Free and Bound (A Club Volare New Orleans Novel)

by Chloe Cox

  “To make a note on a list!” she said, smiling into her window. “That’s totally different.”

  Every time she moved in her seat, she felt her still-swollen labia brush against each other—and she knew he could tell. That connection still pulled at her. She’d never felt so…

  ‘Loved’ isn’t the right word. Obviously.

  She’d never felt so…something.

  Something that made it really hard to imagine that Gavin could have hurt a sub, like Blue implied. But if that’s what had happened—Gavin had hurt a sub, in a scene—then Olivia was really flying blind. It would be impossible to try to convince Aaron Black or Daniel Delavigne or any of those muckety-mucks that Club Volare was a safe place without addressing the past—whatever it was.

  But she just could not see it. She could see the guilt that he carried, for sure. She could see the weight of it. She could see it hurt him.

  But the people at Club Volare LA, the women here—they didn’t let people get away with that kind of thing. They looked out for each other. And Charlene would have warned her, right? Because as much as the idea of Gavin Colson hurting a sub repelled her, as much as everything inside her screamed that Gavin Colson would sooner cut his own arm off before he used it to hurt a sub…

  If there was one thing having an ex-fiancé who came out as gay and then refused to answer any of her calls had taught her, it was that she couldn’t trust her insides for anything beyond digestion.

  “Ready to put your game face on?” she asked him.

  Olivia let herself look at him, and watched his heavy eyes travel up the length of her exposed legs, along the lines of her arms, the curve of her breasts. His hands turned the wheel in a lazy arc, and as they came to a stop in Charlene’s driveway, he looked up at her with a tender smile.

  So ‘loved’ still wasn’t the right word. Obviously. But it would be really nice to be something’d by Gavin Colson, and not just as part of an act.

  He said, “You don’t have to worry about that tonight.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Anybody there who’d care about it is already in on our little scam,” he said. “And the rest are just regular folks who don’t know anything about our scene, so no need to pretend to be anything we’re not. We have the night off.”

  And he flashed that smile again, like he’d just given her the best possible news.

  She tried to smile back, but this time it didn’t quite work.

  He’s right. This is about saving the club, and my career, and my sex life, nothing more. They were not a couple, and they were not part of each other’s lives outside the club. They were just doing a job.

  And I can’t do my job like this.

  “Hey, where you running off to?” he said as she damn near bolted out of the car.

  Olivia ducked down, her shawl sliding off her shoulders, but she couldn’t meet his eyes.

  “I have to talk to Charlene,” she said. “Right now.”

  Twenty-Seven

  Olivia plunged through the double doors, the sudden need to know something, anything, about Gavin that would make her feel better coming over her like a violent itch that she just had to scratch or she’d lose her mind. She’d blown past the foyer, past the living room where everyone else waited, and all the way through to the kitchen. And then she’d stopped short.

  Charlene’s kitchen was like a cathedral to cooking. Or it would have been, all shiny, efficient surfaces and odd-looking tools, if Charlene weren’t whirling around it like a spice-covered Tasmanian devil. And then Olivia couldn’t help but smile a little bit. Charlene was most herself when she was cooking for people she loved, and every little gesture was colored with joy.

  Well, normally that was the case. Olivia looked a little closer—there were lines at Charlene’s eyes, her lips a tight line. Something was wrong.

  She would tell me if I had to worry about Gavin, right?

  “Sorry I’m late,” Olivia said. “We got held up.”

  Charlene looked up in surprise. “Damn, how far behind am I?”

  “No idea.”

  Furiously, Charlene crushed another clove of garlic with the flat of her knife, threw it in a steaming pot, and dried her hands before reaching for the butter.

  “Did you know Gavin was gonna invite Luke?” she said.

  “From the club?”

  Charlene snorted. “He thinks he’s clever, that’s his problem.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Well, you don’t have to worry,” Charlene said, cryptically. She paused. “At least until my surprise shows up.”

  “Your what?”

  “Don’t change the subject. Luke Richards is here. Now what was I doing again?”

  Charlene ran a buttered hand across her brow, cursed, then looked around the kitchen with a marked sense of defeat.

  “Normally I’m on top of my game,” she said.

  “You still are,” Olivia said, encouragingly.

  “I could totally handle this, normally.”

  “You are handling it,” Olivia said. “Because you are a badass. Now how can I help?”

  “I just wasn’t prepared for any surprises other than my own,” Charlene muttered. Suddenly she looked up and laughed. “Oh honey, you’re sweet, but remember that time I gave you an onion to chop?”

  “I have sensitive eyes!”

  “Now if I could get Gavin in here, that would be a help,” Charlene went on, darting across the kitchen to open an oven. “That boy can make a sauce.”

  A memory floated up through the haze of Charlene’s cooking chaos—Gavin, at Charlene’s Cook For Your Life party, saying he didn’t cook. Then Blue talking about Gavin the chef.

  “Wait, since when can Gavin cook?” she asked.

  Charlene smiled and shook her head over a giant mixing bowl. “Since he needed credits and the only thing left was a cooking class,” she said. “He stuck around for the girl and managed to stumble all over a hidden talent in the process, the doofus.”

  The words hung in the air just long enough for Charlene to realize that she had said them. She paused, egg in hand, and cringed.

  “He stuck around for a girl?” Olivia said.

  Charlene sighed, and nodded. “You know I don’t…”

  “You don’t have to,” Olivia said, and she meant it. “I guess I’m just surprised at how unsurprising it is that Gavin wasn’t always so…unromantic. If that makes any sense.”

  Charlene cracked another egg over a mixing bowl and eyed her.

  “You think he’s a romantic?” she said.

  Red alert. Avoid.

  “But that’s why he doesn’t cook?” Olivia went on. “Because of…”

  It felt weird to avoid her name when Olivia was pretty sure she already knew who it was, but she still didn’t want to say it.

  “You’d have to ask him,” Charlene said, again. Then she looked up and shrugged. “But…I mean…yeah. Of course that’s why. Listen, you know I love you, but did you really come in here to ask if I needed help?”

  Olivia forced a smile.

  “I talked to Blue,” she said.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And she said some things, about why Gavin is the way he is.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I just need to know that…whatever happened, whatever it was, I mean I know something went wrong? Or someone got hurt, in a…” She looked up briefly, to find Charlene staring at her, and decided to look back at the floor. “Someone got hurt in a scene, I guess, and I just need to know if I should be…worried.”

  Olivia heard Charlene push the bowl away from her, and studied the floor some more.

  “What do you think?” Charlene said.

  “I think that with my track record, it’s going to be a long time before I trust what I think about men,” Olivia said.

  She hadn’t realized just how sad that made her until she said it out loud.

  “Well, maybe that’s your problem. But you�
��ll get there,” Charlene said. She wiped her hands on the towel tucked into her apron, and sighed. “Look, Daniel Delavigne is wrong. He’s very sad, and he’s angry at just about everyone, and he’s got a lot of money, but that doesn’t make him right. It just makes him loud. And he is one hundred percent wrong about Gavin Colson.”

  Delavigne. So she’d been right—Simone Delavigne was the past Gavin didn’t talk about. Only she wasn’t in the past. She was in his club, every day.

  “You did warn me not to fall for him,” Olivia said softly.

  “That’s not ‘cause he’s dangerous, honey,” Charlene said. “That’s because he’s stuck. And no, you absolutely should not fall for him.”

  Olivia held back a sigh and nodded. She really didn’t want that to be true, and so she didn’t want to talk about it anymore.

  Instead, she said, “Why didn’t you tell me that you used to be in the BDSM scene?”

  Charlene’s head snapped up.

  “It’s just a time in my life that I don’t like to think about too much,” her friend said, carefully measuring out a cup of sugar. “And now you get involved, and Gavin comes back, and I’m…seeing some of what I’ve missed. If I’d had a place like Volare back then…”

  She looked Olivia square in the face.

  “You sure you didn’t know he was going to tell Luke to come along?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  “At least you get to relax,” Charlene said.

  “Right,” Olivia said. “Wait, what?”

  Literally nothing about this felt relaxing.

  “Apparently Gavin told Luke all about your little plan, so you still get the night off from playing house.”

  Olivia nodded. That’s right—she was supposed to be relieved that she didn’t need to put on an act tonight. Only that act was starting to feel real, and now the idea of being just…normal? With Gavin felt like it would take some work.

  Could this possibly get more complicated?

  Oh wait. It definitely could.

  “Wait—what was that you said about a surprise earlier?” Olivia said as Charlene pushed her towards the door. “What surprise?”

  “You’ll see,” Charlene said, and gave an evil grin. “Now go out there and relax your heart out.”

  “Relax,” she says. Hilarious.

  First, there was Charlene’s ‘surprise’ hanging over Olivia like a sword of Damocles. But secondly, and more importantly…there was Gavin.

  It sure as hell felt like they were still playing house, even if there was no one there who needed to see it.

  There was Gavin’s hand on the small of her back as he pulled out her chair.

  There was Gavin removing the cucumber garnish from the fancy cocktail Charlene had made them, not even pausing in the story he was telling, just seeing that vegetable that tasted like soap to Olivia and getting rid of it for her. Not even thinking about it.

  There was the way he watched her when he thought she wasn’t looking.

  Olivia had been sitting at this dinner table, talking to these nice people who gave money to Charlene’s charity every year, for well over an hour and yet she couldn’t remember a single topic of conversation. Somehow it all happened at some distance, at a lower volume, all of it drowned out by the freaking cymbal crashes she heard in her head every time Gavin touched her.

  Because now she had no idea what any of it meant.

  And Charlene was no damn help at all—her friend’s attention revolved completely around Luke, especially when Charlene was refusing to look at him. It was like watching a very ornate dance, and she was definitely going to grill Charlene about it later, but it meant Olivia would have to figure out Gavin all on her own.

  Gavin, who made a point of telling her they could just be themselves, and then showed himself to be…

  “Tipsy,” the blonde woman at the end of the table said. “I am definitely a little bit tipsy, thanks to those cocktails, Charlene, and that means I can finally say what’s on my mind.”

  And she looked at Olivia.

  Olivia froze. The woman—Suzanne?—laughed, like she was just being so bad, and wasn’t it hilarious, and weren’t they all friends.

  “And all I want to know is—”

  She paused and raised her eyebrows at Olivia, like she wanted Olivia to finish the question for her, save her from being gauche. Participate in her own humiliation. Admit that she was either a fool or a fraud.

  Olivia looked at Gavin, and she realized she was both.

  He looked back.

  “Get your mind on something else, Suzanne,” Gavin said.

  The effect was immediate. It was the voice—it rumbled through everything in that room, bringing everything to a stop.

  Suzanne blinked, then frowned.

  “Well, it’s not like it would really be a personal question,” the woman muttered, but she looked down as she did so, retreating from the spotlight.

  “Dessert!” Charlene said into the silence, clapping her hands. She jumped up and ran towards the kitchen doors. “How could I have forgotten about dessert?”

  Olivia let herself feel enough to smile. Gavin was still there, next to her, but more than that—he was completely focused on her. He put one arm around her chair, and leaned forward on the other, blocking her from the view of nosy drunk people at the other end of the table, wrapping her in a protective bubble.

  She’d never felt safer.

  “What kind of pie is that?” Luke called out.

  Charlene opened her mouth, but Gavin closed it for her with a look.

  “Keep it a surprise,” he said, and looked at Olivia again. He smiled. “Pie Surprise.”

  “What about this pie looks surprising to you?” Charlene demanded. “Heck, you can see the apples, I promise you there is nothing—”

  Probably she kept talking. Probably a lot of things happened. Probably some people ate pie.

  But all Olivia could see was the look on Gavin’s face as he watched her, and all she could feel was the jolt of recognition—of home—when he touched her hand, and so she forgot herself—and she let herself feel back.

  She brushed his fingers with her own and held his gaze, staring back at him like this was the first time she really saw another person.

  Which is how she saw the exact moment Gavin Colson freaked out.

  Twenty-Eight

  Goddammit.

  Gavin had gone out to check on his car after dinner had broken up, but truthfully he’d needed a minute. He couldn’t remember ever needing a minute before Olivia, but now it happened all the damn time.

  They’d done good work on his Challenger. Like new, light from the house shining off the burnished hood. He almost wished he could still see the damage from where she’d banged it up. It would be a decent reminder of what could happen when he let things get out of control.

  Yeah, he’d messed up. Hadn’t meant to. But she’d come out of that shower, and then she’d fixed his tie…

  He’d let his guard down, and then he’d let it go too far.

  “Looks like new.”

  Gavin looked over his shoulder—Luke was coming down the porch steps, his boots clunking on the old wood.

  “Your truck’s safe,” Gavin said. “Don’t worry.”

  “I heard you had it detailed.” Luke grinned. “Something about…a ‘dry shampoo’ disaster?”

  “You wouldn’t believe what that woman can do to a car,” Gavin said.

  Luke nodded, bent his head to light a cigar. He didn’t smoke much anymore, just when he thought the occasion merited it.

  “The other day, you heard about Crennel from the boys and you made off pretty quick,” he said.

  “Seemed like something that needed attending to.”

  Luke nodded again, and exhaled a big cloud of smoke into the damp night air.

  “Does Daniel Delavigne know that Simone is going to be a member of Club Volare?” he asked.

  “She’s only a member if she stays sober,” Gavin said.

/>   “But does he know?”

  Gavin took his attention off the metallic planes of his car, and fixed his friend with a look.

  “Simone’s a grown adult,” he said. “Can’t see what it has to do with her father.”

  “C’mon, man,” Luke said. “You know it matters.”

  “Get to the point.”

  Luke nodded. “Saw your man Delavigne out at lunch today,” he said. Luke’s company did a lot of big name construction projects, and they hung out in the same circles. They all had their usual haunts. “He was eating with Crennel.”

  Gavin turned. “He say anything about Olivia?” he demanded.

  “What? No.”

  “You hear anything about Olivia?”

  “Not a word,” Luke said. “Calm down. I didn’t say anything about Olivia.”

  Gavin composed himself—Luke didn’t know about Crennel’s threat to Olivia, and if Gavin’s plan came through, no one would ever need to know. But every muscle and sinew in his body told him to go do something, go protect her. It would be easier if it were that simple.

  “It’s good to see that scowl back on your face,” Luke said, deadpan. “All that smiling had me worried. For a minute I thought that woman broke you.”

  It was meant to be a joke, but it was a little too close to the truth. Gavin’s mind was still turning over this information, Crennel and Delavigne, figuring out all the angles, but the one thing that stood out was how goddamn dangerous his past really was. He’d let himself forget that with Olivia, and now she was…involved. And that meant she could get hurt.

  “Speak of the devil,” Luke said. Gavin turned again to see Olivia coming down the steps in that white dress, eyes locked on him. “Maybe you can give him another kick to get going, Liv, he’s stalled out at grumpy all over again.”

  “Grumpy?” she said, as Luke waved and walked himself back into the house.

  They were alone. She was smiling, but it wasn’t open, not fully.

  She crossed her arms, holding herself.

  “Concerned,” Gavin said. He didn’t elaborate.

  But he didn’t need to—he could see the gears turning in Olivia’s head, saw the way she watched him. Gavin had spent years learning how to read people, consciously, both in business and in the bedroom, and it never ceased to surprise him how some women just seemed to have the skill from childhood. She bit her lip and released her arms, letting her hands fall to her sides in balled-up little fists.