by Zoey Parker
“Um, excuse me. I never wanted to bring them into this,” she said, unable to control the snark. “You brought me into this, which meant that they are now in this.”
His lips tugged downward. “You really wanna go there?”
Frustration bubbled up inside of her. She’d been expecting sympathy. Compassion. Now he was going to act like there was something wrong with her stating a simple fact.
“Yeah. I do, actually.” She crossed her arms.
“I didn’t bring you into shit,” Trent said in a low, mean voice. He leaned forward, bringing his razor-edged eyes close to hers. “Your dad brought you here. The Sokolovs only got involved because he couldn’t manage his fucking addiction. So don’t act like I brought you into this.”
Sam clamped her mouth shut, looking away. He had a point, which she hated. But what Trent said wasn’t the whole story. It couldn’t be. She fought back the tears as she studied a neutral point in the dining room – the legs of a dining room chair.
Focus. Focus. She didn’t want to cry. Not yet. Now now. These burbling emotions were getting the best of her, and while they churned inside of her, part of her sat back in wonder. Where was this coming from? Why couldn’t she keep her shit together?
“Well excuse me for not knowing mafia rules,” she finally shot back, able to meet Trent’s gaze again. “You didn’t exactly give me a handbook when you showed up. That woulda been nice. Maybe next time you manhandle a woman into being your fake bride, you could have the courtesy to bring an instruction manual.”
Trent narrowed his eyes. Tension spiked between them like water on a live wire. “You watch your fucking mouth. I don’t need your sass. I’m just telling you how it is.”
“Then how is it?” She threw her arms out. “I’m not supposed to mention the Sokolovs because why? Because it’s a secret that we’re in with them?” She scoffed. “Come on! You’re posing as somebody’s son, and this bitch is onto us! What did you expect me to say?”
“I expect you to keep your mouth shut about it,” Trent said again, his voice strained like he was a breath away from screaming. “I expect you to not ruin this gig.”
His restraint somehow angered her more. This wasn’t her world. This wasn’t her battle. This wasn’t even her fucking choice. The absurdity of the entire operation bore down on her like a crushing weight. She couldn’t even breathe for a second. Tears sprang to her eyes.
“Ruin this gig?” she asked. “How about ruining my life? Or my family’s life? I thought you were on my side. How am I supposed to know what’s right or wrong to say? Huh? Can’t I even get a fucking pass for that?”
“Don’t be overdramatic,” Trent said, but his dismissal of this pushed her over the edge.
“I’m not being fucking dramatic,” Sam said, springing to her feet.
Tears clouded her vision. She needed to get the fuck out of here. Away from Trent. Somewhere she could cry, and rage, and mourn in peace. He didn’t get it – and maybe he never would. She’d been deluding herself this entire time with a sex fling that would never be anything more than a simple distraction from the shit situation she was in. How had she gone so far astray?
“And fuck you for talking to me like that. If you can’t even attempt to understand the stress this puts me and my family under, then you’re stupider than anyone I’ve ever met.”
She stormed past him, brushing his shoulder on the way, blazing a fast trail to the bathroom. The only sanctuary she could grab, for now. She slammed the door behind her as hard as she could, then locked it for good measure.
And then she crumpled onto the seat of the toilet, face in her hands, sobs wracking her body as she cried and cried and cried.
It seemed there was no end to her grief. She’d never cried so hard. True ugly crying – she wouldn’t have looked in the mirror to save her life and see the shape her face was in. It was like she was letting out everything that had ever hurt or wounded or bewildered her. She cried for the argument she’d just had with Trent. She cried for the shit her dad had gotten the family into. She cried for the stress and the unknowing and uncertainty. She cried for the worst possible outcome, and the safe future she was too scared to hope for anymore. She cried for the fear that Darla had instilled in her, and the way she’d been lying to Krissi about this.
She tried her best to stay quiet, but occasionally a hiccup escaped her. She ran through half a roll of toilet paper blowing her nose.
Her stomach turned. This nausea had been following her all day today. Of course, now it would choose to rear its ugly head. She swallowed hard, then again, the tears subsiding as the real risk of vomiting took over.
What the hell is going on with you?
Bile rose in her throat, and she turned around, lifting the lid. She retched a few times –ungraceful, unsavory noises. But nothing came up. She sighed, wiping at the sweat that had formed on her brow.
Things were getting strange. Insane emotions. Now almost-puking.
She blinked, easing back onto the toilet lid as the realization dawned on her.
Are you fucking pregnant?
The thought thundered through her like a storm on an open plain. Her mouth parted as she combed through recent events. The endless sex. They almost always used condoms – but a few times they hadn’t. And then maybe a few more times they hadn’t either. She nibbled on her lip, tears drying, as she thought back to her last period. It was well over a month ago.
And somewhere in the back of her mind, she’d known it was late. Getting caught in the Whirlwind of Trent made it easy to forget about some things. Made it easy to just think he’d take care of it.
So it was fitting that today – of all days – she’d remember that he wouldn’t be taking care of it at all. Not in the way she’d expected. This had been a sick lullaby. And she was finally waking up.
Doubts stormed her. The pregnancy was unexpected – sort of – but she wasn’t upset. No, she was curious. Maybe even a little excited. She stood, washing her face off in the sink a few times until some of the puffiness around her eyes subsided. She wiped off the mascara that had dribbled down her cheeks until she looked halfway presentable again.
But what now? She swallowed hard, studying her weary face in the mirror. She was twenty-seven and more than capable of providing for this child. She could be a single mom. That thought didn’t scare her.
But Trent? What about him?
The first thing that flashed through her was fear. Not of him… but of losing him.
And that told her everything she needed to know.
This fight might be the first in their weird, twisted history, but it wouldn’t be the last. Because now their relationship was going to go much deeper.
Even still, she wanted to give it a couple of days. Maybe go buy the test in secret, and find out on her own. There was too much up in the air right now. Too much uncertainty.
Right now, she needed all her focus to be on putting one foot in front of the other.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The air between Sam and Trent had cooled to glacial since their blow-up a few days ago. She didn’t ask him to stay at his place or anything, but she barely said three words to him that day after she’d come out of the bathroom.
He tried – man, did he try. But good old fashioned cajoling didn’t work with this one. She woke up before he did, and instead of their usual early morning snuggles, she slipped out of bed and got ready as quiet as a mouse. By the time he stirred awake most mornings, it was almost nine, and she was long gone.
The about-face had him all different types of confused. On the one hand, what the fuck did he care? She was who she was, and this shit would be over soon, and they’d either continue fucking or not.
But on the other hand, he knew it was way more complicated than that. His attempts to make it simple, to gloss it over, didn’t work for long. By the third day of her coldness toward him, he’d had enough. It was Friday – time for their meet-up with Lucas.
And they needed
to figure out the goddamn game plan. Even though anything related to Darla might as well have a big red X drawn on it, he needed to bring it up.
When Sam came home from work that day, Trent was waiting on the couch, fingers laced together. She seemed to startle when she noticed him there.
“Hey,” he said, offering a smile.
“Hi.” She sniffed, dropping her purse on the kitchen table.
“How was work?” He felt like such an idiot. What was he doing with this woman? What theatrical production were they starring in? He needed to remember who he was – a Sokolov grunt man. Free-range bachelor. A man who didn’t stay, didn’t settle, for anyone.
“It was fine.” She crossed her arms, looking anywhere but at him.
“We gonna end this deep freeze or you planning on drawing it out forever?”
Her gaze snapped to his. Clarity burned between them. He felt the snap of whatever had been holding them apart. Keeping her distant.
“Yeah. I think it’s gone on long enough.”
“You still mad?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know what I am.”
“We need to figure out our shit.” He contemplated his palms a moment. “There’s another dinner tonight, so we need to be on the same page.”
She pouted a little. “Do we have to go?”
“We should.” He braced himself for pushback, but she didn’t say anything – just sighed and came over to the couch.
She sat next to him, but with some distance between them. Maybe an indicator of the thawing freeze between them.
“After all,” he went on, “Darla showing up at your place was off the books. There’s no way she’s gonna tell Lucas she did that. So, we go ahead as normal. As planned. We keep up the act, and it might piss off Darla, but she knows we’re not backing down.”
She frowned. “And you think her knowing about the Sokolovs will hurt things?”
He sighed. He hadn’t told her about that conversation with Jacobi – didn’t plan to either. It was his failure. His shit to figure out. Besides, she’d placed her faith in him. And now he didn’t have the backing he’d been prepared to rely on. They were spinning, untethered, in space. That wasn’t smart, and it wasn’t safe. He wasn’t sure how to own up to that. Wasn’t even sure how deep this rabbit hole would go.
“I don’t know. I don’t know who she’s linked up with, or what tricks she might have up her sleeve. All we can do is move forward. I’ll talk to Lucas, see how we can speed this up.”
She nodded, sending him a pitiful look. It was pathetic, but in a way that made his chest hurt. He didn’t believe in the L-word, but this was something close to it. He slung his arm around her shoulders, bringing her up against him.
“We good?” he asked into the top of her head.
He cared, which was what scared him the most. He was supposed to be the free-range bachelor, not the asshole who gave a damn what his sorta-real, sorta-fake girlfriend thought about them.
She nodded, tilting her head back to look up at him. “Will you kiss me?”
He couldn’t say no to that request. To this face. He surged forward, capturing her lips in a kiss that wiped away the past three days of tension. Gone in a blink, like it had never even existed. One kiss turned into two, which turned into a flurry. He gripped the sides of her face, hungrier for her than he’d thought possible. Amazed that three days of emotional tension, while still coexisting side by side, could make him feel deprived. Like he was missing something. Like something had been taken from him.
Sam moaned through the kiss and he guided her back onto the couch, covering her body with his. They made out like that for a while, like teenagers, like hungry lovers, until his cock pressed hard and seeking between their bodies.
He pulled back, chest heaving as he tried to catch his break. “You ready for make-up sex?”
She laughed, swatting his shoulder. “Of course. Been ready since two days ago.”
He surged forward, coaxing one more kiss out of her before he leaned back to shuck his shirt and pants. She sidled out of her own clothes as he got down to his underwear. His cock tented his briefs, and he slid them off, gobbling up her exposed body. The soft curves that he hadn’t seen in days but had somehow felt like years. Sam’s hands wandered the flat planes of his chest. She murmured in appreciation.
“Get inside me, you big brute,” she moaned.
“Damn, woman.” He fumbled with the jeans he’d tossed to extract a condom from his wallet. “Give me a hot second.”
“Don’t,” she said, stilling him by the wrist. A meaningful look waited in her gaze. “Let’s not use it.”
She didn’t need to tell him twice. He covered her body with his, the warmth of her skin greeting his, creating a static spark that shivered through his entire body. Sex never felt like this with anyone else. Made him want to keep getting it with Sam for as long as he could.
Made him want to drop the free-range bachelor plan altogether.
Trent nudged her legs wider, and then he wiggled himself into place, finding that slick crease that felt exactly like coming home. His bulging cockhead found her hot entrance, and he pushed himself inside her, that sweet heat claiming him. His eyes fluttered shut as he surged forward, claiming every last inch of her.
A moan ripped out of her. When he found the last inch of space, he shivered. This. Right here. This was too damn good.
“Yesss.” She clawed at his back, arching to find even more depth.
Trent rolled in a slow circle, the tension driving him nuts. He wanted all of her and more. He rocked into her, then pulled out, starting an intense, purposeful rhythm. One that was both tender and fierce. Her breasts jiggled as he fucked her. Their eyes locked, sending him even higher, swirling in the atmosphere. Straight into outer space.
And that’s what Sam had always done. Since the first day they met. Since the first time they fucked. They had something that was off the charts. And Trent knew, deep inside, that walking away from this was going to be impossible.
He’d been suspecting it for a while, but coming back to her now, after just three days of stone cold distance, he realized the truth. He’d grown addicted to her warmth.
And after living a life that was cold to begin with, he didn’t think he could walk away from this.
Trent’s orgasm built steadily and sneakily like he hadn’t gotten off in months instead of hours. He came like a rocket, just barely pulling out in time, his seed spurting all over her low belly. He’d come too fast though – Sam hadn’t gotten hers. He could tell by the look in her eyes.
So, he pushed himself between her legs, taking that hard nub between his lips. He moaned as he poked and prodded her clit, filling her slick channel with his fingers, the pool of cum on her low belly somehow making him hard again. She was covered in him. Filled by him. Totally fucking drowning in him.
He fingerfucked her hard as he slobbered and slurped at her clit. Her thighs tensed and then she cried out, back arching, pussy quaking around his fingers.
When he slipped himself out of her, she laughed weakly, an arm draped over her eyes.
Nobody spoke for a long time. He just lay there, had between her legs, drawing invisible patterns on her thighs. This was his favorite spot to be. The post-coital bliss. Wrapped in her warmth.
Finally, she said, “Yeah. That’s better now.”
He just pressed a kiss to her inner thigh. Everything felt perfect.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Dinner this week was planned at Lucas’ house, a decision that Trent was grateful for. As soon as they arrived in their evening best – dark slacks and a blue button-up for him, Sam in a form-fitting sparkly black dress – Trent asked for a house tour. Something that seemed well within bounds of friendly, but also helped him scope out the house. To see if there was anything he might be able to spot. Affiliations and the like.
Darla was a stone-faced mannequin as Lucas led the housewarming parade. She’d barely even greeted the two of them as they’d
come in. Lucas, as usual, played the grinning, over-interested father figure, always clamping a hand on Trent’s shoulder or encouraging Sam to pass first.
But as they wound through Lucas’ opulent mansion, rife with columns and gilded artwork and enough rugs to open his own goddamn store, Trent couldn’t find a single thing out of place. Much less anything that might suggest a mafia affiliation, gang links, or any nefarious business.
And without a word from Darla’s end, he could only guess at the tensions that lay beneath their marriage.
Once Darla excused herself to use the restroom toward the end of the tour, by the back of the house overlooking the gardens, Trent stepped aside, pulling Lucas along with him.
