“That only happened this morning,” he says, and I raise my hand in the air to make him stop talking. I need to clear my head.
“You knew it was going to happen though, didn’t you?” I ask him, and he only hesitates for a moment before nodding with a scowl.
“You don’t get it, though,” he says, and I just shake my head.
“I don’t want to get it. You cheated on her.”
“How could I cheat on her, kitten?” He approaches me and I freeze on the spot, unable to move a single muscle. “How could I cheat on someone I’ve never even touched in a romantic way?”
My body tenses up as he raises a hand, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “Not like this,” he says softly. “Never like this.”
“Max…” I breathe, and he stays still like that. I could very well push him off, but I don’t do it. Instead, I can barely stop myself from leaning into the palm of his hand.
“You need to explain,” I tell him. “You really need to explain what’s going on here.”
“I want to,” he tells me. “I will.”
I let him touch me for a second longer before moving away from him, needing to be free of his touch, the distraction. Every time he so much as looks at me, I melt at his feet, and I need to stay focused if I want to get to the bottom of this.
“Start at the beginning,” I tell him as I walk over to the couch. “Tell me everything that happened. How you met her, how you… fell for her.”
“I never did,” he says gruffly, joining me on the couch. I’m both relieved and disappointed to see him choose a spot so far away from me, half-wanting to just beg him to pull me closer.
“There’s one thing you need to understand,” he tells me. “This thing between your mother and me….”
Even hearing him say that is painful, and I wrap my fingers around a blanket on the couch, feeling overwhelmed.
“It’s nothing but a business transaction, Lola Grace,” Max finishes with a sigh.
I’m confused, and I need to know the answer. “What do you mean?”
“Have you heard of my last name?” he asks me. “Rivers?”
I shake my head no, and he chuckles, shaking his head. “I suppose you haven’t, you’re too young to know of my family.” He shifts on the couch, leaning his elbows against his thighs as he begins to explain his history to me.
“My father, and his father before him, ran a successful law partnership. My grandfather started it, and it’s been passed down since then. Our first big break was with my father in the eighties. He was a criminal attorney, and he was defending a very… wealthy, prominent man back then.”
“Who?” I ask, mostly because I’m genuinely curious.
“Sean O’Shea.” Max looks at me as I take in a sharp breath of air. Of course I’ve heard that name before—who hasn’t? O’Shea was a celebrity, a famous actor who got accused of murdering his wife and two children when he found out she wanted to leave him.
He was also found not guilty, largely due to the efforts of his defense attorney.
“He walked away a free man,” I say out loud.
“You could say that,” Max says slowly. “But he was arrested months later, for killing his girlfriend. That time, not even my father could save him. He confessed.”
“Why are you telling me this?” I ask him.
“Because it’s all part of the story,” Max continues. “See, after that, my dad’s firm exploded. I was a kid back then, and even I remember how big it was. Case after case, money on top of money. We made a lot back then, made a fortune.”
“And then what happened?”
Max shrugs, and I can tell this is hard for him to talk about. “Addiction. Women, booze, gambling.”
“Your father?” I ask softly, and he nods. I wish I could reach over to him and touch his hand, but he looks so far away right now, I can’t risk it. It would be like waking someone out of a trance.
“He ran the firm into the ground. By the time my mom noticed, it was almost too late. This was last year. He ruined not only his reputation, but our business and family name as well.”
“Are you close with your parents?” I ask.
Max looks right at me before simply shaking his head. “No. I am not.”
“Where does my mom come in, then?” I ask next.
“She was running her political campaign. She needed to find a supporter, someone to handle her contracts, but also bring more attention to her run for mayor,” Max tells me, and I nod. This is all stuff I’ve heard before. This damn mayoral race is all my mother has been talking about these past few years.
“She needed my father back on his feet, because he is a brilliant attorney when he’s sober,” Max finishes miserably.
“But what about you?” I ask.
“I was collateral,” he shrugs. “Your mother found out about me. She promised to give my father the job and revive the firm if I married her.”
I just stare at him blankly. “But…. Why?”
“Because she needed to appear to have a perfect family, I guess,” Max replies with a shrug. “With you off at college, she needed a man to stand beside her. And she needed the reputation of our firm to hold her afloat.”
“Why would you go along with it, though?” I ask him the most burning question, and his face instantly darkens. I watch him get up from the couch and pace the room.
“I… I had to,” he tells me. “For the sake of my family.”
“But you’re not close.” I’m just repeating the words he told me earlier, but he still glares at me when I say them.
“You don’t understand,” he tells me. “You couldn’t understand.”
“I would if you told me,” I say softly. “If you opened up to me. If you trusted me….”
He reaches me in a few long steps, towering above me on the couch. “I need to touch you,” he says, and the words send shivers down my spine. “May I touch you, Lola Grace?”
I shake my head feebly, and he kneels in front of me. It’s almost too much for me to handle, seeing this man breaking in front of me, hearing at least part of the story of why this is happening to him, to us.
“I can’t…. We can’t do this,” I manage to get out. “Not with my mother always looming over us.”
“But it’s all a farce,” Max groans. “I’ve never touched her. Never kissed her. Never wanted to, for fuck’s sake.”
“So you think it’s okay to kiss me?” I ask him. “When someone could find out and ruin her career? Didn’t you just tell me that’s why you married her? To save your firm and your family…. I don’t think it would help much to touch me right now, Max.”
He groans and gets up, and I immediately regret the words that just came out of my mouth. I want him back on his knees, back on the floor, his eyes still on mine, begging me to understand.
But instead he paces the room, running his hands through his hair. I admire the tattoos on his arms and the way his presence takes up the whole room, even though it’s huge.
“We could do this,” he tells me. “Be together. You live by yourself and I still have my apartment in the city…. No one needs to know, Lola Grace.”
“It’s not right,” I tell him.
“But you know it is,” he urges me. “You felt me. Touched me. Fucked me, Lola Grace. You know it’s right.”
I avert my eyes because it’s almost too much to take. “I can’t do this,” I say softly. “You really need to leave now.”
“Why?” He looks confused, but my vision is blurring and I can’t tell whether I’m just imagining it all. I feel the panic gripping me in its evil clutches, squeezing my throat painfully and making it impossible to move or speak. I just shake my head helplessly, gasping for air.
“Lola Grace?” Max asks me, coming towards me. I can barely see him approaching me, everything is turning into a blur. “Kitten, are you all right?”
I cling on to that one word, the name he used for me the first night we were together. Kitten. I want to be his kitt
en.
And then the memories pull me under…into the dark.
5
Max
She goes out like a light, as if someone put out the fire inside her. Lola Grace’s body collapses right there on the couch, and she slides down the cushions, almost hitting the floor before I grab her, pulling her into my arms instead. She’s shaking, her body convulsing and her fingers desperately grabbing at mine, almost digging into my skin, as if she’s searching for some kind of reassurance. Her eyes are dark and dilated and panicked, and I’m not even sure she can see me.
I want to shake her, do anything to make her come back to me. But I refrain from being rough. Instead, I cradle her head in my arms right there on the floor. Her body is shaking against mine, and she seems helpless to the convulsions consuming her.
"It's all right, Lola Grace," I murmur against her hair. "Shh, kitten, it's all going to be all right. I'm right here with you. Nothing bad is going to happen, I promise."
Slowly, her body stops shaking and she stills in my arms. She's breathing heavily.
"Where's your bedroom?" I ask her, locking my eyes on hers. I'm trying to get her to calm down, hoping that if she focuses on my eyes, maybe hers will stop dancing furiously around the room. "I'll take you to bed, don't worry, kitten. I'll tuck you in."
She weakly motions in the direction of her bedroom, and I scoop her up in my arms as if she weighs nothing. I carry her to the room she pointed to, and she shivers in my arms, trying to press herself closer and closer to me.
I put her on top of the bed, her dress riding up and revealing a tanned thigh. I restrain myself from touching her, knowing it's not what she needs right now. Instead, I pull the duvet tightly around her, and she grabs my arm, her eyes helpless and empty.
"Stay," she begs me. I look into those baby blues and I swear, I do everything in my power to walk away. But I can't fucking do it. This pull she has on me... it's magnetic, making me want to crawl into bed next to her and show her how safe she is with me.
Instead, I lie on top of the covers, our bodies separated by the thin duvet. I long to touch her, but I settle for my fingertips grazing her pretty face, trying to calm her down. Slowly, her breathing returns to normal and she calms down enough to talk to me.
“What happened, Lola Grace?” I ask her softly. “One moment, you were with me, and the next…. You were just gone. What was on your mind, kitten?"
Her eyes connect with mine, and the pain I see in them makes me angry. No person this young should be this afraid, this used to hurt. "Tell me," I urge her again, my voice determined, but soft.
"I...." Her voice is hoarse, her eyes big and dark. "I hate that you married her."
"I know, kitten," I sigh. "I know. But I'm going to get out of it, as soon as I can. Then you won't have to feel weird when I look at you... touch you."
She shivers as my finger glides over her lips. She locks eyes with mine again, saying, "I didn't like her first husband."
"Your dad?" I ask her, feeling confused, and she shakes her head no.
"My dad was mom's high school sweetheart. I never knew him. He died before I was born, in Iraq. I think that really changed my mom," she tells me, and I cherish the information Lola Grace chose to share with me like it's a jewel.
"I'm sorry," I tell her sincerely. "I know what loss feels like and... I know it's crippling."
She squeezes my hand and I go on. "What happened with your mom's second husband?"
"She remarried when I was twelve," Lola Grace tells me, turning to her side. I pull the duvet tightly around her, and she puts her hands under her cheeks, looking up at me. "He wasn't a very nice man."
"What did he do?" I ask her, already ready to smash someone's face in. "Did he try to hurt you? Did he do something to you, Lola Grace?"
She swallows thickly, and my hands form fists beside her in the bed. I swear, if there's a guy out there who tried to hurt my kitten, I'm going to knock all his teeth out.
"Where is he now?" I ask, not letting her answer my first question. I need to know where I can find this prick. It's enough that he upset her once. I'm already wildly protective of Lola Grace, and ironically, it's almost like I really am her stepfather, though her sinful body and perfect little face makes me think of anything but being her father.
"He's dead," Lola Grace tells me with a blank expression. "He died in a car accident. The car crashed into a street light and then caught on fire."
I groan in response. I didn't even know this shit, and I assume it didn't happen that long ago. Just another reason to hate Annabel, for all the shit she hid from me.
"He was off," Lola Grace says detachedly. "I knew he was off the moment I met him. His movements... his words. Jerky, fast, impatient. He used to look at me weird."
"What do you mean?" I ask her.
"He'd...." She swallows again, looking away from me. "A few weeks after they got married, he spilled juice all down my shirt."
"What?" I ask, my voice shaky.
"He just stared at me," she goes on. "At my wet shirt. And then my mom walked in and he slapped me for being clumsy in front of her."
I want to cut her off right then, but I can see she wants to keep talking. So I bite my tongue and hold my comments until she's finished.
"He tried to touch me," she goes on. "Several times. Sometimes with my mom in the room. He'd say he was doing school work with me, and touched me under the table. Told me to come sit on his lap as he read the newspaper, slid a hand up my skirt when I did it, with my mom watching TV in the same room."
"How old were you? I need to know." My hands are shaking.
"Twelve or thirteen," she replies. "When I got older, he got colder towards me. But I was always uneasy, especially when he was drunk. That's why I wanted to get my own apartment."
I lean closer to her, smoothing her hair down. "You know he can't hurt you anymore," I tell her. "He's gone now."
"Yeah," she replies with a weak smile. "He never hurt me. But I think he wanted to."
Her eyes get heavy and I can tell she's going to drift off to sleep any moment now. I stay in her bed, stroking her hair until she starts breathing heavily. I stay until she's sleeping soundly before heading out of the room.
I steal a towel from her bathroom closet and I take a shower there, because it's almost too fucking much. I don't mean to cum, but my cock just spills from the overwhelming sensation of being this close to her. I lean my head against the shower wall and realize that I fucking hate myself.
And then I rub the last drops of cum from my cock, picturing her doing it. I'm sick.
I leave in the morning without leaving a note. But not before leaving a fleeting kiss on her messy hair.
I used to get along with my parents. I had a picture-perfect life, white picket fence and all that shit. That is until my father took the case that would change all of our lives. I should've known it couldn't be good, all that media coverage. All that money. But I was just a kid—how the hell was I supposed to be aware of shit like that?
My father went down screaming and blazing in a fiery tornado. He didn't stop kicking, though, and his own determination—and the addictions he'd developed over the years—kept him afloat. He never stopped fighting. Over the years, it became the only thing I admired about the old man.
He and my mom are still together after some very tumultuous years. It’s something I should respect, but knowing they've cheated on each other plenty of times, I can't bring myself to have respect for either of them.
All this and a thousand other thoughts race through my mind as I head to the restaurant where we're meeting for brunch.
I spot them right away—my mother, an aging but impeccable beauty, and my father with bloodshot eyes and a perfectly tailored suit. And me, their only son. Their biggest fucking disappointment.
I never had the bloodlust they did. Never had the desire to succeed like them. I did finish law school, passed everything cum laude. But after that, I retreated into my own world. Didn't work,
drank too much, smoked too much. Fucked up my life all by myself, just so I wouldn't end up like my father.
Too bad there's more ways than one to mess up a life.
"Hello," I greet them as I sit down at their table.
"Hi, Maxwell," my mother responds, while my dad just grunts in response. "I trust everything is going well on your end?"
What a fucking way to ask how my sham of a marriage is doing.
"We did it yesterday," I tell them.
"We know," my father replies. "We already got the first payment in our account."
"Happy to hear," I reply in a clipped tone, once again asking myself why the fuck I'm doing this. I should've walked away from this shit when I had the chance, but now I'm knee-deep in it.
"Are you moving in with her?" mom wants to know, and I nod.
"Presumably next week. But I'm keeping the apartment."
"Why?" my father inquires. "You don't need it."
"Because I don't intend on keeping up with this farce any longer than absolutely necessary," I say firmly.
"But the mayoral race starts next year," mom reminds me, not that I fucking need her to.
"Yes, and by that time I'll be firmly out of the picture," I reply.
"That could be bad for Annabel," my father responds. "She'll need voters. A husband to stand by her side."
"Dad," I say in a warning tone. "We agreed this was for a few months only. I didn't sign up for a year."
He shrugs. "Things change. I need to have my client's best interests in mind."
"Your client's interests?" I scoff. "What about your goddamned son?"
My fist lands on the table, making the whole thing shake. We receive a few glances, and my mom spits a warning at me. I don't give a shit, though. Not now, not with Lola Grace in the picture.
"I'll play your fucking games," I tell them both. "But not for much longer."
I come to a decision on the spot. "And once we're done with this, I don't want to do you any more favors."
"Favors?" My father roars with laughter. "Like your trust fund, a favor we did for you?"
His Brat: A Dark Bad Boy Romance Page 6
