Legal Heirs - Box Set Edition: Books 5-8 (Surrendering Charlotte Chronicles) (31 page)

“He’s keeping an eye on Hadley for Atticus, all of a sudden Holden has taken a supreme interest in her love life,” Mia said, causing Vivi to lean over Holden’s shoulder to see if he was, in fact, smitten with Hadley.

Vivi had always been close to Atticus, he had been the one to coax her out of her melodramatic black hair, black clothes, black eye makeup, period when she moved to San Diego to live with her dad. They were both fifteen then, and he had convinced her that they were fated to be best friends since they had been born on the same day. It had taken almost a full year to drag her out of her doldrums, she hadn’t wanted to live full time under her dad’s pit-bull, watchful eye. She wanted to stay in Kansas with her zombie-out didn’t-give-a-shit about anything except getting high mother. When she was living with her mother Vivi could do as she damn well pleased. But her father had fought for her in court and won, and she moved in with him on the Bly estate, and Alexander Bly had insisted on paying her tuition to Country Day. She thought she would die the first day of school, watching the cream of society’s snob population arrive in their Lamborghinis and Bentleys, parading around in designer clothes comparing nose and boob jobs. They had all looked at her like she was a piece of trash that had soiled the pristine hallway, but Atticus had taken her by the hand and smiled down at her, and she was suddenly accepted and popular.

She and Atticus had become friends and eventually they slept together, she had even fallen in love with him for a while. But she was an intelligent girl, and it didn’t take long to figure out that although Atticus was a true-blue friend and as loyal as the day was long, he had absolutely zero interest in giving his heart or his body to only one woman. Later, she had fallen hard for Holden Bly, he reminded her of Atticus; their bodies were so much alike. They definitely had a lot to offer a girl, they were handsome beyond belief, and they both had huge dicks and knew how to use them. It was an added bonus that they were sincerely nice guys. Personality wise they were very different, Atticus had an ironclad career plan to be a fighter pilot, and he maintained steely control of his emotions where women were concerned, he was also wild and untamable. Holden was easy going and less driven to succeed, he fell in and out of love with the girls he slept with, and his father kept him under his thumb most of the time and that didn’t seem to bother him. Vivi was still in love with Holden, but other than being cordial, he hadn’t given her the time of day lately. He and Atticus both went to military colleges and they were straight arrows and at the top of their classes in school, but they were hell-raising heartbreakers otherwise. They didn’t mean to hurt the women they took to bed, and mainly they only slept with women older than they were. It had become something of a hard-and-fast rule with Atticus, girls were emotional and got attached too easily. So other than his brief fling with Vivi, he stayed away from women under twenty-one, and he urged Holden to do the same.

At the pool Hadley sipped from a drink the blonde boy offered her and his free hand snaked around and rested on her scantily clad ass. Holden was out of his chair so fast it clanked on the brick patio as it fell over.

“Don’t leave mad!” Mia called after Holden as he rushed down the steps taking them two at a time. In a flash the cabana boy was crumpled on the ground with blood gushing from his nose and Holden was leading Hadley away. “I think Holden’s in love,” she said, raising an eyebrow and smiling at the pained look on Vivi’s face.
Wow, an added bonus
, Mia thought, she could mess up Vivi’s plans to snag her brother as well as screw with Atticus and Hadley. If there was one thing that made Mia happy, it was to make those around her as miserable as she was.

“What do you think you’re doing? Let me go, you’re insane!” Hadley shouted as Holden dragged her through the Beach Club lobby and out into the parking lot. “Did you really have to go all Christian Bale on the poor guy? Dammit, wait a minute!”

Holden stopped when he reached his car, and held her nearly naked body, his hands pressed against her long, graceful back. He wanted to kiss her but he couldn’t stop looking at her beautiful eyes and intriguing mouth.
Fuck
, she was gorgeous and she occupied his every thought. How had he failed to be affected by her before, and why after surfing with her just twenty-four hours ago was he so lost in her? She felt different from any girl he’d ever touched or kissed, and he knew there would always be that difference, she was different, and now he was different because of her. He was not yet twenty and she had just turned eighteen, but he was certain, for better or worse, he was in love with the one girl he should never have looked at twice.

“Are you going to kiss me?” she asked, and she didn’t wait for him to answer. Her fingertips smoothed over his lips and then his cheeks before her hands tangled in his hair, pulling his mouth to hers.

“Hadley,” he said as their lips met and it was an agonized groan that she silenced with the heat of her kiss. “Let’s leave here, come with me now.”

“Where will we go, what will we do?” she whispered against his lips, she couldn’t make herself stop kissing him. There was a fire running through her, rampant and explosive that ensnared her brain, and softened her heart, and ignited her lust. She was falling in love with him, and that was a complication, but it didn’t matter at the moment. What mattered was that she was truly burning for him, burning in a way she’d only heard and read about, and had never truly believed was real. But here it was, heat, lust, need, primitive and carnal, and Holden Bly had started the fire.

“Anywhere, everything… nothing else matters,” he said, and somehow they tore themselves apart long enough to climb into his fast little convertible, and drive toward their destiny. 

*

“What’s the big secret?” Atticus asked. He and Beau West sat down at the table with Mia and Vivi and the server placed tall glasses of sweet iced tea in front of them. The girl blushed as her eyes devoured the two sexy young men, and she blushed harder when Atticus covered her hand with his when it lingered on his glass.

“Who are you scheming against, Mia?” Beau asked, and even though he knew she was an evil little witch, he was still in love with her. That she was beautiful was probably the only nice thing anyone could say about Mia, and she was beautiful, without question. Beau had fallen for her huge, doe-like, brown eyes and her long, silky, honey blonde hair the first year she had come to the beach in Pass Christian. She was seventeen then and already as much of a prima-donna ballbuster as her grandmother, Evangeline. Beau liked that about her, just as his dad had loved the same quality in his former wife. Maybe it was some sort of Freudian mother complex, he didn’t know, and he didn’t give a flying fuck. All he cared about was that Mia was one insanely hot, uninhibited piece of ass, and when they fucked he had the bite and claw marks, and cuts and bruises, to prove it. She never went anywhere without a pair of steel handcuffs and his wrists were permanently scarred from her cleverly sadistic use of them.

“Oh, wouldn’t you two just love to know?” Mia said, ‘accidentally’ spilling her iced tea down the front of her white tank-top so that her bare, rosy nipples were visible. Beau smiled at her little ploy, and Atticus looked away and asked a server to bring a towel. “You’re such a prude, Atticus, it’s not like you haven’t seen dozens, if not hundreds, of tits.”

“I’d prefer not to see my sister naked, thank you,” he said, still looking in the opposite direction as she covered herself with the towel.

She felt her face burning when he finally looked at her, and it made her furious that he could make her feel shame when no one else could. He was pissed off at her for the little stunt with the iced tea; that was obvious by the way his sapphire eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Except for those ‘see straight to your soul’ eyes and the raven-black hair, he was the image of her father. Except that Atticus was taller, they looked just alike, their expressions were alike, and they were both condescending as hell in their ‘let’s reform Mia’ attitudes. What she hated most about Atticus, the thing that was worse than his being her father’s favorite, and his legal heir, were the things he made her feel. She didn’t hate him at all, in fact, she loved him. That was the world’s greatest unsolvable problem, and it had turned her personality from mildly unpleasant to highly despicable; she fantasized about him all the time, and she loved him in a very unsisterly manner.

“I could really ruin your day right about now, if I wanted to, Atti. Shouldn’t you be keeping an eye on your
real
sister?” she said, pulling herself together.

“You are my real sister, and you’ve definitely brought your usual black cloud with you, Mia, so I’ll just leave now. Your games are boring and childish and, no pun intended, transparent,” Atticus signed the bill when the pretty, young server handed it to him, blushing again. “How late do you work?” he asked, as he smiled down at her, she was probably in her mid-twenties, the perfect age, he thought.

“I can leave now, I just gotta grab my purse Mr.?” she said, her voice full of barely restrained excitement.

“Atticus,” he said, taking her hand and brushing his lips across her palm as he towered over her. “I’ll wait while get your things.”

“God, Atticus, you’re such a fucking man-whore!” Mia said, motioning for Beau to follow her as she pushed her chair back and stormed away.

“Later,” Beau said, shrugging his shoulders as he smiled at Atticus. “Why don’t you join us, Vivi?”

“No thanks, I think maybe I’ll take my chances with Atti and his friend,” she said, and looked at Atticus with a playful question in her eyes.

“Works for me,” he said and laughed. “We might have to talk Miss Pass Christian Beach Club into it, but I’ll bet she’ll see it our way.” He pulled Vivi up from her chair and kissed her so deeply that she couldn’t remember why she had ever stopped loving him. When the pretty server returned she only hesitated for a moment before she succumbed to the impish gleam in Atticus’ spellbinding eyes.

Chapter Four

“Hey, where is everyone?” Charlie shouted, running through the wide center hall of the McCall House and out to the back terrace overlooking the beach. The screen door slammed as he came back in and stomped up the stairway to Hadley’s bedroom. Skyler was lying across the bed staring off into space and she smiled and sat up and hugged him. “Where’s Hads, where Atticus? I wanna surf now, will you go to the beach with Sky? We can find Atticus and go, Hadley’s not that good at surfing anyway.”

“Sure, I’ll go with you, Charlie. Atti’s probably at his other house, you know, the one Alex bought for him. You go put on your swim trunks and we’ll drive over there and get him, then we can all surf,” Skyler said, her thoughts had been on Atticus nonstop, and this was the perfect opportunity to be with him. She knew he had a thing about not sleeping with anyone younger than he was, but screw that, she decided. She was seventeen and she was legal, he could just put aside his stupid moral code and take her into his bed and his life.

She brushed her long, pale hair and put on lip gloss and mascara, then wiggled into a brand new bikini she’d been saving for a special occasion. Well, by God, this was that occasion, she was bound and determined to seduce Atticus by the end of the day. Charlie poked his head around the door and asked if she was ready, and she buttoned a couple of buttons on her tight white shirt, grabbed her sandals and they were out the door.

Charlie climbed in next to her in the dilapidated Jeep Wrangler. It served as the official vehicle for driving on the beach and getting from one estate to the next. They cut across acres of lawn, laughing and hoping the old man who took care of the yard work didn’t catch them. Skyler parked in front of the house, it was low and sprawling, built in the ‘raised cottage’ style, although it was a thoroughly impressive and oversized cottage, to be sure. Atti’s new Harley and his Mercedes SUV were parked off to one side on the gravel driveway, and her heart hammered in her chest as she imagined him kissing her and undressing her and…

“Hurry up, Sky, come on. What are you waiting for?” Charlie called out as he raced up the front steps to the porch and burst through the tall pine door without stopping to knock.

“Charlie, hey bud!” Skyler heard Atticus before she saw him, and she stood at the front door and watched him with his little brother. He wore only a tattered pair of loose jeans that hung low on his hips and yet again, her gaze rested on the sexy trail of hair from his naval that traveled downward. “Sky, thanks for bringing Charlie, come on in. I’ve got a couple of friends here, they’re upstairs asleep; I doubt we’ll see either of them, just sayin’. So we’re going to the beach? Great, let me grab my trunks and my board, there are soft drinks and snacks in the fridge, help yourselves. Stay away from the caffeine, Charlie, you know Mom will have a fit if you’re bouncing off the walls later,” he called down from his bedroom, and Charlie rolled his eyes and sucked down a Coke before anyone could stop him.

His bedroom
, Skyler felt her stomach flutter imagining him there, stepping out of his jeans and standing naked. She had known him all her life, she’d seen him in jeans and shorts and all manner of attire, never once had she seen evidence that he wore underwear. Never an elastic waistband showing, not a single crumpled pair of briefs or boxers when she and Hadley had raided his room looking for cigarettes or other forbidden treasures in years past. Atticus evidently was into going commando, probably because he was in and out of his jeans so often, he really did have an infamous reputation as a womanizer. Did she want to be part of that, Sky wondered, did she want to risk being the flavor of the month and quickly become old news? No, not at all. She wanted
him
, and not just his body. She wanted him to fall in love with her, and stay in love with her, and she suddenly realized that wasn’t going to happen just because she had decided to throw herself at him.