by Juniper Bell
"Whew," I said, beaming gratefully at him. "You saved my life." With a chipper wave, I hurried down wide front steps, past the sculpted lions with their silent roars, and into my car.
Hopefully he wouldn't notice it was a rental.
Half an hour later, I was back on the property, squirming through that bathroom window. Luckily, the place had very little security. Christopher McAllister wasn't worried about break-ins and he wasn't a professional hostage-taker. He was just a rich guy messing around with people's lives. Elijah had spotted two tough-looking security guards, but they stayed in a guesthouse out back. No one seemed worried about Rye going anywhere.
Once inside the bathroom, I waited, holding my breath, until I was absolutely certain the butler had gone upstairs to the servants’ quarters. I pushed open the door and tiptoed into the darkness. He'd turned off all the downstairs lights. The only illumination came from the solar lights installed in the landscaping outside. The moon hadn't risen yet.
I picked my way carefully down the hall toward the back of the house. Annabelle insisted that Christopher's study was back there. She remembered it had a view of the rose garden and the lake beyond. I pulled out the tiny pen light Elijah had given me and played it across the burnished hardwood floors. The last thing I wanted was to trip over something.
When I'd almost reached the half-open door of the study, I heard a nearly inaudible groan from behind a closed door.
I froze. Someone else was here. Crap. I tried to remember what might be behind that door. Annabelle and Elijah had drawn a map of the house based on their childhood memories. Was it the door to the basement? They'd mentioned a den where they'd watched movies on rainy days.
The groan came again, along with a muffled curse.
I'd know that cursing anywhere.
Rye.
I hurried to the door and carefully pulled it open. A stairway led into darkness, and there, slumped a few steps down, was Rye.
He didn't seem to notice that someone had opened the door. I played the light over his face and saw that he was out cold. He must have been cursing in his unconscious state. I shut the door behind me and stepped softly down the steps.
I shook him gently. "Rye."
He reacted violently, flailing his arm in my direction. I shrank away just in time to avoid a blow to the nose.
"Rye." I tried again, more loudly. I felt his head for bumps. If he had a concussion, I probably shouldn't try to move him. I didn't find anything, and he seemed to relax under my touch.
I sat back on my heels, mystified. Why was he on the stairs? Why unconscious? What should I do now? Should I call for help? How hurt was he?
Again I scanned him with my flashlight. No blood, so sign of any injury whatsoever. I felt for his pulse. Definitely elevated. And his forehead felt sweaty under my hand. Did he have a cold? A cold that caused him to pass out on the stairs?
If he wasn't fatally injured, I wasn't going to call for the butler. But I couldn't get him down the stairs myself. Or should I help him up the stairs, not down? Should I call Elijah or Annabelle? Maybe the three of us could get him out of the house altogether.
My thoughts were still running in circles when Rye opened bleary eyes.
When he saw me, he opened them even wider.
"Lauren? What the—?"
"Shhh." I hushed him with a finger over his lips. He grabbed my hand, shocking me with the weakness of his grip. "Don't waste your breath with a bunch of questions," I told him. "And don't bother telling me to leave. I'm not going anywhere."
His eyelids sank down over his bloodshot eyes. For a moment I thought he'd fallen back asleep, but then they fluttered open again. "Can you help me get downstairs?"
"Of course. Lean on my shoulder." Using my body as a support, he pushed himself to standing. Even once he was upright, he practically staggered down the stairs. I kept my arm loosely around his waist to keep him stable when he stumbled. By the time we reached the floor, he was walking more strongly, but I still didn't want to let him go.
When we reached the basement level, Rye switched on a fluorescent overhead light. "Home sweet home," he said grimly.
I glanced around at the space. The downstairs den still held the entertainment center Annabelle remembered, but it also contained an army cot set up in the corner. We headed that direction, one slow step at a time.
"What happened to you, Rye?"
He didn't answer until he'd slumped onto the cot. He wore cotton drawstring pants and a U.S. Navy sweatshirt, and lines of pain still tightened his stubbled face. He glanced up at me, eyes as gray as the lake at twilight, and lifted the hem of his sleep pants. I saw a bracelet fastened around his ankle. A red light blinked from it.
"What is that?"
"My uncle's way of keeping me close to my cot," he said bitterly. "It's an electrified bracelet. The farther I go, the more it hurts. Eventually, I go unconscious."
Horror and fury washed through me in equal measures. "You know this already."
He nodded wearily.
"Then what were you doing on the stairway?"
"Testing."
"Testing." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Who would be so crazy as to test their ankle bracelet? Only Rye.
"And building." Weakly, he tried to pull off his sweatshirt. He couldn't quite get his arms over his head, so I helped him.
"Building what?"
"Tolerance. The first night, I couldn't even make it to the stairway. I nearly got to the top this time."
"You're doing this to yourself on purpose?"
He lay back and covered his eyes with the crook of his elbow. "Don't lecture me, Lauren. A guy has to do what he has to do."
I bit my lip to hold back my reaction to that piece of macho idiocy. Did a guy really have to electrocute himself? For what purpose? But I let it go. My poor cowboy looked so exhausted, so defeated. I couldn't bear it.
"Turn over," I whispered. "I'll rub your back for you."
His eyelids drifted halfway closed. "You should really get out of here." But his voice held no conviction.
"Why? Does anyone come down here at night?"
"No. Not until seven in the morning or so."
"That's plenty of time to make you feel better." With what looked like a huge effort, he turned onto his belly. His magnificent back muscles rippled and flexed as he settled into a comfortable position. I stroked my fingertips along his spine, enjoying every dip and knob along the way. My lower belly tightened with a stab of desire.
God, how could I possibly be turned on in this situation? And yet, I was. The always-ready moisture gathered between my legs.
He let out a long, relaxing whoosh of breath. "Oh Lauren. You're a goddess, you know that?"
"Of course I do," I teased. With my thumbs, I found the twin ridges of muscle along his spinal column. I pressed and released, slowly making my way up his back. "I've been sent here from Valhalla to tell you to take it easy on yourself."
The rumble of his laughter vibrated against my fingers. "Funny." He tensed. "Wait a second." He pushed himself up and twisted around to face me. "You're here."
"You finally noticed."
"No finally about it." He glanced down at the bulge in his cotton pants. "I have an amazing early warning radar system."
I bit back a smile. "I can't disagree with the amazing part." I traced the burgeoning line of hard flesh through his sweats. With a groan, he braceleted my wrist and moved my hand away.
"Don't distract me," he said sternly. "Do you mind sitting a little farther away? Like at the other end of the cot? This is important and I can't focus when you're so close to me."
I edged away, though it was the last thing I wanted to do. "Happy?"
"Absolutely not. But thank you." He gave me a one-sided smile. "The reason I've been torturing myself to get upstairs is so I can search the study. I want to see my father's will. The actual document, not what Uncle Chris says is in it. I want to know exactly what I'm dealing with."
"I w
as heading for that study when I found you. I was going to search his laptop."
He shook his head, something dark moving behind the silvery surface of his gaze. "Don't even think about looking at the laptop. He has passwords from here to Timbuktu. But the will, that's different. He's got to have a hard copy of that."
I jumped to my feet. "I'm on it."
"Wait." He tugged me toward him, so I stood between his knees. "You have to promise you won't go near his laptop."
I frowned down at his worried face and searching gray eyes. "I promise. But why are you so concerned?"
"He might have an alarm on it. He's very protective of that laptop."
I wondered what he'd say if he knew Courtney was on Chris’s cyber trail. "It was kind of a shot in the dark anyway. It makes more sense to look for the will. Now can I go?"
"Wait." He drew me closer and nested his face between my breasts. I was already turned on from that back massage, and I knew my hard nipples gave me away. "Will you be careful up there?"
"Of course. Are there any alarms I should know about?"
"I don't think so. As far as I know, all he does is turn on my ankle bracelet at night. The guards stay in the guesthouse. The only danger is Uncle Christopher, and he's out for the night. I think he has a date with his mystery girlfriend, which means he'll be staying at her place. You should have time. But be as quick as you can just in case."
"Okay."
Still, he didn't release me. The warmth of his face penetrated my shirt and made me wild with desire for him. He squeezed my ass with a firm but gentle pressure.
"Are you going to let me go?" I was already sounding breathless.
"Not yet. First I have to tell you something."
"Okay." I wondered if it was possible to come like this, just from his hands caressing my ass.
"I love you."
A smile spread across my face. "You mentioned that before."
"I know. But you need to hear it over and over. Because I'm not sure you believe me. When McAllisters fall, they fall hard, and they fall forever. That's the way it is. I fell for you … well, looking back, I think I fell for you back when you wore braces and painted your fingernails blue. I didn't think of it that way, but why else would I go so crazy when I saw you on TV?"
"You were angry." I touched his hair gently. "You lost your father, you lost your home."
"But it wasn't your fault. I knew all along that you weren't to blame. But I went off like a rocket as soon as I caught sight of you. Maybe it was never about revenge. Maybe it was you, the fact that you disappeared in the middle of the night. I had to see you, be with you."
Shivers swept through me, head to toe. I felt like melting right there on the floor next to his cot. "I love you, too, Rye. You have no idea how much. You're everything in the world to me."
His wide shoulders trembled as he held me. "Let's make a promise, right here and now."
"What promise?"
"Let's not doubt each other again. When I asked you to marry me in Thailand, you said no. You said we couldn't have a marriage without trust, and that we didn't trust each other."
I flinched, thinking of all the things I regretted about that day. "I'm sorry."
"But you were right. I didn't completely trust you. I was afraid you might run away before I got back. I thought I might never see you again."
Tears gathered in my eyes. I wanted to wipe them away, but I didn't want to stop touching Rye. "I wasn't going anywhere."
"I know that. And when I disappeared, you came all the way to Vermont to find me. When I told you to go away, you did the opposite. You broke into this place. I should never have doubted you, and I promise, I take a sacred vow, right here and now, that I won't do it again. I trust you, Lauren. I know there are things in your life I don't know and may never know. But I trust you. I trust you with my life and with my heart. I just want you to know that."
My throat worked, the muscles clenching with emotion. "I trust you too, Rye. But I can't change my past. I deceived people, I took money for deceiving people. I still haven't met my real mother. I have no idea about my father. And Bliss will always be playing her mind games. For your own good, you should get out now."
"Sweetheart, there is no getting out." He gazed at me sternly. "I'm a goner. We'll handle Bliss. We won't let her dictate what we do. We'll do what we want, what we decide together is what we want. Okay?"
Again, emotion choked me. Together. I barely knew what that meant. But I liked the sound of it. "Okay."
That felt like a vow to me.
6
Rye
I would rather have suffered multiple electrocutions than wait downstairs in that goddamn basement while Lauren searched my uncle's study. But I didn't have a choice. I'd just wind up unconscious again if I challenged the limits of the bracelet. Besides, I'd vowed to trust Lauren, and that trust had to include respecting her to be smart about the risks.
After all, she'd shown up here with the intention of searching my uncle's study—completely on her own, with no input from me. I didn't control Lauren. The sooner I got that through my head, the better. So I waited in the dark, straining my ears for any sign of anything going wrong up there. I’d asked her to switch off the light on her way up the stairs, but now my basement felt especially dungeon-like.
She probably wasn't gone long, but it felt like years. The relief of seeing her shadowing figure dart back down the stairs nearly knocked me over. I held my arms out to her and she flew into them. I held her tight, feeling her heart race. "Any trouble?"
"Nope. All quiet." She grinned and reached behind her for the thick accordion file she'd shoved down her pants. "And I think I got what you wanted."
"Amazing." I took the folder, hefting it in my hand. As soon as I touched it, I felt a solemnness come over me. "These are my father's last wishes. The last piece of him I'll ever have."
Lauren put a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. "That's not true. This is just about material possessions. You have so much of your father in you. He would be incredibly proud of you."
I hoped she was right. For so long, my only goal had been to keep our orphaned family together. Now I was about to find out what our father had intended for us.
I opened the folder. Lauren turned on her little flashlight and aimed it at the first page. The legal heading announced it as the Last Will and Testament of Ian McAllister, as executed on the date of May 27, 2004. "This is dated just after he married Bliss."
"Right. Bliss told me Ian left her something."
A sound caught my attention. The sleek rumble of an engine out in the courtyard. Sounds tended to vibrate through the concrete down to my domain. "I think that's the Ferrari."
Lauren gave a panicked glance around the basement. "Do you think he'll come down here?"
"I don’t know. He doesn't usually come back until morning when he's with his girlfriend. Something must have happened."
We both listened closely to the distant sounds coming from upstairs. The thud of the door closing. The rhythmic pattern of footfalls coming closer and louder.
"Fuck," I hissed. I thrust the folder at her. "Take this and get under my bed. Don't move, whatever you do."
There was no place else to hide in the whole goddamn room. She dove under the army cot, face down. I shifted my sheets and blankets so they draped over the side, all messy and tangled, as if I'd been having a nightmare.
"Flashlight," I whispered. She'd dropped her flashlight in her scramble, and it was sending a narrow column of light across the carpet.
"Sorry." She reached for it, straining, and turned it off just as the door at the top of the staircase opened.
I shifted back and forth on the bed, as if I was tossing and turning. Footfalls came down the stairs, heavy and hurried. Fuck, my uncle must really be angry about something. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, he hit the wall switch and harsh fluorescent light flooded my space.
"Get up, Rye."
I groaned and flung a hand ove
r my eyes. "What's happening? Uncle Chris? What's the matter?"
He stood about halfway between the stairs and my cot, arms folded across his chest. He wore an Armani tux and a silk tie hand-painted with a pattern of violet cranes. "We have a problem with Izzy."
Oh hell. What had Izzy done now? I hadn't seen her since the Shapiro party. I swung my legs over the side of the bed, anchoring the curtain of blankets in place. I didn't want them to slide off and reveal Lauren. "What problem?"
"She just got arrested for public indecency. She was fucking the night clerk at the liquor store. It's all on videotape. Van Sant is furious. He's about to call off the fucking merger. Says he's not getting his money's worth."
"So let him call it off. Who needs the Van Sants? The merger benefits him more than the McAllisters."
"The merger is happening." Christopher's steely tone cut like a sword. "We're going to make an official announcement. Here's how it's going to go. Izzy Van Sant and Rye McAllister love each other so deeply, they're going to get married immediately and work through her sex addiction issues after the wedding tomorrow."
"What?"
"You heard me. It's the only thing that will satisfy Van Sant."
"No. Hell no. Actual marriage was never part of the deal. I don't want to marry Izzy and I'm sure she doesn't want to marry me either."
"Izzy just spent four hours in jail. She has no choice. She already said yes."
Hell. Hell and double hell. "I won't do it. It's one thing to pretend for a couple of weeks. Actually getting married, fuck no."
"You keep talking as if you have a choice. You know what will happen if you defy me."
I clenched my fists so tight they hurt. I didn't want Lauren to hear anything about this part of it. She was under my bed listening to every word. What if he spilled it all out, right now? How devastating would that be for her? Redirect, redirect.
"Listen, we'll figure it out tomorrow. Izzy needs help. A forced marriage isn't going to do it. She's an addict. Her problems will keep on surfacing."
"You think I care about that? I don't. I care about getting that merger signed. If she cheats on you from the wedding night on, I don't give a fuck."
