Ties That Bind (The Escort, #3)

by Kristen Strassel

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Likenesses to any people, living or dead, is purely coincidental. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please do so through your retailer’s “lend” function. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at kristen@kristenstrassel.com.

  Ties That Bind (The Escort, #3), Copyright 2016.

  Cover Design by Sotia Lazu

  Table of Contents

  Copyright Page

  Ties That Bind (The Escort, #3)

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Ties That Bind

  Leah’s used to starting over, but this time, she isn’t running away. Her daughter is in college, she’s got a fresh start, and a new business—in Miami, with Jagger Holiday. The second chance is an opportunity to do things better, but soon Leah realizes that they’ll always be far from perfect.

  Jagger can’t tell the love of his life his darkest secret. It’s the reason he started escorting, and why he's spent the last decade running from his broken heart. When he’s on the brink of getting everything he wants—his photography business and a family—he must make the confession that could take it all away.

  Things will be different this time. But only if Leah and Jagger can face their fears about themselves—and each other.

  Chapter One

  Leah

  This wasn’t the first time I left Massachusetts with a broken heart. The first few times I ran for my life, but this time, I wasn’t fleeing. The feeling of emptiness was still there, but for once, it was overshadowed by the promise of something better.

  “How did it go?” Jagger asked when I found him in the airport pick-up line.

  What a sight for sore eyes. Horns honked behind us as I melted against his lips in a kiss. We got into the car, but it didn’t mean we kept our hands off each other. “Better than and as awful as expected. I’m still in shock that I moved Raven into her dorm. She loves her roommate. It’s the one she met at orientation this summer. I think she’ll actually venture out every once in a while—even though her room is adorable.” One of the perks of having a mother who was an interior designer. “Rich was overly civil. He only acts like that when he’s planning to do something awful. I’m convinced he thought there was a Best Parent Award up for grabs, because the monster has yet to show his fangs.”

  “Yet,” Jagger grumbled, echoing my sentiment as he pulled into the traffic leading away from the airport. I’d always welcomed palm trees as a symbol of escape, but now they also meant something else.

  I was home.

  I left out the part where Raven was back on her glad we didn’t have the same last name kick. She still hadn’t recovered from the scandal that told the world how I met Jagger and cost us both our jobs. He’d been expressly banned from helping her move into her dorm. She cringed every time one of her new neighbors recognized me from my former Great Start Today segments. That would probably change in about four years, when she realized I had connections she and her classmates desperately needed. It hurt, but it would pass. Raven always redeemed herself.

  “This time Rich can’t legally run his mouth,” I added. The lawsuit, orchestrated by my ex-husband’s new wife and her best friend, that put me and many other women who used the escort service out of work was dead. I filed a countersuit for slander, and that was very much alive. Even if I cleaned out Rich’s bank account, I wouldn’t get anything out of it but satisfaction. “I have more than enough ammunition to bury him and he knows it, now that Kari found a way to link Rich and Shelley to Beth’s lawsuit. He kept his mouth shut. It’s already a giant improvement over his usual behavior.”

  “Are you going through with the lawsuit?” Jagger asked.

  “Hell, yeah. It’s my chance to say all the things I was afraid to say for too long.” I studied the side of Jagger’s face as he drove. I couldn’t read his expression. All the good stuff was hidden by sunglasses and his hair whipping in the breeze. “Why wouldn’t I go through with it?”

  He stopped at a red light, turned toward me, and took off his sunglasses. Much better. “You’re here now. Raven’s at college and you’re tying up the loose ends from Great Start Today. Why do you want to drag garbage from the past with you?”

  I loved Jagger for so many reasons, but especially his way of putting things into perspective. Everyone else told me to put Rich on the rotisserie spit just because I could. But Jagger was better than that. “I hadn’t thought of it that way,” I said.

  He leaned over and kissed me as the light changed. We set off a chorus of horns every time we touched. “It’s your first official night in Miami. What do you want to do?”

  There was only one answer. “I want to go home.”

  Boxes greeted me in Jagger’s living room—my living room now, too. Raven and I packed at the same time, headed in different directions. I couldn’t stand to be in the house in DC without her, but I had no plans of selling the place. It meant too much to me. Sure, it was just a house, some people would say, but I was an interior designer. Houses were more than walls and rooms. They had a pulse and a soul. Or they should, anyway. That’s where I came in. The house in DC was the first major purchase I’d made on my own, and it was a testament to what I could accomplish when I didn’t listen to all the voices that told me what I wanted was stupid, ugly, or a waste of money.

  I stood on the threshold of my new life, but I knew better than anyone the old one didn’t disappear with the snap of my fingers. I never admitted to myself how bad things really were with Rich. It was for my own sanity, and I convinced myself the woman I was now would never let that happen to her, no matter what. I didn’t know what bad was until I found out what good could be.

  No horns accompanied this kiss. My suitcase landed between us when Jagger took my face in his hands. Shadows welcomed us in the dusky apartment, but there was no hiding the glow in his eyes when he pulled away. He stayed close enough to be blurred by the heat that always radiated between us.

  I was home.

  Things were different this time. Jagger and I had been together in some way for almost a year, and he didn’t know the Leah who apologized for being someplace because she didn’t feel welcome. He knew the Leah people recognized from the TV show. I couldn’t bring myself to share the depths of my life with my ex-husband, even with Jagger. I didn’t need to. Rich spoke for himself loud and clear.

  I put my head on Jagger’s chest, an awkward angle with the suitcase between us, but so worth the effort. His
heart beat in time with the waves crashing against the sand, and it was as beautiful as the lights that twinkled along the shore.

  Three months ago I came to Miami for Jagger’s gallery opening. We hadn’t been a couple when I made that trip, but my heart always beat in tandem with his. Distance and labels were irrelevant. He’d wanted to give me the chance to decide if I was better without him. I knew the answer all along—I wasn’t.

  “What do we do now?” I asked when I straightened. After moving Raven into her dorm, I was so sick of cardboard boxes. I approached the nearest cluster. The top box was labeled office supplies. Nope. Wasn’t touching those until I actually got an office. I lived by the same rules that I enforced with my clients—keep home life separate from work.

  Jagger dragged me away from the boxes. “Hell, no. No unpacking until the morning.” He flipped on the lights and headed to the kitchen. “I’m cooking for you.”

  “What? Did I get in the wrong person’s car?” I teased. Jagger never offered to cook. All the time we’d spent together so far could be considered special occasions. But every time I’d visited him, he hardly had food in his fridge.

  The smile he flashed erased any speculation it was anyone but Jagger. “I can cook. I’ve never subjected you to it until now.”

  This I had to see. I climbed onto one of the high chairs on the other side of the bar. “Is this your plan? Subject me to your cooking the first night, in hopes I’ll take the reins?”

  So many things we had to talk about. We’d never played house before.

  “Not at all.” Jagger grabbed ingredients from the fridge. “Haven’t poisoned myself yet.”

  “Put one in the plus column.” I laughed.

  “Maybe I’ll like cooking now that I have someone to do it for.” Jagger poured something from a pitcher and handed me the glass. “Sangria.”

  “Your sangria can’t be worse than mine, we know that.” I tried to make it at home, once, and realized that mixology was not a skill I’d been blessed with. One sip of Jagger’s recipe had my eyes rolling back in my head. “This is amazing. If I hadn’t already agreed to move here, this would’ve sealed the deal.”

  “Should’ve made it for you earlier.” He raised an eyebrow, but his attention was on the meal. Lots of veggies, a big pan, and what I thought for a second was chicken . . . Jagger knew better. It was pork.

  “Can I help you with anything?” I loved watching him create things. His preferred medium was photography, and any time he pointed the camera at me, I considered it foreplay. “I feel bad. You’re doing all the work and I’m just sitting here.”

  He dropped everything into the pan and pushed it around with a spatula before wiping off his hands and coming over. He leaned on the counter beside me and took a sip of my drink. “That’s not true. You’re providing me with inspiration.”

  It was my turn to raise an eyebrow. “For what?”

  “You’ll see.” He gave me a quick peck before going back to the stove.

  I couldn’t wait to find out. “What if I said I wanted to go out tonight?”

  “We would’ve done this tomorrow. That’s the thing. We have all the time in the world.”

  That’s when it really hit me. I moved to Miami to live with Jagger Holiday. The man I’d paid to spend one weekend with and should’ve never seen again. The man who looked at me and stoked the long neglected flames inside.

  “I’m so glad I’m here.” This move was the scariest thing I’d ever done. There was no hiding that my life was in shambles, so starting over—again—might appear easy to the casual onlooker. But to do it with the man everyone said I shouldn’t be with . . . I had to listen to my heart. It might make mistakes, but it would never fail me. “If you haven’t noticed, I can’t sit and do nothing. Is there a salad? Want me to set the table?”

  “Yes, you can relax.” Jagger laughed. “There’s nothing to do. Seriously. Tomorrow I know you’ll tackle the boxes and start moving stuff around.”

  Oh. I hadn’t expected to get carte blanche. “Are you okay with that?” I’d never moved into someone else’s house before.

  “I think you know what you’re doing.” He leaned in close enough that his long hair tickled my cheek, but he didn’t kiss me. If he had, we would’ve eventually had to go out to dinner because I would’ve made him forget all about what he was cooking.

  He jumped, like it already happened, and went back to the stove. Grabbing two plates, he filled them with stir fry and put one in front of me. Before I had a chance to get up, he shook his head, lips quivering in an attempt to contain his smile, and returned with napkins and forks.

  “You’re full of crap, you know that?” I barely wanted to stop eating to razz him. I was so hungry. “This is delicious.”

  He hadn’t done anything fancy, but it was another example of Jagger’s magic. Just veggies and meat with a little bit of soy sauce, lemon, and pepper.

  “I never said I couldn’t cook. I said I didn’t like cooking for myself.” He stole a peapod off my plate. “I have some news for you.”

  I put down my fork. “What? You let me go on and on about my stuff when you had something to tell me?”

  “I wanted to hear what you had to say. I missed you.” Jagger topped off our drinks.

  The fuzzy feeling came fast after leaving Boston to return to Jagger’s universe. “I could say the same thing. Now tell me your news.”

  He leaned back on his bar stool, sipping his drink. Not giving up the goods. I kicked him, and he laughed before saying any more. “My neighbors at the gallery are moving out. This is their last month. Landlord has the for rent sign up, only in the hallway so they don’t lose any business. I told him about you, and he thinks you’d be a perfect new tenant.”

  If I could get to work without having to search for a new office in a strange city, sign me up. I cheated last time, putting my office in my home, but Jagger’s apartment wasn’t built for that. This was a fresh start, and I’d left all my options open. My name was still spoken in harsh whispers in professional circles after the scandal broke, and I didn’t want to waste any more time apologizing.

  “Which unit?” I asked.

  “The one next to me. It’s a consignment shop now.”

  “Oh.” I thought he meant a unit upstairs. A traditional office. I should’ve known better, considering the source. “A storefront? That’s not exactly what I do.”

  Jagger furrowed his brow. “Why not? It’s an office with a great view. Especially for me.” He ran his foot up my calf. Ninety degrees outside and I had goosebumps. “You’d have plenty of space to store all your furniture and supplies.”

  “I’ll check it out.” I slid off my stool, smoothed his hair away from his face, and planted a kiss on his lips. It wasn’t easy to stop there. But we were in no rush. “You know me, I’m already thinking about how I could make it a store.”

  He leaned back to accommodate me. “Now’s the time to take chances.”

  “You’re right.” I slipped my arms around him, careful not to send us toppling over. “Was that what you were building up to, or was there something else?”

  His grin melted everything inside me. “There’s always something else.”

  Chapter Two

  Jagger

  Every minute I had with Leah was stolen. I plucked her away from the rest of the world, pulling her out of a place that moved a thousand miles an hour.

  I brought her to my home. Now it was our home.

  Stolen implied that we should be punished for our actions. Some of the people closest to us felt that way. That the simple act of two people falling in love would somehow hurt them. Their fear and bullshit couldn’t hold us back.

  It would be a huge transition. I’d be lying through my teeth if I said it didn’t terrify me, but I wouldn’t let it stop me. I’d spend most of my time outside of work alone. On purpose. Leah had come from a far different place, surrounded by people, ruled by their opinions.

  For both of us, it had been a bro
ken system. While Leah’s failures had been put on blast by her shithead ex-husband, I’d managed to keep mine a secret. The longer I kept it from her, the harder it was to bring up. The time was never right. And the space between what I needed to say and hadn’t yet said had become enormous.

  It was possible I’d been more transparent than I thought. After all, I’d charged women to have sex with me for the last eight years, and then walked out of their lives like it never happened. It was its own brand of fucked up. Tomorrow had never been an option. None of the people who paid to spend the night with me gave a shit about what got me there—it was about them, not me. I was flying fucking blind and holding Leah’s heart in my hands.

  I couldn’t let her fall.

  Leah tasted like spice and sangria. Of hot summer nights and the promise of all the things I never let myself have. I’d denied myself this feeling, the simple whisper of my lover’s breath against mine, for as long as I was an escort. I had a lot of time to make up for. I tangled my fingers into her curls, snarled from a long day of travel. She moaned, but Leah would not be refused.

  That’s why I fell in love with her. She’d always believed that things were one step away from working out, and having her here, living with me, I knew she was right.

  She pressed her hands against my chest, pushing me away but not committing to it. Her laugh was muffled against my lips.

  “What’s so funny?” I asked.

  “I’m here.” She slipped out of my grasp. “I moved to Miami to be with you. It’s kind of mind-boggling. It’s crazy and reckless and there’s nowhere I’d rather be.”

  Leah circled the living room, with that grin still on her face, running her finger over the furniture like she had to touch it to prove she wasn’t dreaming. She stopped in front of the sliding glass door, gazing out at the ocean. The surf was gentle tonight, welcoming her home.

  “Crazy and reckless looks good on you.” I came up behind her, needing the heat of her body on this hot, late summer night. I slipped the strap of her tank top off her shoulder, to taste all of her. It had been too long. “But I could do without this.”