by Naima Simone
“Sure thing.” Gregory cupped Cain’s shoulder once more and squeezed. “We’ll continue our talk later, Cain.”
He didn’t bother replying and as soon as the man disappeared into the crowd, Kenan snorted. “I just met the man, but he has me wanting to take a dip in a bleach bath.” He slid Cain a glance. “No offense.”
“None taken.” Cain sipped his Scotch. “Believe me.”
“Good thing you’re marrying his daughter and not him,” Achilles added, pushing off the small bar. “Although, I have to wonder if you’re really marrying anyone.”
Shock whipped through Cain. “What are you talking about?”
“Devon. Your fiancée,” Achilles said, his deep voice lowering. “She wasn’t wearing a ring during your engagement photo shoot. When a man proposes it’s normally with a ring.”
Shit. He forced himself not to look in Devon’s direction. Or glance down at her bare fingers. He hadn’t thought of buying her a ring—it hadn’t occurred to him. His gut twisted. Who else had noticed? Were they speculating even now about why Cain Farrell hadn’t bought his new fiancée—the woman he was supposed to be hopelessly in love with—an engagement ring?
“I don’t think anyone else has noticed. Or at least they aren’t gossiping about it,” Kenan said.
“At least not within our hearing,” Achilles muttered, tipping his bottle up for a sip.
“Anything you’d like to share?” Kenan asked, cocking his head to the side and studying Cain with a narrowed gaze.
The truth shoved at his throat, catching him by surprise. But he remained silent. Old habits died hard. He’d been the keeper of his family’s secrets for so many years that he was a professional at not sharing his burdens with others. If he didn’t hand over information to people, they couldn’t use it against him.
They couldn’t pity him.
Kenan sighed. “Listen, Cain, I’m well aware you don’t think of us as brothers. And you haven’t known us long enough to trust us. But you don’t have to trust Achilles and me for us to have your back. Whatever you need us to say or do, just tell us. We don’t need to know what’s going on or why. Until you’re ready to share.”
It would’ve meant someone who had your back. No matter what. No questions asked. It would’ve meant not being alone.
Devon’s wistful words drifted to him.
Kenan was right; he didn’t trust them. Given his childhood, he’d learned at too young an age not to have unconditional faith in anyone except his mother. But here stood the two men who shared his DNA and not much else, offering him their loyalty? What had Cain done to earn that?
They were fools to give it.
And yet the words to say so froze on his tongue.
“Thanks,” he said. Clearing his throat, he scanned the room for Devon. He spotted his mother but his “fiancée” no longer stood by her side. “Have either of you seen Devon?” he asked, frowning.
“No,” Achilles said. “Last I saw, her father pulled her away from your mother to speak with her. That was several minutes ago.” He arched an eyebrow. “Why? Is everything okay?”
Cain coerced his lips into a smile. “Of course. If you’ll excuse me.”
He laid his drink on the bar and went in search of Devon and Gregory. What was so important that Gregory would leave his guests to talk to Devon?
Unease slid between Cain’s ribs, lodging in his chest. It couldn’t mean anything good.
For him.
“Dad, what’s going on? Is everything okay?” Devon frowned as she followed her father into the library.
Not that she was complaining about getting a breather from the party. No, she was thankful for the reprieve. These social events were tedious and painful for her at the best of times. But to be the center of attention? The focus of speculative glances and pseudo whispers? Many of which wondered how she, a fat nobody, had managed to snag one of the most eligible bachelors in the city.
Yes. Torture.
Her father, on the other hand, was in his element. Already, the fruits of his scheming labors were coming to pass with the who’s who of Boston society. He was a king sitting on his throne. All he’d had to do was blackmail a man and sacrifice his daughter’s future to accomplish it.
She studied her father as he strode to the built-in bar on the other side of the library and prepared a drink. She tried not to allow bitterness to swallow her whole. The man who’d taught her how to ride a bike and then tenderly picked her up and wiped her tears after she fell—he couldn’t have entirely disappeared. The man her mother had loved still had to exist. And because of those memories and occasional glimpses of that loving, supportive father... Because of her mother and the promise Devon had made to her...she couldn’t give up on him. She had to believe the man he’d been wasn’t completely lost.
“How’re you and Cain getting along?” he asked, his back to her.
She frowned. “Fine, I suppose.” How did he expect them to get along? Cain was being blackmailed. He viewed her as one of the conspirators. He loathed her.
Even if he kisses like he filed the patent on it.
She mentally shook her head. As if lust had anything to do with affection or love. Donald had taught her that.
“Fine? You’ll have to do better than that.” He faced her, his drink in hand. “Do you think people haven’t noticed that you two seem distant toward one another? This is your engagement party and neither of you appear happy to be here. People talk. Then they’ll start to speculate.” He swirled the amber alcohol in his glass. “You need to try harder, Devon. After everything I’ve arranged on your behalf, you need to do better so all of my hard work doesn’t go to waste. This relationship might not have been his idea, but if you put in a little more effort, he may forget about that. I need Cain happy. And that is your responsibility.”
“Careful, Dad,” Devon drawled. “With talk like that, you’re edging close to prostitution. And you’re not pimping me out, are you?”
He uttered a sound somewhere between disgust and impatience. “Don’t be ridiculous. This is all for you, for the children you’ll one day have. So you will never have to endure what your mother and I did—poverty, powerlessness, invisibility. No one will look down on you, and I’m ensuring that. Is it pretty? No. But there’s nothing fair about this world we live in. Even Cain understands that.”
“I really think you believe that, Dad,” she murmured, sadness hollowing out her chest. “But Mom would’ve been happy living in a Plainfield, New Jersey, duplex surrounded by family. And maybe we didn’t live in a Back Bay townhome with money at our disposal, but we were happy. We had love, community and joy. We had each other. I don’t care if other people accept me. Money can’t buy that acceptance and it definitely can’t provide what we had back in Plainfield.”
“Spoken like a person who has never known what it is to work their fingers to the bone to provide for their family,” he sneered. “But that is in the past. Your mother isn’t here, and I’m going to provide for you in the way I see fit. Which brings me to another topic...” He lifted his glass and sipped from it, regarding her from over the rim. “It’s come to my attention that Farrell International has a real estate project in the works near TD Garden and North Station. It includes a concert venue, shops, an office tower, hotels, condominiums in a five-hundred-unit, sixty-floor residential tower, as well as transit upgrades to North Station. Farrell is apparently accepting only a handful of investors for the development. I intend to be one of those investors.”
She shook her head, shrugging. “I don’t know what that has to do with me.”
“Everything,” he countered. Placing his unfinished drink on the bar behind him, he strode across the room and halted in front of her. “Right now, Cain isn’t feeling very...charitable toward me.”
Devon snorted. Now wasn’t that the understatement of the millennium.
“That’s where you come in. I need you to convince him to invite me to be an investor on the project.”
The crack of laughter escaped her before she could contain it. “You’re not serious?” Another incredulous chuckle climbed the back of her throat but then she narrowed her gaze on her father’s darkening expression. “You are serious,” she whispered, stunned. “Dad, that’s cra—”
“Thanks to me, you are now engaged to one of the most powerful men in Boston—”
“I didn’t ask you to do that for me. I want nothing to do with it,” she interrupted.
“Thanks to me, you are the envy of every woman in this house, in this city,” he continued, raising his voice and rolling over her protest. “The very least you can do is help me. A project this size would mean millions in profit for not just me but for all of my clients. To be in business with Farrell International would establish my company as one of the wealthiest and most successful boutique investment firms in the country. All you have to do is speak to Cain and use your influence to convince him to let me in on it.”
“Influence?” She scoffed, slicing a hand between them. “What influence? He hates me just a little bit less than he hates you. And even if I did have that kind of sway with him, I wouldn’t do it. I have no idea what you’re holding over him, but isn’t it enough that you’re forcing him into a marriage he wants no part of? Now you want to trick him into a business deal? No.” She shook her head, vehement. “You were just telling me how all of this is for me. This is about you, Dad. All you. And I won’t be a part of taking more from Cain.”
“Where’s your loyalty?” he snarled, crowding closer and jabbing a finger at her. “You are my daughter. Your first allegiance is to me, not to a man who wouldn’t even know you existed if not for my hand pulling the strings. You owe me.”
“I owe you?” she repeated on the tail end of a disbelieving chuckle. “And when do I stop paying, Dad? When is my bill wiped clean? When do I no longer need to whore myself out for your ambitions?”
Anger darkened his green eyes to nearly black pools and red mottled his skin. His mouth disappeared into a hard, angry line. He edged closer, looming over her. “Don’t you ever talk to me like that—”
“Get the hell away from her.”
Devon jolted. The seething fury in that voice had her jerking her head toward the library entrance. Her father stiffened, the corner of his mouth curling as he stepped back and turned to face Cain.
An avenging angel.
The words whispered through her head, and even though she acknowledged the sentiment as fanciful and silly, she couldn’t erase it. With his powerful body, starkly beautiful face and an aura of righteous wrath, the only things missing were wings. She shivered. In apprehension? In fear? In...excitement? She didn’t care to answer that question.
He stalked forward, and, oh God, part of her wanted to run to him, to burrow against that wide chest.
It was the need that kept her feet firmly rooted.
“This is family business, Cain,” her father growled. “Which means it’s none of yours.”
“You made it my business when you forced your way into my life. When you threatened my mother’s reputation. When you made your daughter collateral in a back-alley deal with my father. So no, Cole. Devon is my business.”
Devon is my business.
The statement seemed to echo in the sudden stillness of the room. It reverberated in her ears like a pulse. Pounded in her chest like an anvil. Throbbed low in her belly like an ache. To a person who’d spent the last sixteen years of her life never belonging to anything, anyone or anywhere, that announcement hit her like a drug. One she would be wise to resist.
“This is ridiculous,” her father bit out. “I have guests.”
Throwing one more glare at her, he stormed out of the library, the door closing with a heavy click. Silence vibrated in the room, so dense, she swore it pressed against her skin. Anger still clung to Cain, but it didn’t alarm or frighten her. His outrage was on her behalf, not directed at her.
When was the last time someone had leaped to her defense? Had sought to protect instead of use her? For the second time in as many minutes, she shied away from answers she would regret.
“Has he ever put his hands on you?” Cain ground out, his predator eyes blazing bright.
“No,” she whispered. Then clearing her throat, she shook her head for added emphasis. “No, he wouldn’t do that. Whatever your opinion of him, he’s never been physically abusive.”
Being emotionally neglectful was another matter.
“You’re not lying to me, are you, Devon?” he pressed, his gaze searching her face. She fought not to squirm under its inspection. “You’re not just trying to protect him?”
Irritation surged within her, but something—call it intuition—suppressed the flash of impatience. Beneath the rigid lines of his face and the growl in his voice lurked...worry? No. It was deeper than that. More...visceral. It was darker. Her heart knocked against her sternum as a completely absurd thought crept into her head, twisted her belly.
Had Barron Farrell hurt Cain?
As soon as the thought flickered through her mind, she slapped it down. Impossible. God no. She had no proof of that whatsoever. In an insular ecosystem such as Boston society, surely she would’ve heard some kind of rumor.
You just don’t want to imagine it’s possible.
An image of a younger Cain shrinking away from a larger, malevolent figure shot inside her head before she could stop it. Cain in pain, scared, victimized... She clenched her fingers into fists, the sudden, fierce longing to strike out against that figure so strong, so intense, a tremble shivered through her.
But in the next instant, she silently ordered herself to calm down, to get it together. Cain had walked in on an argument between her and her father. Yes, his assumption had been wrong, but objectively she could understand why he’d come to that conclusion. None of that meant he was a victim of abuse himself.
Given her overactive imagination, maybe she needed to start writing fantasy novels.
“No, I’m not covering for him,” she finally replied. “Cain, I promise you. I wouldn’t lie to you about that.”
He stared at her for several more moments before nodding, the movement stiff.
“What were you arguing about?” he demanded.
The truth pushed at her throat, but that loyalty her father accused her of not having shoved back. If she told Cain about her father’s request, he would see it as another attempt to manipulate him, to extort him. Gregory held something over Cain, but the billionaire reminded her of a prowling beast, waiting for just the right opening to leap and devour. She refused to be the conduit for that opportunity. Gregory might not value prudence when it came to this man, but she did. And if she had to save her father from himself, then so be it.
But speaking of the something Gregory held over Cain...
She moved toward him even though every primal instinct shouted she should maintain a safe distance. Still, she didn’t stop until only inches separated them, and she had to tilt her head back to peer up into his face. His earthy, woodsy scent filled her nose. His heat called out to her, enticed her to share it. Briefly, she closed her eyes, combatting the lure that was him.
“You said my father threatened your mother’s reputation. What did you mean?” she asked, fairly certain he wouldn’t grant her the truth. Since he believed her to be her father’s accomplice, he probably assumed she knew and was engaging in a coy game.
He didn’t reply, but stared down at her, ice chilling his eyes. She read the “fuck you” there before he uttered it.
But he didn’t utter it.
“Your father and my mother had an affair several years ago. My parents’ marriage was not a happy one. Since I was old enough to understand what their arguments meant, I knew Barron was unfaithful. When your fathe
r arrived at my office to tell me about the affair, I didn’t judge her. She just made the mistake of having an affair with the wrong man.”
He calls his father by his first name.
The words swirled in her head.
“Apparently, before Barron died, Gregory went to him with evidence of his affair with Mom. Videos, pictures, texts, emails. To keep it from going public, no doubt so he didn’t look like a fool who couldn’t satisfy his wife,” Cain sneered, disgust dripping from his tone, “Barron signed a contract with your father. The terms were simple—Gregory remained quiet about the affair and agreed not to release any of his evidence to the press and my father would hand me over.”
Oh God. She splayed her hand over her rapidly pounding heart. There was only one place for this to head. One. And part of her couldn’t stand to hear it. The filthy by association part.
“The week after Barron’s funeral, your father showed up with his contract, demanding I honor it, or he would ensure every trash tabloid and gossip site received those pictures, videos and texts. I either marry his daughter or sit by and watch my mother’s reputation be ripped apart click by click, view by view. So, I agreed.”
She gasped—disbelief, repulsion and pain struck her like tiny fists. White noise exploded in her head and bile scorched a path toward her throat. How could her father do that? How could he use Cain’s mother as a bargaining chip? Would he have been so quick to do the same to her own mother? To his wife? Where did his boundaries lie? Or had greed and ambition obliterated all lines?
She was going to be sick. Her suddenly leaden feet stumbled back. She clutched a hand to her stomach, bending over at the waist.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught Cain’s movement toward her, but she shot out an arm, palm up in the age-old signal of stop. She couldn’t bear a touch. Not when she was so fragile. One gentle wisp of air would shatter her.
But he didn’t stop. He walked around her, and strong, muscular arms encircled her from behind, steadying her, holding her up when her legs threatened to give out. A rock-hard chest braced her while powerful thighs supported her. All that strength and brawn—for her, and she greedily, shamelessly, took advantage.
