Atonement (The Atonement Series) (6 page)

Woe is me lived again and I felt the tears as they began to fall from my eyes. I knew Colin would misinterpret them and he did. He thought he’d caused me to cry and immediately, he sat up and took me in his arms. His embrace was warm and he smelled delicious, like a mixture of a freshly washed body, expensive cologne and just a hint of something smoky. Not cigarette smoke because for someone who indulged, I had yet to sniff the reek of stale smoke on his skin or his clothing.

“Hey, come on, don’t cry. I’m sorry. I can be a real dick sometimes. It’s my past rearing its ugly head when I was the king of one night stands and treated women like shit. I’m not proud of my behavior and although I was a total misogynist, I still loved and respected my mother. I couldn’t quite understand how some women had so little regard for their bodies that they would give it up so willingly for a little spending cash and maybe a trinket or two.”

He breathed deeply against my neck and I wondered if he was trying to smell my perfume or inhale a part of me. “I knew you were different from the moment we met but…I didn’t want to overstep my boundaries. I know about the relationship you have with Drew and he loves you…a lot. Too much. I would hazard to say he’s still in love with you and if he could, he’d make you his again in a heartbeat.”

We separated reluctantly and I wiped my tears away with the palms of my hands. “That’s not gonna happen. I guess a part of me is in love with Drew too but we’re not meant to be together. I love him because he was my first love and the first…and only man…I have ever shared my body with but he and I—it can’t happen again.”

Colin gave me a look that made those gorgeous crystal blue eyes of his sparkle. “Have you told him all this because when he gets drunk…the times I have seen him out of control which are few and far between, he moved out here to be with you. There is still a part of him that wants you two to get married and have a couple of kiddies.”

“I don’t even know if I want kids and he knows that. We’ve just been best friends for a really long time and God knows if I could…change the course of action, I would but…” I trailed off as my Android phone began to dissipate the awkward silence with the very raunchy “S&M” by Rihanna.

Shit, it was Aubrey, and I needed to hear from her like I needed an extra fucking head. I quickly leaned over, grabbed my phone and answered before the chorus was over with a curt, “Hello?”

“Hey, sweets, how are you?” she wondered out loud.

There was a slight slur to her speech so I knew she was drunk which wasn’t anything new.

“Nothing much. What is it?”

“I’m kinda stranded at the Last Supper Club and I was really hopin’ you could pick me up?”

“Wait a minute—if you’re stranded does that mean you don’t have a place to stay?”

“Um, duh?”

“What about Stacy?”

“That fucking bitch! You know I caught her and Brandon in bed together. Not that I was paying my rent anyway but do you think if your supposed ‘loaded’ boyfriend is taking care of the rent, it gives him first dibs to screw your roommate too?” she ranted angrily.

“I wouldn’t know as I am still living with Drew and we each pay our own rent,” I replied in a crisp tone.

“Yeah, I know. How is Drew by the way? Is he looking for a girlfriend?”

“I don’t think so—as a matter of fact, he mentioned some hot guy at work he is dying to get to know a little bit better. Colin, I think his name is.”

Colin’s eyes widened to saucers before he slapped my left thigh playfully. It didn’t hurt the least bit but the heat it sent through the silk sheet wasn’t a good thing. His swat had been a little too near my aching sex which hadn’t seen any action in over three months and I was totally feeling the absence.

“That’s cool. Listen, I just need a place to crash for a while. If you can talk to Drew…”

“Listen, we’ll be there in about twenty minutes. Can you please wait outside? I don’t want to have to troll that fucking club looking for your ass.”

Aubrey sighed in annoyance. “Sure, fine. I am in a dress that hits me just below my ass and it isn’t exactly one hundred degrees outside. Just phone me when you get here and I’ll make my way down, okay?”

“Fine.” I ended the call and threw my phone down on the bed before my hands went directly to my hair to hold it out of my face.

Every time it looked like I was about to get a handle on my life, my life seemed to throw a curveball which always seemed to manhandle me. Do people ever grow up? Of course they don’t. We, as a species, didn’t grow up, we just got older and no one was a better example of this phenomenon than Aubrey Gault.

Chapter Five

“
SO, DO YOU
wanna tell me what’s going on here?”

I glanced at Colin’s profile and a part of me wanted to smile though he looked a bit pissed off we’d had yet another interruption so I decided to play it safe and just give him the details he needed to know.

“Aubrey is my cousin on my mother’s side of the family—my real mother. Her father and my mother were siblings. They came from a fairly decent family. Hard working Creole Louisianans who provided a good life for their children who grew up to become responsible adults. Unfortunately, my uncle fell hard for an exchange student at Louisiana State University. She was from Montreal and it was love at first sight, or so I’ve heard.

“The woman is a total basketcase. She left Louisiana State University their mid-sophomore year and went back to Canada. My uncle didn’t even know he had a daughter by this woman, Sandrine, until Aubrey was ten. She’d been in and out of the system because her mother is a paranoid schizophrenic with an alcohol and drug problem. Anyway, she’s always been smart as a whip and she looked my uncle up on the internet.

“By this time, my uncle is married and has two sons but his wife is a complete and utter sweetheart. They take in Aubrey but she is just a nightmare. She doesn’t want to go to school, severe emotional problems, sexual abuse…you name it, the woman has been through it. I mean, she’s only twenty-six but her life is completely out of control and she kind of goes from man to man.”

It was the first time I’d stopped talking long enough to take a moment to breathe.

“How did she manage to get here to Seattle?”

“Um, after a stint at some brothel in Nevada, she decided to look me up and she’s been here since January. I had enough issues with my dad dying so I just threw some money at her and hoped for the best—like maybe she would get bored and go home or something but that didn’t happen. She’s sexy and has a knack for meeting the right people. She’s quite popular at Bare—you know, the strip club for all the wealthy and moneyed of the city—and she manages to turn up on time and does her job but she can’t seem to keep anything else.”

“So, what do you want to do?” Colin wondered out loud after a long silence.

“I don’t know…we’re leaving on this trip soon…?”

“How about next week?”

“Yeah, that’ll work. She can take my room and I’ll butter up Drew to let her stay because I can’t have her out on the street. I mean, my uncle would kill me and he’d have a point. There is plenty of room but the thought of sharing a room with that chick—”

“Why don’t you just take my guest room then? I mean, until we leave? That way you get privacy and your cousin can take your room. We have a lot of planning to do and my work schedule is, unfortunately, pretty hectic next week. We can agree to meet up at O’Shaughnessy’s or talk when I get home from work? Might as well get used to one another’s company now since we’ll be seeing a lot of one another soon,” he explained in a rational tone.

It was a great idea but the thought of spending more time within this hot-blooded male’s presence was enough to make my heart beat double-time.

“Or…I can ask your cousin if she’d like to stay with me?”

God no!

“I don’t mind staying in your overpriced condo,” I responded in a nonchalant voice. “I mean, you bring up a good point and besides, I don’t need my trip ruined because you decide to fuck Aubrey and she does something you would blame me for so it just works out better this way.”

Colin turned toward me as we sat at a red light. “And you’re not worried about Drew?”

“No because she’s tried that act on him and he turned her down so fast he made the Airbus seem slow. Seriously, he is so not interested in Aubrey like that.”

He snickered and I tried to concentrate until we pulled up to the club. I’d called Aubrey moments earlier and she walked out of the Last Supper Club like she owned the place. As usual, she was dressed to the nines, tonight in scarlet Alexander Wang leather and knit sleeveless dress which contained a high neckline but her medium-sized natural breasts were still perky enough to warrant attention with the NHOs she was working in the worst way. Her long legs, the perfect shade of pale olive, were smooth and gorgeous while her feet were encased in a pair of silver and gold Tribute Sandals.

Despite perpetual homelessness and the inability to spend money in any way considered responsible what so ever, my cousin was never seen in anything other than Tributes in all shapes, colors and designs. Apparently, she kept a storage unit in the city for her shoes and clothes as they were worth a fortune alone.

Everything Aubrey wore had to be designer, from La Perla lingerie to dresses, jeans, skirts, sweaters and blouses by all the major fashion houses. She didn’t own a pair of shoes that hadn’t cost her at least seven hundred dollars. Like the fictional
Sex & the City
character, Carrie Bradshaw, my cousin could live without a lot of things but designer clothes and shoes weren’t on that list she kept in her head.

Speaking of hair, despite a lifestyle of hard-core partying, smoking and drinking, she had the most gorgeous raven locks a woman could ask for. Slightly wavy with the perfect tousled look, her hair reached just past glamorous shoulders and appeared bright and healthy. Her dark hair complimented fair olive skin, the most gorgeous blue eyes with a strange violet-tinged ring around her pupils that of course not only mesmerized men but pretty much guaranteed her pert nose, high cheekbones, and luscious full lips were in stunningly good company.

Next to Aubrey, I was just a normal looking chick who could pass for attractive and cute but my cousin was a gorgeous and captivating woman men wanted to possess and women desperately wanted to emulate. She’d lucked out in the looks and body department even if she had obviously suffered in other parts of her turbulent life.

“Stop drooling, Colin,” I murmured as she ran towards us in her Yves Saint Laurent heels and hopped into the back.

“Thanks, Deirdre. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t picked up your phone,” she greeted before she leaned over the seat and kissed my cheek.

“You would have managed somehow,” I replied not quite keeping the sarcasm out of my tone. “Listen, this is Colin, a friend of Drew’s. Colin, this is my cousin, Aubrey.”

She leaned over the console and studied his profile before she gave him a kiss on the cheek too. “Thanks for being my hero tonight…
stud
.”

I briefly turned toward Colin in time to see his face flush a deep shade of crimson. “No problem,” he managed to squeak out.