by Cora Brent
“Will do,” Trent says and casually flips the spatula in his fingers as he watches me with a lazy smile.
I keep an eye on the doorway to make sure my brother doesn’t overhear this conversation. “Fair warning, your juvenile efforts are wasted.”
Trent continues to flip the spatula in a maddening way. He doesn’t respond.
I look him over and do my best to appear unimpressed. “You don’t shock me, Trent. Go get yourself an inexperienced little wallflower to play with. Maybe you’ll have better success shocking her. There’s nothing you can show me that I haven’t seen and done already.”
He chokes on his laughter and then shoots me a look of respect.
There’s something else there too. He’s so keyed up he would probably drop his pants in half a second if I gave him a sign.
Trent shakes his head and tightens his hold on the spatula. “You’re killing me, honey.”
Pointedly, I glance down at his pants. I cluck my tongue at the evidence of a significant bulge trying to break through his zipper. “Funny, from my perspective you look immensely healthy.
On that note, I leave him there and take a short stroll to the carriage house to check on the girls.
I’m sure he’s watching me go.
Good.
I feel the grin spreading across my face. I haven’t felt this energized in quite some time.
6
Trent
I’ve been slacking on my workouts and the pent up energy is getting to me. On an average day I’m disciplined when it comes to spending an hour at sunrise and another hour in the evening using my personal gym. However, I left my setup behind in Miami and I haven’t replaced it yet. Unlike Danny, who uses the gym in town, I have a strong dislike for public gyms teeming with sweaty creeps who think too much of themselves. So far I’ve been making due at home with a set of free weights and a floor mat.
I’m on the tail end of my fourth set of one-handed pushups when I hear the chime from my phone, a warning it’s time for my video conference call. Throwing on a t-shirt is about all I’m willing to do to look presentable. The call is just my daily check in with Kaia Morales, who’s been my second in command at Payback for the last three years. Kaia doesn’t give a shit if I look like a bum.
Taking a seat at the kitchen counter, I flip open my laptop and find that Kaia is already waiting.
“Ready,” I say by way of greeting.
Kaia has worked for me long enough to be unaffected when I don’t waste time with a show of manners. She launches straight into a detailed account of what’s new with the variety of properties under the company’s umbrella. She recites from memory, not looking down at her notes once.
“It’s time to renegotiate lease terms for three of the tenants in the Centerpoint complex.”
“Which tenants?”
“The dry cleaner, the dance studio and the deli.”
All family owned businesses. “Don’t raise the rent.”
“I thought you’d say that. But I still feel compelled to point out that rents in that particular neighborhood have risen by thirty percent in the last two years.”
“Noted. Don’t raise the rent.”
“Fine. Have you made up your mind about the condo building on First Street?”
“Yup. Unload it.”
“The market is down since the holidays,” she warns. “Might be better to wait and see what happens in the summer.”
“I’m aware. Unload it anyway.”
Her brow furrows. She’s wondering why I’ve decided to switch tactics lately and keep a drastic amount of liquidity on hand. That’s not a subject that requires discussion right now.
“When are you starting your maternity leave?” I ask her, partly in an effort to move on.
“I’m not due for another three weeks. I can work right up the labor pains start and even then I’ll probably stay on the clock until it’s time to push.”
I let out a low whistle. “That’s crazy. Why don’t you start next week?”
“What about the First Street condos? There’s a lot to be done before those can be slapped on the market.”
“Get Diane to handle it.”
She hesitates.
“Come on,” I urge, feeling bad that my most dedicated employee has been pushing herself too hard since I relocated. “You and Linus can enjoy a pre-baby getaway or something.”
She’s still thinking. “He’s been trying to get me to step back. My blood pressure has been a little high.”
“There you have it. Don’t worry about anything. Take the full three months, longer if you want.”
Kaia grins. “For a notorious badass you sure are a hell of a boss.”
“Don’t let that news get out. I’m more effective if I’m widely known as an asshole.”
“No one will hear the truth from me. Thanks, Trent.”
“Take care.”
She disconnects and I stare at the picture on the screen for a moment. It’s one of the few pictures of my mother that I still have after my dickhead brother destroyed photos, mementos and anything else he could get his heartless hands on. She’s not posing here. She’s in the middle of speaking, using her hands with an animated look on her face. It was taken at some summer neighborhood block party during our early years in Lake Stuart. Danny was the one who sent it to me after I was finally free of Tavington. He said Jules discovered the picture in a box filled with random photos and thought I might want to have it. I’m sure I never thanked her for passing it along but I was grateful.
I click the internet icon and scroll to my latest bookmark. Social media holds zero appeal for me so I keep my distance. Gretchen, however, takes a more normal approach and has accounts for both personal and professional use. The page I’m looking at is the only one that shows a profile picture and I’d like to see the rest of the content but her account is set to private. If I want to see it then I have to send her a freaking friend request, which is like waving a stalker flag. She might not even update this account anymore. It looks to me like the profile pic was taken a couple of years ago. She’s wearing a college sweatshirt and sitting at a table at a bar. Her red hair gleams and she’s laughing while some faceless guy drapes a casual arm over her shoulders. It’s probably unreasonable for me to hate that guy but I’d still like to growl and smack his arm away. He shouldn’t be touching her, not even digitally.
Gretchen.
I can’t recall another woman who’s captured my attention the way she has. She’s smart and she’s obscenely sexy and nothing fazes her.
Nothing.
There are times when I look at her and I’m sure that if I don’t do something soon my dick is going to become outraged enough to start a revolution.
When that happens she stares back at me with a superior smile as if she knows what’s on my mind and is entertained by my assumption that I might have what it takes to handle her.
I’m dying to show off just how well I can handle her.
Gretchen, for all her worldly, feisty confidence, won’t be able to walk straight for a fucking week if I decide to surrender.
I’m still deciding.
Because she’s still Danny’s sister and because I don’t want to be a prick.
But mostly because starting something with Gretchen will mean opening the door to complications I was never expecting to have.
With that thought in mind and with my cock in a grumpy mood, I head to the bathroom, strip down and turn the shower on full blast. I need to jerk off or I won’t be able to think for the rest of the day.
“I’m not shy about getting my fill.”
“Fuck,” I groan, planting one palm on the wall and stroking myself with the other as I picture soft lips and perky tits and a round little ass that’s begging to be violated.
“There’s nothing you can show me that I haven’t seen or done already.”
She underestimates me. I like that. I want to surprise her. I want to watch her green eyes widen and then roll back into her
head as she shudders underneath me. I want her hands clawing at my hair while my mouth defiles the hot center between her legs.
I want to take it all. Everything.
But today I have to settle for a fantasy as I come hard, pant for a minute with my forehead against the tile, and then seize the shower gel to wash off.
Yesterday I made plans with Danny to go to the batting cages later. While I haven’t played the game in years, I’ve taken swings at the cages now and then and no one can accuse me of being out of shape. I wonder what kind of path I might have followed if Liam and the horrors of Tavington hadn’t twisted my destiny into something different. Anyway, swinging a bat with my old buddy amid doses of good natured banter is something I didn’t have for a long time and I’m glad to have it again. Danny needs to make up his mind soon and decide what he plans to do about the upcoming season.
It’s not until my stomach grumbles that I remember I haven’t eaten yet today. There’s not a whole lot to choose from in the kitchen. I should go to the store since I’ve got nothing else going on for the next few hours.
I’ve just finished pouring the remnants of a bag of granola into my mouth when I hear some weird noise coming from the front door. There’s a low thump, then some animal-like scratching. Finally, the doorbell rings, a lengthy DINGGGG DONGGGGG, as if whoever presses the button doesn’t know how to do it correctly.
There are no deliveries expected today. I toss the empty granola bag in the trash and the doorbell gets tortured again.
DINGGGG DONGGGGGG.
I have zero patience for door to door sales. No one wants their day interrupted with an offer for satellite television or bug spray. Now irritated, I throw the door open to show the visitor the less cheerful side of my personality.
And I stare, dumbfounded.
“Hi,” says Caitlin.
The twins, dressed in sparkly princess costumes, gape up at me as they shiver side by side.
I look around for an adult and see no one. “What are you two doing here?”
Mara hiccups and starts to cry.
Caitlin sniffs. “She’s sick.”
Winter has reclaimed the skies and it’s far too cold for them to be outside dressed as they are. I don’t know how they wandered off but we’ll deal with that in a minute. My first priority is to get them warm.
“Girls, come in.” I wave them inside and they step forward eagerly, although tears stream down Mara’s cheeks.
I shut the door, tell them to stay right where they are, and dash to the bedroom to grab a couple of hoodies.
“Here. You can put these on over your costumes.” I hand them each one.
The look confused.
“They’re sweatshirts,” I explain. “You pull them over your head. See? I’m wearing one.”
Caitlin wrinkles her nose. “I know that.” She yanks hers on and pushes her hands into the sleeves. It comes down to her knees and it’s on backwards but whatever.
Mara tries but gets stuck, her muffled voice yelling “Help! Help!” from within the fleece folds. She turns in blind circles.
Gently, I help her find her way out. She breathes with relief and pushes her hair out of her face. Her eyes are still watery.
I’m crouched down in front of them. “Now what are you guys doing wandering around by yourselves? Where’s your Aunt Gretchen?”
“She had to go places,” Caitlin says.
“And your Uncle Danny?”
“He’ll be back in ten minutes.”
I frown. “Where did he go?”
“He’ll be back in ten minutes,” Caitlin repeats with confidence.
Why the hell would Danny have left them alone, even for ten minutes?
“My tummy hurts.” Mara is crying again.
“She drank the tea.” Caitlin takes her sister’s hand. “It was bad.”
“You drank bad tea?” I ask Mara, beginning to grow uneasy about what we’re really dealing with.
Mara nods.
“And then she threw up on the table,” Caitlin announces.
My uneasiness skyrockets.
I peer directly into Mara’s eyes, which seem a little glassy. She gazes tearfully back at me.
“You’re not in trouble,” I assure her. “But I need to know what you drank, sweetheart.”
“Uncle Danny’s tea,” she whispers. “It was on the table.”
I flash back to the day of the funeral. “To Jules!”
In an instant I understand what must have happened.
“Did you find the tea in the carriage house?” I ask the twins.
They nod.
“Was the tea a brown color and in a bottle?”
They nod again.
Fucking hell, Danny.
He not only left them alone but he left a bottle of whiskey out for them to find.
Mara and Caitlin watch me with identical worry. I don’t want them to know that I feel like throttling their uncle right now.
This isn’t good.
This is the kind of thing that gets reported to the authorities and summons child protective services.
“I need you to think,” I tell Mara as gently as possible. “You have to tell me much tea you drank.”
She screws up her little face as she concentrates and for a second she bears an astonishing likeness to her mother. “I had one drink and then another.”
“You mean you drank one cup and then had a second cup?”
She shakes her head.
“You had one sip and then a second sip?”
She nods.
“And then she threw up,” Caitlin reminds me. “I didn’t have any sips. I tasted it and it was yucky so I didn’t want it.”
I feel like I’ve been holding my breath and now I can exhale. It sounds as if Caitlin didn’t ingest any whiskey while Mara didn’t drink much and threw up the portion she did drink. To make sure, I ask Mara to walk toward me in a straight line, which she thinks is funny. I ask her to touch her nose, which she thinks is even funnier.
Caitlin is inspecting my house. “You don’t have any furniture!”
“I have some,” I argue.
“You should get more.”
“I will.”
I lift one twin in each arm and announce we’re walking back to their house. We can be there in just a minute, before Danny returns and freaks out when he can’t find them.
The girls think it’s great fun to be carried down the street. Caitlin begs to be tossed up in the air ‘like Uncle Danny does’ but given the fact that her sister puked a few minutes ago we won’t be doing that.
The front door is locked but luckily the back door is not. Danny’s still not around but neither is Gretchen and for once I’m glad because I’d rather not be the one who gets stuck explaining her brother’s babysitting failures.
Shit. She’s going to hit the roof when she finds out about this.
“I have to go to the potty.” Mara hops from one foot to the other in the middle of the living room.
“Uh, you can take care of that by yourself, right?”
“Yeah.” She scampers over to the hallway half bathroom.
“I have to go too.” Caitlin runs after her.
The bathroom door slams shut. I sink down on the couch, feeling like I just ran a marathon. I wonder if parents feel this way constantly.
There’s roughly ten seconds of peace before the bathroom door flies open and Caitlin dashes back in here. She stops short right in front of me, her eyes wide.
“Mara wouldn’t get off the toilet.”
“There are other bathrooms in the house.”
“It’s too late.” Her face crumples. “I peed.”
“That happens,” I assure her.
“NO! I GOT PEE ON YOUR SWEATSHIRT!”
“It’s all right.” I reach out and pat her little shoulder. “It’s fine, Caitlin.”
She hiccups. “It is?”
“Sure. I didn’t like that sweatshirt anyway.”
“Really?”
“Yup. It’s too small for me. I look stupid when I wear it.”
She accepts that news with a nod. “Okay.”
When I hear the key rattling in the front door I’m expecting Danny to walk in.
Instead, Gretchen is the one who enters and stares at the scene in confusion. “What’s going on?”
Caitlin runs to her and can’t wait to share. “Mara threw up because of the bad tea and we saw Trentcassini’s house and I got pee on his sweatshirt but he says it’s okay.”
Gretchen looks at me. “What?”
I get to my feet. “She just about summed everything up. Mara’s in the bathroom.”
“Where’s Danny?”
“He’ll be back in ten minutes,” Caitlin offers helpfully.
Now Gretchen gets suspicious. “He left the girls with you, Trent?”
Caitlin answers first. “We found Trentcassini at his house. I still have pee on me, Aunt Gretch.” She pulls her aunt toward the stairs while Gretchen throws me a baffled look.
“We’ll talk,” I promise her.
“Yes, we will,” she says and takes Caitlin upstairs to help change her into clean clothes.
Seconds later, Mara skips out of the bathroom, having recovered nicely from her mishap with the ‘bad tea’.
“I washed my hands.” She holds them up as evidence.
“Good job,” I tell her. “You feeling better?”
“I want a fruit bar.”
“All right, let’s go find you one.”
She holds my hand on the short walk to the kitchen. But we have no chance to look for Mara’s fruit bar because Danny bursts through the back door looking like a wild man.
“Fuck, thank god,” he breathes when he sees Mara. He drops to his knees in front of her. “Where’s your sister?”
“Upstairs with Aunt Gretch.”
He grabs her up in a hug.
She squeals. “Swing me around, Uncle Danny.”
“Later.” He’s clearly shaken.
“Where the hell were you?” I ask him, my voice tight with anger.
He hangs his head. “I left my wallet at the gym this morning. I just ran down to get it. They were happily playing in their tent so I thought it would be all right.”
“You left them alone. Jesus, Danny.”
