Temptations - The Complete Series

by Annie Jocoby

  “Apparently not. Perhaps that act just wiped part of the slate clean, not the whole slate. Which brings me to the inescapable conclusion that Malcolm must have been way, way, way over his head with those people. I’m surprised that Charlotte never said anything to you about all of that.”

  Slade shook his head. “She wouldn’t say anything to me about that. I’m sure that that piece of information was between her and Malcolm. It was a business transaction for her, nothing more. Why would she confide in me about that?”

  “Good point.” I fidgeted with my water glass a little bit, and then took a tiny sip. I wanted to bring up to Slade the fact that he avoided the LA question, but, for some reason, I was nervous to do so. I was nervous, I guessed, because I really didn’t want to know what his answer was for this. I didn’t want to hear from him that he was going back to LA and would forget all about me.

  I silently cursed myself again about being “that girl.” That girl whose imagination ran wild with speculation about what was going to happen in the future with her guy. Slade had upended me completely, body and soul, and there was no coming back from that. I imagined that, if he just went on his merry way back to his home in LA, and just left me here, forgotten, I would give up on men for a little while. Maybe forever. It just wasn’t worth it to put my heart out there and have it stomped on. Of course, the major problem was that Slade wasn’t the first person to stomp on my heart. He wasn’t even close. I had been beaten down so many times, and I always, always got right back up.

  I felt the refrains of the song I Will Survive in my head as I tentatively asked him to answer my earlier question. “Slade, I asked you earlier what you thought would happen with us when you went back to LA. You avoided that question.” I looked up at him shyly from behind my water glass, and then took another sip.

  He took my hands. “I don’t think that far, Serena,” he said. “I have to put one foot in front of the other right now. I’ve just come out of a period in my life where I was sure I would spend the rest of it in prison, only to become worried that it’s my mother who will spend the rest of her life in prison. It’s funny how certain things that were so important before – things like running my business and making it the international conglomerate that it is – become less so when you’re faced with what really matters.”

  I nodded my head and said nothing. I was hoping that he would give me the answer that I really wanted to hear, but, thus far, he wasn’t giving me that at all. He wasn’t giving me anything.

  “Listen,” he said. “I will make a small commitment to you, although it’s probably not what you’re looking for. I’ll buy your firm. I’m quite sure that your now-top partner there, Harry, will be perfectly willing to negotiate with me. I can make the whole thing solvent again.”

  I had mixed emotions about him doing that. I knew that he had the money for it, but, at the same time, I didn’t know why he was doing it. Was it because he needed the firm for Margot, or because he didn’t want me to lose my job?

  I shook my head. “I’m becoming somebody I don’t want to be,” I said quietly.

  He put his hand on mine. “What do you mean?”

  “Insecure. Needy. I’m not that girl, but you keep me so off-balance.”

  He looked mystified that I was talking this way. “I guess I don’t understand. I thought you would be happy that your firm wouldn’t be going bankrupt.”

  “I am.” That was all that I said. It was time to change the subject, and change it quickly. I wasn’t going to be the interrogator here. “Well, you might buy the firm, but I might not be working there much longer.”

  Slade’s face crinkled when I said that. “What do you mean?”

  “I punched Derek today at the luncheon that our firm had in his honor. He put his hand on my leg and…”

  Telling Slade about this was a mistake. He immediately clenched his fist and had a look on his face that told me he was about to kick some ass. Again. “Excuse me,” he said, getting up. “I’m so sorry, Serena, but I hope that you’re done with your dirty martini. Because I’m going to pay the bill, and we’re getting out of here.”

  “Where are we going?” I asked, getting up. I knew the answer to that question, of course. It was obvious. There was going to be some kind of cage match between Slade and Derek, and I wasn’t going to be happy about it. “Slade, you’re still technically out on bail, at least until the prosecutor completely drops the charges against you. I would suggest that-“

  My words were falling on deaf ears. Slade was striding purposefully through the bar, he found a barmaid and gave her some money. Then he turned around, and put his arm around me. “Steady on your feet, my beautiful drunk Serena. We’re going to your home.”

  I shook my head. I didn’t want to face Derek, not that soon.

  However, I knew that if I protested, my words would continue to fall on deaf ears.

  Slade had a look in his eye that was murderous.

  I wondered what he was truly capable of.

  Chapter 5

  Slade

  We got out into the street, and I put Serena gently into the front seat of my Tesla and strapped her in. She was like a rag doll by then, full of gin martinis. That was just as well, as I hoped that she wouldn’t understand what was about to go down. I loved this woman, and I had intended to marry her, but I wanted it to be a complete surprise. That was why I kept avoiding her questions about the future. I hated that she was kept off-balance, but I really wanted to see a look of total shock on her face when I finally bended down on one knee with the biggest, and most beautiful, rock I could possibly find.

  Because I wanted her to be my wife, it gave me all the more reason to protect her. I was going to have to kick some ass, and I was going to have to kick it well this time. I had warned Derek, when I confronted him on his porch that morning, to stay the hell away from Serena. He apparently didn’t heed my warning, so I was going to have to go to step 2. It wasn’t necessarily something that I wanted to do, but sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

  I tried not to drive like a maniac, because I knew that Serena wasn’t feeling so good. She was crumpled up against the door and was holding her belly. “Honey, just let me know if you start to feel sick,” I told her. I had been there too many times before – drinking too much and feeling like crap. It wasn’t even like her to drink this much, but I guessed that Derek just had that effect on her. She probably drank like that to try to escape how she felt around that jackass. I knew that Charlotte's whole game was to make sure that Derek psychologically tortured Serena, but I was goddamned if he was ever going to lay a hand on her again.

  We got to her house, and I helped her inside her door. “Slade, I don’t want to be here,” she said. “I can’t be here. I don’t want to be near that man. That awful man.”

  “Shhh,” I said. “We won’t be staying long. We’ll go back to my house soon. But I have to take care of something here.” I laid her gently down on her couch and put a blanket over her. Her dogs weren’t there, of course, because they were staying with me. I found myself wishing that her dogs were around, though, because I knew how much comfort Serena drew from them.

  I then went out the door and headed next door. I pounded on the door, and a petite blonde woman answered. She looked me up and down and smiled. “Hi, can I help you?”

  “I need to speak with Derek.”

  At that, Derek himself appeared directly behind her. His face furrowed, and he shoved blondie to the side. “I can take care of this, Maggie. Why don’t you go back into the kitchen and continue chopping onions?”

  She looked at me quizzically and then looked very worried. “Be careful,” she whispered to him.

  Derek said nothing, but just continued to stand there. As soon as Maggie disappeared into the kitchen though, he came out on the porch. “I knew that you would be back here,” he said. “I knew it.”

  I clenched my fist. “If you knew this, then why would you do what you did?” I then hauled off and hi
t him right in the gut, and then rapidly punched him in the face. I had learned how to fight when I was very young, before I was taken in by Helen and Scott. I secretly was learning because I wanted to take on my father one day and make sure he never laid another hand on my mother. Of course, she took care of my father before I had the chance to, but the fighting lessons had always stuck with me.

  You can take a boy from the street, but you may never take the street from the boy.

  Derek crumpled on the porch again. I knew his soft spot and this was crucial. A good fighter always knows his opponent’s weaknesses before even throwing a punch. It was fairly easy to find Derek’s.

  He stumbled back up on his feet, but I could tell that he didn’t have much fight in him that night. That was possibly a good thing, because maybe I could keep him in line without resorting to Plan B. He shook his head. “Man, I was drinking today. Probably drinking a bit too much. It won’t happen again.”

  Typical bully. He was all bluster until somebody gives him a beat-down. He was a marshmallow inside, and I was able to completely exploit this.

  “Good. Listen. If I hear one more word from Serena about you harassing her, I’ll have to go to the next step. And I can guarantee that you won’t like the next step.”

  “I’m sure I won’t, but tell me what this next step would be.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “Let’s just say that I know where to hide the body.” I had done it before, when I helped my mother cover-up the homicide of Hugh. I did it so well, in fact, that Hugh was never found at all. He was fish food and Derek would be too if he continued harassing Serena.

  Actually, I had no idea if I actually would be capable of killing this man in cold blood. I certainly would be if he attacked Serena sexually again. I had never come close to killing anyone in my life, but this man was somebody who would bring that out in me. I told Serena over and over again that any man is capable of anything, and I did believe that.

  But I hoped that merely threatening him would be enough for him to back the hell off.

  “You’re actually threatening to kill me?”

  I simply raised an eyebrow. “Either that or expose you for what you are. I won’t even say that I’m going to expose you for who you are, because you’re not even human to me. You’re an ant. You’re somebody who deserves to be crushed under my heel. And you will be, trust me, you will be, if you ever lay another hand on Serena.”

  “You got no proof of nothing.”

  “Oh, don’t I?” There was some way that Charlotte had found out about Derek’s connection to Serena, and I knew what it was. There had to have been some medical record out there that tied Serena and Derek together. Serena didn’t say as much, but I suspected that she did seek help for her miscarriage, and that she put Derek’s name down as the possible father of that baby. Not that this mattered, though. This slime would just say that it was consensual sex and no one would be the wiser. That’s what made rape such a terrible crime to try to prosecute, I would imagine – too much “he said - she said,” to substantiate anything. And, well, trying to report Derek’s crime at this late date wouldn’t do much good. The Statute of Limitations had probably passed.

  “No, you don’t,” he said.

  I stood right in front of him, my fists clenched, and just stared him down. I hoped that intimidating him would be enough for him to leave Serena alone. He already knew that I could throw a punch and that I could take his punches very well. He crossed his arms in front of his chest, but, after a few minutes of my staring him down, he dropped his arms to his side and looked away.

  That was what I needed to see. I needed to see that he was going to submit, and that’s exactly what he did. He was like a little dog that rolled on his back, which was the dog’s way of pleading not to be hurt. It was a dog’s way of submitting.

  I narrowed my eyes and continued to stare at him for a little while longer, and then I pointed at him. “Leave her the fuck alone,” I said. “Or you’ll see what is coming to you, and it won’t be pretty. As I said, I know where to hide a body.”

  At that, Maggie reappeared on the porch. “I have dinner cooking,” she said. “Would you like to join us? And you’re with Serena, aren’t you? I would love it if you and she both could join us. I’d like to be friends.”

  I put my hand behind my neck, and Derek was staring at the floor. Maggie was looking from Derek to me and back again, sensing that there was tension between the two of us, but not really understanding why. “I would love to stay for dinner,” I said, still staring at the cowed Derek. “But I don’t think that Serena is up to it. She’s not feeling well. Can we take a rain check, though?”

  Maggie nodded her head. “I’m a great cook,” she said. “I know that Serena is a vegan, but still, I think that I could probably accommodate her. Derek here eats only meat and some potatoes. Getting him to eat veggies has been a totally uphill and useless battle. I can’t get him to even try a vegetable. But I know how to cook them very well. It would be nice to actually serve somebody who can appreciate that.”

  I smiled at her. She seemed like a sweet person. Why she was wrapped up with this Derek character, I didn’t know. I wondered why anyone would be involved with such a creep.

  “I’ll be sure and tell Serena about your cooking skills. I’m sure she would love to come and visit you guys,” I said, trying to be nice. Of course, Serena wasn’t going to want to have dinner with these two, and I wouldn’t ask her. But I didn’t want to insult sweet Maggie.

  The three of us stood awkwardly on the porch for a beat, and then I begged off. “Well, I have to go back to check on Serena. She’s not feeling well.”

  “Tell her that we’re thinking of her,” Maggie said. “And we hope that she can make it over here soon.”

  “I will,” I said, nodding my head.

  And then I went back to check on Serena at her home right next door.

  Chapter 6

  Serena

  I lay on the couch, but the room was spinning. It was like a fast carousel. I closed my eyes, feeling that nothing was real. Was there really an evil man living right next door? The man who had haunted my dreams ever since I was 17 years old? The man who took my virginity and just left me in the woods after he was through with me? And Slade, apparently, was right next door. I didn’t know what he was going to do to Derek, and I didn’t really want to find out.

  Thankfully, Slade didn’t take too long. He was back with me within an hour. He came over to me, where I was lying on the couch, hugging a large pillow to my stomach. He smoothed back my hair. “You feeling a bit better?” he asked me.

  I shook my head. “I’m feeling really pukey right now, but I don’t know if I can get up off this couch to do anything about it.”

  At that, Slade got up and went into the kitchen. He returned a few moments later with some aspirin, a large jug of water and another glass that had soda water and bitters in it. “Here,” he said, making me sit up. “Take these aspirin and drink all of this water down - every bit of this water. And, after you drink all of this water, take the soda and bitters. Trust me, you’ll thank me in the morning.”

  I took the aspirin and contemplated the jug of water. It was a huge jug, probably holding about 64 oz of water. It was the jug that I took to the gym when I lifted weights and knew I’d be sweating a lot. I didn’t know how I was possibly going to down all of that water, on top of all the alcohol that I already had swimming around in my belly. Still, I knew that Slade was right – this water and aspirin were the best things for me right at that moment.

  “You’re really good to me,” I said to him. “Why are you so good to me?”

  “Now, Serena, you’re not sounding like yourself. You know why I’m good to you.” He kissed me on the forehead lightly. “Don’t you?”

  I nodded my head, but I didn’t really know. I didn’t know much at that moment. Well, I knew that the room was spinning and that Slade didn’t exactly seem real, but that was all that really popped into my brain. “Ye
s,” I said weakly.

  He smoothed my hair once more and kissed me on the forehead again. “I’m good to you because I’m crazy about you. I don’t think that you know how crazy I am about you. But I am. You get me, more than anybody else ever has.”

  I blinked. “But I don’t understand. You’re leaving me aren’t you? Your life isn’t here, it’s in LA. You have to return to that life, don’t you? I mean, I guess we could see each other on the weekends, some weekends, but I don’t know. I never contemplated being in a commuter relationship.”

  I was hoping that he would give me some indication, any indication, on what he wanted to do when he went back to his LA home. But he still didn’t. He just continued to stare at me and urging me to keep drinking the water. “Let’s not think about all of that,” he said to me. “It’s far in the future, maybe. Remember, my mom is being represented by your firm, so I need to be around for that. I need to make sure that she gets out of killing Hugh.”

  I put my hand on his arm and touched it lightly. “You feel responsible, don’t you? Somehow?”

  He sighed and stared at the wall. His hands were clenched together in front of him, and then he hung his head. “Yes. I do.” He took a deep breath. “I do. I should have thought things through that night a little better. But I didn’t. I went on auto-pilot. I should have been thinking about the impact Charlotte would have on my life when she knew what happened to Hugh. What kind of impact she would have when she knew what mom and I did to Hugh’s body.”

  I continued to stroke his arm lightly while I drank my water. “You did what you thought was best in that situation. You were young, very young. And you panicked. I probably would have done the same exact thing in that situation. If Luke or my father or Christopher were in that situation, I probably would have done the same thing. So, please, don’t blame yourself.”

  “I know. But my mother would have done anything that I asked her to in that situation. If I just would have asked her to turn herself in, she would have done it. But I didn’t. Maybe it would have been better if she would have turned herself in. I don’t know. What I do know is that it’s not only come back to bite me in the ass, but it has also given Charlotte ammunition against me all these fucking years. All these fucking years. The chickens are finally coming home to roost, I guess, so all these years that she’s blackmailed me seem like a waste. I probably should have just gone to the police instead of giving Charlotte that kind of power over me.”