The Man In The Mirror

by Georgia Le Carre

  I stood there gaping like a demented goldfish until she came to me and put her arms around me. “I’m sorry, Charlotte. I should have kept my big mouth shut.”

  “It’s okay. It’s okay. I’ll be fine. Time will sort me out.” I flashed her a fake smile. We went into the living room and I chewed uninterestedly at my pizza while I listened to her talk about Yuri and her baby. I was glad she had come. It took my mind off Brett. I had pushed the plate away when the doorbell rang.

  I groaned. “It’s that damn new postman again. Why can’t he just leave it behind the flowerpot like the other one used to do?”

  “I’ll go,” she called as she headed off to answer the door.

  I picked up my empty plate to go to the kitchen, when April called out to me. Something in her voice made me stop in my tracks. Slowly, I moved towards the hallway. One step at a time. It was not the new postman.

  Standing at my apartment door was the man I had not been able to keep out of my mind for more than three seconds for the last three days.

  She couldn’t stop looking at him as she spoke, while his gaze had already moved past her to me.

  “You have a guest,” she said.

  I gripped the plate hard. I couldn’t breathe.

  “Charlotte?”

  “Yeah, I’m here,” I squeaked out.

  “Okay, I’ll leave now,” she said, giving me a wink. “I don’t think I can stand here and watch you turn into a creepy awestruck stranger.”

  She went through the door and he came in. I tried to settle my erratically beating heart, but it was beating so hard I wouldn’t have been surprised if he could hear it. I took a deep breath as my eyes hungrily roved over him. He was dressed immaculately in a double-breasted navy blue suit. His presence seemed to dwarf my entire apartment. My hands itched, the need to touch him an almost possessing force.

  “Brett,” I said.

  “You left,” he accused.

  “I wasn’t exactly given a choice. How did you find me?”

  He shrugged. “I found the name of the agency from a letterhead Jillian had left in the drawing room, but the agency wouldn’t give me your address so I bought it.”

  I shook my head at the lives of rich people. “Just like that, huh?”

  “What did you expect me to do? Just leave it?”

  “No, but…”

  “You made no attempt to contact me,” he said. Something dark slipped into his eyes then and it made me sad. I truly, truly more than anything else … more than even my desire to be with him, wanted him to be happy. Thoroughly and boundlessly.

  “You were not really mine and I was put in my place.”

  He took a step towards me. “You’re mine,” he said harshly. “If you didn’t want to be then you shouldn’t have worked your way into my heart in the first place. But as you did, I’m not letting you go.”

  Hot tears filled my eyes. My heart felt like it was ready to burst. “I don't know that she will let us be. She will always be in the way poisoning you and Zackary.”

  “I apologize that you had to deal with Jillian. It must have been so humiliating for you, but Jillian will never trouble us again.”

  “How can you say that? She is Zackary’s mother. She will always be in the picture.”

  “After I found out you’d gone, I told her to move out. She got very drunk and stormed out of the castle and ordered Barnaby to bring her car to her. Unfortunately for her, she met with a really bad accident. She got thrown out of her car just like I had. But unlike me she damaged her spinal cord.”

  “What?” I gasped, my hand coming over my mouth.

  “Yeah, it’s hard to even imagine it, but Jillian is paralyzed from the neck down.”

  “Oh, my God!”

  “It was her own fault. She liked riding the danger train in more ways than one and it was only a matter of time before something bad happened to her.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “In one of the best hospitals money can buy.”

  “That’s horrible. I detested her, but I didn’t want that for her.”

  “When I went to see her she thought I had come to gloat, but I took no pleasure in seeing her like that. When I was in a wheelchair she showed no pity or empathy so it was as if fate decided to teach her what it feels like to be helpless and stuck inside a body that doesn’t work. I will pay to keep her in the best care possible. I owe that to her father.”

  “What about Zackary?”

  “He’s confused and frightened, but time will take care of that.”

  “Poor thing,” I whispered.

  “So you see. I am the only one you need to worry about now. It’s me and you … and nothing else, and no one else. Do you understand?”

  I couldn’t help smiling. “Who lives that way?”

  “We will,” he said. “You and me and Zackary and all the other children we will have together.”

  He came forward and pulled me into his arms, lightly moving his nose from my hair and down my face to my neck, inhaling, reveling.”

  “How I missed you,” he said. “I would have come to you sooner but all these other events were in the way.”

  I pulled away to stare into his eyes. “You’ve known her since you both were children. She has to be more than an unfortunate event to you.”

  “She is,” he responded, and I could see the deep sadness in his gaze that he was as usual trying to hold at bay … to mask. “Especially when I think of her father. She will have the best care and assistance that she needs, but my road together with her ended a long time ago, even before ours began.”

  I released a deep breath which made my entire frame quiver.

  That made him laugh. “Relax,” he said to me and placed the lightest of kisses on my forehead that made me want more.

  “I love you, Charlotte Conrad.”

  “Me too. I love you so much I could die.”

  “Don’t you dare do that.”

  I grinned.

  “We’ll take it one day at a time, okay,” he stated.

  “I couldn’t ask for more,” I replied, and slid my arms around his neck.

  “You’ve been crying,” he noted as his gaze searched mine.

  I nodded, comforted by his warmth and strength. The tears and sadness seemed far away.

  “Never again,” he ordered.

  Nodding obediently, I crushed my lips to his and gave in to the incomparable taste of home.

  Epilogue

  Brett

  I Say a Little Prayer For You

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtBbyglq37E

  4 years later

  It was our second day in Languedoc, and our first return to the South of France since our wedding three years earlier. The villa was one of our favorite homes.

  A short distance from us, our Chef was working the grill and the smells of meat cooking filled my nostrils. With my eyes shut and a pair of sunglasses shielding them from the late afternoon sun I lounged in the warm infinity pool overlooking the deep blue of the Mediterranean.

  My kids, there were three of them, looked very small playing together on the beach beyond. They were watched by Mr. and Mrs. Boothsworth. Yup, they made it official and tied the knot.

  Sliding the sunglasses up to my head, I looked down at the woman clinging to me. Her beautiful gold hair was damp and clinging to her neck from an earlier swim. My arms were spread out as I leaned against the edge of the pool, while her arms were around my neck and head rested on my shoulder.

  Every inch of her was plastered to me, my cock resting against her stomach, was slowly getting harder and harder. She felt my gaze, and lifted her head to meet my eyes, a dazzling smile across her lips. This woman had plucked me from the dark, lonely hell that was my life and put me into a brand new world full of light and color. She single-handedly changed my life.

  Loving all of me, even my scars. She even managed to change Zackary’s fear of me. One day, when he was six, he asked me to show him my scars. I took off my mask and
he looked at me for a long time, then he smiled and said, “Charlotte was totally right. They are like one of the paintings hanging in the modern art gallery she took me to.” I laughed then. Only Charlotte could ever come up with the idea that my ugly face was a work of art.

  “Sleepy?” I asked her.

  She nodded lazily.

  I brushed her hair behind her ears. “We just got up from a long siesta. Why are you already exhausted?”

  She looked at me from underneath her lashes. It could have been the sun in her eyes, but I was going to take that as an invitation, and I never passed up invitations from my wife.

  Holding her neck in place, my tongue slipped into her mouth and danced with hers, teasing, tasting, and loving. Putting both my hands into the water, I grabbed her cushiony ass to crush her hips to mine.

  She ground herself against me. Rock hard, I let lust guide me as usual to the threshold of pleasure. She was my drug.

  When I came up for air my mind was made up, I was going to take her right here in the water. I shifted position, her back replacing mine against the wall of the pool. Shielding her from view, I turned towards the cook.

  “Édouard,” I called.

  He turned to look and I gave him a wave with my hand. He got the message and nodded.

  Grabbing her thighs, I pulled her feet off the floor and wound them around my hips. A beautiful moan sounded in her throat as my swollen cock settled in the crook of her delicious cunt.

  She bounced her hips, her head thrown back in brazen delight. I loved seeing her this way, completely woman. She kissed me fervently, showing her love for me once more in a way that words could not express. As always it humbled me.

  I pulled my cock out of my trunks underneath the water, and slid her bikini bottom aside to allow it access to its home, but, she blocked it! Halfway out of my mind I searched her gaze for a reason. The furrows in my forehead were her warning that it had better be a good one.

  “I have something to tell you,” she said.

  “You can try to speak when I’m fucking you, otherwise it has to wait,” I growled. I tried to push against her once more, but she stopped me with surprising determination. Holding me at bay she sought to lock my gaze with hers.

  “Baby,” I complained.

  She cracked up in laughter.

  Finding nothing at all amusing I watched her impatiently.

  “I’m laughing at the term of endearment,” she said.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Because I'm not sure which of us exactly you’re referring to …”

  I backed away from her then. When women resorted to speaking in riddles. “This better be worth the interruption otherwise you’re not going to be able to walk for the rest of this trip.”

  “How will you explain my temporary inability to walk to the kids?” she asked.

  I looked ahead at the twin girls and baby boy assisting Zackary at the castle he was making.

  “I don’t owe them one.”

  She leaned forward and whispered into my ear. “What about the one currently with us?”

  My heart stuttered to a stop. “What are you saying?”

  Her gaze on me was searing, threatening to fry my brain to fucking ashes.

  “You’re fucking pregnant?”

  She couldn’t hold back her smile. Pure unadulterated joy ripped through me.

  “Really?” I shouted in disbelief.

  She nodded, her eyes gleaming. “Yes, I’m fucking pregnant. Although, I have no idea how it happened. We only fuck like seven times a week.”

  Tears rushed to my eyes, I lowered my head and rested my forehead against hers.

  “Hey,” she said softly, her voice softening at my unexpected reaction.

  She cradled me like one of our children. “Just to be sure, are these happy or sad tears? Because I know you’re already struggling to find enough sleep with the colony we’re raising.”

  My response was soul deep. “I never expected in my life that I would know what it feels like to be this happy.”

  She leaned away to stare into my eyes. “Oh, Brett. I am the luckiest girl in the whole universe.”

  “Thank you,” I said, the tears falling silently past my scars. She put her hand out to wipe them away, the warmth of her touch on my face that had once chased away the cold felt like silk. “I love you with all of my heart.”

  At that moment tears filled her eyes too. Then she said back the words that I would never get tired of hearing, or take for granted. “I love you even more.”

  The End

  Coming soon…

  So … my next book is titled:

  A Kiss Stolen

  December, 2018

  ****

  Remember Liliana Eden

  When she was eleven years old.

  I look at the grubby boy. He is tall and broad with fierce black eyes and straight black hair. He must be at least a couple of years older than me. I think he’s the son of one of the traveling gypsies. His father did some work for my father. He is standing in the garden. His clothes are dirty and his hands are grubby, but for some strange reason I don’t understand why I feel drawn to him. I decide to walk up to him and offer him some food.

  “What’s your name?” I ask.

  “None of your business,” he says rudely.

  “What a rude little boy you are,” I say scornfully. “I only came over to see if you are hungry.”

  “I’m not hungry. I don’t need your charity.”

  I put my hands on my hips feeling angry at his rudeness. “I was only trying to be nice.”

  His eyes flash. “You want to be nice?”

  I look at him, confused. “Well, I did. I’m not sure I want to anymore.”

  “Then piss off.”

  I gasp. I don’t know why I didn’t just walk away and tell Daddy. “Why are you being so rude?”

  “Why are you being such a pest?”

  “All right I want to be nice. What do you want?”

  Suddenly he grabs me and kisses me on the mouth! I am too surprised to resist. His mouth is firm and forceful and hot. Something flutters in my belly. Then he lifts his head and looks into my eyes. I can’t look away. I’m too astonished.

  “Liliana Eden, I’m going to marry you one day,” he declares, before striding away.

  I touch my lips. They are still tingling. He kissed me. Ewww … Yuck. The rude boy kissed me! I run towards our house as fast as I can. I fly in through the door and burst into the kitchen. Both Mommy and Daddy are there. “A boy kissed me,” I announce breathlessly.

  “What?” Daddy shouts and jumps up, his face dark with fury.

  Mommy grabs hold of his wrist. “She’s only eleven, Jake. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “Fuck it doesn’t.” Daddy swears furiously as strides out of the house.

  I watch him march up to the boy’s father. They talk, Daddy gesturing angrily. The man calls his son and slaps him upside the head. The boy says nothing. He just turns his head and looks at me through the window. There is no smile on his face. He just stares at me until his father slaps him again and pulls him away.

  I touch my lips. They are still tingling. I wish I had not told Daddy about him.

  And the Eden saga continues with the:

  A Kiss Stolen

  For those of you who are familiar with the Crystal Jake (Eden) Series you will know Liliana as Jake’s daughter. This is Liliana’s story.

  Note: it can be read as a standalone, but your enjoyment will be enhanced by reading the Crystal Jake series.

  Get The Series Here”

  Crystal Jake

  ****

  And if you have already read the Crystal Jake Series,

  have you met the Blake Law Barrington,

  The Billionaire Banker

  Sample Chapters Ahead…

  The Billionaire Banker

  Book 1

  OWNED

  from the

  The Billionaire Banker series

  Publ
ished by Georgia Le Carre

  Copyright © 2013 by Georgia Le Carre

  The right of Georgia Le Carre to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the copyright, designs and patent act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious, any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-0-9576812-5-5

  Quote

  You aren’t wealthy until you have something money can’t buy.

  —Garth Brooks

  Blake Law Barrington

  I drop a cube of sugar into the creamy face of my espresso, stir it, and glance at my platinum Greubel Forsey Tourbillion, acquired at Christie’s Important Watches auction last autumn for a cool half a million dollars.

  Eight minutes past eight.

  I have a party to go to tonight, but I’m giving it a miss. It’s been a long day, I am tired, I have to be in New York early tomorrow morning, and it will be one of those incomprehensibly dreary affairs. I take a sip—superb coffee—and return the tiny cup to its white rim.

  Summoning a waiter for the check, I sense the activity level in the room take a sudden hike. Automatically, I lift my eyes to where all the other eyes, mostly male and devouring, have veered to. Of course. A girl. In a cheap, orange dress and lap dancer’s six-inch high plastic platforms.