by K. M. Scott
“You feel so good, Serena. I’ve missed this so much,” he whispered in my ear as he buried his hand in my hair.
I tilted my head back to look at him and wanted more than anything to believe he still cared for me like I cared for him. But what did it matter? My father would never allow us to be together.
“Nothing’s changed here, Ryder.”
He gently cradled my face in his hands and shook his head. “We’ve changed.”
“You know what I mean. It doesn’t matter how much I’ve changed or how you have. My father will never let us be together. You know that.”
Instead of admitting the truth, he kissed me softly and whispered against my lips, “I don’t care. I never did.”
When he said things like that, it felt like butterflies had been let loose in my stomach. I wanted to think it didn’t matter, but I knew how my father could be. Ryder knew that too. Why didn’t he want to admit that?
“He’s already hurt you for being with me. Who knows what he’ll do if he finds out we’re together again.”
But nothing I said seemed to make a difference. He kissed me again, making all those memories of how much I loved just being with him rush back.
“Serena, I don’t care. Whatever he does, it won’t hurt as much as being without you.”
I gently touched his cheek and felt the beginnings of a beard. “Janelle said you were in the hospital for two weeks last time.”
He shook his head and brought my hand to his lips to kiss my fingertips. “I survived. I’ll survive again too, but not if you’re not with me.”
“What if he sends me away again, Ryder? That’s what will happen if he finds us together.”
Tears welled in my eyes, and he pulled me close again. “He won’t send you away again. We can leave if that happens. We’ll figure it out. Just tell me you still care.”
“Of course I do. There’s been nobody since my father sent me away to Italy.”
Something about how he looked away when I said that made me wonder if he’d been with anyone else in the time we’d been apart. “What about you? Do you still care?”
“Of course I do, Serena.”
“Then why won’t you look at me when you say it?” I asked as I gently turned his face toward me.
The intensity was gone from his eyes, replaced by a look so guilty I knew the answer before he spoke.
“Serena, whatever I did, it didn’t matter because I never stopped wanting you.”
I stepped back from him as the whole world felt like it was falling away beneath my feet. “What do you mean?”
“I never stopped thinking about you. Every minute I laid in that hospital bed, all I could think about was how much I missed you. I didn’t care about my broken bones or how much everything on me hurt. All I cared about was seeing you again.”
“Then why do I see in your eyes that at some point you cared about something or someone else even more?”
He reached out to take my hand, but I stepped back even further. Why wouldn’t he answer my questions?
“I never cared about anyone or anything more than you, Serena. You can trust me,” he said, pleading with his eyes for me to believe him as he spoke those words.
I didn’t want to believe what I saw in him. “You met someone? Are you still with her now?”
My stomach twisted into knots as I waited for him to answer, even though his hesitation to say anything told me all I needed to know. He had moved on, no matter what he said about how he never stopped caring for me.
“It’s not like that. At least it’s not for me,” he finally admitted in a quiet voice.
“What’s not like that? What does that mean?”
A look of pure pain settled into his eyes, and he said, “Her name is Kitty. I helped her when her boyfriend got rough with her, and we spent some time together.”
“Kitty? Like kitty cat? What is she, a fucking stripper?” I asked, practically spitting the words out.
He didn’t have to answer. The sheepish look on his face said it all.
“Kitty, the stripper, is the woman you started dating after I was sent away?”
Ryder shook his head. “It’s not like that.”
My disgust grew with each passing second. “Kitty. Who’s named Kitty? Why don’t you just call her pussy so you know what she’s there for?”
He took a step toward me to hold my hand, but I pushed him away. His shoulders sagged, and he hung his head. “It isn’t what you think. She was too young to be in that business and got herself into trouble, so I tried to help her. I guess she got attached.”
I couldn’t believe my ears! He’d helped this stripper because she got in trouble? That night in my father’s office as he exiled me from the only home I’d ever known while Ryder stood by and watched him flashed through my mind, and my hands balled into tight fists at my sides.
“So I guess you are able to protect someone when they need it most? Nice to know since you left me swinging in the wind when I needed you!”
He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. What could he say? He had the capacity to help this person named Kitty, but for me, he just watched as my father punished me and never said a word in my defense.
Finally, as the hurt spiraled through me, tearing all my memories apart, he said, “Serena, this doesn’t change the fact that I never stopped caring about you.”
As the tears began to roll down my cheeks, I turned to leave, unable to stand there and listen to any more lame excuses. “No. It just changes everything I thought about all that time I was away. That’s all.”
He didn’t say anything else. He didn’t have to. There was nothing more to say.
Chapter Ten
Ryder
A knock at my door signaled it was show time, so I downed the last gulp of my whisky. Dressed in my usual black suit, white shirt, and black tie as Robert demanded all his security detail wore, I looked like a pallbearer instead of one of the guys who had the job of making sure nobody got too close to him.
My job today as he watched his older daughter marry someone he’d handpicked for her was to make him look important. He didn’t need security to guard him at his own house any more than I did, but by having men like me around him, he appeared to be far more impressive.
At least that’s what it seemed like. I knew he had his hands in much of the seedier parts of what went on in Baltimore, so maybe he was in danger of being attacked here. He certainly traveled in a rough crowd compared to the people who’d be mingling with him to celebrate Janelle’s marriage. Underground fighting, strip clubs, and other illegal businesses that involved everything from drugs to escorts brought with them ugliness most wouldn’t suspect someone who looked like him would have anything to do with.
One last check of my look in the bathroom mirror and I headed out to the garden where the ceremony was to be held. The three other men who were part of his security detail stood watching as Robert barked out orders to the caterers and florist.
One of the men, a guy named Jesse who was a few years older than me and a former cop in some small town upstate, pointed at the hundred or so chairs set up and said, “That many guests and all he has is us?”
The two other men who were older and had been with Robert for years simply shrugged as if they’d seen things like this before at the Erickson estate and none of it concerned them.
“Like anyone’s going to get over the walls or past the guard at the gate,” Gannett said, raising his bushy old guy eyebrows up into his forehead to show his disbelief that either could happen.
“I think we’re meant to be more ceremonial than anything else,” I said to Jesse as I took my position next to him. “You know, show for the crowd.”
Show horses.
He rolled his pale blue eyes and shook his head so his blond hair moved left and right around his face. “All this for a girl’s wedding. I think if I ever have a daughter I want her to elope. Look at Robert. He looks like he’s about to go out of his mind with
those goddamned flower people.”
Jesse wasn’t the brightest bulb in the box, so I wasn’t surprised he didn’t know those flower people were called florists. I looked over to where Robert stood lecturing some poor guy half his size with thick black birth control glasses about some problem with the garland around the altar and saw his face get redder by the second. Maybe Jesse had something with that whole eloping idea.
Turning on his heels, Robert waved his arms in the air as he made a beeline toward us. Instinctively, the four of us straightened our backs and stood tall as he approached. To Robert, everything was about appearances, and to have your security detail standing like some group of scumbags on a street corner wouldn’t do.
“Gannett! Pike! I want you two out here with me during the ceremony. Jesse and Ryder, you two will be at the front door as people come in. I don’t need you to pat them down or anything like that, but keep an eye for any problems. Understand? When the ceremony begins, come back out here.”
We all nodded and then Jesse and I headed toward the house to take our posts. Watching the front door like some goddamned bouncer wasn’t much, but I was thankful I didn’t have Gannett or Pike’s job standing out in the sun at one o’clock on an August afternoon tagging along with Robert while he stressed out over every little detail of his little girl’s big day. Let them have to deal with the garland problems and issues with the wrong champagne on the waiters’ trays.
Standing on either side of the front door in the entryway that still impressed me every time I walked through it, Jesse and I did exactly as we were commanded and watched each guest as they arrived. None looked dangerous or even suspicious in the least. All they seemed to be were wealthy people like Robert dressed to the nines for a wedding.
The first notes of the wedding march floated through the house, and Jesse motioned for us to head back out to the party. “I think that’s our cue. You coming?”
I wanted to stand out in the heat and watch someone I didn’t particularly like get married as much as I wanted to cut off my own arm. “I think I’ll stay here to catch any stragglers. I’ll be out in a few minutes.”
A worried look came over his face. “What do you want me to tell Robert if he asks where you are?”
As much as I liked Jesse, he really wasn’t very smart. The guy was definitely all muscle. “Tell him I stayed behind just in case anyone showed up late and needed to be checked out.”
“Oh, okay. Will do.”
A few guests did arrive late, so I did my job and then enjoyed the relative quiet of the house since it was just me and the usual staff inside. When the ceremony was over, I made my way to the back doors that led out to the garden and I saw her.
Standing next to her sister as the wedding party posed for pictures, Serena smiled on cue as I watched in amazement how beautiful she’d become in the last two years. Even dressed in an ugly dark pink bridesmaid’s gown, she stood out against everyone around her.
Janelle’s reception went on well after its planned ending, so by the time Robert told us we could quit for the day, it was nearly eight o’clock. I turned down an offer from Jesse to go drinking at a little bar some girl he wanted bartended at and made my way toward my apartment in the south wing.
Turning the corner out of the garden, I saw Serena sitting on a bench alone far away from the party. Her shoulders were hunched over and her head was lowered. As much as I knew she might not want anything to do with me, I couldn’t ignore her.
I walked over to where she sat and stopped, but she didn’t seem to notice I was even there. Clearing my throat, I asked, “Too much celebrating?”
She turned to face me with a look of surprise in her eyes. “Celebrating. Yeah. That’s it.”
The edge in her voice said she didn’t think much of the big party raging nearby.
“So Janelle’s married now,” I mumbled awkwardly, unsure if I should even continue the conversation. This Serena seemed different than the girl I’d know back then. Harder. Angrier.
She sighed and shook her head. “Yeah, to some guy she barely knows because it makes my father happy. Sounds like a sham to me.”
With the old Serena I would have joined in and commented on what really did sound like a sham marriage, but I didn’t know where I stood with this version of her. “Well, love comes in all forms, I guess.”
Rolling her eyes at me, she snapped, “Really, Ryder? Is it the suit that makes you Robert Erickson’s perfect employee or do you really believe that load of shit you just dumped on our conversation?”
“Whoa, okay. Maybe I should go. It sounds like you’ve had a few to drink and I’m not sure getting into an argument with my boss’s daughter is a good career move for me.”
This Serena and I mixed like oil and water, so I turned to leave, disappointed at how much she’d changed.
“Wait, don’t go. I’m sorry, Ryder. I didn’t mean to sound like such a bitch. That was the alcohol talking.”
I turned to see her waving me back toward her and smiling. Maybe things weren’t all that different.
Taking a seat on the bench next to her, I took a good look at her and saw that sadness in her eyes I’d seen before.
“I hope I’m more than just your boss’s daughter, Ryder,” she said, the sadness in her eyes morphing into hurt.
Hanging my head, I said, “I don’t know why I said it like that. You’re more than that. You know that.”
“I don’t know what I am anymore. At my uncle’s house, I got to go to school and be a student. I got to live on my own pretty much. Now that I’m back, I don’t know what I am here to you or anyone else.”
I didn’t say anything. I wanted to tell her that whatever I’d done with Kitty all this time meant nothing. That seeing her made me happier than I thought I’d ever be again.
“You look different, Ryder. I saw it the other night. You grew up in the time I’ve been gone. Now you’re one of my father’s suit guys. You’re moving up in the world.”
At the moment, it didn’t feel like it as I sat there while she judged me for the choice I’d made. “It’s a living.”
She smiled and loosened the knot of my tie. “I never liked any of my father’s henchmen. They’ve always been colorless thugs. You make me think maybe my father has changed his ways if he has you working for him like this.”
I wanted to tell her whatever changes Robert Erickson had made in the past two years weren’t for the better, but like always, I said nothing about my work for her father. A small part of me was ashamed, but another part wanted to shield her from the ugliness that came with what I did for him.
Her hand lingered near my neck, making memories of our time together come rushing back. Unsure what she felt for me after the other night, I changed the subject.
“So you’re not a fan of your new brother-in-law?”
She frowned and let her fingers fall away from my collar. “I only met him twice, so I really don’t have any opinion on him as a person. My problem is with my father arranging a marriage for Janelle because it benefits him.”
“She seemed okay with it today, unless it was all a show.”
Serena blew the air out of her lungs in a loud huff of frustration. “No, she seems perfectly happy, actually. I tried to convince her that she didn’t have to go through with it, but she likes the idea of my father picking some guy out for her simply because he works for whatever business plans he has. As long as he’s wealthy, it’s all good, I guess.”
“Some people aren’t looking for love, I guess. She must be getting something out of it, though, right?”
Twisting her face into an expression of disgust, she said, “Yeah, security. Like being treated like chattel to be traded as my father pleases is anything close to security. What if Charles does to her what my father did to my mother? Then where will she be?”
I remembered the two of us talking about her mother’s leaving, but she’d never accused her father of being responsible for that. Curious why she did now, I said, “I thou
ght your mother just left one night.”
“No. I thought that too because that’s what he always told me, but I overheard my aunt and uncle talking about it one night and she didn’t leave. My father sent her away. She became a hassle to him, so she had to go. That’s what my uncle said. Do you know my mother wasn’t here today to see her daughter get married? Even if it was a sham, she still should have been a part of it. Her own daughter’s wedding!”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
My attempt at making her feel better failed, and she continued to complain about her father and my boss. “Did you see that woman my father had hanging off him today? He fucks around like he’s a single guy who should be doing that kind of thing, but he’s not. He’s the husband of a woman he sent away. I don’t know which is worse, thinking she just left one night and never wanted to come back or knowing that he was the reason she was forced to abandon us.”
Her emotions bubbled to the surface, but she stopped herself from crying. “I’m sorry. It’s just really hard to come back here.”
I didn’t know what to say to that because even just seeing her again made everything for me better. “It’s getting late. I need to head toward my rooms. Do you want me to walk you up to the house?”
Serena shook her head. “I won’t let this happen to me like Janelle let it happen to her.”
“I can’t imagine that would ever happen to you,” I said as she stood from the bench.
She looked down at me with rage in her eyes. “I’d rather be dead than end up like my mother and sister. Disposable human beings who go away when my father decides he’s got no better use for them. Not me.”
I watched her storm off toward the house and thought even though so much about her had changed from the girl I’d spent all those hours with, I may have liked this Serena even more. Her time away had made her stronger.
Robert was sadly mistaken if he thought he was going to dictate her life like he did everyone else’s.
Chapter Eleven
