Cruel Shame

by Sofia Daniel

  I don’t remember ever getting so turned on by a simple hand job. Maybe it was the excitement of having gotten Kendrick to admit something, but I was so aroused and wet that it ached.

  As I nipped and sucked his neck, Kendrick’s hips made gentle thrusts. I groaned, wishing it was me he was thrusting into. Shit, I wanted to lay him on his back and ride him to a gallop.

  Kendrick’s large hands gripped my shoulders. “I’m going to spend.”

  I ran my tongue along his neck. “Do it.”

  His knees buckled, and he held onto the table for balance. I quickened my pace, stroking, teasing, squeezing that gorgeous, thick length until he imploded in my hands.

  Kendrick slumped against me, breathing hard and trembling, his arm gripping me around the middle as though I was the only thing tethering him to the train.

  My lips curled into a smile. In a twisted sort of way, this was one of the most exciting experiences of my life.

  By the time Kendrick’s breath slowed to a steady pace and he drew back. I was ready to push him on the bed and prime him for another round.

  He stared down at me with hard eyes. “If you’re expecting me to return the favor, think again.”

  My nostrils flared, but I hid my reaction and gave him a gentle pat on the chest. “Don’t worry, Ken. That was a one-off.”

  Kendrick flinched, the smugness in his features vanishing. For the first time since he’d started speaking to me, he didn’t have a single thing to say in response. Instead, he turned around and got dressed, leaving me wondering if he had expected me to melt into his arms.

  He didn’t speak to me over breakfast, nor did he speak to me on the taxi-ride from the center of London to Richley.

  Around nine in the morning, our black cab pulled into the courtyard of the shithole where I’d spent my first thirteen years, a 1930’s detached house with orange bricks on the ground floor and cream pebble dash cladding that extended to the roof.

  When I was younger, it used to be a normal house with a door on the left that led to a staircase, but Billy Hancock built a two-story extension, creating Richley’s first mock Tudor mini-mansion. Now, a pair of bay windows curved on both sides of the front door, which boasted a new porch, complete with portico-style columns.

  “This is your house?” Kendrick asked.

  I met his puzzled features with a scowl. Sure, it was tacky as hell, and I much preferred the Victorian house where I lived with Sammy, but did Kendrick have to be such a dick about it? Not everyone’s family owned ten percent of Scotland’s farmland. He probably lived in a castle even fancier than Templar Academy.

  “My mother lives here, if that’s what you’re asking,” I snapped.

  “Lilah, I wasn’t—”

  “It’s fine.” I opened the door and stepped out of the taxi.

  What he thought about my origins didn’t matter. I wasn’t the same girl who got kicked out of this house. Mr. Burgh was my real family, as were Gideon and Maxwell and Orlando. Kendrick was… He stepped out of the taxi and smoothed down his herringbone jacket. Kendrick was someone I’d have to tolerate.

  Low barks sounded from around the back, sending a shudder down my spine. I also wasn’t the same girl Billy could dangle over the kennels.

  Chapter Twelve

  I continued toward the house with the winter sun on my back. With each approaching step to the front door, the sound of barking increased to a frenzy. Every fine hair on my body stood on end at the prospect of being close to those bloody dogs.

  Behind me, the door to the black cab clicked shut, and Kendrick caught up with me at the doorstep.

  “What breed?” he asked, making me flinch.

  I turned and met his curious, gray eyes. “What?”

  “They sound agitated.”

  His question trickled into my skull. “Rottweilers and German shepherds, but he might have added a few others since.”

  Kendrick’s brows rose, seeming to ask me to elaborate. I shook my head. It was bad enough hearing those dogs, worse was being near dogs trained by the man who used them as instruments of terror. I wasn’t going to talk about it on Billy Hancock’s doorstep.

  I pressed the doorbell and cringed at what now sounded like a chorus of hellhounds. The only thing stopping me from not running out on the street was the knowledge that Billy never let those dogs into the house. At least he didn’t before he went to jail. A shiver trickled down my spine. Before I sent him there.

  “Nobody can hear a doorbell over that noise,” Kendrick said.

  The second time, I kept my finger on the doorbell at a continuous ring. If Billy Hancock was out there feeding them, he’d hear the sound when the monsters finally stopped barking.

  Moments later, the door swung open, and a middle-aged woman with an obvious black dye job stuck her head through the doorway. She looked like one of the overdressed wives of Billy’s associates who would volunteer to run errands around the house whenever Mother became overwhelmed. This one wore thick, black kohl around her eyes and her lips, which she filled with a bright cerise.

  “What?” she snapped.

  “Is Abby in?” I asked.

  The woman paused. “She’s busy.”

  I pursed my lips. Busy was the term our housekeepers used whenever Mother was in a drunken stupor or too high on coke to be coherent. “Can I come in and wait?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”

  “Lilah Hancock.”

  Her gaze swept from my bleached hair down my body and stopped at my shoes. This was what we call in Richley ‘looking someone up and down.’ Not necessarily an act of aggression unless accompanied by a twist of the lips or some sort of scowl. It was a way of assessing someone without asking tedious questions, such as what they did for a living.

  Without a grimace, her eyes flickered to Kendrick, who stood behind me. “And him?”

  “My boyfriend.”

  Kendrick huffed, sounding like he was about to utter a denial, but I elbowed him in the ribs.

  The woman stepped aside. “I’ll let Mrs. Hancock know you’re here.”

  “Thanks.” Remembering all that bullshit Kendrick gave me over the Christmas break about not coming in without an invitation, I grabbed him by the hand and pulled him over the threshold.

  A faint scent of weed hung in the air, reminding me of the heavenly kush Sammy and I used to grow in the basement of our house on Beddington Road. The hallway was the same as I’d remembered: salmon-colored marble floors, magnolia walls, white skirting boards and a white ceiling.

  Two new oil paintings of Mother and Billy Hancock hung on the wall. Some people enjoyed glamor photography but Billy commissioned art of Mother and himself. This latest work was an atmospheric piece of a blood-red sky where a centaur with my stepfathers face and muscled torso brandished a reaper’s scythe. A naked, stylized version of Mother clung to his back, showing a hint of side-boob.

  I glanced at Kendrick, but he was too busy gaping at the painting of Billy wrestling a three-headed Rottweiler with the body of a rhino to notice.

  The first door on the left led to the lounge, the only room in the house fit for decent company. It was where lawyers and policemen went whenever they visited. I guided Kendrick inside, hoping the decor hadn’t changed since Mother kicked me out.

  Apart from a thick ivory carpet to match the walls, it was still the same. A vast space filled with the largest flat-screen television on the market, brown, leather Chesterfield sofas, and an oak coffee table with a glass top. I closed the door behind us, blocking the sound of barking.

  “Impressive,” Kendrick said.

  “This room is sound-proofed and double-glazed.” I lowered myself onto a leather sofa.

  Kendrick stood over me and folded his arms across his chest. “Why did you tell the housekeeper I was your boyfriend?”

  “It’s easier this way.” I pulled him into the seat next to me.

  “But I’m not—”

  “They’ve seen Maxwell already and know we’re
together.” I cringed thinking of the last time I saw Mother. Maxwell had accompanied me to St. Luke’s hospital, where Billy Hancock tried to bequeath me his drug empire to run with Sammy. “It’s going to be a nightmare explaining why he couldn’t come down with me and why I brought his twin.”

  Kendrick nodded and glanced around the room, seeming to take in the gas fireplace and bookshelves filled with gold-embossed Versace plates and golden ornaments of dogs. On the wall hung Hermès and Versace scarves in picture frames. Above the mantle sat an elaborate, gold clock Billy Hancock bought from an antique dealer who swore it was a late-nineteenth century Ormolu timepiece from Tiffany and Co.

  Everything about this room screamed that the owner of the house could afford the very best.

  He exhaled a breath. “Did you mean what you said earlier?”

  “About what?” I pulled out my smartphone and scrolled through the messages. None of the other girls I had contacted the day before had replied.

  “That you would never—”

  The door opened, and the black-haired housekeeper strode in, holding a notepad. “Mr. Hancock says I should offer you something to drink. What will you have?”

  “Two teas, please,” I said before she reeled off a list of spirits.

  She nodded and disappeared behind the door.

  Kendrick’s glare burned the side of my face. Even though he hadn’t gotten to finish his question, he knew that I knew what he wanted to ask. When I told him that the morning hand job would be the last, was I telling the truth?

  The answer to that question was complicated. I could tolerate most of Kendrick’s prickly personality with Maxwell and Orlando as buffers. His silly mind games were a little too much for me on his own. I’m not sure what he expected when he implied that would be the last time I touched his dick. All I did was agree with him.

  I turned to Kendrick. “What do you want from me?”

  He drew back and scowled. “Nothing.”

  “Then why do we need to talk about it?” I asked.

  We sat without speaking for several moments, the only thing filling the silence being the ticking of the Tiffany Ormolu clock. I turned to the bay window, watching a white vehicle slow as it passed the house. Stupid, unmarked police cars. They made it so obvious when a house was under surveillance.

  The door opened again, and the housekeeper came in holding a silver tray with one of mother’s bone-china tea sets. This one was rimmed with gold leaf and decorated with teal-colored flowers. The woman even provided a plate of Belgian cookies.

  As I poured us both a cup of tea under the woman’s watchful eye, the door opened again.

  Billy Hancock strolled in, wearing a burgundy silk dressing gown with thick, black collars and lapels. I refused to refer to him as a stepfather because that would imply he was Mother’s husband and a form of parental guardian. I acknowledged him as neither. He looked like an aging boxer about to make his comeback or a deleted scene from Terminator Two featuring the T-800 caught between changes of clothes.

  “Your mother is busy.” He sat on the leather sofa opposite.

  “I’ll wait.” I turned to Kendrick with the milk jug raised. He shook his head.

  “What’s this about?” Billy Handcock gestured at me to pour him a cup.

  I poured milk into my full cup and pushed it across the coffee table. “Family business.”

  His eyes narrowed. “And?”

  “I’m only going to say it once, so let’s wait for Mother to wake up.”

  Billy Hancock’s gaze slid to Kendrick and travelled and up and down his form. “This is the boy you chose over Sammy?”

  “Yes,” I said from between clenched teeth. “It’s nice to be with a man who doesn’t raise his hands against women.”

  He scoffed. “No, Treacle. You just prefer a man who lets the police swing their fists.”

  Kendrick hissed. I squeezed his hand, urging him not to speak. That false arrest was in the past, and Maxwell had already groveled and made up for his mistake by helping me with the Liddells. Neither of us needed to prove a damn thing to a man like Billy Hancock.

  Billy Hancock leaned back in his seat and glared at Kendrick, who met his glare with an even gaze. Maybe Billy thought he was still the tough guy who left prison, but from the pallor of his skin and the dark circles under his eyes, he still hadn’t recovered from being shot.

  I placed a hand on Kendrick’s chest, slid it up his neck, and cupped his jaw. When he turned his gaze back to mine, I leaned forward and gave him a peck on the lips. He drew back and offered me a tiny smile.

  A relieved breath eased out of my lungs. Male posturing over.

  “It’s going to be a long wait for your mother.” Billy Hancock let the rest of the sentence hang in the air.

  “We can come back later.”

  “No.” He raised a palm and smiled. “Stay here. Margaret just put a roast in the oven. I’m sure you and…”

  “Maxwell,” I said.

  “Right,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll both enjoy her hasselback potatoes.”

  My heart sank. Not because of the prospect of sitting across a dinner table with Billy Hancock—that was bad enough. If we were staying for lunch, it meant that Mother was going to be unconscious for several more hours.

  I ground my teeth, my veins burning with hatred. This was all his fault. He kept enough gin and cocaine in the house to supply a bloody village, knowing full well that Mother had a problem. That bastard was the one who got her addicted.

  Billy Hancock was a fucking spider and Mother was caught in a web of addiction and withdrawal. Most guys like to trade up when they got more successful. Dump the old wife for a new, sexier model. Not Billy. He clung onto Mother like she was the only woman in Richley. Clung onto her drunken, coke-addled self. Clung onto her even after I sent him to prison.

  It was the foulest relationship I’d ever seen. When Mother wanted drugs, he supplied them. When she wanted to get clean, he paid for her to enter a rehab facility. When she wanted to leave, he plied her with enough drugs and gin to get her addicted all over again.

  Memories of everything I had witnessed in this house swirled through my mind—the beatings, the blackouts, the bellowing. They formed loops and knots and twists, making my blood boil for vengeance. As long as this man was still alive and out of prison, Mother would never be free.

  A knock sounded on the door. Billy Hancock stood with a wide grin. “Come in and join us for a cup of tea.”

  I turned to find my ex, Sammy Kettering, strolling into the lounge. Tottering at his heels was that two-faced bitch, Nichelle.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I drew in a sharp breath through my teeth as Sammy strolled into the living room like he was an honored and regular guest at the Hancock residence.

  Now that he’d regained the weight from prison, he looked… so much older. Twenty-seven was hardly granddad material but he hadn’t been eating right and now had a double chin. Shit. Nichelle had probably been ordering a bunch of takeaways instead of cooking real food.

  Sammy wore his favorite leather jacket over a hoodie and tracksuit bottoms, looking like he’d just rolled out of bed, and Nichelle wore my old cerise bodycon dress with a cut-out middle that exposed her thighs.

  I rolled my eyes. These days, there were far worse things a girl could do than steal my clothes.

  “Lilah.” He shot Kendrick a filthy glare. “I came down as soon as I heard.”

  I turned to Billy Hancock, who brought the cup to his lips and smiled. “What do you want?”

  “Another chance, of course,” Sammy replied.

  I gave Nichelle a pointed glare. Stupid cow tilted her head to the side in one of those what-are-you-looking-at expressions. She wasn’t the brightest girl in the world, but even she should have recognized the implied insult.

  “Come on, Lilah.” Sammy walked around the coffee table to Billy’s sofa and perched himself on its arm. “You can’t stay pissed off at me forever.”

  “Wha
t part of catching you in bed with another woman and leaving you don’t you understand?” I snapped.

  “Boys will be boys, won’t they?” Billy gave Sammy a hearty clap on the back.

  Kendrick turned to me and frowned. “This is your ex?”

  “I only stayed with him because I had nowhere else to go,” I lied.

  Up until the day I found him in bed with Nichelle, Sammy and I had a great life. He hadn’t cared about my age, hadn’t cared that everyone suspected me of being an informant, and he supported me through my exams. He even helped me set up a sewing room in his house. Then he ruined it all by jumping into bed with one of my friends.

  Nichelle teetered across the room in my red snakeskin Manolo Blahniks that Sammy bought for me the previous Christmas. I pressed my lips together to hide a scowl. The bitch was two sizes bigger than me and had probably distorted the leather. She stood at the edge of the sofa, waiting for Sammy to move up. When he didn’t, Nishelle shuffled around Sammy and settled between him and Billy Hancock.

  “Lila…” Sammy’s constipated expression told me everything. He was tiring of Nichelle. He really wanted to make things work with Billy Hancock because he practically ruled Richley’s underworld.

  I shook my head. If he thought I was the key to climbing up the ranks of organized crime, he should have been faithful and less free with his fists. Billy Hancock ogled Nichelle’s breasts as she shifted on the sofa, and I cringed at the thought of Sammy only keeping her around so he could hand Nichelle over to Billy as a gift.

  “Lilah,” Sammy whined. “Look at me.”

  I met his pathetic face with a scowl. “If I’d known visiting my own mother would turn out to be an ambush, I’d have waited for her in McDonalds.”

  Kendrick stood. “Let’s find a hotel and wait for her when she’s free.”

  As I rose, both Sammy and Billy Hancock shot to their feet.

  “Leave this house,” Billy snarled through clenched teeth, “And I will keep Abby busy for weeks. Don’t think I won’t.”