Forbidden: A Romance Anthology

by Yolanda Olson

  Because I’m the best, I reply to myself in the same words Damon’s spoken to me.

  “How well do actually know him?” The sorry way he’s looking at me tightens my chest. And I’m going through everything I know of Damon. All the moments we’ve shared. All the beautiful things he’s uttered to me and all the shit he’s done…

  Yes, Damon Coldwell is an enigma. He’s a complicated man, but…he would never steal the only thing I had left of my family.

  Would he?

  “The only reason your father gave Marsh your job was because Damon convinced your fiancé to send us his resume, and of course…your father didn’t want to lose him. He’s like a son to him, or so I’ve heard.”

  What?

  “Don’t look so disappointed, little mouse…”

  Little mouse.

  My hand works my chest, trying to loosen it so I can breathe. So I can make sense of all this.

  Damon wouldn’t play me like this. He wouldn’t. After everything…

  What if…

  No, he wouldn’t tell me he loves me while stabbing me in the back.

  And I know he loves me. I do. You can’t fake the way he looks at me or the way he touches me or…

  But what if…

  “Is everything okay?” My assistant’s voice seems so faraway. And I can’t breathe.

  “I think some water would be good,” he tells her. “It’s nothing personal, Ava. It’s business.”

  “Why are you telling me all this?” I choke on my words.

  “Because we have no need for you anymore. It’s done. Monroe belongs to Coldwell. It’s all he wanted.” Tucking in the chair across from me, he looks straight up at me, leveling me with his narrowed gaze. “I didn’t think you’d be so easy. Maybe Damon was right…sometimes when you want something done, you need to do it yourself. And I have to hand it to him. He did you well.”

  And I’m back in the crowded elevator, watching two men laugh and joke…about me.

  I can hear Damon’s quip as clear as day: Sometimes if you want a job done, you have to do it yourself.

  “You are a very good editor, but I don’t know if you’re a right fit here. Let’s be honest, do you really think you can work with us after this?”

  “Miss Monroe?” My assistant places a bottle of water and a glass in front of me.

  “Thank you.” It’s all I can manage.

  “It’s almost time to leave for your 4:00 p.m.” She smiles at me, concern etching the lines of her face. “Also, I have Dr. Cruz for you on the phone.”

  “Please clear my schedule.”

  “Yes, miss.” She nods. “And the doctor?”

  “I’ll call her back.”

  Dex steps back, looking apologetic, his hand holding his chest like his heart is truly bleeding for me. When he leaves under Bianca’s dark, watchful glare, she comes over.

  Fanning me with a wad of papers from my desk, she takes my hand, grumbling something about men being snakes.

  “You talk to the doctor, and I’ll sort the rest.” Her tender eyes look me over as she hands me my phone.

  When she leaves, I put it to my ear in a haze of disbelief and sorrow. And it has nothing to do with the company and everything to do with the man I let take over my heart.

  Is it really true?

  It all makes sense…it all fits so well with everything that’s happened…

  “Hello? Miss Monroe?” I come back to the call. “Hello?”

  “H-h-hi.”

  “I hope this isn’t a bad time?” she asks, and tears start pouring from my eyes. They pour and pour and pour as I listen to her tell me about my results, and my world completely plummets.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  AVA

  I’m spiraling down a rabbit hole, as Dr. Cruz talks me through all my options. All the while I’m still in the office with Dexter looking down on me. Breaking my heart. Obliterating my world. It’s like Groundhog Day except it revolves around the last two hours of my life.

  “You don’t have to make a decision today. If I were to make an estimation after the internal ultrasound, I’d say you’re about five weeks along. In this state you have till twenty-four weeks to terminate the pregnancy.” She smiles when I look at her startled because I never imagined myself in this situation. Having to make a decision.

  “Does it have a heart?” It’s a fucking stupid question, and I have no idea why I’m asking it.

  “At this point?” Dr. Cruz clasps her hands over her notes. “Yes.”

  I nod, silencing my phone. No doubt Fran has alerted Damon to my call. It was her stuttering silence that sold them out in the end.

  I look up at the doctor, trying my best to smile through the soul-splitting pain in my chest.

  “Thank you,” I tell her when she hands me the information on my options and all the things we’ve discussed.

  I’m relieved I can leave when she walks me out telling her secretary when to arrange my next appointment.

  I stand outside thinking of where to go. I consider my apartment, but Damon will be there, and I don’t want to see him right now. Fuck, I don’t want to see him ever again if not for the fact that I don’t want him to see what he’s done to me.

  He did you well.

  Fresh tears sluice down my face as I try to figure out where to go. I try calling Mom, but she doesn’t even let it ring out anymore. She’s declining my calls.

  Was it his plan all along to isolate me?

  If so, why would he introduce me to his family? I don’t understand why all of a sudden nothing makes sense, and I need to make sense because there’s a baby inside me and fuuuuck! I can’t do this shit on my own.

  I manage to hail a taxi after a while, and whilst I have no idea where I’m going, I tell the driver to take me to the park. The fucking park.

  What is wrong with me?

  “Ma’am?” The driver pushes a wad of tissues through the cash tray. “Is everything okay? Do you need help?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Oh man,” she grates. “Look, I can’t drop you off like this.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “You don’t look fine, and you were outside that doctor’s office… You’re not sick, are you? You’re okay, right?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “It’s just that you hear about healthy young women getting real sick now with cancer and—”

  “I’m. Fine,” I tell her, and because I can’t bear to listen to her analyze my situation, I give her Lacie’s address. It’s a Monday; she’ll probably be at the office, but her doorman knows me well enough to let me up.

  And he does. In fact, he calls the elevator and takes me all the way up to her floor. Sitting on the floor outside her door, I look through the information the doctor gave me. I’m pretty sure I’m ready to collapse from sheer exhaustion when she arrives.

  “Oh fuck.” She pauses in front of me. “What’s happened?”

  Hoisting me up from the ground, she lets us into her home. It’s not over-the-top, but impressive enough that you know she makes very good money.

  Once she’s got me on her couch, she starts to go through all the shit in my hands. “Oh fuck.”

  At this point I have no tears left to cry. I’m empty in feeling and being. I remember thinking Damon had broken me before, but that was nothing compared to this.

  “What am I going to do?”

  “Wash,” she says, grabbing her phone and texting away as she paces in front of me. “You’re going to wash this day away, and then we’re going to order pizza and dirty burgers and all the shit we can get here tonight. And we’re going to pig the fuck out. Besides, you have the best excuse, right?”

  “I can’t have his baby.”

  Lacie stops, turning to face me with narrowed eyes, “Did he tell you that? Is that why you’re upset? Because he was a dick about it?”

  I laugh because I actually wish that were the reason.

  “You’re laughing at least.” Helping me up, she
guides me into her bathroom. “I don’t know what’s happened, but I promise we’ll work it out together. You know I’m good at working shit out.”

  She pushes me into the walk-in shower, and as I undress, she brings me a bath sheet and some of her bad-day fluffy pajamas.

  “I’m going to order food. You take your time.”

  DAMON

  Thank God!

  I answer the call before she has a chance to change her mind. “Ava?”

  The voice on the other end laughs sourly. “I don’t know what you’ve said or done, but I’m going to enjoy hurting you. Every tear you’ve made her cry. Every piece of her you’ve broken…I’m going to hurt you for it. You just had to be a decent guy. Take responsibility.”

  She puts the phone down without finishing, and I’m left going over everything.

  Take responsibility?

  I keep going over her words as I leave Ava’s door and get back in the car. It takes me no time to get Lacie’s address from Warner. When I get there, however, the doorman turns out to be a problem. He’s an old boy, but fuck, he’s not having any of my shit.

  In the end he calls Lacie so many times that she comes downstairs, rage coloring her face a deep crimson.

  “You!” She practically runs at me. Her hands land on my chest with a hard shove. I’m taken back by how strong she is. “You need to fuck off. Haven’t you done enough? Haven’t you hurt her enough?”

  “Miss Taylor, is this man bothering you?” The old boy tries to get in between us.

  “It’s okay, Sam, I’ve handled bigger bastards.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you think you know, but I need to talk to Ava.” I hold her at arm’s length by her shoulders.

  “No, you don’t. You’ve done enough damage. How could you turn your back on her…on your child?”

  My already twisted stomach tightens around my heart. “What? What are you talking about?”

  Laughing, she pushes away from me. “You’re something else, you know that? To come here and pretend you’re fucking clueless. Meanwhile, your pregnant girlfriend is falling to pieces upstairs. What is wrong with you?”

  I’m immobile as her statement sinks in and echoes around my head.

  My pregnant girlfriend?

  My pregnant girlfriend.

  Ava’s pregnant?

  Lacie heads back toward the elevators, pressing the button like it’s personally offended her. The doors ding open, but instead of going in, she turns back to me. “I can’t believe I actually admired you for what you did at the game. I can’t believe I was beginning to think you were a decent person…”

  “Is she okay?” I ignore her rant. “Is the baby okay?”

  “Why do you care now?” she asks venomously, and I really can’t hold back anymore.

  “I don’t give a fuck what you know or what you think you know,” I start for her, my long strides knocking her doorman out of the way. “But I would never turn my back on her or our child.”

  “So why the fuck is she in pieces?” Lacie shouts right in my face.

  “I did something, and I need to explain to her why. I need her to know that it’s for her. It’s all for her…”

  “What?” She looks at me utterly confused.

  “Ava wanted Monroe, so I bought it for her.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  AVA

  “Damon’s downstairs.” Lacie sits on the edge of her bed, watching me as I stand in front of the long mirror on her wardrobe.

  It’s no surprise—I knew he’d eventually come here. I thought it would take him longer, but then what do I know, right? At this point I’m asking myself if I know anything about Damon. The only thing I’m sure of is that I have his baby inside me.

  It’s weird because I don’t feel different. I don’t look different. I just know that there’s another human growing inside me. And it’s got a heart. Too small to hear or see, but it’s got one. It’s alive.

  I pull the pajama top down and turn to her. “Okay.”

  “He wants to see you.” Standing, she wanders to me. Her eyes flit everywhere like she’s hiding something. “You need to hear him out.”

  “No. I don’t.”

  “You do, Ava. You really do.” I can tell from the way she’s looking at me that she’s already spoken to him. She has that piteous pout to her lips she gets when she feels sorry for you. “Call him or talk to him through the door…I don’t know…just listen to what he says, and then you can make a decision you are less likely to regret.”

  “The only thing I regret is…” Loving him. I can’t actually bring myself to say the words out loud. The thought is another dagger through my already bleeding heart. “The only thing I regret is letting him near me.”

  “Babe…” Her arms wrap around me. Lacie is the closest thing to family I have left. Everyone else is gone. “Sometimes we have to do things that hurt us. But they’re the right thing because in the long haul…”

  I look up at her, and she looks so sad, so very sad, and it’s got nothing to do with me.

  “I’ll tell him to go away.” She smiles weakly at me before walking away. “Food will be here soon.”

  I follow her out, listening to her tell Damon that I’m too tired to talk today. That it’s been a long day for everyone, and the best thing is to sleep on things. She fields him as though she’s protecting one of her clients.

  Not long after she’s gone into the shower, the food arrives and with it, a note.

  The blocky all-uppercase scrawl is somewhat messy, like it’s been rushed. The paper has that faint woody amber scent that makes my pores come to life, and every part of me craves Damon’s warmth. And all I can do is stare and stare at my name written boldly and underlined like it’s the most important thing on that page.

  “You’re not feeling sick, are you?” Lacie asks, taking the food from me, and I follow her into her kitchen. Her eyes flicker to the hand on my chest. “Are you going to read it?” She nods at the note I’m holding to my heart like it’s a salve to my pain. “You should.”

  “He lied to me.”

  “But you knew he was a liar when you let him in.”

  “I thought…”

  “You didn’t think—you wanted what Damon could give you, and you took it. You didn’t do anything wrong.” She sighs, handing me a plate with a slice of pizza, fries, and a burger. “Eat what you can.”

  She grabs her own plate and heads for the couch. We sit in silence, neither one of us eating or really watching the show.

  “I fucked Callum.”

  Wait. “What?”

  “I fucked Callum Warner.”

  “Shit.” It’s all I can say to that without sounding judgmental.

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “No.” Putting her plate down on the coffee table, she then grabs mine. “Read the note.” She pulls it out of the pouch at the front of the sweater and hands it to me before sitting back and hugging me to her.

  I stare at my name some more before I unfold the paper. I take a deep breath, but it does nothing to stop the tears from flooding my eyes. I blink and blink them away, but there’s too many. I thought I was all cried out, but his scent and the familiarity of his handwriting…

  My beautiful Ava.

  My heart stutters at those words, before it tightens somewhere in the pit of my stomach.

  “You want me to read it to you?”

  I shake my head, wiping my eyes dry before I start again, this time breathing through the onslaught of emotions and feelings.

  My beautiful Ava,

  I don’t know where to start. Maybe I should start by saying how sorry I am that I’ve hurt you. But I’m not the good guy. I’m not a hero. I’m the villain. And I warned you—I would do anything for you. Once you’re mine there’s nothing I won’t do to keep you. To make you happy. There’s nothing I won’t do to look after you and what’s yours.

  It just didn’t start off that way.

  I gave you
r father the chance to save Monroe from the very beginning. But he was too proud, and when he finally had to ask for help, he still wouldn’t concede that his ship was sinking. So, I put as many holes in it as I could to make it sink faster.

  And when the other houses started sniffing around, I had to make sure that I took his best asset. You.

  You were the ultimate bargaining chip. Your father was always so careful at keeping you away from things—I thought he was protecting you. I thought he would do anything for you.

  He didn’t, and it’s why I made sure you took from him everything he was willing to take from you. I wanted him to see everything he’d underestimated.

  I wanted him to fear you, like he feared me.

  I wanted him to see everything I saw.

  The passion. The fight. The care. The love.

  Everything I had come to love and admire.

  But he reduced it all to petty crumbs to dust his pockets, and even when he handed me Monroe on a platter, I couldn’t take it from you.

  I couldn’t betray you. I couldn’t fathom letting you go.

  That was the first time I ever feared losing something—you.

  It meant working out a different way of saving Monroe. So that in the end, no matter what, it’s yours. Like it should always have been.

  You are the only loss I fear, Ava. The only loss I could never survive.

  You are my one and greatest fall.

  You.

  Always, always yours,

  DHC

  Incapable of staunching my tears, I hold the note to my chest, trying to process all that’s happened. Trying to find my feet and a clear head because even hurt, I can’t bring myself to hate him. Even when it’s all I want to do.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  DAMON

  Grayson follows me into Dexter’s office, and he looks as exhausted as I feel.