitored like she was some kind of criminal.

  “Nice to see you, cousin,” Drew said, taking a sip from the glass he was holding. It was filled with champagne, a sparkly kind with a strawberry in the middle. “You look nice, Emery,” he said, leaning in to kiss both my cheeks, and I let him, enjoying the way Liam’s jaw twitched.

  As I pulled away from Drew, I caught a glimpse of a tiny bruise that grazed his chin, and I wondered if Liam had put it there last night.

  Drew saw me looking at it, and his eyes narrowed, like he was trying to figure out if I knew he and Liam had been fighting the night before. And yet there was a calmness there, too, almost like he wanted me to know, or didn’t really give a shit if I did. I quickly averted my eyes to his champagne glass.

  “That looks delicious,” I said. It was really just an excuse to stop him from wondering what I was looking at, but as I said it, I realized I was telling the truth. I badly wanted a drink.

  “Yeah, well, you can tell Annabelle picked the drinks.” He drained the rest of his glass. “Malcolm would never stand for this frou frou shit.”

  “There was a waiter wandering around passing them out,” Vienna offered.

  I glanced around, but I didn’t see anyone.

  “Emery won’t be drinking tonight,” Liam said.

  “Yes, I will,” I said, making sure to keep my voice light. “I just need to find someone with a tray of champagne.”

  Vienna’s lips twitched into a tiny smile, as if she were enjoying the fact that there was tension between me and Liam, and her blue eyes fell to the space between us, where she watched as Liam’s hand tightened around mine. “There’s a bar downstairs,” Vienna said. “I’d be happy to take you down there, Emery.”

  “That sounds great,” I said.

  I hated her in that moment. Something about her just rubbed me the wrong way -- how she acted so cool and above it all, and I just hated that there were things about Liam she knew that I didn’t.

  But my desire for a drink and to show Liam that I wasn’t beholden to his every whim overrode my distaste for Vienna.

  So I followed her down a winding staircase to the lower level of the boat. The bar was situated in a huge room that was dotted with sophisticated black leather sofas. The bar took up one whole side of the boat, and bottles of alcohol were lined up against a mirror which had the disconcerting appearance of reflecting the ocean back on itself, like it went on forever.

  Through the windows on the other side of the boat, the ocean sparkled, spread out in front of us like a jeweled runway.

  Beneath us, every few feet, parts of the carpet were cut out, replaced by circles of glass, so that you could see through to the water below. It made walking hard – it gave a disconcerting feeling, almost like you were constantly stepping off an elevator or something, that same kind of dizzy vertigo hitting you with every step.

  “It’s so you can look at the fish later,” Vienna explained. “When we get farther away from shore. Not like anyone on the boat does it. It’s gauche.”

  “That seems silly,” I said. “Missing out on seeing something beautiful because you might look silly.”

  “They won’t miss out, Em,” she said, intentionally shortening my name as she glided to the bar. And it wasn’t in a cute way, either, not like she wanted to use a nickname in an effort to forge a connection between us. No, sbe said it like she was trying to make me sound old-fashioned, like I was Auntie Em from the goddamn Wizard of Oz or some shit. “Most of us have been on scuba trips that make looking through a hole kind of anti-climatic.”

  I ignored the dig and ordered a glass of moscato from the bartender, regretting it when I realized it was the same drink I’d ordered at the casino, when I’d met that man who’d accosted me. But I didn’t care. I needed a drink, and I hated the taste of wine. Moscato was bubbly and sweet, just the kind of thing you could drink and not feel like you were drinking alcohol until your head was too fuzzy to care.

  Vienna ordered a dry white wine, something fancy and French that I couldn’t pronounce.

  I set my credit card down on the bar, but when the bartender returned with our drinks, he looked at it and frowned.

  “It’s open bar, Em,” Vienna said snidely.

  Which she could have told me before he brought the drinks.

  “Oh,” I said casually, as if I didn’t care about my faux pas. I took a sip of my drink and tried to pretend like my face wasn’t flaming.

  Smartly dressed people wandered by on the boat, some of them nodding or saying hello to Vienna, but she made no move to introduce me.

  “So,” she said. “Have you talked to Liam?”

  “About?”

  “About investing in his father’s company.”

  “Liam makes his own decisions,” I said. “You should know that.”

  “How should I know that?” she asked, and for the first time, she seemed a little rattled. There was nothing overt about it. Her voice didn’t crack, but there was something there, something pulsing below the surface. She didn’t like thinking that maybe Liam and I had talked about her. I could tell.

  “Isn’t that why you came to the plane the other night?” I asked. “So you could try to convince him to get back together with you?”

  “Is that what he told you?” She laughed. “I’m sorry, Em, if he made you feel insecure, but I’m with Drew now.”

  “Yes, you guys seem so in love,” I said snidely, taking a sip of my drink. The long gulp went down smooth. This was some good wine, the kind of wine I’d never had before, the kind of wine that probably cost something obscene per glass, the kind of wine that could definitely get me drunk.

  “We are,” Vienna said, just as snidely. “Of course, it’s like that when you have a history with someone. Liam, Drew, and I all grew up together. But I’m sure Liam told you that.”

  “I assumed,” I said, “since Drew is his cousin.”

  “Then you know about what happened between the three of us?”

  I stayed silent, and my eyes fell onto my credit card, which was still sitting on the bar. My hands craved something to do, but I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of seeing me pick it up, like it was something to be embarrassed about.

  “Of course,” I said.

  Her eyes narrowed into little beads, and her mouth pulled into a thin line. “I really doubt it,” she said. “Because if he told you what happened, you wouldn’t be standing here talking to me.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re so blinded by love for him that you’d believe him,” she said. “That’s how it always is with the women he dates. They don’t know how to handle him.” She swigged back the rest of her wine in one fluid movement, then signaled the bartender. “Red this time, please.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, my heart pounding. Suddenly, I felt claustrophobic, like I needed to get out of there. “Anyway, I should probably get back upstairs. Liam will be waiting for me.” I grabbed my credit card and turned to leave.

  But Vienna reached out and grabbed my arm, pulled me back toward her. “Listen and listen good,” she said. “I don’t know what exactly is going on between you and Liam. I do know that Liam sure as
hell didn’t meet you asking for directions, and I also know there’s no way he told you anything about his past. That honor is reserved for the people who lived it.”

  “That may be true,” I said, wrenching myself out of her grasp. She may have been beautiful and rich, but physically she was no match for me, and I took delight in the look on her face as I pulled away from her with ease. “But there’s a reason he’s here with me and not you.”

  “The reason, Emery, is because he’s in denial. Like I said, I don’t know why he’s picked you to be the one he might listen to, but if you care about him at all, you’ll talk to him about investing in his father’s business.”

  “If I care about him at all, I’ll let him make up his own mind.”

  “You don’t understand,” she said, and now she seemed very upset, very mad, almost like a feral animal. “This is important.” She grabbed at me again, her nails digging into my skin, and when I tried to pull away, they scraped against my skin, causing scratches and scant lines of blood to appear.

  “Let go of me,” I said, and when I turned, I saw Liam’s mother coming down the stairs.

  At the sight of Annabelle, Vienna let me go, and I stumbled toward the stairs, falling when I reached the bottom. I heard the crowd of people who were huddled around the bar gasp, but no one moved to help me.

  “What did you do?” I heard Annabelle demand of Vienna.

  “She’s useless,” Vienna said. “She’s not going to help.”

  I straightened up and rushed up the stairs.

  My phone was buzzing when I got to the top, and I fumbled in my purse for it.

  A text.

  From Maddie.

  I’m sorry, Emery, but I have to block you. Please don’t contact me again.

  I cried out, both from the shock and horror of the text, and from the fact that I could finally get a good look at the scratches Vienna had left on my arm, which were now bleeding angrily.

  Maddie had never sent a text like that to me, had never just given up on me. Even during our worst fights, she’d never, ever, shut me out. She’d never refused to talk to me, to try to figure it out. It was the thing I loved about her and our friendship, one of the things that bonded us together.

  The boat began to move away from the shore, and I felt panic rising inside of me.

  I needed to get away from here, needed to get away from this boat, from these people, from this life.

  I searched for Liam, and when I saw him leaning over the side rail, my heart caught, that familiar feeling clutching and clawing at my heart.

  I loved him.

  That’s what I’d told him, and I meant it.

  But I couldn’t do this anymore.

  He looked up, as if he could sense my presence, and he rushed toward me.

  “Emery,” he said. “What happened?”

  “I want to go home,” I said. “Please, I just… I need to go home. Back to New York, please, I want…”

  The rest of my words were drowned out by the sound of Malcolm tapping his knife against a glass.

  “Attention, please,” he said, and everyone looked up to see him on the upper level of the yacht, standing on a balcony overlooking us.

  The crowd around us cheered, as if he were a king coming out to hold court.

  “I’d like to welcome everyone here tonight and thank you for coming to celebrate. This is a very special night, because not only are we celebrating our current success, but my son Liam has just announced that he will be partnering with me on expanding our current franchise into the Pacific Northwest!”

  The crowd gasped and clapped, and a man with a press badge turned his attention to Liam and snapped a picture.

  “What?” I asked, confused. I looked up at Liam, watched as his jaw set in a tense line. Why would Vienna have been asking me to talk to Liam if he’d already agreed to invest in his father’s business?

  Unless he hadn’t.

  I studied Liam’s face, could sense the fury pulsing underneath his perfectly arranged features.

  He obviously hadn’t agreed to invest in his father’s business. Instead, Malcolm had taken it upon himself to make that announcement, knowing that if he said it in front of everyone, Liam would be forced to do it.

  Liam was furious. But he stayed quiet, obviously not wanting to make a scene.

  But I was past that point.

  “No, he didn’t,” I said, yelling up to Malcolm. “He didn’t say he would partner with you. He didn’t want to.”

  “Emery,” Liam said, and I felt him grabbing my arm, but I shook him off. The crowd was murmuring now, slowly getting wind of what was going on as I continued my outburst.

  “You made that up,” I said. “He doesn’t want to partner with you, but for some reason you think that you can just say that he does, and that will make it true. It’s not true.”

  The crowd was gasping now, their voices getting louder, and Malcolm looked confused, like he wasn’t sure what to do.

  He laughed, like he was trying to make it out like I was playing some kind of joke, but it wasn’t a joke.

  Not to me.

  These people might have been committed to their secrets and their lies and their demons.

  But I wasn’t going to be a part of it.

  Not anymore.

  “Emery Waters, everyone,” Malcolm said. “Liam’s lady friend. Apparently she hasn’t gotten the memo that Liam doesn’t share details of his business with everyone.”

  The crowd nervously tittered, and my eyes locked on Malcolm’s.

  I saw the fury on his face, saw that it was directed at me, like hot lightning that I could feel burning through my body. And for the first time since I’d gotten here, I was afraid of him. Very afraid of him.

  He raised his glass to his lips, and I watched as he flicked his other wrist at a burly security guard, who was standing on the side of the boat.

  The guard started moving his way toward me, but Liam stepped in his path. “Don’t you fucking touch her,” he growled.

  I didn’t know where they were going to take me, what they were going to do. We were on a fucking boat, for God’s sake. It wasn’t like they could kick me off.

  I ran toward the other end of the boat, and watched as the Palm Bay Yacht Club glittered on the short, only about fifty yards away.

  It wasn’t too late.

  I knew how to swim.

  I stood on the railing, took a deep breath, and jumped.

  10

  The water was cold.

  No, it was freezing.

  The kind of freezing that knocked the breath out of you, the kind of cold that seized your chest and made your toes numb.

  It was so unexpected that for a moment, I was paralyzed.

  It wasn’t just the cold. It was also the vastness of the ocean.

  The closest I’d come to swimming in open water was a lake, and it was nothing like the water of the ocean. The ocean water felt lighter, expansive somehow, and I could taste the salt on my lips, could almost feel it seeping through my skin.

  I was sinking, and for a moment, I couldn’t tell which way was up.

  Then my feet hit against the soft sand of the bottom, and I pushed myself up toward the light.

  When I broke through the water, I was already facing toward the yacht club and the shore, away from the actual yacht. I didn’t turn around – I didn’t want to see all of them looking at me, watching me, wondering why the crazy girl had jumped off the boat.

  Instead, I sliced my arms through the water and began to swim.

  I was so intent on not looking back that when Liam’s hand grabbed my ankle, I screamed and tried to kick him off.

  “Jesus, Emery, stop fighting,” he said, and then his arms were around my waist, pulling me toward him.

  “Leave me alone,” I said. “I can swim just fine.”

  He ignored me, instead holding me close to him with one arm while he guided us to shore with the other.

  Once we hit water shallow enough to stan
d up in, I pushed him away and began to walk toward the shore.

  People on the beach were pointing and staring – I couldn’t even imagine how I looked, my hair matted to my face, my couture gown ruined – but I didn’t care.

  All I cared about was getting away from here, getting away from him.

  I wasn’t sure where I was going to go or what I was going to do, and I really didn’t want to have to walk through the lobby of the Palm Bay Golf And Yacht Club in my current condition.

  There was no way around it, though – the sides of the club were flanked by tall bushes, all of them expertly manicured.

  So in order to get out of the club, I had to go through it.

  “Emery,” Liam said from behind me. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

  “Away from you,” I growled. I was like a woman possessed, and I pulled open the door at the back of the club and began walking through the lobby toward the front entrance.

  Behind me, I was dimly aware of Liam pulling out his phone, calling for his car, his shoes making slushing noises on the marble.

  I’d lost one of my shoes in the ocean, and it wasn’t making it hard to walk, so I reached down and pulled the other one off.

  The hotel was quiet this time of day – it was after check-in and too late for golf, so most people were out to dinner or events. As a result, the only weird looks I got were from two middle-aged women, both of them Botoxed and tanned to perfection.

  When they saw Liam rushing after me, one of them whispered something to the other.

  “Say it to my face!” I yelled at them as I barreled toward the front doors. It was a ridiculous thing to say, but I didn’t care.

  Once I was out in the front of the club, standing on the cobblestones, I reached for my phone.

  Shit.

  My phone.

  It had been in my purse when I’d jumped into the ocean, and I remembered having a moment where I’d thought to myself that I should raise my hands up over my head, to make sure my phone didn’t get ruined.

  But as soon as I hit the water any thoughts I’d had went out the window. Even if they hadn’t, I wouldn’t have been able to keep my phone safe anyway. There was no way – I’d sunk to the bottom of the ocean.