“We’ll have the white to go with our dinner,” he says confidently to the waiter.
Wine? The waiter is surely going to turn him down or ask to see ID but the waiter doesn’t ask, just writes down the order.
“The lady will have the salmon, wood smoked, with the house salad for her appetizer. I want the filet mignon, bacon wrapped, rare. Make sure the chef doesn’t over do it, I hate it anything past pink.”
“Yes sir,” the waiter says making quick notes on his pad.
I stare at Todd dreamily. His perfect blond hair, his skin that has never known a blackhead, piercing gray eyes. I love the way he’s just taking charge, total control. He didn’t ask me what I wanted for dinner he just ordered it for me.
We make small talk through dinner. Talking about school and classes. He loves to talk about lacrosse and I listen interestedly. I don’t know much about the game though our school has a championship team. Sports have never held my attention for long. As we talk he reaches across the table and takes my hand, holding onto it like he can’t let go. Dinner is served and I eat very lightly. The wine is making me light headed but I don’t want to eat too much, he’ll think I’m a pig.
Through it all he keeps touching my hand. A couple of times his foot brushes my calf under the table and a thrill runs through me. I eat a few bites of my salmon then push it aside, instead sipping and enjoying the wine. I’ve only had a few glasses before in my life and none of them have tasted as good as this one.
I don’t know how much I’ve had to drink but I think I’d best slow it down. I feel a little light and spinney, probably not a good sign. Todd keeps touching me, smiling, then he asks about dessert.
“Oh, no,” I say. “Shouldn’t we be getting to the dance?”
Todd smiles and agrees. He pays the check and I notice he leaves a very large tip for the waiter. He must come here often enough that the waiter knows what to expect if he serves to an underage kid.
I stumble on my way back out to his car but Todd catches me. He helps me back into my seat and I fumble a moment with the safety belt. The night air helps some but I still feel pretty light headed. I try taking a couple of deep breaths while Todd walks around the car then we are driving.
“Do you like music?” Todd asks.
“Oh yeah,” I say.
He taps a button and music fills the car. I’m not familiar with the artist but it’s nice. We drive along in comfortable silence the music taking the place of conversation. I struggle to stay alert. I keep drifting off into space or something as I stare out the window. That wine is really affecting me tonight and I’m regretting drinking so much. I startle back to awareness again and see that we’re no longer in the city.
“Where are we?” I ask confused.
“Oh I wanted to show you something special,” he says glancing over at me and smiling.
“Oh,” I reply.
We pull onto a dirt road and he drives along a few more minutes then pulls off in front of a very old and dilapidated barn. I hear the snap of his seat belt unbuckling and then he leans over towards me.
“You’re a very beautiful girl,” he says one hand stroking the side of my face.
“Thank you.”
My heart is pounding. Is he going to kiss me? He is! His perfect lips come close, then closer. I can see the small white line of his teeth behind beautiful lips as they close with mine. Our first kiss is electric. A thrill runs through me and I’m surprised by the softness of his lips against mine. He kisses me gently, with great attention. His tongue licks across my lips and another jolt runs through me to my core.
I feel like I’m in heaven. He pulls back and our lips part slowly, clinging one to another. He strokes the hair back from my face as he stares into my eyes.
“You’re gorgeous,” he says as his hand drifts from my face down my neck and along my arm. His thumb brushes the exposed skin of my upper chest and I feel my body responding, my nipples tightening into hard little buds.
I raise my hand and touch his face, tracing the lines of his jaw, feeling the first stubble of a five o’clock shadow. I start towards his hair but he stops my hand.
“Not the hair,” he says. “I’ve still got to go to prom.”
I smile and laugh and so does he. It eases my awkwardness. One of his hands drifts along the curve of my side until it’s resting on my hip. He leans in and kisses me again. The hand on my hip starts pulling my dress up.
My head still feels light headed, it’s hard to focus and as his hands start wandering over me. I’m not sure what I’m doing or what he’s doing to me. His hands start to get rougher, pulling hard at my breasts.
“Ow,” I cry out as he jerks roughly. “Todd that hurts.”
“It will be all right,” he says throatily. “You know you want this.”
His hand is on my crotch fumbling his way inside my panties until he roughly shoves a finger into me. It hurts, this isn’t pleasant or romantic at all like I’d envisioned. I push his hand away.
“No Todd, that hurts, don’t do that.”
He pulls back but doesn’t move his hand. He’s looming over me and his beautiful grin now looks like a sneer.
“What are you too good for me?”
“No, that’s not it,” I say confused. My head is spinning and I’m uncomfortable.
“What then? Come on,” he insists.
I try to pull my dress down over my hip but he won’t let me. The door behind him suddenly opens and Todd is gone. I hear the sounds of a struggle outside as I try to sit up but my dress is in disarray.
“You leave her alone!”
Samuel?
I finally sit upright and outside the car Samuel is squaring off with Todd. Todd is bleeding from his nose but Samuel has a large bruise forming on his right side. The two of them circle each other with their fists raised. I can’t figure out why Samuel, who hates me, is here. This can’t be real. I’m absolutely mortified. I think if I was anymore embarrassed I’d just die.
“Samuel!” I yell.
Samuel turns to look at me and Todd doesn’t hesitate. He swings hard taking Samuel in the jaw which spins him around but doesn’t knock him down. Samuel looks at Todd and growls then he rushes him coming in low. Samuel’s shoulder hits into Todd’s mid-section lifting him off the ground and then he releases him. Todd flies off of him and lands on some rusted tools a few feet over with a sickening crunch.
“TODD!” I scream and run over to him tripping on the hem of my dress and falling next to his body.
Todd doesn’t move. He looks at me and I can see he’s not breathing. His eyes are glassy and lifeless. I look over my shoulder at Samuel.
“What have you done?”
Chapter four
Samuel
My lawyer grips my hand on the table looking at me intently.
“Let me introduce the new evidence. It’s not too late.”
“No,” I say.
I stare her down. I’m not going to do it. Right now all of this falls on me. Nothing hits Lucille and I’m not going to let it. This is my problem, not hers. I grab her hand and place it back on the table. She shakes her head and turns towards the judge. We have been called back because the jury has reached a verdict. Once they read it my fate will be sealed.
I’m resigned to this. It’s the only way I can protect her.
“All rise for the Honorable Judge Mathias,” the bailiff says in his bored voice.
Everyone in the courtroom rises as the judge walks in. The place is packed. I’m the event of the week. What will happen to the rebel rich kid? News crews crowd the balcony behind us, the seating is packed with gawkers both for me hanging and against.
“Please be seated,” Judge Mathias says.
He’s an old, stuffy man with what little hair he has remaining slicked back tight to his head. He hits his gavel weakly as he tells us all to sit. The bailiff then walks over and lets the jury in. I watch as they enter, staring at each one, waiting to see if they meet my eye or not. No one do
es.
I suppress a chuckle. A jury of my peers. My peers apparently are all over fifty and decrepit. One juror carries an oxygen tank with him. What do these people know of high school? I shake my head and steel myself to face my fate. I won’t let them have the satisfaction of seeing me sweat. I got this.
“Has the jury reached a verdict?” Judge Mathias intones.
“Yes we have your Honor,” the only standing juror answers.
“Very well, Bailiff pass that to me please.”
The courtroom is dead silent. You could hear a pin drop. Someone in the back sneezes and my back muscles tense as I push down the urge to jump. The Bailiff walks over to the standing juror and takes a piece of paper from him then slowly makes his way back to the judge. This takes approximately three years of my life watching these slow old people move with the rest of my life in their hands.
The Judge takes the paper, unfolds it, looks at it. Then he sits it down, reaches inside his robe, pulls out a pair of reading glasses and picks it up again. His face gives away nothing as he hands it back to the Bailiff. The Bailiff takes it, takes another three year walk back to the juror and returns the paper.
“On the count of murder in the first, how do you find?” Judge Mathias asks.
Someone behind me inhales sharply. I stare at the juror who doesn’t once look at me. My lawyer’s leg starts to tremble and she again grasps my hand.
“Not guilty your Honor,” the juror says.
“Thank god!” someone behind me cries out, it sounds like my mother.
“NO!” someone on the other side of the courtroom yells.
The judge starts banging his gavel loudly. “Order! Order in the court!”
Murder one is off the table but that’s not the only charge they brought against me. It does however remove the threat of the death penalty. At least being rich and having a ridiculously expensive lawyer bought me that much.
The courtroom settles down after a few moments of the Judge banging his gavel. Then he returns his attention to the juror who’s still standing.
“On the charge of Involuntary Manslaughter, how do you find?”
I tense. This is the one she didn’t think she could beat. My heart slows to nothing. All I see is that man standing there, staring at the piece of paper in his hand. He looks up in slow motion and for the first time he makes eye contact with me. I see it in his eyes, the sadness, the desperation.
I know my fate.
“Guilty your Honor,” he says tearing his eyes away from me.
The courtroom erupts into chaos. People are screaming, some are cheering. It’s a mad house. Extra security appears from somewhere and starts pushing the audience out. I’m surrounded and can’t even see my family in the confusion. Over it all there is the click of the cuffs on my wrists then I’m being dragged through the rear of the courtroom.
The last sound that reaches me is the Judge banging his gavel and yelling for order.
Bang, bang, BANG!
Chapter five
*** Six Year Later ***
Lucille
“Jesus Bradford, the least you can do is clean up after yourself!” I yell picking up the dirty dishes he has left across the living room.
He doesn’t bother looking away from the computer. I’ve no idea what he’s doing. I never do really. He’s always poking at something on the internet or playing on the console. All while he’s ‘looking for work’ or preparing for his certification exams. I’ve heard the same story for two years now.
“Brad!” I raise my voice an octave. It’s the only way to get his attention.
“What Lucille?” he says turning around with a great show of exasperation.
“Pick up after yourself, all right?”
He rolls his eyes and my blood boils. Rolling your eyes is a teenage girl thing, seriously. He turns away without a word back towards the monitor and I lose it. I throw the cup in my hand at him. It smacks him in the back of the head spraying the remains of whatever he was drinking around his head and across the monitor.
“Damn it Lucy!” he yells jumping up.
“Now are you listening to me?” I scream back at him.
“We have a maid for this shit!” he yells back.
“I have a maid, you just live here for free! Now clean up after yourself! When are you going to get a job!”
“Ugh, you don’t really get it. You’re always so angry. Maybe you need therapy or something to get that temper of yours under control.”
I grit my teeth and clench my fist to keep myself from throwing something else at him. Mentally I count backwards from ten. A trick I learned years ago from a therapist I saw after what happened to Todd.
“You really suck all my motivation out of me,” Bradford whines.
“Get a job or get out of my house,” I growl turning my back on him.
“Easy for you to say. Mommy and Daddy gave you their company to run. You’ve never had to work for money, everything just gets handed to Queen Lucille!”
I storm off ignoring him. I grab my laptop and throw myself down on our bed. I don’t know why I put up with him. He had a great job when we met, a nice place of his own. It seemed great. It was great. The sex was okay but he was nice and seemed hard working. Until I let him move in with me. His idea of course.
My e-mail chimes a new message so I open it up. It’s a notice from my bank that I’ve over-drafted my account. There has to be some kind of mistake, I can’t possibly have over-drafted. I had several thousand dollars in there!
I log in to the bank website and load my accounts. My eyes narrow as I look down a list of charges that I know I didn’t do. There’s a long series of charges all from a website in Europe. I copy the address and open it in a new tab of the browser.
An online gambling site pulls up and it all clicks together. Son of a bitch.
“Bradford, what in the holy hell are all these charges?” I ask thrusting the bank statement in front of him.
He looks them up and down then looks at me with open disdain. He doesn’t bother answering, instead he turns his attention back to the computer. I push down the urge to bash him in the head with the laptop.
“You really need to answer me,” I growl.
“What difference does it make? We have money,” he says.
“No, I have money. You are living off of me. You’ve lost over ten thousand dollars in the past three days! Are you crazy?”
He whirls around on me jumping to his feet. He’s in my face forcing me to take a step back. His larger frame and size tower over me and suddenly I’m afraid.
“I’m not crazy. I’m not some spoiled little rich girl! I’ve got a system and it’s working fine thank you very much. Now if you’d quit sucking all the life out of me I’d like to get back to what I’m working on!”
I don’t want to let it go but my heart is racing, my blood runs cold, and my stomach is in knots. I can’t confront him directly. I’ll just call my bank and get them to block the account.
“Fine, whatever,” I say backing away. “No more. Christ I’m going to have to pull out of my trust fund to pay make the rent on this condo.”
“Do whatever you have to do, just leave me the hell alone.”
I walk back to our bedroom. What the hell happened to me? When did I give in to this? My hand is shaking so bad I drop the laptop which clatters loudly to the floor.
“Yeah, money so tight maybe you should quit tearing up the computers!” Bradford yells from the living room.
I kneel down and collect the laptop then manage to sit on the bed before my tears take over. My life wasn’t supposed to be like this.
Chapter six
Samuel
“Last day Sam,” Jonathan, one of the guards, says walking up to me.
I put the weights back on the rack and sit up on the work bench. Grabbing a towel I wipe my sweat off.
“Yeah,” I reply.
“What you going to do out there in the real?” Jonathan asks.
“Get la
id,” I quip.
Jonathan grins at me. “Yeah, I reckon that’s what I’d want to,” he says.
Several inmates stare at the two of us in a small group to one side. Jonathan walks over to them one hand tapping on the baton at his side and the other resting on his stun gun.
“Problem convicts?” he asks.
The group disperses with muttered words. They’re hoping for one last chance to jump me before I’m routed out. I haven’t made many friends in here. I walk back to my cell to gather my things. Two more hours then I’m on freedom road.
“Hey man, last day,” Fred says from his bunk.
“Yeah,” I say.
“Man I’m going to miss you. You hear that shit about the ballers are looking to jump you?”
“Yeah,” I grunt staring at myself in the mirror.
My beard is several day’s stubble and I look like shit. It’s hard to sleep here and my eyes are sunken in. I run some water in the sink, cold because convicts don’t deserve hot water, then lather my face with cream. The ritual of the razor moving across my face is soothing, I focus on the steady motions watching my old face emerge.
I pause shaving as my new scar comes into view from under the cream. It runs the line of my jaw on the left side. A gift from my first days here in prison when I was still a punk. I learned my lessons well. No one comes at me alone now.
“What you going to do man?” Fred asks.
“Handle a problem,” I say.
The bunk squeaks as he rolls over on his side to look at me. He props himself up on one arm idly scratching his fat, hairy belly. The faint smell of piss drifts off of him. Fred is a shitty cellmate.
“You going to go after them?” he asks.
I stop shaving again and stare at myself. My eyes are colder now. I feel colder. I turn to look at him.
“I’m going to fix it.”
A Baby for My Hero Stepbrother: Forbidden Billionaire Romance Page 2
