Emily
Oliver has been away for the past few weeks. Well, all of us have been away for the last week. But he’s having difficulties. The public relations team are making it impossible for him to come back.
He’s been texting nonstop, and the things that come out of his fingers are even more tantalizing than when they come from his lips.
I can’t complain about his public relations team.
Knowing him as well as I do, I’m sure through the years they’ve had to squash and spin a lot of the things he’s done and said.
Oliver
What are you wearing?
Clothes.
Oliver
That’s not how this works Em.
Every morning, I put on clothes.
I know what he wants me to say, but it’s a game we’ve fallen into. I miss him so much. The Whitehall public relations team have him scheduled out for more royal appearances than he’s done in years. He’s given them until the Joneses’ party to use him.
Oliver
I can’t be bothered with clothes anymore. I’m too tired.
Let me see.
Oliver
Now you’ll play dirty talk with me. When you’re the one getting the reward. Well, I see how it is.
A picture arrives of Oliver in jeans and a T-shirt.
Those are clothes.
I text him back a picture of me. I’m wearing one of Callie’s couture numbers. Which reminds me.
Did your sister like the sweater?
Oliver
Yes, Sutton’s going to wear it to a hospital visit on Saturday. Tell Callie to be ready.
Will do. When are you going to be . . .
I type ‘home,’ then erase it and type ‘back’ before hitting send.
Oliver
I’ll be there Thursday. I wouldn’t miss the big day.
Oh, you don’t have to.
Oliver
I want to. I can’t wait to see you, Em. Not being with you is tearing me apart.
Miss you too.
I toss the phone onto the bed. I’ve been spending more time sequestered here. A firm knock echoes through the room.
“Dr. Moss is here to see you,” Esmeralda says through the closed door.
Oh joy.
“How are you?” Anders comes in as the doctor leaves with his black bag full of props.
“She and the baby are the picture of health,” he announces to no one.
But whatever. Keep up the charade, doc, and collect your check full of zeros.
I stare at his excited bald head. The man might be doing this for a sack full of gold, but he’s also placing himself in harm’s way so Thayer and I can take down James.
Does he even know what sort of danger he’s put himself in?
Not that I can talk to him about it. We just pretend, as he measures my stomach full of Esmeralda’s scones and rolls.
The woman can cook. I’m going to gain twenty to thirty pounds and not leave here with a baby.
I jump off the bed and grab a running shoe from next to the window, where the blinds are drawn shut. “Do you see another shoe?”
“What?” Anders stares at the single shoe in my hand.
“My shoe, have you seen the other one?” I search behind the screen, where my clothes from last night are on a chintz-covered footstool.
I could pick them up—I should pick them up—but I’ve seen how Thayer stares at my little piles of clutter.
They’re driving him slowly mad. Is it petty?
Yup. Does it bother me that the housekeeper will take care of them later?
Yes, but I’ve been slipping her extra cash for her son’s football team.
Apparently, there are a few boys who still don’t have kits, and the season is almost over.
I know I’m messy, and I’m trying to be as messy as reasonably believable.
I search the bathroom, where my toiletries and makeup are scattered over the counter.
No shoe behind the door or in Thayer’s walk-in closet, where his suits are in perfect order again.
“Found it!” Anders calls from the bedroom. He’s crawling out from under the bed when I come into the room. “It was all the way by the headboard. No idea how it could have gotten that far under the bed.”
“I do.” I smirk at Anders. “My fiancé’s playing a game of hide and seek.”
“I’ll talk to him.” Anders’s voice is low.
“Don’t bother. I’m the one who started this war,” I say as I lace my shoe up. “Let’s go. He’s probably left already.”
“Who?”
“The doctor. Let’s go.” I dart down the corridor and the long hall to the portico.
Holloway is closing the back door of the SUV. He taps the hood of the car twice.
“Wait, stop the car.”
Holloway steps up. “Woah, wait a minute.” He waves at the driver and turns back to me with confusion. The SUV pulls forward ten feet and stops.
I race up to the car. I want, no, need to have my faux doctor give me a prescription for exercise. Or sea air. I can just lie and say he told me to do it. It’s all a lie anyway, so what does it matter if he actually says it? “Never mind.” I wave the car off.
Holloway raises his eyebrows, but the car door opens. It’s not Dr. Moss but Thayer.
Crap, crap, crap.
He’s wearing a dark charcoal gray suit, his hair shorter than I noticed when I actually looked at him last. Which has been a day or two.
I’m asleep before he gets into bed, and he’s gone when I wake up.
Oh, I know he’s in bed with me at night.
His infuriatingly good scent wafts over me, causing me to clench my legs together and not think about the firm planes of his muscular body.
“Fiancée, is everything okay? I spoke to the doctor.”
“Did you? Good. He told me I need fresh air. And exercise.” I plant my hands on my hips. “Everything is good.”
“That’s what he told me too.” There’s a flick of something in Thayer’s eyes. A dare.
“He told me I should get some sun.”
“He mentioned that to me too.” Thayer cocks his head.
“Good.” I cross my arms over my waist. I can feel Anders’s eyes on the back of my head, and shifting gravel behind me says there’s a larger audience. “There’s not a lot of sun here.”
“No, there isn’t. I’ll arrange something to get you warmer.” He nods at me, pausing with his hand on the door handle.
I’m cringing on the inside, but this is exactly the sort of thing I need to do better at.
Someone behind me clears their throat, and it urges me forward. I meet Thayer halfway across the portico.
He bends down, his lips against my ear. “Pretend you like me, Emily,” he whispers.
“I’m going to kiss you now.” His hand palms the side of my face.
His thumb gently brushes over my lips. Intensity rolls off of him.
Intensity, with a light citrus scent. It’s a lot to deal with.
Either that or I’m horny as heck after not having sex for a couple of days.
His mouth brushes against mine, a graze at first. Lightly, his tongue presses against the seam of my lips, and I open.
It’s a moment before I’m on my tiptoes taking the kiss to the next level.
His arm presses against my back until we’re crushed together.
I’m lost in his touch. I know it’s fake. But the teenager inside me is squealing. I need to squash her before I have to do this again. I drop my heels to the gravel and break the kiss.
“I’m glad you’re well, fiancée. I’ll be in London tonight, like we discussed. Early morning meeting and all.” He drops a kiss on my hair, nods to the crowd behind me, and pivots away.
I’m frozen, my hand holding my arm at my side. He didn’t mention he wasn’t coming back tonight. Nor did he tell me he was leaving for London. I never know where he’s going to be or when.
I squeeze my legs together as I watch the SUV pull around the building.
The gray English day is heating up. I glance at the sky before I turn around.
There’s four of the security team there along with Anders and Ryder.
There’s a weird look on their faces, like I’ve gone mad. Ryder shakes it off first.
“We heard shouting, Ms. Emily,” Dakota the guard says. It’s taken me forever to get them to stop calling me by my last name. We’ve settled on Ms. Emily.
“Yes, sorry. I needed to say goodbye to Thayer. What shall we do without him for a whole day?” I say.
There’s a different visceral reaction on Thayer’s guards’ faces than Anders and Ryder have. The guards have an “Oh, no, what is she going to be up to now” look. While Anders’s and Ryder’s is more of an excited “fuck, what are we going to do now” look.
“I don’t know if you heard me talking to Thayer?” They shake their heads at my rhetorical question. “But the doctor has told me I need more exercise and sunshine. I’m going for a walk. So we don’t create too much of a stir, I’ll take Anders and Ryder. The rest of you, have a good day.”
They head back in, each of them turning as they walk down the long hallway to their bat cave or whatever is behind that door.
Holloway clears his throat, and I pivot. “Yes, Holloway? You have an opinion?”
“I do. But I’ll keep it to myself. I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
“That wasn’t a request.”
“Why?”
“To protect you from yourselves. Are you going now or later?”
I flick my eyes back to Ryder and Anders. “Now.”
The walk to town doesn’t take long. And the food at the pubs might not be as good as Esmeralda’s, but being out of the gilded cage makes it taste sweeter. Having convinced the server I’m no longer suffering from morning sickness is even better.
I lean across the table. “So what are we going to do tonight? When the cat’s away?” I wiggle my eyebrows at them.
Holloway sits across the pub at a table by himself. He scowls at me. I know there’s no way he can hear me, but it feels like he can. He’s paid to keep the tables around us empty.
“We need to keep it clear. This is even a bit risky,” Anders says, putting down his water glass. He’s not drinking.
I flash my eyes at Ryder to talk some sense into Anders.
Ryder’s pint glass clicks on the table. “I agree with the killjoy here. It’s not a good idea.”
“One or both of you come in for a few minutes in the morning. How can that be any different?”
“Holloway told the rest of the security team that we do a briefing about your schedule in the morning.”
“Well, I’d like to be briefed more.” I cock my head.
“Trust me, Em. I’d like to do nothing more than brief you all night long. But . . .”
“Fine, then. I have a stop I need to make after we’re done here.” I stand and cross the pub to Holloway. He followed us with a car in case of . . . well, in case of what I don’t know.
“What are we doing here?” Anders asks as Holloway parks in the lot outside the Dulwich Forest Football Club.
“Spending Thayer’s money.”
“Awesome. I’m in.” Anders opens the door, and we slide out of the SUV. There’s a little kid sitting on a bench outside the shabby building.
He smiles up at the trio of us coming in. “Waiting for my mum,” he says, though we didn’t ask.
“I’ll wait out here,” Holloway says, and he stands on the opposite side of the door.
“Don’t scare the kid.” Ryder points and laughs.
“What do you think the limit is on his black card?” I ask Anders.
“Isn’t the point of a black card that there isn’t one?” Anders replies.
I wiggle my eyebrows at Anders.
“Nice,” he says, laying his hand on the sway of my lower back. We follow the signs down a hallway of cracked linoleum tiles to the office.
“I’d like to see someone about making a donation,” I tell the lady behind the receptionist desk.