True Vision (29 page)

Noah turned her to face him. “He seems like a pretty strong guy to me.”

She cupped his face, kissed him on the mouth. “I’m going to tell my mother about Rena now, okay? You might want to take a hike.”

“Are you sure it’s the right time?”

“Yep. Her guard might be down. Unlike you, I’m not too noble to take advantage.”

“Good luck.”

After he walked out of the waiting room, leaving only Charlie and her mother in the room with burnt orange accents, she sat down in the chair next to Elise’s. “Hi.”

Elise didn’t look up from the hands clasping and unclasping in her lap. “Charlotte.”

Charlie drew in a breath and looked at the side of her mother’s face. “Why do you call me that?”

“It’s your name.”

“I’m not Charlotte. I’m Charlie.”

“Fine. If it’ll make you happy, I’ll call you Charlie.”

Charlie laughed softly. “So all it took for you to want to make me happy was for Alex to be on her deathbed.”

Elise stiffened. “This is an inappropriate time to try to agitate me.”

Charlie nodded and chewed briefly on her bottom lip. “I know about Rena.”

Elise said nothing, but her hands stopped twisting. “Who?”

“Your sister, Mother. Your sister Rena. I know all about her, so there’s no point in denying it any longer.”

“You can’t know,” Elise said, her voice low and hoarse. “You can’t possibly know.”

“You’re not the only one who can see inside other people’s heads.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I suggest you shut your mouth before your father returns.”

“I’m not going to tell him, Mother. That’s your job.”

Elise pushed up out of the chair and paced away, her arms wrapped around her middle.

“And just for the record,” Charlie said, “I don’t think he’d hold it against you. He has plenty of other reasons to leave you, and he hasn’t.”

Elise stopped pacing and glared at her. “Your sister is in intensive care, hanging onto life by a thread, and all you can do is taunt me.”

“I’m not trying to hurt you or taunt you or make you miserable. I’m just trying to talk to you. Can’t we just talk?”

“Not about . . . that.”

“Why not? Why can’t we talk about the truth? What’s so horrible about it?”

“It’s evil,” she breathed. “It’s unnatural.”

“Evil? Who told you that?”

“No one had to tell me. I figured it out all by myself, and then I ran away and never looked back. I’m not like them. I never want to be like them again.”

Charlie stood and went to her mother. “Are there others? Do you have other sisters?”

Elise turned her back, dropped her head back and stared at the ceiling as though beseeching the heavens. “I vowed I would never talk about them. They’re not a part of me. Not anymore.”

“Rena is sick, Mother.”

Elise whirled to face her, horror widening her eyes. “What?”

“She has cancer.”

Elise slapped her—

Charlie dropped out of her mother’s shock and back into the moment with her ears ringing and her cheek stinging. The same old pain.

Her mother glared at her with fiery eyes. “Do
not
try to manipulate me like that ever again. Ever. Again. I will take your head off. Do you understand?”

Charlie curled her hands into fists at her sides. “I understand that you’ve wasted a lot of time denying who you are and what you are, and it’s made you a very unhappy, very angry woman. Now your sister is dying. You have an opportunity to return to her, to see her before she’s gone. What you do with that opportunity is up to you.” She took a step toward her mother, forcing her back for a change. “And if you
ever
hit me again, I will hit you back. Do
you
understand?”

Instead of responding, Elise turned on her heel and stalked out of the waiting room.

Charlie’s shoulders sagged, and she lowered herself to the closest chair. Could that have gone worse?

God, she missed Alex. And Sam. Where the hell was Sam?

Charlie had left her older sister a message with the latest cell phone Sam had sent her, preprogrammed like the older models before it with a masked phone number that went right to voice mail. While Sam never answered the phone, she always returned Charlie’s calls. Sometimes not for a few days, though. And their conversations were always short and to the point. “Nana died in her sleep. Just so you know.” No sisterly small talk here.

Charlie tried not to be annoyed with her sister’s mysterious absentee act, sometimes wondering if Sam had gone into witness protection without telling any of them. That’d be just like her. And would make sense, considering Sam hadn’t returned to Lake Avalon once since she’d fled, not for visits, not for holidays, not even for Nana’s funeral. Charlie wondered if she would have come for Alex’s funeral.

“You did the best you could.”

She raised her head to meet Noah’s eyes, surprised to see him standing before her. She struggled to focus on the moment. Oh, yes, she’d failed yet again to get her mother to act like a human being. “Were you listening?”

He nodded. “Just outside the door.” He gave her a tight smile. “Wanted to charge the room when she slapped you.”

“It’s good that you didn’t. I needed to handle that.”

“I know.”

She sighed. “I’m sorry I couldn’t do better. For Laurette.”

“Hey, you got her to stop denying the connection. That’s huge, isn’t it?”

She nodded. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

He took her hand and drew her to her feet. “If we’re going to kick some Royal Palm butt, we need to get going. But, first, there are a few things I’d like to do to you.”

CHAPTER
FORTY-EIGHT

W
e’re good and screwed now. Charlie Trudeau has probably already told the cops everything she knows about Louisa and what we’ve been up to.”

“Then why haven’t we been arrested?” he asked, his hand tightening on the phone. The thought of prison terrified him. Everyone knew what happened to young men in prison.

“I have no clue. Maybe with Louisa dead, they want to catch us in the act. They’re probably setting up a sting operation as we speak.”

“So we take a break, let it all blow over.”

She scoffed in his ear, her voice harsh. “You’re so young and stupid. It’s not going to blow over until they’ve nailed us. Especially with Charlie Trudeau on the story. You saw what she did to Dick’s. That was the point from the start.
Silence
Charlie Trudeau before Louisa’s body was discovered. If you’d dumped Louisa in the river instead of taking her home and trying to make it look like a fucking break-in, we’d have been fine. Fucking amateur.”

“Well, I’m sorry I let you down with the way I handled my first homicide. But I
am
a fucking amateur. I didn’t sign up for murder.”

“I don’t appreciate your tone.”

“You don’t appreciate my tone?” His temper slipped a dangerous notch. “Give me a fucking break! I’m so sick of your condescension. I gave you everything. Did everything you wanted. I became a killer—” He strained to turn down the flame of his rage. “You know what? Maybe I’ll go to the police myself and tell them all about you, about how you seduced me to get me to do your dirty work. How about that?”

Silence.

Oh, fuck, what had he just done?

When she finally responded, her voice was cold steel. “You were a willing participant.”

“I was putty in your hands,” he countered.

“Very hard, eager putty.”

Rage rushed to the top of his head. Murderous rage. She’d used him, turned sex into an act of manipulation and domination, and then she’d turned around and slept with that other guy, like what they had meant
nothing
.

She laughed in his ear, that low, sexy laugh that used to instantly get him hard. “You enjoyed yourself, and you’ve reaped the other benefits as well. You have exactly what you wanted. Cold, hard cash.”

What good was cold, hard cash when he was at the mercy of this psycho bitch? She’d used sex to turn him into a killer. Fucked him over in so many ways that the last time he’d even been able to get it up was when he’d had his hands wrapped around Charlie Trudeau’s throat.

“Are you there?” she purred. “Are you thinking about my mouth on your—”

He slammed the phone down.

CHAPTER
FORTY-NINE

N
oah had her pinned and desperate, her nails digging into his back while her inner muscles clamped around him, eager and primed for release.

“Please.”

The thunder of an approaching storm shook the house, as though backing her demand, but he held still, stronger and heavier, able to impose his will on her, if not out of bed, then in. Most definitely in.

She hooked her ankles over his lower back and tried to lift her hips, to get him to move, to finish. Inside, where she was deliciously tight and hot and wet, he felt her flex around his cock, trying to coax him to lose control. Jesus, he wanted to lose control, he was so close. But he enjoyed torturing her, enjoyed making her beg. Hearing his name on her lips in that guttural, frantic moan . . . it undid him.

Slowly, keeping her still with his greater weight, he bracketed the fine bones of her wrists with his long fingers and drew her hands above her head. He flattened them to the bed and sank his fingers between hers, reveling in the hitches in her breath, its uneven rasp in his ears.

“Please, Noah.”

More thunder as he closed his eyes, focused. Not yet, not yet. He wanted to live in this moment as long as possible. Charlie open under him. His flesh deep, deep inside her. Connected in the most basic way.

He’d never felt like this before. Never took his time like this. Sex had been about getting off, releasing tension, having a good time. Here, with Charlie, it was so much more than that.

He loved her. The thought of losing her . . .

He rested his forehead against hers, regulating his breathing, waiting for the perfect moment. Until he’d slowed down, stopped just before she peaked for the second time, their lovemaking had been fast and furious, as frenzied as the storm that grew outside. He’d felt desperation riding his heels, fear that this might be the last time. Once he told her . . . she might not want him anymore.

Oh, God, please. He’d shrivel up and die.

Lightning flashed, thunder boomed, Charlie moaned.

“Noah, God, you’re killing me here.”

Her voice was choked, beyond desperate. And he smiled, pleased that he could do that to her.

He moved, one slow, dragging withdrawal, until his cock popped free and cool air washed over his heat. She whimpered out a protest that slashed straight to his gut. Hold on, baby. Just hold on.

He couldn’t remember ever being this hard, this ready to explode. It took all his willpower to hold back. It helped not being inside her, surrounded by all that hot, wet friction.

He shifted his hands, trapping her wrists in one and moving the other down between their sweat-slicked bodies. She moved restlessly, tugging at her hands, groaning at her inability to escape. He held fast, knowing if he let her touch him, it’d be over. And he wasn’t done yet.

He grasped his cock and rubbed the tip against her center, knowing exactly where to focus his attention and gritting his teeth at the exquisite sensation. She pushed up with her hips, seeking more.

“In,” she gasped. “I want you inside me when I come.”

“Are you close?” he asked, and released a strained laugh, because he knew damn well how close she was.

She groaned and reared up to nip at his chin. “Now!”

He responded with a deep, grinding thrust, and as she started to come, he let himself go, fighting to focus, to watch her come while he came. He wanted to see what his orgasm did to her.

Every muscle in her body went taut under him. He released her hands, and she grabbed his hips as she convulsed, her head arching up off the pillow, the cords in her neck standing out in sharp relief. He thrust and thrust, going deeper, trying to drive himself as deep inside her as he could, and while her head tossed on the pillow and his name burst from her lips, he blasted off.

The world turned white, and he had to fight the need to throw his head back and shout her name, fight to keep his eyes open and on her face, on her expression. He rocked against her as the mind-shattering pleasure rocketed through him, braced above her, looking down and watching, anticipating. God, he couldn’t wait. It was going to be a sight to see.

He felt the briefest pause in her body, before what had just blown his mind blew hers.

Her mouth opened, but no sound came out as her dazed eyes locked on his. For a long moment, her every muscle went taut, her entire body frozen in his moment of blinding, stunning ecstasy. Her head fell back to the pillow, but the rest of her, the rest of her shuddered uncontrollably against him, and he felt her inner muscles tighten and clutch at him all over again, as though experiencing his orgasm had triggered another of hers.

Amazing, he thought, breathing hard, gasping for air. Unfuckingbelievably amazing.

And then her eyes rolled back in her head, and her whole body went limp.

Noah jerked in surprise, scrambled up onto his knees. “Charlie?”

She blinked up at him in the next instant. “Hey.”

He leaned over her, studying her dazed and dark eyes. “Did you, uh, did you just black out?”

Her smile grew, and she stretched languidly, groaning. “No. I got seriously light-headed, though.”

He sat back on his heels, his heart still trying to ram a hole through his rib cage.

She pushed herself up and leaned forward to kiss him. She tensed when their lips first touched, but then she sucked his bottom lip into her mouth, stroked it with her tongue before letting it go. When she drew back, she grinned at him, her eyes twinkling. “You think you’re wielding a lethal weapon, huh?”