Beyond Ruin (Book Four of the Bidden Series)

by Cierlak, Crystal

  "I don't want to dwell on it or cry about it," Natalie began again. "I have no interest in talking about my feelings or in any way re-living what was undoubtedly the most painful 48 hours of my life. Things with James just got to the point where it was all too much to handle, and now it's over."

  Quinn opened her mouth but shut it again before she could speak. Instead she reached for Natalie's hand on the table and squeezed it gently. She held it there for a long while, the two of them sitting in the midnight silence of their shared living space, staring off into the distance.

  Finally, after a considerable amount of time passed, Quinn said, "But why Audra?"

  Natalie's lips picked up in a smile, at once breaking the gloomy mood that had settled between them. "Have you met the woman? She's intelligent, business savvy, and not to mention gorgeous." And after seeing her half naked all Natalie could think was why not Audra? She shrugged and sipped from the white wine glass. "It wasn't planned or expected. It just kind of happened."

  "So you're..." Quinn's eyes roamed around the room as if the word she was looking for were sitting amongst the decoration somewhere. "Hooking up?" she finished.

  "It's casual. I'm attracted to her. Why not act on it?"

  "Does she know that it's just casual?"

  Natalie nodded. "The easiest part of being with Audra Robertson is that there is no expectation of a future." Being sure of that fact was a comfort she needed.

  "You know if you wanted to explore your sexuality you could have just asked me. I went to college; I had the requisite Sapphic fling." Natalie's eyes narrowed, her lips pursed. "What? It's true!"

  Without warning Natalie leaned across the table and planted her lips on Quinn's, suckling alternately on her top and bottom lip. When she pulled away Quinn looked a bit shell-shocked.

  "Did you feel anything?" Natalie asked.

  Quinn thought on it for a moment, then answered, "Not really."

  "When I kiss Audra it's like lighting a firecracker in my sternum. And her breasts," she added dreamily. "Oh my god her breasts-"

  "Okay!" Quinn cut her off. "Yes, great rack. Let's leave it at that." She poured them each another shot. "To kissing whomever you want to kiss. God bless America," Quinn toasted. Natalie clinked her glass to Quinn's.

  "Cheers."

  Natalie downed the liquid and slammed the glasses onto the table with Quinn, smiles breaking through their faces as the liquor coursed through Natalie's body.

  Quinn picked up the bottle, her shot glass, and stood from the table. "Okay, I've been dying to see what's in those boxes you had shipped home."

  Transcendently drunk and blissful, Natalie sank into the bathtub, a fizzy bath bomb exploding into a kaleidoscope of pastel color and sensual creamy rose at her feet. Though her mind was exhausted from travel and drink, her body was alight with bundling energy radiating from her center. Heated water lapped against her skin, re-sensitizing it to a state of heightened arousal. Her fingers roamed her body, skating over smooth wet skin beneath the sudsy surface. She breathed in slowly, her mind rewinding the hours to the plush queen size bed on the plane, Audra between her legs with her lips on Natalie's breasts.

  The bathroom door opened with a loud jolt and Natalie jumped when she saw it was only Joe, his hand ready to unzip the fly of his jeans.

  "Jesus!" he screeched when he noticed Natalie in the tub. "Why are you in my bath?"

  "It's bigger than mine," Natalie shrugged.

  "Fine," he growled. "But I have to piss and since this is my bathroom you forfeit the right to complain about it."

  "Deal." She closed her eyes again and zoned out at the sound of his pants zipper sliding down and the subsequent relief that followed.

  "You have a good flight?"

  "Could have been better," she sighed. Much better. "I flew out with Audra and Frankie. Why didn't you tell me you'd reached a custody arrangement?"

  "I figured it could wait until you got back," Joe responded over the sound of the toilet flushing. "Welcome back, by the way."

  "I have some good news for you," she teased as Joe turned away from washing his hands at the sink.

  "Oh?" He grabbed for a towel to dry his hands. She didn't mind that his eyes took in the full sight of her in the tub. "What's that?"

  "A new client. A big new client."

  "Who?"

  "The one Fitson property not currently handled by Brighton New Media."

  Joe crouched down at the side of the tub, his eyes glinting with humorous surprise. "You're joking. The Golden Palm?"

  "You've heard of it?" Natalie asked, taken aback at hearing the name spoken by someone who wasn't Audra or Quinn.

  "Are you kidding? It's legendary. Remember when I told you about walking in on Fitzgerald and Celine making out? Back when we were college kids?"

  She rolled her eyes. How could she forget the story of how James and Celine met? "Yeah."

  "That party was the unofficial first auction. But I hear the club is super exclusive today. You can't even get in unless you're a millionaire several times over. And the women..." He inhaled deeply, his eyes touring the length of the bathtub from end to end before meeting her eyes again as he exhaled. "I hear they are equally legendary."

  She noticed then the scent of alcohol mixed with cologne emanating from his body, and the patch of tan skin that peeked out from his shirt, the top two buttons of which were left undone.

  "How do you know about The Golden Palm, Red?"

  She bit her bottom lip to keep from smiling. "Like you said. It's legendary."

  "And you got us the account?"

  "Actually, Audra gave it to us."

  A brief but deep chuckle escaped his throat. "Goddamn. I feel like a kid who was just invited to take a tour of the North Pole at Christmas."

  Natalie could no longer hold back her smile, and emboldened by her state of relative inebriation, said, "Little did you know you've been living with two elves this whole time."

  Joe's laughter receded, but his eyes - searing pools of whiskey-colored intensity - remained on her. "No way."

  Her head cocked slightly to the right. "You don't believe me?"

  "I believe you about Quinn. But I can't for a second picture you putting yourself up for auction to the highest bidder, Natalie Harlow. You're too..." His tongue ran across his bottom lip, eyes never once leaving her as he settled on the right superlative. "Sweet."

  A few months ago that comment might have incited her frustrated wrath, but instead a kernel of pride swelled into a pleasurable arrogance inside her. "It just so happens I hold the record of receiving the highest bid. Ever."

  Joe set his elbows on the edge of the tub, his chin atop his left hand. "You're just full of surprises, aren't you, Red?" His breathing was hypnotizing to watch. Controlled. Purposeful.

  Had she never before appreciated the rugged charm that radiated off him like waves of heat on a scorching summer day? There had been flirtation, innocent at first when they initially met and even after he found out she was seeing James - whom Joe did not like - but it was always within the realm of friendly and acceptable. Like Quinn, she hadn't told Joe any details about her breakup with James, and she doubted he even noticed the breakup to begin with.

  Still... she never failed to appreciate that Joe was handsome, especially after Quinn's apt description that he was like a tree any woman would love to climb. Deep tan skin, dark hair and those eyes; he was the visual definition of the kind of sexy broodiness every woman secretly wanted in a lover at least once in her lifetime.

  After several quiet and intense moments passed he groaned through his teeth. "I think I need to take a cold shower."

  She noticed a smudge of ink on his arm and reached up to rub at it with her wet fingertips. After it dissipated her fingers remained, tracing along the path of a thick vein that traveled from wrist to elbow.

  "Natalie..." he began, his tone a warning despite the rasp of laughter that followed. "I'm drunk."

  "So am I."

  "W
hat about Fitzgerald?"

  Her eyes widened playfully, her shoulders giving a noncommittal shrug. "What about him indeed?" She waited, secretly challenging Joe to instigate a movement towards her. In her periphery she could see his chest rising and falling in quiet but rapid succession. His hair was a mess of dark waves that had once been slicked back into his usual style. "Unless you don't want-"

  His lips were on hers before she could finish, soft but fierce in their exploration of her already swollen lips. She accepted him readily, tasting of his mouth as his tongue swept against hers. His arms dove into the water and found her sides immediately, fingers grasping to her saturated skin. She pulled at the opening of his shirt, smiling with satisfaction as each button popped off one by one until his chest was exposed.

  Joe pushed back from the edge of the tub and stood, taking his shirt off with both hands in one swift motion. His naked chest was a slick washboard of abs on top of abs. She watched, body tingling with impatience as he stripped from the rest of his clothing before climbing in next to her, displaced water lapping over the edge of the tub and onto the floor. A muscular arm wrapped around her torso, pulling her in close until their lips were entwined again. His arousal pressed into her stomach, firm and ready.

  "Turn around." His voice was gruff, heavy with need. She turned, and followed further as he sat in the warm water, her legs folding at his thighs as she straddled him. Thick hands slipped across her damp body, moving from breast to stomach and in between her thighs as his lips kissed mindlessly at her neck and shoulders.

  Using the leverage provided by her legs Natalie lifted her hips and arched her back, ready to receive him. Joe slid one hand down her hips from her stomach until his fingers were within the delicate softness between her thighs while the other hand gripped at the base of his shaft, guiding it up as she lowered herself down.

  His fingers caressed her clit as he took her inch by inch, filling her until she was flush against his thighs. Her mouth opened to quietly expel the moan that rose up from her throat. She arched her back and encircled her arms around his neck, her breasts spilling into his waiting and open hands. A whisper of a growl blew at her neck as he kneaded the pillowy mounds. Her body fell with graceful ease back onto his chest as he reclined against the head of the bathtub.

  "You like that?" he breathed into her ear as he rocked his pelvis, his fullness moving against her insides.

  "Don't stop." Natalie arched and lifted in tandem with his movements, losing herself in sensation as his fingers roamed her body, squeezing and rubbing and fingering without discrimination.

  The relief of having fullness inside her was nearly too much, and with each thrust she cried in delirious joy, her muscles already contracting in micro spasms of electric ecstasy. Broken waves of warm water swept in and over her body like the tide as he moved beneath her, thrusting and pumping as though on the arduous journey to make her body implode from sensation.

  Her hips moved frantically, grinding onto him as she climbed towards impending climax. When it happened it was instant. Time momentarily slowed to a standstill, then exploded in ripples of tormenting pleasure that wracked her body's muscles as though they were charged with electric current. A few more thrusts and Joe was following, his erection throbbing hypnotically inside her tender walls. He panted at her ear as he stilled, her own body falling limp atop him as her orgasm flushed her body with molten warmth.

  Joe wrapped his arms around her torso and held her as their breathing quieted to a silence softer than the sound of the bath water calming from undulating waves to tepid stillness. The sudsy bubbles had dissipated, leaving them in clear water.

  "Christ," he swore, laughter following the epithet. "I think I have a new appreciation for bathtubs."

  Natalie gripped the sides of the tub and pulled herself up to a squatting position and turned to face him. She was weak with exhaustion down to her bones, but didn't mind the feeling. The release had quieted something inside of her that had been festering all evening, and she was grateful for the reprieve. Her eyes glanced down at his midsection where he was still partially erect; he was big even then, and she wouldn't be surprised to find herself sore in the morning.

  "This doesn't have to change anything between us," she said, her eyes climbing up his heaving chest to his eyes.

  "Agreed."

  "And we should just keep this between us. Especially if it happens again."

  "Do you want it to happen again?"

  Natalie stood and climbed gracefully from the tub, steadying her balance as droplets of water fell from her body to the marbled ground.

  "Red?" he asked as she wrapped a towel around her body. She turned and regarded him coolly, lips pursed and eyes considerate. She leaned over the edge of the tub and met his lips with a sweet kiss. When he responded she deepened the kiss, sweeping her tongue against his in one long lap before pulling away.

  "Good night, Joe.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  "Morning, Buddy." James kissed the top of Frankie's head before sitting down at the dining table for breakfast.

  "Morning, Daddy. Caroline made banana pancakes."

  "I can see that. It smells good in here. Where is Caroline?" He glanced around and into the kitchen before stabbing a few pancakes with a fork and piling them onto a plate.

  "She went to get coffee."

  "Ah. So your aunt Audra sent me a message this morning telling me that I am to bring you to work with me today?" He stuffed a forkful of pancake in his mouth and looked quizzically at his daughter, who looked characteristically preoccupied with her iPad.

  Frankie nodded. "To help her run the company."

  "And here I thought that was my job."

  "She said you might not fire anyone if I'm there."

  "Did she?" he asked between clenched teeth. "Tell me," he started, leaning in so he was more on Frankie's level. She turned to look up at him, brown eyes big and receptive. "Do you think it's right to continue to employ someone who isn't doing their job effectively?"

  Frankie's nose and eyes scrunched together as she considered the question. It softened his heart to see her giving serious consideration to the question. He often found her older-than-her-years disposition to be somewhat humorous, but more than anything he was proud of her for it. Most children her age were picking their noses and eating dirt. Frankie was like an adult trapped inside a child's body.

  "No," she decided after her moment of thought. "Not if there is someone who could do the job better."

  "My thoughts exactly!"

  "Is there someone better?"

  James chewed on another bite of breakfast. An image of Natalie came to mind. He used to look forward to her scheduled visits to Fitson, especially because it meant they didn't have to work so hard at hiding the fact that they were in a relationship. Once Ivy took over the account that was the end of their visits. And shortly after that the end of their relationship entirely.

  "There always is," he answered. "So what else has Audra offered or promised to you? Your own office?"

  "No!" Frankie's cheeks squished her face as she giggled.

  "A car?"

  "You're so silly, Daddy."

  He wrapped a free arm around her small waist and pulled her in close to place another kiss atop her head. "Yeah, I know. If it gets too boring we can ask Caroline to take you to a movie or something."

  As if on cue Caroline strode through the penthouse doors, a magazine tucked under one arm and coffee cup in hand. "You two talking about me behind my back?"

  "I was just telling Frankie that if we asked you very nicely you might come pick her up at work today and take her somewhere more interesting."

  "Shouldn't you at least wait until she's ten before using her as child labor?" she asked through a smirk as she sat opposite him at the table.

  "Tell that to your niece," he quipped.

  "I think MOCA had a new exhibit open this week?" Caroline offered.

  "Maybe tomorrow," Frankie politely declined. "Natalie said
Audra and I could come by to have gelato at the new office."

  James' fork fell from his hand and landed with a loud clatter on his plate. Both Caroline and Frankie whipped their heads in his direction at the loud and abrupt sound. James picked up the utensil and tried to pass the whole thing off as a non-event. Inside, however, his heart was racing.

  "When did you talk to Natalie?" he asked, his tone measured so as to not give anything away.

  "Last night on the plane," Frankie replied nonchalantly.

  James glanced up at Caroline, who was suddenly immersed deep within the pages of her magazine. She hadn't mentioned seeing Natalie when she picked up Frankie.

  He had no idea that Natalie was even in New York, let alone that she was in contact with Audra of all people. To the best of his knowledge they weren't even friends, so how the hell were they flying together on the same private plane with his daughter? Audra made no mention of Natalie before she left for New York the previous morning.

  It had been months since he last saw or even spoke to Natalie. Had Audra been in contact with her the whole time? He could barely imagine the two of them as friends. Natalie was too sweet for the sharp as nails, takes-no-prisoners Audra. He needed answers.

  "Go get ready," he said as he rustled his fingers through Frankie's already disheveled bed hair. "We've got a busy day ahead of us."

  "So where are we with The Gentleman's Show?" Natalie looked up across the dining table to Joe, a pen in her hand poised and ready to jot down notes on the pad of paper sitting next to her laptop. They each anchored either end of the table with Quinn, Shane - the assistant she stole from her days at Brighton New Media - and an intern named Lorelai rounding out three of the other chairs. They always worked family style at the table, volleying questions and ideas across the space. There were no cubicles or desks, nothing that reeked of a corporate atmosphere. They were a small team that managed big business from the luxurious comforts of the penthouse condominium that Natalie, Joe and Quinn all called home. It was a risk to blend home life with the professional, but one that so far was paying off, even if Natalie had been gone the last few weeks.