Chapter Fourteen
Scarlett
I wake up to the sound of Beckett's angry voice. Everything is a little sore after having sex with him, but it feels good. Sex is the only thing Beckett and I have. He may not like me as a person, but he definitely enjoys what we have together physically. And the same sentiment is true for me.
I realize, since I’ve been startled awake, that I need a glass of water, so I get up to fix myself something to drink. When I walk across the plush carpet to get water, I hear part of Beckett’s phone call next door.
“I know I can’t enter this conversation as evidence in a court of law, but I can use it for other things.
The World Wide Web is a very big place with lots of interesting places to plant evidence where needed.
So if I just heard you threaten my wife and child, I’ll make sure the www and more hear it too. ”
What the hell is he talking about? Who is threatening our lives? I know that Beckett is treacherous; he carries himself with the majestic air of a dangerous man. I don't think I would be at risk, though. I hate eavesdropping on him, but I also don't want to end up hurt. Or worse.
When Beckett comes out of his room I am standing in the corridor with my cup of water. “Is everything okay?” I ask as he passes.
“Fine.” He gives me a look like he knows I’ve been listening. “An old flame just read about us in a gossip rag online. She has no right to be angry, but I do. Why are you not in bed?”
“You were pretty loud and I needed water.”
“Never mind, just get in bed now, please, or I won’t have sex with you again until your T score is negative.”
“What?”
“Bone density. You’ll get used to being married to a doctor,” he dismisses as he walks away.
“I don’t know, it depends on how much I can learn in five years.” Saying it out loud feels sad, but I’d signed the papers. I’d agreed to it.
“I heard that,” he says from down the hallway, and then his footsteps return.
I am still standing there with my water. “Please don’t say anything shitty right now. I’m feeling kind of vulnerable and none of my people are here. I mean, Rayne is one of my people, but she can’t talk, or hug…”
He sighs and I think I might cry, then he walks over and with his big muscular arms pulls me into an embrace. “I’m your people,” he says gently, “and I can hug.”
For whatever reason—I blame hormones—this makes me cry. All he does is stroke my hair and help me into bed. As soon as I am securely in the spot where he wants me, he kisses my forehead and pulls the covers up.
“I’ll have Gloria give you something to help you sleep,” he says before he walks out.
That was it—a hug and barbiturates. Five seconds later Gloria comes in and administers the drugs I am reluctant to take because I am breastfeeding.
“Do you think it’s wise?”
“It’s a very low dose of Trazodone, love.
You’ll be fine.” And in a few minutes, I’ll be out like a light.
“Mr. Myers would never give you anything that would hurt you or his baby.” She sounds like she is scolding me, and I bristle at the term ‘his baby.’ She is our baby, but I take the drugs, ready to sleep.
I am luckier than most newborn mothers. I have a night nurse who comes and checks on my baby and me, and we have Gloria during the day.
On the weekends there is another nurse, all from the various hospitals where Beckett works.
All of them seem like they want to impress him, but when they meet me and see Rayne, they usually back down a little.
I don't need much help, just a little assistance taking a shower.
I can get around my room just fine. I still have a regimen of medication to take and since I am not allowed to go anywhere I really don't need much more than that.
I am not exclusively breastfeeding because I don't have much milk for some reason.
At night, the nurses supplement my lack of milk with formula.
I am not too worried about that because it sets a good precedent for Rayne to learn not to be a fussy eater.
In the morning I am trounced on by Mia. I am still asleep and have no idea what time it is when a petite figure bounds into my room and throws herself across me and the bed.
“I’m breaking you out of here,” she shouts, and boy she is loud.
“I have to give the kid a boob,” I say before even opening my eyes.
“Well, whip out the tit and get to it. We’re going to Panache for brunch and then I’m taking you shopping.”
I finally open my eyes and look at my bundle of adorable Mia.
For the first time, I see traces of Beckett’s handsomeness in her face.
Mia is adorable and blonde, so pretty and perfect, but she is like my sister.
I think of Beckett as a reckless, dashing man who plays fast and dirty with his life, but he really isn’t any of those things, I don’t think. He just looks like he is.
“Wow, how did you get the Crypt Keeper to agree?” I say, putting on the robe Beckett had taken off of me the night before.
“Brother extraordinaire doesn't know. You know what they say: better to beg forgiveness…” she laughs.
“You’ll be begging forgiveness; I’ll be chained up in the basement with him taking a paddle to my ass,” I say, feeling a little giddy to be getting out of the house.
“Kinky,” she dismisses. “We won’t be too long and you haven’t left this penthouse in weeks. You deserve a day on the town. I’ll tell him I kidnapped you.” She offers me one of her signature flirty smiles and it doesn’t take more than that to convince me.
I am dressed and ready to go in ten minutes.
I breastfeed Rayne and Mia makes cute faces which she seems to love.
After Rayne passed the six-week mark she had a lot more personality and loves smiling.
She has a tiny little dimple on the side of her cheek that reminds me of Beckett.
He has a dimple, but I almost never see it because he rarely ever smiles.
My baby has my dark hair and my blue eyes and that is it; the rest are Myers genes. Beckett and Mia are beautiful, so I don’t mind. Mia holds her niece in her arms and coos, playing with her little fingers and toes, and then we hand her off to the nurse and the two of us escape.
Panache is an exclusive restaurant in Midtown that we drop Beckett's name to get into. It is hard to get a reservation, so Mia put ours under her brother’s name earlier that morning.
The food tastes better than anything I've ever eaten.
I get a mango soufflé with an egg white, truffle, and heirloom tomato tartlet and a beautifully frothy cappuccino.
I could have died and gone to heaven, the food is so good—and I have a private chef, so that is saying something.
“So,” I start asking questions I didn’t ask when she visited me at Beckett's loft because I was pretty sure he had the place bugged. I wouldn't put it past Beckett to have surveillance cameras with sound all over my room. “Tell me, how do you really like your place?”
“Ugh.” She lets out an exasperated sigh. “It's too big, it's too lonely, and it's too close to my meddling brother. But I like being near you. That was a non-negotiable.”
“I kind of started seeing this guy. I mean, it's nothing too intense. He's a rock star in a rock band or a rock legend in his mind. I’m not quite sure because he goes by a pseudonym, but won’t tell me what his real name is, which is a little weird, but I don’t care, the sex is good.
I kind of like him. Right now it's just sex and good banter but I don't know, it might go somewhere. I also like having the Rock Star because every time Beckett sees him in the hallway he scowls. That makes me happy.”
“Oh my god, that would make me happy too.” We both laugh.
I glance over at the table just a few tables away from us.
I usually don't pay attention to people in public.
Not to be vain, because I never really cared that much about it.
I was used to being stared at. Ever since I was a little girl I was told how beautiful I was.
Because so many of the men coming and going from my house focused on my beauty with such disturbing intensity when I was young, I learned to block out everyone's stares and comments. But there is something about this guy and how he looks at me that sends a shiver down my spine. He isn’t looking at me with a distant longing, no.
He is watching like he is waiting for something.
“Do you see that guy over there?” I indicate the guy by rolling my eyes in his direction. “Don’t look now, but do in a minute,” I tell her.
Mia waits the obligatory minute then casually stretches and turns to look at the guy. Not her smoothest move but I don’t care because he is still staring at us.
“Shit, what is his problem?” she whispers when she turns back to me. “It’s like he's a mafia spy or something. He has spy eyes.”
“Right?” I agree. “That’s what I was thinking.”
“He’s probably just hard-up horny, but we should get out of here. I want to go shopping and you could use a few things now that we’re both dripping in moola.” Another cute smile and Mia stands up.
“I thought you shunned his money?” I mean, I am not one to talk. Beckett Myers is paying for everything for me too.
“We fought. We nearly came to blows especially after I let him buy me the apartment and then he said the money was mine. My dad was a dick, but it was his dick that made me and I deserved the money, so I took it because when Beckett is done fighting, he’s done.
And, well, it’s nice to have a little extra or, you know, enough to buy a small island and a yacht. ” She giggles.
“Well, I’m glad you gave in. This was fun.
” I’ve finished all I could eat and I stand up too but feel a little lightheaded and have to pee so badly.
A downside to giving birth is the inability to control the old bladder with just a little liquid in it.
Every woman is different, but my bladder decided she is on strike.
“I have to pee,” I tell Mia. “Can you hold my purse? I’m just going to be a sec.”
“Yeah, sure,” she says lazily. “I’ll pay the bill and meet you outside.”
“OK.”
I give her a quick smile and duck into the cool bathroom with avant-garde graffiti on the wall.
There is a woman at the sink washing her hands whom I ignore because you ignore people in places like that.
I go into the stall to do my business. When I come out to wash my hands I suddenly have a scarf around my face.
It smells like rose perfume and is big enough to cover my eyes and my nose.
Suddenly everything feels off-center. There is a loud sound like a door banging and then men's rough and calloused hands grab my wrists yanking my arms backward.
I feel the cold bite of steel and know I am being handcuffed.
A large coat is thrown over my shoulders and I try to scream, but his hands are at my throat, cutting off my air.
The man puts his other arm underneath my armpit and around my back to keep me standing.
The scarf is taken away from my face and I am able to see that the woman has red hair, but my vision is too blurry to make out anything else.
I don’t know what kind of drug they’ve given me, but everything feels like I am walking through water and drowning. My heart races and I panic.
“Oh my God,” the woman says with a high-pitched laugh.
“We drank way too many mimosas I think. Fuck, am I drunk.” She makes a big scene as the man lifts me into his arms, tucking me against his chest. I struggle to get out of his embrace and to scream but he has me muscled too close to his shoulder.
I think he might break my neck. Then I feel a cold round cylinder at the top of my thigh underneath the coat.
“Say anything, bitch, and I’ll shoot you,” he says, and I believe him.
As they take me through the restaurant I am afraid Mia will recognize me and get herself in trouble by confronting them but I am hidden by the camel-colored overcoat.
The guy has one hand over my head and the other holding my legs with a gun pointed at my thigh.
The woman beside me is making such a loud fuss about being drunk as we stumble through the restaurant that she trips over a chair.
“Is there a problem here?” I hear someone ask.
I don't remember anything after that.