The last person she expected to see glaring at her was Stone. Legs spread wide, like a pirate riding out a storm on the deck of his ship. His fist raised high, ready to strike against a wooden panel that was no longer in front of him. Thunder rolled across his dark expression.
Clearly, he wasn’t any happier than she was.
“What the—”
He didn’t even wait to be invited inside. Not that she had any intention of doing so. But he took away the satisfaction of refusing him entrance by brushing past her.
“Did you do it?”
Frowning, Piper shut her front door and stared at it for several seconds. She could ignore him, call her father’s security team and have him escorted off the property. Something about that felt like a great idea.
Spinning on her heels, Piper faced him. One look at his expression had her thinking twice. She really didn’t want any of the guys to get hurt trying to toss him. And it was clear Stone was a powder keg just waiting to blow.
Strangely enough, she had no concern for her own safety. She had no doubt he’d defend himself against anyone who came against him. But he wouldn’t touch a hair on her head.
Even if she wanted him to.
Nope, that wasn’t a thought she was going to consider.
The best way to handle Stone right now was to be the calm against his storm. But to do that she needed to figure out what had him so fired up.
“Did I do what?”
Stone’s gaze narrowed, becoming glittering chips of hard amber. “Sell the photograph. Give someone details about our relationship.”
“What relationship, Stone? We haven’t been friends in a very long time.”
Beneath the flush of anger, his skin paled. But that was the only evidence her words had hit a mark she honestly hadn’t been aiming for.
Pulling a phone from his back pocket, Stone closed the distance between them and shoved it toward her face.
A photograph she’d never seen before filled the screen. A picture of the two of them. And she was wearing the dress from last night.
“Goddammit,” she breathed out.
“You’ve either developed some very good acting skills or you didn’t have anything to do with this.”
Piper’s gaze flew from the screen to Stone. She searched his face, looking for something other than the accusation ringing through his words. Anything.
Because right now, she was struggling against a rampant need to reach out and touch him. To run her fingers down the rough stubble covering his jaw. To pull him back to the bed she’d just rolled out of and leave the covers rumpled from something other than a restless night.
Stupid. Pointless. Maybe she wasn’t quite sober after all.
Ripping her gaze away from him, Piper looked at the photograph again. Stone really thought she had something to do with the invasion of privacy she was staring at. “Go to hell.”
Needing some space and a better understanding, she grabbed Stone’s phone and paced away. Her finger stabbed at the smooth surface, scrolling and scanning as the words in the accompanying article flew by.
It was short, filled with innuendo and very little fact.
Piper spun on her heel to face him again when she was a safe distance away. “I’m assuming since you’re at my door, y’all don’t have any idea who’s responsible for this?”
A muscle at the edge of Stone’s jaw ticked. “No.” He ground out the word between clenched teeth. “The security team is scrubbing surveillance footage as we speak. There was someone out on the balcony around the time we were in the library, but they’re in shadow. We can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman. But it looks like they knew exactly where the cameras were.”
“Beautiful. You’re saying it could have been anyone? Staff? Guest?”
“I have a friend who’s trying another tactic. We’re hoping to work backward from the photograph to figure out where it originated and maybe who sold it to the media outlet that sent it viral.”
“You can do that?”
The corner of his mouth tipped up in a mocking half smile. It was a bastard version of the beautiful smile he used to spread around liberally, but there was something about it that had her belly taking a dive to her toes.
“I can’t, but we know people.”
“You know people? As in you know people who don’t have a problem breaking the law?” Was that what he was saying?
Stone shrugged, his massive shoulders straining against the cotton of his shirt. Piper swallowed, trying very hard not to notice...and failing miserably.
“They’re not breaking the law. Exactly.”
Piper’s mouth twisted into a wry grimace. “Well, isn’t that a relief. Are you trying to get thrown back in jail?”
His wide, gorgeous mouth twisted into a cocky grin. “I’m not the one skirting the gray areas of the law.”
She wanted to shake her head. To wipe that coolly confident expression right off his face. To knock some sense into his thick skull. None of which would do much good, so she settled for saying, “Cold comfort.”
This time the knowing grin he flashed her sent a storm of energy crackling across her skin. Yep, he needed to leave. Her defenses—and brain—were clearly still drunk on the wine from last night.
“Well, thanks for the wake-up call. Sorry I can’t help you more, but it’s time for you to go.” Crossing the room, Piper opened the front door, squinting against the glare of sunlight as it stabbed into her eyes.
Stone stood stock-still for several seconds. His gaze raked over her, cataloging her entire body and leaving her restless and edgy. Her hair was a mess. She looked like hell. Not to mention her head pounded. Pride had her fighting back the urge to fix herself. Nope, she wasn’t going to do it.
It didn’t matter what Stone saw or thought. He would not intimidate her. She wasn’t about to let that brooding gaze or his oozing irritation get to her.
It took everything inside Piper to bite her tongue and not fill the charged silence growing between them. But that’s what he wanted, which was exactly why she wouldn’t.
Slowly, Stone crossed the space. And, no, she didn’t notice the way his body moved or the bunch and pull of his massive thighs straining against faded denim. Nope, not at all.
Pausing beside her, Stone reached for her. His fingers grasped a strand of hair that had fallen from the knot she’d pulled on top of her head. A shiver rolled down her spine as he followed the line to where it curled against her collarbone.
Goose bumps erupted across her skin the moment he touched her. But he didn’t stop there. The warm weight of his hand followed the line of her shoulder and arm. His fingers brushed the back of her hand and for a second she thought he was going to tangle their fingers together.
Until she realized he was just reaching for the phone she still had grasped in her hand.
Leaning forward, his warm breath brushed across her skin as he murmured, “I need this back.”
Piper immediately dropped it. If he hadn’t already been poised to catch the phone it would have fallen straight to the floor.
She didn’t care.
The connection between them needed to go away.
She’d felt the bond the day she’d met Stone when she was six. It deepened as they grew. Morphing, at least for her, when she hit fifteen. For so long, Stone had been her world. Her person. Until he wasn’t. And she’d thought going ten years without contact would have killed the attachment, but apparently for her it wasn’t enough.
And now Piper didn’t know what to do with it. And that unsettled her more than she wanted to admit.
A knowing grin twisted Stone’s lips and glittered at her from those golden, polished stone eyes. God, she wanted to smack him.
Stone used the edge of the phone in his hand to give her a little salute. “I’ll let you know what we find.”
“Maybe not, but I do.”
Goddammit. Fine, she did care. She just didn’t want to admit it to him. And she definitely didn’t want him worrying about her or taking care of her anymore.
“I’m fine, Stone. Go, live your life. Enjoy your freedom. Let me live mine.”
In that moment, Piper wanted exactly that. For him, but also for her. She wanted to be free, as well. Unfortunately, something told her, wishing wouldn’t make it so, for either of them.
* * *
Stone’s fist slammed into supple leather. The jar of it reverberated up his arm, a comforting and familiar sensation. Beneath the punch, he could feel the shift of sand inside the weighted bag. His shoulders and arms ached with exertion. Sweat dripped down his face and into his eyes. He welcomed the sting.
It not only reminded him he was alive, but it took his mind off the picture of Piper, fresh from bed and heavy eyed, that kept playing over and over through his brain.
Because his mind was an antagonistic bastard hell-bent on leaving him with a permanent hard-on and the taunt that he couldn’t do anything about it.
“Man, you might have enough energy to go twenty more rounds, but I don’t.” Gray’s voice was muffled by the bag sitting between them. His body was braced against the swing of it, holding it in place as Stone swung again.
“A couple more,” he panted out, not ready to let his body rest.
“I don’t care how often you punch this bag, it isn’t going to solve your problem.”
“Oh, yeah? And what would that be?”
“That you can’t make her do what you want her to.”
“And what do I want her to do?”
Abandoning the bag, Gray dropped into the old metal folding chair he’d sat in the corner. Snagging a bottle of water, he downed half of it in a few heavy gulps before deciding to answer. “You’d prefer she be locked in a tower with no windows or doors.”
“You’ve been watching too many animated movies, man. Maybe you should try something a little more hard-core.”
“Funny. I notice you didn’t suggest I was wrong, just attacked my choice of entertainment.”
“No, seriously, try some porn. It might help you find your balls so you can punch that bag like a man.”
Gray picked up the nearest thing to hand, which happened to be a sweat-soaked towel, and whipped it across the room at him. “Hurling insults won’t make what I’m saying any less accurate. You can’t make her do what you want, which pisses you off. She’s not the little girl who followed you around with adoring puppy-dog eyes.”
“She never did that.”
Gray leveled a bullshit stare at him.
“Fine. There might have been a little hero worship when she was a little girl.”
“Take it from me, there’s still hero worship. She was watching you the other night.”
That had Stone pausing midsip on his own bottle of water. “What?”
“At the party. I noticed her.”
Stone’s fist tightened around the plastic, hard enough that a spurt of water shot up and over.
“Stand down. Not that way. I mean, sure, she’s absolutely gorgeous.”
“Get to the point, asshole.”
“I was lurking on the outskirts of the party. It’s not like I knew anyone there so that’s where I belonged. But she was there with me, a part of the group, but not really. It was obvious she did know quite a few people attending because they kept stopping her to speak. She was polite, but disengaged. And I wondered why she’d come since she clearly didn’t want to be there.”
Gray kicked back in the chair, lounging in a way that was completely relaxed. Something he couldn’t remember ever thinking about Gray. People saw him as intense and intimidating, which Stone admitted he absolutely could be. Out of their group, Finn was the fun-loving fuckup that everyone loved because he was mischievous and always made you laugh. Gray’s brain never stopped. He was always thinking, calculating and adjusting. He observed, which was apparently what he’d been doing the other night.
“Then I realized she was there because she was watching you. But she was also keeping her distance, which bothered me.”
Not surprising considering the environment they’d both recently come from. There, you had to be observant and vigilant or risk getting stabbed in the back when you least expected it—often from someone you counted as an ally.
“At first, I wondered if she was pissed. Or had a vendetta. Then I realized, the way she looked at you...oh, she’s plenty angry with you, but there’s more. And something tells me there always has been.”
Stone shook his head. He really didn’t need Gray’s words ringing through his brain right now. Not with everything all jumbled up after his visit to Piper’s place this morning.
“It doesn’t matter. I’m staying away from her. She has no reason to see me. I’ll do what I can to shut down the media attention and we’ll both move on with our lives.”
Gray scoffed, the sound scraped against Stone’s last nerve. “Good luck with that, man.”
Five
Piper juggled the trays of mochas she’d stopped to pick up. The strap of her bag slid to the edge of her shoulder, threatening to fall right off and upend the careful balance.
The way her morning was going, that would just be the cherry on top.
She hadn’t slept well last night, which meant she’d overslept and was running late. Something she absolutely hated. And she probably shouldn’t have taken the time to stop and get a shot of caffeine, but it was the only chance she had to get her morning back on track. Without it...she’d be useless in her first session.
Something she hated even more than being late.
Feeling the need for some armor after the last couple days, she’d dressed carefully and pulled out a pair of spiked Louboutin heels to match the power suit she’d chosen. And after about twenty minutes in them, she remembered why they’d been on the back shelf. They pinched like a son of a bitch, even if they were damn pretty.
Thank God she kept a pair of emergency heels in her office. She just had to make it there.
Rise and Grind was only a block away from her office, which meant it was a staple for everyone she worked with. Once she hit her desk, she was going to take five minutes to meditate and get her day back on track before seeing her first patient.
A sound peeled out from the depths of the bag that was hanging on by a dangerous thread. Whoever was on the phone was just going to have to wait until she could unload everything.
Turning the corner, it took Piper about five strides to register the melee halfway down the block. And then another few beats to realize the knot of chaos was standing right in front of her office.
Or it had been before the twenty or so people surged toward her like a tsunami, with just as much destruction in their intent.
Piper froze. She blinked, her brain already sluggish and unable to process what was happening. Voices bombarded her as the group closed in.
“Ms. Blackburn, how does your stepfather feel about you dating his son’s murderer?”
“Can you shed some light on what happened between Anderson and Blaine?”
“How is Mr. Stone adjusting to being released from prison?”
“Doesn’t it bother you to be sleeping with a murderer?”
Piper stared at them, her eyes wide, their words rushing over her in crushing waves.
Someone jostled her. Grabbed her arm to gain her attention. The trays of coffee tottered before going over. Dark liquid arced around her. People yelped and jumped back.
While she hated losing the caffeine she desperately needed, it cleared a path forward. Piper rushed through the hole like a professional running back, leaving the cups behind her, rolling across the pavement.
With a death grip on the str
ap of her bag, she barreled up the steps and crashed through the front door. Slamming it behind her, Piper sagged.
Elizabeth, a divorced single mom in her late thirties and her office manager, came racing into the front entrance. Her pale green eyes were filled with kindness and concern. But her body was relaxed. She was one of the most capable women Piper had ever met. She could count on one hand the number of times she’d seen Elizabeth truly upset, and all of those involved her son and daughter. She was unflappable, which was a real benefit for Piper’s clients.
“I’m sorry,” Elizabeth said.
“Why?”
“I tried to call and warn you. Anna had a meltdown about a class project this morning so I was running late.”
Piper laughed, the sound a little thready, but still there. “Apparently, we’re all having a stellar morning.”
A soft smile curled Elizabeth’s lips. “I’m thinking you might win this competition, Piper. You have coffee all over your suit.”
Looking down, Piper realized Lizzy was right. She hadn’t even felt the heat or wetness hitting her. “Fracking hell.”
“Yep, that about sums it up.”
Behind her, someone turned the knob and tried to open the door. It moved about half an inch before colliding with her shoulder and shutting again. Piper barely had time to react before it moved again.
“What the...”
She recognized Mrs. Collins’s voice. Her first appointment every Monday morning.
Jumping out of the way, Piper yanked the door open. Mrs. Collins, a petite woman in her sixties, stood on the front stoop. Her bleached blond curls, perfectly coiffed in a mane two inches around her head, quivered. The pearls she always wore at her throat were cockeyed and the blazer she’d put on this morning was hanging off one shoulder.
Piper understood exactly how she felt.
Behind her, the group of vultures surged forward, using the opportunity to hurl more questions at Piper.
Grasping Mrs. Collins by the arm, Piper yanked her inside and slammed the door again.
The Rebel's Redemption Page 5
