She had rolled her eyes and left his trailer with the wok in hand, seriously considered beaning him over the head with it. She'd somehow refrained, and had instead just bided her time. Waited for an evening when Cole was going to be out all night, serving up drinks to bikers and other individuals that Claire had no real clue about. That part of Cole's life would always be a mystery to her, and she was good with that.
So she'd invited Jack over, and when he'd walked into her trailer and taken a look around, she'd tensed. Just a little bit. No, she'd never been to his home, but she was working on the assumption that it was a hell of a lot nicer than this.
Not that she was ashamed of where she lived. Hell, no. It was a million miles away from her two-floor, 8000-square-foot penthouse on Park Avenue, of course, but she liked this home better. Yeah, it was a shitty little trailer in a shitty little trailer park – but she'd worked really hard to make it nice. She'd bought cheap, brightly-colored sofa cushions and throws for the chairs; she'd found cute plants and flowers on sale, and had invested in a few heavy glass IKEA vases; she'd hung up curtains and thrown down throw-rugs... and the whole effect was cheerful, bright, and warm.
But the best part of living in this crappy place wasn't inside the trailer... it was outside. Because the second that Claire opened her door and set foot outside, all she saw were the Rockies looming over her. Huge and fierce, yet strangely welcoming and protective, she'd fallen in love with them in a photo many, many years before, and when she'd left New York, she hadn't hesitated for even one minute about where she was going. It was always going to be Denver.
Jack had arrived with a bottle of red wine, and she'd accepted it with a smile. He'd also dropped a quick, hard kiss on her lips, and she'd accepted that with an even bigger smile. Ever since he'd spun her around and kissed her up against her car three nights before – just kissed her like he'd meant it – she'd longed to taste his mouth again, craved that rough-yet-careful touch on her skin once more.
Jack Gordon was clearly a man who was used to taking control in his life... and the most feminine part of her wanted to see if he'd take control in the bedroom too. Because if he did, and if she let him? Claire thought that surrender would be the hottest, sexiest thing that she'd ever known.
"Smells great," he said now, sniffing the air appreciatively. "What is that?"
She set the wine on the tiny kitchen counter, went looking for a corkscrew. "Nothing fancy, I'm afraid. Just a shrimp stir-fry with noodles. Is that OK?"
"Is that OK?" he repeated, walking over and taking the corkscrew from her. "Yeah, it's OK, baby. It's great."
Claire felt her cheeks flush at being called 'baby', so she turned to face the stove again. She heard him pouring the wine, and then he set a glass next to her.
"Thanks," she told him. "You want to sit down? I'll need another two minutes."
"Sure thing. Anything you need me to do to help?"
"No, I got this. Go relax, Jack."
Jack nodded, wandered over to her sofa. He sat down with a huff of surprise as he sank about six inches into it. Claire laughed.
"Yeah, sorry about that," she said as she strained the noodles. "I should have warned you: that sofa eats people."
"No shit," he muttered, struggling to get free. "No spring support, huh?"
"None." She plated up the shrimp and vegetables, then carried everything over to her tiny table. It was already full-to-overflowing with two plates, two sets of cutlery, and a candle, so she set the food on a side table. "If you can haul your ass up, come on over. Dinner is served."
He muttered something under his breath, then got his feet under him. She watched him cross her living room in three long strides, then, to her shock, he held out her chair for her.
"Uh," she managed. "Thank you."
"Sure thing," he said, his voice low and husky. "My daddy raised me right. I know how to treat a lady."
Claire swallowed hard, wondering if that last sentence was a double entendre of some kind, decided that it quite probably was. Firmly forcing her mind from all the ways that Jack might treat a lady right, she served their dinners, then sipped her wine, before finally looking up at him.
Oh, God... he was looking at her, and he was looking at her in that way. That way that made her think that he was trying his damnedest to crawl on under her skin and know her. That way that always made her feel a bit shaky and very vulnerable.
She loved it when he looked at her like this. She was also afraid when he looked at her like this.
What does he see?
"So." That sexy-as-hell voice made her thighs clench. "How'd you end up in Denver, huh, baby?"
Claire bit her lip. Aw, hell... decision time, and right out of the gate. She'd managed to avoid this conversation over lunch and dinner, and had encouraged Jack to do most of the talking, and she'd kept her chatter firmly on her work. But here they were, on date number three, and she was trapped in her trailer, and he'd be here for a good two or three hours, at least, and his very first question was the impossible one.
So... what to do? Trot out her safe, fake story, the one that she had told Cole and Mirrie and Spider? Or maybe – just maybe – she could tell Jack a bit of the truth?
Some of the truth.
A kind of selective, scaled-down version of the truth.
Yeah, sure... what's the harm in that, really? Broad strokes. No major details. But no lies.
Well... no more lies than absolutely necessary.
"I came here after my marriage fell apart," Claire blurted out, deciding to just go for it. Well, kind of go for it. Sort of. Within reason. "My ex-husband got into some trouble with the law, and I took advantage of the situation to leave him at last."
Across the table, Griff almost choked on his noodles. What the actual hell was the woman doing?
Griff recovered, then sputtered, "Uh... what kind of trouble with the law?"
"He was a businessman, and he stole some money from his clients. A lot of money, as it turned out."
"Really?' Griff responded, taking a huge gulp of wine as he adjusted to this new reality. "What kind of businessman?"
"Investments," Claire said. "He lied to people, and then he basically made off with the cash."
The big question now; the question that was going to change everything with its answer. Griff took a deep breath, and he asked:
"And did you – did you know?"
"Oh, God, no." She shook her head, her eyes open and honest behind her glasses. "I was oblivious and stupid and unaware, but that's why he married me, isn't it?"
"What's why he married you?" Griff said, mystified.
"He married me because I was naive and easily-led," she said bitterly. "I'm so damn stupid when it comes to people, Jack, you have no idea. I always take them at face value, you see, and I believe everything that I'm told, and that makes me an easy mark."
Griff flinched, but she didn't notice, thank Christ
"I was raised in a small town," she told him. "My family was very wealthy, and as great as that was in some ways, I suppose, it wasn't great in others. My Mom had lost three children before me, so she considered my birth and existence a kind of miracle. Her biggest fear was to lose me too, so she refused to let me go to school. I had nannies, then tutors, then I was home-schooled. I had no close friends, I never went on a date, and I never went to college, of course. Instead I stayed at home and in town, and helped Mom with her various charity things. That's where I met my ex."
"At a charity event?"
"Yes. It was a golf thing, and he showed up in his gorgeous car, all smiles and flash, and he paid attention to me, in a way that nobody ever had. He brought me punch, and he asked me questions, and he listened when I talked. He was a perfect gentleman, and he asked my father's permission to see me again, and Dad said yes. So he came up the next weekend for a barbecue in our backyard, and he was so attentive to me and Mom, and he was respectful of my Dad, and he was so smart and successful. He just... he swept me off my feet, you know? An
d not just me. My parents, too. We were all enthralled by him."
Griff could see it, actually. Wilbur Worthington was a smooth-talker – there was no doubt about that – and if he'd spotted the sweet, shy, sheltered blonde girl, he'd have been able to talk her into anything. Her overprotective parents would have been a harder sell, of course, but if he'd paid the proper respect, and had dazzled with his charm and money, then they'd have come to see him as the perfect future son-in-law.
"So when he asked my father's permission for me to marry him, after a year of courting me, Dad said yes, and no hesitation. And I was thrilled, of course. I mean, I was twenty-one years old, and I'd never been anywhere or done anything, and I really thought that life with him would... I don't know. Make my world bigger, I suppose."
"And did it?"
"At first, yes." She bit her lip, a classic gesture of silencing oneself, and Griff wondered how much more she was going to tell him. "But then... then it got smaller."
"What do you mean, baby?"
Claire glanced at him, and he knew that the endearment both pleased and startled her, which was why he'd started doing it. Now, though, he did it because he liked it, too. Because it felt right to call her 'baby'.
"Well..." She sighed, drank a bit of wine. "He took me to Europe for our honeymoon, and even though we went to five different countries, I didn't see much. He – he worked all the time, and I was afraid to go anywhere on my own, and so we just stayed in the hotel rooms, mostly. I had begged to go to Paris, since it's the one city that I want to see more than any other on earth, and he'd promised that we'd go... but just before we were to fly to France, he cut our honeymoon short. He said that he had to get back to the office, and anyway, he needed me to start decorating our home, and seeing a personal shopper to help me buy the right clothes, and I had to get on a diet and exercise program. He – he said that I had to start performing my wifely duties." She blushed a deep red. "Beyond the bedroom, he meant. And I was so sheltered and inexperienced, and I had no clue who I was, you know? I had no real education, and I had no girlfriends to talk to, and Mom had stayed home her whole life, and I just – I just thought that my job was to look good and stay quiet and keep the home nice. I didn't know how to ask for things for myself. I didn't even know that I could."
Griff was silent, fighting down his rage. Yeah, Claire Worthington had been one hell of a glossy, glittering trophy wife – but it had never really occured to him that maybe she hadn't wanted to be one. That maybe she'd been taken advantage of, in some ways, and that she'd just been too naive to know it was happening.
"Anyway." She cleared her throat. "That was my life with him. It was drilled into my head that I had to stay slim, and stay in fashion, and sit on the best charities. He lectured me over and over again about 'being a credit' to him, and since he brought in the money and had the big, important job, I wasn't to complain. Not about anything, not ever." She was silent for a few seconds. "Not the other women that he was seeing, sometimes sleeping with in my own bed. Not him weighing me every morning, and then telling the chef if I was allowed to eat that day. Not the refusal to give me a baby. Not the weeks and weeks of traveling on business, with a revolving door of 'secretaries' who had nicer jewelry than I did after they returned from wherever they'd been. Nothing."
"Oh, Jesus," Griff said, horrified. "Oh, my God, Cl – Caitlin."
Right away, he slammed his stupid mouth shut. Jesus fuck, had he really been about to call her 'Claire'?
She hadn't noticed a thing, thank God, and she kept talking, her eyes fixed on the candle flame between them.
"I was with him for fourteen years, Jack. Fourteen years, and I went around without a clue about so many things because he kept me in the dark, and I was too damn dumb to even know that I was in the dark. But I did know that him having other women was wrong, and I did know that being called stupid and useless was wrong, and once I figured out that I wasn't a pathetic little toy, then I just wanted to get out."
"Why didn't you get out?"
She sighed. "Mom and Dad were in a horrible car crash three years after I got married. They weren't killed, but they were badly injured... they were in comas. I had power-of-attorney, obviously, but their wills stipulated that extraordinary measures had to be taken in such cases, so I ended up spending all their money on their care. When it ran out, I thought about selling the jewlry that I'd inherited from my grandmother and mother, but it wasn't anything like enough, so my ex said that he'd pay for it. Then he told me – he said that if I ever left him, he'd – he'd pull the plugs."
"Asshole," Griff growled. He'd known about her parents, ofcourse, but he'd had no idea about the circumstances. "What's happened to them now?"
"Oh," she said softly. "They both died. Dad first, almost two years ago, and then Mom a week later. Their bodies just gave out. And as horrible as it sounds, when it happened, I thought,'Well... now he has nothing to hold over me. Now I can go.'"
"And did you?"
"No. Because by that point, the investigation into his financial activities was in full swing, and the police were involved, and I just didn't know what to do. So I stayed put."
"But you eventually left him."
"Yes." She ate some shrimp, absently. "Yes. Things were going very badly for him, and he was weak and powerless for the first time in our entire relationship. And I – well. I kicked him when he was down. Right in the balls."
"Good girl," Griff said, perhaps more viciously than necessary. "I hope it fucking hurt him."
"Oh, I don't think he cared about me sticking around too much at that point. Especially because I was blackmailing him."
"What?" Griff was electrified by this piece of news, since he had no idea what she was talking about. "You what? How?"
"He and his lawyers wanted me to provide false testimony and evidence that would help his case. They wanted me to say that we'd been somewhere together that we hadn't."
"They asked you to lie?"
"Oh, yeah." Claire smiled, and he found himself smiling back, even though he had no clue why. "But I used my cell phone and recorded one of the conversations of them telling me lie, and made about ten copies. I sent one to every lawyer, and I sent one to my ex, and I told them that if I didn't get the world's fastest 'no-contest' divorce, I was sending that recording to every media outlet in the country. They couldn't get rid of me fast enough after that."
"So I guess you got a nice payday, huh?" Griff said, watching her closely. "Walked away with a decent-sized chunk of change bcause of the blackmail?"
"Oh, God." She laughed, really laughed, and he leaned back a bit in confusion. "No. So no."
"Why the hell not? Seems to me that you could have gotten anything you wanted."
"First, there wasn't any money to wrangle. Like, at all. All his assets were seized, all his bank accounts were frozen, and so where the hell would a payday come from? He had stuck everything in secret accounts somewhere, and he couldn't even get to those, because they were watching him too closely. Second, I didn't need his filthy money. I had my inheritance jewelry to sell, and it wasn't riches, but it was pretty OK. It was enough for a plane ticket here, and to start up my business. Third, I knew that if I took anything from him or his cronies ever again, they'd have a hold over me forever. Forever, Jack. And seeing as he'd told me what to eat and what shoes to wear for fourteen fucking years, I wasn't in a big rush to give him any control or power over me again. I walked away, and I walked away with nothing but my inheritance. And you know? I'd never been happier. That's the truth."
And that was the truth; Griff knew it was. Claire hadn't been in on the schemes, he believed that in his bones. She hadn't taken a payday, he also believed that. And most of all, she'd left that marriage with what was hers and hers alone... and she had no interest in looking back, or in bringing anything from her old life into this new one. She was here, living in this trailer because that's what she could afford right now, building up a small business with her own hard work and talent.
>
She wasn't a freeloader, and she wasn't a cunning bitch. She was a woman who had married a prick, and had finally left him, and she'd walked away with nothing.
Nothing but her pride.
It was enough. Fuck, it was everything.
He stared at her, loving her quiet strength, and that was when he lost control.
Fuck the assignment. Fuck playing it cool. Fuck the rules.
He shot to his feet, hauled her up and onto her own. His mouth descended on hers, too hard, too rough, but he couldn't stop it, and anyway, she didn't seem to mind. She moaned and melted in his arms, and that was when he picked her up, right off her feet.
Claire looked up at him, alarmed.
"Jack –"
No. No, she couldn't call him that name. Not now, not in this moment.
He carried her to the bedroom, tossed her onto the bed with no grace. She stared up at him, and he quickly leaned over her, took her mouth. She moaned again, longer and lower this time, and that was when he pulled back.
"Not one sound," he growled at her. "Not one word. Not one noise."
And for the love of Christ, don't call me 'Jack'.
"But..." she protested faintly.
"Not one word, kitten. I'm gonna take you, and you're gonna come without making a sound. Not one, or I stop."
Her mouth opened in shock, but she stayed silent. She shut her mouth, then bit her lip.
"Good girl," he said approvingly as he removed her glasses. "Now... take off your clothes."
She opened her mouth again, slammed it closed. Griff nodded.
"Ummm-hmmm. You're a fast learner, baby. I like that." He started to unbutton his dress shirt, and her beautiful eyes followed the movement down. "Now... get naked. Immediately."
She was hesitating, he still saw, and that was when he softened. "What's wrong, kitten? You don't want this? If you don't, it's OK. Say so." He gave her a self-depracating grin. "I was a bit neandertal, and I know it."
"That's not it," she said, not meeting his eyes.
"So what is it?"
Silence, except her not talking was now just about the last thing that Griff wanted.
Solid Gold (Unseen Enemy Book 8) Page 13
