by Lexi Blake
“I didn’t wake up from the gunshot,” Drew said quietly. “I would have thought the shot would wake me up. There would have been two and my room was right above where my father’s body was found.”
Pavel looked halfway sympathetic. “He would have used suppressor . . . what you call . . . silencer. Due to nature of crime, he would have taken suppressor with him and left the gun behind. It was to look like murder and then suicide. This is to keep police in the dark. Was it heat from fire that woke you? Or smoke detectors?”
“They didn’t go off.” Drew was staring at some place in the distance, as though he was right back in that house and not seeing what was happening in the here and now. “Someone disabled them that day. It wasn’t the heat that woke me. It was the crackling sound. Like a log in a fire on a cold night. And then I realized I was inside the fireplace.”
Drew looked like he was going to be sick, but he took a deep breath and then let it out slowly. “I think I’m going to call the office, make sure everything is going all right. If you need anything, I’ll be right outside.”
He stood and walked off.
Her heart ached for him.
“I have looked into this,” Pavel said. “They could have gotten someone who would have killed children, but why? The people who pay my brother already had a way to take company, yes?”
He wasn’t an unintelligent criminal. “Yes, there was a clause in the contract. If Benedict was found to have perpetrated any kind of felony, his stock defaulted to the other investors.”
“Ah, this is why murder must come first.” He nodded and sat back. “I wondered. More simple to shoot them both. So that begs question: Why set fire? It raised questions where none needed to be raised.”
“I agree.”
“Only person who would do this is person who hates. My brother kill quickly. But burning the house with the children inside, that would take a dark heart. From what I read, this person locked everything. They gave the children no way out. They would have burned to death. This is horrible way to go. He is one who saved them all, no?”
She fought to blink back tears because she couldn’t help but think about how terrified Drew must have been, how alone he would have felt. His parents were dead on the floor. At least he would have believed that. He’d been fourteen years old and the world had come down on his shoulders.
Had it just happened again? He knew his mother was evil, but somehow discovering that she’d done what a hired assassin wouldn’t do was so much worse.
“Yes, he saved them.”
“He should to be careful,” Pavel said quietly. “He has much to lose and if this person is still alive, he will be wanting to cover tracks. Sometimes these things, they are better left alone. Sometimes it is best to let God sort these things out, no?”
“I don’t think he can let that happen. Would you?” She couldn’t see a world in which Drew simply lived out his life without pursuing some kind of revenge on his mother. He might not be capable of it. She had to hope he would allow her exposing the truth to the world to be that vengeance. She didn’t like the thought of him going toe-to-toe with a woman who had hated her life so much, she’d been willing to burn it down along with her children.
His lips curled up in a devilish grin. “I would not let such crime go unanswered. I enjoy violence. Though if I had billion dollars, perhaps I enjoy other things. You have more questions, you said.”
Suddenly they didn’t seem so important. “I think this should do. If you can think of anything else, I would appreciate it.”
“You are good girl. You call me if you want to ask questions about life. For the fictions, though. Everything I say to you is not truth.” He winked pointedly. “If I tell you all about how I take down the worst criminal in Moscow using nothing but a pencil and a rubber, this would be mere fiction. But I did this brilliantly. You see the pencil was extremely sharp and I used the rubber to make a bow. It was extra large, of course. My aim is true and I hit the carotid artery from twenty feet away. Then no more bad guys. Well, except for me, of course.”
He continued on, but she was thinking about Drew. And Iris.
She had burned her house down and tried to kill her own children. She’d wanted to start over and leave nothing behind.
Would she try again?
Drew stepped back in and sat down beside her as Pavel continued on. She reached for his hand. He tangled their fingers together, but didn’t look at her. Sitting so close, he’d never seemed further away.
Chapter Ten
Drew held Shelby’s hand as she eased into the limo. He closed the door behind her before looking to his driver. “How bad is traffic? Can you get me to the office fairly quickly?”
Bennett was in his late fifties, a professional rapidly approaching the end of his career. He’d told Drew he planned to retire in the next two years. One more change Drew would have to deal with. “It could be thirty or forty minutes to downtown, but getting home will be just as long.”
He sighed and opened the door again. “Traffic is bad through downtown. I need to get back to the office. I’ll have Bennett take you home and I’ll call a cab.”
She frowned his way. “No.”
“Shelby, it will take more than an hour to drop me off at the office and take you home. I can spare you a good portion of time.”
“Then it’s good that I wasn’t going home. I’m going to the office with you. I want to transcribe some of my notes and then I’ll go with you straight to the restaurant.”
He could argue, but she would see through him. He simply nodded Bennett’s way. “To the office, please.”
He climbed in beside her. Luckily the window between the back and the front of the limo was down. Maybe it was time to refocus on his work. He’d neglected it in favor of spending enormous amounts of time in bed with Shelby.
Yes, it was time to look to his work. The launch was coming up and he wasn’t going to fail. This was where his father had gone wrong. His father had paid too much attention to his mistress and not enough to what was going on around him. Perhaps if he had focused on his work and his family, he wouldn’t have gotten himself killed. Perhaps he would have noticed that his wife was a raging psychopath who should never have been allowed to breed. Perhaps he would have realized the danger he was in.
Perhaps he wouldn’t have left Drew holding the bag.
“Babe? Can we talk about it?” Shelby’s quiet voice broke through his inner rage.
He was so fucking angry with his father. With Hatch. With his mother. With all of them. They’d fucked up everything and he’d been left to deal with it.
“I need to make some calls. Check in with Bran.” He was pleased his voice was so even. “I might be able to make the last afternoon meeting.”
He pulled out his cell, but she slid her hand over his. “I don’t think you’re in any place to go into a meeting, Drew. We could stop somewhere and get a drink and talk this through. Or we could go home and relax before we meet everyone.”
“I told you, I need to get to work, so unless you’re offering to blow me right here in the limo, I suggest you get your own work done.” There went his even tone. He sounded arctic, but then this was probably closer to who he actually was than the idiot lover he’d been playing for the last two weeks. She should get used to it. This was who he really was.
Cold. Calculating. Controlling.
He was silent as she leaned over.
“I’m sorry you had to hear that, Bennett. We’re going to need some alone time,” she said before pressing the button to close the window between them.
“Not a problem, ma’am,” Bennett managed before the window shut him out.
And left Drew alone with a woman who might walk away tonight. He thought he would have more time with her, but he wasn’t sure he could control the roiling anger in his gut. He should never have gotten in this damn car
. He should have walked away because he knew this would happen. He would explode and show her how much of an ass he could be, and she would realize how much better she could do. He would be alone again, and that was probably the way it should be. He had nothing but cash to give her and she didn’t value that.
“Drew, talk to me.”
“I don’t want to talk, and I’m sick of you interfering in my life and my schedule. I told you what to do if you want my attention.” Better to show her how awful he could be. He looked back down at his phone. That should shut her up.
He was about to press the button to connect him to Bran, when he felt her move. She twisted on the seat next to him, unbuckling her seat belt and flipping her body over so she was lying on the bench, her head in his lap.
“Why do you always try to make me feel like a prostitute when you’re upset?” Her green eyes stared up at him.
Damn, but she was pretty. “Why do you have to keep pushing me when I’ve made it plain I don’t want to talk?”
“All right, you don’t want to talk. Let me hold you.”
“Why? What would that do?”
“It would help me feel close to you.”
“I don’t want you close to me. Get up.”
She shook her head. “If I thought for a second you didn’t want me close to you because you didn’t want me, I would. Drew, what she did to you was beyond horrible.”
Why couldn’t she understand him? “I don’t want to talk about it.”
She sat up, putting a hand on his chest. “Okay, then let me hold you. Hell, I’ll do that thing you asked about if you tell me you need me and don’t turn it into something trashy. I’m okay with giving you what you need, but you have to accept it for the gift it is and not some kind of transaction. If you need sex right now to take your mind off what you learned today, I’m your girl, but I’m not your punching bag.”
Frustration welled inside him. “Are you? And how do you know you’re the only one? Girl, that is. You don’t want me to treat this as a transaction, but isn’t that exactly what it is?”
“I suppose everything is, but the question is, what do I get out of it?”
He should have known this would happen. It was too good to be true. “I don’t know. I wish you would fucking tell me because I don’t know. I guess you get the book. I guess you get to push your career forward and I get to fuck you.”
“I get your sparkling personality,” she replied. “I came for the story but I stayed for the sarcasm. You can say all the nasty words you like, but I see through you. I know you need me. You need me to push you to take time off and to enjoy your life, and I’m starting to think that you can’t enjoy your life without me.”
He didn’t like how vulnerable she was making him feel. “You think a lot of yourself, don’t you?”
“I didn’t. Not for a long time, and then I met this insanely brilliant beast who has no idea how to deal with a woman who cares about him. You’re trainable, though. You’ve done so well, but this is a speed bump we’re going to have to get through. So one blow job and then you’ll listen to what I have to say?”
Despite the anger inside him, his dick hardened at the very thought. “I thought you weren’t going to prostitute yourself.”
She gave him a smile. “I’m not. It’s the only way you know how to accept comfort right now, and you need it so badly, Drew. So yes, I’ll give this to you, but you should understand that if you say one bad thing about me afterward, if you aren’t appreciative, you might not have anything left for the next girl.”
He gave up the fight. He reached out and hauled her up and into his lap. Somehow she always managed to find a way through his every defense. “I don’t want another girl. I don’t want fucking anyone but you.”
She cupped his face, looking him deep in the eyes. “I know because I feel the same way, Drew. So stop pushing me away. Tell me.”
He shook his head. “I already told you. I don’t want to talk, but I can’t do what I should do, either. You should get out of this mess.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
Then she’d made her choice. “I can’t be gentle right now.”
“I don’t need gentle. I need you.”
He let his hand find her hair, fingers tangling in all that soft red glory. “I hope you don’t regret those words, baby. Because I need a lot from you right now. I want to forget. I want to fucking forget that my mother did what an assassin wouldn’t. She locked us in. She set the fire.”
“And you brought them all out and you took care of them and you were a man, Drew.” There were tears in her eyes as she stroked his skin. “She did her best and you saved them all.”
But he hadn’t. He hadn’t saved his father. He’d been a fool for years, thinking his parents were some pure thing that evil had cut down.
He’d only found one pure thing in the whole world, and she was sitting in his lap and offering him everything.
And he was going to take it. He forced his mouth down on hers, her arms coming up and around him. The woman had no sense at all, but he wasn’t going to complain. Need wiped out all his rage. He needed her. If he could please her, keep her close, maybe all of this would be survivable.
He let his tongue play against hers, devouring her like a starving man. How could she do this to him? He’d had her twice the night before and yet his whole body ached with need. She was the only thing that could make him forget. He’d been foolish to think he could work when what he needed was to make her scream.
“Lie down on the seat.”
She looked up at him. “What?”
“Don’t argue with me. Lie down.” He needed to be in control. The last several hours he’d been so out of control. This was the one place he could rule.
She turned and lay down, her feet toward him. He eased the heels off her, tossing them to the floor. Such soft skin. He let his hands drift from her ankles up to her calves. Her skirt was modest, but those bare legs got to him. Soft and warm. Like the rest of her. That was what she was to him—all the softness and warmth he’d missed out on for years.
“Spread your legs,” he ordered.
Her eyes had already gone hot and she spread herself for him. “I thought I was the one who was going to be on my knees.”
“I like you on your back,” he growled as his hand moved up to her inner thigh. “I want to lose myself for a little while. I want to surround myself with your taste and touch and the way you smell when your pussy gets greedy. Do you have any idea how much I love the way you respond to me?”
“It’s never happened with anyone else, Drew. I like sex, but it’s so different with you. All you have to do is walk into a room and I want you.”
For now.
He let his hand drift up, rubbing against the cotton underwear she wore. It was already damp. He slipped under the hem to stroke the petals of her sex. “Do you want me to taste you, Shelby? Do you want me to put my mouth on you and let my tongue explore every inch of your pussy?”
She nodded. “Yes. I want that. I want you to put your mouth on me.”
His finger slipped over her clitoris, that plump bud already prominent. “Can I suck you here?”
“God, yes,” she replied quickly. “Please.”
Yes, he needed this. Hearing Shelby beg for him, seeing her making a place for him, giving herself up to him—that’s what would burn away the shame he’d felt. He shoved her skirt up with rough hands and leaned over, putting his face right against her, inhaling the intoxicating scent of her need. “I love how you smell.”
Her body moved restlessly. He sat back up and dragged her underwear down. He had to move a bit, but he managed to get them off her legs and tossed them aside. She wouldn’t need them again. He liked the thought of her walking around for the rest of the day without any underwear. All he would have to do was push up her skirt and he could ta
ke what was his.
“I also love how you look. You’re so beautiful.” In every way. He was staring at her pussy. It was the single most perfect pussy he’d ever seen. Plump and wet and perfect and all for him.
He’d been accused of being selfish before, but it wasn’t true. He hadn’t known true selfishness until this moment. Everything he’d done had been to protect or avenge his family. He hadn’t spent his college years partying and having fun and learning who he was. He’d spent them working eighteen-hour days to lift them all up. 4L wasn’t his. It was theirs. The houses and cars weren’t really his. They belonged to his family.
Shelby was his. Only his. This relationship was just the two of them. “I lied when I said I didn’t like you interfering with my schedule.”
He leaned down, grateful for the roominess of the limo. Her back arched, offering her body up. “I know that. I’m sure you’re an excellent liar when it comes to business, but I see through you, Lawless.”
No one else did. He let his mouth hover over her, breathing her in. “I want you to fuck with my schedule because that means you want to see me.”
“It means I care about you,” Shelby agreed. “It means I want you to spend more time with me and enjoy your life more.”
“I’ve enjoyed my life so much more since you came into it.” He kissed her clit. Just a peck.
She groaned, a frustrated sound. “I feel the same way, though right now I’m ready to smack you. Please, Drew.”
He chuckled. “But this is pleasing Drew. You screw with my schedule to show me how much you care. I tease you. I make you crazy and then give you what you want. I think it’s a fair trade-off.”
“It doesn’t feel like it right now. How can you do this to me? Five minutes ago I wasn’t thinking about sex and now I’m pretty sure I’m going to die if you don’t hurry up and put your mouth on me.”
