by Ella James
At least, it’s supposed to be empty. I’m supposed to curl into a ball and sob, because when I get this mad, it’s the only thing I can do to discharge my anger. Instead, I find myself staring at Hunter West.
6
Hunter
HER FACE IS blotchy, like she’s been stung by a bunch of bees. I can tell she’s close to crying because her sea blue eyes are glowing, and she’s got them wide, the way women do when they don’t want tears to spill and smear up their eye makeup.
Her wavy, red-brown hair is messy, hanging just above her shoulders, and I want to run my fingers through it.
Shit.
I shouldn’t even be here.
I noticed the gate open and thought it was weird; the housekeepers always shut it. And housekeepers are the only ones coming and going lately. I keep an eye on the place because I want to buy it soon; its acreage backs up against my lodge, which is where I was heading when I made this detour. When I saw the unfamiliar car and found the door unlocked, I threw on my superhero ape.
Fucking stupid. I shouldn’t be in Libby DeVille’s childhood home without an invite, standing in this massive, outdated kitchen with her, just like I shouldn’t have lingered when I heard her conversation with her father.
I tell myself to keep this brief—after all, Priscilla’s waiting for me—but my feet aren’t listening. I take a small step closer, my eyes never leaving hers, even as she looks me over, Lakers cap to boots.
“Asshole father?” In the tomb-like silence of the house, I’m surprised at how deep my voice is.
I can see her shoulders rise and fall; she’s trying to control herself. Judging by the bit I heard, it makes sense that she would be worked up. If his reputation is anything to go on, Benjamin DeVille didn’t do much for his wife or daughter when he was with them, and does even less now that he’s left town.
Libby smooths the pained look from her face and crosses her arms. “How much did you hear?” she asks me with a slight wince.
“Enough to know you’re probably not the one in need of therapy.”
She squeezes her eyes shut, running a hand back through that silky hair. “Wow, well that’s embarrassing.”
If only she could be a fly on the wall at the family home in NOLA back when I lived there with Dad, Rita, and my half-sister, Amber. This wouldn’t even register on our drama-ometer. I want to tell her that, but I’ve got no clue how.
Libby chews her succulent lower lip, and it’s my turn to stare her down. I’ve only seen her once since the night of the party, and that was from a distance; I’m surprised to find she’s looking more like a fit, trim, spin-class type than the curvy bombshell I remember.
She plays with the ends of her hair, and I let my gaze roll from her low-cut royal blue sweater down her loose jeans to her suede shoes—some kind of moccasins. Even with the weight loss, she looks cute. Casual. I feel a pleasant tingle just from being near her.
Finally her eyes flick up to mine, like she’s waiting for me to say something. So I do. “What do you need money for?”
Her mouth draws up like she’s sucking on a lemon. I like this face on her. The you-should-be-ashamed-of-yourself face; it’s kind of sexy mistress. To top it off, she arches her eyebrows primly. “That’s not really your business, Hunter West.”
Maybe not, but I have a pretty good guess. “Is it the governor’s son?”
Her eyes flash, dark blue now. “The son the governor cut off and sent to a shitty hospital because he’s a dickhead who deserves to be ridden out of California on a rail?” Her cheeks flush. “You probably shouldn’t ask me about that right now.” I watch her delicate eyebrows meet as her sea blue eyes narrow to slits. “What are you even doing here?”
Her eyes wander the expanse of my chest and I know she’s taking in the size of me. I saw the Mace on her key chain in the parlor, and I wonder if she’s feeling nervous.
I nod toward the back of the house, relaxing my shoulders so maybe I look a little friendlier. “I saw the gate open and wanted to check in on things. I own the property behind you.”
Her furrowed brows crease more deeply. “The old retreat?”
“I bought it off the Episcopal Church a few years back. Turned it into a quail hunt.” She still looks wary, so I give her a little more. “Just being neighborly.”
Her face is blank—a damn good poker face, if I do say so. I can’t tell what she’s thinking. I wonder at the odds of her having heard about my connection to Sarabelle’s disappearance and decide they’re probably nil.
Next, I think about that night on the bed: her head pressed into a pillow, her hair spread around her face. The memory of it makes my dick twitch, but then I remember how it ended: with Libby seeing me with Priscilla. Impotent anger washes over me, but I’m still hard enough to hurt. I shift my weight, but that just makes it worse.
Libby’s eyes are on mine, thankfully. “Well I’m okay,” she tells me, tucking some hair behind her ear. A tiny pearl gleams from her earlobe, and I have the odd thought that I could buy her something so much bigger.
“I appreciate you stopping in to check on things, and I’m sorry you got an earful of my business.” She waves at the kitchen doorway. “You’re free to go.”
I don’t want to go, though.
“Really, I’m just fine here.” She’s got her hands on her hips, and I notice she’s closer to the parlor door than she was before I looked away. For a fraction of a second, I allow myself to play out a fantasy. Libby runs and I bolt after her, capturing her upper arms and whirling her to face me. I plant my mouth over hers and cup her ass as I press her soft body against mine.
I can’t contain a hungry smile, and Libby side-steps, now even closer to the parlor.
I arch a brow. “I make you nervous?”
She smiles smugly, and the nervousness I thought I saw looks more like impatience. “I have my black belt in Judo. Do you?”
A grin stretches my face, but my lips aren’t sure what to do with it. It falls right off, and I press my mouth into a more familiar solemn line. I adjust the bill of my cap, feeling the weight of the last few months. “You’d be right to be nervous. That’s a good thing. You never know whose room you could be wandering into.”
“So that was your room that night.”
More statement than question, but I say, “Who’s asking?”
She looks at me strangely, and I realize I’ve become too paranoid.
“Sorry.” I rub my brow, feeling frustrated and tired. “It’s been a long...week.”
I’m shifting my weight, telling myself to head for the parlor, when her mouth does something soft. I want to kiss it. My cock throbs as she nods, like she’s looking in a crystal ball and seeing every sleepless night and fucked up, dead end day that’s led me here, to her kitchen. I wanted to play hero for her, and it’s just so stupid. I feel revulsion rise in my chest.
Then she says, “I believe it.” Her words are soft silk, and when they leave her ruby-colored lips, her radiant eyes are on me, gentle and perceptive.
My throat tightens. I remember her that night at the party—the warmth of her, the scent of her. I need to leave, but I’m rooted to the kitchen floor.
Libby’s eyes flicker to my clenched fists, and I imagine what I must look like: two-hundred-twenty pounds of head-fucked male, product of an escort and a professional asshole. But instead of bolting for the Mace, she tilts her head, regarding me like she would a puzzle.
“Do you stay at the vineyard often?” she asks quietly.
“Sometimes.” I’m not sure why she cares.
The corner of her mouth lifts, a lovely little half-smile that makes me wonder if she has any idea what effect she has on me. “I’m sure you don’t remember this, but you helped me fix my car once, years ago.”
I nod, but I don’t return her smile. Even then, when she was just a kid, she captured my attention.
She turns and walks into the parlor, and I follow her into the spacious room, decorated in shades of black and g
ray and red. She looks over her shoulder as she grabs her keys from a Victorian secretary.
I can tell she’s thinking about something. She hesitates before casting a troubled look into my eyes. “Did you do that to your room?”
“Do what?” I frown, annoyed at how I can’t seem to make myself leave.
“At the party,” she says. “Your room there was a mess.”
I flinch at the memory, debating only briefly whether to be honest. “I was…very angry that night.” My voice is ultra-deep; husky. As I drink in Libby, I go back there.
I remember the sensation of choking—a sensation Priscilla sometimes likes to experience with a collar, or—so much worse—my hands on her throat.
I’m holding Libby’s stare, hoping she’ll see these things inside me and tell me to get going. I notice I’m holding my breath, waiting for her wary dismissal. Instead, her mouth softens again. I wait for her expression to morph into pity or sadness, but she looks serene. “I think there are two sides to you,” she says quietly.
She must think one of my sides is a psychopath. At least she won’t be disappointed if I ever become an official suspect in the escort disappearances.
Thinking of that, while looking at her delicate face, makes my heart pound uncomfortably, and I realize how afraid I am that it might come to that. I’m completely innocent, I remind myself, but I know better. There’s a common perception, partially true, that rich people are above the law. It’s true for a lot of us, but I have a feeling my notoriety could work against me. I’m the kind of guy prosecutors like to stick a case to.
Libby can read my mind. I think she can. Her eyes are latched to mine, and I see my heaviness reflected on her face. She slides her hands into her pockets, stepping closer as she speaks. “What I mean is, most people only see what you want them to see. Like the night my mom’s Porsche broke down.”
I remember that night. It was back when I was fucking an escort from Los Angeles. The sex was explosive, but I always felt like shit after, and I’d been relieved when my security manager interrupted over the intercom. A few minutes later, after pulling on some pants, I’d gotten my first glimpse of Elizabeth DeVille. She’d had her hair in a pony-tail that stuck up off the side of her head, and she’d been wearing short red shorts and a light blue tank top with a whale on it.
“You like whales?” I’d asked her when I finished with the car.
Her face had gone all soft and pretty, making me feel more like one-hundred-and-three than the twenty-three-year-old I was, and she’d shrugged. “Yeah, but not a lot more than any other animal. I just like saving things.”
The car was a piece of junk that likely wasn’t going to make it a hundred more miles, so I convinced her to spend the night in my guest house. After Marietta went to sleep, I found myself sitting out by the swimming pool, hoping Elizabeth might wake up and come outside. It was ridiculous. Embarrassing, even.
She’s inches from me now, and reaching toward my face.
For a second, I feel a thrill of fear I haven’t felt since I was a boy. It settles deep inside my stomach. Then her hand touches my shoulder, and I start to sweat from every pore.
Her free hand grabs one of mine, and she closes the distance between our bodies with a gentle tug. I lean closer to her, moving in slow motion. I’m feel slightly dizzy, as her thumb touches between my brows.
“I see a frown mark, though,” she whispers, “right here.” I blink, surprised to find the soft sensation makes my eyelids heavy.
“I thought you were upset that night,” she murmurs as she strokes. “After...” She blushes, and I blink my heavy eyelids.
“I could see you at the foot of the bed, and I was kind of worried for you. I don’t know why, but something about you...” That frown is back, visible through my lashes, and it feels like someone’s scooping out my insides. I feel gutless and emptied, like I might dissolve into a puddle at this woman’s feet.
“Something about you just seems sad. I don’t know what about poker-playing would make a man sad, but I’m watching these,” she says, gently thumbing my frown lines one more time. “Try not to let them get any deeper.”
I nod at her, feeling like I’m in a dream. As I’m walking out the door, I turn again, fighting a vision I have of kissing her mouth.
I take her porch stairs two at a time, and my knees ache from my misadventures with Priscilla. I swing into my F-250, and before I can get a handle on myself, my phone buzzes. Priscilla. Seeing her name on the screen is like jumping into icy water.
I hit the button to answer, but I can’t bring myself to say ‘hello’.
I can hear the static on the other end, static and the clinking sound of hooker heels. “Hunter?” She says it like the lash of a whip. “Where are you? I’m waiting.”
“Keep waiting,” I spit out.
“Believe me, I will. But you’ll pay for this.”
I grip the steering wheel and wonder if Sarabelle is dead already. I’m playing this fucked up game in part for her. And in part because I can’t bear what would happen if people found out that Rita wasn’t my real mother. If people found out what I did to her.
I can still hear her low voice, a whisper in my memory where it should be a scream, and for the briefest moment I can feel the sticky sweat I used to get when she was mad. I can hear her say, “You’re trash, just like your mother.”
And I can see her crumpled in my arms, as her face turns white.
I lower the phone and I’m punching the ‘end call’ button when I hear Priscilla on the other end of the line. Her voice is low and sultry, but it’s wicked all the same, giving me flashbacks of another evil bitch.
“I know where you are,” she says. “And I don’t like it.”
7
Elizabeth
I LEAVE MY mom’s house feeling like a changed woman. It’s dangerous for me, because it involves Hunter. I can’t imagine what gave me the courage to be as forward with him as I was. It’s true I’m not exactly shy, but this is Hunter, golden god, my oldest, only crush.
In one fleeting interaction he went from Hunter West The Fantasy to Hunter West Real Person, and the bad thing is, I like him even more now. He was sympathetic when he asked about my dad. He cared that I was upset; at least that’s the feeling I got. I could be wrong.
But not about the end, when we were in the parlor and he told me he’d been angry that night at the vineyard. I know I’m not wrong about that, and while I admit maybe I’m being self-indulgent, I feel like I can say almost for sure that what I saw between Priscilla and him wasn’t really…accurate. Hunter seemed disgusted with himself when he looked at me that night. And tonight... He seemed kind. Not at all the kind of guy who gets off strangling porn stars.
I can hear Cross’s voice in my head, telling me I don’t know anything about Hunter, and I admit maybe I’m star struck. But I just don’t think so.
If he’s only a playboy, would he have been as nice as he was to me tonight?
Yes, idiot. That’s what puts the ‘play’ in playboy.
I sigh, because I can’t heed my own warning, and all I can think about as I park in front of Crestwood Place is when I’ll see Hunter again.
SATURDAY MORNING, I wake up early and make the half-day drive to Los Angeles. I could have asked Arnold to take me, but seeing Cross for the first time at this new place is something I want to do alone. I’ve still got Hunter on the brain, so as I fly toward the city, my mind is a tangle of feelings. For Cross, I feel anxious. I’m afraid I won’t be able to help him out of this. Also, I really miss him. I’m praying that maybe when I get there—if I can get them to let me in today—he’ll be awake again.
I’m curious about Hunter. Wildly curious. I’m practically craving him, although all fluttery feelings vanish as I drive through a dreary patch of East L.A. I pull onto a run-down service road then hang a right onto a dead-end street, and there it is: Sunshine Acres. The buildings is tall and Soviet-esque—completely devoid of frill. The parking deck is dark a
nd dank, even by parking deck standards. I tell myself my imagination is exaggerating, but I swear there’s a thick layer of grime on everything.
The lobby, accessible from the third floor of the deck, is a vast space under a low-lying ceiling, filled with plastic chairs and smelling of stale carpet. There’s a cut-out in the wall where two women and a man sit behind a counter.
I stop in front of a stick-thin woman with short black hair and ask for the charge nurse. I’m not nervous, because I know if she says “No,” I’ll come back in a few hours, and I’ll find a way to sneak inside. I’ll wait for Cross’s nurse to take a bathroom break. I’ll decide for myself how well he’s doing, and damn their lousy visiting hours.
The charge nurse appears a minute later, leaning out one of the unmarked steel doors and wearing bright green scrubs and a name tag that says OLIVE. She looks me over, from my Ugg Moccasins to my jeans and discount designer sweater, and she folds her arms across her chest. “It’s Saturday,” she says. “What do you want with me?”
I can tell she’s a straight-shooter, so I match my tone to hers and cut right to the chase. “My friend Cross Carlson just got here, and I’d really like to see him. I know it’s a Saturday, but I’m desperate. So I’m asking for a favor—just this once.”
She blinks at me. It’s an exaggerated blink, almost comical, and afterward she bugs her eyes out, like she’s just heard something sensational. “Do you know who’s running this place today?” she asks me in a dead-pan tone.
I shake my head, and she says, “Frankie, and Frankie’s not here right now. I can let you in this once, but you’ve got fifteen minutes before Frankie gets back from lunch. If Frankie catches you, you’re shrimp.”
I frown as she pushes the door open for me, then hustle behind her down the wide, gray-carpeted hall. “Just out of curiosity, what’s shrimp mean?”