I dialed Billy. The phone connected half way through the first ring.
“Flower, where the fuck have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you.” Billy sounded unusually flustered.
“What’s going on? Did something happen to Addy? Oh my god, did she choke or something?” I’d nearly choked on a Lifesaver at age eight. The experience was horrifying. My mom had just died and the Colonel called 911. Since I was still partially breathing, the operator advised letting the Lifesaver melt. Ten minutes it took for my partially blocked airway to fully clear. The Colonel was calm, almost icy. After, I accused him of not loving me because he hadn’t even cried. Later on, he explained he’d been frozen with fear. It was one of the few times he shared his feelings with me. And it made me uncomfortable, trying to reconcile the indifferent Colonel with human emotions. I wanted him to feel, but I didn’t know how to handle it.
“What? No,” Billy said, drawing me from the memory. “You sound out of breath. Are you all right?”
My hand gripped the phone tighter. “I’m fine. What’s the emergency Billy?”
“Addy’s crying and I can’t get her to stop. I knew this would happen. Didn’t I tell you she has separation anxiety? You’ve really done it now, flower. She may never forgive you.”
I swallowed the lump forming in my throat. “Put Addy on the phone.”
Some shuffling and then, “D-daisy when are you coming back?” Addy’s little voice was thick with tears.
“What’s the matter, sweetheart?”
“I can’t find my favorite pillowcase.” Addy had this ratty pillowcase she liked to sleep with, the only thing left over from her days in foster care. “And the rooms in this hotel are too dark, I’m scared. I need you to sleep with me.”
“Maybe you can sleep with your father?” I suggested, hoping the solution would ease her tears, getting me off the phone and back in Colin’s arms. “You two can have a slumber party. Wouldn’t that be fun?” I put all the enthusiasm I had into my voice.
Muffled noises, it sounded like someone was covering the mouthpiece. Suspicion skirted a finger along my spine. If this was one of Billy’s tricks … Addy came back to the phone. “No, we—I need you to come now.”
I didn’t miss her slip up. She’d said we. Billy had put her up to this. I bit my lip, trying to gauge whether her tears were real or fake. “Put Billy back on the phone.”
A second ticked by. “Flower?”
“Addy’s scared of the dark, see if she’ll go to sleep if you leave the light on in the bathroom.”
“That’s all?” Billy sounded cranky. A sure sign he wasn’t getting what he wanted.
I breathed in and out, in and out. My gaze landed on Colin, reclining on the bed, hard-on still evident under his jeans. I licked my lips. He cocked a “what are you thinking” eyebrow at me. “No, that’s not all. I’ll be there as soon as I can. I need to find a flight.”
“No need, flower.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “I’ve got an airplane waiting for you.”
I hung up without saying another word. Son of a bitch had played me. I bet he wanted me back to iron his underwear or lotion his chest. Okay, I’d kind of be into that. But then I remembered the sound of Addy’s voice, her fear, her sweet plea. Whether or not she was faking, I couldn’t let her down. Better to be safe than sorry.
I looked at my Navy SEAL and nearly cried. “I’m sorry, can I take a rain check?”
Billy sent a private jet. The flight took just under three hours, then another forty-minute town car ride to Billy’s hotel. We pulled up to the Four Seasons at half past eleven. The concierge was waiting with a penthouse key card for me. Whenever possible, Billy liked to stay in a hotel’s presidential suite. Made him feel important. As if his super ego needed any more inflating.
I burst into the penthouse, seeing Billy first. He was splayed on a linen couch, brown drink in hand. The room was decorated with shiny, lacquered wood walls and floor-to-ceiling windows displaying the New York skyline and the rolling green of Central Park. A fire blazed. The scene looked romantic, cozy—homey. Instantly, I missed my Navy SEAL. I hadn’t even begun to scratch my itch.
“Where’s Addy?” I asked, letting my purse and bag slip from my shoulder to the floor.
“She’s sleeping,” he said, throwing back the drink.
“Oh.” My brows darted in. “I guess I’ll go check on her.”
“You missed my turkey with a beer shoved up its ass.”
Across the palatial room, a mahogany table was set with the remnants of a Thanksgiving dinner fit for a queen—silver dishes and crystal goblets gleamed in the firelight.
“Sorry,” I called out, heading for the hallway. Addy was behind one of those doors. Even if she was sleeping, I could still kiss her goodnight, make sure her pillowcase, AKA stand-in blankie, was tucked safely under her chin.
“That’s all you got to say to me?” Billy hollered. “No happy Thanksgiving, or thanks for the airplane?”
I stopped in my tracks. At my sides, my hands balled into fists. A million curse words filled my mouth. I twirled around. “Happy Thanksgiving, Billy.”
He frowned at me. Frowned at me! “You don’t sound very happy. Do you want a drink?” he asked, bending forward. On the coffee table sat a half-empty bottle of what looked like expensive whiskey. He poured himself a healthy helping.
“No.” I gritted my teeth so hard my molars nearly cracked. “I want to go check on Addy, then I want to take a shower and go to sleep.” What the actual fuck? Everything seemed under control here. If I didn’t find tear stains on Addison’s face, I was going to lose my shit. I wondered if Billy would press charges if I took a pair of scissors to all his clothes, especially his vintage T-shirts. He obsessed over them, made me wrap them in tissue when I put them away.
“You seem particularly hostile this evening, flower.”
I rubbed my forehead. “Billy, it’s almost midnight. I left Tampa without telling my father.” Not that he would care. “When you called it was a bad time—” I caught myself before finishing.
Billy sat forward. “Bad time?” He scrutinized me, his look grew angry. “You sounded out of breath. Were you fighting with someone? Was someone hurting you?”
I stared up at the ceiling. “No. I was … I was doing things.”
“Things?” questioned Billy, clearly bewildered. I dropped my chin, gaze meeting his. Understanding dawned all over his happy face. “Oh, you were …”
“Yes,” I hissed. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to—”
Billy set his chin. “I don’t know how I feel about that.”
“I’m sorry?” Too bad nobody asked you, I thought.
He shook his head, stood and sauntered to me. “No, I don’t think I care for that at all.” He stopped inches from me, drink still in hand. “What kind of example does that set for little bird?” His breath smelled of whiskey and cinnamon and pumpkin. The pumpkin did it for me. I licked my lips.
“Addy was states away,” I reasoned. My hands clenched and unclenched, energy sparked between us.
Billy swallowed the last of his drink and sat it on a nearby glass-topped table with a decisive thunk. “Still, can’t have you flaunting your extracurriculars around my daughter. One of us has to be the responsible one, flower.” He ran a finger down my cheek. I wished I hadn’t refused the drink. I could use some liquid courage.
“If I’m the responsible one, who are you then?”
He smiled, wicked and charming, the way I’d seen him do around so many groupies, and Svetlana. Poor Svetlana. Billy had broken it off with her. They’d lasted three weeks, just enough time for Svetlana to emotionally invest and Billy to freak out. “I’m the fun one, flower.”
“I’m sorry I asked.”
He chuckled, a husky timbre I felt all the way down to my toes. I’d witnessed Billy in seduction mode, but I’d never been on the receiving end of it. Even when he’d hit on me during my interview, a part of him seemed reserved, like he was
holding back. The mood he was in tonight was unusual, broody, and something else I couldn’t put my finger on. He just wasn’t quite his irreverent self. Did the holidays make Billy melancholy? “So who was he?” he asked.
My thoughts were muddled, a pile of pudding under Billy’s sensual assault. “Who?”
“The guy you were with, flower.”
I swallowed. “His name is Colin.” I could still feel the burn from his stubble on my breasts.
“Colin,” Billy scoffed. He stepped back and crossed his arms. “Sounds like a namby pamby. I’ve never met a Colin I liked.”
Breathing came easier. Without Billy standing so close I could focus. My thoughts cleared, sharpened. “Well it’s a good thing you’ve never met him.” And you never will.
“What does Colin do anyway? The last Colin I met still lived in his mother’s house, in the basement, and had very pale skin, kind of like a vampire. I hope this chap isn’t the same one.”
“Actually he’s a Navy SEAL.” I threw my shoulders back, put my chin up.
Billy wandered the living room, arriving back at the expensive bottle of whiskey. He took a swig straight from the bottle. I guess he’d moved past the need for glasses. “A Navy SEAL? I’m not familiar. And I’m not intimidated by a man who’s a member of some porpoise group.”
“Actually they’re kind of known in the states as elite warriors.”
Another scoff from Billy. “You should suggest they change their name to the pirates.” He waited a beat. “Or the honey badgers, those are some bad motherfuckers.” He chugged the bottle, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “On second thought, maybe I should meet him if he’s going to be in our lives.”
I stared at my now slightly drunk boss. “He’s not going to be in your lives.”
One blond eyebrow quirked imperiously at me. “No?”
“No, he’s in my life.” I wish he was inside me right now. “I am in your life. But you two will never cross paths. It’s like a Venn diagram.” I spied a pad of paper and box of markers. Addy liked to draw before bedtime. I sketched out a Venn diagram, two circles overlapping in the middle. Above the left circle I put my name and above the right Billy’s. At the intersection I placed Addy. Then I wrote Colin’s name, complete with a heart over the i, inside my circle. “See.” I held the paper up, showing it to Billy. “Billy and Colin no meet, ever.”
Billy was in front of me in seconds, he tore the diagram from my fingers. He set the paper down and drew a large circle around the diagram. “You’ve got it all wrong, flower.” He scratched out his name and scribbled it back in the much larger circle, the one encompassing my circle. “I’m your universe, you just don’t know it yet.”
My mouth parted.
“Ah, you’re speechless, finally.” He cupped my cheek and his palm was warm, even against my flushed skin. I blinked slowly then drew my eyes up to meet his. His eyes were the color of jade and charcoal rimmed, as if they’d been charred at the edges.
“Billy,” I whispered.
“Yes, flower?” He regarded me through half-lidded eyes.
“Addy wasn’t really upset was she?”
“No,” he simply said. “She missed you but I prompted her to call.”
“Why?” My throat felt dry.
“I needed you to come back. I can’t sleep without the sound of your snoring in the other room.”
I scrunched up my nose. “I don’t snore.”
“You do. And sometimes you even giggle, sounds kind of like that insane tiger from the show Addy used to love, the one about the fat bear obsessed with honey.”
“Winnie the Pooh.”
“That’s the one. Now, if you don’t mind shutting your pretty mouth, I’m going to kiss you.” He bent down and his lips pressed against mine. He kissed my top lip, then my bottom, nibbling them. “Let me in, flower,” he said against my mouth. This was wrong. So wrong. Addy was sleeping in the next room. Despite my reservations, my hands went to his chest, fisting his t-shirt and pulling him closer. Underneath the thin fabric, I could feel his hard chest and beneath that the thunder of his heart. Its beat matched mine. Billy swiped my lips with his tongue and I opened my mouth, pressing my body against his, wrapping my arms around his neck. I dreamt of us kissing before but it hadn’t ever been like this. Wet and hot, with the force of a million suns.
“Fuck, flower,” Billy growled against my mouth. “You know how many times I’ve thought about doing this?”
“Have you?” I mused.
He pressed kisses along my jaw, down my neck. Teeth grazed my ear lobe. “Every time you run your mouth at me. Every time you flip me off. When you put red hair dye in my shampoo.” His hand dug into my hair. His other hand cupped my ass with bruising strength, pain morphed to pleasure.
A small laugh escaped me. His hair still appeared pink in certain light. He hadn’t spoken to me for two days after that. Best two days of my life.
“You think you’re so goddamn funny.” The hand on my ass whipped back and then landed again with a slap on my denim-clad left cheek. “That’s for licking my bacon.” Oh, he knew about that. “You deserve that and more but fuck if I care. I want to take you somewhere dark and quiet and have you all to myself.”
Somehow we’d positioned ourselves near the fire. Beads of sweat trickled down my back. Billy’s hands left my hair and ass and snaked up my T-shirt. He cupped my breasts. “Natural,” he said. “I fucking knew it.”
I threw my head back and moaned. His thumbs flicked over my lace-covered nipples. My eyes fluttered open. I wanted to watch, to see his big palms cupping my flesh. My vision snagged on the table, on Addy’s drawings. She’d sketched a picture of the three of us—Billy, her and me—standing together in front of a house. Apprehension cut through my lust.
A hand left my breast and dug into my hair, directing my mouth back to his. Controlling bastard. His lips were centimeters from mine. “No.” My denial came out weak and unconvincing. I grabbed a hold of his wide shoulders, managing to push him back just an inch. “Addy,” I said.
“She’s sleeping, flower.” He rubbed my breast. Oh, that felt good. I stifled a moan and a shudder of pleasure.
“We can’t. Remember when you hired me? It’s one of your rules,” I feebly explained. I remembered all too well. I think we should fuck, he’d said as part of his odd interview.
“Just because the door to the house is locked doesn’t mean we can’t play in the yard.” He sucked on my neck and squeezed my breast. That was a good combination. Like a Big Mac and fries, it just went together. I let him go for a moment, his clever fingers working my flesh, his mouth plundering mine.
Addy’s picture caught my eye again. “No,” I said, and this time it was firm, a bucket of ice water pouring over our heated exchange.
Billy stepped back, more like staggered. His eyes were dilated. “Fuck!” he ground out, running a hand through his hair. Two giant steps and he had the whiskey bottle back in hand. This time he chugged a good quarter of it.
I straightened my clothing, pretending my world hadn’t just fallen apart and come back together again in some new, unrecognizable way. Things had changed. “We should talk about what just happened.” My voice sounded small, inconsequential.
Billy wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “What did just happen, flower?” I didn’t like his tone, cutting and condescending.
I swallowed, stepped away from the fireplace. “Clearly, there’s something going on here.” I motioned at the space between us. “But nothing can happen. Right?”
Billy tilted his head, giving me nothing. A muscle ticked along his cheek. Perhaps he was still feeling the aftershocks of that kiss. I know I was.
“Addy,” I said. “Addy comes first.”
He flung himself onto the couch. He rested his head on the back and placed an arm over his eyes. “I probably won’t even remember this in the morning.”
I winced. This had been important to me, but not to him. I was just a warm body, somethi
ng to take the place of groupies and model girlfriends. “Yeah.” I went for a lighthearted tone. Didn’t quite nail it though.
“The holidays, they fuck me up, flower.” He took another swig of the bottle.
“Oh?” I approached him.
He removed his arm and gazed at me. “I grew up in a small town in England, my dad ran an auto shop. It’s been in his family for years, he made me start working there when I was ten. I hated fixing the cars, the way the grease would gum up under my nails. Even then I knew my hands were meant for something else, something better.” His hand flexed around the bottle. “Wankskovsky Auto, that’s the name of my pop’s shop. The kids in town used to call me Wanks, they thought it was funny, making me into some jerk-off. When I started the band with Jett I changed my name permanently to Wanks. I showed all those fuckers. I took the name they tried to shame me with and put it up in lights.” He laughed, then grew silent for a moment, somber. He picked at the bottle’s label with his thumbs. “Behind the auto shop was a field. I used to hang out there, in the tall grass where nobody could see me, where the kids couldn’t find me. I used to fancy forest sprites lived there. You’re exactly what I pictured.” He smiled at me a little crooked, a lot beautiful. “A forest sprite with little fangs and ugly sweaters.”
I shook my head, a smile touched my lips. Somehow this moment felt even more intimate than our kiss. “You’re an awful man, Billy Wanks.”
“I don’t deny it.”
I sat carefully on the other end of the couch, folding a leg beneath me. “Do your parents still own the auto shop?”
His lips twitched, he looked away. “I don’t know. They disowned me after I started the band and changed my name. I wasn’t any good to them as a poor musician. I showed them though.” A ghost of a smile skirted past his lips. “I made it big. They came back around when they knew I had money, tried to get a hold of me through Steve, and when that didn’t work they sold my life story to the tabloids.”
“I’m sorry.” The apology didn’t seem like enough.
Hard Lessons: (A Wild Minds Prequel Novel) Page 5
