by Kris Jayne
“My feelings for you are because you’re family.” Her silicone chest puffed as she spoke.
Another rejoinder hovered on my lips, but I bit it back. “Then, we’re in agreement.”
My relenting deflated her aggression. “Anyway, I’m glad you and Grace get along. That’s all. I’d like you two to be close,” she said, “and Gregory Jr. too.”
“What does Grace do for fun?”
Marisa lifted a shoulder and frowned. “All the things any little girl does. She reads. She does gymnastics. She and her dad play games.”
“Her gymnastics sounds like more work than fun,” I commented.
“She’s quite good. Her coach says she has potential.”
“She’s only six.”
Marisa’s eyes flashed with annoyance. “At six years old, Simone Biles was doing advanced skills on the balance beam and on her way to Olympic medals.”
“Is Grace going to be an Olympic gymnast?” I didn’t mean to sound doubtful, but her shoulders seemed a little narrow for the weight of such grand ambitions.
“If she keeps training, she could be. I won’t limit her potential,” Marisa said.
“She pushes hard. That’s all. It seems like a lot for a kid her age.” When we were outside, she barked orders like a Marine. Either she was naturally that bossy, or she’d picked it up from her coaches.
Marisa turned up her nose. “That’s not for you to decide. Your dad and I want to make sure she and Gregory Jr. are raised with more focus.”
“Than I was, you mean? What did you think my mom and dad did? Let me be raised by hippy wolves? I was pushed just as hard. I’m still me. And from what I’ve seen, Grace is Grace. She’s got natural drive, and I think—”
“I don’t recall asking for your opinion,” Marisa snapped.
The last thing I wanted was to fight over Marisa and Dad’s parenting style. “No, you didn’t. And you’re right. It’s none of my business.”
She relaxed, and her tone reset. “Maybe we do push her too hard sometimes. If you were around more, you could be a balancing influence, if you wanted to be. You could move back to North Carolina. We’d all be so excited—the kids, your dad, me.”
I held up a hand. “I’m not moving here. I’ll come back after the new year to handle some things with the business. That’s it.”
Marisa’s demeanor soured again. “You mean turning the company over to Carter Cross.”
“I mean making sure Dad’s transition plans are accepted by the board.”
“What your dad wants is for the business to stay in the family. How is that supposed to happen if it gets turned over to an outsider while Grace and Gregory grow up?”
“Carter is a smart, capable leader,” I said.
“He’s not family.”
“That’s not what you said this morning.”
“You know what I mean. He’s not a Kelso.”
Neither are you, so who asked you? “He’s worked in the business longer than I did, and Dad’s fond of him. They’re close.”
“It should be you.” Marisa grabbed my knee.
I shot to my feet and made a note to call a real estate friend. I didn’t want to stay at the house and play grab-ass with her when I came back to town.
“My father couldn’t convince me to join the family business, and he groomed me from conception. I don’t know why you think invoking the memory of some long-ago screwing with batted eyes is going to be more successful.”
“You always think the worst of me,” she pouted.
“Can you blame me? We had a nice family day. Let’s leave it at that.” I flashed her my palms in surrender and took a step back.
She jumped up and pushed her fist into my chest. “I don’t know why you have to be so stubborn. This is where you belong.”
I grabbed her hand and pushed it away. “No, it’s not. I need to pack up. I have an early flight tomorrow.”
“When are you coming back?” she asked.
“Next week. Make sure Grace knows I won’t miss her performance.”
I went back to my room with the image of Marisa and her sourpuss face stuck in my mind and causing pain in my neck.
Chapter 8
Delilah
I climbed into bed with my phone and my tablet and opened a book, and my phone rang. Griffin. I flopped back against the headboard and answered.
“Hello, Mr. Kelso.”
“Ugh, don’t call me that. It reminds me of when I was your boss.” I could hear the wince in his voice.
“I never called you Mr. Kelso, did I?”
“Sometimes I heard you refer to me that way on the phone with people. It makes me think of my dad. He is Mr. Kelso,” Griffin groaned.
It sounded like he’d a day from hell, so I shifted the conversation to keep it light. “I mean it with the utmost respect. What should I call you? I feel like giving you a nickname.”
Griff was taken. I knew that, and he didn’t seem to like it when Marisa called him that.
“Master of the Universe,” he suggested with a humorous boom.
I snorted. “Yeah, anything with ‘master’ is right the fuck out.”
“Shit, that’s not—” He sounded stricken.
“I’m kidding.”
After a beat of hesitation, Griffin mumbled, “I don’t know. Nicknames have to arise naturally.”
“You’re right,” I chirped. “I’ll think it over and maybe have fresh ideas in the morning.”
“Are you headed to bed already? What time is it there? Nine o’clock?”
“Yeah, it’s a little early, but we had a long day.” I stretched my legs under the blankets, pinning my phone between my ear and my shoulder. I flipped the book over on my lap.
“Your daughter arrived safely, I take it?” he asked.
I smiled. “She did. Katerina and her new fiancé, Adrian, are here. They’re up watching a movie. I thought I’d give them some privacy, so I retired to my bedchamber.”
It was kind of Golden Girls to hit the sheets so early, and I wanted to make sure he knew that I had an excuse aside from my more advanced age.
His sniffling laugh wafted over the phone line. “Retiring to your bedchamber. I like that. So, are you already in bed?”
Curiosity tinged his husky voice.
“I am. I was reading when you called,” I replied.
“What are you reading?”
I stared at the cover of my paperback. A handsome duke gripped a buxom lady around the waist. She eyed him provocatively through lowered lashes. Did I want to tell him I was reading a steamy honeymoon scene in a Regency romance?
No. I did not.
“Just a novel,” I said.
“What kind?”
“A historical novel.”
The notion of historical literature prompted an excited recitation of recent publications. “Last week, I finished a fictionalized story about Louis XIV’s court. I can’t remember the name of it. Versailles politics, intrigue. Which one are you reading?” he asked.
My cheek twitched. “It’s a historical romance, actually.”
“Oh.” The word popped with genuine surprise. “Like a sexy one or like one of those Christmas movies where all they do is kiss?”
I swallowed and stumbled. “It’s, you know…there are some…sexy moments in it.”
“Really? Now, I have to know. What kind of sexy moments?” His question sounded like a wink and a wiggled brow.
I gripped the phone in a full panic at the thought of discussing the scene I had read. Even though Griffin had been all over my body like white on rice only days before, I couldn’t get the words out. The thought of talking dirty on the phone nearly made me break out in hives, so I focused on summarizing the plot in the most boring way possible.
“The heroine was compromised and forced to marry the hero. She’s had a crush on him since she was a girl, but he also cheated her father out of some land or so she thinks. Anyway, he never considered getting married, but then his older brother
died and he inherited the dukedom and—”
“But there are sexy parts to this?” Griffin sounded incredulous.
“I’m getting to that. So, he’s only marrying her to be protective, but now, it’s their wedding night. She’s a nervous virgin. He’s been a rake. So, he’s got to walk her through it. It’s your typical historical romance.”
I hated dismissing the whole genre, but I longed to change the subject. I noted the page number I was reading and closed the book spread on my lap, then tried to redirect the conversation again. “What did you do today?”
After a long pause, Griffin grumbled, “We had the birthday party for Gregory Jr. It wasn’t much of a party. We had cake after lunch. This morning, I made pancakes with Grace. That was fun. I talked with my father. He’s ready to transition the business to his second in command, and he needs help to convince the board to accept someone who’s not a family member.”
I hadn’t realized that Griffin had much to do with his father’s business. “How are you going to help with that?”
“Technically, I’m still on the board. I gave Dad my proxy, but I do get a vote. I was going to talk to you about this, actually. I don’t want to put my business plans on hold, and I’m still working through the checklist you gave me. I can do both, but I’ll need to do it from North Carolina.”
“What about your job at Lumina?”
“I have a conference call with the executive team on Monday. I’m tendering my resignation.”
That surprised me. A week or so ago, Griffin had hesitated to quit without lining up more clients in the new business. Now, he was jumping in feet first. I hadn’t understood why he waited in the first place, but I wondered about the sudden change of heart.
“Are you sure?”
“The more I think about it, the more sure I get. It’s time, and then you and I will have plenty of time to set up your operations plan. Only I’ll need to be here.”
“We can manage that. We can do conference calls and handle most things via email,” I said. Long-distance business relationships weren’t the problem.
“It’s more than that. I don’t even have the right to ask this, but I was wondering if maybe you couldn’t come out with me for part of the time. It’ll be easier to manage our work that way, but mostly, I like having you around, which is totally selfish. You have your own business to run.”
“I do. I’m booked until almost Valentine’s Day.”
“I wouldn’t ask you to do anything that doesn’t fit with your schedule, but if you could maybe come out for a week even, that would be great. I don’t want to go three months without seeing you,” he said.
The soft desire in his voice got to me, stoking the thoughts I’d already had about visiting him while he was there. “Let me check my calendar. I was already freeing up time in February and March to handle wedding plans with Katerina, so maybe I could come then.”
“Perfect,” he said. “Now, enough of that boring stuff. Let’s get back to your steamy book. We were about to get wild on the virgin’s wedding night.”
I cleared my throat. “I think I’ve pretty much summed that up.”
“No, no, I don’t think you have. We were hovering on the cusp of what sounded like a lesson in rakish, debaucherous sex,” he replied with a glee that sent heat spreading through my belly.
“It’s not…no.”
He pressed on with growing humor in his tone. “It must be if you’re avoiding the topic this much. The more you evade my questions, the more curious I become for you to read me a bedtime story.”
“I can’t,” I said.
“Can’t what?”
Well, shit. He wasn’t going to let me squirm off the hook. “It’s kind of an explicit scene, and I really don’t want to read it out loud or tell you exactly what happens. I’m flop sweating here,” I confessed.
“Just a question, but how are you fine with reading it but you don’t want to talk about it?”
“The books don’t make me uncomfortable to read. It’s…saying it out loud or reading it out loud or explaining it to somebody else.” A nervous giggle bubbled out of me. “Especially to you. I could read this to my friend Clarissa, and we’d have a laugh.”
“It’s not like we haven’t, you know, done it.” He purposefully sounded like a teenager and laughed hysterically through the phone. “And see, I’m having a laugh.”
“Are you laughing at me?” I snapped—only half serious.
He stopped immediately, getting control of his breath. His voice soothed. “I would never laugh at you. I’m laughing at your book, maybe. What’s it called?”
“Trapped by a Duke.” I flung a hand to my face.
“And does he trap her? Like a bondage kind of deal?” The excitement in his voice made me deliciously nervous.
“No. There’s no bondage. She’s trapped in the marriage.”
Griffin’s tone turned serious. “Delilah, you can feel comfortable talking about sexy things with me.”
“It’s not like talking about sex bothers me exactly, but I never have before…like this.”
“Talked sexy with a guy?” he asked.
“Not over the phone.”
“Not even with your ex-husband?” His question rumbled low with disbelief.
Now, it was my turn to laugh hysterically. “God, no. Terrence would have sooner died than talk dirty.”
Once, he’d been on a business trip, and I joked about missing his cock. He’d balked and told me he didn’t like hearing me say that word. I told him I didn’t see the problem. Wasn’t he always telling me “the marriage bed cannot be defiled”? Terrence told me that hearing that kind of language from the mother of his child turned him off. Properly chastened, I never did it again.
“I enjoy talking dirty,” Griffin growled. “Especially since I won’t see you for a few more days, and I miss you. But if you don’t, that’s okay, too. It’s too soon, maybe. We need more time for our relationship to develop.”
He missed me. My skin felt warm from head to toe. Reconnecting with him even over the phone titillated, but I didn’t want him to think…
My mind blanked. What was it he’d think? That I was a tramp? There’s nothing I could say that would be any trampier than what I’d done with him on Christmas night.
On Jesus’ birthday! I snickered to myself.
I was already a tramp, and he didn’t care. Why shouldn’t I let myself have fun?
“Okay,” I said. “I’m not reading it, but I’ll tell you what happens.”
“You don’t have to do something you don’t want to do. We can talk about anything you want. We can compare Texas and Carolina barbecue. I called because I wanted to hear your voice,” Griffin said, softly.
“No. I want to.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. I miss you, too.”
I swallowed and took a deep breath, ready to lean in and let go.
I turned the book over and flipped back a few pages.
“They’ve had wedding revels all day, and her things have been moved to her new home with the duke—”
“What’s his name?” Griffin interrupted.
“Thomas St. Mark, the Duke of Beauthorn.”
“Does he have a beautiful thorn?” he asked with a snicker.
“Stop it.”
“Sorry. Keep going.”
I exhaled. “Her name is Anna…Anna St. Mark, now. It was Penrith. Anyway, she’s arrived at her new house and is waiting for Beauthorn in bed in her room.”
“What’s she wearing?” He purred the question, and my mouth went dry.
I took a sip of water from the bottle on my nightstand.
“Her chemise. It’s like a slip they would wear under all their layers of clothing.”
“What are you wearing?” His voice dropped an octave with the question.
My toes curled into my cotton sheets. “A nightshirt.”
“So also a chemise?”
“Of sorts.”
“So yo
u and Anna are waiting in bed barely clothed,” he said.
I picked at the corner of my paperback. “Uh huh. She’s waiting for her husband. I’m waiting for you to shut up.”
“Sorry,” he said again and chuckled.
“She turns toward the bed, and he comes up behind her. He bends his head, sweeps her hair out of the way, and kisses the nape of her neck. He trails his fingers up and down her arms and finds the ring settled on her finger, which reminds him that she’s now his. Then, he sweeps his hands back up and in front, cupping her breasts.”
I cleared my throat. Griffin’s breathing quickened.
“He takes note of her nipples hardening against his palms.”
“She likes it?” he asked.
“Presumably. This scene is from his point of view. She arches against him. Her head falls back, and she moans.”
“She likes it.” Griffin practically moaned, so I could tell he did, too.
Thinking of how much he liked it and what he might be doing triggered an ache that slowly edged out my embarrassment.
“Her hips start to move, and her backside sways against his crotch. He likes that. He fantasizes about bending her over a chair and doing her from behind, but he figures that’s too much for a virgin.”
“Probably. Too bad. That sounds like a tremendous idea.”
“You like that position?” I ventured the question, feeling curious and increasingly tingly all over.
“One of several I enjoy. I’ll show you when I see you,” he promised. “Keep going. Since he doesn’t bend her over, what does he do?”
“He moves his hand down her stomach and between her legs and fingers her through the fabric.” My breath hitched.
“When are we going to lose this chemise? It’s in the way,” Griffin’s grumbling voice interjected.
“You’re impatient. The author is trying to set the scene. Anna is moaning and moving against Beauthorn, and he’s making sure she’s ready. She’s a virgin, remember? He can’t go charging in like a rutting bull. He’s the hero. He has to be nice,” I explained, clinging to my schoolmarm routine to maintain some control over the feelings sparking my body like a wildfire.
