Enraptured (17 page)

“Because that would be terrible,” I agreed sardonically.

“I know that you have your misgivings due to the violent history there. But I give you my personal guarantee of his safety.”

I killed the last of my juice and rose from the table. “No good,” I answered. “I’ve heard too many of your campaign promises.”

I exited the kitchen and headed back up to my room.

Now that I understood what Zoe’s true purpose in my house really was, I was no longer willing to dismiss the warning signs I had previously ignored. Once the De Havillands returned to New York, I began asserting myself more and more, confusing the young blonde with my firmer, more no-nonsense tone.

I was back, baby.

Every time she tried to edge me out of my life, I straightened my spine and treated her like the employee she was. If she was there to help me, she was going to do what I said. That started with getting the hell out of my way. I cornered Drew during one of his late-nights in the study to establish more proper working boundaries.

“You don’t want her sharing meals with us? Isn’t that a little rude, Rachel?”

I shrugged. “Harrison and Cleo are on our payroll, too. Have you ever invited them to share a meal at the table?”

“No,” he admitted. “But you have. So why treat Zoe any differently?”

My eyes narrowed as I glared at him. “It wasn’t too long ago that I was Zoe. The innocent, single woman brought in to raise your child. How long did it take for the boundaries to blur and the lines to cross, exactly?”

He chuckled to himself. “What are you suggesting, Rachel? That I would start an affair with my son’s nanny right under my wife’s
nose?”

I tilted my chin.
“Wouldn’t be the first time.”

His eyes hardened as he looked at me. “I told you those rumors were false.”

“I just find it interesting that the woman you hire to take care of our children looks a lot like your first wife and your last fiancée.”

Drew grew angry. He slammed his fist onto his desk before he rose to pour himself another drink. “I don’t care for your accusations, Rachel.”

“And I don’t care for the late nights and the emotional freeze you’ve put me through. If Alex isn’t around for you to wag me under his nose, then it is like I don’t exist at all.”

His mood soured even more. “I don’t appreciate my behavior being questioned. This is the nuts and the bolt of running one of the most successful companies in America. You know that. You were bitching at me about it two years ago
before Zoe was even an issue. Or don’t you remember?”

“Fine,” I
conceded. “Run your business. But this house? And these children? They are my business. That is the job you hired me for, isn’t it?” I asked with a raised eyebrow.

He killed his glass of whiskey before he walked back to his desk. He shoved papers into his briefcase.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“To the office,” he snapped. “For peace and quiet.”

“It’s nine o’clock at night,” I reminded.

He offered a derisive chortle as he sneered down his nose at me. “Why worry? Zoe is staying here.”

He slammed out of his office and didn’t return until after two in the morning.

A chill descended over the house that left Jonathan quiet and pensive. I was sharper than I needed to be with the sweet girl he had come to adore, and his father was surly if ever bothered to show up at all.

Elise reveled in the tension when she came to pick him up, and I once again had to shoo Zoe away from doing what was my job alone: dealing with his other mother. Elise watched the young girl slink from the room. “Kudos for finding your back bone,” she said. “But it’s useless. The war was lost the minute she walked in the door. And you know it,” she added before she swept from the room to collect her son.

I spent my evening in my office, preparing Jonathan’s lesson plans for the following week. Though she was studying to be an educator, I refused to turn the reins over to Zoe just yet. Jonathan had been and still was my student. If she was there to assist me, then that was precisely what she would do. She would follow my orders and work according to my plan, not the other way around.

That night she opted to dine alone in the kitchen. I realized that my demeanor was making her uncomfortable, but every time I looked at her I saw her for the carrot on the stick she was. It was time both Drew and Troy learned I wasn’t going to just roll over while they toyed with the rules of decency to get whatever they wanted whenever they wanted it.

Drew was still playing by his own rules that evening, when eleven o’clock came and went and he hadn’t yet come home. I sent texts asking where he was, but he hadn’t seen fit yet to respond.

I stared at my phone, debating on how bitchy I was going to be about it. Finally I picked it up, but it wasn’t Drew I called.

It was Alex.

“What’s up?” he asked casually.

“Drew’s not home,” I said. “Do you know where he is?”

“I think he mentioned something about a video conference to London,” he said. “I’m surprised he didn’t tell you.”

“In his mind he is a god, and it was my job to worship him. Answering my nagging questions doesn’t hold any real appeal.”

He paused. “Are you okay?”

Finally I blurted out about Zoe and Troy and even what Sloane suggested about letting him canoodle with the help while I was debilitated by my pregnancy. It felt good to say it to someone who might understand, and Alex knew these mixed up rules and the people that made them far better than Nancy ever would.

I heard him sigh. “I can’t say I’m surprised. For the record, I did try to warn you that this wasn’t Texas. We have our own rules here. And they suck.”

“I know,” I grumbled. “I just thought if I gave myself to this marriage and committed as his wife that he would see there is another way.”

“Valiant effort,” he said.
“But wasted with Drew. He’s too broken. It would take something drastic for him to get the message.”

“What do you suggest?”

A pause. “I have some ideas.”

“Like what?”

“Going to Mexico,” he answered flatly.

I sucked in a breath. “Alex, you can’t.”

“If I can uncover that Teton Tech and their Mexico holdings are linked with the cartel to smuggle illegal drugs and guns, and link it back to Troy, then maybe I can get rid of his worst influence.” He paused. “That’s the only thing that will release him from Father.”

“Not at the expense of your life, Alex.”

I could picture him shrugging on the other end. “I’ve always been the expendable one, Rachel. The spare, the backup plan.”

“Not to Max,” I argued. “He needs you.”
I need you
.

“If
I can’t fix this, what kind of life can I offer him? This threat hanging over our heads like the sword of Damocles is only going to get worse the further entrenched Drew gets. I can practically hear the fibers of the rope snapping now. That puts us all in danger, including Max. He’d be better off raised in England with my mother’s family.”

He was scaring me. “You can’t go,” I reiterated.

“I don’t think you have a say in the matter. It’s my life.”

“And it’s my fucking family,” I snapped as tears poured down my face. “I don’t want you to go.”

The long pause that followed was finally interrupted with “Don’t want who to go?” It was a question slurred by Drew as he entered the bedroom, and I glared at him through my tears.

“I have to go,” I told Alex before I disconnected the call and placed the phone back onto the nightstand.

He saw Alex’s face on my phone, which curled his lip up in a snarl. He ripped his shirt off of his shoulders. “I don’t answer your texts and you go crying to Alex?” He shook his head with a disgusted sneer. “Your conversion into Elise is almost complete.”

I wiped my tears with the back of my hand. “If this is how you treated her, I understand her better than I ever wanted to.”

He spun around, enraged. “And how do I treat you? Just because I don’t jump when you snap, somehow I’m failing you? Look around you, Rachel. I plucked you out of nothing and made you a queen!”

I grew angry. “I never asked for any of this, Drew! Not one diamond, not one dime. I don’t give a shit about your money or your power. I love
you
. I want
you
. I want us to be a family.”

He rolled his eyes. “Family,” he repeated with disgust.
“The code word for Alex.” He stalked to my side of the bed. “I already told you that I don’t share.”

“But I’m supposed to, is that it?” I shot back.

“I told you that nothing is going on with her,” he growled as he leaned down to face me.

“Your good buddy Troy will be so disappointed,” I murmured. “After all the thought he put into finding the perfect ‘assistant’ for your needs.”

“I am not Troy,” he snapped.

“Thank God,” I replied.

He crawled along the bed, backing me against a pillow. “I don’t need Troy’s help finding a woman to warm my bed. I don’t need to pay one, and I certainly don’t need to mope around the house and diddle the help. I can have any woman I want,” he snarled. “At the office, on the street, they’re everywhere. They smell the money,” he said in a quiet, lethal voice as his mouth hovered over my mine. “They see the car, the clothes, the wedding ring,” he added. “They all want to be the one who is kept on the side, in some luxury Brentwood apartment, with jewels and cars and money to fill the absence while I go home to my wife.”

I glared at him. “And that makes you a big man, does it?
A god?”

He ran a finger along my pajama top before he ripped it open, sending buttons flying across the room. I gasped and tried to cover myself, but he shook his head. “You know what makes me a god, baby. You feel it every single time I touch you.” He kissed me roughly until I was forced to submit. He groaned deep in his throat as he pressed me onto my back.

Even as mad as I was, my arms wrapped around his neck and I pulled him closer. I was hungry with need. He wore a satisfied smile as he dragged his mouth from my swollen lips. “Maybe it is time to remind you why I chose you, and you alone, to be my bride.”

He kissed his way down my sensitive body, over the swell of each heavy breast and the generous curve of my full tummy. He eased the pajamas off of my body before diving between my legs. I gasped as his tongue found its target. I cried out as he teased me with the tip of his finger and his nimble tongue, swirling together until I convulsed against his face, my thighs clasping his head into me deeper. He turned me over onto my knees as he stepped out of his pants. He was hard as rock as he eased up behind me and slowly slid into me as his hand slid up my back and into my hair.

He rode me until we both were crying out. He reached places I forgot even existed. When he clasped my hair in his fingers, I screamed out in a mix of pleasure and pain. It only encouraged him more. He released himself with a loud, primal grunt. When he fell onto the bed, he pulled me to his sweaty chest. As the fog of our white hot passion cleared, his touch turned gentle.

“Did I hurt you?” he asked.

I shook my head as I rolled onto my back. “No. You didn’t hurt me.”

He spread his palm against my vast belly. “Did I hurt them?”

Again I shook my head. I held his hand to my stomach and watched his face as I waited. His eyes grew wide as he felt the tiny fluttering movements under my skin.

“When?” he asked breathlessly?

“Today,” I confessed. “But I wasn’t sure until just now.”

He kissed his way along my bare body to rest against my pregnant tummy. “My babies,” he murmured softly before he looked at me.
“My wife. This is my family, Rachel. Never doubt what I would do for any of you.”

I ran my hand through his thick, dark hair. “Prove it. Don’t send Alex to Mexico.”

His eyes hardened as he stared at me. “What?”

“You heard me. It’s time to be your brother’s hero again. Don’t send Alex to Mexico and get the hell away from Troy De Havilland.”

His face was hard as he pulled away from me, put on his robe and slammed out of the bedroom.

I lay
awake most of the night, waiting for Drew to return. Around dawn I slipped into my robe and headed downstairs, where I found him asleep on his sofa in his study. There was a half-empty bottle of scotch in one hand, and with one leg up on the edge, his robe had gaped open.

There was no clearer invitation to kick dust on the line of propriety and skip happily toward unrestrained lust than a drunk, naked
bazillionaire in his private study.

After all, I had done exactly that a couple of years before.

I closed the door behind me and walked over to where my husband lay. His eyes fluttered open as I pried the bottle from his strong fingers. “I wasn’t done with that,” he muttered.

“Yeah, you are,” I replied as I carried it back to the bar.

Drew ambled up into a sitting position. “What time is it?”

“A little after seven.”

He rubbed his eyes with his hands. “I should get to the office.”

“It’s Saturday,” I reminded.

“I told you a long time ago that this isn’t a nine-to-five job.”

“Yeah, well neither is marriage. You don’t get to alienate me every time you get pissed at me.”

“Works so well for you,” he countered.

I sighed and crossed my arms as I faced him. “Can we take a break from the sniping, Drew? It’s not helping anything.”

He stood. “You don’t have to hear it if I’m at the office.”

“Please don’t go.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Why?”

“I want you here.
With me.”

“So you can campaign to spare Alex from
going to Mexico?”

I shook my head.
“I won’t mention him at all. It’ll be just you and me. Bride and groom. Newlyweds.”

He studied my face for a long moment before he finally relented.
“Fine. Let me shower and then I’m all yours, Mrs. Fullerton.”

True to my word, I said nothing at all about Alex as we dressed, then drove up the
coast for breakfast in Malibu. In fact, we said very little, now that certain topics were off the table. We headed to the Getty Villa to explore the antiquities on display amidst the grand Roman inspired country house tucked just off of the Pacific Coast Highway. There we bore witness to art that stretched all the way back to 6500 B.C., which rendered us both speechless as we spent the day amidst priceless treasures. The natural beauty in the sculpted gardens was just as breathtaking. “I can’t wait to bring Jonathan here,” I said as we strolled through the Outer Peristyle.

He squeezed my hand with his. “He’s an old soul. He would definitely appreciate it.”

I smiled. “It’s what I love most about him.”

A similar smile tugged the corner of his mouth as well. “Me too,” he confessed softly. “With the babies coming, I’ve been thinking a lot about legacy. All Fullertons up until now have had only one: amass wealth and all the power that comes with it. My father was a scary man,” he admitted. “As was his father before him and likely his father before him. Every time I look in the mirror, I see each of them staring back at me. I see their demands and their expectations and their endless disapproval.
Yet I’ve never seen their faces when I look at Jonathan, despite everything I’ve done to put them there.” He paused for a beat. “And I’m glad.”

I curled around his strong arm.
“Me too.”

“He’s the best of us,” Drew said. “How he came from Elise and me is a mystery.”

“You’re a good man, Drew,” I assured.

He scoffed with a shake of his head. “I don’t think anyone touched by Malcolm
Fullerton could be good. Good was another word for weak, and that got beaten out of us at a very young age, along with empathy and compassion. If you give to everyone with an outstretched hand, it isn’t long at all until you’re the one with the outstretched hand. It was always survival of the fittest.”

I nearly bit my tongue in half as I did my level best to keep my promise and not talk about Alex. This would have been the perfect opportunity to point out that Alex had escaped this particular legacy due to Drew’s own compassion.

Instead I just listened.

“That’s a legacy I don’t want to pass down to our children, Rachel,” he continued softly. “If you ever wonder why I chose you, why I married you and why I am so fucking grateful every minute of every day that you are the mother of my children, it all comes back to legacy. You are the only one I’ve ever me
t who demonstrates goodness as strength.” He looked down at me. “You humble all of us.”

A tear
formed in the corner of my eye as I wound my arms around his neck.

I was feeling pretty good about our day together until we pulled back up into the drive, where Alex’s work truck sat beside the fountain. Instantly the lines hardened in Drew’s face and his eyes narrowed as he looked at me. “Were you expecting company?” he asked in a low, controlled voice.

I shook my head. “I had no idea, Drew. I swear.”

He said nothing as he exited the car and headed into the house. He was pensive as he glanced into the living room, stalked past his study and made his way to the kitchen. I practically had to run to keep up. He stopped short just in front of the double doors leading toward the terrace. There on the plush wicker love seat sat Alex and Zoe. He had his arm along the back of the seat as Zoe strummed Jonathan’s guitar. He smiled proudly at her as she squealed in delight, obviously mastering a tune he was trying to teach her.

Drew didn’t even look at me. “I’m going to ask you again, Rachel. Did you know he was coming over today?”

I shook my head as I watched their interaction. It was like a knife in my gut every time he bestowed that sexy smirk to the blushing blonde. “I didn’t ask him and he didn’t tell me.”

“So this is just more of Alex being Alex,” he grumbled. “He’s just playing with Zoe for the hell of it, just like Martina at the office.”

“He wouldn’t do that,” I argued softly.

Drew sneered down his nose at me. “You always want to see the best in him but I already told you. Good was beaten out of us at a young age.” He glanced back out onto the terrace, where we both saw Alex capture a lock of Zoe’s hair to push it out of her face. “Anything else is just an agenda, another form of warfare.”

He spun on his heel and stalked back to his study, where – no doubt – he’d reach for yet another bottle of alcohol. I almost wished I could join him as I watched the scene unfold on the terrace. Alex Fullerton was a free agent, one who needed no permission to romance any girl he chose.

But until now, he had never shown much interest in courting anyone other than me. I thought that made me special.

Now I wondered if Drew was right. Maybe Alex always had an agenda.

I slid the door open and stepped outside. Both Alex and Zoe were startled to see me approach, and he quickly dropped his arm from the back of the loveseat. “Alex, what a nice surprise, I wasn’t expecting you.”

He shrugged as he stood. “I came over looking for Drew, but Zoe said you both had gone out for the day.”

She was quick to jump to his defense. “I asked him to stay, Rachel. I thought maybe he could teach me a little guitar so I could maintain Jonathan’s studies while he was in Mexico.”

My heart stopped as I stared at him. “Could you give us a moment alone, Zoe?”

She nodded at once. “Of course.” She ducked her head and scurried away, possibly afraid of incurring my wrath once more.

“You should be a little nicer to the help,” he murmured. “You were in her shoes not too long ago,
remember?”

“If you mean when I was
the chew toy you both were fighting over, then yes. I remember well.”

His jaw clenched but he didn’t rise to the bait. “I came over here because I’d like to ask if Max and Millicent can stay here while I’m down in Mexico. This business may take a while and I’d feel a lot better knowing they were with family, especially Max.”

My blood ran cold. “So you’re really going through with it.”

He shrugged. “They need me to properly set up De Villa Rojas since nobody knows horses like I do.”

“That’s bullshit and you know it.”

“Regardless, I’m going. Can they stay here or not?”

“Of course they can,” I snapped. “If only to provide you incentive to come home.”

His eyes scoured my face. “I already have that.”

My breath caught as our eyes held. “Stay safe, Alex.”

He spared me a crooked grin. “
Don’t you worry about me. I’m titanium, baby.”

A long moment stretched between us before I flung my arms around his neck. There were tears in my eyes as we broke apart. “I’m not saying goodbye,” I said. “It’s not goodbye.”

He touched my face with his hand. “It’ll never be goodbye, Rachel. No matter what.” I watched as he walked back into the house. I couldn’t follow because I knew I’d burst into tears and beg him to stay.

Instead I raced up the stairs to lock myself away in the privacy of my bedroom. I knew that Drew would not disturb me as long as the booze held out, which gave me time to worry, and mourn, in peace.

For two years straight Alex had done nothing but warn me of the dangers in Mexico, and now he was willingly heading down there when conflict raged around the FEI holdings. Teton Tech had finally started to level out, but his quarter horse ranch was another matter entirely.

“
Quid pro quo
,” Troy De Havilland had said. Pablo Rojas had finally made progress legitimizing our company so we would offer a courtesy to establish his family stables, a partnership of sorts since the Fullertons were established horsemen. On paper it seemed straightforward enough, but every time I thought about any of it, a strong sense of foreboding tore at my gut.

My eyes were still rimmed red when Drew made it upstairs later that evening, concerned that I had turned away dinner because I had been too stressed out to eat. Instead I drank water and juice, with enough trusty crackers to keep my stomach from lurching right out of my throat.

He was equally in a state, but not for the same reason. “You need to eat,” he instructed as he brought a tray of food to the bed. “Our children don’t need to suffer just so you can pine over your lost love.”

I couldn’t even look at him. I turned away and pulled the covers up to my shoulders, only to have them ripped away.

“Did you hear what I said?” he thundered.

My glare bore right through him as I sat up. “Maybe you can eat while your brother marches off towards a dangerous, volatile situation, but I can’t. Call it weak if you want, I don’t care.”

“I don’t call it weak,” he replied as he grabbed the tray. “I call it stupid.” He placed the tray of food across my thighs. “He wants to show that he’s committed to FEI, and what better way than to use his own unique talents and strengths to do it?”

I glared at him, saying nothing. He continued.

“Tell me, Rachel. Are you really mad about Mexico? Or are you pissed you no longer have Alex wound tightly around your little finger?” He smirked humorlessly. “He’s not just romancing some blonde on the patio, you know. Funny how his aversion to Mexico quickly abated the minute there was a hot Latina goddess to join him on his travels. A beautiful woman that he himself hired, right after you broke his heart.” My eyes widened as I processed this new information. “That’s right. She was never pawn, darling. She was his.”

I gulped hard. What was he implying? What did it mean?

He had no problem at all telling me precisely what it meant. “They’ve gotten quite close. But I never realized how close until I saw the travel itinerary. One room,” he added in a lethal whisper. “Indefinite stay.”

My stomach dropped, but I refused to let Drew see that.
“I’m sure your good buddy, Troy, will be so happy to hear it.”

Drew leaned down with both hands on either side of the tray. “He was.” I grit my teeth as he went on. “Unlike you and Alex, Troy knows what needs to be done. This is business, not some fucking movie of the week.”

I cocked my head to one side. “Now who’s being stupid?”

Rage boiled in those crystal blue eyes. “What did you say to me?”

“You know how dangerous that situation surrounding Teton Tech is. This isn’t something we’re just conjuring up because we’re bored. People have died, Drew. Do you really want your brother to be one of them?”

“There are two things wrong with your theory. One, Pablo Rojas has cleaned house in Teton Tech, virtually removing any violent, criminal element, making it safer than a dozen other foreign companies I own. Two, my brother is as slippery as a greased pig. Nothing grabs onto him because he’s gone at the first hint of trouble. You should know that,” he added. “Face it. Alex is good at playing the martyr, but he’s nothing more
than a sniveling little weasel, scrounging around for scraps.”

My hand flew across his face before I could stop it. With a growl he grabbed the tray and threw it all onto the floor with a resounding crash, before pinning me to the bed.

“So this is where your loyalty lies?” he snarled. “You marry me, you fuck me, you take my money and live in my house. But just like that whore, Elise, you would still choose his side over mine.”