“You did.”
“He can afford it.”
Cal didn’t argue. He knew the next five minutes were vital, before his father was wheeled into surgery. He’d already been told by the serious-faced Dr. Wang that it wouldn’t be an easy surgery. Not with his father’s previous heart damage from the last attack and the way he’d treated his body in the past few years. Christian liked his whiskey, his cigars, and his privacy. He thought eating healthy and walking on treadmills were for weaklings. When he was actually doing the construction part of the business, he’d been in better shape, but the last decade his father had faded to the office work and wheeling and dealing behind the scenes.
“I’m calling Tristan and Dalton. They need to know.”
In seconds, his father raged at him in pure fury. “You will not. Touch that fucking phone and I’ll wipe you out of my will.”
Cal gave him a hard stare, refusing to flinch. “Go ahead. Been looking to work at Starbucks anyway.”
“Don’t mock me. I don’t want to deal with their guilt or bullshit. I’ll be fine, and we both know it.”
“Dad, they have a right to know.”
“They walked out on me. They have a right to know nothing.” A thin stream of drool trickled from his mouth. Cal studied the slow trek, embarrassed his father couldn’t control it. Losing bodily functions would be worse than death for his father. He needed to come out of this surgery in one whole piece, or he didn’t know what would happen.
Ah, shit, he needed to call his brothers. His father made a mule look yogic. They might have had a falling-out, and not spoken for too long, but they were still family. The hell with it. He’d contact them as soon as his father went into surgery—it was the right thing to do.
Christian half rose from the pillow. “Don’t even think about going behind my back, boy. I have ways of making your life hell beyond the grave, and if I wake up and they’re here, I’ll make sure you regret it.”
Again, that brief flare of pain he had no right to feel. How long had he wished his father would show him a sliver of softness? Any type of warmer emotion? Instead, he’d traded those feelings for becoming a drill sergeant with his boys, the total opposite of the way Mom had been. Not that he wanted to think of her anymore. It did no good except scrape against raw wounds. Caleb wasn’t a martyr, so he stuffed that shit back down for another lifetime.
“Whatever, old man. Save the fight for the surgery.”
They were interrupted when the Dr. Wang came in with an easy smile. “Okay, gentlemen, this is it. We gotta wheel him into surgery. Say your good-byes.”
Caleb froze and stared into his father’s familiar face. Took in the sharp, roughened features, leathery skin, bushy silver brows. Those brown eyes still held a fierce spark of life. In that moment, Caleb decided to take a chance. If something happened in surgery, he didn’t want to regret it for the rest of his life.
He leaned down to kiss his father on the cheek.
Christian slapped him back with a growl. “Cut it out. Grow some balls. I’ll see you later.”
The tiny touch of emotion flickered out and left a cold, empty vastness inside his belly. So stupid. He felt so stupid. “Sure. Good luck, Dad.”
“Don’t need no damn luck. Make sure you do what I say. I don’t want to see your brothers.”
They were the last words Caleb heard as his father was wheeled into a surgery that took over five hours to perform.
The next morning Christian Pierce was dead.
And then the nightmare really began.
Dance of Desire
By Christopher Rice
1001 Dark Nights
Acknowledgments
Once again, a huge thanks to both Liz Berry and M.J Rose for inviting me to be part of this special project. (And Steve Berry for being the instigator.) Another huge thanks to Jillian Stein for making romanceland a better place with her personality, humor and social media saavy.
Kimberly Guidroz and "Shy" Pam Jamison did a wonderful job of editing this one, as always. But Kim, in particular, deserves more thanks than one page can accommodate, for more reasons than I can list here. As always, Asha Hossain does a wonderful job with the Dark Nights covers. Two more big rounds of thanks to cover model Jamison Murphy and photographer Cathryn Farnsworth.
For her friendship and general support of my romantic endeavors, I will always be grateful for the fact that Lexi Blake lives and breathes and is so generous with her knowledge and talent. And in the case of this particular novella, I'm eternally indebted to Liliana Hart, who not only invited me to write a story set in the world of her MacKenzie Family, she allowed me to crossover some of its characters into DANCE OF DESIRE.
And I'd be remiss if I didn't also give shout outs to my good friends and general support network, Eric Shaw Quinn, Becket Ghiotto, Christina Barnett, Karen O'Brien and my mother. And of course, all my Texas relatives who inspired the finer parts of this story.
Prologue
Then
Amber resists, but finally opens her eyes.
Caleb really is kneeling next to her bed, whispering her name.
This isn’t just another one of the sexy, grown-up dreams she’s been having about the boy since summer started. Dreams in which he traces the curves of her body with his fingertips and gazes into her eyes with that serious expression that always makes him look so manly and handsome.
He’s really here, his breath soft against her cheek as he whispers her name.
The smell of his cologne is as strong as all the other woodsy smells inside her father’s lake house. A few hours ago, they’d both gone to bed at the same time. He in one room, she in another. So did he spritz himself before appearing at her bedside? The idea of him doing a little grooming before calling on her in the middle of the night makes her face feel tingly and hot.
The brand is probably Ralph Lauren Polo, but never would she ask because then he’ll know just how much she likes it. Every whiff makes her envision the parts of his body that have become impossible to ignore, no matter how many times she tries to avert her eyes from his new biceps and his suddenly thick and powerful legs. That cologne is the aroma of his undeniable manhood. And the smell of it at her bedside makes her head spin.
They’re only fifteen, but already the son of her father’s best friend is over six feet tall, prompting her dad to cry more than once this trip, “Boy, you don’t quit growin’, you’re going to be brushing the clouds by the time you’re a man.” That’s the Caleb she’s started to dream about, a powerful giant of a man, his back ridged with muscle, his solid arms powerful enough to lift her off her feet and make her feel like she's flying.
She whispers his name. But that’s all she says. She doesn’t want to scare him away.
Late night television drones in the living room downstairs. Her dad must have nodded off in front of the thing again.
Was that what Caleb was waiting for? For her father to fall asleep?
“It’s happening,” he says, taking her hand in his. “Come see!”
He tugs on her hand as she stumbles out of bed, stops long enough for her to slide her flip-flops on without releasing his grip. He waits patiently, making her feel even warmer inside.
Together they pad silently down the carpeted stairs, through the living room lit only by television flicker.
She was right; her father’s out cold in his favorite recliner.
Caleb opens the sliding deck door, then once they’re outside, kissed by warm air and surrounded by cricket song, he slides it shut behind them with barely a squeak. The whole time, he doesn’t let go of her hand. Amber’s not sure what’s making her heart race—his persistent grip, or the sight of him so cheerful and excited in spite of all the trouble that’s descended over his family that summer.
She doesn’t know the whole story, but she’s overheard some of her father’s phone calls these past few days. He’s used words like detox and rehab and men who can’t come back from over there. She knows over there means Iraq
, and she’s pretty sure the man in question is Mr. Tim, Caleb’s father, her dad’s closest friend from the Marines. Things must’ve gotten bad lately. Her father plans these lake house trips weeks in advance, especially if Caleb and his dad are coming.
This trip was last minute. This time they only brought Caleb.
Whatever it is, Caleb’s not talking about it.
He’s not much of a talker in general and when he does open his mouth, it’s usually to give soft-spoken lectures about stuff he’s seen on science shows, like how volcanoes form and birds migrate. Sometimes the topic doesn’t interest her that much. What interests her is how Caleb gazes into her eyes while he explains another nerdy factoid. It’s like he needs for her to listen, needs for her to know what he likes. Needs for her to look into his eyes too. Just the other day, he placed one hand between her shoulder blades because he didn’t want her to miss the sight of a duck skimming the lake’s surface as it came in for a landing. She didn’t want him to stop touching her so she just kept nodding and watching, as if landing ducks were the most interesting things ever.
They keep walking through the dark.
He’s taking her to the lake.
Last spring her father replaced the steps leading down to the boathouse, and when the air is thick with humidity, like tonight, the waft of cedar comes off them in overpowering waves. The closer they get to the shore, the faster Caleb goes and the harder she has to work to keep him from pulling her off her feet.
Whatever he wants her to see, it’ll be gone in a few minutes if they don’t hurry.
When they reach the tip of the boathouse, he releases her hand. He’s behind her suddenly, gripping her shoulder in one hand, pointing to the night sky with the other. A full moon, bursting with light, sends rivulets of ivory across the lake’s black surface. This is exactly the scene he described to her earlier when they were pretending to sunbathe on the dock while sneaking looks at each other’s half-naked bodies.
“What time was it last night when you saw the moon?” she’d asked him.
“Past midnight.”
“But you only went to bed at eleven.”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
They both knew what thoughts were keeping him awake, thoughts of his father’s drinking and of how crazy his mother was going trying to rein it all in.
“Wake me up next time,” she’d told him. “I’ll keep you company.”
Such simple words, but she’d felt like she was jumping off the edge of a cliff when she’d said them. Instead of answering, Caleb gave her a long look as he fiddled with the leg of his shorts. She’d silently cursed herself, called herself an idiot and worse.
Caleb was just a friend. Honestly, he wasn’t even that, was he? Circumstances had thrown them together, that was all. He was the son of her father’s best friend, so they were basically like distant cousins, only with no shared blood in their veins. Crazy of her to think there might be more there.
If her friends could see her now, they’d probably laugh at her; the same friends who’d swooned that day her father had picked her up from school with Caleb in the passenger seat of his truck, and Caleb, wearing a Stetson that was about a half-size too big for his head, had given them a cocky grin, looked right into her eyes and said, Afternoon, pretty lady. Not afternoon pretty ladies, even though she’d had about four other girls standing on the curb next to her when he’d said it.
Clearly she’d made way too much of that moment. Sometimes afternoon just meant, afternoon and pretty lady was what a guy called you when he was trying to look cool.
Or so she’d thought earlier that day. Before he took her up on her offer and woke her up in the middle of the night so they could look at the moon together.
Which they do.
Because it’s beautiful.
When he lowers his right hand, the same hand with which he was just pointing to the night sky, her breath catches. Every muscle in her body tenses in anticipation.
Where will it land?
Her shoulder, it seems.
She forces herself to breathe.
Gently he turns her around. The tips of their noses are inches apart, breaths mingling in the moonlit darkness, his as rapid and shallow as her own. The knowledge that he’s as nervous as she is comforts her.
“Need to kiss you,” he says.
“Need to or want to?” she whispers.
“No difference when I’m lookin’ in your eyes,” he says.
When her mouth opens to say his name, he pulls her to him.
At first it’s awkward and tentative. She’s only ever kissed one boy, and now she has a terrible moment of wondering if this is really what everyone else has been talking about, this fumbling of lips and tongue tips and trying not to breathe right at the wrong time.
Then Caleb takes her chin in one hand, cups the side of her face in the other, centering them both.
His tongue slips between her lips. She relaxes, invites him in. Heat spreads from her scalp to the tips of her toes. Heat and a sense of having been suddenly connected to a man for the first time. Not just any man. Caleb. Strong, handsome, sure-to-be-a-giant-someday Caleb.
A phone rings in the distance.
They both ignore it
More rings. They stop.
Her father’s high, barking cry pierces the night.
She wants to yank back from Caleb’s kiss, but her mind fights with her desire. If Caleb is experiencing a similar struggle, she can’t sense it. His kisses intensify, his arms around her now, gathering her T-shirt into his fists.
The house’s sliding door squeals in its track. Her father’s boots pound the cedar steps. Have they been caught?
“Caleb?” her father shouts. “Caleb? You out there, boy?”
She hears not anger but fear and sadness in her father’s voice. He can’t see them through the shadows.
“Yes, Mister Abel! I’m here.”
“Come on up, son,” her father says. “Something’s happened…”
His face is hidden in the shadows, but his voice cracks with emotion.
“Sir?”
“It’s your parents, Caleb. Something’s happened to your parents.”
Chapter 1
Now
Even though she’s spent the past few days crying at work, Amber Watson Claire has managed to avoid shedding a single tear in front of her boss. So far her breakdowns have all started the same way. She loses herself in some menial task for about fifteen minutes, then she suddenly, violently remembers it’s been less than a week since she opened the door to the storeroom at Watson’s, the bar her father built, and found her husband plowing one of his bartenders with the abandon of a porn star.
The tangle of their sweaty, clawing limbs amidst cases of beer and piles of flattened cardboard boxes is like a frame of film she can’t excise from the reel no mater how many times she pulls it from the projector and goes after it with a pair of scissors.
She sees them screwing when she’s sorting her boss’s mail into three neat piles—bills, junk, and personal.
She sees them screwing when she’s printing out the seating chart for the Women of Industry breakfast at the Prestonwood Country Club her boss is scheduled to host later that month.
Everywhere Amber looks she sees the crazed rutting of her husband and that vile home wrecker in those last few seconds before the woman saw her standing in the doorway and let out a small scream.
She’s not sure why, but she’s convinced that after one week from that horrible, life-changing moment, things will get better. Or at least easier, if not altogether easy.
One week! That’s all she needs.
One week between the present and those horrible twenty minutes it took her husband to empty his side of the closet into some suitcases, shouting excuses for his cheating while she sobbed in the other room.
Couldn’t she see it was all her fault? She was the one who was always riding his ass. About what exactly he didn’t say; maybe she’d said Please don’t break our
marriage vows one too many times for his liking? She was the cold fish in bed. She was the one who never wanted to be touched. The first accusation had been a steaming crock of bullshit, the second and third, outrages on par with his cheating.
For months she’d quizzed her girlfriends on how to liven things up between the sheets. And she hadn’t just come up with new ideas. She’d bought toys, ordered costumes, printed dirty stories off the Internet she thought he would like and offered to read them to him. But every time she’d made an attempt to warm the chill that had gripped their bedroom for a year, he’d dismissed her like she was some sex freak. The only problem, Amber, is that you keep saying there’s a problem, he’d told her again and again and again.
And yet, the one who couldn’t connect was him, it turned out, and he couldn’t connect because he was plugging himself into another socket every day at work.
“Amber?”
Her boss’s confident baritone ripping out of the house’s intercom system never fails to make her jump. But a few weeks into the job, she had trained herself not to scream whenever it happened. When she cries out this time, it leaves her red-faced and ashamed.
A short silence follows. Her boss heard her little outburst. Great.
“Darling, can I see you in my office upstairs?” Belinda Baxter says. Her East Texas twang makes everything she says sound vaguely accusatory, even when she throws in a darling, a honey, or a sweetheart.
“Be right there,” Amber croaks, clearing her throat.
“Great. But first, honey, can you go to the wet bar in the living room and fix a vodka martini? I think Henry moved all the liquor in from the pool house after the Neighborhood Council meeting.”
“How many olives?” Amber asks.
“However many you’d like, sweetheart. The drink’s for you, not for me. See you in a bit.”
So much for hiding my tears, she thinks.
She doesn’t even like vodka, but when your wealthy boss offers you a top-shelf cocktail in the middle of a workday, you don’t say no. That’s just a given, she’s sure of it. Maybe it’s even written somewhere in the handbook of personal assistants. If there is a handbook for personal assistants. So far she’s learned everything about working for Belinda on the fly, and she’s only made a few missteps here and there. That’s to be expected when you get hired to organize the personal details of a multimillionaire’s life not on the basis of your actual resume, but because you made a moving speech about your late father’s efforts to combat PTSD at a fundraiser organized by said multimillionaire.
1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Nine Page 31
