by Bromberg, K.
This is what it would look like.
Her tired after a long day. Me staring at her, thinking how gorgeous she looks just like this: hair messy, lipstick long gone, a million pieces of dusted-off glitter dancing on her skin.
This is what it would feel like times a million. I bet.
Me wanting to pull her on my lap, nuzzle my nose under her neck, and think about sinking into her body to release the frustrations of my own long day.
And then I realize that I’m saying with her. With Vaughn.
My body tenses. Slow the fuck down, Lockhart. You played princess for Lucy. You did it because you felt bad for being the catalyst that is causing Vaughn’s world to spin out of control. You did it because it was the right thing to do, and hell if getting a killer blow job out of it in gratitude didn’t cross your mind in the process.
Panic hits me.
The kind that makes your thoughts misfire, and you question everything about yourself, because this isn’t you. These thoughts aren’t yours.
“Hey.” Her hand slides over my neck, fingernails scratching gently, as I sit on her couch. My eyes close at the sensation, at the desire to just be here with her with no expectations, with no demands.
I love her.
The word hits my ears, and I jolt up out of my seat as if it’s the first time I ever thought them when it came to Vaughn.
I have said them, though. In a rush to win her back after doing something awful, I said them. Words I thought I knew the meaning of but realize now I didn’t have a goddamn clue.
I told her I loved her before to try to win her back. That’s what you’re supposed to say, right? But it was only panic then, only words said through the haze of lust and the supposition of need.
But now, after we’ve been through all this drama, all this conflict, I’m still here when normally I would have hit the road. I’m still here because she’s taught me things about myself that I never knew—that I’m good with kids, that there is something to be said about sleeping with someone without having sex, that forgiveness is more powerful than anything—but most of all she taught me that I am capable of love.
I love her.
I repeat the three words in my head and know that for the first time in my life, I truly understand their meaning and the power they hold. They’re not to be feared or taken lightly. They’re not to be wielded like a sword.
They’re to be meant. To be spoken at the right moment. To be used sparingly.
I love Vaughn.
My chest constricts, and my entire body heats as her eyes flash to me while I stand like a deer in headlights in the middle of her living room.
“You okay?” She takes a step toward me, concern loaded in her tone. “You look like you just saw a ghost.”
“Yes. Fine.” What are you going to do, Lockhart? “I . . . uh . . . forgot something in my car.” I throw my thumb over my shoulder to sell the lie.
“Okay.” She says the word, but I just stand there without moving. “Are you going to get it?”
“Yeah. Sure. I’ll just”—move your feet, Ryk—“be right back.”
“’Kay.” Her smile lights up her eyes. “I’ll pour the wine.”
Her smile lights up her eyes?
You have it fucking bad, Lockhart.
Pathetic and bad.
I open the door, distracted in more ways than I ever thought possible, shut it behind me, and then stumble to a stop.
He’s medium height, lanky, without an ounce of muscle on him. His hair is an oily brown, his fingers stained with what looks like grease under his nails, and his clothes look out of place on him. Expensive threads on a sketchy man.
His eyes widen and his head startles when our eyes meet. I’m on edge immediately.
“Can I help you?”
He takes in my dress shirt unbuttoned, my cuffs rolled up, and zeroes in on the watch on my wrist. His gaze stays there for a beat before he shifts on his feet and jerks his arms oddly.
“I should’ve known.”
“Excuse me?”
My first thought: the fucker is a client who somehow found out Vaughn and Vee are the same person.
My second thought: the asshole is her private investigator, the man who should have known about her uncle and warned her about the warrant out for her arrest but didn’t.
The third? A homeless man looking for some blow? A man lost? Nah. Neither. Not quite sure yet, but every damn part of me hates him already.
His laugh rings out into the quiet suburbia night. “You the sugar daddy Vaughny’s using now?” He lifts his chin toward my Maserati parked in the driveway before his eyes glance to my watch again. “Sell your soul for some of her pussy now?”
My body tenses. My fists clench. My personal demand to shut my mouth falls on my own deaf ears. “Get the fuck out of here.”
His laugh rumbles on the verge of hysteria. He seems crazy, but there’s an awareness in his eyes that tells me to use caution.
“The price just went up.”
“Price?”
“For Lucy.”
“Brian, I presume.” My voice is unaffected despite the sudden rage and need to protect that owns me. Does he know Lucy’s inside? Is that why he’s here?
“Ah, rich and smart.” His smile widens, exposing stained but perfectly straight teeth.
“I suggest you turn your ass around and never set foot here again.”
“Or else what?” He throws his hands up. “You gonna sic the Big Bad Wolf on me?” He laughs. “That’s got nothing on the hell I’ve gone through. Losing my wife. My daughter.” Not a single word holds an ounce of sincerity in it.
“You don’t give a rat’s ass about Lucy, and you sure as hell didn’t give one about Samantha either.”
“Is Vaughny telling lies again?” He tsks and makes the shame motion—his index finger running over the length of his other index finger. “She has a bad habit of that, you know. Twisting the truth to fit whatever it is she wants at any given moment. I’d question everything she tells you. Sam was always warning me about that.”
“All you care about is where your next high is coming from.”
The grin he flashes sends chills down my spine. “Don’t be so sure about that, Daddy Warbucks, because I definitely care about how much you’re going to pay me.”
“Fuck you.”
“Oh? You think you’re not going to write a check out to me?”
“For what?” I ask, although my stomach is already churning, because I know what he’s going to say.
“To pay me off so I don’t steal the adoption right out from underneath that cunt of a sister-in-law of mine’s nose.”
Each word he speaks ignites a fire in me like I’ve never known before. My body vibrates from the physical restraint to not swing my fist before he says another word.
“No one’s paying you a dime, you worthless piece of shit.” I take a step closer to him, shoulders squared, fists clenched. “You think this is going to win you favor in the whole process? Selling your daughter to pay for your habit? Huh? You might think you can get away with saying it to Vaughn. That people won’t believe her. But I’m a lawyer. I know a lot of people who can make your life fucking miserable.”
He claps his hands slowly, his expression one of complete indifference. “Congratulations. I’m so impressed. You must be really smart to screw people out of money for a living.”
“I said it before, and I’ll say it again. Get the fuck out of here.”
“Or what?”
It’s my turn to laugh, loud and disbelieving, as I imagine breaking the fucker in two. My hands itch to. “Take your pick. Broken nose. Hospital bed—”
“She really has you whipped, doesn’t she?”
“Last warning.”
“Tell me,” he says as he sniffs loudly and completely disregards my comment. “I always wondered something about Vaughny.”
“Your choice.”
“Is her pussy as tight as she is uptight?”
In
my mind my fist is plowing into his face. One punch after another until my knuckles are bruised and his face is bloody. In my imagination this all takes place, and there isn’t a single repercussion to beating the shit out of this loser.
But I’ve let my reactions govern too much when it comes to Vaughn. When it comes to fucking things up for her.
And it takes every ounce of restraint I have to not throw the punch.
Every.
Ounce.
My muscles ache from being so tense.
“So it is that good, huh?” It’s not his words but rather the way he looks at Vaughn as she opens the door and gasps at the sight of him.
“Get the fuck out of here,” I grit out, every single vestige of control I have snapping in my words. I take an aggressive step toward him, and the fucker jerks to step back and trips, plowing face-first into the concrete retaining wall of her raised flower bed.
He yelps as I watch him flounder on the ground, and I feel nothing at the sight of the blood where the brick has cut his cheekbone.
“Vaughny,” he says when his eyes finally focus on her standing beside me, and the hairs stand up on the back of my neck from the way he undresses her with his eyes, like he’s imagining violating her every way he can. “You didn’t tell me you had a man.”
“Leave, asshole.” My fist clenches, and I push her behind me so he can’t look at her.
In his delayed reaction, he finally reaches up to feel his cheek. When he looks at the blood on his fingers, a slow, taunting grin slides onto his lips.
“You can thank your sugar daddy,” he says to her as he hunches over and pushes himself up, his laugh sounding so odd right now. “Just think what the cops are going to say when I head there looking like this, pointing the finger your way.”
“Go right ahead,” I grit out, my body vibrating with adrenaline. “I didn’t touch you.”
His laugh echoes through the empty night. “They’re not going to know any different.”
“Try it.” I take a step forward, and he stumbles back, that sick smile still on his lips.
“I’ll sue you for everything you’re worth, lawyer boy.”
“Be my guest.”
“You don’t get it, do you?” He angles his head to the side, suddenly serious in a way that fucks with my head.
“Get what?”
“Who’s smart now? The lawyer . . . or simple me who just wrote his own ticket?” He runs a hand down his cheek and smears the blood over his skin. “Pay, or I go to the police.”
“Go to hell.” It’s all I can think to say as I push his words away, not wanting to acknowledge every fucking ounce of truth they might hold. “They won’t believe you.”
He pretends to hold a phone up to his ear. “Yes. Hello, Mr. Police. Vaughny is shacking up with an out-of-control psycho. A man who punched me right in front of my own daughter.” Vaughn and I both whip our heads to the doorway, expecting to see Lucy standing there, but find it empty.
“Leave, or I’ll call them myself.” I take a step toward him.
“Please, Brian. Just go,” Vaughn pleads, and the broken sound in her voice—the fear woven into its tone—fucking kills me.
“Congrats, Richie Rich. You just cost her the only thing she cares about. It’s not you. It’s Lucy. Good luck ever getting the adoption now.” Brian holds his hand up and rubs the tips of his fingers together as if he’s rubbing money and lifts his eyebrows.
I might not have touched him once, but the blood on his cheek and the contentious custody battle between these two make his threat very real.
It’s only after I watch him walk across the street, get in his car, and drive off that I finally breathe. When I turn around, Vaughn is gone.
“Vaughn?” I ask when I enter the house, but I stop when I see her.
She’s pacing the room, her face a mask of fury as she moves. All that contradicts the anger emanating from her are the tear streaks on her cheeks.
“Nothing is going to happen. He doesn’t have the balls to go to the cops. As much as I had visions of knocking him out, I didn’t. That would have invited the problem. But that?” I hook a thumb toward the door. “That’s nothing we can’t explain. It’s our word—sensible, responsible citizens—against his.”
“You don’t know him.” It’s the first time she’s looked my way—albeit briefly—since I walked in the door.
“I consider myself lucky, then.”
“This isn’t a joke, Ryker. This is . . . this is . . .” Her hiccupped sob throws me.
I move to stand in her line of pacing so she’s forced to stop and look at me. When she does, I pull her in against me and hold her tight. “It’s not a joke. I know that. But I also know we did nothing wrong.” I press a kiss to the top of her head and just breathe her in. Her fear. Her uncertainty. Her desperation to take care of Lucy.
All of it.
And I know I love her even more because of it.
There are those words again. That thought again.
“I’ve got you, Vaughn,” I murmur against the crown of her head. “I’ve got you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Vaughn
I toy with the card on the flowers that were delivered an hour ago.
Sorry for what happened. I’ll make this right by you.
The flowers are vibrant, while I still feel washed out from the gamut of emotions that have owned me over the past few days.
Hell, who am I kidding? The past few weeks.
The bright side? Ryker just might be right. Brian is too much of a wimp to go to the cops and make a false report.
The call I waited for all day never came. The one from Priscilla asking me what happened to Brian and then having to disprove her crazy accusations.
It didn’t come the next day either.
Maybe Brian didn’t go to the police after all.
I bury my nose in the flowers again, draw in their perfumed scent, and sigh in relief for what feels like the first time since Brian left here with his threats.
I jump when my cell rings. My pulse calms when I see it’s one of my girls. “Hey, Ivy. Everything okay?”
“Always.” Her throaty laugh fills the line.
“What’s up?”
“Couple things. Does the name Carter Preston ring a bell with you?” I sigh at her mention of his name. “Ha. Your sigh says it all.”
“It’s a long story, but yes, I know the senator. He’s someone I choose to steer clear of. Why?”
“Guy’s got a real hard-on for you.”
I snort because I don’t trust myself to speak in response. “What do you mean?”
“I was at an event. Lots of bigwigs. Lots of money. Lots of politicians. There was an ol’ boys’ conversation. Services like ours came up. The senator asked if I knew any good ones—kind of a lead-in, since later my date told me he’d already told Carter the company I work for. I wasn’t aware there was any history between you, or I wouldn’t have said anything to him about Wicked Ways.”
“What’d he say?” I ask.
“Just that you’re not what you seem. That you sleep with clients and steal them from your girls.” She’s guarded when she speaks, and I can tell she’s trying to feel me out from my answer alone.
“So in other words, he’s trying to cause trouble for me. Trying to rile up my troops with lies and turn them against me?”
Christ. I roll my shoulders and have to tell myself to relax the clench of my jaw.
“Either that or he’s forcing your hand to confront him. Some men get off on the power play of shit like this.”
“Lucky me,” I murmur, but I know she’s right. He’s playing a game right now. One I can’t afford to engage in—or lose.
“Sorry to be the one to tell you, but I thought you should know.”
Silence hangs on the line, and then I realize I never officially answered the question for her.
“I met with a client to discuss a replacement girl for him when the one he chose couldn’t meet h
is needs. The client and I hit it off. We’ve gone on a few dates. I can see how it could be perceived as stealing clients from my girls without all the facts,” I lie, omitting the money he transferred to my account in the early days. “But it wasn’t anything like that.”
“Thank you for telling me,” she says, and I can only hope she believes me. Otherwise, the shitstorm that Carter is trying to stir up will be working.
“Anytime. What else? You said there were a few things.”
“I have a nervous Nellie,” she says, our term for a client who keeps scheduling and then canceling. “He wants to talk to you.”
“Name?”
“Noah B.”
“Shit,” I groan. “That’s my fault. I had to cancel our meeting the other night at the last minute.”
The other night? That was over a week ago. And of course my mind veers back to the town car ride. To Ryker’s mouth between my thighs and the magic of his tongue. To the emotion in his eyes as he looked up at me, face framed by my thighs.
I think of Noah’s voice mail that I forgot to respond to because I was preoccupied with everything else.
You’re dropping balls left and right here, Vaughn.
“I’ll handle it. I’ll call him the minute we hang up.”
The quickest way for a girl to turn on you is if you mess with her ability to make money. My lack of response to Noah did just that.
“Thanks, Vee. He’s willing to pay. He just needs to show up.”
“I hear you. Like I said, I’ll get on it right now.”
I end the call and click on my computer to get his contact information. In less than a few minutes, I have a meeting set up with Noah and have offered numerous reassurances to him.
The rest of the day flies by, and as I do my weekly check-ins with my girls, I’m not surprised to find a few of them have heard the same gist from either the senator himself or another girl asking about it.
My first line of defense is to give the same explanation I gave to Ivy.
My second is to worry how Carter was able to get in touch with so many of my girls. One is too many.
The safety net I thought I’d built around this business seems not to be as secure as I once thought it was. Either that or he’s digging through my electronic footprint somehow so that he knows how to contact them.