by Bella Andre
For the past few days, Drake’s property had felt like a perfect, private cocoon. But she’d known it couldn’t last forever, hadn’t she? Stupid Rosa, to think that she could be the one to decide when it was time to go. Even stupider to believe that her tentative, fragile happiness could withstand being faced with her past as Rosalind Bouchard, reality TV’s bad girl.
“I thought you were in Miami with your family, dealing with the nude photo scandal. Especially now that all those new pictures have come out.”
“New pictures?” Rosa finally came unstuck, if only to echo the two horrible words. Bile rose in her throat at the thought of new pictures circulating.
All those new pictures.
Her knees wanted to buckle. She wanted to sink right into the leaves and let them bury her.
Only, as she watched the stranger take in her knotted sex-hair, kiss-bruised lips, and Drake’s half-buttoned flannel shirt, Rosa knew she didn’t have the luxury of falling apart. Not yet.
Not when there was so much damage control to be done first on Drake’s behalf.
No doubt, if Rosa left things like this, the stranger would get on her phone and social media apps the second she turned around and walked away. And if she came inside and saw the paintings—especially now that there were several of Rosa in the nude—she wouldn’t have a chance of persuading the woman that she and Drake weren’t an item. But if there was even the barest chance that she could pull this off, she had to try.
“I’m just a family friend,” she said, trying with all her might to sound normal, though it wasn’t easy with blood rushing like a flash flood into her head. “I was in the neighborhood, so I thought I’d drop in to say hello.” Her legs felt as shaky as a newborn deer’s as she walked toward the stranger. “It’s really nice of you to bring pie. So Mona is your grandmother?”
“You know her name?”
Rosa hoped her smile didn’t look as pasted on as it felt. “She’s a lovely woman.” Rosa took the pie from the woman’s hands, somehow managing to keep her own from shaking. “Really sweet. And wow, this smells great.”
Keep talking, she silently coached herself. Use what you’ve learned from all the interviews you’ve done over the years to turn things where you need them to go.
“I’m sure Drake is going to love eating this pie when he gets back. I’ll be sure to leave a note for him so that he knows it’s from you.”
“Where did he go?”
Rosa shook her head as if she had no idea. “Probably out painting some incredible vista.”
She crossed a million mental fingers that he wouldn’t wake up and walk outside right then. Rosa hated lying, but she would do whatever it took to keep him as safe as he’d made her feel.
“He’s always been like a brother to me.” The lies tasted like sawdust on Rosa’s tongue, especially when she had to deliver them in such an easy tone. No man had ever been less like a brother. “Thanks again for bringing the pie. Oscar, time to head back in now to get your breakfast!”
Thank God, he trotted right up to her as if he’d merely been biding his time playing around with squirrels while he waited for her to call him.
“I’m sorry,” Rosa said to the woman, giving her another smile, “I didn’t get your name.”
“I’m Trinity. And I still can’t believe you’re standing right here in front of me when I’ve been watching you on TV for years.”
So far, Rosa had managed not to answer any questions. Knowing her luck wouldn’t hold out forever, she headed for the quick close. “It’s been really great to meet you, Trinity. And thanks for watching the show.” She put her hand on Oscar’s ruff and, brilliant dog that he was, he started to lead her back to the house. “Have a great day.” She gave the woman one last smile over her shoulder, then opened the cabin door and walked inside.
Closing it behind her, she leaned against it and looked around the room at Drake’s easels and paintings. He was so brilliant. So sweet. So good.
“Rosa, there you are.”
As he came out of the bedroom with a big, sexy grin on and nothing else, her heart skipped a beat in her chest.
She wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t let herself fall apart again the way she had the first time out on his cliffs. She thought, I’m falling in love with you, and the very last thing in the world I want is to leave you.
But what she made herself say was, “It’s time for me to go.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
No.
It was the only word Drake could think. The only thing he knew to be true.
If Rosa truly didn’t want to be with him any longer, he would never hold her here against her will. But if she was leaving for any other reason—and he figured there could be dozens of possible options to choose from right about now—he wouldn’t let her run again.
Not without him at her side.
He didn’t trust himself to say anything at first, simply put his hands on her face and kissed her. And when he finally made himself draw back, he said, “I love you.”
Joy flickered in her eyes, but a split second later, that joy was gone. “You can’t.” She tried to push him away. “You don’t.”
“I can.” He lowered his mouth to hers again. “I do.”
Right here, right now, whether she liked it or not, he was making his vows to her. Vows that he wouldn’t let her feel hopeless, afraid, or alone ever again.
“What happened while I was sleeping? What’s brought the panic back into your eyes?”
“Oscar needed to go out and it was so sunny and bright. I felt...” She closed her eyes. “I felt hopeful. Like maybe I could get through this. Maybe I could figure things out.” When she opened her eyes, they were bleak. And full of the cynicism he hated to see. “There was a woman outside. A pretty one, with pie. Mona’s granddaughter.”
At last, the scene began to take shape for Drake. “She recognized you.”
“Of course she did. And there I was, wearing nothing but your shirt. She had to know what we’d been doing even though I lied. I told her we were just family friends. That you’re like a brother to me.”
He laughed. He couldn’t help it, when nothing had ever been more preposterous.
“It’s not funny.”
He brushed a lock of hair from her eyes. “She’s going to find out the truth of what we are to each other soon enough, Rosa. Everyone will.” Because he wasn’t going to let her run from him like she’d tried to run from everyone and everything else.
“There are more pictures! New ones!” She finally managed to duck out from beneath his arm. “You can’t be with me.”
Rage at hearing of more pictures hitting the Internet rose so fast it choked him, but he needed to hold it at bay. For now. “I’m with you now. And we’ll deal with the pictures together.”
“I can’t drag you into this with me. Not like this. Not when the scandal has just got even bigger. I need to leave right away. Before Trinity thinks of a reason to come back and finds us here together. Before she sees me on all these canvases, and pictures of your paintings end up on the Internet too.” With every word, he could hear and feel her panic growing more and more out of control. “I should never have come here. I should have found somewhere more remote, looked for a better place to hide out.”
There were so many things he wanted to say to her, but only one truly mattered right now. “I love you,” he said again, wanting to make sure she didn’t ever forget it.
For the past few days, he’d watched her begin to believe more and more in her strength. Yesterday had seemed like such a big turning point on so many levels.
Now, however, her belief seemed to have been stripped away again.
He knew it was the shock of learning about more pictures—and being surprised by a fan in the woods when she thought she was safely hidden from that world—that had done it. But he also knew Rosa was more than strong enough to deal with all of it.
Right at this moment, however, it was clear that he wouldn’t have a prayer of c
onvincing her of any of that. So instead of trying, he said, “If you want to hide, really hide, I have just the place for you.”
She looked at him as if that were the very last thing she expected him to say. “You do?”
“I do.”
Looked like he was going to be paying a visit to his father’s cabin at Summer Lake in the Adirondacks, after all.
But he wouldn’t let them leave without a reminder of how far they’d come in his little Montauk cabin. He swooped her up into his arms and carried her toward his bedroom.
“Drake, put me down. Didn’t you hear anything I just said? We need to leave.” She shook her head. “I mean, I need to leave. You should stay here. You should forget about me.”
“We’ll be leaving together,” he informed her, deciding to simply ignore her urging him to forget her since it was so ridiculous. “But it’s a long drive to the Adirondacks, and we’ll feel better if we clean up first.” Better still by reconnecting in the most elemental way possible.
He carried her past the bed and into his bathroom. Already naked himself, he didn’t bother stripping her out of his flannel shirt before walking into the shower and turning it on. He could feel how cold she was, and not just because she’d been outside with barely anything on. He might not be able to warm her up all the way just yet, but between his body against hers and the warm water, he could sure as hell try.
Turning her so that her back was to the tiled shower wall, he set her on her feet, then reached for the front of his shirt and ripped it open. A couple of buttons pinged against the wall and floor as she gaped at him in shock.
“Now? You actually want to do this now?”
He threaded his hands into her wet hair and lowered his mouth to hers. “Always.”
Her lips were too cold against his, but only until she began to kiss him. “This is crazy,” she murmured as he ran his hands over her curves, shoulders to hips, then back up along her belly and waist until he was cupping her breasts. She moaned, “Crazy,” again as he played with the tips of her breasts first with his fingertips, and then with his tongue.
He couldn’t argue with her about crazy, given how consumed he’d been since the moment he’d first set eyes on her. All his life, he’d tried to keep crazy out, thinking it would protect him from sharing his father’s fate.
But Drake was no longer convinced that crazy was a bad thing.
As he rained kisses down her body, he lowered himself to his knees until he could center his kisses over the sweet, addictively soft flesh between her thighs. Her hands bunched in his hair as she let him reposition her legs so that one was propped up on the built-in tiled seat.
“You make me lose control,” she said as she looked down at him through long, wet lashes. “You make me forget why we shouldn’t do this. Why I shouldn’t let you be with me.”
“Good.”
His response, raw with possession, continued to reverberate in the shower as he found her again with his tongue, his control as far gone as hers. For the moment, at least, she was no longer fighting him—trying to fight what had always been between them—as she rocked her pelvis into him, truly the most sensual creature alive.
He needed more. Needed to be closer. Needed to be completely connected with her when she let herself fall.
Thank God, when he stood again he found one more condom left on the shower ledge. He wasn’t sure he would have been able to stop even without it. Not when making love with Rosa—and becoming one with her—had become as deep a necessity as breathing.
Seconds later, he had on protection and reached for her hips to lift her so that she could put her legs around his waist. In one gorgeous movement, she sank down onto him, taking him so deep that his vision actually went black for a moment.
He’d initially been the one kissing her after she’d come in from the cold, but now she was devouring his mouth, nipping over his jaw, sucking at his neck. They rode hard and fast against each other, but even in the midst of crazy he made sure to cradle her head and hips against the tile. Made sure to keep her safe, always.
“Drake.”
When she gasped his name into his mouth, he knew she was close. But it wasn’t enough just to make her come, just to give her pleasure. Not this time. He needed to make sure the physical was completely entwined with the emotional so that she couldn’t forget so easily what was between them.
He drew back so that he could look into her eyes. Her cheeks were flushed, and her lips were full from his kisses.
“I.” He thrust hard and deep on the word, and her lids fluttered half closed with pleasure.
“Love.” He took them both higher again, felt her inner muscles grip him so tightly he could barely hold on as she exploded around him and sent them flying together.
“You.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Drake’s SUV had a big backseat, but Oscar insisted on sitting in Rosa’s lap. The entire car smelled like dog, and his panting steamed up the windows, but with every mile they drove, Rosa welcomed his warmth more and more. Especially when he periodically lifted his head to lick her cheek as if to say, Everything’s going to be okay. You’ve got us.
Drake hadn’t said much during the six hours they’d been driving, only checking in a couple of times to see if she was hungry or thirsty. Not because he didn’t care. On the contrary, she now knew exactly how much he cared.
I love you.
Three little words that kept playing over and over inside her head.
I’m with you now. And we’ll deal with the pictures together.
Just like always, he’d stood by his words, not only by working to break her out of her panicked state by taking her into the shower and loving her brainless—but also by barely taking the time to stack his canvases in the back of his car before he checked her out of the motel and set off for his father’s house in the Adirondacks. And, just like always, he knew she needed some time to process the most recent twists to her scandalous week. Not only that there were new pictures...but also that he loved her and was clearly planning to stand by her, no matter what. Even if it meant changing her hiding place to a different forest six hours away.
At the same time, this road trip wasn’t merely about finding a new refuge so that the paparazzi wouldn’t swoop in before she was ready for them. It was also about Drake going to see his father.
He was so close to his siblings, his cousins. Only with his father was there a fracture. One she would give anything to help patch up.
It seemed telling—in a positive way—that the first safe place he’d thought to go had been his father’s house. No matter what else happened—and even if her own relationship with her mother remained a mess—she vowed to help him.
Thankfully, with every mile they covered, she felt more of that strength she’d started to build coming back. Panic had been her first instinct outside the cabin when she’d heard about the new pictures, but with Drake as steady as ever beside her, she was able to remember that panic wasn’t her only option.
No, she was game for plenty of other emotions now, including fury that the creep who had taken the pictures of her had held some back so that he could get even more money for the second round.
“I’m going to take him down.”
Drake didn’t seem surprised that this was the first thing she’d said to him in hours. He simply smiled and said, “I know you are.”
Rosa leaned over to give him a kiss, then bent to give Oscar one too. “Can I have your cell phone again?”
Though Drake immediately handed it to her, he said, “You don’t need to see the new pictures, Rosa.”
“I do.” She willed her hands not to shake as she pulled up a browser and typed her name into the search box. “I need to know exactly what I’m up against instead of continuing to bury my head in the sand.”
But, strangely, none of the sites that had run the first set of pictures had anything new up. In fact, as far as she could see, none of the previous pictures were still running either
.
“What are you seeing?” A muscle jumped in his jaw, and his hands tightened on the steering wheel as he waited for her answer.
“They’re not here. I mean, there’s a story that says there are new pictures, but—” She couldn’t believe what she was reading. “But no one is running them.”
Drake turned from the road to look into her eyes for a split second. “Smith.”
Thinking the same thing, she scrolled back to the search box and typed in Smith Sullivan’s name alongside hers, then read aloud from the first story that popped up.
Smith Sullivan has taken a major stand this morning against cyber-attacks and the exploitation of women as he weighed in on the Rosalind Bouchard nude photo scandal. “If this happened to your sister or girlfriend or daughter, would you run the pictures and call it news? No, you’d do everything in your power to get them taken down and convict the person who took and sold them.” Sullivan has made it clear that he will no longer work with any media outlets that continue to run the photos.
Rosa clicked on a follow-up link and told Drake, “Evidently, the pictures were pulled from every major site within the hour. No one dares defy him, even for click bait like these pictures.”
“He always was a good guy. Fame and Academy Awards haven’t changed him one bit.”
She’d swung in so many emotional directions today. Waking up joyful, then slamming into deep, dark panic. And now, utter gratitude.
But as she read on, some of the panic rose again. “It also says they’ve been trying to reach me and my family for comment with no luck so far, but that they’ve heard a rumor that I’m vacationing in the Hamptons.” The trees had been getting thicker and thicker since they’d crossed into Adirondack Park, thick enough now that before she could read too much more, the phone lost its signal entirely. Relieved to be able to turn it off, she had to tell him the final thing she’d read before the phone had gone dead. “My connection to the Sullivan family also seems to be a big question right now. It doesn’t look like Mona’s granddaughter named you in any of her tweets, but they’re not going to have to look far to realize you’ve got a place in the Hamptons.”
