by M. Robinson
“No. He can’t. I know my mother thinks the sun rises at the Hughes’ French chateau, but I don’t give a fuck. If you touch her, if you speak to her, if you so much as glance at her, I’ll throw you off the Morelli estate with my bare hands.”
That makes me smile. It’s a slow, lazy kind of smile. It’s not good to show weakness, but then again, I don’t have any. “I’ve got a sister myself. I suppose protectiveness comes with the territory. Still, don’t you think this whole growling caveman thing is a little much?”
“You don’t want to press me, Hughes.”
We grew up running wild amid the satin, glittering trappings of events like this one. There was one time we conspired to let loose my sister’s pet gerbils in a costume party. Another time we loaded our nerf guns with the sticky-sweet profiteroles intended for dessert. We’ve been both friends and enemies. “You have a reputation for your temper. People believe what you feed them, but I know the real Leo Morelli. I know who gathered up the gerbils and put them back in their cage when my father wanted to drown them in the grotto.”
“The gerbil wasn’t salivating while looking at my sister.”
I laugh without a sound. “Salivating? That’s unfortunate. One does hate to be obvious.”
“She’s not like your other women.”
“My harem, you mean? Hadn’t realized you’d met them.”
“I’m serious.”
I turn a narrowed gaze on him, on his dark eyes and coal-black hair, on the cold countenance that holds so many secrets. Her secrets. “She’s not like the other women here, who glide through the room, secure in their position and privilege. She’s running around like a goddamn servant, and I don’t see you doing anything to stop it.”
“What happens in our family is none of your business.” He pushes past me, bumping me as he goes. A crude message, but an effective one. “Hunt elsewhere, Hughes.”
And I try.
I’ve partied with many of the young women in the crowd. Fucked them. Had threesomes with a handful of them. But there’s always a fresh crop of them—ones who are finally old enough to warrant their own invitations. Ones whose families just made enough money to join this elite sphere. Nouveau riche, my aunt would say with a sniff of her large nose. Ones who’ve gotten back from some commune in Amsterdam or college in Switzerland.
I could hunt, as Leo Morelli put it, and take home delicious prey.
A woman presses herself against me. I turn to see a bubbly, blonde Patricia beaming up at me. “Finn! I’ve missed you.” She throws her arms around me, pressing her breasts against my tux, encompassing me in a cloud of Yves Saint Laurent Black Opium. “Where have you been?”
“Working,” I say, which is ironically the truth.
Connor laughs, because he’s never worked a day in his life. He’s on again, off again with Patricia. Judging from the way he drapes an arm over her bare shoulders, they’re currently on. “We just got back from Vail. Everyone was there. Where the fuck were you?”
A stern-looking matron turns to give us a dirty look for bad language. I wink at her, and she turns back, her cheeks slightly pinker.
“Chamonix Mont Blanc has the better runs,” I say, because they’ll assume I was skiing and getting wasted and fucking my way through the resorts there.
“Yeah,” he says, laughing his frat boy laugh. Did he practice it in the mirror or did it just come naturally to him? “A Hughes can probably reserve the black diamond runs all to himself.”
Patricia takes my hand and tugs me closer. Too close. “Are you coming to the after party? A friend has the hook up at this new club. G-Eazy’s supposed to be there.”
“Does anyone still care about him after Halsey broke up with him?”
A giggle. She pulls me closer. It would be awkward in front of any other boyfriend. Considering how often Connor’s cheated on her, it’s merely exasperating. “And then after we could get high. Connor booked us a suite. Some of us are going to hang out.”
I’ve been to my share of after parties. Someone’s always got the hook up at a club, especially when we can slip them a fold of hundred dollar bills. From the look in Patricia’s eyes, she wants to get up close and personal tonight. I’ve fucked her. And, separately, I’ve fucked Connor. Don’t judge. Repressed frat boys can be a great ride. Maybe if I fucked them together?
When you’ve done everything, it’s hard to find something new.
It doesn’t matter how beautiful they are, or how talented their mouths. I don’t want the people standing in front of me. I’m not even sure I want sex.
Instead I want the secrets held in sad, dark eyes.
“Text me later,” I say, extricating myself from Patricia’s grip.
Screw Vail and G-Eazy. Screw Leo Morelli.
I want Eva.
That turns out to be a more difficult task than expected, however. She’s not mingling in the ballroom. She’s not helping elderly guests pick food from the buffet. She’s not even soothing a five-year-old heiress who’s crying because the pony took a shit.
I move through the throngs of people, smiling vaguely when people call me, returning a distracted handshake before plowing on. Where the hell is she? If they have her working in the goddamn kitchens again like a goddamn house elf, I’m going to lose it.
I’m passing through the large hallway leading to the art gallery when I see it—two members of the waitstaff gathering up broken glass from marble floors.
“What happened here?” I ask, leaning against the doorframe.
One of them widens her eyes. Nervous around a guest, maybe. Or nervous because of what just happened. There’s a sense of panic in the air, more than comes from a broken crystal glass. “N-nothing, sir. Only cleaning up a small mess. I was clumsy.”
“I don’t think you were clumsy,” I say, and she flinches even though my voice is soft. “But someone was. Where is he? Or she, I suppose? It could be either gender. Or neither of them, but somehow it’s always a man causing problems, isn’t it?”
She makes a small sound of denial, unwilling to share information. Except a quick dart of her eyes gives him away. Or her. I’ll find out soon enough. I stride across the gallery floor, the heels of my Ferragamo Angiolos tapping on the stone. A heavy wooden door with ornate scrollwork guards one of the many antechambers. Salons, you could call them. Drawing rooms. Old world places for gathering in small groups. Or motel rooms, as they’re more often called among the cousins, because they’re always available for a quick fuck. No one bothers you here.
I knock on the door, expecting to find a belligerent guest vomiting on the Aubusson. Or a rowdy couple baptising the leather armchair.
The sight that greets me makes my blood run cold.
Bryant fucking Morelli, the patriarch of this family, the ex-CEO of Morelli Holdings, the host of this little shindig, stands there, face red, cursing profusely.
With his hand around Eva’s wrist.
The skin around his grip has turned white from the pressure. There’s fear in her wide eyes. And pain written in the tight line of her lips. He’s hurting her.
And I see red.
Chapter Three
Eva Morelli
Damage control. That’s the only thing on my mind since my mother sent me from the ballroom. Your father. That was all she said. All she needed to say.
There was an emergency with the fake snow turning to ice. A horse-drawn carriage almost went down. And there was a disaster where someone had brought their purse dog and then let him loose. The miniature chihuahua had climbed six feet high in the central Christmas tree and then barked until someone climbed through the needles to pull him out.
Then my mother whispers those words, urgent, pained, and I know this is the emergency now.
I search the ballroom. The dining tables. Outside.
A group of people are caroling, drunkenly singing the refrain to Hallelujah.
The discordant notes send shivers down my spine.
I find my father in an antechamber
off the art gallery smashing glasses of champagne against the painting of our family as if they were baseballs in a batting cage.
Waitstaff hover outside the room, unable to stop him. Just as well that they don’t get in his way. We don’t need another ambulance called to the house.
Waitstaff get ambulances. Guests get ambulances.
Family? We get a first aid kit in an upstairs bathroom. We’re used to Bryant Morelli’s rampages, used to the shouting and the shoving and the bruises that inevitably follow.
I’m used to it. At least, that’s what I tell myself as my father shakes me in anger, as he grasps my wrist. As I flinch away from his slap. He doesn’t hurt me often, not anymore, but it still happens sometimes. The old desperation takes hold of me. Along with the fear.
Then the door swings open.
We freeze, my father in fury, me in shock.
Any number of people could have wandered back here. Everyone knows about the antechambers. The cleaning staff regularly has to pick up used condoms from the ten-thousand-dollar rugs after these galas. If it’s a guest, they’ll probably sense we’re in a conflict and find another room. They might gossip, but at least they’ll go away.
It’s not a random guest that stands there.
It’s Finn Hughes. My heart thuds against my ribs. I barely have time to register him standing there, austere in his bespoke tux, his usually affable expression made dark.
Then he crosses the room in hard, floor-eating strides. He does something too fast for me to see, a blur, and then my hand is released. My father recoils with a grunt of pain. He pulls back, holding his arm against his side, snarling with indignation.
Then I can’t see him anymore, because Finn steps between us.
My father is not a small man. He’s solid. Strong for a man in his sixties. Terrifying when he’s in a rage. The idea of Finn—charming, elegant Finn—being hit by his fists makes me cry out.
Except he doesn’t get the chance.
Finn throws a punch, knocking my father back. Another punch. “You want to pick on someone? Pick on me. You want to fight? Fight someone who will fight back.”
I’ve always known Finn was tall and lean. I never realized how strong he was. Not until he pushes my father against the wall and shoves him a foot off the ground—all two hundred and fifty pounds of him. He holds him up with one hand.
My father curses in gasping breaths.
Finn scoffs. “Oh, you’re going to fuck me up? You and who else? Would your own sons back you up in a fight? Your brothers? You sure as hell can’t take me yourself.”
“I’ll ruin you,” my father rasps.
“You can’t touch me, old man.”
Adrenaline rushes through my veins. I run to grab his free arm. “Finn,” I say, out of breath, panicky. “Please. Stop. You have to let him go.”
Finn looks at me, hazel eyes made brilliant by violence. “Why? Because he’ll punish you for this? I should break his fucking neck.”
“No,” I say, tears stinging my eyes, humiliation a hard knot in my stomach.
Some people might wonder why I want him spared, this man who runs rampant in my nightmares. He’s hurt me in countless ways, but he’s still my father. Flesh and blood. Family loyalty was drilled into me, etched into my skin, from the moment I was born. Love is tangled up in guilt and shame and duty. I can’t even tell them apart.
None of this should make sense, but as Finn looks at me through those green and golden eyes, I have the feeling he understands. “Fuck,” he mutters, releasing my father in a single, quick move, letting him slump to the ground.
I take a step forward to stop him and then halt. Approaching him now would be like approaching a hungry crocodile—I could have my neck snapped in an instant.
“How dare you,” my father says, glaring at Finn. “I’ll have you run out of town. I’ll have you horse whipped. I’ll have you drowned in the fucking river.”
Anyone would be scared when being threatened by him. He’s powerful and wealthy—and vindictive. But Finn doesn’t even seem concerned. He seems… contemptuous. As if he’s watching a hornet wage war on a mountain. My blood pounds with anxiety. Danger, danger, danger. This is a terrible situation, but still, there’s something so brave about Finn’s nonchalance.
I wish I had his courage.
“You do that,” Finn says, his voice colder than I’ve ever imagined it. This isn’t a carefree playboy. This is a man with power and responsibilities. “Later. For now you’re going to walk off that black eye. Anyone asks? You ran into a fucking door.”
It seems impossible. Every part of me revolts from the possibility, but somehow, the command works. My father swears the whole way out the door, muttering threats and curses, but he slinks away, out of the antechamber, leaving the door ajar behind him.
“Christ,” Finn says, shutting the door.
“I’m sorry that happened,” I say, babbling, shaking with nerves. “Please don’t think—I mean, you must wonder how—I’m sure he didn’t know—”
“He didn’t know I would interrupt?” he asks, his voice dry. “I’m sure he didn’t. Does that happen often? Him hurting you.”
“He didn’t hurt me.” The lie comes out automatically.
He doesn’t break eye contact as he crosses the plush rug. As he takes my arm, gentle even as he proves me wrong. His thumb brushes my wrist, and I wince. It’s still red, the flesh burning where my father twisted it. I know from experience that it’ll be blue tomorrow morning.
“Liar,” he says, the accusation soft.
There’s a hitch in my breath. “It’s not that bad.”
“It’s worse. I knew he was an asshole, but I didn’t know—Fuck, maybe I did know. Maybe the whole goddamn world knows how bad men can be, and we just let them do it.”
“Don’t,” I say, a knot in my throat. Seeing him angry on my behalf… it does something to me. Makes me yearn and hope. Dangerous feelings. “Leo protected me.”
A glance down at his wrist. “Where is he?”
It’s not a real question. His tone says it’s a challenge, like he’s calling me a liar again. And maybe I am lying. Leo protected me. He got between me and my father countless times, taking beatings for me, fighting back—though he could never manage Finn’s icy composure. We were all too heated for that. But he couldn’t be around me twenty-four seven. He couldn’t protect me when he wasn’t home. He couldn’t be everywhere at once.
“You aren’t going to tell anyone about this, are you?” I can only imagine my mother’s horror at finding out that Finn Hughes saw my father in that state.
He shakes his head. “I should have killed him while I had the chance.”
“No,” I say, somehow managing a dry tone. “Then my mother would really freak out.”
“She might thank me.”
I run my hands along my arms, trying to control my shivers. It’s the adrenaline. I recognize this feeling from other times my father rampaged through the house. My mother would retreat into her sitting room with a bottle of wine. My sisters would be jumpy and anxious. My brothers would often get into a fight even though the danger had passed. I’ve never felt that before, brimming over with violence, but somehow I’m feeling it now. Like I want to push Finn. Like I want to push him and pull him, but I wouldn’t hurt him. No. I’d kiss him.
I shake my head, forcing the crazy thought away. “She would probably help you hide the body. You’d give her that insouciant smile, and she’d say, ‘anything for a Hughes.’”
“Insouciant,” he says, using that exact smile. Charming. Irreverent.
It shouldn’t be possible, but he makes me smile, too. “That’s what you are.”
His warm hazel eyes take in the way I’m shaking, and he reaches out. He tucks me against his chest. For a moment, I hold myself rigid. I’ve been hugged a hundred times at the gala so far. Family, friends, acquaintances. Even strangers will hug me in the Christmas spirit. Or because they want to get closer to my family’s power. None of t
hose hugs felt like this.
On a soft exhale, I let myself sink into his arms.
He murmurs against my hair. “Who the hell uses words like insouciant? Except for The New Yorker.”
“Lots of people use that word.”
“What does it even mean?”
Strong. That’s the first word that comes to mind, because I’m in his arms. I can feel the surprising hardness of his body beneath the smooth lines of the tux. Strong and brave in the face of violence. “It means nonchalant.”
His lips move into a smile against my hair. “Another big word. Do you talk like that all the time?”
I make a small sound, more of a dismissal than an answer.
“You’re different,” he says. “Why are you different?” It doesn’t come out like a question. It feels more like he’s wondering something aloud, something he’s thought before.
“I’m not different,” I say, because I don’t want him to get the wrong idea. I know why he’s interested in me. Because I’m one of the only women he hasn’t been with at the gala. I’m a novelty. Something new, but not special.
His fingers go beneath my chin. He tips my face up. Those hazel eyes look different this close. A deeper green. The golden flecks shimmering. He’s beautiful but opaque. It’s impossible to see what he’s really thinking or feeling. I have the sense that all his charm is a front. I don’t know what lies beneath the playboy surface. Maybe no one does.
“Why did you come here?” I whisper.
A liaison, most likely. A plan to meet up with one of the women at the gala. So why haven’t they come? “I was looking for you,” he murmurs.
“Why?” It feels like opening Pandora’s box.
“To do this.” That’s all he says before he leans down. His mouth is an inch away from mine. He hovers there, letting his breath warm my lips, breathing me in.
He brushes against me. It’s a tease, that faint touch. My nerve endings come alight. He kisses the way he talks—playful, laid back. I relax into his embrace. He licks the seam of my lips, and my breath catches. I push up on my toes, surging closer.
