ROUGH RIDER (57 page)

“I’m not sure yet. But it may involve withdrawing everything from my account and starting all over someplace new. Would you be willing to do that with me, if it came down to it?”

I sat up a little, studying his face. “Are things that serious between us?”

Preston shrugged. “They could be. I don’t know. But that’s a last resort. In the meantime, I can simply say I’m not interested in being a larger part of Harvey Enterprises until his plans for the future include you, too. Maybe there’s still time for me to change things from the inside—hold his feet to the fire over this. I am his only heir, and the only one who knows enough about the family business to take it over once he’s out of the picture. Without me, the board would cut this company to shreds and dine on its carcass.”

“Do you think that’s enough leverage?” I asked him. “And what about my mom?”

“That’s up to you,” he told me, gliding his fingers up my ankles and calves. “What do you want to do about that?”

I pursed my lips in thought. On one hand, Preston’s father manipulating my mother for his own gains didn’t sit well with me. She was a terrible person, sure enough, but did she deserve to be used and lied to like that?

On the other hand, didn’t she sort of have this coming? I couldn’t say that out loud, of course, but my mother had been more awful than ever since she and Mr. Harvey had hooked up. It might serve as some kind of sick vindication to tell her the truth: that she was no more special to him than any other woman who would silently put up with his shit.

“I’m not sure,” I said at last. “If it were me, I know I’d want to know. But my mother isn’t me. In fact, she isn’t most people. I’m not sure she’s even human.” I sucked in a sharp breath as Preston fondled the very sensitive backs of my knees. “I can’t say with any certainty that she wouldn’t blame me for this, somehow, or that she might turn a blind eye and accuse me of lying to ruin her happily ever after. She might just write me off as jealous and tell your father to make your life hell until you got rid of me, or something.”

Preston smiled. “That’s not going to happen,” he told me as he slowly crawled into the tub.

“Preston!” I shrieked, watching his clothes stick to his body. His white button-down clung to his hard, muscular chest, revealing the tone of his skin beneath, and I laughed as he prowled toward me. “You’re getting soaked!”

“So are you,” he breathed against one of my nipples cresting the surface of the water. Then he bent his head down and took it between his teeth, gently laving it with his tongue as he nibbled and sucked and made me sigh.

“Oh, hell,” I muttered. “We’re getting ourselves into so much trouble…”

Preston didn’t seem to care about that. He only grasped my opposite breast with his hand, crushing it between his fingers as he drew his body up against mine and parted my legs with his hips.

“It’s worth it,” he assured me, inspiring chills up and down my spine. I slipped my arms around him, running my dripping fingers through his hair as he pressed his growing erection against my slit under the water. “Bend over the side, Maddy, while I turn on these jets.”

I blushed but did as I was told. After the day we’d had, I needed Preston inside of me. With just a gentle touch, he’d brought me to this place again, a place where no one and nothing mattered more than the man of my dreams claiming me. It didn’t matter that some silly piece of paper might complicate our lives. Stepbrother or not, I was going to do this.

He helped me up onto my knees and turned me around, my back against his chest as I gripped the high edge of the tub. I pressed my stomach against it, my heaving breasts hanging over the side as Preston spread me with his knee, my pussy positioned right against the place the jet would bubble up from.

I stuck out my ass and rubbed it against his swelling crotch, moaning as he continued to tantalize my nipples with his fingertips. Then he drew one hand away, reached over, and turned on the control for the jets, and I threw my head back in utter bliss as the one I was straddling pounded perfectly against my clit.

“Oh, God,” I moaned, squirming as it pummeled me.

The silken fabric of Preston’s slacks fell away as he pulled his cock free of them, pressing it against me from behind. He parted my folds, sliding his tip against my slippery opening while I writhed and shuddered on the jet teasing me into utter oblivion.

“You’re so perfect,” he whispered, nuzzling my hair before digging in deep. I cried out as he filled me, his thick shaft stretching my pussy wide as he grabbed onto my tits with both hands and pushed all the way up to his hilt. “I need you, Maddy. No matter what happens, say you’ll stay with me.”

I scrabbled for purchase on the slick edge of the tub as my stepbrother began to thrust in and out of me. Every movement of his hips splashed water onto the tile floor. I could feel waves of it surging up over my back, wetting my hair and crashing over me like Preston was the ocean itself, and I was being swept away by the tide.

I had never felt like this with any man before. And I knew, deep down in my heart, that I never would.

I let myself believe that this could work. I released the fear inside of me and took Preston in deep, finally giving him unfettered access into my soul, my precious core.

“Yes,” I hissed, throwing my head back against his shoulder as he grunted into my ear. “I’ll stay, Preston. I’ll always stay. I promise.”

“Nothing will tear us apart,” he groaned, laying feverish kisses upon my neck as he took me. Before I knew it my orgasm was upon me and I screamed, bucking against him, the water now flowing freely out of the tub as we both undulated in ecstasy. “I swear it, Maddy. I’ll take care of you, always.”

And then my stepbrother was spilling inside of me, filling me to the brim with his seed. I shuddered beneath him, feeling as though we’d made a pact, a bond that couldn’t be broken by anyone, not even our families.

Everything would work out. I was sure of it. We’d run away together, if we had to. Preston had promised me as much.

I turned and kissed his lips, no longer thinking of him as the man who would become my stepbrother, but rather the man who would make my deepest, wildest dreams come true.

Later, I would hate myself for being so damn blind.

D
espite
all the
money I had, all the privilege extended to me by mere virtue of my birthright, it was only now that for the first time in my life, I felt truly powerful.

I had long viewed my status as a billionaire as more of a curse than a blessing. Maybe in some other family it would have been different, but in the Harvey family, I lived in a gilded cage. People always thought that because of my money, I could do anything I wanted. They were sorely mistaken. I could only do what my father would allow. Hell, my mother had died alone as proof of that fact.

For years, I had cowered in his shadow. But now I was defiant. Now I felt like a man. And it was all thanks to Madison Hearst, my soon-to-be stepsister and the love of my life.

I gave her the next day off and invited my father to meet me at my office, where I would break the news to him that I wasn’t his good little soldier boy anymore. It had taken most my life for me to see him for what he really was, but now that I had, there was no turning back. This was do or die. Either my father would back off and let me run the company as I saw fit, or he’d threaten to ruin me and stalk out under the impression that I still gave a fuck. If the former happened, Maddy and I would have to keep our relationship secret, but that wasn’t impossible to do. If my father chose the latter, I’d take everything out of my bank account, dump my vested shares, and she and I would run away together. It really was that simple.

There wasn’t much for us here, anyway. Billions of dollars could give us a fresh start somewhere new. Hell, maybe we could go into business together, a joint venture where she kept me honest and I kept her realistic. Part of me was secretly hoping that was the way things would turn out. There was nothing I wanted more than to throw my father’s misery right back in his face just before I vanished into thin air.

I made myself a cup of coffee while I waited, imagining my gorgeous, half-naked stepsister lounging on my bed and getting a well-deserved break from all this insanity. Whatever happened next, I was rushing right back home to her. I couldn’t stand to be away from her for more than a few hours at a time. Waiting here without her was torture.

Thankfully, I heard the front doors open and close not long after.
Oh, thank God.
He was finally here.

I made a point not to bring him a mug of coffee as I strode out, smiling as I envisioned the pure rage on his face once he heard my decision. But that smile soon turned to a slack jaw and a frown as I saw who was standing in my foyer instead.

“Jane? What the hell?”

She grinned, tossing her long, auburn hair as she sauntered toward me in her leopard-print kitten heels. “Don’t you ever get tired of greeting me like that?” she asked me, clutching a manila folder in her hand. “A girl could get the idea that you’re not very fond of her.”

“I’m
not,
” I growled. I didn’t want to leave any room for her to get the impression that I was somehow pleased she was here. “I was expecting my father. Why are you here?”

“Because the senior Mr. Harvey doesn’t need to get his hands dirty,” she said, stopping mere inches from me. She was wearing a very expensive brand of perfume, but on her, it was putrid. “He knows how to delegate. Shall we do this in your office, Preston, or would you rather get into it right here?”

I hated the way she looked at me then. There was a hunger in her eyes, one that made my stomach turn. I snatched the folder out of her hand, knowing damn well that whatever she wanted was detailed in there.

“What the hell is this?” I asked her, flipping it open. “Is he trying to buy me out?”

I choked as I saw the reality of the situation. My eyes widened and a hot ember of rage took flame in my chest. This wasn’t a buyout offer at all.

I looked at Jane, trying not to shake as I asked her, “Where the
fuck
did you get this?”

“Oh, Preston,” she purred, walking around behind me. “It wasn’t that hard.” She stopped and slid her hands around my waist from behind, trailing her blood red nails down my stomach as she whispered, “Next time you’re fucking your stepsister, maybe don’t leave the balcony doors open.
Anyone
could just look in and see.”

“And take pictures,” I snapped, whirling on her so fast I almost knocked her down. This was how my father had known about me and Maddy. Jane the hell-bitch had delivered the photographic evidence right into his sleazy hands.

She regained her balance and smirked. “Don’t shoot the messenger, Preston. I just do what I’m told.”

“Oh, yes. I’m sure my father twisted your arm about this,” I sneered, tossing the folder and its contents into her face. “What does he think this is going to accomplish, huh? Does he think that I’ll come crawling back now, begging him not to ruin my future at Harvey Enterprises with these obscene photos? She’s not my stepsister yet, Jane. Nobody going to give a shit if my father—”

“—waits to release them until he and Madison’s mother are legally married?” Jane asked, batting her eyelashes in mock innocence at me. “If he cuts off all your money and then sends these photos to ever single potential employee Madison will ever interview with in her entire life? You
really
think no one will give a shit that Madison Hearst was fucking her stepbrother?”

I shook my head in disgust and disbelief. “He can’t possibly be serious.”

“Oh, he is,” Jane assured me, grinning from ear to ear. “In fact, he’s willing to throw you completely under the bus, if that’s what it takes. He’ll leak the photos to some tabloid somewhere and watch you go down in flames, if he has to. He might even come out the better for it, denouncing his only son’s perversions and rooting him out from the company.” She stepped on one of the pictures and slid it toward me with the toe of her high heel. “Check your bank accounts, Preston. I’m sure you’ll find that you really are between a rock and a hard place.”

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and quickly logged in to my personal accounts. Just as Jane said, every single one of them had been frozen. Two of them I couldn’t even log into at all, and the third had a red banner across the screen that said “pending the results of an investigation.”

“I have cash,” I told her. It wasn’t much, but it was still enough to get me and Maddy the fuck out of here. “Hundreds of thousands. I don’t need billions to start a new life without my father and you.”

“You mean the money you keep in the safe at home?” she asked me, and I felt my insides coil with dread. “Carla was sweet enough to fetch that for us. But don’t be too mad at her, Preston baby. She was very loyal—right up until the point where your father threatened her with deportation. Little Enrique would be so torn up if his mommy had to go back to Venezuela without him.”

I wanted to wring this bitch’s neck. I wanted to watch the life drain out of her eyes as I pressed and pressed until her throat collapsed. I wanted her to suffer through every moment leading to her death. And then I wanted to do the same to my bastard father.

“Think about Madison,” Jane said, snapping me out of my murderous rage. “Maybe you don’t care what people think. Maybe you’ll find a way to get by with that business degree of yours. But let’s face it—Madison will be fucked. She’ll never get a job anywhere ever again. And who knows? Maybe some day she’ll have a mysterious accident just like your mother did—”

“I swear to God, Jane,” I whispered, just barely holding back the fury inside of me. “Keep talking about Madison and my mother. Say one more word about either of them, and I’ll make sure
you
have an accident somewhere down the line. Maybe not now, maybe not even in a year, but it’ll happen. And it’ll be messy. It’ll hurt. You’ll suffer in ways you can’t even comprehend. Say something smart, Jane—I dare you. But if you know me at all, I’m betting you keep your fat, whore mouth shut.”

Jane’s lips parted, and I waited for her to say something stupid, anything at all that would give me a reason to carry out the sentence she so richly deserved. But then she shrugged, shouldering her Prada bag as she told me, “Just think it over, Preston. You can ruin both your lives, or you can both come away from this relatively unscathed. Maybe it’s a shit choice, as far as choices go, but at least he’s giving you one.”

“Go,” I said. It was the only word I could manage that wasn’t an expletive.

“You’re right,” she said. “I should. Mr. Harvey will be wanting an update.” She looked me up and down before adding, “We could have had it all, Preston. And maybe, if you play your cards right, we still can. I’ve always liked the thought of having a baby, you know? Stranger things have happened. Feel free to stare at my ass on my way out. Maybe you’ll be seeing a little more of it soon?”

I watched her walk away, fiddling with her cell phone as she stepped back through the doors to my office and out into the sunshine that seemed at odds with the anguish I was feeling now.

I spent the next ten minutes ripping everything apart. Everything I owned, everything I had built—I didn’t want it. All I wanted was
her.
And she was the one thing I could never have.

When my knuckles were raw and bloodied I sank to the floor in front of the stairway, my chest heaving as I fought for air between snarls and gasps. Everything was crumbling down around me, and the person I needed the most was the one whose heart I was going to have to break in just a matter of minutes.

Someone texted me. My hands shook as I reached across the floor and retrieved my phone from where it had struck the wall when I’d thrown it. Beyond the cracked screen, I read the last little message from Jane.

Carla went ahead and set up a few cameras on her way out. If you tell that sweet little stepsister of yours anything we talked about, your father will do all that he promised and more!

She was the most evil fucking bitch in the entire world. And I was the bastard who was going to do her bidding. What choice did I have? My father was going to ruin my life, and Jane had threatened to do something far darker than that. How did she know about my mother’s accident? What the hell was she trying to imply?

“
P
reston
—are you okay?”

Maddy looked up at me from the heap of sheets she’d made on my bed. Her brown hair was a tangled mess around her face and her green eyes flashed with concern as soon as she lifted her head and saw me. She was wearing an undershirt of mine and no panties. She looked more stunning than I’d ever seen her before.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of her as I committed her image to memory. This was how I wanted to remember her: her pretty face still bleary from sleep, completely unaware of what was about to come; that light dusting of freckles across her nose looking golden in the mid-morning light; her full, delicate lips chapped from where I’d roughly kissed them the night before.

“We need to talk, Maddy,” I said, willing my voice not to break.

She sat up on the bed and combed her hair with her fingers, trying to wrestle it into place as I looked down at her. Her gaze drifted to my knuckles. “Preston, you’re bleeding…”

“It’s over,” I said, trying to push the words out past the lump in my throat. I could feel everything inside of me screaming not to do this, to find some way to fuck Jane and my father over.

But there wasn’t a way that didn’t put Maddy directly in the line of fire. My father had connections, and with an almost laughably small amount of his fortune, he could make the rest of her life a living hell. I couldn’t do that to her. She didn’t deserve it. I couldn’t let her go down with the ship because of me.

“You quit?” she asked, a glimmer of hope flaring in her eyes. She smiled. “That’s… that’s great! I mean, we’ll have to figure a few things out now, but it’s what you wanted, right?”

I shook my head at her. She wasn’t getting it. I had to leave no doubt in her mind as to what would happen next. “No. I didn’t quit. It’s over.
We’re
over.”

Maddy stared at me for what seemed like an eternity. With every moment that passed, a new expression washed over her face. First there was dumb shock, then confusion, followed by a snort of denial, and then her lips quivered. That last one didn’t leave her, and I could see her emerald eyes filling with tears.