No, the man is more than capable of butting heads with me. He isn’t soft. He isn’t hard. Like me, he’s both.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if I were soft where he’s hard, and vice versa?
And no, I don’t just mean in the obvious ways with sex.
I mean in life. With the things that count.
Could I have it all, love and respect, with Drake?
The notion is worthy of further contemplation, and I take a seat beside him, only closer now that the boundaries of sex have broken down between us. He curls an arm around my shoulder, and the limo starts to decelerate. As we approach Marla’s house, I realize I’m glad we had that argument.
I knew this week would lead us to the bedroom—that’s why I was so touched that he hadn’t been a jerk and brought a gazillion dozen condoms with him in expectation of where this visit might lead. Just because it was likely, didn’t mean it was a dead certain either. So, he scored a point there.
But that aside, I’m glad we’re at that phase now.
There’s something about Drake I need in my life. Just doing without him these past three days was tough. How? I can’t really describe it. An emptiness to my days that no amount of talking to him on the phone could heal. I didn’t need to talk, I needed to be with him. To have his presence at my side. And now he’s here, that part of me that felt a little lost, is now purring with delight at having him so close.
When the limo starts to brake to a gentle stop, it comes as a welcome relief because the wind is frigid as it blows in and hopefully clears out the smell of sex. When the chauffeur, Milo, opens the driver door, I tell Drake, “We’re sharing a room, right?”
He smiles at me. “I’m glad you agree.”
I laugh, grinning widely at his retort, but inwardly, I’m consumed with how quickly, and deeply I’m falling for him.
With any other man, I’d be scared. But not with Drake. Never with him.
Jayce
Watching Drake meet Marla is more amusing than I could have imagined.
Unlike my arrival, Marla didn’t come along as the welcome party to the runway. Mostly because I asked her if I could go alone—after the welcome gift Drake gave me, I’m sure as hell glad Marla was back at the house. But she’s there, in the doorway, waiting like some grand lady of old.
I could totally see her in an English country house or something utterly Downton Abbey-esque. A string of titles to her name and a silver spoon firmly embedded in her mouth from childhood. For all that though, she isn’t actually loaded down with airs and graces. If she were, I probably wouldn’t like her and wouldn’t have felt so deeply that I needed to help her.
Still, she’s there, gracious and elegant, and the second Drake spots her, he flushes. “Christ, it’s really her.”
“You liked her films too, huh?” I tease, amused mostly by his reaction.
There’s no point in getting riled up; my feminine pique won’t let me bother. Marla is one of those ephemeral fantasies that both men and women have for their idols on the silver screen. I can’t hold it against him, not when I felt as overwhelmed at the sight of her, and I didn’t even crush on her when I was young!
He seems to realize he was staring, and he clears his throat nervously. “Sorry, what?”
“Did you like her movies?”
He shocks me by saying, “Not really. I thought the parts were too big for her. She was too young.”
My mouth drops open at that. “You do realize Angel in Denver is one of my favorite films ever?”
That has him rolling his eyes. “Of course, it is.” He blows out a breath. “You won’t hold my taste in cinema against me later on, will you?”
I grin at him. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“Don’t be mean.”
“But that’s what you like about me, isn’t it?”
“Oh Christ, are they still flirting?” David’s head hangs over the side of the roof, peering upside down into the car window.
My cheeks flush with realization of what had happened in this limo, and that I’d had three ghosts to witness it. How had I forgotten about them?
How, dammit?
“Don’t worry about it. I made sure they didn’t see anything,” Kenna assures me, jumping down from the roof with a grace that shouldn’t be possible in her kitten heels.
“I can promise you, I have no desire to see a couple copulating in the back of a moving automobile,” Casper says with a haughty sniff.
“Oh Christ, they were doing it?” David makes gagging noises.
“Why the hell do you think I made you go outside? Bloody hell, David, Drake told us you were smart.”
“I am!” he flushes, sneaking a nasty glare at Kenna. “I just didn’t think Uncle Drake would do it in the back of a car.” More gagging noises ensue, and I’m really grateful that Drake isn’t privy to this conversation.
Only, he is. He’s realized that I’m concentrating, only it’s not on him or Marla, which rapidly narrows it down. Sighing, I admit, “Don’t worry. They didn’t see anything.”
He clears his throat again, this time, he’s mortified rather than nervous. “Shit, I forgot.”
“Me, too. But Kenna made sure we had our privacy.”
I watch as he rubs a hand over his face. “You sure?”
“Positive.”
“Good.”
“Don’t worry, he’s as freaked out by the idea as we are.”
“You’re not fucking wrong there!” David snarls, then grunts when Kenna bats him around the side of the head, scolding, “Language! There are ladies present!”
David narrows his eyes in a glare that spins between Kenna and I, but he shrugs and strides off, apparently too pissed off, or grossed out, to stick around.
With a smile at Milo, who ignores me, as he opens the door, I climb out and wait for Drake to join me. Standing side by side, we stare over at Marla, but Drake lets his gaze drift over the mansion.
It’s huge. Did I mention that already?
But more than that, it has an odd design. It’s almost like an antebellum mansion fell in the middle of the Adirondacks.
Large pitched roof, pillars at the front, huge white facade with windows that gleam and sparkle in the moonlight, as well as the lights that illuminate the driveway shining onto the topiary, so the shapes are visible even in the darkness. They give off some funky shadows too.
More spotlights highlight the building itself, as though it’s a show house rather than a home, which fits, actually. There’s no way this could ever be a comfortable place to life.
At least, it’s not my idea of comfort.
“Wow,” he murmurs as we step forward, closer to our host.
“It’s even more impressive inside,” I warn him quietly, then to Marla, introduce, “This is Drake Edwins, Marla. My partner.”
That statement, a declaration of intent as well as possession, doesn’t have Drake backing away as I’d feared. If anything, he embraces it and curls an arm about my shoulders, then with his free hand, holds it out for her to shake.
Marla does so, in an admittedly pansy-like grip. She’s so elegant, it’s disturbing. My handshake is like a dude’s. I can’t help but compare myself to the graceful older woman, a woman who is actually closer to Drake’s age than I am.
Nervous now, I hide my frown as Marla guides us into the front hall. The ceiling is as tall as the forty-foot height of the building, and it’s split by a grand staircase, which leads to two off shooting wings of the house. The left side of the foyer is overtaken by greenery, making it like an internal greenhouse. This is aided by the back wall being close to ninety percent glass. It’s almost a see-through wall, and in the morning, when the sun hits it, the room is blinding with the strength of the light. It’s also hot as hell, but the plants, a lot of ugly ass orchids, seem to appreciate the claggy humidity.
Doors on the ground floor lead to various rooms that I’ve yet to see myself. I’ve kept mostly to my quarters, only visiting Marla in her suite, and then eat
ing in the main dining hall with her too.
“Am I to assume you’ll be sharing a room with Jayce?” Marla asks, but there’s no real query to her tone, nor is there an accusation or disapproval. She’s just making sure her guests are afforded every necessity they require. That's some shit only the Swiss can teach. I guess I can thank them for the TV that was delivered to my room the first night.
Drake nods, smiling politely at her. “That’s correct.”
“Milo will see to your luggage. Would you like to freshen up? Dinner will be served in half an hour. Jayce can show you where we eat.”
“That’s great, thank you. After dinner, are you amenable to starting... well, to talking with me?”
Marla looks at me, and I nod eagerly, trying to encourage her to get this show on the road.
She hesitates. “Aren’t you tired from all the travelling? New York is quite a way away.”
“It is, but I only have a week, and Jayce has explained that the situation is urgent.”
I immediately hold up my hands, palm up. “I only told him that you were struggling to cope with Charles’s passing, Marla. Anything else, you’ll have to tell him yourself.”
Drake’s curiosity hums under the surface. Maybe I can sense it because we’re standing close to one another, or maybe because I’m starting to know him and the way his mind works. “Jayce didn’t have to say much, truth be told, Marla. The instant she told me you needed help, I knew I had to come. She wouldn’t have asked unless it was imperative.”
He’s right there. I don’t particularly like psychologists—oh, the irony that I’m dating one. But just because I don’t like them for myself doesn’t mean they don’t have their uses for other people.
Years of being swapped from shrink to shrink, as my parents attempted to get the notion out of my head that I could see ghosts, scarred me a little, but if anyone needs therapy, it’s Marla. And Drake is... well, he’s Drake. I wouldn’t have screwed the man in the limo on the ride over here if I didn’t think he was a decent, honest, warm-hearted guy.
Marla’s unease is evident, but I shake my head at her and give her my ultimatum again. “If you want me to help Charles, then you know the deal.”
Her jaw clenches. The muscles flexing white as she nods, once, then turns on her heel, saying as she moves down the hall, “I’ll see you at dinner.”
“Wow, she must be mad. I thought she’d take us to our rooms again. She’s kind of anal when it comes to being a hostess.”
Drake stares down at me a second, then murmurs, “Lead on, Macduff. I need to have a shower before dinner.”
“Work up a sweat, did you?” I tease, then feel my cheeks heat when Milo clears his throat, silently asking us to move the hell out of the way. We swerve to the side then follow him up the staircase.
As usual, he’s bristling with disapproval, but whereas I ignore him, Drake eyes him with curiosity.
This place, this case, is going to be one big puzzle to Drake. I can sense it.
“Did you know I studied psychology at college?” I ask him, letting my steps lag so Milo can go on ahead.
My question drags his attention from the chauffeur and directly onto me. “You did?” His astonishment has my lips twitching.
“Minored in it.”
“Holy Christ, how do I only know this now?”
I shrug. “Didn’t see much point in telling you. I’m not a psychologist. I didn’t take it any further.”
“I didn’t realize you even went to college,” he admits, sheepishly.
“You don’t see me as a student?” I ask, cocking a brow at him. I’m not offended, even my parents were stunned when I told them I was heading off to a university.
What astonished them the most was the school I’d chosen.
That had accepted me.
The satisfaction I felt that day throbs through me now. I think all children who lived with the constant disapproval from their parents throughout their childhood never manage to distance themselves from the ridiculous need to one-up them. To shove triumphs in their family’s face, to prove to them just how wrong they are.
That day I told them I’d been accepted at Yale had been one of the best days of my life.
“Not really. I had you pegged as anti-establishment.”
“Oh, definitely. I hated it. Every friggin’ minute,” I tell him, with a wry smile on my chops. “But I did it.”
He shakes his head at me, confused. “Why? If you hated it so much?”
“I had to prove a point .”
“To whom? Yourself?”
I shrug. “I guess. I wanted to know if I could do it, and I could and did. But also, and it’s pretty childish, I wanted to best my brother.” I wrinkle my nose. “Not very nice of me, but I had a lot of anger burning inside me that was aimed wholly at him and my parents. I worked my ass off to get into Yale, and then, I worked harder to beat his grades.”
“You went to Yale?” His eyes have bugged out now, and I reach up to tap his cheek for not believing in me.
“I did.”
“I’m impressed.”
I grin. “Figured you would be. Snob.”
He laughs. “Not really. It didn’t bother me you hadn’t gone to college. I figured it wasn’t your way.”
“Like I said, it wasn’t, but I know enough shit to recognize a woman in need, Drake.”
He eyes me then nods at Milo as the chauffeur passes us on the way back down to the front hall. He must have dumped Drake’s luggage at the door already.
“Is that a warning?” he asks me.
“No.” I sigh. “Maybe. I don’t know. I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone what she told me, so she has to open up to you herself. But things are bad, Drake. Very bad.”
“I could see that. The woman’s highly strung.”
That has me blinking. “She is?”
He tapped his nose. “Intuition.”
I accept that with ease. A lot of people wouldn’t, not believing in things like hunches and the like. But I see ghosts, so what do people know, huh?
That being said, I thought Marla had a timeless calm about her. I hadn’t seen the fact she was strung out on her nerves until she’d admitted her suicide attempt to me.
Impressed, I tell him, “I’m not sure if you can work miracles on her in a week, but it will give me time to work on Charles.”
“You didn’t actually tell me what you were going to do with him,” he says, grabbing his case as he opens the door to our rooms.
Our rooms.
The notion makes me positively giddy.
He looks around, taking in the classy decor with a whistle which he dismisses after a second, returning his attention to me. He cocks a brow, silently stringing out his question.
“Try to get him to cross over, of course. It’s what I do, Drake.” I grimace, then admit gruffly, “At least, I try to.”
His gaze softens as it lands on me. “We tried, Jayce. That’s all we could do.”
Knowing he’s referring to David, I wonder if I should tell him about the kid’s desire to stay on this plane because of a crush. Because I’m uncertain if it would hurt him or not, I decide to leave it for the moment. We have enough to do and little time to achieve it.
“The shower’s through there, Drake.” I point out the door to him.
His smile is slow. “Care to join me?”
Chapter Eight
Jayce
Dry, Drake looks like a sex god.
Wet?
Christ, it seems impossible that he’s a desk jockey. A fancy one, but a rider of paperwork nonetheless.
He has muscles within muscles, and I don’t mean like your favorite book cover model. These are... intense. Like solid, packed.
Opposite one of those six-packed Gods in the gym, they look blown up, over inflated. Drake looks mean as hell, but he is, admittedly, smaller than those kinds of dudes.
I strip faster than him, eager to watch him get naked. Hey? Who can blame me? I stripped in the
limo. It’s his turn to give me a show.
His shirt came first, revealing a split chest and what looked like an eight pack, but because I figured they were as much an urban legend as Marla, I had to blink a few times to make sure I hadn’t been deceived. Then, I saw his biceps and realized the guy works out but not in any way I’d have imagined.
Wasting hours pumping iron is not Drake’s style. Not one little bit.
When he toed out of his leather loafers then unbuttoned his fly, letting his pants fall to his hips and then shoving them down with a push from his hands, I felt my mouth drop open at his cock—which is loooovely and hard for me—but also, his thighs and calves.
The bookish Drake I thought I knew has another side to him.
How did I miss that?
His lips twitch at my prolonged gawk, and when he puts his hands on his hips, inadvertently framing his eminently suckable shaft, it takes a while for me to hear what he’s saying. “Are you just going to look?”
I blink at him then pounce. He laughs as he stumbles back into the wall, managing to grab me when I hook my legs around his hips, but the momentum of my move drags him back.
He steadies himself, then cups my ass. “I’ll take that as a no.”
Busy fiddling with his arms and the intense muscles there, I mumble, “How often do you work out?”
He frowns. “Is that what you’re looking at?” he sounds disappointed.
I snort. “I was admiring your dick too.” Laughter bubbles from me when he looks a little more satisfied by that response.
“Every day. I practice yoga.”
“There’s no fucking way you get muscles like these from yoga alone.”
He shrugs, and a moan escapes me at how that makes me jostle against him. His eyes turn fiery, and I know he liked the way our torsos and sexes rubbed together too. “I practice some martial arts a couple of times a month too. Would be stupid not to in a city like Manhattan.” I grimace at that, guilt filling me. He seems to understand though, because he shakes his head. “When we get back, I’ll set you up at my dojo.”
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