by Penny Reid
Then I felt him sigh. It sounded content and it made me smile. I had to bite my bottom lip to keep from laughing because the noise made me so happy.
“What?” His voice penetrated the darkness, sounding curious and maybe a little concerned. “What’s wrong?”
I shook my head, willing myself not to laugh.
“Tell me.”
I mimicked his sigh, but said nothing.
He stilled, waited, his hand at my breast toying with it, with me. I tried to ignore the lovely stabs of pleasure caused by his ministrations, coiling again in my lower belly.
Out of the blue he blurted, “We should move in together.”
My eyes flew open. All thought was bulldozed straight out of my brain by Martin’s statement.
“I…what?”
Martin pinched my nipple, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger, causing me to hiss and tense, then he smoothed his hand from my shoulder, down my ribs, over my side, over my hip, until it cupped my bottom. He caressed me there, like touching my body was his favorite thing to do.
This time when I sighed it wasn’t meant to mimic. It was a sigh of pure contentment. Who knew that lying in Martin’s bed, having one’s bottom stroked could feel so good?
“I said,” he whispered against my ear, “we should move in together. When we get back we’ll start looking for places.”
“That seems terribly impetuous and likely to end badly.” My voice was lazy, soft, and not at all argumentative.
“It won’t end at all, Kaitlyn.” He kissed my shoulder, then smacked my backside once. “Now I need to get some sleep or else I’m going to be dead for practice tomorrow.”
And with that he resumed our position—bringing me against him, hand at my breast—and fell quickly asleep.
Meanwhile, I did not.
It was one thing to be passionate, it was quite another to let passion be the sole driving force in my life. Reason and rationality still had a place at the table, even if passion wanted to have sex on aforementioned table.
So I spent at least another hour and a half reasoning my way through this latest and unexpected minefield. Because I wasn’t going to move in with Martin unless I trusted him completely, unless ground rules were established, discussed and negotiated, unless we were both on the same page. Unless I was in love with him.
And I didn’t and we hadn’t and we weren’t. And I wasn’t…at least, not yet.
CHAPTER 5
Simple Organic Compounds
I know I fell asleep because I was eventually woken up, and the waker-upper was a demon sent from hell.
“What the actual fuck is going on in here?”
This question was shrieked very loudly, and startled me into a sitting position on Martin’s bed. Instinctively, I grabbed the sheet to cover myself. I blinked through my sleep and glanced frantically around the room, worried it was on fire or about to explode—because why else would someone be yelling at me?
I brought the shrieker into focus and frowned at her. I had no idea who she was. I wondered for about two seconds if I was still dreaming and in my dream I was being harangued by an insane wet T-shirt contestant, or a woman made homeless by her penchant for elective plastic surgery.
“Pardon me…I’m…what?” I asked her sleepily, figuring if she were merely a figment of my imagination she would disappear.
She didn’t disappear.
“I said,” she ground out between clenched teeth, her hands coming to her slim, Barbie-doll like hips¸ “what the actual fuck is going on in here? Who the actual fuck are you?”
I blinked at her, knowing definitely this was not a dream. I would never dream a person who used the phrase “the actual fuck” unless that person was a parrot trapped in a human’s body and didn’t know any better.
“I was sleeping,” I answered honestly, pushing my hair out of my face. I shook my head to clear the cobwebs as I looked around. I was in Martin’s room and the events of the prior night abruptly rushed back. I didn’t have any time to organize my thoughts because the woman was still glaring at me, so I continued, stating the obvious. “But now you’re yelling at me and I don’t know who you are.”
Her head did this strange bobbing/pivot thing on her neck, which really made her look like a parrot. This of course surprised me, though I successfully fought the sudden urge to burst out laughing.
“You don’t know who I am? What the actual fuck?!” she shrieked.
I took a deep breath and leaned back against the headboard of the bed. I clutched the sheet to my chest as I surveyed her, noting this was definitely one of those occasions where passion served no purpose.
She was tiny, maybe five one, and very tanned. She was also wearing platform sandals that added four or five inches to her height. She also had very small hips and very thin legs. But her boobs were as big as mine, maybe a little bigger, and truly gave her the unnatural proportional appearance of a Barbie doll. Her eyes were pale blue, her hair was bleach—and I mean bleach—blonde; it fell like straw around her shoulders and likely reached her tiny bottom.
She was wearing blue eyeshadow and pink lipstick and there was just something really wrong about her lips and lack of facial expression. Though she was shrieking her face never seemed to alter its expression. It was eerie.
“I’ll tell you who I am, and then you’re going to get the actual fuck out of Martin’s room, leave this house, and never talk to him again.” She sounded angry. Her words told me she was angry, but her dead-face was distracting and fascinating.
She pointed to her sternum, the place between her giant, balloon-shaped boobs. “I am Mrs. Sandeke, Mart-tin’s stepmother…? You see? I own this house and you need to leave.”
I didn’t like how she said his name. It was…possessive, and…creepy.
“Oh,” I said, nodding. “Nice to meet you.” I cringed after the automatic words left my mouth, because they would likely sound insincere given the situation; therefore, now flustered, I rushed through the rest of my thought. “Um, well, if you’ll give me a few minutes to get my things then I’ll be out of your—”
“No.” Martin’s voice thundered from someplace down the hall and pulled Mrs. Sandeke’s attention over her shoulder.
He wasn’t running when he entered his room—seemingly careful not to touch her as he slipped past where she hovered at the door—but he sure was walking fast. His eyes held mine as he approached the bed, then he bent down, cupped the back of my head, and gave me a quick, soft kiss.
“Hey, you okay?” Martin looked genuinely concerned, maybe a little panicked, and his eyes darted between mine. I barely had time to nod before he said, “I’ll take care of this, don’t worry about a thing. You’re staying with me.”
“Mart-tin! What the actual fuck?” This time she didn’t shriek. She whined.
Martin’s eyes rolled back and I saw he gritted his teeth as he straightened and stood, turned and faced his stepmother.
“Can you get her to stop saying that? It’s really irritating,” I muttered to his back, hopefully low enough that only Martin would hear.
“Patrice,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest, “you need to get out of my room.”
Everything became very, very still.
Leave it to Martin to intone so much with slowly and softly spoken words. They dripped with icicles, icicles of hate. I actually felt the temperature of the room drop at least five degrees. I hoped he never spoke to me like that.
“But…but Mar-tin...” Her voice became very baby-like, high pitched. It was weird.
I couldn’t see her because Martin was blocking my view, but I imagined her expression didn’t alter because…dead-face.
“You know you are never allowed in any of my rooms.”
“But,” she sighed softly, like a bird cooing, “you know you don’t mean that.”
“You disgust me. You’re repulsive. You married my father for his money and have been trying to fuck me ever since. Climbing in bed with a fourteen-year-ol
d boy is not okay, Patrice.”
I flinched, and my mouth fell open in shock, my eyes expanding to their maximum aperture. There was family dysfunction, and then there was Martin’s family. This was crazy. This was Jerry Springer meets Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous meets The Count of Monte Cristo.
“Why…what…why…” Patrice huffed and puffed, sounding lost and alarmed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I want Kaitlyn to know. I want her to know what being with me means, what disgusting baggage I carry in the form of family members.”
The room fell silent, and I felt another shift in the temperature of the room; it grew even colder.
“Fine,” Patrice said, her voice now alto, sounding entirely different…like a completely different person.
Instinctively I leaned to the side to see if a new woman had taken her place. It was still her, but her posturing had changed. Her shoulders were thrown back and her chin was tilted stubbornly upward. Other than that, her face looked the same, because…dead-face.
Patrice crossed her arms over her chest and added, “But you should do this skank someplace else, not in my house.”
“This isn’t your house. This is my house. All the houses are my houses. Everything is in my name. Everything was put in my name before my father married you, because he knows you’d divorce him, screw him over in a heartbeat if you thought you could walk away with more than a few hundred thousand dollars.”
What the what? His house?
This statement—or reminder, I was guessing—didn’t make her happy. The room temperature dropped again. I wondered if it would snow.
Obviously feeling cornered and nasty, Patrice decided to go for the personal approach. “You like this type of girl? The chubby ones do it for you?”
“Don’t.” The single word, again softly and slowly spoken, sent chills down my spine. It was more than a warning; it was a threat and it sounded lethal.
She held her hands up. “Whatever. I don’t care. But I will enjoy tearing her to pieces and making her life hell and using your money to do it.”
He chuckled at this. “That’s funny, Patrice.”
She cocked her head to the side as he laughed. “What? What’s so funny?”
“This girl right here,” he motioned to me, sounding proud and coldly amused, “this girl is Kaitlyn Parker, as in Senator Parker’s daughter. You know, potentially the first female president of the United States in the next election cycle? As in the granddaughter of Colonel Timothy Parker, the astronaut. She’s untouchable. She’s a national treasure. You do something to her, the entire fucking world will bring pain to your doorstep.”
I’d never thought of myself in these terms, not really. Nothing he said was untrue, but living the reality of being a perceived national treasure and accepting it were two entirely different states. Therefore, hearing this declaration come from Martin’s mouth—like he had thought about it—made my brain stutter and a spike of alarm shoot up my neck.
Patricia’s eyes slid to mine and, miracle of miracles, her expression did change. The color left her face and her eyes seemed to dim. Meanwhile I sat motionless in the bed, not sure what I should be feeling.
Then Martin added, obviously enjoying himself a great deal, “That’s right. She’s a goddamn national treasure, and she’s my girlfriend, and you need to get the fuck out of my house before I decide to stop being so nice to you.”
CHAPTER 6
Dimensional Analysis
Unbelievable.
That’s the word that kept flying around my stunned brain. I couldn’t even play the synonym game with the word. It was just all completely, totally, entirely, wholly, and absolutely unbelievable.
It was, the entire exchange was, epically unbelievable.
Patricia Sandeke—fourth, latest, and longest-lasting wife of Martin’s father—was…truly a different species. I know it’s not PC to think ill of my fellow females. In fact, one of my life rules is to try to assume the best of people, but—I’m sorry and I’m not sorry—the woman was a miserable excuse for a human being. She was a caricature, the epitome of a scheming, blonde bimbo gold digger.
Maybe she had hidden layers and a secret pain that explained away all her terrible behavior.
Maybe I was being a petulant and judgmental harpy.
Or maybe there were no hidden layers or depth. Maybe there weren’t two sides to this story. Maybe she was a black hole of vapidity and greed.
And Martin…
I tried to swallow. My mouth was dry, and therefore my throat was parched. I hazarded a glance at him but then quickly looked away before he saw my sneak peek.
I didn’t honestly know what to think about Martin.
At present he was staring straight again, the set of his jaw grim, the clouds in his blue eyes menacing. We were speeding away from the house via a fancy speedboat.
I didn’t know anything about boats, but I knew this one was super fancy for a speedboat. It was like a mini yacht. We were in an enclosed cabin aboveboard that looked over the bow; Martin was sitting in the elevated captain’s chair and I was in the co-pilot seat to his left. Both chairs reminded me of splendidly plush, leather barstools with armrests.
The vessel even had a downstairs bedroom with portal windows for undersea viewing. The space was much larger than I’d expected from first glance of the boat hull; it had room enough for a double bed, dresser, desk, bathroom, efficiency kitchen, two closets, and a respectably sized sitting area.
He hadn’t said more than two words since we left the house. But before we left, in his room, he explained that he’d cut morning practice short when Mrs. Greenstone radioed Lee in the boat about Martin’s father and stepmother’s unexpected arrival.
After the showdown at the I’m not OK Corral, otherwise known as Martin’s bedroom, he gave me one of his shirts and a pair of his shorts so I could get dressed. Then he left and told me to lock the door after him.
To me it all felt clandestine, cloak and dagger, high dramatics.
To Martin however, I suspected it felt like a Wednesday.
He returned ten minutes later with my things and informed me I would be sleeping with him for the duration of my stay. I opened my mouth to question this, but then he added that the gargantuan suite was the master suite, and Mr. Sandeke had claimed it for himself.
I wanted to point out that there were other rooms in the house, but Martin’s severe and distracted scowl made me back off. I decided to just go with it…for now.
I changed into my own clothes before we left, but I made him turn around while I dressed. Being naked at night with a happy Martin felt different than being naked during the day with an angry Martin. Yes, the odd modesty rules were likely my own dysfunctions rearing their ugly heads, but I didn’t have time for self-psychoanalysis. Martin wanted us to leave the house, and do so as quickly as possible.
He busied himself by stuffing some of my things and his things into an overnight bag.
When I was finished changing, I risked his ire by asking, “What about Sam? We can’t leave her here.”
“Eric has Sam. He’s taking her to the cottage on the other side of the island. We’re going to meet them there tomorrow. Everyone else, all the other guys, are flying back today.” He didn’t look at me as he said this, as he was too focused on his task of merging the essentials of our belongings into one small bag.
“Tomorrow? She’s staying?”
“Yeah, I figured you wouldn’t stay without her, so…” He sighed, picking up my chemistry book. After considering the cover for three seconds, he put it in the bag.
I guessed he didn’t want to chance another encounter with his wicked stepmother. Or maybe it was his father he dreaded seeing. Or maybe both.
Sitting next to him now, while he steered his fancy speedboat with livid concentration, I didn’t know what to say.
When I thought about relationships, I had thought the role of the significant other was to know what to say. My parents alw
ays seemed to know what to say to each other. But then, my parents had been married for thirty years and hadn’t been raised by evil people.
I’d only been conversing (about topics other than chemistry) with Martin for six days. Granted, those six days had included quite a lot of conversing. Sam had been right when she’d said this week was relationship boot camp. I was certainly getting bang for my time buck.
But the fact remained I didn’t know Martin well enough to know what to say, or if I should say anything at all. So I fretted instead until he slowed the boat to an idle, stopped it, then cut the engine.
I glanced around us. We were some distance away from the southernmost tip of the island and no other boats were nearby. We were completely alone.
“This was a mistake.”
Martin’s distracted statement drew my attention. I studied him for a beat, wondering if he were planning to continue unprompted.
When he remained silent, his eyes examining the gauges on the dashboard in front of him, I decided to ask, “What was a mistake?”
“Bringing you here, to the island. We should have just stayed on campus; my father wouldn’t have bothered us there. But I thought…” Martin absentmindedly covered his mouth with one hand, lifted his eyes to the horizon.
I didn’t wait to see if he was going to continue. I slipped from my chair and closed the short distance between our seats, standing in front of him, and placing myself between his legs. I wound my arms around his neck as he lowered his eyes to some spot on the floor. His hand dropped to his knee but he made no move to touch me.
“Martin…” I tried to use the voice my dad used when he attempted to explain the unexplainable. It always made me feel safe and comforted; in fact, I repeated my father’s words now because they seemed right for the situation and it was the best I could do.