Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
SILAS
“He’s a sweet savage.”
N ow, I’m getting pissed.
Who the fuck did Eily invite to our island? And I swear to god, if he betrays my wife’s trust, I’ll chain a cinder block to his ankle and send him swimming. It won’t be the first time I’ve done it.
Ask Charlie.
“Okay.” Stacey lifts her palms. “Don’t freak out, but I don’t think this man has been here. At least, not yet. He flies to New York the first half of every week. He’s not back in Charleston until Thursdays.”
“How do you know?”
I’m interrogating now. I’m not fucking around when it comes to my island, my partners, my wife .
Stacey rolls her eyes like it’s painful to reveal this, but she’s loyal to our group. “He’s a lawyer, okay? Like, by day. He has a practice in Charleston and one in New York.”
“So, if he’s a lawyer, why don’t you know his name? It doesn’t make sense. ”
Redix is with me now. He’s sounding pissed, too.
“Oh, I can tell you his pseudo name,” Stacey answers. “It’s Michael Cummings.”
“Cummings?” I’m shocked. “Like from the law firm on Meeting Street? We’ve closed real estate deals with his firm. Hell, he handled the closing on this island. But, I never met him, only his partners.”
Cade jumps in. “No one’s met him. Or at least, only a few have. He’s an enigma. Few know his face, but all know not to fuck with Michael Cummings.”
“Can y’all just give me some points?” Eily laughs. “My villain is Cummings . I swear that pun just keeps on giving.”
I brush past it.
Usually, Eily makes me laugh. She is punny.
But this?
I don’t like it.
This is our island. This is our home. This is everyone I love, and I have a loaded Remington with an itchy muzzle and a pile of concrete blocks and chains if someone doesn’t tell me what the fuck is going on.
“So, who is he then? And if he hasn’t been here,” I press, “then who the hell has?”
Stacey sighs, “I can’t share his real identity. That’s where the NDAs come in. He rents the room on the third floor of Delta’s from me. He uses it for meetings.”
“Meetings with who?”
I knew it. I knew something, more like someone, was behind that black door.
“I’m not allowed to say,” Stacey answers. “But…” She shakes her head as if she’s torn between helping us and betraying him. “I can tell you no one’s getting hurt. Well, not good people. He’s meeting with them. He’s hiding another life. His lawyer gig is a cover. ”
“He’s using a sex store as a cover?” Daniel grumbles. “A cover for what ?”
Yep, even our gentlemanly Brit is fuming.
Sure, we love our women. We trust them. We support them. Hell, they’re usually in charge because they look so goddamn sexy being right all the time.
While me?
I feel too damn protective over Eily, over the future we dream about, to risk it for some Halloween fun that may backfire.
“He’s mafia.” Cade pops off.
Like it’s no big deal.
Like it’s what’s on the dinner menu.
Organized crime with Uzis.
Please pass the salt.
“Bullshit,” Redix scoffs. “There’s no mafia in Charleston. It’s too fucking hot and humid for gangsters.”
“Bless your heart.” Charlie’s amused. To the point of murder. “Call them mafia. Call them savages in seersucker suits. Whatever. But Michael Cummings is a front for organized crime.”
Eily muses. “Then what’s disorganized crime? Like messy criminals? They leave cookie crumbs at the crime scene?”
Okay. I gotta laugh at that. “Baby girl, get serious. You’ve invited a gangster to haunt us, and now, it ain’t even him sneaking up on our sex.”
“But don’t you see?” Eily’s eyes get big. “It is him. I found someone so organized that he’s fooled us. And his fake last name is Cummings, so I insist on points for that.”
Cade twists her lips. “It could be him.” She’s sold on the possibility. “Cummings could’ve made an exception and not flown to New York. Maybe he gets off on scaring us. ”
“Hang on.” My head is spinning. I went from organized mud wrestling to organized crime on my island. And it ain’t even noon. “So you’re saying that we know him? Well, his fake name and his law firm?” The women nod. “Then call him. Ask him if he’s been here this week.”
Flirty glances dart. Top teeth bite sexy lips. Four hot women scope each other, but no one will break their pact.
I swear. They’re the sisterhood of the traveling wet panties.
They won’t rat each other out.
So, I gotta play it.
Rarely, I do.
I save it for times like this. Times when being a man is necessary. Patriarchy has its privileges—lots of them.
“Eiiilllyyy.”
I level my stare at my wife, playing my HUSBAND card. My king card.
“Yes, Silas.”
She bats her lashes, holding the WIFE card. It’s the ace. It’s my heart in her hand.
“Have you called Cummings?” She snorts. That pun is her favorite. “I’m serious. Tell me. Did you call him, and what did he say?”
After four skipping steps, she wraps her arms around my neck. Craning her petal lips for my kiss. Giving me that bewitching look that convinces me to buy dildos for her in every color. Or to eat spinach because it’s good for my sperm.
I’d drink lava for her.
She knows.
But she’d never hurt me.
Now, drive me crazy? In the cutest damn way? Welcome to Eilyville. Yes, you’d want to live here, too .
“My sweet, sexy husband.” She pecks my lips. More like I can’t resist leaning down to kiss her even though I’m being played like a royal flush. “Have I told you today how much I love you?”
“ Eiillllyyy .”
“How you have the biggest cock ever?”
“ Eillllyyy .”
“How horses are jealous?”
“Do you want a spanking?”
She beams. “Yes, daddy.”
I raise a brow.
“Fine,” she sighs, “I have called Cummings,” then giggles again.
Dammit, she loves that word.
“And?”
“And…” She kisses my neck, gently biting it, too. It makes me squeeze her tighter, feeling the raging storm of passion and protection she has stirred inside me ever since I met her. “And you’re too sexy to get mad at me.” She grinds on me, raising my dick like an Eilyville flag.
“I won’t get mad if you tell me.” Caressing her hair, I say sweetly, “Now, goddammit.”
“And he didn’t answer.” She winces. “Not my text or call, and not Stacey’s.”
“He’s gone radio silent,” Cade adds.
But I don’t break my stare, lost in my wife’s jade eyes. I find my dreams here every time.
I really can’t get mad at her.
Under all the spritely fun and naughty antics, Eily has an old soul. She’s been through enough, and that’s what I love most about her. Despite what she’s survived, Eily chooses joy.
And she loves sharing it .
Lots of it.
All the goddamn time.
“So, it could be Cummings who’s been here?” I nuzzle my forehead to hers. I know she did this for our friends, for our Halloween party. She just got carried away. “He can just be a good mobster, scaring us for fun?”
“Yep!” Eily blurts. “So, don’t worry. I promise. He’s a sweet savage.”
“Or,” Redix taunts, “it’s not Cummings, and we really are haunted.”
“Like Charlie was last night. A haint possessed her.” Charlie whips her stare at Cade, who shrugs. “What? Was that a secret?”
Daniel’s tone drops. “Charlie, what does she mean you were possessed ?”
Whoops.
That took a hard right turn.
Is Daniel aroused or pissed? Tough call. His accent is so rich and seductive when he leaves voicemails … people save them for solo pleasure.
“I’m sorry,” Cade stresses, solely focused on Charlie. “I didn’t know it was a secret.”
“Charlie? Are you keeping a bloody secret? From me ?”
Yep. Daniel’s pissed.
Nothing’s lost in translation now.
“It’s not a secret,” Charlie sighs. “We were just having girl talk.”
“Yeah, we had Lip Love in the hot tub,” Eily adds. “We do it all the time. We talk about your dicks and how much we love them.” We’re silent. “I mean, we don’t use you for your dicks. We really love you too. All you guys.” She squirms. “Didn’t you know?”
I did .
I overhear Eily on the phone all the time. And I gotta admit … hearing how I have a “donkey dick” makes my day.
But Daniel gives that wolf look again, and it’s legit. He’s mad. It masks his pain, fearing Charlie is keeping secrets from him. Which she never would. I know her. She’d kill for him. Again.
“It was just us gossiping.” Cade jumps to Charlie’s rescue. “We always debrief after a good dicking down.”
“Yeah,” Eily rescues Charlie, too. “It’s like a five-star review of our fucks. Oh, we should start doing that! We should start journals. Oh, and scrapbooks, too. I can do some character drawings of us and…”
She trails off because Daniel locks his glare on Charlie.
“Which was it?” he fumes. “Was it girl talk, or were you possessed? Because I’ve never seen you like that. Is that not what you wanted from the men last night?”
Ah, that’s where this is coming from.
Daniel loves Charlie so damn much. It takes the greatest trust for a man to share his wife like that. To fulfill her fantasy. To give her what she wants, if it’s what she wants.
Because Daniel will kill a man who touches Charlie otherwise. Painfully. Like ripping limbs off, one at a time, before slowly spooning out his heart.
That’s why he’s mad. He feels responsible for her. He protects her.
But wait.
Does that mean he believes in haints, too?
Charlie wraps her arms around his waist, not caring he’s covered in mud. “I wanted everything last night,” she gently assures him, “and thank you for giving it to me.”
He accepts her tender kiss and then another, cupping her cheek, the one with a scar .
“And maybe it was so incredible, I felt possessed.” She caresses his muddy pecs. “That’s what I told them. That I felt spirits. That I had visions. That I saw and felt you all, but when I closed my eyes, I saw and felt people that weren’t here, too. Or more like … people who were here long ago. And one man in particular. Every time I came, I saw his face so clearly before he pulled his horned gold mask on.”
Eerily, cold slices up my spine, making my ears suddenly ring. My hair, tugged into a knot, tingles over my scalp.
My pulse skyrocketing…
All the nights I’ve spent on my boat, searching over the dark water here. All the evenings I’ve wandered through the marshy forest. All the moments I felt someone lurking. Calling. Making my head turn. Looking over my shoulder into the shadows, the palms rustling, the moss swaying.
But no one stood there.
I was sure.
Something lurked there.
That’s a haint.
It’s not a person. It’s not a ghost. It’s a spirit, a soul craving to live again. But it can’t, so it lives through you.
If you let it in.
I joke with Charlie, “So, it is your horny ancestor, Lois Ravenel, haunting us?”
It’s either that, or I let this scare the shit out of us.
Out of me.
On this island, I’ve felt it, too—a possession, a power, an urge to do something, and it’s not my will making me do it.
Months ago, when I was clearing the land for our tents, I found something hidden at the base of the live oak. It’s the largest tree on my island and must be at least four hundred years old.
And when I say found .
I mean … it found me.
It made me dig, brushing away dirt until it gleamed back at me.
A gold rabbit.
An antique ceramic figurine as big as my palm was smudged with dirt, but its flaking gold leaf paint still caught the light peeking through the oak branches above.
It wasn’t a cute bunny for Easter. It wasn’t an old child’s toy or a treasured family heirloom.
No, it looked…
I don’t know how to describe it except … occultist. Ritualistic. It was half sinister rabbit, half erect man.
The timing unnerved me.
It found me the day, just hours after Eily and I started to try to get pregnant. That morning was our first time without birth control when she was ovulating.
I didn’t know if it was a good sign or a bad omen, so I looked it up online.
Long before Easter bunnies and stuffed animals, pagans used rabbits as fertility signs. Rabbits and eggs—go figure. It’s like modern religion turned them into harmless, candy-sweet symbols, masking their hidden sexual meaning.
So I never told Eily.
She was too excited that day. She hoped we’d get pregnant right away, and I didn’t want to jinx it.
The next day, I buried the rabbit where I found it, returning it to its hallowed grave. Choosing joy, as Eily taught me, I hoped it would be a good omen.
It’s still there, hidden, beckoning at the base of the ancient oak on the edge of camp. I swear I can sense it. I swear it has a voice.
“Maybe you’re right,” Charlie answers me. “Maybe I was possessed by my pagan ancestor. I can’t explain it, but I sure felt something. Someone .”
Eily chuckles. “Yeah, you felt dicks galore, and it was heavenly.”
“So you don’t believe in haints?”
Redix grins at Eily. He loves teasing her.
“Oh, I do.” Eily lifts her chin. “But compared to living hot and hung humans, ghosts aren’t sexy. Haints aren’t hot.”
“Wanna bet?” Charlie cocks a grin. “Because that haint I saw last night when I closed my eyes was hot.”
Eily wrinkles her nose. “If that’s true, isn’t that like fucking your family?”
“More like your hot uncle, twenty times removed.” Stacey chimes in, gently slapping Charlie’s ass. “The French do like to keep it in the family.”
Charlie just smirks.
She won’t deny it. She won’t admit it.
But I’ve had enough.
Is some morally righteous mobster scaring us? Maybe. Is some salacious spirit spooking our sex? I don’t hate the idea as long as it doesn’t ruin the week. As long as Eily has fun.
I found that gold rabbit ten months ago, and I’ll believe in anything to get Eily pregnant.
For now?
I just want her to smile.
“Alright, y’all. Shut up about good mafia and ghostly monsters.” All look at me. I squeeze the nozzle, wetting T-shirts and screaming faces. “Time to mud wrestle.”