Pretty girl names … or are they basic?
Is he trying to flatter or insult me?
I draw in a hard breath as I climb out of the water and quickly wrap my body in the soft warmth.
He tosses back another mouthful of beer, this one more generous than its predecessor.
“You’re not going to give them any name.” I keep my tone sweet as I tug my sundress off the chair, and then I turn my back to him and pull it over my damp body.
“What makes you so sure of that?” His words are subtly slurred. I imagine this isn’t his first beer of the night.
I face him once more, hardening my confidence. “Because if you’re who I think you are, you’re not twenty-one. You’re not going to be calling the cops with liquor on your breath.”
His head cocks to one side, as if he’s studying me from a new angle. “If I’m who you think I am, then you should know … my family pretty much owns the cops. Sorry, Sugar Tits, but I’ve got nothing to be scared of in this scenario. You, on the other hand …”
Either he’s trying to get a rise out of me or he truly is as big of an asshole as they say …
I may be known to keep sweet, but I’m not going to stand here and let someone objectify me because I made one bad decision.
“Sugar tits? I guess it’s true what they say—money can’t buy you class.”
He laughs, unfazed, as if my insult merely ricocheted off his steely exterior.
“So what should I call you then?” His penetrating stare falls to my chest before skimming back to my eyes.
“You’re seriously going to turn me in? I didn’t steal. I didn’t break anything. I didn’t hurt anyone. I only went for a swim …”
I fold my arms across my breasts, which I’m quite certain are standing at full attention, and toss him a frown.
“You trespassed on private grounds,” he says. “Last I checked, the police don’t take kindly to illegal activity in this part of town.”
This part of town …
Of course. The southwest quadrant Meredith Hills is the “rich” section of this godforsaken town. Anything south of LeGrand Street and west of Sunderland Avenue is the place to reside. It’s an interesting layout too—the streets almost designed like spokes in a wheel, all of them poking out from the Monreaux residence, as if it’s the capitol complex of this great-and-powerful city.
I roll my eyes. “Spoken like a true Monreaux.”
August chuffs. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
I lift a shoulder. “You’re your father’s son. That’s what that means.”
I’m bluffing. I know nothing about his father besides the fact that he’s a wealthy, powerful, and resourceful man and people tell stories and give warnings. I don’t know what he’s truly like behind closed doors—and I never intend to find out.
August takes a step closer, though I attempt to pay him no mind. I also try to ignore the throbbing pulse in my ears and the nausea swelling in my belly. I have no idea what he’s capable of, but I’d be wise not to put anything past him.
I gather my bra and panties and stuff them into the pockets of my dress before sliding my feet into my faded flip flops. “Get over yourself. I said I was sorry and now I’m leaving.”
Making my way toward the fence line, my steps falter—I’m going to look ridiculous climbing it in nothing but this soggy sundress. But I force the thought from my head, ignoring the weight of his stare on my backside growing heavier with every step.
I don’t care what he thinks.
The Monreauxs might own this town, but at the end of the day, August and I are nobody and nothing to each other. We’ve gone nearly two decades like two passing ships in the night. No reason we can’t continue on that way.
“Hey …” he calls after me, his voice cutting through the dark.
I keep going.
“Hey, I’m not done with you.” His words are edgier this time, louder.
I pick up my pace, sprinting so fast I hardly feel the ground against my feet.
The fence is just a few meters away, almost in reach when the shattering of glass stops me in my tracks.
I glance over my shoulder as he collapses onto the edge of a pool chair, shards of his beer bottle broken at his feet.
Did he smash it … on purpose?
A hundred Monreaux stories dance through my head all at once, rumors indistinguishable from facts swirling together in a sea of uncertainty. Most of the time people like to exaggerate for the sake of telling an interesting story, but Mama always says every lie is rooted in truth.
All I know is most people say that family is as dangerous as they are powerful, as unpredictable as the stormy sea. Dysfunctional yet loyal to a fault. And thick as thieves. Locals stay away from them for good reason.
I once overheard someone claiming that getting into bed with a Monreaux—figuratively or otherwise—is like playing a game of Russian roulette. Odds are you’ll come out of it alive, but you’ll never be the same after.
Unfortunately, those odds weren’t in my Aunt Cynthia’s favor when she dated August’s father decades ago. She didn’t come out of it alive—which is exactly the reason my parents forbid me from going anywhere near this family.
I steal one last glimpse of the wickedly handsome Monreaux boy, at his broad shoulders and chiseled jaw and messy hair, at the shiny fragments broken glass surrounding him, and I make a running leap for the fence.
Within seconds, I’m dashing home, to the side of town where people keep bars on their windows and police sirens double as bedtime lullabies. Where air conditioners break and water bills sometimes go unpaid. Where no one hires house sitters because vacations are the kind of thing you only do when you win a little bit of cash from a scratch-off card or your tax refund is a little more than you were anticipating that year.
By the time I get to our little gray bungalow on North Fifth Street, the soles of my feet are on fire, and my lungs burn in sympathy. I toss my tattered flip flops in the garbage can by the back door and sneak inside.
My father is working nights, and Mama’s asleep in her room, the TV blaring and ceiling fan whirring. They’ll never know about my little escapade tonight, thank goodness.
On my way to my room, I catch my reflection in the mirror in the hall, cringing at my blonde waves that have dried into a frizzy lion’s mane of a look. A second later, I peel off the damp dress and toss it on the back of my desk chair.
Tiptoeing to the kitchen, I fill a plastic cup with ice water from the fridge and drink it all in one go. Returning to my ninety-degree room, I crack a window, switch on a box fan, and collapse on my lumpy mattress.
My breath eventually settles despite my adrenaline-soaked blood, and the events of the past hour play in my mind like a surreal fever dream.
Everything happened so fast.
Half asleep and semi delirious, I stare at the stained ceiling above as a loopy grin claims my face. The whole thing is kind of funny. Trespassing and skinny dipping is the last sort of thing anyone would ever think I’m capable of doing, Monreaux estate or otherwise. In fact, I can’t think of a single soul who’d believe any of this anyway.
Guess it’ll have to be my little secret …
And honestly, I’ve always wanted to see a Monreaux. Maybe it was all those times my parents whispered about them when they thought I wasn’t listening. Or maybe it was the way strangers always looked around the room before they’d start talking about them in public, like they had ears in every corner of this town. They were a mysterious enigma placed on the highest shelf, just out of reach.
At least now I can say that I saw one.
And if I’m lucky, I’ll never see him again.
* * *
Chapter Two
* * *
August
* * *
“Way to go, asshole. Better clean this shit up before Dad and Cassandra get back.” I’m awoken by a familiar voice in my ear followed with a sharp kick to the shin.
Gannon.
I sit up from the pool lounger chair, lifting a hand to my throbbing temple as my eyes adjust to the searing sun overhead. Instinctively I reach for my phone, only to find it in my brother’s possession.
He waves it. “You can have your phone back when you grow the fuck up.”
“Fuck you.”
“You’re pathetic, you know that?”
I smirk. “That’s news to me.”
“Maybe you should think about actually doing something with your life instead of chugging stolen beers and getting high by the pool.”
I don’t get high. I can’t stand that head-in-the-clouds, floating sensation. It’s too cheery for me. But he can think what he wants to think. It’s all the same.
“And hooking up with a different girl every night. You forgot that part,” I add.
“You fucking wish.”
If he only knew …
I’ve gotten more ass this summer than Gannon’s had in his entire life. And that’s including the college-aged nanny he lost his virginity to at fourteen.
“Dad’s going to be home in a few hours,” he says. “Pick this shit up. Take a shower. Put on a clean shirt. Wash your damned hair. You look like you have fucking mange.”
I’ve been called a heartless bastard more times than I can count, but put me next to Gannon and I’m a purring, milk-drunk kitten.
“At least I don’t look like a corporate stock photo.” I squint up at him, shielding my eyes from the glare of the sun. It’s a Sunday afternoon, but he’s dressed in designer slacks and an ironed polo with our country club’s crest on the pocket. Ever since he graduated first in his class at Vanderbilt, the stick up his ass has grown exponentially. Just for fun, I add, “The discounted kind with dead eyes.”
“You want your phone?” He waves it toward me. But before I can reach for it, he chucks it into the pool with a flick of his Rolex-covered wrist.
It lands with a pathetic splash, barely audible over the trickling waterfall feature my father’s girlfriend insisted on adding last year.
I don’t react.
I don’t give him what he wants.
I never do—and I’m pretty sure he hates me for it.
“What do you think Mom would say if she saw us right now?” I ask.
The Mom card has always been Gannon’s Achilles’ heel. I was two when she died. I have zero recollection of her. But he was older. He still has memories. And he was the biggest fucking Mama’s boy—at least that’s what Soren tells me. I’ve seen it in some grainy home videos too. Gannon has always been … extra. Our mother had the patience of a saint to put up with his constant neediness. “Bet she’d be real proud, don’t you think? Watching us going at it like a couple of prideful jackasses.”
Gannon remains impressively stone-faced, though uncharacteristically quiet for a minute.
“If Mom were here, pretty sure she’d be telling you to get your shit together,” he finally responds. “But since she’s not, someone’s got to do it for her.”
“You’re doing the lord’s work.” I place my palms in a prayer position. “Saint Gannon.”
My brother opens his smart mouth to respond, only to have his thunder stolen by our weekend housekeeper, Clarice. Gazing down, she toddles to the pool with a dust pan and broom in hand.
“Good morning,” she says, crouching to sweep up my mess. Her knees crack and she stifles a moan as she bends. She’s way too fucking old for this shit, but she’s loyal and efficient so my father will keep her on until her dying day.
Once upon a time, she was our full-time grounds manager with a staff of fourteen hand-picked souls, but time caught up with her, as it does, and my father chose to keep her on weekends rather than put her out to pasture.
No one’s ever accused Vincent Monreaux of having a soft spot, but he’s good to those who are good to him.
Gannon pinches the bridge of his nose, giving me side-eye while Clarice does my dirty work.
I exhale. “Clarice, you don’t have to do that. I’ve got it.”
All of this fanfare over one fucking broken beer bottle—and none of this would’ve happened if it weren’t for the naked chick swimming in my pool last night.
At first, I thought I was hallucinating. I’d had a few beers and I was heading back for more when I heard the splash outside. I shoved the living room curtains apart and peered toward the pool, which was pitch dark except for the faint glow of moonlight on the rippling water … water that should have been still.
And then I saw her. Floating. Peaceful. Oblivious. Naked.
Clearly deranged.
Possibly high on drugs for all I knew.
Or dead.
I’ve never fashioned myself a hero by any stretch of the imagination, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t preparing myself to fish a lifeless body out of the pool. But by the time I got out there, she was hiding in the grotto—like I wouldn’t fucking find her.
Her clothes and sandals lay in a crumpled pile on a chair, and I yelled for her to show herself. When she finally emerged, it took all of two seconds for me to recognize that face.
She was a Rose.
Sheridan Rose, to be exact.
A vile, disgusting … beautiful … Rose.
I didn’t know her, but I knew all about her—and her parents. So I’d kept a poker face and played dumb. I’d seen outdated pictures of her family before, from archived news articles. And I knew she’d dated a guy from my high school a couple years back. In tagged photos on social media, I’d studied her heart-shaped face for more hours than I’d ever admit to anyone … because she wasn’t just gorgeous, she was forbidden—and that made her unlike the rest.
For as long as I can remember, my father has been obsessed with the Roses and avenging the smear campaign they’d launched against him, his reputation, his business, and our family name a lifetime ago.
We’d almost lost everything because of them.
Not to mention my mother’s death suspiciously occurred a block from their house, and the bastard who struck her and drove off was never found. To make matters worse, not only was my mother’s life taken that day, but so was the life of my baby sister. Mom was twenty-two weeks along, carrying the little girl they’d so badly yearned for. A “sweet little angel” to round out our perfect family, as my father stated in a camera interview once.
Without warning, nearly everything my father had ever wanted was taken from him.
Forever.
He almost had it all.
To this day, my father is convinced it was one of the Roses. Someone who saw an opportunity and seized it. Someone with good reason to want to inflict the worst kind of pain and loss onto a Monreaux.
Someone like Rich Rose.
Last night, like a true coward and in true Rose fashion, the naked girl ran off before she had a chance to pay her penance. Like she could just wander in here and walk off like nothing happened …
And then she had the audacity to ignore me when I called after her—that’s when I smashed the beer bottle.
All I could think about was how the spawn of the family that destroyed mine dared to waltz her perfect peach-shaped ass onto our property like she owned the place.
The fucking nerve of that woman.
Clarice sweeps up the last fragment of glass, and Gannon heads into the house without a word—thank God. I wait until they’re both out of sight before fishing my dead phone from the deep end with a leaf skimmer, and then I make my way inside to clean up. Not because Gannon told me to, but because I can’t stop picturing the Rose girl’s ripe tits and pouty mouth and I need to get my head straight with an ice-cold shower.
She was a sitting duck.
I knew exactly who she was.
I could have easily made her atone—in more ways than one.
She’s lucky I didn’t.
And if she’s smart, she’ll never set foot on these premises again.
Because I can’t promise I won’t seize the opportunity next time.
; * * *
Chapter Three
* * *
Sheridan
* * *
“I can check you out over here, sir.” I wave to a bearded customer Sunday afternoon who promptly deposits a pair of Air Pods and a wireless iPhone charger on the counter before all but tossing his credit card at me.
I scan his items, ignoring the weight of his gaze on my chest, choosing to believe he’s reading my name tag instead of eyeing my covered cleavage. I’ve worked at this cell phone store six months now, and no amount of training could have prepared me for the assortment of general public creeps who come in. But I suppose it’s to be expected. Par for the course or whatever. Everyone has a cell phone. “Two hundred four dollars and eighty-nine cents is your total today.”
He sighs and nods as if the exorbitant price is my fault, and I slide his card through the reader and wait for the beep.
TRANSACTION FAILED.
“I’m so sorry, sir—” I say until he interrupts me.
“—try it again.”
I run the card once more.
TRANSACTION FAILED.
“Is there another card you’d like me to try?” I force a friendly smile into my tone. These situations can be embarrassing, though something tells me this man has no pride and gives zero fucks.
Eyes glazing over my chest, he pushes a hard, stale coffee breath from his mouth before fishing a different card from his wallet.
The bells on the front door jangle, and my attention flicks in that direction. A tall figure fills the doorway, backlit by the sun. He takes two steps in, letting the door glide shut, and scans the store space.
Our eyes lock from across the room, and in a fraction of a second, my blood turns to ice water.
“Hello?!” The gruff man in front of me snaps in my face. “You still with me?”
His transaction goes through, and the machine spits out a receipt. I hand him a pen and clear my throat, keeping a close eye on August Monreaux with a lump in my throat.
“Welcome to Priority Cellular, how can I help you today?” My notoriously bubbly co-worker, Adriana, approaches him before I have a chance to warn her off so someone else can deal with him. Though what could I possibly say that hasn’t already been conveyed by his ripped jeans, devil-may-care smirk, and the chilled glint in his eye?
The Match: A Baby Daddy Donor Romance Page 23
