Clayton (Bourbon & Blood Book 2) (12 page)

“What’s going to happen to Samuel? Be honest with me here.”

I sigh and stop filling out the form for a second. “He’s not going to prison. It’s a nice pipe dream, but you and I both know that won’t happen.”

“He broke in! He drugged me! He tried to kill me! He was planning to kill you and John!”

“But he’s Samuel Darcy… and he has friends that will cover for him, that will call in favors. At the most, he’s going to get a slap on the wrist in county jail. This will not be prosecuted to the fullest, Annalee… but he’s still leaving here. Whatever it takes.”

She’s finished filling out her paperwork, so she takes the clipboard from me and starts filling out mine. She’s the queen of multi-tasking. “I don’t like it. I hate that he’s getting away with it.”

“He’s not the only one who can call in favors… I can make his life hell here. And socially, after this, he’s screwed. Most of his circle will drop him like a hot rock. It’s not going to be hard to convince him to go.”

“Promise me… I want him gone. If Emma Grace had been home—.”

“Don’t!” I can’t think about it. I won’t. If I do, I’ll go find him and finish what I started. “I’m not letting anything happen to her. And I’m not letting anything else happen to you.”

The ER door opens and a nurse appears. She calls Annalee back first and I sit there, waiting impatiently. I don’t like that I can’t lay eyes on her right now. Samuel is somewhere in the hospital, I know. I put nothing past the son of a bitch.

After a few minutes, the nurse calls for me. I walk toward her and she smirks. “So much for living on the hill… The Darcys have gone redneck.”

I’m not in the mood. “Your brother works at the distillery… and your husband is trying to get a job there. Think you’re helping out either of them right now?”

She clams up then, but her expression remains sour. I tolerate the temperature check, the invasive questions, and the blood pressure cuff that is way tighter than necessary. When she leads me back to the ER she puts me in the cubicle next to Annalee’s, not because she’s being nice but because there’s not other option. Samuel is on one side of the nurse’s station and we’re in the only two cubes on the other.

He’s under guard. There are two sheriff’s deputies standing outside the curtained off area.

“I should have driven us to Lexington.”

She looks over at me. “No. He’s not running us off… not from here, not from anywhere. Besides, I’ve had a shitty day and I’m not dealing with that traffic.”

I just want to be home. In my actual home… with my wife, with my daughter and without it looking like an earthquake zone. The doctor walks in and I just keep holding onto that thought.

T
hey finally discharged
us both and I feel like we’ve been there for hours. I glance up at the clock as we’re making out way outside and I realize we have actually been there for hours. Three of them, to be precise.

I look at Clayton over my shoulder. He looks exhausted and I know I don’t look much better. “This day has been endless.”

“Let’s just go home. I want a shower… preferably with you and then I want to sleep for about twelve hours,” he replies.

Heaven couldn’t be better than that sounds. “No funny business in the shower. Neither one of us is allowed to get our stitches wet or do that much lifting.”

“I’m probably too tired anyway,” he says, and opens the car door for me. He kisses me and while it was intended to be a quick kiss, it doesn’t stay that way. His lips move over mine and his tongue glides over the curve of my bottom lip. Resisting that is impossible. By the time he pulls back, we’re both breathless and I can feel the heat pooling between my thighs. With nothing but a kiss, he makes me crazy.

“So much for sleeping,” he says. “I’ve missed you. Every goddamn day, I’ve missed you.”

“Just get me home and take me to bed. You can prove it.”

The drive home is fast. Mia is sitting in the living room and Emma Grace is long since passed out in her bed. Mia looks from Clayton to me and then just shakes her head. “You both look like the walking dead.”

I smile even though I don’t really want to. I really want to yell at her to get the hell on out so he can rip my clothes off. Instead, I say, “We both kind of feel like it too.”

Mia gets up off the couch and grabs her purse. “I can take a hint. I’ll see you at Emma Grace’s recital.”

When she’s gone, the door locked behind her, Clayton is on me instantly. His mouth is on my neck, his hands are stripping my clothes off.

“Emma Grace is upstairs,” I protest.

“The office,” he whispers. “The door locks.”

It’s also ten feet away. I move quickly and he’s right behind me. The door closes softly and the clicking of the lock is impossibly loud. I’m already stripping.

I’m exhausted beyond belief. The events of the day have left me raw, like an exposed nerve. All the emotions are running hot and close to the surface, but I need this. I need him. To forget. To feel. To just escape into something blissful for a few minutes.

He’s behind me, and I can feel his naked chest at my back as he guides me forward until I can lean over on the desk. His hands are on my back, stroking down over the curve of my hips, then cupping my ass. He pulls me up until I’m on my toes, my legs spread just a little. His hand slides between my thighs. I’m so wet for him already. I don’t need any foreplay. Just him. Sinking into me. Filling me up.

“I need you,” I whisper and the sound is so broken I can barely recognize my voice.

“Tell me what you need, baby,” he says softly and slips two fingers inside me. I arch my hips back against him, wanting more.

“Just fuck me… please. Don’t make me wait. Don’t make me beg.”

I hear his zipper and then I feel him pressing against me, the velvety soft head brushing against my thighs. I press my forehead against the cool desk top and part my thighs just a bit wider. His breath hisses out, the sound so loud in the room. Then he’s pushing into me, sinking in slowly.

I can feel every inch of him and I can’t hold back the moan or the shiver. His fingers are gripping my hips tightly, digging into my flesh. He begins to move, withdrawing in long, slow strokes only to plunge in again, more forcefully, deeper. My whole body tenses in anticipation of that thrust, of the power and the heat of him.

One of his skilled and oh-so wicked hands moves from my hip, sliding over my belly, then lower until he’s lightly strumming my clit in time with each thrust. I’ve got a death grip on the edge of the desk now and I can’t hold back the shattered moans as he plays my body like an instrument.

My legs are trembling, the muscles of my thighs quivering as he strokes into me again and again. Everything inside me is coiled tight, the tension building to that razor edge between pleasure and pain. When his other hand moves up to my hair, gripping it tightly and pulling my head back, it simply snaps, the climax pulsing through me in time to the beat of my heart.

Clayton’s movements become faster, rougher, and then he stiffens against, his hand clenching my hair even tighter. The flood of warmth as he comes inside me only heightens the tiny aftershocks of my own release, making me shiver beneath him.

When he leans forward and presses a kiss between my shoulder blades, I can’t help but smile. There’s always a contradiction in him, equal parts demanding and tender, gentle but with a firm touch. He is simply everything I have ever needed and more.

“We need a bed,” he whispers. “Before we both fall over.”

“You started it,” I point out. He’s moved away from me and I immediately miss the warmth of him as I’m gathering my discarded clothes.

“You’re kind of irresistible… and we’ve got some lost time to make up for,” he says softly.

We do, but for now, all I want is to go to sleep with his arms wrapped around me. I want to wake up with his leg draped over pinning me to the bed while I desperately try to figure out how to mange going to pee and not waking him up. It’s funny the things you miss. The smell of his cologne, the fact that my side of the bed looked like a tornado had come through while his was barely disturbed, his often smart-ass remarks—all of those things have been missing from my life for a year, and now I get them back. It’s overwhelming and I’m alternately grateful and terrified. I don’t want to need him again, I don’t want to be afraid of losing him again, but it’s there, an incessant whisper in the back of my mind.

“Stop thinking,” he says.

“Easy for you to say. I’m worried,” I admit.

He’s adjusted his clothes and looks moderately put together. I look like I’ve just been bent over a desk. “I’m worried—.” It’s a hard thing to confess, to put into words. “Worried this won’t work. That somehow we’re going to end up right back where we started… you’ll be keeping secrets and I’ll be jealous and insecure, wondering if it’s another woman, or worse, and you just don’t care anymore.”

He pulls me into his arms, holding onto me tightly. I resent how right it feels. Yes, he’s moving back in. Yes, the divorce has been called to a screaming halt. But we’re not who we were a year ago, two years ago. This thing is still between us, a wall of solid ice over the parts of us that hurt the most. The only thing that will melt it is time, but if I can’t get a handle on my fear and if I can’t stop looking for all the ways it won’t work, that’s a chance we’ll never get.

“Let’s go to bed,” I whisper. “I just can’t think anymore tonight.”

“It’s going to be okay,” he says softly.

“How do you know that?”

“Because I’ll do whatever it takes to make it okay.” His tone is firm despite the gentleness of his voice. It’s so typical of him, but it makes me hopeful and I need that.

T
here isn’t
much to pack at the condo. The furniture is all second hand from either our basement or from Mama’s. It’s all so old and broken down it’s not worth renting a truck to move it. I’ve dumped most of my clothes in suitcases. Annalee will probably find fault with how they’re packed, and she probably should. But I don’t care. I just want to be home. I want to officially be back in my own home and have this shithole in my rearview mirror.

The knock at the door is a surprise. I wasn’t expecting anyone. To see John standing there, I know something is up. “What’s he done?” I ask immediately.

“He wants to make a deal,” John replies evenly. “And my expert opinion is that you ought to go along with it.”

“Did you miss the part where he tried to murder my wife?” I ask. I know he’s not going to prison for it. I know that somehow he will get out of it, but it pisses me off.

“He’s never going to trial, Clayton. We both know that. The DA is married to the daughter of Samuel’s golfing partner, who also happens to be the judge who would preside over this case.” I can tell John is pissed. He only ever gets all lawyerly and chatty when he’s mad as hell. “That’s assuming we could get a grand jury to even indict him in a county where everyone is terrified, in debt, or otherwise beholden to your damn father in some way.”

“So that’s it?” I demand. “We’re not even going to try? This would ruin him forever, John. Completely!”

John shoves his hand into his hair. “At what cost? You, your wife, your kid… you still have to live in this town. Is it better to ruin him and have everyone at your kid’s school know about it or to let him go quietly and preserve some dignity?”

It’s true and I know it, but I don’t like it. Still, Annalee and Emma Grace have to come first. “What does he want?”

“To talk to you,” John replies. “They took him from the hospital to the jail this morning, but he won’t be there for long. They’ve already called the judge to get bail set for him.”

“It’s Saturday morning!”

“Like it or not, people owe your daddy, Clayton, and they will move heaven and earth for him.”

I throw the rest of the clothes in the last suitcase and carry it out to the car. John’s waiting for me there. I’m not stupid enough to talk to Samuel alone. That would bite me in the ass for sure.

The drive to the jail is short. I’m not saying anything and neither is he. I’m pissed off all over again. The idea of setting eyes on him reignited the fury from the day before.

“Do not lose it in here! For someone who spent his whole life being the calm one, you’ve lost your damn mind!” John cautions.

It’s true. I was the calm one, but the last year has changed all that. We head into the jail and go through the ridiculous process of getting screened to visit the prisoner. After it’s done, we’re shown to a small room with a table and a few chairs that are clearly held over from the ̓70’s.

Samuel’s face is busted all to hell. His nose is broken, both eyes black and his lip is split. It’s more satisfying than I thought it would be to see him that way.

“You wanted to talk. Talk.” I’m not going to spend my whole damn day listening to his demands when I have no desire to meet any of them.

“I want the million dollars you promised… In writing, in a binding contract. If you’ll do that, when they let me out of here, I’m gone,” he offers.

“That deal is off the table,” I insist. “You lost your bargaining power when you tried to kill my wife.”

“I could always try again,” Samuel says softly. “You work an awful lot, Clayton. You leave that poor woman alone too much.”

I want to murder him, to ram my fucking fist into his face so hard that he’ll never get up again. “If you ever go near her again—.”

“Let’s not be hasty,” John butts in. “Don’t say anything in here that you might regret later.”

“I won’t regret it.”

“As you lawyer,” he insists, “I can promise you that you will. When do you want the money?”

“As soon as the trust comes through,” Samuel says. “And whatever is in the account right now is all mine.”

There’s nothing in that account. The last of his expenses came through and wiped it out. “You’re sure we can’t get this to stick?” I ask.

John shakes his head. “A million dollars is a small price to pay if it means being rid of him forever.”

I know he’s right. The good ol’ boy system is still alive and well in Kentucky. It doesn’t matter how open and shut the evidence in a case is, if it’s never permitted to go to trial. If it came down to it, those crooked bastards would just keep issuing continuances until the son of a bitch kicks the bucket.

“I agree to the terms, but I have a few of my own. If,” I am staring him dead in the eye as I say it, “you ever step foot back in the state or attempt contact with any member of our family, the contract is void. Not only is it void, but I will take you to civil court for all that you’ve done. The criminal court judge and the DA might be in your pocket, but I’ve got friends of my own that you can’t touch.”

Samuel grins, the expression grotesque on his swollen and bruised lips. “You’ll never admit it, but you’re just like me, Clayton.”

It’s not entirely true, but there are enough similarities that I’m not going to argue the point. It’d be an exercise in futility anyway.

“Get the papers drawn up, John. I’ll sign them and then I don’t ever want to set eyes on this fucker again.”

I walk out of the small room and it feels like I can breathe again. I’ve always hated him, even when I was a kid. I can remember seeing Mama cry, again and again …over the infidelity, over his cruelty. Emotional abuse wasn’t something I could conceptualize then, but as an adult, I know that’s what he did to her. It’s what he did to all of us.

John walks out just a minute behind me. “You know that’s all bullshit, right?”

“What?”

“You’re not like him, Clayton,” John says. “You might bend the rules, you might even break them… but you didn’t do it because you felt they just didn’t apply to you. You did it because that was the only way to bring him down. The problem we have right now is that not a damn one of us recognized just how bat-shit crazy he really is.”

“Let’s hope it’s not genetic.” The joke falls flat. But having just agreed to give him a million dollars of the money that is supposed to be used to take care of Mama, neither one of us is in a mood for humor.

“You need to get Quentin and Mia to agree to this,” he say. “I don’t think they’ll balk when they know why. But still, based on the guardianship agreement he signed yesterday, it has to be all three of you or it’s a no go.”

“I’ll see Mia tonight… I’ll talk to Quentin tomorrow. It’ll be taken care of by Monday.”

John nods. “In the meantime, don’t leave Annalee alone. I wouldn’t put it past him to try something again.”

After that, I drop John back at the condo where his car is parked and head home. Annalee is waiting with Emma Grace to go to her dance recital. I promised her I wouldn’t miss it for the world and I meant every word.

“You don’t look happy,” Annalee says.

Total honesty is a bitch. I glance in the rearview mirror. Emma Grace has her little pink iPod out and her earphones in. “We’re going to have to pay Samuel to leave town… Otherwise, he just hangs around like a bad smell and we’ll never be rid of him.”

“Out of Patricia’s trust?” she asks.

“Yes. That’s pretty much all we have unless Quentin comes through with an investor. He might… It could be a big turning point for all of us financially.”

She nods, and then she simply lays her hand over top of mine. I turn mine palm up and twine my fingers through hers.

“I trust you. You’ll do what’s best for all of us… You always do, even if I don’t approve of your methods.”

“No more secrets. No more lies… In the meantime, I’m stuck to you like glue.”

She grins. “I like the sound of that.”

It feels like it used to, for just a moment, at least. “We’re really okay, aren’t we?”

“We’re getting there,” she says. “It’s not a straight line back to the top, Clayton. There’s going to be fits and starts. There will be days when I’m still mad, days when I question everything you say and everything you don’t.”

“I love you… and if that means tolerating abuse from you on occasi—.”

She pulls her hand from mine and glares at me. “Abuse? Really?”

I snatch her hand back. “I’ll do penance later,” I promise.

“We’re supposed to have dinner at your mama’s with Mia and Bennett tomorrow. Quentin’s coming… and Mia told me she’s bringing someone you’ll want to meet.”

“Who?” I ask.

“Your half-brother,” Annalee says softly.

I knew. Not his name or his location or his age, but I knew he existed. “When did she meet him?”

“This morning… He’s from Ireland. Your dad definitely got around. And apparently he and Loralei Crawford are a thing.”

“He came all the way to Kentucky and hooked up with his half-sister’s best friend?” I ask. It sounds fishy.

“Don’t borrow trouble,” she warns. “You don’t know anything about him yet… And stranger things have happened. You met me dancing around a burning couch and told me on our first date you were going to marry me.”

“What’s so strange about that?” I ask.

“I didn’t run away screaming.”

I glance back at Emma Grace who is singing blissfully out of tune in the back seat. “You can try that later. I promise to catch you.”

“I love you,” she says. “Even when I was mad as hell at you, I loved you. And I don’t ever want to be without you again.”

“You won’t. That’s another promise I’m going to keep.”