by Lexi Blake
Luscious
Lexi Blake
Luscious
Lexi Blake
ebook ISBN: 978-1-937608-44-6
Published by DLZ Entertainment LLC
Copyright 2015 DLZ Entertainment LLC
Edited by Chloe Vale
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination and are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or establishments is solely coincidental.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Author’s Note
An excerpt from Master No by Lexi Blake
An excerpt from Scandal Never Sleeps by Shayla Black and Lexi Blake
About Lexi Blake
Also from Lexi Blake
PROLOGUE
Arlington, Virginia
Macon Miles sat up and it took a moment for him to realize that the ringing in his head was actually the doorbell. How much had he had to drink? His stomach turned as he took in his surroundings. He was in his shitty one-bedroom on the couch Elise had decided she didn’t want because the dog had pissed on it or something. Her dog, of course. She’d kept the dog but not the couch or him.
He looked down. Six months and he still checked. He would have thought he would be used to it, but every time he woke up, he had to check.
Yep, still only had one fucking leg. One and a quarter. Maybe a little more, but not quite a third. God, he was a kid counting his age in quarters and halves except he was doing it with what was left of his limbs. One and what? Something less than half, more than a fourth. Yeah, that described his leg all right. Maybe if he’d been better at math he wouldn’t have gotten his leg blown off.
There was a volley of knocks, but he slumped back down on the couch. Whoever it was could go away. It was probably one of the neighbors trying to sell him some meth. Yeah, it was that kind of place.
He stared up at his ceiling and tried to find some semblance of will. Will to do anything. Will to get off the couch. Will to breathe. Will to fucking live.
Nope. That had apparently been blown to shit with his leg. He’d left his willpower in Afghanistan along with his limb. He laughed. Life and limb. He’d promised he would give it all for his country and he had. His leg had been sacrificed to the almighty IED.
And his wife had sacrificed, too. She’d sacrificed their marriage, her morals, her dignity, very likely any chance at future orgasms because he knew her new man and he was a selfish asswipe.
Unfortunately, he was also Macon’s oldest brother.
He closed his eyes. The banging had finally stopped. Maybe he could find some peace, or at least another bottle of whiskey.
When he went to get the whiskey, he should also get some sugar and eggs.
That thought made him sit up. Pastry Chef Wars was coming on tonight. They were all self-centered douchebags, but he kind of liked the show. Okay. He was pretty obsessed with it. One of the boxes Elise had shipped to his new place had come from their rarely used kitchen. She sure as hell wouldn’t deign to cook, and he’d been getting his ass blown up halfway across the world, so the kitchen tabletop appliances they’d received for their wedding were mostly unused.
One day, in between horrifically painful PT sessions, he’d opened his mother’s old recipe book. He hadn’t really known the woman. She’d died long before he had memories at all, but his stepmother, in an uncommon fit of sentimentality, had saved her recipe book. It was a notebook written in his mother’s own careful hand.
He’d opened it and felt some connection to that woman who had given birth to him all those years before. He touched the pages and read the words. The first recipe had been for chocolate cream pie, and he’d smiled when he got to the last ingredient. Love. She’d drawn a heart beside the word.
His mother’s recipes always included love. He didn’t have any of that now, but he did like playing around with desserts. He’d been surprised to find he was good at it.
If his Army buddies could see him now… Not that he would let them.
He thought briefly about Ronnie’s sister. Ronnie Rowe had been the new kid. He could still vaguely remember meeting him the day he’d joined Macon’s team. Ronnie had been so green. The kid had thrown up after his first firefight. He hadn’t really known much about Rowe until that day…
His sister kept calling, but he couldn’t talk to her. Not yet. Maybe never. He’d failed so terrifically that he didn’t want Ronnie’s sister to ever meet him. He wondered if she looked like Ronnie. He’d been a tall goofball with red hair and freckles.
And then he’d been nothing but a body on the ground. He’d been nothing at all and Macon had been left alone. Sometimes he woke up in the middle of the night and Ronnie’s body was still there, right beside him, blank eyes staring up and reminding him that he was the only one left.
Sometimes he thought he should have let them take him. A bullet to the brain might have been the easier way out than this slow, pathetic march.
The sound of the door scraping open brought Macon out of his thoughts, and his heart rate tripled. He looked around the room. Where the fuck was his leg? No. Screw the leg. He needed his gun. Where had that gone?
And where was his damn death wish when he needed it?
“Macon? Don’t shoot me.”
Macon stilled. He hadn’t heard that voice in years. No. He couldn’t do it. The last thing he needed was this. He was freaking dreaming and his brother was going to make him feel like shit. Not the oldest one. Not the one who had run out with Macon’s wife. No. This was worse. The voice he heard was Adam, the brother he’d wronged himself. The last person in the world he wanted to see was Adam because Adam was the only one he couldn’t hate.
He often wondered if his mother had stayed alive, would she have allowed things to go so wrong? Did she look down and weep because her family was so very broken?
“Hey.”
He opened his eyes and was suddenly really sure this wasn’t a dream. His brother was standing in front of him, dressed like some fucking movie star and looking years younger than Macon felt. “How did you get in? You should leave.”
Adam grinned as though he hadn’t expected less. “You have serious issues with security, little brother. I picked that lock in no time flat. This place is a one-star roach motel. I don’t even think most roaches would stay here.”
He was wrong about that. Macon had to beat the disgusting fuckers back constantly. Adam. God. His brother was standing right in front of him and Macon had to wonder if he hadn’t come for revenge. Had he come to see how far his brother had fallen?
Did it matter? His first instinct had been to tell him to fuck off, but now that he was standing right here, he kind of wanted to beg him to stay. He and Adam had been closest in age. Alan hadn’t had time for little brothers, but Adam had always been patient and gentle with him. Even when it pissed off their dad because brothers were supposed to fight for position, not treat each other like pussies who couldn’t handle a punch.
Fuck it all. He didn’t want to fight anymore. Every minute of every day seemed like a fight and now Adam was here and Macon was five again. He wanted his brother to make things better.
He’d lost that right.
Adam s
ighed as he took in the room. “This is significantly worse than your dorm room. And what is that smell?”
It could be anything. He’d gone nose blind two weeks into his new life. He’d gone from hospitals and their antiseptic smells to this place.
He tried to straighten up. God, he wished he’d brushed his teeth. His mouth still tasted like cheap whiskey. He might have one shot at this. He’d nearly died and the one regret he had was never telling Adam how he felt. Adam might have come here for revenge and Macon would give it to him. He deserved it. Macon had been a shit and anything Adam wanted to dole out would be nothing compared to the hate he felt for himself. But he owed Adam one thing, and now that he was standing right here, Macon was determined to pay up.
“I’m sorry, Adam. You should know I think every single day about what I did to you.” His brother was into alternative lifestyles, to say the least. When he’d gotten kicked out of the Army for breaking Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Macon had been pressured into shunning him. He hadn’t, not all the way, but he also hadn’t fought for his brother. He hadn’t stood up for Adam the way Adam would have stood up for him. “I tried…no, I didn’t try hard enough. I should have walked away. I should have told them to fuck themselves. You and Jake are a really great couple. You should be allowed to be happy.”
Adam groaned and looked around, seeming to try to find a clean place to sit. He remained standing. “Dude, we’re not lovers. I’m straight. Jake’s straight. I’ve never once touched that man’s junk and I never will. We share.”
“Share? Like love and stuff?” It didn’t compute.
A long sigh came from his brother’s mouth and Macon was pretty sure he was getting Adam’s “dumbass said what” face. “Did the IED blow up your IQ? We share a wife. We’ve shared women for years. It was what we were doing that got us kicked out of the Army. We were discovered with a superior officer between us. A female superior, who also happened to have caught the eye of a general. The general had not taken kindly to the infraction. Dad is the one who told you I was gay. Here’s a surprise. Dad lies.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being gay. It’s natural.” He’d briefly tried that argument with his father and Alan, but Elise had shut him down. She’d wanted a house off base and the only way to get it was with help from dear old Dad. Macon had tried to convince her to tough it out, but she’d cried and cried and he’d sold his brother out in the end because it was easier to let Adam go than to fight it out with everyone else.
He’d been a fucking coward.
“It’s not considered natural in our family, but I’m glad you see it that way. You always did have a mind of your own.” Adam finally cleared off a space on the coffee table and sat down in front of Macon. “You called to let me know the important stuff. You called to let me know Dad was sick. How much trouble did you get in for doing that?”
“It doesn’t matter. The bastard keeps holding on. His remission seems to be long term.” The last conversation he’d had with his father, the old man had told him to suck it up, of course Elise preferred Alan. Alan was more of a man than Macon was.
He hadn’t talked to his family since then.
“You risked a lot to call me, but you didn’t bother to give me a ring about nearly dying? Oh, there was the drunk dial of two nights ago that brought me here, but I could have used a sober heads-up. You’re lucky I kept the same cell number all these years.”
Shit. He’d done that? Embarrassment flashed through his system. “Fuck. I didn’t realize I’d called. I kind of lost track of the phone. I shouldn’t have called you at all.”
“Yeah, you should have. You should have called me while you were at Ramstein. You should have called me when you got home and realized your wife was fucking big brother and they had both screwed you over. What the hell are you doing in this rat hole?”
He’d forgotten that Adam could play the fatherly role from time to time. “I can’t afford anything else. Dad cut me off and my Army severance isn’t much. Elise stayed married to me long enough to take half the insurance settlement I got on my leg.” TSGLI paid out a hundred grand for traumatic injuries. Elise had taken fifty thousand and then also shared her maxed out credit card bills with him. She was a giver.
“How are you getting to rehab?”
“Bus.” He was still wobbly on the damn prosthetic. He’d fallen more than once and the humiliation always burned through him.
Adam sighed. “You’re coming home with me. What of this crap do I need to pack? And where’s your damn leg? Shouldn’t it be close to you?”
His brother got up and started walking around the apartment, poking into everything. Macon was ashamed of how messy he’d let the place get. He’d been taught to be neat, that everything had a place. “Adam, I can’t go with you.”
Adam turned. “Why not?”
He couldn’t think of a single reason why. Not one. He hated his life. He didn’t have a family anymore.
He could have a fresh start. Maybe in Dallas he wouldn’t sit around and drink all day. Maybe if he wasn’t constantly reminded of everything he’d lost, he could build something new. Did he even want that?
Adam came to stand in front of him, placing a hand on his shoulder. It was the first time he’d been connected to his brother in years. “That old life is gone, Macon. Unless you want to try to win her back…”
“Not in a million years. I can’t stand the thought of that woman. Or Alan. Or…god, I hate them all, Adam. I fucking hate them all. It eats me up inside until I don’t want to do anything but remember how much I hate them.”
“Then come to Dallas and we’ll start over. I have a son. I promise you can’t be around him and keep all that hate in your gut. You can stay in the guesthouse if you like. It’s really just a house. When we moved we bought two lots and kept one of the old houses while we built the dream house. Now we keep it for family. Jake’s got a massive family and it’s really easier to not share a house with all of them. You can stay there long term and I’ll find a physical therapist in the neighborhood.”
Adam had a baby? A son? He had a nephew? He couldn’t let his nephew see him like this. He had to clean up. He had to sober up. Damn. He did have a family. Adam was offering him one.
“Macon?”
Macon focused again. “Why? Why would you help me?”
Adam sighed and leaned forward. “Because you’re my brother. Because I learned a long time ago that life is way too short to hold grudges or to waste it on hating things we can’t change. I would like my son to know one of his uncles. I would like to be a brother to you and I would definitely like to avoid having to bury you, and I’m fairly certain that’s where all this is heading if you don’t come with me.”
A single moment played out in his head, the memory as fresh as if it had happened yesterday. He’d been standing in the doorway, watching his big brothers getting in the car to go away to school. He couldn’t go to school, but Alan and Adam were going to learn how to be soldiers, like their dad. They would be gone for a long time. They were going to something called boarding school.
Just when he thought they would leave without another word, Adam had bolted back and he’d hugged Macon. “I’ll miss you.”
They weren’t supposed to hug, but it felt right. He held on to his brother until their father broke them up and hustled Adam to the car.
He’d been left behind, but Adam wasn’t leaving him behind this time. Despite everything that had happened, Adam was here.
He could stay and let hate eat up his whole fucking life or he could start over.
“My prosthetic is in the bathroom, but I might have used it to smash the mirror, so you should probably watch out for that.”
Adam shook his head. “You’re seeing a shrink, too.”
He would if Adam told him to. It was far past time to listen to someone who had it together. “And I don’t need to bring much.”
Some clothes and one book. His mother’s recipe book.
Maybe it would com
e in handy.
* * * *
Sarah Allyson Jones stared down at the headstones. One was fresh, the other only months old. She’d spent all the cash she had left on those two slabs of marble and concrete.
Sunshine washed over the graves. It was a gorgeous Georgia day and that seemed like the greatest insult of all. The grass was green, forsythia in full bloom. Everywhere she looked there were peaceful plants coming to life. The cemetery was a contrast—a garden of green for the dead.
She wanted rain. She wanted the plants to rot and the sky to fall around her.
She wanted to go back to the woman she’d been before Ronnie’s death. No. Before her mother’s illness. Had it really been so long since she’d laughed and teased and felt like she had a future?
“Your mother was a kind woman,” a soft voice said. When Sarah turned around she saw the preacher standing there. Reverend Alton was a nice man. She’d been going to his church since she was a teenager. “The last few months of her life were an aberration.”
The last few months of her life had been all about pain and lies. Agony from the cancer eating her lungs and lies from the Army. Her mother had sent her only son off to fight for his country and all she’d gotten back was a pine box and lies about how he died.
Ronnie hadn’t been her blood. Sarah had been a foster kid who won the lottery. She’d been thirteen when Carla Rowe agreed to foster her long enough to find a permanent home. A few months had turned into years, and she’d found a better home than the misery she had before.
How could it all be gone? How could they be here? Had those years of happiness been a momentary respite? Would her life be about misery again?
“She was angry after Ronnie died.” Somehow she felt the need to defend her foster mother. She touched the arch of the gravestone, feeling the cool of the stone beneath her palm. She prayed there was peace there for Carla and that she was with her son again.