Found (Lost & Found Book 2)

by Scarlett Finn

  The way he inhaled and his eyes dropped wasn’t a sexual move, she sensed a conflict in him. Learning how to read him was a great step, but she’d rather he didn’t have to be so torn up for her to get there.

  “Responsibility,” she said. “You feel responsible for me. Like you said, you’re all in with women. You like to be able to fix things and to be in control. You feel like you need to fix me and I’m stopping you.”

  “You’re not broken, Candy,” he said, brushing her hair away from her temple. “We’re broken right now, us as a couple, and that’s on me. I should’ve gone all in from the first second I saw you. Pretending I didn’t love you, pretending I wasn’t there… that’s what got us here. I should never have let you walk away.”

  “First,” she whispered, hooking her arms beneath his to hold herself against him.

  They were broken and Poppy had no idea what to do.

  “Just let me be here, huh?” he said. “I need to be close… just in case.”

  “In case I drink wine?” she asked, slipping her flat hands into the back pockets of his jeans. “You know what happens when I drink wine around you.”

  “No, I forget, remind me.”

  She squeezed his ass, reminding herself of the day they’d met. “Can I just sleep here?” she asked on an exhale, pressing her body into his.

  “Nothing would make me happier, baby.”

  “Nothing?”

  “Short of us being naked and horizontal.”

  She laughed and leaned back. “That’s what I thought. Though after Charley moved in, we did vertical more than once.”

  “All you’ve gotta do is say the word.”

  “Honey,” Poppy said, pushing up to her tiptoes. “I don’t have to say a thing. I didn’t have any problem taking what I wanted before, did I?”

  “Yours for the taking.”

  “Goodnight, First,” she said, rising to kiss the corner of his mouth. “Go entertain your friend.”

  Letting him go felt unnatural, but she didn’t have a choice. Until Holden was dealt with, they were treading a dangerous line. Poppy didn’t want to hurt Turner, never in a million years. He’d once said he couldn’t give her what she deserved. At the time, she hadn’t understood. But she understood now.

  Poppy couldn’t give Turner what he deserved, no matter how much she wanted to. It was all about holding. About restraint. Where Turner was concerned, that had never been an easy feat.

  SEVEN

  The men were in some meeting by the time Poppy made an appearance the following morning. Her decision to procrastinate after her workout was a deliberate choice to avoid the breakfast table. Getting too used to seeing Turner at family meals was bad for her mental health. While he was on the estate, it was happy and comforting to see him. One day, probably soon, he’d leave and she’d only have memories of him being around.

  She and Grammie had spent most of the day together and enjoyed lunch outside again. Grammie had tired, so Poppy escorted her to her bedroom and settled her in for a nap. She didn’t leave until her grandmother was sleeping. It was odd seeing her indestructible grandmother as anything other than indomitable.

  She was thinking about going to the music room or maybe taking a nap herself when she heard the squeal. The happy sound of unadulterated joy called to her. Creeping in the direction of the noise, she smiled when she heard the laugh that followed. Young, innocent, alive, coming from the bedroom opposite hers.

  Poppy didn’t exactly mean to spy, but the door was open and the bed stood on the opposite wall, so she couldn’t avoid seeing him. Turner sat on the edge of the bed, holding his phone up suggesting he was on a video call.

  “Your wish worked,” Turner said, adjusting his position and pressing a button on his screen, though she didn’t know what it was until another delighted scream filled the space.

  “Aunt Poppy!”

  That was Emmie’s voice. It was so unexpected that joy propelled her across the room. “Sweet girl,” Poppy said, taking the phone from Turner’s hand without permission. She hunkered down on the floor by the bed, holding the device in both hands, her arms resting on the mattress. “Hello, beautiful.”

  “Auntie Poppy, we’re missing you here.”

  “I miss you too, beautiful,” Poppy said. “How are you? Are your brother and sister there?”

  So far all she’d seen was Emmie’s face filling the screen. After asking Emmie leaned back just enough to show Noah at her side.

  “When are you coming home, Aunt Poppy?” Noah asked.

  “Yeah,” Emmie said. “Grama’s teaching us how to make new cakes. You need to try them.”

  “I would love to, honey,” Poppy said, ignoring the heat gathering behind her eyes. “Do you like living with Grama?”

  “She makes lots of cakes with me,” Emmie said.

  Noah pushed his weight against his sister, trying to muscle her aside. “Aunt Charley showed us videos with Granpa. Uncle Turner is in them too.”

  “He is,” Poppy said, curling her arm to rest her head against it. “They’re really good videos.”

  “We’re going to make videos of us,” Emmie said, pushing in front of her brother again. “Will you come and be in our videos?”

  “When is Uncle Turner coming home?” Noah asked, more direct about pushing his sibling.

  “Be nice to each other,” Poppy said. “You’ll see Uncle Turner soon, I promise.”

  “Do you live in a castle?” Noah asked.

  Emmie huffed at her brother. “Aunt Poppy is a real-life princess. Yes, she lives in a castle.”

  Poppy laughed. “I don’t live in a castle. I’m not a princess… You’re the princess, baby girl.”

  The little girl’s face contorted in confusion. “Princesses can only marry princes. Uncle Turner isn’t a prince… How can you marry him? He’s not a prince.”

  Emmie’s instant grief came in time with Poppy’s panic. “Oh, uh… sweetie—”

  “They in love,” Noah said. “People in love have to get married so they can have babies.”

  Excited, Emmie gasped. “I can look after your babies! Can I look after your babies?”

  “Honey—”

  “They has to get married,” Noah said, tussling with his sister.

  “I get to be a bridesmaid,” Emmie said, bouncing up and down. “Can I walk down first, not Ashlee?”

  “You have to walk with Ashlee,” Noah said. “She’s too slow.”

  “You walk with her,” Emmie huffed. “I want to walk just me… or, oh…” She grabbed the phone to pull it right up to her face. “Can I walk with Uncle Turner?”

  Poppy smiled. “Grooms don’t walk down the aisle, honey. They just wait at the altar for the bride.”

  “Noah can wait with him then. Uncle Ritchie will be there and Uncle Naught… Is Uncle Preston coming home soon too? We have to try on dresses, Aunt Poppy. Can I wear pink? Or yellow like the sunshine?”

  All the talk of weddings wasn’t easy to hear. The kids were so excited about the prospect of a wedding and cousins, Poppy didn’t want to be the one breaking their little hearts.

  “Okay, guys, there’s a lot to think about before then,” Turner said, taking the phone from her. “We’ve got to go just now, okay? But we love you.”

  “Will you have babies I can look after, Uncle Turner?” Emmie asked.

  “We’ll see, Sprog, okay? Now go find your mom and your sister. Behave yourselves.”

  “Love you!” Emmie chirped before making lots of kissy noises.

  They said their goodbyes and hung up. Poppy stayed on her knees by the edge of the bed, her chin propped on her stacked hands.

  “You okay?” Turner asked, stroking her hair.

  Exhaling, Poppy wasn’t sure what was in her head. “I barely know them and I miss them,” she murmured. “The thought I might never see them again…”

  “You’ll see them again,” he said, his fingers tangling in her hair. “They’re your family if you want them to be.”
r />   Peeking up at him, Poppy didn’t know whether to be flattered or suspicious. Using the kids to bring them together would be a sneaky move. Turner wasn’t like that; everything about him was genuine.

  “I missed you every minute,” she said, shifting to rest her head on his thigh. “The minute I walked out of your place, I knew that getting over you wouldn’t be easy.” She closed her eyes, enjoying how his fingers moved through her hair in a rhythmic motion. “What we were couldn’t have gone on forever. It was never supposed to. Being your sex toy, sharing your bed, it was the greatest thrill of my life… You were the greatest thrill. The best lover I ever had. The only man I wanted to…”

  She didn’t finish. The potential of that sentence hung heavy in the air between them.

  “How early did you know that you felt something for me?” he asked. “Something real?”

  “Early.”

  “Before we had sex?”

  She exhaled a laugh. “Definitely.”

  “That was what you meant last night, when you said you were unhappy.”

  “I wasn’t unhappy,” she said, rising from her knees to sit on the bed next to him. “Please don’t think that I was.” Poppy laid a hand on his face. “Being with you was an incredible adventure. I wouldn’t trade a second of it for anything.”

  “You wanted more.”

  She didn’t want to lie, which made it difficult to respond, so she took a few seconds to think about her words before saying them. “Sometimes when we were talking I wanted to say more, give opinions or suggestions. I would always remind myself of the arrangement and I wouldn’t—”

  “I wish you had,” he said, smoothing her hair from her cheeks before cupping them. “I know it was fucked up. I take responsibility for that… for hurting you.”

  “You didn’t hurt me,” she said, touching his chest. “It was my fault that I let myself believe… let myself think that maybe…”

  “I might love you too?”

  Their eyes met. Love. That was the truth. He was the truth. A quake of need went through her. Turner. Her Turner. He was hers. He’d come all this way and stuck around even when she wavered because he was sure, above everything else in the universe, that they were meant to be together.

  “Sometimes I think about your dad,” she said, licking her dry, nervous lips. “Your mother told him her dream, what she wanted, and without making a big deal of it, he went out there and made it happen. She wanted a big family. A home to fill with happiness and love. It seemed out of reach, she never thought it would happen, but he made it happen.”

  “What’s your dream, baby?” he asked, his thumbs moving in a tender caress. “Let me prove to you that our love is as real as theirs.”

  Her dreams were selfish. Val told Ed about hers without knowing how far he’d go to deliver. Just looking into Turner’s eyes, Poppy could tell that he’d be as passionate about hers.

  Leaning a little closer, her hands slipped south to gather up the hem of his shirt. Wanting him, needing him, it wasn’t smart, but he didn’t stop her. In fact, he grabbed his shirt at the back of his neck and tugged it off before grabbing her face and pulling their mouths together.

  Since their agreement, sex had been allowed. Justifying it to herself was easy, especially when the sweep of his tongue against hers was so certain. More than just desire, Poppy tasted his thirst for her. For them to be together. For forever.

  “Turner,” she whispered when he yanked down the zipper of her dress and pulled it off over her head.

  He grabbed her torso and picked her up to toss her further onto the mattress and then he was on top of her, kissing her lips, her cheeks, her jaw, her throat. Every part of her wanted him and he wanted to sample every part.

  The heat of their need grew in time with the throbbing intensity of their urgent touch. It had been too long. Their bodies were on the verge of starvation; a feast was on offer right there on that bed. The only way to live, to keep on breathing, was to sate their hunger. Then and there, hard and fast.

  “Turn, you’re not going to believe—oh, holy fuck.”

  The shock of another voice reminded Poppy that not only were they in her parents’ house, but the door was open. Pushing Turner away, she tried to sit up, but his lower body stayed on hers, pinning her down.

  “Ever think about closing the damn door?” Preston asked. “Never mind a sock on the doorknob.”

  “Oh, God,” Poppy said, her words rushed. Somehow Turner’s tee-shirt had ended up beside them, so she grabbed it to hold it against her chest. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry for who?” Turner asked, glaring at his friend. “Did you need something?”

  Coming a step closer, Preston turned a tablet toward them. “There’s something you should see.”

  “Something more important than this?” Turner growled.

  “To me, yes,” Preston said, approaching. “Probably not to you given your alternative option.”

  “I’ll leave you guys,” Poppy said, trying to wriggle out from under Turner while putting his tee-shirt on.

  “Baby—”

  “Stay,” Preston said, seating himself in the bottom corner of the bed. “This is important to both of you.”

  There in the middle of Turner’s bed, her legs still tangled with his, Poppy watched as Preston pressed play on a video.

  “That’s David Leicester,” she said, just as the image began to talk.

  “We were close. Very close, if you know what I mean,” David said, standing next to a reporter who held a microphone in his face. “We talked a lot. I knew her very well.”

  The reporter brought the microphone back to her mouth. “Did Poppy discuss Mr. Abernathy with you?”

  Holden got a title and last name, while she was just Poppy? It was infuriating.

  “She’s a woman who knows what she’s got,” David said when the microphone was turned back to him. “As smart as she is beautiful. Poppy knows how to work a man, to manipulate a situation.”

  Her mouth opened in shock.

  “Do you believe this is all a game on her part?” the reporter asked. “Is she playing all of us?”

  “Don’t get me wrong, Poppy’s an amazing woman,” David said. “She can tie a guy up in knots, if you know what I mean…”

  The overtly suggestive leer on his face widened Poppy’s eyes. “Did he just suggest we—”

  “Shh!” Preston said so they could hear the rest of David’s words.

  “But I do think we’d be fools to take everything in this situation at face value. Something is going on. Poppy assesses every step before she takes it.” That was so ludicrous that it almost warranted a snort of laughter. “Don’t underestimate her. You think Holden Abernathy is shrewd? Poppy is far more cunning, I don’t doubt it for a second.”

  The reporter turned back to the camera. Preston hit pause.

  “I’m going to kill him,” Poppy said, trying to push Turner’s legs away to free her own. “I swear to God, I am going to—”

  “Hey,” Turner said, swaying closer to kiss her shoulder. “We’ll take him down, don’t worry.” His focus landed on his friend. “How do we take him down?”

  “Defamation is difficult to prove,” Preston said. “But we can ruin him with legal fees.” On a careful intake of breath, his eyes bounced from Turner’s to hers a couple of times. “Before we think about that, I do have to ask—”

  “No,” Turner barked. “She never went anywhere near the asshole.”

  “Poppy?”

  “Of course I didn’t,” she said, then grabbed for Turner. “Charley. You have to call her.”

  “Yeah,” he said, sitting up to retrieve his phone from the pillow.

  “Charley was into him,” Poppy said by way of explanation to Preston. “She wanted to date him. They went out a few times, more as friends than anything else. I don’t know what’s changed in the last couple of weeks.”

  Preston lunged over her to grab for Turner’s phone before he could dial. “What the hell�
��”

  “Let me talk to her first.”

  “What?” Turner snapped, scowling at the lawyer. “Why do you—”

  “Because if she was upset with Poppy then God only knows what Charley said to this guy. If you get in her face, she’ll never be honest.”

  “Oh God,” Poppy said, sinking onto her back, her hand sliding onto her forehead.

  Of course Charley would be mad at her. She thought their friendship was real before Poppy just vanished from her life. Charley would’ve learned through the press, or maybe her brother if he’d had time, that Poppy wasn’t exactly who the Maddox sisters believed her to be.

  If Turner had told Charley the truth, before or after the stories hit the media, Charley would’ve found out that not only had Poppy misled her, but her own brother had too.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Turner said, stroking her stomach. “Whatever it is, we’ll get through it.”

  “Instead of solving problems, all we seem to be doing is gaining new ones,” Poppy said, pushing both men out of the way to jump up off the bed. “This is all my fault.”

  “This is Abernathy’s fault,” Turner said, standing up with her. “I don’t want you to lose sight of that for a second.”

  Fraught, Poppy slid the heel of her hand up her forehead, her fingers curling into her hair. “Oh God.”

  “Hey,” Turner said, snagging her free hand to angle her his way. “Stop giving him power.” She blinked at him, not expecting to see his smile. “All that matters is the people we care about. We don’t care about him, do we?” Poppy shook her head. “You told me that for something to have the power to upset us, it has to mean something to us.”

  “Charley means something to me,” she said. “I don’t care what David says to the press, so long as you know he’s—”

  “Full of shit? Trust me, baby, I do.”

  “Then that doesn’t matter, let him enjoy his five seconds of fame. But Charley… I already hurt her once and she likes this guy. I don’t want her to hate me more, but I don’t want him to use this as a way to wheedle himself in with her. I was already worried that she was setting herself up for a fall, except now when it happens, it will be my fault.”