A Perfect Storm (18 page)

“Okay, well, I started by making a list of everyone who’d written Calliope a letter she’d kept, then discarded close family members, as it’s unlikely Imogene would have called someone familial ‘her ladyship’ in her letter to her sister.” With every gesture Sophie made and word she spoke, pure sunlight radiated from within her and tagged everything in her sphere. “Nobody replies directly in another letter to this secret Imogene hints at—at least not one I could find—so I’m guessing that letter was lost or destroyed at some point. But, in reading over some of the other letters we do have, I narrowed it down to three women who Calliope likely considered her closest friends. Then, using some of the contacts in your notes, I checked into Calliope’s schooling, when she would have had her coming out, the locations of the family homes of these other women in relation to where Calliope grew up, then cross-referenced the timeline to the three women on my list. I discovered that Jane was only one year older than Calliope. She also grew up less than a day’s ride away from Calliope’s family home and attended the same finishing school.” The confidence in Sophie’s smile turned her from pretty to downright arresting. “That is someone who is likely to have been a good friend of Calliope’s.” Grinning so huge it looked as if she might burst, Sophie declared, “I think Jane’s family is the one we need to find.”

“So go for it,” Lucien replied. “What do you need me for? You’re doing a bang-up job all on your own.”

Sudden furrows marred Sophie’s forehead. “We are a local station, and I am not going to get the authorization to hire people to find Jane’s descendants. It would be too expensive for this kind of human-interest piece. I can figure out a family tree on my own, but that’ll take some time.” She scrunched her face and looked at him through one eye. “I don’t mind, but…”

Lucien made a funny face right back at her, unable to hold it back. “But I’ve already had people track a lot of this stuff down, so you’d like me to have them find these family members for you.”

“I don’t have any right to spend your money,” Sophie responded quickly, “but if you could do that, it would be awesome.”

“I can do that,” Lucien said, grinning back at Sophie. “I’ll get in touch with my guy and have him contact you right away.”

Sophie launched herself at Lucien and threw her arms around his neck. “Thank you!” She sank into him for a split second, just enough to please the hell out of his cock, and then jerked away. “Sorry.” Pink cheeked now, Sophie pulled a face as she pushed her hair back behind her ears. “I am being completely unprofessional, but I can’t seem to help it. I have been pulled into this history and want to know what happened with William and Jude. Just for myself. Even if there wasn’t a story.”

Lucien went back to steepling his fingers against his chin.
Gotcha
. “And that’s why I didn’t want anyone but you in charge of telling this tale.”

“Thank you.” Just as Sophie blushed an even deeper red, a New Mail icon popped up on her computer screen. “I bet that’s my brother,” she said as she slid the laptop in front of her. With a glance at Lucien, she rolled her eyes and laughed. “He’s probably letting me know he’s on his way to Maine to see for himself that I got through the storm unscathed.”

Unable to control it, Lucien clenched his jaw. “That protective of you, huh?” Amazingly, his tone came across completely normal.

Shrugging, Sophie said, “He’s getting better, but he still has slipups.” She put her chin in her hand and captured Lucien’s stare. “That’s what big brothers do for younger siblings, though, right? I imagine you were the same with yours.”

Dozens of choices concerning Josh flashed like a slide show in front of Lucien’s eyes. His heart squeezed terribly, and he murmured, “Not enough for too long and then too much.”

“How so?” As Sophie asked, she rubbed her fingers against the tension lining Lucien’s mouth, and Lucien jerked.

Shit
. Lucien shot to his feet.
What did I almost just tell her
? “It doesn’t matter. Excuse me, will you?” Magnus appeared in the doorway right then, and retreat lay in a much-needed apology to his friend. “I need to talk to Magnus.” Still agitated as hell, fucking thrown at how easily he’d almost admitted to his failures as a brother, Lucien grabbed his cell phone. Without looking Sophie’s way again, he added, “I’ll make that call to my contact and have him get in touch with you.”

Goddamn shit-kicking mother-fucking asshole
. Lucien silently called himself a few more names before he reached Magnus. He needed like hell to apologize to the man, but the never-ending weight of the job he still had to complete pressed even heavier on his shoulders. Lucien had to ratchet up the game with Sophie. And do it fast.

Sophie watched the scene just outside the door peripherally—admittedly snooping on Lucien again—unable to rein in her fascination with him. The men kept their voices much too low for Sophie to hear the exact words exchanged, but something in Lucien’s body language rang as earnest and straightforward. After a few moments, Magnus accepted Lucien’s handshake.

The men continued to engage in low-volume conversation, and since she couldn’t hear them anyway, Sophie drifted back to Lucien’s behavior just before he’d excused himself. While she wholeheartedly believed he wanted to apologize to Magnus, she’d also picked up on the tension in him the moment the word brother had come into their exchange. Then the almost forlorn way he’d let slip
“not enough for too long and then too much”
in relation to Josh had pricked at Sophie’s heart. The man so obviously had regret and pain tied up in the loss of his brother. On the one hand, Sophie could have kicked herself for bringing up Royce so lovingly when Lucien no longer had Josh; at the same time, a twist deep in her core told her she wanted to be the one Lucien would open up to about his little brother. She didn’t have to question the employees of Ravenstoke in order to know Lucien did not talk about Josh with anyone. She could see it in his shuttered eyes and kneejerk withdrawals. More importantly, she could feel it in her gut.

Just as Lucien and Magnus shook hands again, Sophie yanked her attention back to her computer. After reading a terse email from Royce, in which he stated he did not see how she could be completely fine after witnessing the damage the storm had done on the news, Sophie closed her laptop and gathered her notes, prepared to give Lucien back his study. Rather than Lucien returning, though, Magnus moved to his desk and took a seat. Sophie whipped around to look at the doorway, and Lucien was long gone.

From across the study, Magnus said, “Lucien decided to get some air.”

“Ah.” Sophie paused midstep. With a shrug, she hugged her laptop and files to her chest. “I guess I’ve been crowding his space.”

“Maybe.” Magnus rubbed his face and neck, and Sophie wondered how aware the man was of how often he touched his birthmark. “But no matter how much he snarls, he needs to have his routine rattled.”

“He must be out of sorts quite a bit today,” Sophie responded. She had no stake in Magnus forgiving Lucien, yet something inexplicable inside her sensed this friendship needed to be restored. Maybe for Lucien’s soul more than even Magnus’s hurt. “Lucien confessed that you took the brunt of his agitation today. He was very angry at himself for what he said to you—whatever that was,” she quickly added. “He did not divulge details.”

As Magnus glanced at the vacated study entrance, his face turned so rigid for a moment Sophie thought he looked hewn out of stone. Then he shook his head and made eye contact with her again, and no hardness existed in his eyes. “Lucien is a better man than his behavior and choices sometimes indicate,” he shared. “He took me out of a situation that would make you sick to your stomach, and he gave me a job and an opportunity to build a life for myself that existed in the light rather than darkness. The darkness gets hold of him every once in a while, but you must not believe that is who he is. Not at his core.”

Something tugged deep in Sophie’s belly and robbed her of a bit of her breath. “I believe you.” The wispy quality in her voice matched the fast beat in her heart. “I don’t know why I do, except to say that I look at him sometimes and think beneath the cockiness, overt sexuality, and clear joy he gets at pushing my buttons is the loneliest man I’ve ever seen, and that he just needs someone to love him most and choose him first.”

Magnus raised a brow. “I knew there was a reason I liked you.”

Nervous laughter bubbled up through the cartwheels tumbling Sophie’s insides. “I didn’t say I know what to do with those pangs when I feel them.”

“More of what you’re already doing,” Magnus advised. “Take every opportunity afforded you to get deeper under his skin. Don’t let fear make you hesitate”—deep mercury swirled like a storm in the depths of Magnus’s violet stare—“because once you are able to get off this island, if you have not become the most important thing in his world, he might not let himself invite you back.”

“That’s a ringing endorsement,” Sophie muttered.

“It is the truth. Do with it what you will.” With that, Magnus turned to his computer, dismissing her almost as summarily as his boss was able to do.

As Sophie left Magnus to his work, one thing became crystal clear. Magnus wanted her and Lucien in a sexual relationship. But was that because he genuinely saw something in her that he felt was right for his boss, or had that very man put Magnus up to this in some scheme to further his mysterious goal?

Everything in Sophie rejected the idea of Magnus manipulating her with outright lies. At the same time, she still believed Lucien had some multi-level game in play designed to lure her deeper into his world. Thinking back to the man who’d struggled to talk about his brother, and then his friend speaking of him in a manner that seemed to reek of honesty, Sophie feared Lucien had succeeded in whatever he’d set out to achieve.

She was intrigued.

She wanted him too. Achingly so.

And she was prepared to step fully into whatever game he was playing in order to get him.

Chapter Nine

Deep into the hours of the night, as the wind once again raged outside and battered the castle with the banging of tree limbs, Sophie hovered somewhere between sleeping and awake. Completely aware of her bedroom and the weather outside disturbing the quiet, Sophie also moaned as Lucien—an image only, certainly not real—slid into bed next to her in full 3-D. Without words, he commanded her to roll onto her back and make a place for him between her thighs. As she did as she was told, Sophie gasped; a strong tug pulled deeply in her core. Then Lucien crawled on top of her, settled between her spread legs, and nothing else mattered.

Above her, Lucien’s amber gaze pierced the darkness and sent a tremor through her.
This is it
. Just as Sophie lifted her hips to welcome the length of his cock, just as she parted her lips to accept his kiss—
oh yes, yes, yes
—a knock sounded at her door, flinging Sophie back into reality.

Before Sophie could let loose with one of her rare curses, another knock sounded. “Sophie, it’s Emma. I need to speak with you.”

Sophie immediately jerked up straight. Forgetting to even grab her robe, she bolted out of bed and raced across her chilly bedroom. After yanking open the door, uncaring about her own state of undress, she asked, “Is everything all right?” Her gut clenched with sick as she imagined something terrible befalling Lucien. Sophie couldn’t imagine Emma would come to her at this hour—or any hour—with bad news about anyone else in Ravenstoke. She clutched Emma’s hand. “Tell me.”

Emma’s stare softened, and she offered Sophie a sweet smile. “Everything is fine.” She pet Sophie’s hand with a gentle, assuring touch. “But if you’d like to witness more of what we do at Ravenstoke, then you need to come with me now.” With a pull on Sophie’s hand, she added, “Lucien is there to observe already.”

“Wait.” Sophie ran her hand down the side of the T-shirt she wore, stopping at the hem that barely hung long enough to cover her sex and ass cheeks. “I’m not dressed.” Heat blazed through her as she realized Emma must already know she wasn’t wearing any panties.

Sighing, Emma said, “Don’t worry. You’re perfect.” When she tugged Sophie this time, Sophie didn’t resist. “You have the shirt, and Lucien has the pants.” As Emma led Sophie toward the meeting area, then across to the line of secret rooms Sophie had discovered her first night on the island, the vibrant redhead chuckled. “Together you can complete a full outfit.”

When they crossed to the long, dark hallway on the other side, a muffled masculine shout ripped through the shadows and sank straight into Sophie’s being. Immediately, she knew it wasn’t Lucien, but the thought that he was already watching whomever it was—Magnus or Cale—rippled through her cunt just the same. Whatever was happening behind one of these doors, she would somehow become a part of it, and the knowledge sent a thrilling jolt through her.

When did I become this person
? When had she turned into someone who got wet with the thought of watching other people have sex, and even putting herself on display as well?
Is it just because I’m here at Ravenstoke, and these feelings will go away when I leave
? Sophie immediately rejected that notion. She’d never been one to join in, with anything, as a way to fit in with a crowd. Her parents and Royce had taught her better than that.
So then is Lucien the only reason I’m fascinated? Would I not care if he didn’t hold so much of my interest?

With a little sputter under her breath, Sophie found she wasn’t thrilled at the idea of exploring this side of her sexuality purely with the hopes of catching the eye of a man. She didn’t like the thought that she would succumb to peer pressure either. Neither concept reflected well on her.

Then, for the moment, an explanation ceased to hold the forefront of her thoughts. Just as another deep, male cry reached Sophie’s ears, Emma opened a door, and the scene on the other side flung every bit of common-sense introspection out of her mind.

Sophie swallowed thickly.
Oh dear God in Heaven
. She looked, took in the landscape of the whole room, and her pussy immediately started to throb.