Requested Surrender (19 page)

Have you ever done the backside glide?

She pulled this sticky note off and was going to put it on the pile she gathered to answer later, when she stopped and did a double take. The backside…? Oh, he was funny. Hilarious, after she read the next one.

Well, have you?

And the next one.

Aren’t you going to answer?

And the next one.

Lacy I want you to answer.

Her eyes narrowed because she knew
he
knew the answer already. Otherwise he wouldn’t be stalking her with these fucking notes!

She went into the library, marched to the desk and ticked the yes on a lot of boxes, but when she got to the one about Greece she put an X in the no spot. Do you like dancing? Check. Then she got to the glide one and she stared at it. Beat her pen against the desk a couple of times and then directly on the paper itself. Wondering what she could answer. It wasn’t as simple as a yes or a no. Hm…

The light bulb went off and she smiled. Then she drew a third box and wrote:
Maybe
beside it. That’s the one she ticked. Then on the next three stalker ones she drew a third box and ticked it, writing underneath:
refer to “Backside glide” for response.

“You’re going to get an earful on this.” Knowing that to be true, she didn’t change her mind though. She simply left the notes on the desk where he’d asked her to, and tried to forget about them. Not hard to do as her thoughts kept returning to his dungeon. “Damn.”

She worked for an hour cleaning some of his albums until she couldn’t help but connect some dots. Stopping to eye the items on the desk besides the notes—namely the red satin bag and the lube—she scowled. Because once she added to those things the topic highlighted in his notes, she had the theme. Now she really wanted to go back to the one note and change the ‘maybe’ she’d ticked to a no.

“And he called poor Phil a sneaky bastard.”

Finished up in the library she had her lunch and lamented over how quiet the house was when David wasn’t in it. Not that he made a lot of noise, but his presence brought a certain amount of energy that left when he did. The place was just a stuffy old mansion with exquisite furniture when he was gone. When he was home, it was a play-park filled with all kinds of kinky possibilities.

That had a dungeon.

A room he trusted her to stay out of…

When that came to her she was stalking past his bedroom door and made her decision. She was going to stare down the bad for a change. Thumb her nose at it, as it were. David’s patience and faith in her gave her the courage to do what she’d never done before. Did she want to go in his dungeon? Absolutely. Would she? Absolutely not.

She went right to the bookcase and stared. The longer she stayed there the more at ease she became until she closed her eyes and heard David’s voice echoing in her mind.

You have to be patient.

Suddenly all the restlessness she’d felt this morning, and every drop of curiosity she’d had upon waking up, was gone. In its place was a profound peace. The kind she always experienced with David.

Damn, she missed him.

Giving herself a shake, she opened her eyes and took a deep breath. He’d said he’d be home tonight so she’d have to wait. Maybe her missing him would get her creative juices flowing. She still hadn’t come up with a design for the new painting he wanted.

She was thinking about that when she turned and caught sight of his closet. The door was open and all she could see were two neat rows of perfectly aligned suits on either side of it. In the middle separating them, were floor to ceiling drawers made out of mahogany. She walked around the bed and was going to close the door, but then she caught the scent of his cologne. The crisp one she loved.

Stepping inside she picked up the sleeve of the first suit jacket and breathed in deep. God it smelled good. She let go and then stood there marveling at how neat and precise his things were. Sectioned by color and length, she noted, as she brushed her hand over the hanging blazers as she walked the length of the closet. When she got to the end she let her hand slide over the smooth wood of the drawers before she went down the coats on the opposite side. These were tuxes, she decided as she headed for the door. Expensive ones too. The fabrics were so soft that she—

Thud!

“Fuck!” Lacy looked down at the wooden bars at her feet and her first thought was they were antique spreader bars. Probably why it took her a few seconds to see the canvas slats that connected them. This wasn’t kink paraphernalia. It was a luggage rack her hand had inadvertently caused to tip over. It must have been tucked behind the suits. Quickly she bent to pick it up and that’s when she saw the toppled over shoebox with scattered papers.

“Double fuck.” She fell to her knees and climbed under the hanging clothes to gather the pile, and then on closer inspection she gave a sigh of relief. The mess wasn’t as bad as she’d originally thought. Only a pile of envelopes. Hm. All unopened.

She stacked them in a neat pile and dragged the bottom of the box over to her. As she placed them inside she noticed two things. They were all addressed to David and they were all from the same woman. If the handwriting didn’t give that fact away, her fancy name label would have.

Elaina M. Burbaker.

Lacy reached for the top of the box and when she picked it up, she saw a lone piece of paper. Did it belong in the box? This could be a problem. She held the box top in one hand and plucked up the paper with the other, but before she could check it out she saw something else. It looked like a picture frame. It was upended and tipped back against the wall.

“How much fucking stuff was in the damn box?”

Putting the box top down she leaned on forearms and crawled under his suits to get it. She was stretched out on the floor of the closet with the letter in one hand and the frame in the other when she got a bad feeling about this. Turning the frame over, that horrible feeling intensified when she spied the image of David and a woman. It made her heart ache because they looked very happy. He had the woman bent over in a dip and was kissing her cheek while her laughing eyes looked into the camera. It was the loving look in the woman’s eyes that made her gut wrench. Yeah, best to get this back in the box that way she wouldn’t have to look at it.

She made one shimmy out to the right when she remembered the letter. Praying that it wasn’t one of Elaina’s as she unfolded. Maybe it was something else altogether…but it wasn’t. And the second she saw the script she started reading. 

To the only man I’ll ever love, David Hollan,

My name is Elaina Marie Brubaker and I’m a drug addict. I know you don’t want to hear that. I know you still don’t believe it, but it’s true. I’m not asking you to forgive me I’m only asking, begging, that you accept what I’m going tell you now. I screwed up. I wasn’t strong enough to deal with the pain of my past. Some people cope with their demons and some people self-medicate in order to survive. Unfortunately, I did both. It wasn’t fair of me to start a relationship with a man like you. A strong individual who loves deeply and selflessly. I knew I wasn’t perfect, but I made you believe I was…until I wasn’t. I saw your soul that night. The night you found out and it killed me a little but not enough because I came back and you let me in. I wish to God I’d had the strength never to return, but that’s the illness. You talk yourself into believing someone will save you. I thought you would save me. I know you believed you could too, but that’s not the way addiction works. The drugs were a better friend, a more intimate lover to me than you were. How sick is that? But then, you know the depths of how bad things were when I left you the second time. You thought I was going back to Hank. Back to that unhealthy and abusive relationship because that’s all I knew given my past, but it wasn’t Hank I was returning to. It was my best and truest friend. The drugs that obliterated my past, Hank and even the guilt I felt over what I’d done to you. When you were the only true and honest being I had in my life. Yes, I saw your soul that night and I know my selfish and thoughtless words made it bleed. I’m sorry for that and for every other unkind thing I did to you. You deserve better. Much better. And I’m so very thankful you turned me away that third time because I could never guarantee that I wouldn’t hurt you again.

My name is Elaina Marie Brubaker and I’ve been clean and sober for nine months, thirteen days and six hours.

Always yours,

Ella

Lacy folded the letter and scooted the rest of the way out from under his jackets. She wasn’t sure how these things were stacked, but she was going to go with the logical order. The envelopes in first, then the folded letter and then the framed picture on top. She slammed the box lid on and then stood to right the luggage rack. Once she had it repositioned in back against the wall she put the shoebox on it and stepped away. Watching as the suits she’d only thought to admire swung to and fro.

This was the bad because now she knew something David obviously didn’t want her to know. But now that she did she was torn. On the one hand she sympathized with the woman, but on the other she was outraged on David’s behalf. Truthfully, it was the beginning of that letter that bothered her most. “To the only man I’ll ever love.” It was a sad sentiment and reminded her so much of
Captivating Z
she started to panic. She needed to get out of there. Get some air. Think. She didn’t want to go to the studio. She needed space and distance.

Without a backward glance, she exited the closet and closed the door. She was in such a hurry to get out of the room she nearly ran into Andrew as he walked in.

She gasped.

“Ms. Pembrook?”

“Sorry, Andrew.” That’s all she said before she took off for the stairs. She couldn’t go to the studio now. Not until she got her head together and figured out why her heart was aching so bad.

You know why it’s aching. If David finds out you found that letter—worse, you read it— he’ll dump your sorry nosey ass!

One look at the sunshine drenching the staircase and she knew where she’d go. To the garden, only she didn’t want to go through the house and chance running into anyone else. In her current state she’d probably start crying and she never cried.

Only on your birthday…

She slammed the door on that thought as hard as she slammed the huge front door when she left the house. Gulping in fresh air as she raced to the gardens, willing the ache in her heart to go away. But it didn’t and she knew why. This wasn’t just about her fear of being caught. What had her more worried, as she paused by the rows of hawthorns to catch her breath, was why hadn’t David opened those letters?

***

David was pissed. Here he’d been thinking he was going to have a wonderful afternoon with Lacy, now that he and Phil had done their road trip and come to terms with one another, but he was wrong. He intended to head home early, only before he did, he’d texted Lacy and got no response. So he’d called Andrew who told him that Lacy wasn’t there. Hearing that he’d panicked. Honest to God, palm-sweating panic until Andrew called back five minutes later to say that Ms. Lacy had been out in the gardens.

David was so relieved. “Is she still outside?”

“Yes, sir, but there’s something else I think you should know.”

“Yes?”

 “I heard a noise upstairs in your suite right after lunch and when I went up to check on it, Ms. Pembrook was rushing out. She was very upset about something. I was going to mention it when you got home, but I thought you should know just in case…”

David didn’t need Andrew to finish that thought. Just in case she’d left to sit outside because of what she found in the dungeon she’d snuck into. He was mad, but his simmering anger had less to do with her going into that room when she was told not to, than it did with her not answering her texts or telling Andrew she was going out in the first place. Yeah, he knew another trigger had been pulled. One of his, but he’d have to forget about that and deal with her disobeying him.

“Thank you. I’ll be home within the hour.”

It was actually forty-five minutes later, after he’d learned Lacy was now inside, that he walked into the studio. He’d already rationalized his anger. This was about her disobeying, not about her leaving him. Or about how terrible he had felt when he thought she had. He put that down to his past and the baggage that never quite went away no matter how many times he’d tried to come to terms with it. The old nightmares regularly reoccurring affirmed that he still had work to do in that area. But for now he’d put it aside and focus in on his little trespasser.

“Lacy.” She looked up and when David saw her, he stopped. Her hair was a mess. There was grass on her blouse in spots and a smudge of black, probably charcoal from her drawings, on her cheek and yet, for all of that she was beautiful. So he had to steel himself against the desire to go easy on her.

“What’s the matter?” She slid off the stool and frowned. “Did something happen when you were away?”

“Yes.”

She took a step toward him and then halted. “Are you okay?”

“Fine.”

“Phil?”

“He’s fine, too. This isn’t about me and him. It’s about you.”

 “Oh?” She turned and scanned the art supplies that surrounded the easel, murmuring, “I’m still trying to come up with something to paint. Inspiration is a fickle thing.”

“And you saw nothing today that would inspire you?”

“N-no.” When she slowly turned around to face him again he inwardly sighed. She knew exactly why he was here. Hopefully she wouldn’t make him pull it out of her.

“What? Why are you looking at me like that?”

She shifted from one foot to the other. A guilty action if ever there was one.

Before she dug the hole she was in with him any deeper, he’d give her a head start in the opposite direction. “You did do something wrong while I was gone and I want you to own up to it.”