Pink Lilies (Beautiful People Book 1)

by Lacee Hightower

Rain was coming down in sheets, so I set out a black sweater dress and knee-high, chocolate brown boots. The heels borderline hooker-heel high, I hoped I didn’t sink in the mud at the outdoor service. Or demolish my favorite boots.

  Chapter Six

  Alex

  Although the weather couldn’t have been much worse for a graveside-service-only funeral, the rain had at least stopped. Now that the front had passed over, we had mud and bitter cold wind to contend with. Weird for this time of year, I’d just used the air conditioning at home. Gotta love Texas weather.

  Underneath the tarp, I sat in the metal chair with my hands tucked under my legs, attempting to warm them, along with hiding the fact that they were shaking. I couldn’t figure out why Becca’s family opted for an open casket. It didn’t even look like her. She would have hated the way they had her hair styled.

  Sudden tapping on my leg brought me back to reality. The funeral was wrapping up and I hadn’t listened to one word the preacher had said.

  “Dad and I need to go speak to some of these people, Alex. Do you mind coming with us?”

  “Of course not, Mom.” Dad took my mom’s hand, helping her stand.

  “Alex Bohmann, is that you, dear?” Crap!

  I turned toward the raspy voice of my high school algebra teacher. “Ms. Morgan! It’s so nice to see you.”

  “I can’t tell you how sorry I am to hear about Becca. She was such a sweet girl and a delight to teach.”

  After sharing her condolences, we said our goodbyes and spoke to several other people as we headed back to the car. Nothing but headstones and silken flower arrangements leading to the parking area, something to the side of me caught my attention. The backside of a tall, dark-haired man wearing a long trench coat stepped into a black SUV, a feeling I knew him from somewhere sending a cold shiver through my spine. Dark sunglasses covered his eyes, and I only caught the side of his head before he closed the door.

  The next hours passed in a blur. The turnout for the funeral was larger than everyone anticipated, and after speaking to people I hadn’t seen in several years, I was thankful it was over. Irritated with myself for not recognizing two people I’d attended school with, my mom luckily handled that crisis for me. Miraculously, I’d held back my tears during the bulk of the service until the lid of the casket closed and they started up with the taped recording of Josh Groban singing “To Where You Are.” When all of this was said and done, I planned on letting Mom and Dad, and everyone I was close to, know that under no circumstances did I want a funeral when I died. No graveside service. No nothing. I didn’t want people crying over me and I sure didn’t want them looking at my stiff, unrecognizable, lifeless body in some metal box.

  ****

  Mom and Dad went to bed early after the church meal, and figuring I’d try and get some much-needed rest, too, my brain seemed to have other ideas. Once again, insomnia won out over sleep. Nothing but tossing and turning, I gave up and played Yahtzee on my phone for a while and checked my email. Come morning, I planned on calling Maci to see if she was familiar with any of these clubs, and if we could get in any of them without a membership. I had no idea if we could, but Maci loved the club life. But then, we were talking a whole different kind of club. How many were there in Tarrant County? The area was huge. I’d read enough erotica to know we probably wouldn’t be able to just walk through the door of a lot of these places, and they most definitely wouldn’t give up any information on members, even if we did somehow manage to get inside. Nevertheless, maybe we could get in some of them. Maybe somebody might know Becca. It was a stretch, but a start.

  My phone needing a charge, I plugged it in, briefly remembering the man in the black SUV. Could he have been the man Becca was seeing? Something about him still seemed eerily familiar. Probably an old schoolmate, I wondered if he could be Daniel Coker, the only real boyfriend Becca ever had. I’d probably never find out.

  Chapter Seven

  Tyler

  I grabbed a towel, wiping my face after a second round of pullups. My shoulders ached as I bent over to grab the remote and turn off the music. I couldn’t even remember how long I had been in here working out, but based on the amount of sweat dripping off my nose, it had probably been long enough.

  The small town of San Angelo didn’t have a decent airport so I’d driven my Land Rover to Becca’s funeral, the drive boring as fuck. But, I owed it to her to pay my final respects. My mother’s words from a day I didn’t care to ever relive came rushing back. “I’m not sure I want to be put in the ground when I die.” Burying my little sister had been the worst day of my life. Killed by a drunk driver, my family had never really recovered from her death. They never would. Well too familiar with the pain involved in losing a family member, recovery for Becca’s family wouldn’t be easy.

  Chief of Police in Topeka, Kansas, people in the small town were convinced my father was the perfect, upstanding model citizen and family man. Little did any of them know what a complete joke that ended up being. After my sister’s death, an unforeseen change took over my dad and he presumed to take his anger and depression out on me with his fist. In the beginning, I insisted he was fragile and grief-stricken, going through the worst time of his life. Eighteen and damn sure strong enough to protect myself, instead, I accepted the beatings. Three weeks before I was scheduled to leave for Texas to attend college and hopefully med school, he drunkenly walked in my room telling me I was nothing but a disappointment and proceeded to break my jaw.

  Something in me gave that night. I snapped, taking my father down and beating him within inches of his life, which hadn’t turned out to be the last time that would happen. My mother’s crying and pleading to stop probably saved the sorry bastard’s life.

  Little was I to know at the time that he had been abusing my younger brother, Mason. Exactly three days after I’d had my jaw broken, I walked into the muted screams of my kid brother being held down as the old man’s cock was halfway up his ass. Not only was dear ole dad an abusive motherfucker, he was also a rapist.

  Karma being a bitch, he presently lived in a home in Kansas, wasting away in the last stages of Alzheimer’s. Mason sat home in his own world of silent misery, never the same mentally, while my mother spent her days either volunteering at the hospital or just doing things with Mason. Thankful she’d found something to make her happy, as for my dad, I didn’t give a flying fuck.

  Mason never speaking much after that day, he spent the bulk of his time in his own quiet world playing computer games, surfing the web, or building creations with Legos. Therapy hadn’t helped my brother. In and out of the best known psychiatric offices for years, my mom made the decision to stop putting him the process after a while. He refused to speak a word to any of them and only became agitated during the visits. With a psychological trauma of this nature, the doctors said only time would tell. He could possibly snap out of it all in one day. Or not. So far, there had been no changes.

  In the beginning, my dad was a great father. Plenty of family barbecues, throwing the football, vacations, and everything else that normal families did. Then, on a night home from an eighth grade football game, Carly and two other cheerleaders got into the car with two older guys we’d known our entire lives. Little did anyone know that would be my little sister’s last day on this earth. Broadsided by a drunken driver hauling a U-Haul trailer, she and the driver of the car were both killed instantly. As we all tried healing from the tragedy, my father was unable to move on.

  Now, I couldn’t be sure of the reasons, but being married and having three-point-five kids just wasn’t something I envisioned in my future. What seemed normal for most came across as alien in my perception. Maybe I should have paid a crap load of money to listen to a therapist get his rocks off by telling me I was messed up. Probably a shrink’s dream come true, I’d never gone that route and started my life with an entirely different logic. College… Med school… Money… Women.

  One thing my parents had blessed me with was a nice
college fund. Always ambitious, I was fortunate enough to attend a good school and graduated with honors, knowing exactly what scope of medicine I planned on studying. Voted Best Cosmetic Surgeon in Dallas the last three years, I loved my line of work and ultimately lived very comfortably. By and by, I led a damn good life.

  Buying into Venture as a silent partner was something I’d done on pure thoughtless impulse. Justin’s loyalty coupled with our similar adult lifestyles, were only a couple of the reasons he’d remained my closest friend since childhood. The only family he had, he’d certainly been there to walk me through the worst experience of my life, even considering the fact his own childhood had been way more fucked up than mine. Helping him start up the club was my way of paying the favor back.

  Venture was his place. Now that he was successful, I only helped him with the numbers, and even that was rare. In the beginning, I visited often, but quickly realized the club atmosphere wasn’t for me. With a high-profile job that meant everything, I couldn’t take the risks that were involved. I honestly hoped to sell my part in the place in the near future and be done with the whole experience.

  Interestingly enough, Justin was an excellent business man and had the place set up with some pretty compelling features, raking in more than enough money to give himself a spectacular life. One of the setups he had was a special room where everyone who went in for the evening had to wear a mask with only small slits for the eyes and nose. Those that went into The Mystery Room were normally looking for nothing but pure hardcore, no-strings-attached sex with a stranger, and anything could go down. Yet the rules were that nobody in the room was allowed to remove their masks, exchange names, addresses, or any other kind of personal information. I’d visited the room in the beginning. It was where I met Katherine. Even though masks and names weren’t exchanged, her obvious red hair and large green eyes, along with the birthmark across the top of her left arm, were a dead giveaway the next time I saw her in the club. The only woman that I’d actually been in a relationship with for over three months, she was genuinely more of a Dominatrix than a submissive. It wouldn’t have ever worked long-term for us.

  Before Becca, the bulk of my visits to the club were mainly to go over the books and see Justin. But once we met, the trips became more frequent. She loved the place. And the whole concept of Dominance and submission. Days before we ended our relationship, she’d insisted that I cuff her on the club’s dungeon horse and pull her hair as I tore her ass up with a paddle. I had tried a lot of things in my life as a Dom, but I generally did so in the comfort of my own home. With my own shit, in a private environment.

  On the other hand, Becca loved the club atmosphere. She thrived on the pain and the thrill of being watched. Our last day there, she’d begged to let everybody observe as I reddened her ass before fucking her senseless. Flat out refusing, I didn’t pull my dick out in a crowd. That was a hard limit. Once we got back to my place, the evening turned into a great night, even though something had seemed off about her. I never could quite put my finger on what it was exactly. Earlier in the day, she mentioned not feeling well, but seemed right on track once we got to the club.

  The first time I laid eyes on Becca, she had come to my practice to interview me about my specialties, how I got interested in plastic surgery, and the profession in general. In her last year of college, she was writing her thesis on cosmetic surgery in the twenty-first century. By the time she left my office, I knew she was interested in way more than just nose jobs and liposuction.

  The first month we were together, I basically introduced her to the lifestyle. Even though she came across as quiet and reserved, underneath that freckle-nosed shy girl was a true submissive in waiting. Things were going well between us. Then she dropped the “L” word. That was where I drew the line. I didn’t love Becca. I never would. Ultimately, I ended it all.

  ****

  Steaming water from the shower rolled off my body in long sheets as I stood with my head lowered against the marbled wall. A million thoughts streamed through my mind. I knew I was a fucking narcissistic jerk. The exact words Becca used when I told her it was over between us, it hadn’t been the first time I’d been called that. It definitely wouldn’t be the last.

  Wrestling with guilt, I’d replayed that last day when I told her I didn’t love her over and over in my mind. I hated watching a woman cry, yet I’d walked away leaving her in tears. Jack Smithhart, my attorney and elite member of Venture, did some checking on Becca’s suicide. Foul play was suspected. Notes in her journal stated that she’d been visiting a fetish club. The cops would most definitely be checking out every club of its type in the Metroplex, digging for information. Most likely looking for … me, even though I knew Becca was smart enough not to mention me by name to anyone. Not even in her journal. Fortunately, Venture was in the heart of Dallas County, and with Becca living in Arlington, maybe we’d get lucky and either be bypassed altogether, or at least have some time to come up with the right words if in fact they did come nosing around. Only a silent/sleeping partner, it was possible I wouldn’t be questioned at all. The fact I’d done nothing wrong wasn’t the whole issue. I hadn’t. And I had alibis for that entire week. The unwanted attention I’d get, however, could slay my business. That’s why I’d contacted Jack and told him the whole story.

  Water rolled off my back, my mind racing with this possible shit storm, but also images of this apparent relative of Becca’s. Dreams of her long dark hair and blue eyes had come to me more than once. Five seconds passing, I dropped my head, my hand gripping my rock-hard dick and pumping it to kingdom come thinking about this girl.

  Even her name choked me. What the hell was that about? But, as disheartening as it all was, I knew I couldn’t go after her. Related to Becca in some way, as much as I wanted to know her better, I refused to go that route, knowing I’d end up hurting her.

  Frustrated with myself, a pent-up growl lifted up my chest, my hand job getting me absolutely nowhere. With my eyes bolted shut, I visualized those damn blue eyes staring straight through me as she brushed her tongue across her bottom lip. Harder than stone, within seconds, I was gritting my teeth and blowing all over the marble tile, pumping myself until every last bit of my spunk slowly seeped down the wall. Finally, I let loose of my now limp rod and banged my head against my arm.

  Aside from being beautiful and a little like a bull in a china shop, Alexa had some seriously inviting spirit in her step, though. I liked that. A lot. Causing a damn scene in the Krispy Kreme shop, she’d handled herself like a champ. Wasn’t overly-intimidated by me, which was another reason she was so fascinating. I couldn’t remember the last time a woman had impacted me this way. Holy fuck, what the hell was I doing? This had to stop before I got in so deep over the clumsy little beauty, that I couldn’t escape. I needed this woman out of my head. She didn’t belong in my world.

  ****

  Three procedures scheduled today, I had to focus and get my shit together. Imperative that I get this girl out of my goddamn gray matter, my perception had to be dead on for my job. There was no alternative. I stepped out of my car and grabbed the doughnuts, sensing the bleakness of my mood. Fighting the feeling I somehow knew a certain someone could change in an instant.

  Chapter Eight

  Alex

  “You know you love Stein Mart. If you and Dad would ever come visit, we could go. The shopping here totally sucks.” My mom shriveled up her nose.

  “I know it does. Maybe we’ll drive the RV up that way before too long.” Sad I couldn’t stay a couple of extra days, I couldn’t afford to. “Say bye to Dad again. He goes to work way too early.”

  “I’ll tell Dad, but be careful, Alex. Please don’t drive too fast.”

  “Okay, Mom. I love you.”

  The drive back to Dallas was long and exhausting. Other than mesquite trees and dry flat land, there wasn’t much scenery in this part of the country, so about the only thing a person could do to stay awake was to crank up the music and jus
t drive.

  The back-route between San Angelo and Dallas had areas that were still two-lane highways. Some nearly deserted, I liked driving on the winding roads. It was better than the boring flat interstate. No hands-free in my Honda, I turned down the music and punched Maci’s number on my cell. Definitely not a morning person, it was only 10:15 AM. Chances at getting my head bitten off were fifty-fifty at this early hour on her day off.

  “Hey, Alex. Are you back home?” Thank God she’s awake!

  “I’m driving now. I should be home by 3:00 or a little later. Hey, I have a weird question.”

  “Shoot. You know I get off on weird.”

  “How much do you know about fetish clubs? Becca was going to one, but no one knows the name or who she was going with. I was just thinking maybe we could check out some in Tarrant County, if we could even get in.”

  “Damn, Alex. I’ve never been to a BDSM club, and there’s probably quite a few in Dallas/Ft. Worth. Besides, what about Becca’s cell phone? I was thinking about that earlier. Couldn’t they find any leads from her call history or texts?”

  “I don’t know yet. The detectives still have her phone and journal, so I suspect they’ll find something soon, if they haven’t already. She talked about a doctor and going to the club with him, but didn’t give names of either. I know it’ll be damn near impossible, but this is the only way I can think of. What do you think?”

  “I think hell to the yes to playing detective! That sounds wicked! Let me see what I can do.”

  * * * *

  Never once did I expect to be walking through the doors of a fetish club. Steeling myself for what was behind the doors of Venture, I hadn’t really mentally prepared, which was probably best, considering I didn’t have time to chicken out. Both dressed in short, tight dresses and hooker heels, with more makeup on than I normally used in a week, a sand blaster was probably in my future to get all this out of my pores.