Quantum Boxed Set TAME: Books 1-3

by Force, Marie

  I wake up to the most god-awful smell. I’m almost afraid to open my eyes to see what it is. When I do, I realize I’m sharing my pillow with the wildebeest, and she’s got some nasty morning breath.

  “Christ on a stick,” I mutter as I realize that not only is she sharing my pillow, but apparently I’m snuggling with her, too. I long for the days when she was snapping at me. How in the hell did I end up snuggled up to Fluff rather than my gorgeous wife? And speaking of my gorgeous wife, where is she?

  I roll out of bed, leaving the beast snoring, go into the bathroom to take a leak and brush my teeth. I find a pair of gym shorts that I pull on before I go looking for Natalie. In the living room, I spot her rolled up in a ball on the sofa, her dark hair spread out on a pillow.

  Why is she sleeping on the sofa and not with me?

  I sit next to her and lean over to kiss her awake. Her eyes flutter open, and for a second she looks happy to see me before the light in her eyes goes dull. What’s that about?

  “What’re you doing out here, sweetheart?”

  “Couldn’t sleep and didn’t want to bother you.”

  “You wouldn’t have bothered me. I much prefer you and your sweetness to Fluff and her gorilla breath.”

  “She doesn’t have gorilla breath.”

  “Yes, she does. And that’s me being kind.” I tug on her hand. “Come back to bed for a while. It’s still early, and we have nowhere to be until later.” Addie will know to book us on a late-day flight so we can have some time to regroup before we head to Mexico.

  Natalie resists my efforts to lure her back to bed.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Could I talk to you about something?”

  “Of course.”

  Her brows furrow and her lips purse, like she’s screwing up the courage to tell me what’s on her mind.

  “Sweetheart, tell me what’s wrong.”

  She looks at me, and it occurs to me that I still haven’t seen the true color of her eyes without the brown contact lenses she wears. I want to see the real color. Maybe she’ll show me while we’re in Mexico.

  “If I ask you something personal, will you tell me the truth?” she asks.

  “I’ll always tell you the truth.”

  “Do you promise?”

  “What’s this about, Natalie?”

  “The room at Hayden’s…”

  Oh fuck… “What about it?”

  “Are you into that stuff, too?”

  For a second, my brain totally freezes. I just promised to tell her the truth, but if I do, then she’ll know that I’ve kept it from her until now. She’ll think I’ve been unsatisfied every time we made love when I’m the opposite of unsatisfied.

  “Flynn?”

  “No, I’m not into it. That’s his thing, not mine. I’m into you. You’re all I need, Natalie.” I lean in to kiss her forehead. “Can we go back to bed now?”

  “You go ahead. I’m going to take a shower.”

  “Let me get you dirty first.” I turn my attention to her neck, but she slides out from under me, her face set in an unreadable expression, which is all new. I can always read her. “Nat? What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. I just want a shower.”

  “Okay, then…” She leaves the room, and I sit there for a minute, confused by her behavior. What the hell just happened here? I return to the bedroom and get back into bed to wait for her. She comes out of the bathroom thirty minutes later, fully dressed for much colder weather than what we’re experiencing in Southern California.

  Then I see the suitcase she’s pulling behind her. I get out of bed. “What’re you doing?”

  “I’m going home to New York. I’m returning to school and my apartment with Leah.”

  I feel like I’ve been knifed in the heart. “What the fuck, Natalie? You’re leaving me?”

  Her eyes fill and her jaw sets before she nods.

  “Why?”

  “Because you’re a liar, and I won’t be married to a man who lies to me about who and what he really is.”

  That’s when I realize two things—one, she’s seriously leaving me, and two, she knows the truth about me. How in the fuck did she find out?

  “Natalie, wait. Let’s talk about this.”

  “We did talk, and I gave you the opportunity to tell me the truth. Instead, you looked me in the eye and lied.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “We both know you lied.”

  “And that’s a deal breaker? After everything we’ve been through, you’re actually going to walk away from me? I thought you loved me.”

  “I do love you. I love you with my whole heart and soul. I’ve shared every part of myself with you, even the most painful parts. I’ve been closer to you in the last month than I’ve been to anyone else in my life. I’ve kept nothing secret. Can you say the same?”

  “Natalie… You don’t understand.”

  “I understand perfectly. You didn’t think I could handle it, so you kept it from me.”

  “Yes! That! Exactly.”

  “Except, when I gave you the chance to fix it, you continued to lie. That’s the part I can’t live with. How will I ever know what else you’re keeping from me? How will I ever know if you’re satisfied with me when you obviously want more than you think I can give?”

  The ground is shifting under me, and I can’t find my footing in this situation. A sense of desperation unlike anything I’ve ever experienced overtakes me. I want the last hour to do over again more than I’ve ever wanted anything, ever.

  “If you leave, there’s no chance we’ll ever find our way through this.”

  “If I stay, there’s no way I’ll ever know that I truly have all of you. I’ve lived half a life for long enough, Flynn.” Her voice catches, but she recovers her composure. “I’ve loved every minute we’ve spent together. You’ve been so extraordinarily generous and tender toward me from the beginning, and you’ll never know how much I appreciate that.”

  “I don’t want your goddamn appreciation.”

  “And I don’t want your goddamn lies. Come on, Fluff. Let’s go home.”

  Fluff launches off the bed and follows Natalie and her suitcase out of the bedroom.

  “Natalie, wait. This is insane. You can’t go back to who you were before. The press will be all over you. You won’t be safe.”

  “I’ll be fine. After a while, they’ll lose interest in the boring schoolteacher from New York who was briefly married to the movie star.”

  Hearing her describe our marriage in the past tense fills me with panic. “You’re just going to give up on us that quickly? Without even giving me a chance?”

  “I’ve given you every chance. You’ve had more than enough time to tell me the truth, and you didn’t. And this morning, you lied to my face.”

  “How do you know? Who told you?”

  “Valerie.”

  Hearing that, I want to roar from the rage that surges through me like a tidal wave, sucking me under and making me see red. I’ll fucking kill her for this. I somehow manage to find the words to ask the one question that has to be asked. “When did you see Valerie?”

  “The other night in the ladies’ room at the SAGs. She gave me quite the earful, but I didn’t believe her. The Flynn I know and love bears no resemblance whatsoever to the man she described to me, so I blew it off as meaningless jealousy. Then when she called me last night, after you were asleep, to tell me about your room downstairs and where I could find the key, I had a feeling she wasn’t making it up after all.”

  I feel like I’ve been shot straight through the heart. I never got around to getting rid of the stuff in the basement, and now she’s seen it. This can’t be happening.

  “After I saw what you have down there, you know what occurred to me?”

  “What?” I ask through gritted teeth.

  “Yesterday, when we were in Hayden’s room, you were naked and hard as a rock. It turned you on to be in that room with me, didn’t it?�
�

  “Yes,” I hiss. “So what?”

  “It’s too bad you couldn’t have just told me that. Now we’ll never know what might’ve been, will we?”

  “You can’t leave me over this. I won’t let you!”

  “You won’t let me? What’re you going to do?”

  I make an effort to soften my tone so I don’t make this worse, if that’s even possible. “You’re overreacting, baby. I kept it from you because I didn’t want to scare you after everything you’ve been through.”

  “And I understand that. I even appreciate it. But when I asked you straight out and you lied to me, that’s something else altogether.”

  “I realize that now. I shouldn’t have done that. I swear to God, I’ve never lied to you about anything else—and I never will again. Can’t we please talk this through and figure it out together?”

  She wants to. I can see that, yet I also know there’s a backbone made of steel in her that’s gotten her through worse than this.

  “So many times,” I say, “I told myself I should walk away because you deserve better than me. Remember after our first date when I didn’t call you? It was because Hayden convinced me that a nice girl like you had no business getting tangled up with the likes of me. Then you texted me and asked me to see Aileen. I took one look at you that day and knew I could never walk away from you. I love you so much, Nat. I put your needs ahead of my own. That’s what this comes down to.”

  Her eyes are full of unshed tears that break my heart. “I had a right to know about your needs. You should’ve told me, especially before you married me.”

  “Yes, I should have. You’re absolutely right—and I was wrong. So very, very wrong. I screwed up. I’ll never deny that. But we can fix this. I know we can. We’ve already endured more than some people do in a lifetime. Please don’t give up on us, Nat. You told me the night we got married that you wouldn’t.” I take a step closer to her and put my hands on her shoulders. “You made promises to me.”

  She pushes my hands away. “You lied to me! Don’t talk to me about promises, Flynn. This is why Hayden can’t bear to look at me, because he knew the truth about you—and I didn’t.”

  I gather her in close to me, breathing in the scent of her hair. “You can’t leave me, Nat. You’ll ruin me.”

  She begins to cry in earnest. “I don’t want to leave you, but I can’t live with someone who lies to me as easily as you did this morning, especially over something so important.”

  “It’s not important! That’s what I’m trying to tell you!”

  She wiggles out of my embrace, pushing me back. “If it’s not important to you, then why do you have a room full of BDSM equipment in your house? And don’t make it worse by telling me it’s not yours or some other line of bullshit.”

  Before I can form a response to that, Fluff begins to bark and snarl at me the way she did when Natalie and I were first together.

  “I have to go.”

  “You can’t leave without security.”

  “I’ll let them drive me to the airport, and then I’ll put my hair up and wear glasses. No one will recognize me.”

  “Yes, they will, Natalie. You’re being naïve.”

  “I’ve been naïve from the beginning where you’re concerned. Why stop now?” She goes into the kitchen to retrieve her purse and then returns to the foyer, where she bends to clip Fluff’s leash to her collar.

  “So that’s it? Just like that it’s over?”

  After a long, endless pause during which I die a thousand times, she finally looks at me. “I need some time.”

  “How much time?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll call you when I’m ready to talk to you.”

  “I’ll give you a week, and then I’m coming after you.” As I say the words, I wonder how I’ll survive a week without her, the same week we were supposed to spend on our honeymoon.

  “Don’t do that. I won’t see you until I’m ready to.”

  “I’m sorry, Natalie. I fucked this up. I freely admit that. Please don’t go. I love you so much. Please.” I have never once, in all my life, begged a woman for anything.

  Until now.

  “I don’t want to go, but it’s what I need right now. I will call you. When I’m ready.” With Fluff’s leash attached to one hand and her suitcase in the other, she opens the door but turns back once more. “I love you, too. You are the best thing to ever happen to me.”

  The door closes with a click that echoes throughout the house like a gunshot.

  Through the beveled glass on the side of the door, I watch her approach the security detail. I see one of them open the back door of an SUV for her. I see her and Fluff get in. Right before the door closes, Natalie wipes tears from her face. And then they’re gone. Almost as fast as they entered my life, they’ve exited it.

  Motherfucker.

  I pick up a heavy crystal vase that sits on a table next to the door and throw it across the room, shattering one of the plate-glass windows in the back of the house.

  I stand there breathing hard and filled with rage, most of it directed at the venomous bitch who is my ex-wife. I want to find her and kill her, except even that wouldn’t be what she deserves.

  I’m also fucking furious at myself for not getting rid of the equipment in the basement before I brought Natalie here, but that’s not exactly something I could ask Addie to take care of for me since she knows nothing about it. And there hasn’t been time, without Natalie here with me, to do it myself.

  The rage slowly drains from my system, leaving only pain behind. I’ll give Natalie the time she says she needs, and then I’ll go after her. I’ll get her back or die trying. I will tell her everything I should’ve told her from the beginning, and this time, I’ll hold nothing back.

  She’s mine. She will always be mine.

  The doorbell rings, and I run for the door, hoping Natalie has come back, that she’s changed her mind about leaving me.

  But it’s not Natalie. It’s the FBI agent. Vickers.

  “Mr. Godfrey, I’m afraid we have a problem.”

  * * *

  Turn the page to read the thrilling conclusion of Flynn and Natalie’s story in Victorious, now!

  Chapter 1

  “I can’t fucking believe she left me.” I pace the length of Marlowe’s deck in Malibu, the million-dollar view of the Pacific completely lost on me today. I feel like my heart has been ripped from my chest and run over by a Hummer. Natalie is gone, and the pain is excruciating. “She actually left me. She promised she never would. She made promises to me, Mo.”

  “Flynn… You need to calm down.”

  “Calm down? How do I calm down when my wife has left me?”

  “I’m afraid you’re going to have a heart attack or something. Your face is all red, and you’re sweating.”

  I rub my chest, feeling as if I might actually be having a heart attack. “What am I going to do, Mo? Tell me what to do.” I’ve told Marlowe only that Natalie caught me in a lie and left.

  She looks at me for a long moment before she breaks eye contact and gazes out at the endless ocean. “I don’t know. This is a tough one.”

  I flop into the chair next to hers, only because I’m exhausted and despondent and can’t pace anymore. I can’t imagine an hour without Natalie, let alone a week or more. That’s how long she said she needed to “think” before she’ll call me. A week. It feels like a lifetime.

  “I broke a window at my house.”

  “When?”

  “This morning after she left.”

  “Did you tell someone so it can be fixed?”

  I shake my head. The window has been the least of my concerns, what with the fucking FBI showing up about five minutes after Natalie left for the airport.

  Marlowe picks up her phone and places a call. “Addie, it’s Marlowe. Flynn is here, and there’s some stuff going on. He asked me to tell you he broke a window at his house earlier. One of the big ones in the back of the house. Could
you call someone to come by to fix that for him?” She pauses. “Let me ask him.” She holds the phone out to me. “She’d like to talk to you.”

  I’m tempted to say no. The only person I want to talk to is Natalie, but that’s not possible. I extend my hand for Marlowe’s phone. “Hey.”

  “What’s wrong?” As my faithful assistant for the last five years, Addie can tell with one word that something is very wrong. “I got a call from the pilot that Natalie took the plane you were supposed to take to Mexico to Colorado—by herself—and she’s not answering her phone.”

  So she went to see her sister Candace. I’m not surprised. I’m also reminded that the FBI has my phone, and until I get it back, Natalie has no way to call me. I will fix that first thing in the morning. “I, um…” I don’t want to say the words out loud. If I keep saying it, that makes it real. “Our plans changed.”

  “Okay… So what’s wrong?”

  “Natalie and I… She… We… She’s gone back to New York by way of Colorado to see her sister.”

  “Why? For how long?”

  “It’s a long story, and I don’t know.”

  After a pause, Addie says, “What can I do for you?”

  “See about getting the window fixed?”

  “Already done. I sent a text from my computer while we’ve been on the phone. I’ll go over there to meet the workers.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What else?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “I’ll be here when you figure it out.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Flynn… Don’t let her get away. No matter what, do not let her get away.”

  “I won’t.” But as I say the words, I’m petrified that she’s already left me for good.

  “So what did the FBI want with you this morning?” Addie asks.

  “How do you know about that?”

  “They came to the office first.”

  “Apparently, Rogers’s wife told the officers investigating his murder that I was threatening him, and he feared for his safety.”

  “You threatened him with legal action, not physical harm.”

  “Which is what I told Vickers.”

  “Was he satisfied by that?”