by Scott, Talyn
"Well, Monty," she mocked, "the day's still young.” Michael shut the door and got behind the wheel. A milky partition allowed them some privacy.
"I don't think calling him Monty is such a good idea, considering we've placed him as your personal bodyguard."
"Now you tell me," she tried to lighten the mood, but it was impossible to bury the hurt.
Avery sat across from her, assessing. “Helen's picture obviously startled you. I’m sorry for your pain.”
“It must have startled you to walk up on Noah and me.”
“I need another minute or two to catch my breath on that one. Have you been with him in that way the past few days?”
“Just today.”
“Please, tell me he used protection.
“He didn’t even take it out.”
Relief softened his eyes. “So Dylan is still your only one?"
"If I don't count you, then yes."
Nodding slowly, he offered, "Okay, I realize you were in a bad place. That you thought Dylan and I didn't want you for you, and that you are still reeling over what happened to you last night. Dylan and I are reeling, too, in case you’re wondering."
"Presently, I'm freaked out."
"Me, too." He placed his hand on her knee. "I’m sickened over this entire mess, Payton.” She turned away and watched the beach house disappear in the distance, saying nothing. Finally, he lifted her chin with a finger, turning her to him. “I saw your face, when you came. You were sated for a moment, and then you went completely empty." His hand went higher, bordering her inner thigh. "How’s that going to work out for either of you?”
“Believe me, I made myself perfectly clear to Noah. He knows the score." She shifted in her seat, but Avery kept his hand in place. "He knows exactly how I feel.” That she loved the man sitting in front of her.
“Good." Avery slowly moved his thumb in tiny circles undoubtedly meant to make her wet. It was working. "He may be your friend, but you deserve better than a hit and run.” His voice was urgent, his hand burning a path to her inner thigh. “You've been friends since childhood. I'm sure I don’t have to remind you of his reputation.”
“You don’t have to remind me.” No matter what happened between them on that beach, nothing really changed. Noah would always be Noah - her hot friend she could count on for everything except fidelity. “But I’m not falling back into bed with you and Dylan.”
“I’m deeply in love with you, and this isn’t our goodbye by a long shot.”
Payton felt as though a high wave had pulled her under. She finally managed to say, “Then you’d better explain far more than what I read in those newspaper articles.” The sun glinted off his nipple piercings, and she clutched his silky shirt tighter to her breasts. "And afterwards, you’re going to have an impossible task. You will have to convince me I wasn’t sought out to replace your lost love.”
“I can do that easily by simply telling you the truth.” The van veered left, moving onto a narrow backstreet. “As you know, Gilda Easton took me under her roof. At first, she was my guardian under the fostering program, but my mother couldn’t stay out of jail long enough to make any semblance of a proper home, so Gilda adopted me. I gave her hell, to say the least, but she never gave up on me as my birth mother did. Gilda kept saying I would be a strong Easton man one day. In keeping with grooming me to leadership, she sent me to the same boarding school as Dylan. From there, we attended the same college."
"Partners, even then?"
“In taking women, no.” His thumbnail lightly grazed her thigh. “We weren’t exactly inseparable. In fact, we didn’t get along.”
“Because he was Easton blood and you weren’t?”
“No, Dylan was never a snob. I have to take the credit for our problems back then. I didn’t know how to handle my erratic feelings, and I’m surprised I made it through college. Much the way you have trust issues because of what your father did to you and your mother, I guess I had trust issues stemming from my mother. I had alcohol poisoning often. I smoked too much weed, and snorted cocaine on more occasions than I care to admit. Hung out with the wrong people, and messed around where no has any business messing around. I was a textbook rebel, and the mammoth chip on my shoulder was set firmly in place, for a while.”
“That’s mostly understandable,” she offered.
“I don’t agree.” After another left, they straightened out on what looked like a private road. “Acting out as an adult because of whatever I incurred in childhood was an excuse not to grow up and become a man. When I decided I had no more excuses, I straightened my shit out. Sure, I needed control in every aspect of my life, especially regarding sex, so I skipped the alcohol and drugs. Stayed far away from the wrong people, and then I slipped waist deep into club scenes where dark fantasy and willing slaves kneeled happily for the wealthy. And for a long while, I liked where I was.”
Jealousy slammed Payton, but that was her insecurity talking. “What about Dylan?”
“Dylan stayed out of the scene completely, spending all his free time with a woman he’d reconnected with at one of Gilda’s fundraisers. A woman I had dated when we were only sixteen, but she couldn’t handle my temper and dumped me.”
Payton thought about the picture she’d seen. “Helen Savon.”
“Yes. But things weren’t exactly rosy for Helen, either - not that abuse and neglect had touched her. Still, in the households of the affluent, perfection is expected of the children or they embarrass the parents in front of their equally affluent friends. Helen hadn’t pleased her family, since she’d only completed a two-year degree in paralegal studies. This was a great accomplishment for her, considering she struggled with dyslexia.”
“That’s horrible.” Two familiar SUVs came out of nowhere, splitting in opposite directions in front of an enormous black gate centered by The Easton logo. “Her parent’s weren’t proud of her at all?”
“Not until Dylan informed them he was serious about her and found her a position within our company, sort of an internship with quite a few benefits. Then they had bragging rights before their friends. In turn, she appeased Dylan, carrying him through those darkest days when he couldn’t move past his parents’ deaths.”
She ran her eyes over his burns. “The fire in Tower Amore.”
“A terrible way to go,” he said, as the gate opened slowly for the van. “Worse still, it’s an unsolved arson case.”
Payton pressed her head to the cool glass as they passed substantial limestone pillars. As they moved up the winding drive, several small houses with narrow wraparound porches and tin roofs lined a far field. Obviously, they were caretaker houses, yet they appeared empty. “Is that why the police tried to pin it on Dylan, since he inherited the bulk of the Easton estate?”
“Well, he inherited a great deal of money and fifty-two percent of The Easton Company, so the authorities claim he had motive.” Rows of Little Gen Magnolia Trees littered the expanse of the lawn, their dewy leaves glistening in the sunlight. “This is ridiculous considering how many people died in that fire along with his parents. But the police don’t care how absurd their hypothesis are, since they have an unsolved crime that killed hundreds of people, and they have the families of the deceased to answer to as well as the public.”
“Then the explosion happened,” she prompted, recalling the article she and Noah had read. At her right, a wide field surrounded a wealth of pristine stables.
His jaw clenched. “Then the explosion happened. I, uh, I had slept with Helen the night she’d died, had been sleeping with her behind Dylan’s back for a month or so, and we’d gone behind Gilda’s house and slipped into that fucking boathouse. I thought Helen was the only good thing that had happened to me since Gilda adopted me, and she promised me that she loved me. No lover had ever told me that. I was stunned. In fact, on the night Helen died, she wanted me to stand with her and tell Dylan how we felt. Well, how I thought I felt at the time.” He stopped, his eyes suddenly far away.
/> Up ahead, Live Oaks heavily threaded with dipping Spanish Moss anchored the grandest southern mansion she’d ever seen, even on television. “And?”
“I wasn’t ready to tell Dylan, to devastate him. I had suddenly regretted taking away the only peace he’d experienced after his parents’ deaths. I had misgivings a mile long, to say the least. And when I told her how I felt, she blurted out what every college-aged man dreads.”
Payton cupped her throat. “Helen was pregnant.”
Chapter 8
Avery pursed his lips. “That’s what she claimed.” Michael parked the van under a three story high carport, where a striking, wrought iron lantern hung low, swaying slightly in the breeze. “We’ll never know.”
“Was that your only chance to have a child?”
“No.”
“Avery.”
“Don’t.”
“Okay.” She nearly sobbed when Dylan stepped out of the house barefoot, wearing faded jeans and a cream fisherman’s sweater. He leaned against the mansion’s opened door, crossing his arms. Those wary, aquamarine eyes were trained straight on Payton, waiting for an answer or maybe an absolution; she didn’t know which, but she hated the absurdity of feeling guilty. Then it dawned on her. “Did you…text him about Noah?”
“He needed to know,” Avery replied. Michael opened the van’s doors, offering a hand to assist her. “I’ve got her,” Avery said, jumping down and then turning to her. He waited until Michael was out of eyeshot and eased her down, keeping his dress shirt in place over her ass. “This estate belonged to Dylan’s parents,” Avery explained as he walked her up the limestone steps. “Now it belongs to Dylan.”
“Hello, sweetheart.” Dylan pushed off the wall, his eyes moving up and down her half-nakedness. “I would greet you properly, but I don’t know what’s still running through your head.” A tick started in his jaw, when he spotted her bruised face. “Just tell me, if you’re okay.”
“I feel well, thank you.”
Avery pulled her through the largest doors she’d every seen on a private house. “I’m explaining Helen’s death.” They passed a double, winding staircase painted stark white though the steps were inlaid with black marble.
“Dad’s study,” Dylan said from behind, the heat of his stare fixing on the backs of her legs.
Solemnly, Avery opened the right door in a duo door set, ushering her inside a vast room that could double for an old timey European bookstore. Rolling ladders were positioned on either sides of the room, ready to lead her to her next book. She couldn’t find a speck of dust anywhere, but the place still felt like a ghostly, lost in a moment of time where the owners never returned. Above the fireplace, a young Dylan stood poised between his equally gorgeous parents, his chubby cheeks smiling as he sat on his father’s knee. Payton wondered how many years it took for his child self to reclaim that smile.
She reached up and gripped the mantle, to keep her hands away from them. “Okay, Avery, what happened next?”
“Helen and I fought over Dylan, over her pregnancy.” He sat on a chesterfield, leaning back and staring at the ceiling. “The list was endless. It was terrible. We called each other names, said things that can never be taken back or apologized for, and when she started tossing anything she could lay her hands on at my head. I left the boathouse so we could cool down.”
Dylan moved right behind her. “But Avery never made it far. I was right outside the door, and I’d heard everything.”
Avery groaned. “The horror on your face, Dylan. I’ll never forget.”
Dylan stepped even closer, the heat of his body penetrating hers. “I think I temporarily lost my mind. For some reason, I first focused my rage on Helen more than Avery. Maybe I thought the child was his, even now I can’t be sure.”
Avery cut in, “At that time, she was the thread of your sanity. As your lover, you thought that she’d let you down more than I had.”
Dylan brought his mouth to Payton’s ear. “It’s hard to trust someone who’s faithless.”
Avery continued, “Helen strode past him, stopping their shouting match in mid-tirade, and walked to her car she had hidden just outside a line of Melaleuca Trees. But I couldn’t let her drive while that upset.”
“Especially after she’d said she was pregnant,” Payton agreed softly.
Avery exhaled slowly. “Yes, no matter how upset I was, I would never wish harm to an unborn. So I pushed Dylan out of my face, and started down the pier after her. The next thing I knew, I had been knocked in the water. At first, I thought Dylan had come at me from behind, but I saw sky-high flames quickly engulfing the Melaleucas.
When he stopped, Dylan explained, “Helen’s flaming car centered it all.”
“It was an inferno.” Avery stood up, walking to the fireplace where Dylan and Payton stood. “I swam back to the pier as fast as I could go, bolted across the never-ending length to save her.” His gold-green eyes were glassy. “In my nightmares, I can still hear the wood pounding beneath me.” He inhaled slowly. “When I reached what was left of Helen’s car, I could see nothing of her. The fiery glare and the intense heat were impossible to maneuver. Any way I tried, I knew I would die immediately. I was lost standing there.”
Dylan said, “Lost watching our lover incinerate.”
Avery wrapped her in his arms, resting his chin atop her head. “For a few seconds, I thought about jumping in and ending myself.”
“I can’t imagine all the emotions going through you then.” She curled her arms around his waist. “The shock must have been unbearable.”
“It quickly turned into a dreamlike quality,” Dylan explained.
“And when Dylan reached me, he roared like the hounds of hell, pummeling me with his fists, kicking me back and back and back.”
Dylan murmured, “He just let me, didn’t fight me in the least.”
“Because I felt absolutely nothing.” Avery kissed the top of her head, his breath sawing in and out of his body. “Dylan must have knocked me unconscious, for the next thing I knew, half of my body was engulfed in flames. Dylan was yards away, his hands waving frantically at Gilda and our cousins. Somehow, Gilda spotted me over his shoulder. Dylan turned in a wash of horror, but Julian had already reached me, wrapping me in a wetted saddle blanket and rolling me on the ground.”
“If you hadn’t been wet from your fall in the water…”
“It would have been worse, I’m sure.” Dylan said. “Avery could be dead.”
And she would have never known him. That thought was a punch to her chest. “So Dylan blamed himself for your injuries.”
“I had to move on, so I forgave Dylan quickly.” Avery lowered his head, breathing against her throat. “After all, he was mourning Helen and his parents. Unlike me, he grew stronger, even when the police tried to blame him for yet another arson case because of the trace of explosives they’d found at the scene. I, however, reverted to my old ways for years,” he said almost apologetically. “At least, until we found a way to share women.”
“Was that the only way you found intimacy?”
“Absolutely.”
Payton looked at Dylan. “And both fires remain unsolved.”
“To this day,” Dylan said. “And someone’s trying to torture me again, by hurling my past sins at my back. This time, that person is trying to hurt you.” He kissed the divot beneath her lower lip as Avery’s grip tightened on her. “I won’t stand for it.” Dylan’s breath tickled her lips. “You’re everything to me.”
Dragging his mouth down her cheek, Avery murmured, “The night we met, ah, I was so miserable, Payton. I can’t tell you how badly.” His hand slipped beneath the shirt covering her naked body, trailing up her hip. “Dylan had moved on without me, taking Caroline Roslyn as his. I walked out on a balcony and watched them dance. Even then, I recalled Dylan not looking too happy himself.”
Dylan pressed his lips beneath her jaw, tasting. “I wasn’t.” His hand mirrored Avery’s, trailing up her opposite hip.
“I was fooling myself.”
“When I turned away from the sight of them dancing, something tugged me back.” Avery flicked the front of her throat with his hot tongue. “I’d never sensed anything quite like it, but I held this possessive edge I couldn’t name, couldn’t explain. Searching across the dancing crowd, I caught sight of your hair flickering under the gaslights, the heavy curves of your ass and thighs.” His hand beneath her shirt curved around her ass, fondling. “My head spun so fast that I nearly lost my breath. All of the sudden, I didn't care about Dylan moving on, I just knew what I wanted.” His fingertips found her dark crevice. “And that was you. Whoever you were, whomever you were with didn’t matter to me.” He dipped inside, stroking her anus. “I knew I could fix everything that might stand in our way in order to have you, because I never wanted to let go of that feeling. I still don’t. I still won’t.”