I Am Yours (Heartbeat #3) (14 page)

“My little cousin went to get coffee and donuts? You have to be kidding.” I hear the amazement in Kelly’s voice as she strides into the apartment. “What if she gets lost?”

“That’s kind of the idea.” Adam leans into her, tickling her ear with his breath. “She’ll be gone for at least a half hour if you want to…I don’t know…do something.”

Earlier, Adam moved his Neon into a clearing in the woods, hiding it from view. If there’s one thing Kelly can’t resist, it’s a caffeine rush. Even while pregnant, she’s been devouring her one allotted cup of decaf every morning. The whole time we were in the Outer Banks she kept sending me on daily coffee runs, so my absence shouldn’t send up too many red flags.

“Adam, I’m shocked you’d even mention something like that.” She feigns astonishment, but it’s easy to see that she’s flattered by his proposal. “You’re such a naughty boy. You’re with Katie now. Isn’t one woman enough for you?”

I want nothing more than to barge out of the closet and deck her one, pregnant or not.

“Well…she has some issues, you know?” He’s being evasive, well aware that I’m listening.

“What kind of issues?” Leave it to Kelly to play dumb.

“Like…with intimacy and stuff.” I can see Adam blush from here. “She doesn’t want to do much and—”

“I get it. You’re about ready to explode, huh?” She grins up at him. “I can definitely help you out in that department. How much time do we have before she gets back?”

“About twenty-five minutes.” The clock is positioned on the wall next to the closet, and Adam’s eyes linger on the door to my hiding space. He’d better knock it off or he’s going to give me away.

“Perfect. We can do a lot in twenty-five minutes.” She takes his hand, guiding him toward the bedroom.

“Uh, how about out here on the couch?” He seems nervous now, and Kelly picks up on it, ticked that he doesn’t want to go all the way with her.

“I know I’m as big as a beached whale, but I can still…” He silences her by gliding his fingers over her breasts.

“I don’t think I can wait that long.” Adam’s nearly breathless as he pleads with her. I try to hold the phone steady, but the yearning in his voice hits me dead on.

“Oh, you’re that frustrated, are you?” She giggles, shoving him onto the couch. “We’ll start with you first then.” She kisses him deeply then stands back, taking him in.

“I can’t tell you how much it turns me on, knowing that my baby’s inside of you.” From any other guy, that would sound lame, but from Adam it’s as sexy as hell.

“Yeah…um…” Kelly pauses, her hands fumbling with the clasp on Adam’s belt. “Me too, babe.”

“I can’t tell you how much learning the truth has completely turned my life around.” He gasps as Kelly lowers the zipper on his jeans. “I wouldn’t have anything to hold on to if it weren’t for that. I was dying to get you up here so we could be together. It was killing me to have to wait a month before I could have you all to myself.”

“Aren’t you forgetting about Katie?” Her tone is firm as she tugs on his jeans, pulling them down.

“She won’t be an obstacle. Just send her back to her father. We’re not clicking at all. She was all I could think about for months, but now that she’s here, I realize she’s not the one I want. I want you.” As he props himself up on his elbows, his mouth finds Kelly’s. Without breaking the kiss, she straddles his lap, her pregnant belly bulging against his chest. His jeans are around his ankles and he’s sitting there in nothing but his boxers. She moves against him and he arches his back to meet her.

“Ohhhh…” she moans as she yanks her dress up over her knees. “You feel so good.”

“Tell me how much you want me, baby,” Adam groans, flexing his hips.

“You’re the only one I’ve ever wanted,” she cries, grabbing his shoulders. “There’s never been anyone else who makes me feel like this. Only you.”

“Not even my brother?” he asks as she throws her head back.

“I forgot about him…the moment…I saw…you,” she exclaims, rocking against him.

“There’s no one else?” he presses her while slipping a hand beneath her. “Not your boss or some guy back in Philly?”

“Fuck…there’s no one…only you,” she utters, panting heavily.

“Say my name,” he commands, knowing she’s on the verge.

“Adam…oh, Adam…” She loses it, collapsing onto his chest, completely spent.

“We got it,” he says, nodding in my direction while rolling out from under her.

“What are you talking about?” She blinks up at him, confused. “Got what?”

“You…on camera,” he states, pulling up his jeans.

“Oh, Adam, you made a sex tape of us?” She reclines against the cushions, sizing him up. “Now that’s hot.”

“No, Katie did.” He motions to the closet, and I step out, holding his phone.

“What the fuck, Adam?” But I’m the one she’s glaring at.

“I’m sorry you had to see that.” He looks at me apologetically, lowering his head.

“You only did what you had to do.” I try to play it off, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get the image of Kelly riding him out of my mind.

“Katie, give me that phone,” Kelly commands, her voice deadly.

“I don’t think so,” I spit back.

“Katie!” she barks threateningly.

“I think it’s something Dr. Savoy would enjoy watching, don’t you?” Adam bends down, getting right in her face.

“How did you…?” She can’t speak, practically choking on her words.

“Find out he is the father of your baby?” She winces as he shouts. “Let’s just say a little birdie told me.” Whipping around, he says to me, “Katie, hit send.”

“Katie, don’t!” She turns absolutely white, her body rigid with fear. Desperate to control the damage, she crawls toward Adam on her knees. “Please, Adam. He can’t know.”

“What? That you need me to get you off? That he’s not man enough for the job?” The harshness of his insults quickly reduces her to tears.

“Adam, I need him to support this baby. I can’t raise it on my own.” She grovels at his feet. “He lives in a big house in Cherry Hill. He can give me whatever I want. Please don’t screw this up for me. I have a good thing going here.”

“You disgust me, you know that?” He leers down at her. “It’s always about the money with you, isn’t it? You’ll do anything to get ahead, even carry the child of a monster like him.”

“What do you mean…a monster?” She blinks up at him, a dangerous gleam in her eyes.

“You know exactly what I mean, and if you don’t want him to see this video, you’re going to put an end to whatever the hell he’s doing to us.” Adam lowers himself to the floor, preventing Kelly from avoiding his gaze.

“Adam, he’s a genius. You don’t know what you’re talking about. He only wanted to help you.” She sounds so sincere that it’s hard to tell if she’s lying. “George is a good man, a pioneer in his field. He’s going to make a difference in so many lives.”

“Kelly, he experimented on us without our consent. Yeah, he sure sounds like an ethical human being,” I grumble behind her. “You let him use us like we were his puppets. How could you stand back and let that happen?”

“You don’t know him like I do,” Kelly says adamantly. “George has devoted his life to working with patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.”

“Then why all the secrecy?” Adam asks, determined to get an answer. “Why were we kept in the dark?”

“Because he needed a blind study. You couldn’t know what he was doing or the results would be skewed.” Kelly brings her hands to rest on her belly. “We were in a bit of a time crunch, and I needed to act fast. He asked me if I knew anybody who might fit the criteria and you were the first two who came to mind. It was completely innocent. I swear.”

“How much money is at stake?” Undeterred, Adam continues to prod.

“Potentially millions if George succeeds and no one beats him to the punch. The military is concerned with how the number of suicides has increased over the past few years. Medication doesn’t seem to be working and they’re desperate for a new approach.” Kelly wipes away a stray tear trickling down her cheek. “I didn’t think being a part of the study would do any harm. You were the perfect candidates, and I thought you’d see nothing but positive results.”

“Yeah, well, we didn’t,” I say glumly.

“Really, Katie?” she asks, placing her hand behind her back for support. “Are you still having problems with intimacy?”

“Kelly, back the fuck off.” Adam’s voice is murderous.

“No, I’m not afraid of her, Adam. Let her know what a farce this whole thing is.” I join them, sitting on the floor. “I was fine up until Brian’s big revelation on the beach. I guess the stress that caused threw everything out of whack.”

“And what about you, Adam?” Kelly’s attention shifts to him. “Do you still blame yourself for not saving that girl in the movie theater parking lot?”

“I’m still having nightmares about it, if that’s what you mean.” He glares at Kelly from under his sandy eyelashes.

“Really? That’s not supposed to be happening. I already told George to discontinue your treatment.” Kelly seems ruffled, like things aren’t turning out the way she thought they would. “I saw you that morning in the Outer Banks and it scared me. I called George after that and he promised to stop the trial. We’d already collected all the data we needed. When you met Katie, that was supposed to be the end of it.”

“It doesn’t seem like it. Adam had another nightmare yesterday.” I’m certainly not about to let Kelly off the hook that easily.

“And that’s why I’m here. I couldn’t believe it when you told me. I had to come and see for myself.” Kelly massages her temples, the tension getting to her.

“You have to make him stop, Kelly. This can’t go on any longer,” Adam declares forcefully.

“I’ll talk to him again,” Kelly says in a rush.

“Talk to him now.” I’m sick of her false promises. It’s about time she delivered on them.

“Uh, okay. Can you hand me my bag?” She points across the room, and I retrieve it for her. It’s super heavy, bulging with manila folders. Rooting through it, she pulls out her phone. Her gaze shifts between Adam and me. “Maybe I should do this in private?”

“Kelly, cut the crap and just call him already.” Adam sighs, raking his fingers through his hair.

“All right, fine,” she huffs, thumbing through her contact list. “He’s not going to like this, you know. He might get really mad and—”

“And what? Leave you? Fire you? Good, I hope he does.” I can’t help it. Hearing how she only cares about herself is pissing me off—big time.

“But where am I going to go, Katie?” she whines, holding off hitting the call button. “I’ll be right back at square one.”

“Maybe you should have thought of that before you did all this.” Adam lectures her without an ounce of sympathy. “You better ask him if there are any side effects for stopping this form of hypnosis. Because as soon as you hang up, we’re getting new phone numbers and cutting him out of our lives completely.”

“I don’t think that’s wise, Adam. George is a powerful man. He’s not going to let you just walk away, especially if he thinks you’re a promising candidate for his study. He has too much invested in you now.” Her voice trembles when she considers the possibilities looming in front of her. “It looks like he’s finished with Katie since she hasn’t been dreaming of you. His phone calls to her have probably stopped. But if he’s still contacting you…”

“I don’t get it. You said all he needed was for me to meet Katie and I did. So why cut one of us out of the study and not the other?” Adam’s eyes are blazing as he questions her.

“I don’t know, Adam. Really, I don’t.” She lowers the phone to her lap, putting off the inevitable.

“Did you do something more to Adam in the Outer Banks, Kelly?” The idea pops into my head, and I immediately put her on the spot. “I saw you come out of his room.”

“Jada was a complication we didn’t expect,” she mutters. “I didn’t know about her until Adam said he was bringing a plus one to the wedding. When I told George about her, he got pretty upset. He said she was a variable that could throw off his calculations. Adam couldn’t be in love with two people at the same time or we wouldn’t get an accurate reading for the study.”

“How was he monitoring us anyway?” Adam asks, perturbed.

“George would turn on the FaceTime applications on your phones to gauge your progress. He would plant ideas into your heads by voicing them through the speakers of your phones while you were asleep as a type of subliminal messaging system.” Kelly seems fatigued as she leans against the couch.

“Did he turn our webcams on during the day?” I rub my arms as a creepy vibe washes over me. What if he spied on me changing my clothes—or doing other things?

“Only periodically to see how well you were doing in your daily lives but not as frequently as his nighttime calls. That’s how we knew Jada was Adam’s new partner, but we had no clue that he was dating her,” Kelly continues, seemingly lost in thought.

“I wasn’t dating her,” Adam protests.

“But you wanted to?” I can’t help asking.

“I don’t know. Not really. I was too caught up in you to even think about anyone else,” he admits grudgingly.

“But that’s not exactly true, is it?” Kelly pipes in. “There must have been something there or George wouldn’t have asked me to conduct a hands-on session with you. It’s risky repeating the initial hypnosis after you’ve already been put under. I was surprised George had me do it to you again, but he was worried how Jada was affecting things. Resisting your feelings for her was causing a buildup of stress in you that he didn’t like.”

“So if Jada hadn’t entered the picture or Brian hadn’t spilled the beans, would Adam and I even be questioning our feelings for each other right now?” My cheeks burn when I feel Adam looking at me.

“Those two factors became pretty major obstacles when it came to your recovery, that much is certain.” She nods her head slightly, agreeing with my theories.

“You’re telling me we were supposed to fall in love? That was the cure?” Adam sounds absolutely flabbergasted. “You’ve got to be kidding me. All that just to brainwash us into developing feelings for each other?”

“Kelly, it’s pretty farfetched to think that Dr. Savoy could develop some kind of mental love potion.” I’m trying to get a handle on things, but I’m as floored as Adam. “Seems kind of naïve for someone so educated and respected in the field.”