I’m inherently distrustful nowadays, especially after Samuel roped me into a sham marriage and abused me in every way possible. This was only fortified when I was kicked out of the Jackson home and turned out in the street.
It would be very easy for me to suspect Rand’s motivations, yet for the life of me, I can’t help but believe he’s a genuine person. As such, after I visit the attorney, I intend to visit him at his shop and let him read the will with me.
Chapter 3
Rand
I got into work right at ten, which is what time the doors are supposed to open at Westward Ink. I’m not a tattoo artist. My reasons for working here are varied, in no particular order, and really don’t define who I am.
After getting knocked out of competitive skiing two years ago, I decided to make Jackson my permanent home. I’d spent a great deal of time here, skiing the double-black diamond slopes as part of my training. I liked the locals and the atmosphere. I also liked the powder that was always in abundant supply. In addition, Jake Gearhart, one of my closest friends, made this his permanent home and opened up a ski shop, so I figured… why the fuck not? This was as good a place as any to settle down.
What I did not want to do was work in or around the ski industry. It’s not from sour apples or bitterness over my injuries and the early end to my career. I wasn’t lying to Cat this morning. I choose to glory in the fact that I had a great career while it lasted. She didn’t ask about it, but there’s more to competitive skiing than just winning races. And I’m really talking about endorsement deals and sponsorships. Like I said before, I could afford much bigger and better than the tiny apartment where I live as I made a fuck of a lot of money during my heyday. But I don’t need more, so my money is banked, along with my gold and silver medals, in a secure lockbox. I spend my money if I want something, and I still buy my mom Louis Vuitton and my dad expensive cigars.
Most of my early training was done on the East Coast, as I’m a native Vermonter. I attended prep school with Jake at the famous Carrabassett Valley, which is a private alpine skiing, snowboarding, and freestyle academy that has produced many Olympic and World Cup champions. It sits at the base of Sugarloaf and I cut my teeth there, but after I turned eighteen, I moved to Park City, Utah to train with the U.S. Ski Team. In between training for competitions and recovery of my injuries, I lived a great deal of time in places like Tahoe and Jackson where I’d spend weeks, sometimes months, working my way back up to championship level.
I met my buddy and Westward Ink owner, Pish Malden, here in Jackson when I got my first ink during one of my numerous stays in the area. He was someone I’d grown close to over the years. After I moved into the apartment above Jake’s garage, Pish and I were casually talking one day as he was working on some ink on my arm and he ended up offering me a job. Not as a tattoo artist, mind you, but really just helping to run the shop to start out. I also took a part-time job bartending at The Wicked Horse last year, which then earned me a one-way ticket to my role as a Fantasy Maker at The Silo, but I’m content helping Pish out here for now. It keeps me busy and I like busy.
While I’m not a tattoo artist, I am an artist of sorts. In fact, in my late teens, my parents were proud to see I excelled at two things. Skiing and drawing. I had mad skills at both. But they gently pushed me toward skiing, since honestly, there was just more opportunity there. So I became a competitive alpine skier who drew and painted in my spare time. When Pish learned this about me, he would often take some of my doodles and designs and put them in his tattoo template book. So yeah… I might not actually do the ink, but there are many people who walk around with one of my designs on their bodies.
Pish offered to teach me how to tattoo, but I’m just not interested. For one, it takes a long time to get good at it and, honestly, I don’t know what I want to do with my life. I’m pretty sure it’s not working at a tattoo shop forever. Besides, I end up spending a lot of time at The Silo and I’m not interested in working more hours at Westward. So Pish settled on me being sort of a manager of the shop, coordinating schedules of the other artists and keeping things running smoothly. I’m in charge of opening every day except on weekends.
In his spare time, he taught me how to do piercings. That isn’t hard at all and while Pish did my tongue, I’m proud to say I did my own nose and eyebrow. So if someone walks in and wants a piercing and the other artists are busy, I can do that in a pinch.
Right now, however, the shop is dead. Pish is off today and the other artist, Josh, is finishing up a small piece at his station. He’ll head out to a late lunch after, and I’ll hang here until he gets back to handle any walk-ins. I’m scheduled to work all day today, but if it’s really slow in the afternoon, Pish won’t care if I take off a bit early.
About every five minutes, I’ve been looking at the front glass windows and door of the shop that look out over Pearl Street, expecting Cat to come walking in any moment. It’s nearly two and I haven’t heard a word from her. I don’t even have her fucking phone number as it wasn’t something I thought to get before I rushed out this morning. I just assume she saw my note, got dressed, and went to the attorney’s office. Frankly, I expected it to take no more than a few minutes to obtain a copy and then she would come to the shop. I thought she’d be here a long time ago, and I’m wondering if she packed her stuff up and left.
It’s a possibility I’m not liking at all.
I hear Josh’s southern twang as he walks out of his cubicle. He’s a transplanted southerner who came out this way about ten years ago to work at Yellowstone and never left. Josh is giving his customer post-care instructions, and then he’s walking out the door to lunch while I handle the payment. Just as I’m counting out change, the front door opens with the clang of a large cowbell, and I see Cat walking in.
She’s a stunning vision of elegant wealth. It’s how I know she probably dressed most days of her married life to Samuel—in designer clothes and expensive jewelry. I’ve never seen her this way because whenever Samuel brought to her The Silo, she was dressed in leather, vinyl, or hardly anything at all. It didn’t really matter what she wore through the doors, she was usually naked not long after that. Looking at her now as she walks toward me with a large, black purse slung over her shoulder and her sunglasses perched on top of her head, I’m having a hard time even imagining that this woman and I have ever fucked. Or done some of the really fucking dirty stuff we’ve done together. It’s almost surreal.
She waits patiently while I finish with the customer, her arms casually folded in front of her and looking at some of the design options framed on the wall. Once the dude leaves complete with his bandaged biceps because he had barbed wire inked around his pale, skinny arms, Cat turns to me.
“Did you get the will?” I ask.
She reaches into her purse with a grimace. “That asshole attorney made me wait for almost two hours.”
Cat pulls the thick document out. It is folded into thirds. She opens it as she steps up to the counter.
I walk out from behind and ask, “Why did you have to wait so long?”
She practically growls when she says, “I was being given the run around. At first, his secretary said he wasn’t in, but I told her that was fine. I didn’t really need to see him, just needed a copy of my late husband’s will. Then she admitted he was in and would need to approve it, but was in a meeting and I’d have to wait. When he finally came out to the lobby, a fucking hour and a half later, he admitted he didn’t have a signed copy on him. Just an unsigned copy that Kevin had given him.”
I come to stand beside Cat at the counter as she flattens the thick document out before us. Before she starts to read, she flips to the last few pages and sure enough, there are no signatures there.
“If it’s not signed, then it has no power, right?” I ask.
“Supposedly, but the attorney said the signed copy’s in Vegas.”
“And he never asked to get a signed copy before forcing you out?”
Cat shrugs. “Guess not.”
We stand beside each other, our shoulders touching, and lean over the document. It’s long and cumbersome, but within the first few paragraphs, we see the offending language.
I, Samuel P. Vaughn, being of sound mind and body, do hereby will, devise, and bequeath my entire estate, including all real and personal property, in equal shares, to my sons Kevin Vaughn and Richard Vaughn, share and share alike.
The next few paragraphs direct what do with his property if his sons predecease him, including distribution to his grandchildren as apparently, his younger son Richard has two kids. The real kick in the teeth is the next paragraph that states:
I specifically make no provision for my wife, Catherine Lyons Vaughn, in this Last Will and Testament, other than her clothing and other personal effects accumulated throughout our marriage as well as any jewelry I have bought her through the course of said marriage.
Cat makes a sound of disgust low in her throat and flips through the rest of the thick document. We can’t see any other provisions that really apply to her and again, the last few pages are conspicuously bare of signatures.
“This document means nothing,” I say as I stand straight and turn to face her. “Without signatures.”
“Agreed,” Cat says with loathing. “I’m thinking about calling Richard who lives in Vegas. Even though he’s the youngest, he’s the more ‘reasonable’ of the two brothers.”
“Where’s Kevin?” I ask.
“I think at the Jackson house. That’s what the attorney said when he kicked me out. That I had to vacate because Kevin was coming to stay.”
“So he essentially told you to leave your own home without having a valid copy of a document giving him the power to do so, probably only on the word of Kevin Vaughn telling him one had been signed?”
“Pretty much,” Cat admits.
“Yeah, that doesn’t fucking work for me,” I mutter as I grab the will off the counter and fold it back up. Handing it to her, I say, “Listen… you really need to hire an attorney. That’s the best thing you can do at this point.”
Cat shakes her head, grim resignation evident. “I can’t do that, Rand. I just don’t have the money it would take. Maybe if I could get a job, I could save up or something.”
Well, fuck. She’s between a rock and a hard place.
Ordinarily, I’d see the damsel in distress, particularly one as lovely and alluring as Cat, and I’d step in to save the day. Jake teases me mercilessly because I have this inherent need to nurture, care for, and develop others. Not sure where that comes from, but it’s something I can take to the excess sometimes.
I should offer to loan Cat the money to hire an attorney, or maybe take it upon myself to do that. But I don’t make those offers because, frankly, I don’t think Cat would accept. She seems to have the art of “stubborn pride” down to a science if the fight over her sleeping on the couch is any indication.
Besides, there is something I could do that’s more behind the scenes.
“You should feel free to go hang back at my apartment, or whatever,” I say as I lean my elbow on the counter. “I’ve got about another hour here and then I’m heading over to The Silo. If you don’t have any objections, I’m going to talk to Bridger about this and get his take on it.”
“Why Bridger?” she asks, her head tilted curiously to the side.
“Because he’s one of the smartest dudes I know. Plus, he’s well connected. He’ll probably know something about this attorney who forced you out of the house. If not, maybe Woolf will. Do you mind if I tell them about this?”
She doesn’t hesitate as she sticks the document back in her purse. “No, not at all.”
“Okay, good then,” I say with a smile, reaching out and touching my hand to her shoulder, where I give a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll get it figured out.”
As I start to pull my hand away, I’m stopped by hers coming up to latch onto my wrist. Her grasp is delicate, barely touching me, but it holds such power. Cat steps into me, her soft brown eyes shining with gratitude. She goes to her tiptoes, which isn’t much more of a stretch given the sky-high heels she’s wearing, and leans into me. Placing her lips against my cheek, she kisses me just barely and pulls away. “Thank you, Rand. For everything.”
Christ, she smells good. And that body is just inches from mine.
She releases her hold, and my hand falls away from her shoulder. I want to grab her back to me and… what?
Hug her? Fuck her? Tell her it will all be okay?
Tell her to suck my dick?
Please Cat, suck my dick?
Instead, I turn away from her and walk behind the counter. “I probably won’t be home until really late tonight, so I guess I’ll see you then.”
“Okay,” she says with a smile and starts to turn away.
“Unless you’re coming to The Silo tonight?” I throw out, hoping my voice doesn’t sound anything more than casual.
She gives a small shake of her head. “I don’t think so.”
The weight of crushing disappointment hits me again. While I’ve firmly made up my mind I am not touching Cat while she’s at my apartment because I’ve invited her there out of friendship, I’d reasoned in my mind that she was still fair game at The Silo. I mean, if you walk in those doors, it means you want to fuck. No-strings-attached sex to be precise.
Right?
So, if Catherine Lyons were to walk into that door tonight, technically she would be fair game.
I think.
But that apparently isn’t happening.
Chapter 4
Cat
I can’t believe I’m here.
I promised myself I wasn’t coming back. Not after Rand found me sleeping in my car in the parking lot last night.
Not ever again.
Yet here I am, nervously smoothing down a simple black, form-fitting strapless dress as I stand outside the entrance door to The Silo.
One of the most truthful things I’ve ever admitted to myself is that my feelings for The Silo are complicated. It’s a place I’ve loved and hated at different times.
It’s made me feel beautiful and ugly.
Needed and abhorred.
Powerful and weak.
The times I’ve felt good walking out those doors were fleeting, the buzz and adrenaline of great sex already a cold, distant memory. The lingering happiness that filled me from being desired and needed by others soon fizzling into nothingness.
But those times I’ve felt bad walking out… those stuck with me a lot longer. Usually through a scalding hot shower to wash away the sweat of others, while I sat on the tiled floor and chanted over and over again that this was what I needed to do to survive.
Oddly enough, The Silo helped me survive the sick perversion Samuel was intent on forcing me to endure. It was the lesser of two evils, and so I made sure I put on quite the show whenever my husband brought me here so he could watch me get fucked and debased because that made him happy. He watched with clouded eyes from his wheelchair, his mouth twisted into a feral grin, and I made sure he believed I loved every bit of it, because it was one of the few ways I could assert my independence from him. It was also how I could hurt him, if even only a tiny bit, because he’d much rather believe I hated it.
Sadly, sometimes I did love every bit of it. My lips curve upward as I realize, many of those times involved Rand. He’s an amazing lover and he’s adventurous. He is wide and varied in his kink, and even if he wasn’t fucking me, I loved watching him get off with others.
And that is the reason I’m here.
Rand Bishop.
A man I’ve fucked and sucked several times in the past.
A man I am immensely attracted to.
A man who has provided me unparalleled kindness in the last twenty-four hours.
I want him, and I want him tonight. It has to be here because I get the sense he’s deemed me to be off limits in his apartment. He wouldn’t accept my body as payment to him fo
r his generosity last night, but that’s not what The Silo is all about. It’s about people making free choices to get their rocks off in an environment with like-minded people. It’s about sex with no strings or expectations, and pleasure as the only end goal.
Taking a deep breath, I reach into my little clutch purse and pull out my security fob. I punch the digital code it provides me into the wall panel, and the door unlocks with a soft click.
The Silo is the brilliant brainchild of business partners Bridger Payne and Woolf Jennings, although Woolf recently sold out. It’s a round concrete building with a white-domed top that looks just like an authentic silo. It sits just off the back of Bridger’s nightclub, The Wicked Horse.
While it might look like a colossal bin to store grain in from the outside, the inside is a massive round space with glass-walled rooms around the perimeter. It’s a sex club and all kinds of kinky, nasty, sexy stuff goes on inside this place. It’s a no-holds-barred type of club and anything goes as long as it’s consensual. Some of the things I’ve done in this club would make the devil blush.
As I exit the short hallway that leads me to the center, I immediately spot Rand standing up at the round, black-lacquered bar that takes up the middle of The Silo. I ignore all the other activity around me as I’ve seen it before. Fully dressed couples mingle with cocktails in their hands. Naked couples in the glass-walled rooms, fucking in every way imaginable. It’s all almost passé to me, because I’ve not only seen it all, I’ve done it all.
Just last week, I let Bridger lock me in a stockade, effectively securing me around the neck and wrists, and then I invited several men to fuck me. Pussy, ass, mouth… didn’t matter. Luckily, it was one of those nights that was a good one. I enjoyed it. I came several times, and when I walked out, I didn’t feel degraded. That’s because it was my choice to be there, not Samuel’s, and I did what I wanted. I also called a stop to it all when I was done. And trust me, after the seventh guy, I was done because I was sore and my neck ached. My wishes were immediately granted, and I was treated with kindness and reverence by the men around me. Bridger was there to cover my body with a robe and lead me off to the bathroom where I could get cleaned up and dressed in privacy.
Wicked Need (The Wicked Horse #3) Page 3