No Simple Sacrifice (Secrets of Stone Book 5) (25 page)

I screwed together enough fortitude to lift an equally indicting glare. “And that’s what you’re there for.”

“Oh,
that’s
what you think? Then you’re wrong. So fucking wrong. Drake…I don’t know how much more she can take.”

“Stop.” I got it out as a command—barely.

“We’re not whole without you.”

“
Stop
.”

“Fuck you. I’m not going to stop.” He pounded forward again. “So sorry if this is too much, sugar plum. If your delicate sensibilities can’t bear to face the messy-icky you’ve made.” Yeah. He was going after every button on the panel. “But it’s not too late to clean it up. Come home, dammit, and
clean it up
.”

I jammed my hands into my pockets. Jutted my jaw.

Fought the temptation—to say yes.

To give in…

And fuck up every truth her father had uttered.

“I can’t.” I battled to shove a shoulder over, to jerk my whole body around. “I…can’t.”

“Yes, goddammit. You
can.
Drop off the hussy and come home to us, Drake.”

Just as quickly, I spun back around. Lifted my stare, praying it looked openly defiant. “I’m not going home with Janelle. I’m staying at my place in Mount Greenwood, if it’s any business of yours.” I watched it all sink in to him, weighing his shoulders in shock and defeat, before adding, “I’ll come by when you two aren’t home and pack up my stuff.”

So much for defeat. His stance filled out with rage, powering into his new charge at me. “Fuck this! Fuck
you
.” He stopped short, battling to collect himself. “I want to knock your fucking head off, you heartless prick.” When I took that in silence, unable to argue, he tore forward by another step. “
Why
are you doing this? ‘Our one’. That’s what you said…was what you called her. You love her as much I do, Drake. You treasure what we both are with her. Look me in the eye, and tell me that’s not true.”

I jogged my gaze upward…until it fully met his.

Then didn’t say a thing.

Locked the words behind my gritted teeth. Let them foam and churn into bile that scalded worse than the whiskey, flooding back down my throat and into my gut. I wished I hadn’t eaten.

I wished I hadn’t come.

I wished I were standing anywhere but here—especially as my brother’s face contorted with the pain
I’d
dealt. The agony I’d inflicted. The wound I couldn’t take back.

The pain raged worse as he spoke again…in a tortured rasp. “She needs us both, Drake. Please. I can’t do this alone. I can’t do this without you.”

I swallowed hard. It helped absolutely nothing. My throat closed, not allowing air in or out. My head pounded, and my blood flowed in a hot and cold mess through my whole body.

He was gutting me. Flaying me wide open with the goddamn tears in his eyes, the desperation in his posture.

And I wanted to just let him.

Death would be a fucking mercy now. Dear God, it
had
to be.

“Look at me, goddamn you. I’m crying like a bitch. Is this what you want to see, Drake? Is
this
what you need, in order to let me in?” He shook his head, clearly disgusted with himself. Balled his hands into white-knuckled fists. “What the hell is going through your head? Can’t we at least talk about it?”

For a second, I was drawn in again. So fucking tempted to say yes, to just spill it all to him. The confrontation with Perizkova Senior. All the things that made so much sense, even now. But where would that get us, except right back here? What would that yield, except two of us bearing the burden instead of one?

Sometimes, the martyr thing really was for the best.

“There’s nothing to discuss, Fletch. I think you know that as well as I do, man. We had a big problem, the three of us being together. I just confronted the elephant in the room, and made him move on. It’s that simple. Problem solved.” I shrugged again. Screw the martyr. Detached asshole fit better. I told myself I’d learn to like the disguise…eventually.

Fletcher opened up a full grimace. “This isn’t a fucking
problem
, dickwad.
She’s
not a problem. She’s the woman of our dreams—the one who completes us. Do you remember
that
part? Nothing about this needed ‘solving’—at least until you brought that woman to this thing.” He paused only to get in another harsh breath, and flash those pearly whites even harder. “How or why you ever
thought
about parading Janelle in front of Talia, I will never understand.”

“Didn’t say I needed you to, did I?”

He unleashed a brutal huff. “So this is really how you’re going to play this out? Truly how you’re planning to move on?”

That was it. I wheeled on him, exposing my own gritted teeth. “I have
not
moved on. I will
never
move on.” I opened my mouth to add more, but nothing came out. For a moment, just one, I let the shields drop—allowed him to glimpse every goddamn ounce of the hell in which I was living. “
This
—tonight—that woman—” I stopped when the ballroom’s door opened behind me. Stiffened as high heels clacked on the foyer tiles. God
damn
. Why couldn’t Janelle leave me alone, even for five minutes? Perfect. She could hear this too. “Janelle’s an accessory, Fletch. She means nothing. Zero.”

A gasp sliced the air.

And my heart.

Fletcher and I spun in tandem—

To where our Talia stood, tears brimming and streaming down her face.

“I—I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I d-didn’t mean to…overhear. B-but perhaps—it’s best—I did.”

Fuck.

Fuck.

I moved toward her, unable to stop…dread clawing my blood. “Natalia—”

“Don’t.” She hurled up both hands, warding me off like a criminal—until the force of my stare drew her own up. Inch by excruciating inch, her composure crumpled in front of me again—and speck by blistering speck, so did the layers of my soul. “W-was that all I was too, Drake? An accessory? So easily replaced?”

“No,” I retorted. “
No.
”

“Then what?” Fletcher interceded. “What the hell
is
she?
Was
she? You owe her more than that. You owe
us
more than that.”

I let a breath rush out. Drew another in, despite how it felt like swallowing a sword. Why the hell not, as long as I was falling on one?

Still, I made myself face her. Reached out, hoping she’d let me hold her hands…this one last time. When she did, the sword pulled out a little—but not much. These would likely be the last words I ever spoke to her. I had to make absolutely sure she heard.

“You are…my entire heart. My life. I will
never
forget what we had, sweetheart.”

For long beats—too many—she didn’t say a thing. Just looked. Stared. Her heartbeat throbbed through every inch of her petite frame…just like every choked sob.

Before she wrenched free, tearing past us both—sobbing her way out into the night.

Fletcher didn’t waste time with the same dramatic flair. “I’m going to get her wrap,” he stated.
You
”—he pointed hard at me—“need to go make sure she’s okay.”

“Yeah.” It sounded as dismal as I felt. “Okay. But I promise, I won’t interfere anymore.”

“Christ.” He stabbed a hand through his hair. “Fine. Whatever. Fuck you, Newland. Just…fuck you.”

He strode back into the ballroom to get Talia’s wrap. I hoped he’d hurry. It wasn’t raining but probably would later, if the shit didn’t turn to snow on its way down. She’d be sick by morning at this rate.

I forced myself back from the door she’d just raced through, longing more than anything to chase her down and pull her back inside. But then what? Nothing was going to change my decision. All Fletcher’s grandstanding was useless.

I compromised, keeping an eye on her through the glass doors. Her small body shook with emotion and cold. If my heart wasn’t already decimated, the sight of her out there, in such blatant torment, was finishing the job.

My arms ached, needing to hold her.

My body tensed, feeling incomplete without her.

My spirit screamed, battling the pull to care for her.

Never again.

That was Fletcher’s job now, and after they both got over the initial shock, he’d step perfectly into the role. Be everything she needed—and everything her family would welcome, in the wake of Hurricane Gavin.

A door opened on the other side of the terrace. The figure who’d exited the building still walked in the shadows but was clearly approaching Talia. Woman code probably stated if you saw one of your tribe upset, you comforted.

Except in this case.

Shit. Shit.
Shit.

The figure emerged from the dark—with the force of a bright yellow street sign. Made sense, since that was the color of her dress.

“Fuck.” I growled it as Fletcher emerged back out into the foyer, Talia’s thick velvet stole in his arms. It looked like something that belonged to his mother—and probably was—but at the moment, Francine Ford and her old money fineries were the dead last of my concerns. At the opposite end of the list was the scene playing out fast and furiously just beyond the glass.

“Fuck,” Fletcher added to my assessment. Sometimes, no enhancement helped it. This was one of those times.

We traded one glance.

And just like that, were united in one thought again. Which, in this case, equated to pure dread.

Still, I had to try. “Any chance in hell they’re talking shoes or tampons or shit?”

Fletch’s brows cocked, not unlike the first look he’d given me tonight, back in the ballroom. “Are you blind? Look at Tolly’s posture—and her fists.”

I nodded grimly. “You’re right.
Fuck.
”

And we were in here, holding our dicks and talking about tampons.

Not anymore.

Moving in matching motion, we pushed through the doors—just in time to watch the first of the bitch fireworks fly.

Fletcher

“D
on’t blame them
because
you
pulled up short.”

Janelle’s opening comment froze my feet in their tracks—and fried the blood in my veins. Like Drake, I rushed forward, ready to tell the calculating shrew exactly what hole she could crawl into, but skidded short the second Talia prepped for her comeback.

Our little girlfriend suddenly turned into a goddess.

An avenging one.

The sleeveless cut of her gown exposed every muscle in her back, as her presence seemed to grow by another inch. She shoved out a foot, bracing her strappy heels as if they were battle boots.

“Damn.” Drake’s astonishment, echoing my own, nearly split the word into two syllables.

“Short defines only my stature, Janelle. But you wouldn’t know that, because you don’t
know
me—or, for that matter, anything about those men. And I’ll thank you to keep it that way.”

“Damn.” I copied D’s inflection in a coarse mutter.

Janelle was a bimbo about a lot of things. Toe-to-toe smack talk wasn’t one of them. “Oh, honey,” she cooed, letting her words slide out like cream-covered razorblades, “bless your sweet little heart. You’re more naïve than I thought. I know every single inch of both of those two—intimately, as a matter of fact—and because I’m in such a good mood, I’d even be happy to share a few tips…if that’s what’s come between the three of you.”

The steel in Talia’s spine stiffened more. The striations in her arms grew more defined, leading my scrutiny down to her balled fists. “I don’t want—
or
need—a shred of advice from you.”

“You sure? I mean, those boys
do
have needs, sweetie.” She fanned herself. “Insatiable ones at times. Oh, my lord.”

“Shut. Up.”

“Just offering a little free advice, dear. You know…friend to friend.”

“You are
not
my friend.” Tolly leaned into the one step she took. “And stay away from my boyfriends.”

Janelle acquiesced by a backward stride—emphasis on stride. The woman was slick as gutter water when it came to these battlegrounds. “Oh my God.” She tinkled out a little laugh. “You poor thing.
Boyfriends
? Seriously? Drake Newland and Fletcher Ford are the reason they invented the word
manwhore,
darling. How do you think they got so good at what they do?” She pressed her lips in, as if fighting back another laugh. “I think I actually feel sorry for you now.”

“Well…don’t.” It stammered out of Talia. She twisted a foot as if the concrete under it had suddenly turned to quicksand. I squirmed, feeling her discomfort from twenty feet away. Clearly, the comment wasn’t what she’d expected—in a verbal sparring game that already wasn’t her wheelhouse. “I—I don’t want your pity. I don’t want anything from you, and neither do they.” Her foot slammed down again. “Get it through your head, Janelle—now and for good.
I’m
the one they’re with.”

“Which is why
I’m
going home with one of them?” She curled arms in like a blonde Morticia Addams. “The sexier one, if you ask me…but maybe the fashion plate look is more your jam in a man,
n’est-ce pas
?”

Well, now it was personal. But as I surged forward again, I was stunned to look down and see my best friend’s hand restraining me—while his stare stayed firmly glued on Talia. His dark eyes were suffused with love and pride—and his unmitigated belief in her strength to handle the blonde, preening skank.

She didn’t let him down.

“Ohhhh. You know
French
?
Ooo la la.
Trés bien.
That’s makes things so much easier. I’ll make this short and sweet, then.
Ta gueule,
Janelle. To save your brain cells from exploding on the translation, that means ‘shut your damn mouth’. You
can
spend that limited mental wattage on
this
: Drake isn’t going home with you. He’s coming home with the people he
belongs
with. Fletcher and me.”

I pumped a fist of victory.

Drake beamed an ear-to-ear grin.

Janelle paused for one second. Then tossed her head back on a cackling laugh. “Ohhh, honey. Goodness, you’re cute—but face it. You’re just not enough to keep those two happy. I mean…
look
at you. No, really.
Look.
I know the ‘plain little owl’ thing is trending with the kids right now, but this isn’t a playground and that pair outgrew peanut butter and jelly a long time ago. They need peacocks and caviar…and my darling, you are
not
caviar. Don’t hate yourself for it. It just…
is.
” She smoothed down her slinky gown. On the way back up, she cupped and plumped her ample cleavage. “Stop trying to compete with the peacocks, Talia. They can be a very tough act to follow. Like…umm…
moi.
”