Lies

by Aleatha Romig

  “And you say I’m perceptive.”

  He looked up from my wound. This time as our eyes met, both our lips curled upward, threatening a smile. The next second, he pulled me against him, my hand trapped between us.

  “Wait,” I said, mumbling against his chest and trying to pull away, “I don’t want to get blood on your shirt.”

  Sighing, he didn’t loosen his embrace. Beneath his starched shirt and against my ear, his heart beat in double time. “I don’t give a fuck about the shirt. You were gone...” His chin came to rest on the top of my head. “It didn’t make sense, yet...don’t do that again.”

  Placing a hand on his chest, I pushed myself away and tried to peer upward. “I wasn’t gone. I can’t...” I sighed, refusing to go down that road again tonight. “I was downstairs eating. I noticed your plate wasn’t touched.”

  “I lost my appetite.”

  Leaning back farther, I looked up at him. “I don’t want to fight with you. I don’t. But you need to listen to me. I have to be in the office tomorrow. The meeting I told you about is with Pauline McFadden. Her husband is a United States senator and is considering a bid for the White House. Having Pauline wear Sinful Threads would be a marketing opportunity that I can’t pass up.”

  With each of my words, Sterling’s jaw clenched tighter until the cords were once again visible in his neck.

  “What is it? Why are you turning dark?”

  “Dark?”

  “It’s what you do...your expression hardens and you...I don’t know...your eyes...”

  He took a deep breath, and as he did his chest pressed against me, causing my breasts to flatten. “Come to the bathroom and let me look at your finger. After all, if you cut it on the glass it’s my fault. We need to talk.”

  Was admitting that it was his fault the same as an apology?

  No, but I had the feeling that with Sterling, it was still a step in the right direction.

  I didn’t move. “There’s more. Winnie has something going on. I don’t want to leave her. I asked Reid to look into it.”

  “He told me.” He reached for my uninjured hand. “Come this way.”

  Allowing Sterling to lead me, I followed as he tugged me through the bedroom and into the bathroom, hitting every switch as if he commanded the afternoon sun to shine.

  I squinted, unaccustomed to so much light. “Jeez, Sterling. It’s too bright.”

  “No, sunshine, I need to see that finger.”

  “It’s only a cut,” I said again as his hands came to my waist and he lifted me like a doll, setting me on the edge of the vanity. Then he gently reached for my wounded finger and removed the paper towel. My face scrunched as he squeezed the end of my finger, forcing out more droplets of blood. “Ouch.”

  His face lowered, inspecting the cut. “Let me get some tweezers. I think there’s still glass in there.”

  I withdrew my hand. “Um, no. It’s all right. Maybe I could just run it under the water more?”

  “After I get the glass.”

  “Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”

  “The medics are overworked in wartime. We all did what we could.” His dark gaze glistened as his lips quirked. “My superhero talents are broad and diverse. It will take years for you to witness them all.”

  Years?

  With my lip once again between my teeth, Sterling searched through the drawers, setting out tweezers, antibiotic ointment, and a Band-Aid. Though I closed my eyes as he fished for the crystal, it didn’t hurt as much as I’d thought it would. Instead, I was suddenly besieged by a new emotion.

  I couldn’t recall the last time someone had taken care of me—yes, there was Dr. Dixon, but she was a doctor. I then remembered Sterling’s care the morning he helped me shower after the poisoning. As he tended to my finger, I was struck by the care and compassion he demonstrated. It was in stark contrast to how he behaved other times.

  Perhaps he was right. It would take me years to learn all the sides of Sterling Sparrow.

  When he looked up, his head tilted as his thumb came to my cheek. “I’m sorry if that hurt.”

  I hadn’t realized that another tear had fallen until he’d wiped it away. I shook my head. “Thank you for doing it—for taking care of me.”

  “Someday you’ll get it, Araneae. You’re mine. I take care of what is mine.” He lifted me from the counter allowing my feet to be back on the floor. “Wash it well, and then I’ll put on the ointment and bandage.”

  “You’re bossy,” I said, looking at him in the large mirror over the vanity.

  His lips came to my neck. “Get used to it.”

  I hated to admit it, but I was getting there—getting used to him.

  Once the bandage was in place, Sterling kissed the Band-Aid.

  I wrapped my arms around his toned torso and buried my face into his chest. His shirt had the lingering scent of his expensive cologne as my senses filled with musk and spice. “I meant it, Sterling, thank you. You can drive me crazy, make me angry, and then...” I looked up. “...you do something so unexpected.” I sighed. “You’re a complicated man.”

  Surrounding me in his strong arms, he rested his chin on my head. “I wish this could be the end of our night. Say we’re sorry and have some great make-up sex.”

  Was that the apology?

  I shrugged. “I’m exhausted, but I’m game.”

  He lifted my chin. “Sorry, we need to have that talk.” He glanced at the shower stall. “I’m going to take a quick shower while you get ready for bed. I’ll meet you there. Then we’ll talk.”

  “What if I’m talked out?”

  “Remember the night at the cabin when I told you there were more things to discuss and you said they could wait?”

  My eyes opened wide. “Did another plane crash?”

  “Not yet. That’s what we need to discuss.”

  Araneae

  Sterling kissed my hair before walking out of the bathroom. My mind wanted to know what he was going to say, what warranted discussion over make-up sex. My body was on the brink of not caring. After the evening we’d had, the mood wasn’t exactly erotic. Tender would be a better description.

  The anger and rage from downstairs had dissipated. The tenderness didn’t forgive that the anger had occurred, yet the current climate counterbalanced it, much as in nature. Perhaps the night could be best equated to the calm following a storm. The atmosphere, having been volatile and explosive, rumbling with thunder as lightning strikes zigzagged through the sky, becomes quiet, the energy degenerating or becoming something else. Where there had once been clouds and flashes, the sky was now clear, the mood now peaceful and calm.

  Storms served a purpose. Lightning contained nitrogen needed in soil. Without the lightning, the soil would become unable to support the growth of plants. Man could add it chemically, yet there was nothing like a good storm to bring nature back to life.

  Maybe with Sterling, they also served a purpose—a balance.

  As I began to ready myself for the night, Sterling returned to the bathroom, his clothes now gone. From his reflection in the large mirror before me, I scanned him up and down—from his mussed hair to his day’s worth of beard growth, down farther to his broad shoulders and defined abs. My vision halted as it scanned even lower.

  Sterling may have said he wanted to talk, but his body was considering other things.

  I turned around, my lip secured between my teeth as my smile grew, pulling my lip from its captivity. When our eyes met, I said, “If you want to talk, you’re using the wrong technique.”

  His head shook. “You’re killing me. But I’d bet you already knew that.”

  “What if I decide to join you for the shower?”

  He reached for my hand. “Your Band-Aid would get wet, and all that hard work will be for nothing.” After a chaste kiss to my finger, he turned away and stepped into the large shower. Steam floated through the air, rising above the glass.

  Working to keep my bandage dry, I w
ashed my face, brushed my teeth and hair, and smoothed lotion on my skin.

  The humid bathroom filled with the scent of bodywash and shampoo until the hot water ceased and Sterling stepped from the enclosure. Even through the mirror, his skin glistened under the reflection of the lights upon the droplets of water slowly descending his toned body. Our eyes met in the foggy reflection.

  “I hope you like what you see,” he said with a grin.

  I turned back to him as he wrapped a plush towel around his waist. “Was I drooling? Because I just might have been drooling.”

  Taking a step closer, he cupped my chin and ran his thumb under my lips. “Nope, I think you’re good.”

  Leaving me alone, he went back to the bedroom while I finished smoothing lotion and changed into a long blue nightgown I’d left hanging on a hook.

  A few minutes later, in bare feet, I padded back into the bedroom.

  As the door opened, I stood for a moment and stared. Sitting in bed with his damp hair, eyes closed, and head leaned back against the headboard, was Sterling Sparrow. It almost appeared as though he was sleeping. In reality, I rarely saw him asleep. It seemed I usually fell asleep before him and woke after he’d left. Seeing him this way, for some reason, felt like a gift.

  Yes, he infuriated me.

  Yes, he was exasperating.

  And yet in a moment like this, he was vulnerable—as vulnerable as he ever was. In the short time I’d known him, it seemed that Sterling was a man who was always on his game, always watching, always listening, and always calculating. Few people were given the ability to witness him when he wasn’t on.

  He’d told me over and over that I’d been promised to him, that I was his, and yet as I walked closer to the bed, I wondered what that really meant.

  How had so much happened in the span of a few weeks?

  As I climbed up the small footboard to the mattress, Sterling’s eyes opened.

  “I’m sorry, I was trying not to wake you,” I said.

  He pulled back the covers, revealing the basketball shorts that replaced the towel, as he made room for me to sit beside him. Admittedly, there was a bit of disappointment that he was wearing anything beneath the blankets.

  Between that and the way he’d been in the bathroom, it seemed that he was serious about our talk.

  I turned off the lamp on my side of the bed and scooted closer. The now-familiar aroma of Sterling calmed me, as spice and musk filled my senses.

  He inhaled. “I love the scent of your lotions.”

  My smile grew. “I was thinking the same thing about you.”

  As he wrapped his arm around my shoulder, I laid my head on his.

  “Araneae, this is one of those times we talked about.”

  At first, I didn’t speak. We’d talked about too much to know to what he was referring and then I remembered.

  Craning my neck his direction, I took in his profile as the cords in his neck tightened and his jaw clenched. I couldn’t fathom what he was about to tell me, but from his mood, I knew it wasn’t something that was easy for him to say.

  Placing one hand on his chest, I said, “Remember your promise.”

  He didn’t answer as he stared down at me, his eyes swirling with a battle of emotions. The fight we’d had was forgotten as I gazed back, longing to take the pain away from his eyes, to reassure him that no matter what he told me, it would be all right, but I couldn’t. I didn’t have that ability. I couldn’t reassure him when I too was now feeling the same unease.

  “You promised to be with me, to not let me learn bad things alone.”

  He hugged me tighter to his side. “Araneae, I’ll never leave you alone, never again. You’re mine. I’m yours and that means that through it all, the secrets, lies, and promises, we’re a team. I hope that after you learn more about yourself and about me, you won’t see me as the monster I’m capable of being.”

  “Sterling, you’ve already told me more about my life than I ever knew, then I ever would have known. I’m learning more about you every day. I can’t promise the future. All I can say is for right now, this minute, though sometimes you can be overwhelming, I’m where I want to be. I’m where I feel safe and...cared for.” I almost said loved.

  Was that how I felt?

  I lifted my chin until our lips met. The connection was a spark, a flash, a reassurance that together we were more than we could possibly be alone.

  “Sunshine, you’re the overwhelming one.”

  “Me?”

  His finger tapped my nose. “You. I’m never nervous or at a loss for words. I’ve done things you couldn’t understand and wouldn’t condone. I’ve seen the worst of the worst. I’ve stared the devil in the face.” He looked down at the gold ring he wore on his right hand. “And through it all, I was dead inside. Nothing is able to hurt you when you’re without feelings. I’ve lived a large percentage of my life that way. There are few things and even fewer people whom I truly care about. Yet right now, my stomach is in knots.”

  “What are you going to tell me?”

  “I’m going to tell you why you can’t have that meeting with Pauline McFadden tomorrow.”

  I jumped back, away from his embrace. “No, you can tell me about my life. What you can’t do is demand anything regarding Sinful Threads. I’ve told you that before.”

  He took a deep breath. “For the record, almost everyone else in the world would respond, ‘Yes, Mr. Sparrow.’”

  I sat taller as my head shook. “That’s not my response.”

  His lips quirked, the tips moving upward. “I’m well aware.” His hand ran through his still-damp hair. “Let me clarify. This isn’t about Sinful Threads. It’s about your life—your safety. You can’t have that meeting with Pauline McFadden until you know who she is.”

  “She’s Senator McFadden’s wife.”

  “Will you listen to a broader biography, a deeper understanding?”

  My head tilted. I didn’t like that he was discussing Sinful Threads, yet he’d said the magic word that gave me hope—will.

  “Yes,” I said. “I will listen, but then the decision is mine.”

  Sterling nodded as I settled back against his side, fitting under his arm perfectly.

  I sighed, inhaling his clean scent. “Then go on.”

  Sterling

  Go on.

  When she’d first come upstairs, the red patches and redness of her eyes told me that she’d been crying. I’d been the reason then, and with all of the nondormant part of my heart, I was afraid I would be again. The organ that until recently I wasn’t sure existed now ached, leaving me wondering how much I could say and how Araneae would take it.

  I’d been truthful about my stomach. Araneae McCrie scared me in an unfamiliar way. Though she’d been mine for nearly two decades, I was woefully unprepared for how she’d affect me, how much I would enjoy basking in her sunlight.

  What will happen when she learns more of the truth?

  “Sterling?” she asked, waiting for me to speak.

  I swallowed. “You can’t meet with Pauline McFadden.”

  Her body tensed in my embrace. I held her tighter. “Damn it, Araneae, listen. Just listen.” I pulled her chin to me and covered her lips with mine. Damn, she tasted like toothpaste, and I wanted to eat her up, forget this conversation, and make love to her until we both fell sound asleep.

  Make love?

  What the fuck?

  Where the hell did that come from?

  I’d never used that phrase in my life. I fucked. That’s what I did.

  Pulling away, I looked into her eyes. “Please, listen. Like I said before, you can’t meet with her until you know the truth about who she is.”

  “Then tell me because we’re meeting tomorrow at eleven.”

  I took a deep breath. Tomorrow morning by eleven I wanted Araneae on the yacht we had chartered. I didn’t want her back at Sinful Threads at all with Winnie there.

  One battle at a time.

  “Fuck,” I
began, running my free hand through my hair. “There’s no easy way to say this, so I might as well jump in. You’re right that Pauline McFadden is Senator Rubio McFadden’s wife. You’re also right that he has the exploratory committee and is currently raising campaign funds all in preparation for a presidential bid. Not that he doesn’t have the funds himself, he does. Big donors attract other donors. It is a lot of smoke and mirrors.”

  “Normal politics. So what’s the problem?”

  I scoffed. “That’s a loaded question. McFadden has been big in Chicago since I was a boy, even before that. He wasn’t in that room with my father the first time that I saw your picture because those were all men from my father’s outfit. They were all Sparrows—not genetically, but family bonds run beyond blood.

  “He wasn’t in that room because he has his own—his own outfit,” I went on. “Do you know what I’m saying?”

  Araneae laid her head on my chest as her finger traced circles on my exposed stomach. “Is that what you do?” she asked. “I mean, I suspected, but is what you’re telling me like...the mob? Like Al Capone and the Godfather?”

  A sad smile came to my lips. “Bad comparisons, but for the sake of understanding, yes. I never want to tell you the details, so never ask. Like I mentioned before, it’s called the underground for a reason. It deserves to stay there. The old saying that crime doesn’t pay was created by people who didn’t do it right. With this life comes money and power...and secrets.”

  Sitting up, she laid her head on my shoulder as her small arm came over my chest and her fingers splayed. The soft brown of her eyes stared up at me.

  “I don’t want you to see me like that,” I admitted.

  “Sterling, I don’t know what you’re going to say, but the man I see right now is a man who bulldozed into my life, who turned it upside down, and who is now sharing part of his life with me, a man I doubt shares much of anything with anyone.”

  I closed my eyes and took another breath, saying a prayer that what she learned wouldn’t change that view. “My father...” I swallowed. “...utilized his power in ways different than I. Some of the ways he chose to make money disgusted me. I’m not perfect and I oversee some shit—a lot of it. It’s that his shit was worse. While I was in the army, I kept tabs on Chicago, as much as I could. I wanted to know what was happening so I’d be prepared for my return.