Things Remembered (Accidentally On Purpose Companion Novel #3) (25 page)

“Sit down,” he’d said firmly as he gestured to a leather couch.

“I—”

“Sit. Down.”

I’d wanted to throw him a mutinous look, but I suddenly felt too drained to keep up any pretenses. I went to the couch and sat. Kyle remained silent as he’d gone to the other side of the room and pulled a bottle out of a cabinet. He’d poured dark amber liquid into two glasses and offered one to me. I’d taken it from him and sniffed it.

“It’s bourbon,” he’d said as he pulled a chair away from the front of his desk. He positioned it directly in front of me and sat down.

My voice had grown hoarse from crying. “I’m not sure if drinking bourbon hours before I’m supposed to report to rehab is the wisest thing for me to do.”

“You’re going to rehab for drugs, not for drinking.”

“And you know this how?”

“I’m not wrong,” he’d said easily.

After a moment, I’d agreed. “No, you’re not.”

I took a long sip of the bourbon. It had burned going down, but I’d welcomed it.

“For the record, I’m not happy about you going to rehab. I’m not glad you have a reason to go into rehab. I’m not right, either; you haven’t returned to your old ways.”

“But I’m doing drugs again,” I’d pointed out in a quavering voice. “I’m an addict again.”

“You’re always an addict. Once an addict, always an addict. Your addiction doesn’t go away. You either master it, or it masters you.”

I’d heard similar statements before, but it was as if I were hearing it for the first time. I took that in and let it digest for a moment.

“Why do you say that I haven’t returned to my old ways?” I’d asked.

His gaze was intense. It had locked me into place, and I could not look away.

“You are now a talented, respected, and indispensable member of the Sterling Corporation family. You have made notable strides within the company. In your personal life, you are independent and trusted by your friends and family. Whoever you were before, you didn’t have any of that. You have come so far. It is a very long way back to the old ways, Mayson, and I don’t believe you’ve slipped that far. Understand that I am not sugar coating this for you. I am not making your addiction into some small matter because it’s not. It’s serious. It’s life or death.”

He’d taken my empty glass from me and stood up. For once, I was speechless. Kyle Sterling had complimented me—had said nice things about
me
.

“We will take Dusky for you,” he’d said, after putting the glasses down. “We’ll keep him as long as you need us to.”

Slowly, I’d stood up. I’d looked at Kyle for a long moment as he leaned against his desk with his arms crossed.

“Why are you being so nice?”

At that, he’d scowled. “I’m not being nice. I’m being honest. Besides, you haven’t been the same pain in the ass over the past few weeks. I can’t verbally spar with someone whose brain is addled by drugs. Your forked, demoness tongue isn’t as sharp.”

Somehow, despite the tears, my fears, and my humiliation, I’d found a teasing smile.

“I think you like me,” I’d sang softly, followed by a hiccupping sigh from crying.

Kyle’s scowl had deepened. “I don’t like you, but…”

“But?” I’d raised an eyebrow.

“You are a remarkable and formidable adversary,” he’d admitted with bitterness, and then gestured to the door. “Get out of my office.”

“And you think I’m pretty,” I’d said, walking backward toward the door.

“You are pretty in the same way that decay smells sweet,” he’d deadpanned.

I’d paused. “So, you do think I’m pretty.”

“Get out!” he had roared, before physically removing me from his office.

Even as his door had slammed behind me, I’d felt a massive relief knowing that Dusky would be okay while I was gone. I’d also felt a determination I hadn’t felt before going into Kyle’s office. I’d realized that I had so much more to lose than I ever did before, and I was going to work hard to keep it all.

“By the time I got to Lily’s and Kyle’s that night to drop off Dusky, I was already feeling the effects of withdrawal,” I said to Luke. “The symptoms are horrible and unbearable. Even though my ultimate goal was to get off the drugs, I
needed
to take more, at least to get me through the night. It was obvious to both Kyle and Lily that I was suffering. They knew what I was most likely going to do when I left them. So, they convinced me to stay with them for the night. The truth was, I was too distracted by my symptoms to drive home anyway.”

While Lily had put their daughter Amara to bed that night, and while Kyle had gone back to my apartment to get the bags I had already packed, I lay in the guest bedroom writhing with increasing pain, and violently shivering. It had been so long since I had gone through withdrawal, and I’d been much younger. It seemed to me that this time around was far harder than it had ever been before, and it had only been about fourteen hours since I last took the drug.

“When Kyle came back, he came back with his father,” I said, and then quickly added, “Not his faux father. His Darth Vader father.”

Luke, who had been listening with intense interest, narrowed his eyes.

“The man who treated Emmy after Kyle hurt her?”

“Yes,” I confirmed with a nod. “Larkin. He gave me something to ease my symptoms. It wasn’t heroin, but it did make me high, as some meds used for withdrawal can do.”

“So, Kyle saved your life by giving you more drugs to make you high?” Luke asked with skepticism woven into his tone.

I sighed with some exasperation. “Luke, most addicts can’t quit the drug cold turkey. The symptoms are—as I previously mentioned—unbearable. Most likely, the addict will take the drug again because it’s a sure-fire way to relieve the symptoms of withdrawal. However, many people overcompensate. They take too much of the heroin to try to relieve their pain and discomfort and they end up overdosing. Many of them die. I
have
overdosed after trying to quit cold turkey before, and I most likely would have done it again. Even if I didn’t overdose, at home on my own, I would have come up with a million reasons why going to rehab wasn’t a good idea, despite the fact that I wanted to be clean. The drug would have killed me eventually; if not my body, it would have definitely killed my way of life. Some existences are far worse than death.”

I knew that for sure because I had lived like that more than once.

“So, yes. Kyle Sterling saved my life. Since coming out of rehab, there were many times I would have relapsed if I was left to my own devices. Having a strong support system is key, but having someone who has experienced addiction and understands the way it works is monumental, at least for me. More than that, Luke, Kyle understands me in a way that no one else can. You don’t have to like it. You don’t have to agree with it. If it pisses you off, it pisses you off, but I’m not going to apologize for being friends with him, even if he does have the tendency to be a douche puddle from time to time—or most of the time.”

Luke breathed in heavily and let it out slowly.

“I don’t like it,” he said after a moment. His voice wasn’t hard, but his words were. “I don’t like him. I will never like him because there isn’t anything in this world that can make me like him. Even if Emmy forgave him, I will never forgive him. He can save your life a million times, rescue babies and puppies from burning buildings, and thwart World War III, and I still won’t like him. You are right. I don’t have to like him or forgive him. I, too, refuse to apologize. I refuse to apologize for hating the man. He could have killed my wife, and he could have killed my son. I will never be able to be okay with that under any circumstances. I will carry my hatred for Kyle Sterling to my grave. But…” He sighed and his words softened. “I am glad that he helped you. I am glad that you have a friend that understands you in ways that we can’t. I am grateful for what he’s done for you, but you are not a result of what Kyle Sterling has done, Mayson. It is your endurance, your strong will, and your hard work that made you who you are today. He may have helped you along, but you saved yourself. Don’t underestimate what you are capable of because after all you’ve been through, you are capable of great things. You are more than what you think you are.”

I couldn’t help the small smile that formed on my face as he stood up and kissed my forehead.

“You know, Kyle said those exact words. ‘You are more than what you think you are.’”

Luke looked slightly put out by that, but then he shrugged one shoulder. “I never said that he wasn’t a smart man.”

Chapter Twenty

“I’m pretty sure this isn’t the reason you hired a nanny,” I said breathlessly as Grant kissed my neck.

“I hired her to take care of the kids and house when I’m working or busy. I would constitute this as being busy,” he murmured in my ear before returning to the task at hand.

“You mean
getting
busy.”

“And dirty.” He released a little growl. “I would very much like to get dirty.”

“You’re already a dirty old man.” I gasped when his teeth grazed over an especially sensitive spot. “How much dirtier do you intend to get?”

He pressed his erection against my thigh.

“Filthy,” he whispered, before transferring his remaining kisses to my mouth.

Even as we heard Juliette, the kids, and Dusky moving about the ware-home, our pajamas mysteriously ended up on the floor and tangled in the bedclothes. My fingers explored his dark skin, feeling the tautness of the muscles in his arms, and how they flexed in his back. He kissed a fiery trail down the center of my body until he reached the neatly trimmed patch of curls between my thighs.

“I love that you don’t shave it all away,” he said, kissing my inner thigh.

“Real women wear hair,” I sang softly.

“Mmm. Indeed, they do.”

I gasped, and my eyes fluttered as his tongue entered me. I had been breathless before, but oxygen seemed to disappear from me altogether as Grant’s mouth worked on my sensitive flesh. He feasted on me leisurely, as if we didn’t have anywhere else to be, and nothing else to do. I didn’t complain. I held onto the back of his head, moaning and gently thrusting my hips.

When at last, he came up for air, I eagerly pulled him to me and kissed him. I didn’t mind how he tasted—a pleasant mix of him and me. I didn’t mind the smell of him, either, mixed with the smell of me. It only made me want and love him more.

He entered me, sliding himself to the hilt and making my back arch off of the bed. I had to hold back my cry of desire so that we wouldn’t be heard, but a whimper escaped past my lips. Grant dipped his head to capture the next whimper as he thrust inside me, slow and deep.

His fingers laced with mine above my head, but he was very careful not to restrain me in any way. Someday, I wanted him to hold me down and fuck me to within an inch of my life, but I wasn’t ready for that yet, even if I did trust him implicitly.

I loved that he didn’t talk utter nonsense during sex. Our moans, groans, whimpers, and gasps were enough for us. The occasional requests to go harder or faster, or to be kissed or touched in a certain place, and the utterances of love were all that we needed.

Besides, too much talking would remind me of
them
, the demons that took from me what wasn’t theirs to take. I didn’t need any further reminders of them, and I didn’t need them in the bed I shared with the man I loved. Although bi-weekly therapy sessions with Grant had helped tremendously with our sex life, as well as love life, unfortunately, the echoes of the past still occasionally made an appearance. Sometimes, it couldn’t be helped, but Grant always held me until I stopped shaking, and kissed away tears with the patience and love of a saint.

As he always did, he waited for me to climax before reaching his. He wrapped his arms around me as he released himself inside me, softly chanting my name onto my neck as I stroked his strong back.

He lay on top of me and semi-hard inside me for a long while before either of us tried to move.

“We have to get up,” he said with a sigh of resignation.

“No, we don’t,” I whined. “I don’t want to adult today.”

“I have to go get a bad guy, and you have to go police the employees of Sterling Corporation.”

“Get someone else to get the bad guy. You
do
own the company. I can call out of work. We can then pretend we’re going to work but run away and do kid stuff. We can go to the Franklin Institute, or the zoo, or go to the movies.”

He kissed my jaw before rolling off me and getting to his feet.

“That sounds very tempting, Baby Girl,” he said, smiling down at me in all his naked, sexy, hot glory. “But I am going to have to decline. I need to be with my team today.”

He started for the bathroom, most likely to stop the conversation from going any further. It wasn’t a new conversation. We’d had it a few times in the months since the beach vacation.

I liked that Grant owned his own business and that he got criminals off the streets, but I didn’t like the danger involved with the job. I learned fairly quickly that when he said he needed to be with his team, it was because they were going after a bad man—or woman—that was known to have violent tendencies or to carry a weapon.

Not ready for the conversation to be over, I got up and followed him into the bathroom where he was just stepping into the shower. I got in right behind him, not even giving him time to close the glass door.

“Can’t your team function without you?” I asked, passing him his body wash. “I mean, you did hire them. You wouldn’t have hired half-assed bounty hunters, right? You hired people who can get the job done without you?”

“Yes, I did hire them,” he agreed with a sigh. “And yes, they are capable of functioning without me. In fact, they do very well on their own, and there isn’t anything half-assed about any of my people.”

“Great!” I said cheerily. “Then they can go catch the latest big bad wolf on their own.”

“Mayson,” he said my name with a gentle reproof. “I can’t send my team into dangerous situations while I am chilling at home, or at the museum or wherever.”

“Why not? I’m okay with it.”

He leaned in, kissed me softly on the lips and then once on my bare shoulder.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said, trying to sound conciliatory. “We’ll play hooky on Friday, okay? We’ll do whatever you want to do.”

That
was the end of the conversation. He had washed quickly as we were talking. Then he stepped out of the shower, leaving me with soap suds and my anxiety.

There had been too many days and nights over the past six months of waiting for Grant to return home after going to recover someone. You would think that I’d get used to it, that my anxiety level wouldn’t be so high. I wasn’t used to it. I could never get used to it. There would always be a small voice in the back of my head that dared ask the question, “What if he doesn’t come back?”

“I’m not going to ask that question,” I said aloud to myself in the shower. “Not going to ask. Not going to ask. Not going to ask…”

I joined Grant, the kids, and Juliette in the kitchen a little while later. My morning routines had changed, for the most part. I only stopped for coffee and a pastry if I was leaving from my own apartment, which was becoming more and more infrequent. The mornings I left for work from Grant’s, however, I drank my coffee and ate breakfast with him and the kids. I liked that routine, almost as much as I liked our evening routines.

Regardless of where I was going to sleep, as much as was possible, we had dinner together as a family. I liked hearing about Natalie’s half days at preschool, and Alex’s stories about the fifth grade. Since I didn’t experience the fifth grade in an actual school, I always found it fascinating to hear about his interactions with other kids and his teachers.

I always stayed until after the kids were in bed, because that, too, had become routine. Despite how often the nights could be crazy, I liked the goodnight hugs from Natalie and the occasional chats and Lego get-togethers in Alex’s room. I especially liked that strangely gratifying time on the couch with Grant after the kids were tucked away for the night. It was our alone time, our time to talk about our day, or to catch up on our television shows, or our time for physical activity.

Grant wasn’t always home at nights, though, and it seemed ridiculous to send the kids to their grandmother’s in New Jersey or to have the woman come stay at the ware-home while he was gone. Juliette sometimes helped out, but she was generally finished by six. It only made sense that I stepped in. The kids still visited with their grandmother on some weekends, but during the week, I was there, fixing dinner, helping with homework, and making sure they got bathed and into bed.

So…I had become something like a mother, even though I said I didn’t want to be anyone’s mother. I was, by no stretch of the imagination, an exemplary mother. I was still
me
, a little selfish, very much inappropriate, and a bit unstable. I probably let the kids eat too much junk and watch too much television, too, but I did the best I could with them.

“Don’t forget that tonight is dinner at your mother’s,” Grant said to me as he, Alex, and I walked down into the garage.

I groaned. “I forgot. I guess you’re reminding me now because you don’t think you’ll make it?” I gave him an unhappy look.

“I’m sorry,” he said with sincerity. “I don’t think I’ll be back by then.”

He put his arms around me and held me tightly. Feeling stubborn, I didn’t hug him back.

“Not only are you going after another big bad wolf who may or may not have bigger teeth than you, but I also have to go to my mother’s alone.”

He chuckled softly in my ear. “You won’t be alone. You’ll have Natalie and Alex with you. Now hug me and give me a kiss. I have to get Alex to school before he’s late.”

“You guys are grossing me out,” Alex announced.

I turned my head to look at the boy and narrowed my eyes. “In a year or two when your voice begins to change and you start growing hair in your nether regions, you’ll
love
to have a girl hugging all up on you.”

Alex looked disgusted. Grant shook his head and sighed heavily before kissing my forehead and releasing me from his embrace.

“I’ll see you later tonight,” he said, looking disappointed as he opened the driver’s side door of his Range Rover.

Alex gave me a wave as he made his way to the passenger side.

“Come back over here,” I said to Grant, wagging my gloved finger.

He looked skeptical, but after a moment, he came back to me. Thankful that I was wearing a pair of boots with a high heel, I wrapped my arms around his neck and brought my lips to his. Even though I could hear Alex making gagging noises from inside of the truck, I kissed Grant for what felt like a solid minute.

“I love you,” Grant murmured, rubbing his nose with mine. “Have a good day at work. I’ll keep in touch throughout the day and I’ll see you tonight.”

“I love you, too,” I whispered. “Do not come back home shot, stabbed, beaten, or otherwise maimed.”

“I promise I will come home in one piece, and Friday, we’ll have a hooky day, just like I promised.”

He kissed me once more, gave me a beautiful smile and a wink, and then he was gone.

I watched my mom’s face burn with a light I had never, ever, seen before, not until the first time she had met Natalie and Alex two weeks after we returned from the beach. We had gone to her house for dinner on the night that would have been my usual visit. I had expected the same detachment she’d always had, and her same old cold, impassive face, but that night I discovered a new version of Jasmine Santini.

She had smiled so much that night, that I thought her face could not have been real. It had to be a porcelain mask, and I expected at any time for it to slip and shatter on the floor, but it never did. She was this other person that I never knew—with her smiling, and laughing, and a softness that I was never taught. Conversation with Grant came easily for her. She was social and gracious and not my mother. She wasn’t my mother. She couldn’t have been be
my
mother.