She hissed at me. “That was because of your actions, and because of your foolish feelings of devotion to those men.” Then, her voice returned back to normal, as if she were spouting things off that everyone else on the planet knew but me. “I was trying to help you, trying to free you from the bondage that always ensues when you get involved with a boy. If you had listened to me and kept yourself away from men, then you would be stronger and happier. You would have power and freedom. Now what do you have, huh? A run-down building and three men fighting over who will get to crawl between your legs.”
I felt the heat start to flush my face. She knew nothing about my relationship with the guys, nor did she respect what I was trying to do here.
“Do you really think that you can keep this balance up for long?” she asked. “Do you think that these three men will fall at your heels without killing each other first?”
“I’ve already chosen who I will be with,” I said, not sure why I even felt the need to answer her.
“Yes, I heard. And how is that going for you?” she asked with raised brows and a sarcastic grin.
“They’ll come around,” I said. I didn’t even know what that meant. There wasn’t really any idea to “come around” to. The four of us would stay together, until we didn’t. And when that day came, Michael and I would remain.
“No they won’t,” she said.
“How do you know?” I yelled. Fatigue had finally won out over my patience as I lost my temper. “You don’t know anything about it, or about us.”
“They’re all the same,” she said. “Boys can never be trusted—ever.”
After several solid weeks of working on The Sanctuary, the place was actually looking pretty fantastic. Each bedroom had been done up with its own cool theme, all designed to promote a sense of peace and safety. The bathrooms were fully stocked with toiletries of every kind imaginable, and the kitchen was fully stocked with food and drink. The common area was fully furnished now and there was plenty of room for people to both congregate and to stow away in a little corner nook to read.
There had been some tension between the three boys and myself, but overall, we had all been staying together and getting along pretty well. Since we hadn’t really had any alone time, Michael and I still hadn’t been able to physically have each other, and it was starting to wear on us both. I could barely stand next to him without wanting to touch him in all the places that made the inside of my thighs hot. If it went on too much longer, I was actually starting to worry about randomly grabbing him in public, out of the sheer need that was clawing at my insides.
I had been trying to be kind, patient, and forgiving with Naomi because after I had heard her tell me about the childhood she and my mother endured, and about her misguided reasoning and methods for trying to set me on a strong, albeit savage, path, I really started to see that a lot of this wasn’t her fault at all. She had been a victim ever since she was a small girl and it had caused her to be legitimately mentally unwell.
But Naomi actually seemed to be surprisingly content here at The Sanctuary. She had slowed her pursuit of the inheritance money, which was almost all but used up now anyway. I spared no expense for anything inside the group home and also put some of the money into investments that would feed back into The Sanctuary and hopefully propagate it for years to come.
Naomi didn’t even seem to think about the money anymore.
She seemed to love her new home and the constant attention of the people around her. She was happy when I gave her some leadership decisions to make, even when they were ridiculously small decisions like what color to paint the bathroom walls. But when she came back with an answer like “lavender” and then saw that I actually had it done the way that she asked for, she and I started to build a bit of a mutual understanding. I was helping her, and in return she was helping me fulfill my mother’s dying wish. She had gone from wanting to steal the fortune, to becoming a supporting member of its success.
We had decided to do a soft grand opening of the facility, a party to introduce The Sanctuary to the community and open our doors that very night to welcome anyone that needed or wanted to come there. So far, there were only two bedrooms in the building being occupied; Naomi’s room, and the bedroom that all the guys and I stayed in together. There were still twelve other bedrooms that could be filled, all ready to go with soft, clean linens on the beds and bottles of water and a hot tea machine on the dressers. It was like a mashup between a hotel and a mental hospital. Except that description was way too rudimentary. This was something special. Here, in this place, people could quietly heal themselves at their own pace, and maybe even help those around them. I had hired a few staff members, although I wanted to be very hands on, so I kept the staff to a minimum. The party was going to be a fun and relaxed event, more like a hipper version of an open house.
When people started to arrive, there were lots of whispers and impressed looks, which seemed to indicate approval by the community at large. Guests wandered all around the building freely, with the exception of the two locked bedrooms. By the time the evening was winding down, I had already received a few inquiries about how to apply to live here, mostly for people that the guests knew and wanted to help. There was even one young woman, that was one of the guests, that came up to me at the end of the night and asked if she could be the first official resident (aside from Naomi of course). I wasn’t quite sure why she would want to come live here though.
She seemed like she had her act completely together, and from the looks of what she was wearing, she wasn’t down on her luck by any means.
“You want to live here yourself?” I asked her as the guys were busy cleaning up and she stayed behind to talk with me.
“Yes,” she said.
“When were you thinking about moving in?”
“Tonight, if I can.”
“Forgive me for asking,” I said. “But you don’t seem like you’re the kind of person that would need to stay at a place like this.”
“Isn’t the whole point of this place not to judge the level of help that someone needs? That’s kind of what your whole mission statement that you talked about tonight was, right? Not everyone wears their mental health diagnosis on their sleeve.”
“You’re right,” I said, feeling awful about being so insensitive and ignorant. “You are more than welcome to stay here. Want me to give you the paperwork to fill out?”
“Sure,” she said.
I left the woman in the common room and went to go fetch the application packet. I hadn’t really expected anyone to take us up on our offer quite so soon, but this was the reason we had the party to begin with. I wanted everyone to know that we were here and ready to welcome guests, and to help provide a sanctuary too. When I returned to the room with the application, I flagged one of the staff members to come help her complete the process. I had hired a couple of people to be on site for extended hours, although they didn’t live in the building.
At some point, it might be necessary for me to hire live-in staff so that I didn’t need to be around all the time.
Once she had finished her paperwork, the staff worker walked with her to help her choose a room and handed me the application as they walked by. I opened the folder and looked at her neatly printed handwriting which said “Sarah” on the top of the page.
“Hey,” Michael said as he walked up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. I turned my face to the side to nuzzle his. “That went pretty well, didn’t it?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think so. We’ve already got our first resident.”
“I don’t think Naomi counts,” he laughed. “She was kind of a package deal.”
I waved the folder over my shoulder for him to see. “This woman just applied to stay here. Her name is Sarah.”
“Wow, that was fast.”
“Are we ready for this?” I asked him.
“What do you mean? This was all your idea,” he laughed.
“Yeah, I know. I
just hope that I can do a good job with it.”
Michael turned me around in his arms until I faced him. Then he took the folder out of my hand and set it down on a nearby table.
“This isn’t a medical facility,” he reminded me. “It’s just a nice, safe place for people to come when they’re down on their luck or feel alone. Just having a place like this where people can go with no questions asked, that already means you’re doing a good job with it. Besides, look at what you managed to do with the halfway house. That place is a huge success and has helped tons of teenage kids. Now you have this place where you can help adults that need it, just like your aunt. Which, by the way, she seems to be doing pretty well here.”
“Yeah,” I said with a smile. “I never thought that Naomi would be reformable, especially not after all that she has done. But she genuinely seems to want to be better and do better now.”
I looked over and saw Naomi helping Sarah get acquainted with where things were in the house.
“She still hates men though,” I joked.
“Yeah well, no worries there. I plan to stay completely clear of her until we leave,” Michael said. “And speaking of leaving, come on. I want to take you somewhere.”
I thought he was referring to somewhere inside the building, but when he handed me my coat, I realized that he meant we were going out.
“What about Naomi?” I asked.
He thumbed over his shoulder. “Adam and Rob are still here. I’ll tell them that they’re on guard dog duty for a few hours.”
“A few hours?” I asked. “Where are we going?”
He grinned. “It’s a surprise.”
On the ride to our surprise destination, I couldn’t help but stare at Michael as he drove. I kept my hand in his lap and my fingers rubbed against the soft fabric of his jeans. He looked happy, and I wasn’t sure if it was because of whatever surprise he had in store for me, or because things were going okay at the moment. There hadn’t been any intimacy since the storage room incident with Adam. Mostly because we had been so busy and so tired with getting The Sanctuary opened up. But also, because the four of us had been working tightly together, and I didn’t want to do anything to rock the boat.
Adam still hadn’t talked to me much about my choice and about the fact that I hadn’t told him and Rob. We mostly just worked together during the day and talked about other things instead, as if we were avoiding the emotional issue altogether. But at night, Adam would curl up around me just like the four of us always slept. And no matter how much division or coldness there was within awkward or uncomfortable moments of the day; all of that melted away while we slept touching each other at night. It was like we couldn’t even stay upset with each other if we tried.
Of course, at some point in the near future, Adam and I would still need to finish that conversation.
My decision to choose Michael and my decision not to tell the others, was something that still needed to be discussed. Rob hadn’t mentioned anything about it at all, and I wondered if Adam had even told him. I felt sure that he would have. It would have been hypocritical of him to be upset at me about “omissions” and then fail to tell Rob about what he knew. So I was pretty certain that he had told Rob already. Although I didn’t know why Rob hadn’t said anything to me about it yet.
“Okay, so no thinking about anything else right now,” Michael said as he pulled out a silk scarf to tie around my head so that he could cover my eyes. “And also, no peeking.”
“How could I peek? You have a scarf wrapped around my eyes,” I giggled.
“True,” he said as he gently helped me out of the car. “I just don’t want to ruin the moment.”
“What moment?” I asked as I held onto his arm while we slowly walked into a building.
I could tell we were inside someplace now because the noise of the city streets was dampened, and the chilly breeze was gone. It was silent wherever we were though. It didn’t sound like there was anyone else there, which made me instantly tingle, thinking that this was a romantic surprise. We climbed a lot of stairs, and I mean a lot of stairs. Then I heard a creaking door open and the sounds of the city again.
There was an even gustier and chillier breeze now as I wrapped my coat around me, and Michael grabbed me nearer to him.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Yes!” I said excitedly.
When he pulled the end of the scarf loose and it fell down from my eyes, I couldn’t believe where I was standing. I looked over at Michael, who was standing next to me with a wide smile and a look of absolute adoration in his eyes. Then I looked out across the rooftop of the aquarium. I saw the spot where Michael first grabbed me, in that heated moment where I didn’t know whether to be afraid for my life, or afraid for my soul. I saw the greenhouse where Michael and I had first made love to each other. And perhaps more than anything else, I saw the night play through my head again when I first knew that I loved him.
I didn’t know it then; at the time, I just thought that my emotions were running wild and that at most it was probably lust from the thrill of the moment. But looking back on that night; I knew it. I knew it right down into the core of my being. I knew that Michael would be the one.
Michael took my hand and we walked over to the edge of the roof.
“Right here is where we stood,” he said. “The exact moment when I was trying to figure out if we were going to be enemies or lovers.”
“Perhaps we were a bit of both,” I said. “Or perhaps we started as one thing and have ended up the other.”
“Enemies to lovers?” he asked. “Well then, in that case; I’d like to get to the lover’s part now.”
He pulled me closely into him and I let my body press against him as we kissed.
“This was a nice surprise,” I smiled when our mouths pulled apart.
“Oh, but this wasn’t the whole surprise,” he grinned.
Michael took my hand and led me to the greenhouse, then he pulled out a small ring of keys from his pocket.
“How did you get the keys to the aquarium?” I asked.
“I just called in a favor,” he answered elusively.
When he turned the doorknob and pushed open the greenhouse door, I didn’t even need to walk all of the way inside to see what he had done. There in the center of the greenhouse, was a pile of our fur blankets from Asheville, for us to lay on and wrap around ourselves. There were candles lit along the inside of the walls. The air was perfumed with the scent of flowers and the starry sky cast the perfect amount of dim light into the greenhouse.
“This is the rest of your surprise,” he said.
11
I walked inside and stood in awe as I looked around me, taking in the sights and smells of the night-blooming jasmine and the tiny, specked reflections on the glass that shone in through the moonlight and danced with the light of the candle flames to make little light prisms.
“This is the best surprise ever!” I said as I turned and threw my arms around his neck.
“Oh, I think that the best is still yet to come,” Michael said rather mysteriously.
We both sat down on the pile of furs, and I rubbed my face against one.
“I’ve missed these blankets,” I said as I thought about the last time that I was wrapped in these soft fur blankets as I listened to the rain start to fall outside.
“I’ve missed that night,” Michael said. “Up until the part where you left that is. I’ve missed it so much that I wanted to recreate it for you here tonight; with me. No other distractions, just you and me. Since I couldn’t bring the whole bonfire and mountaintop, I figured that a romantic night on the rooftop of the aquarium was the next best thing. Do you like the surprise?”
“Yes, I love it. How could I not love it?”
“I just felt like this might have been what we needed right now,” he said.
He was right, this was exactly what we needed right now. Sometimes I felt like I was so overwhelmed that I just needed to step away from ever
ything for a minute. I couldn’t think of any better place to step away to than this.
Since it was springtime, the air was not quite so bitter cold. But there was still a nice chill that nipped the air, which wasn’t quite ready to let go and give way to spring yet. We left the door of the greenhouse open, so that there was still some coolness inside the little glass room that would quickly be heating up. I sat snuggled against him, as Michael pulled the furs around us. These furs reminded me of a time when I was ready to walk away from everything that I loved just in order to save it. I would never do that again. The candles flickered around the edges of the greenhouse, which along with all the leaves and greenery, made intricate shadows against the backdrop of night. Michael reached behind a plant and pulled out a bottle of wine and two long-stemmed glasses.
“Wow, you really did think of everything,” I said.
“There wasn’t much to think of,” Michael said. “It’s just a glass room with some light, some wine, and some furs. But I guess when you think about it, it’s everything.”
I smiled and took a long and delicious sip of wine while I listened to the sounds around me. There was a paradox of silence in the enclosed space against the still-buzzing city below the rooftop. I let my mind wander and relished the feel of Michael’s arms around me as I leaned against his chest.
“Do you ever wonder what things would be like now if Julian was still alive?” he asked.
“That’s a strange question to ask during an intimate rooftop interlude,” I teased.
He chuckled too, but then his look became more serious.
“It actually has a lot to do with us I think,” he said.
“How so?”
“Well, Julian was your best friend. He knew you better than any of us did, and I always thought that if you had chosen someone besides me, that it would be him.”
I turned my head to the side to look in his eyes and saw that he was serious.
“Michael, it’s one thing to be jealous of Adam or Rob, but you can’t possibly be jealous of a dead man.”
Vicious: A Dark Bully Reverse Harem Romance (Beautiful Tyrants Book 3) Page 8
