Brave Enough (16 page)

Tag

“Is she okay?” my mother asks when my foot hits the bottom step.

“I don't know.”

Mom's brow furrows into a frown. “Do you think she knows?”

“No, there's no way she could. I think her asshole of a father said something to upset her.” I run my fingers through my hair, getting angrier. “I just wish I could do something about it.”

I feel protective of my wife. Men like William O'Neal don't deserve the love of women like Weatherly. He doesn't deserve to be able to hurt her, to be able to affect her the way he does. He shouldn't be allowed to dictate her life, to manipulate her the way he does. And yet he does. As wrong as it feels that he gets some part of her heart, he does. He has it. And he obviously doesn't give a damn how he treats it. Seething, I grit my teeth. I could happily
wrap my hands around his throat and throttle the shit out of him for whatever he said to upset her.

But then that would be hypocritical. I'm hurting her, too. Maybe even worse than he is. She may not know it yet, but
I
do.
I
know I'm keeping things from her, things that would possibly change the way she feels about me. Even though I'm doing it for the right reasons, it still churns like acid in my gut that I have to. This is not who I am. I don't hurt people and not give a damn about it later. Even the women I've been with, I've always treated with respect. That's who I am. That's who I was raised to be. That's who I
want
to be. The type of man who deserves the love of a woman like Weatherly, not the kind who breaks her heart and then walks away with some of the pieces stuck to his shoe.

Small, cool hands grip my forearm, jarring me from my thoughts, and I look down into my mother's worried eyes. “She's in love with you, son. You take care with her. She trusts you and you're . . . you're . . .” Her eyes well with tears.

“Mom, I'm not going to hurt her. I will make this right.”

“You're lying to her. You're already hurting her. You just don't know it.”

“She'll understand when it's all said and done. She's not a cold woman. She'll understand. And then she'll forgive me once she realizes why I've done the things I've done.”

“That's a big gamble. If you break her heart, you might not ever get it back.”

It's my turn to frown. Although my insides clench at the thought that she might hate me when this is over with, however
small the possibility, I still think Weatherly will understand when I tell her everything. She'll understand why I had to keep some things to myself until just the right time.

But hearing my mom tell me that I might not ever get my wife's heart back gives me pause. I haven't had it nearly long enough. I'm not ready to give her up yet. Maybe ever. But the problem is, I've come this far,
too far
. How can I make it right without going back in time and being honest with her from the start?

That's the rub. I don't think there
is
a way. I think I've come too far to turn back now.

“But it's already done. How the hell am I supposed to change it
now
?”

Immediately, I feel guilty for snapping at Mom. She doesn't deserve that. She's just trying to help. Hurting
her
was never part of my plan either. Everything I've done, I've done for her. So she'll never have to leave her home, so she'll never have to worry about medical care. Whatever happens to me in my life, with all the crazy turns it's taken, she'll be okay. Even if I lose everything, she'll be taken care of for the rest of her days.

“You could tell her. Before it's too late.”

I bite my tongue, agitation and frustration welling up inside me. I was going to tell her that morning on the balcony, but other things got in the way, other things like her little moans and the hot, wet feel of her body gripping mine. After that, I just didn't think about it again. Weatherly and her delectable body are very distracting.

But they're not distracting me now. Damn it. And I get the
sinking feeling that my window has closed. But maybe I should try anyway.

“Let me get a few things in order, then I will. I'll tell her.”

“I just hope she understands. Trust and honesty are so important in a marriage. I just wish—”

Guilt and the fear of losing Weatherly forever is making me feel defensive, like I need to explain to my own mother that I'm not the monster here. I still feel like the bad guy. At least Weatherly was honest with me. I can hardly say the same.

“Ours wasn't a regular kind of marriage, Mom. You can't forget that she originally agreed to this out of convenience, too. She's not the clueless, innocent here. We
both
did what we had to do,” I defend vehemently.

“But you knew her reasons. You didn't give her that same courtesy.”

“I couldn't. And you know why.”

“You
could've.
You could've trusted her. But you didn't.”

“I couldn't risk you, Mom. You know that.” I feel like my mistakes are crowding in on me, a jury ready to convict. An executioner ready to cut Weatherly out of my life.

“I begged you not to do this.”

“Well, I did. I did what I thought was best and I suppose I'll have to deal with the consequences, too. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go to town. If Weatherly comes down, tell her I'll be back before dinner.”

And with that, I walk off. I leave my mother behind. I leave Weatherly behind. But I take all my messed up feelings over this
with me so I can sort through them and figure out how the hell to turn this around.

—

The warm August sun is low on the horizon when I pull back into the drive. I fully expect to smell food when I walk in, as Mom called a couple of hours ago and said she wanted to fix us a special dinner tonight. To celebrate.

But I smell no dinner. I hear no voices. It's just quiet. Oddly quiet.

I walk through the first floor, looking for signs of life. I find none. The kitchen is dark except for the single light that shines over the island. I take the stairs two at a time and find that our bedroom door is still closed. I knock softly, but get no response, so I knock again.

“Weatherly? Are you all right?”

Still no response, so I open the door and peek inside. I can see the outline of her on the bed. It doesn't look like she's moved since I left. Alarm streaks through me. I push the door the rest of the way open and walk quietly to her side.

“Weatherly?” I whisper.

I can see the side of her face now. Her eyes are open and she's staring at the wall, at nothing. I can see the dying, orangey light revealing to me what she won't. It shines on the wet tracks streaking down her cheeks. It sparkles in the damp spikes of her lashes. She's been crying. Again. Recently.

Gently, I slide my hands under her shoulders and knees and lift her into my arms. I cradle her against my chest as I turn to sit on the bed. She's limp, but stiff, too, in a way. She keeps her arms
down at her sides, doesn't attempt to put them around my neck or touch me in any way.

My stomach feels heavy. Something is very, very wrong.

“Talk to me, baby,” I say against her hair. The endearment just slips out, but it feels right.
She
feels right. In my arms, in my life.

She makes no move to speak, just stares straight ahead. I brush a silky curl away from her throat, but she still won't look at me.

“Weatherly, you're scaring me,” I tell her. And I mean it. This isn't like her. What the hell happened?

I feel as much as hear her sigh. She swells and then shrinks in my arms. “Just let me sleep tonight. I'll be better tomorrow.”

I don't know how much to push if she doesn't want to talk about it, so I stand and turn again, putting her right back where I found her. I bend to kiss her cheek and then she rolls away from me, goes back to staring at nothing.

Weatherly

I wake to the feel of Tag's weight bearing down on the mattress and, a few seconds later, his arm sliding around me to drop over my waist. His body heat almost burns me from behind. My body wants to move toward it, to sink into it, but my brain keeps me perfectly still. It's the same war that I've been fighting for hours now. My brain and my heart can't agree on anything. And my body . . . well, it's just a damned unruly traitor.

I don't move a muscle until I feel the steady puff of Tag's breath against my neck grow deep and even. Only then do I relax enough to fall back to sleep.

—

In my dreams, lips that feel like heaven are kissing my neck. I arch my back and press my hips into the rigidity prodding me
from behind. A breathy sigh tickles the hair by my ear and the hardness presses back. Heat pours into my belly, saturating the place where my thighs are squeezed together.

A warm hand glides over my hip and pulls my nightgown up to my waist. A rough palm settles on my stomach and inches its way down. Down, down, down to the ache that never seems to abate.

Long fingers cup the inside of my thigh and lift my leg, setting it on a firm, slightly hairy one. The cool night air hits the damp material of my panties and I groan softly. The hand shifts and I feel the
snap
of elastic breaking. Silk parts, leaving me open to the insistent fingers that find my core. I gasp at the first contact. A gentle exploration of my folds proves that I'm wet, more than ready for whatever my dream lover has in mind. A naughty explicative is growled into my ear and then the hand disappears. There is movement behind me and then something broad presses into my entrance. I tilt my hips back toward it, craving fulfillment on an unconscious level.

I feel hands again, teasing and taunting, pinching my nipples as the smooth head rocks between my legs. I whimper, desperate to know the pressure of it inside me, filling me up.

The palm skates down my stomach again, finding my clit and rolling it gently between skilled fingertips. I reach back and dig my fingernails into a firm, muscular butt cheek, pulling it toward me, begging for more. And I get it. All at once, he dips down just enough and then pushes up and into me, stealing my breath.

Teeth and tongue are at my ear, fingers and palm are at my mound, heat and strength are at my back. And the voice, the voice I'll never forget is ringing out into the dark. “Jesus Christ, you feel so good!”

And that's what brings me awake. Fully awake. To Tag touching me, making love to me, thrilling me. From dream to reality, Tag owns my body. It seems that's a fight I'm destined to lose.

So I give up fighting. I place my hand over his and I urge him on me, his fingers playing, his palm massaging, all the while his long, thick cock is sliding in and out, in and out.

When my breath starts coming in erratic bursts, Tag picks up his pace, pushing me relentlessly toward a release that I'm losing control over. I bite down on my lip and I push it back. I fight it with everything that I have, somehow reasoning that if I can keep from letting go, I might stand a chance of surviving Tag Barton.

But he's not satisfied with that. As if sensing that I'm holding back, Tag pulls out and sits up in bed. He looks down at me, his gaze eating me up before he even touches me again. I squeeze my eyes shut, unable to resist if I can see his gorgeous face and his gleaming eyes. I see the want there. I see the passion that's only for me, but it's all a lie. A lie that hammers ten-inch spikes into my heart. So I block him out the only way that I can.

Tag gently rolls me fully onto my back and parts my legs. He runs his hands from my knees to my groin and follows them with his lips. They continue up my body, stopping only to pay homage to my navel and my nipples before I feel them at my throat. Still, I don't look at him. I can't.

He goes still after he settles between my legs. I feel him throbbing at my entrance. I feel my entrance lapping at his crown, begging him to come inside.

“Look at me, Weatherly,” he orders softly.

I squeeze my eyes shut tighter.

He shifts on top of me, rubbing the head of his cock between my folds, a move specifically designed to drive me mad. I grit my teeth and pray for strength.

“Please look at me. I want to see your eyes,” he pleads, dragging his lips over my chin and my jaw, to my ear. “Please.”

There's something earnest in that one word. It sounds different. It
feels
different, different even from the first one in the sentence. It seems . . . desperate. Maybe that's why, against my better judgment, I open my eyes.

I'm held the moment I meet his gaze. His gray eyes are deep, shadowy pools of mercury that suck me in and steal my will, destroy my resistance. With our gazes locked, he slides slowly into me, a sweet promise made without words. His eyes never leave me, penetrating me deeper than his body. All the way to my soul. “I think I'm falling in love with you, my fair Weatherly.”

I gasp, his words so close to the ones I've waited and longed to hear from him. They melt into my blood as orgasm spreads through my body, his confession an accelerant to the fire in my belly. Like a blazing heat, it starts at the place where we're joined and radiates outward, suffusing my every cell, warming my every muscle.

I groan at the feeling, unlike anything I've ever experienced. Rather than violent and explosive, as it normally is, this is deep and steady. Reverent almost. It pulses gently through me with a ceaselessness that rocks me to my very core.

Tag doesn't take his eyes off me. Not when his breath hitches, not when his body jerks, not when his muscles quiver. We savor every second, every subtle nuance together, locked. Joined.

And when the heat starts to wane, when the ecstasy begins to
abate, Tag leans forward to brush his lips across my cheek, capturing the single tear that escaped from the corner of my eye.

—

When I wake again, Tag is gone. I feel him as if he were still here, though. My body remembers every touch. My heart remembers every word. If only I could believe either.

I think I'm falling in love with you, my fair Weatherly.

God, how I wanted to hear those words a day ago, a week ago! But now? I can't help wondering if somehow he knew how much I wanted to hear those words and he's using them against me, another manipulative tool designed to get something from me.

My eyes burn with unshed tears as I'm overcome with that feeling of loss again. I grieve what was. Or what
I thought
was. I grieve what will never be. I mean, where could we possibly go from here? He married me to get Chiara. To my soul, that feels like he married me to steal from me.

Searing pain pulses through my chest. The truth hurts so much. But I have to push back the pain. I almost blew it yesterday. I can't let him know that I know, which means that today I have to act more normal. Starting now.

I shower and dress and make my way to the kitchen. It's empty, but there is a basket of warm muffins, covered with a towel and a note from Tag.
Enjoy, beautiful. I'll be back before lunch. T.

I bite into a moist blueberry muffin and pour myself a cup of coffee from the still-warm pot. I don't taste either. I might as well be eating cardboard and drinking wet air. I glance at the clock on the wall. It's just after eight, nowhere near lunch. I perk up as my brain
starts to form an idea. A plan. Maybe during his absence, I can find something to use
against him
, or something to help us. To help
me
.

After I brush crumbs off my shirt and rinse out my mug, I sneak back up the stairs to the room that Tag moved into the day that I arrived here. When he was forced to move out of mine. I can't be certain that he'd even keep anything incriminating here, but if by chance he
did
, I intend to find it.

Only not in the bedroom. I find some clothes, some personal hygiene things that have not yet made it into “our room” and a few other uninteresting odds and ends. Nothing important or telling. Or helpful.

As I make my way back down to the first floor, I rack my brain for other places he might've left things. I can't believe that there wouldn't be
anything
of a business nature here. Not one scrap of paper, not one note. A laptop or computer. There
has to be
something somewhere. I just have to find it.

I meander through the house, hoping I'll be inspired, but I'm not. I head outside and into the grass, following the curve of the yard around to the back of the house. I see the caretaker's quarters with its open front door, although I don't see Stella. She might be resting. Tag kept on the housekeeping services, just to a lighter degree, while we were gone. I imagine he might keep them on full time so that Stella doesn't have to work in her condition.

As I eye her little place, I wonder if he'd have kept important things there. I can't imagine why, though, since he wasn't actually staying there with her.

Then I remember the cabin. The one that's being renovated. The one that he was staying in intermittently before he took up
residence at the main house. The remodeling was confined to the bath and kitchen, with only painting to take place in the other areas of the small structure. Nothing that would necessitate Tag moving
all
his stuff out. Maybe he left some things there. In a desk, maybe, or a cabinet or a drawer. If he did, it'll be locked, no doubt. It would have to be, what with the way it was renting out to perfect strangers there for a while. But only important things are locked. And what I'm after would definitely be considered an important thing.

I turn and walk in that direction. According to Tag, the renovations came to a standstill because the old family friend who was acting as contractor was involved in a car accident. He had to postpone work for three months while he completed physical therapy after his knee surgery. I think that was only about two months ago, not long before I arrived, so the cabin should still be vacant. Private. Searchable.

I feel paranoid, like someone could but look at me and know that I'm up to no good. I glance guiltily left and right as I traverse the shaded path that leads to the cabin. I find no one watching me, but it does nothing to calm my nerves.

I breathe a sigh of relief when I reach the big oak that stands guard over the quaint little cabin. It has two small dormers and a rustic front porch that make it perfectly suited to the mountainous backdrop. The inside will be state of the art after the remodel is complete, but it will still retain all of its traditional vineyard charm.

The front door is unlocked, so I push my way in and close it behind me. It takes my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the dim light, but when I do, I can see what great work has been done thus far.
The kitchen has been outfitted with stainless steel appliances, tile backsplash and a skylight, and there are two slabs of granite resting on the island, as though someone stopped mid-project expecting to return the following day. Only no one did.

I take a minute to look around. It's been years since I've been inside this place.

My casual browsing comes to a screeching halt when I reach the bedroom. Beneath the plastic sheeting, the same kind that has been placed over all the furniture, I see a small desk pushed into a corner. The construction dust is hardly noticeable, which is in sharp contrast to the thick coating that covers every other piece. Someone has come to this desk recently. Or maybe often. They've peeled back the sheeting to look underneath. I just hope whatever drew them here is still present.

Carefully, I fold the sheeting onto itself, revealing the wooden desk with its four drawers and matching chair. A laptop rests, closed, on the surface, making me wish that I had more time. I'll need to have a better idea of where Tag is and when he left before I attempt to break into his computer. For now, I'll have to settle for going through the drawers.

There is a key lying at the edge of the laptop, in plain sight. Even though it's a long shot, I grab it and see if it fits the master lock for the desk.

And it does.

I pause, frowning. If he left it unlocked, or the key so easy to find, there can't be anything of import here. But then I reason to myself that since the cabin has been empty of both guests and
contractor for two months, maybe Tag just left it unlocked because he was the only person here.

Until me. And he probably never thought poor little rich girl, Weatherly, would ever catch on to his ruse.

Whether my logic is flawed or not, I know it won't hurt to at least look while I'm here. So that's what I do.

Going through the drawers, I flip through notebooks and papers, files and folders. There are all sorts of things about the running of Chiara, things any caretaker might track, but nothing suspicious. I find information about the passing of Joseph Barton, Tag's father. The death certificate, the obituary, some pictures of their family in the early years. Nothing that I need, though.

I'm about to give up when I see an envelope sticking out from underneath that stack of papers. It's simply labeled
Jameson Gregory Randolph III.

The hair on the back of my neck stands up when I read that name. Jameson Randolph is the owner of Randolph Consolidated, the company that has been staging a hostile takeover of my father's company. Why in the world would Tag be in possession of something that references him or belongs to him?

A week ago, I wouldn't even have considered going through Tag's things this way. A week ago, I had
no reason
not to trust him and
every reason
to give our marriage a real shot. But today isn't a week ago. Today everything is different. Today I don't have the luxury of trust. That's why, with trembling fingers, I turn over the envelope and reach inside for the contents.

There are two letters inside, one on plain, white copier paper, the other on thick, creamy stationery. I unfold the white one first.