24
Elvira
HE'S ONLY USING YOU . Fuck. Why did I let her get to my head?
Of course, he was using me. We were using each other.
And it was a perfectly fine arrangement.
I have never had this many orgasms without even needing to concentrate.
Levi knew my body better than anyone and knew how to turn me on without doing much.
And living with him was turning out to be a fairly good decision.
He was clean and reserved the clutter for his office.
For a rich boy, he knew how to pick up after himself and clean the place whenever possible, even though he had a maid who came in every day.
He was really into movies now. By showing him Pride and Prejudice , it seemed I had created a monster. Insisting we watch all Jane Austen adaptations every night. I wasn't complaining. I loved them, but I fear he is no longer the no-TV guy. Just yesterday, I caught him looking up TVs on his laptop.
As for work, he was still irritable, but after I told him how harsh he could be and how demanding he was, he had tempered his mood, to my surprise.
Working with him was easy. He rarely brought up our relationship.
At work, we were colleagues. But at home, he was something else. A lover and, dare I say, a friend.
As for the Johnson letters, the work was going on well.
After we failed to decode them, we instead chose to concentrate on the uncoded ones.
Levi had found little in terms of his mystery, but there was an invaluable amount of knowledge about Richard III's court. Some of which wasn't public knowledge.
"It's good," I said to him one night after he sent me a paper he wanted reviewed. It was about the daily life of regular peasants during the Wars of the Roses. Something we had uncovered in our research. "You didn't need to put my name as second though. I hardly did anything."
"If it weren't for you, we would not have found the monk's writings. Your name is going onto the paper."
"Thanks, but I still think—"
"Elle, I am not doing this because you are blowing my back out every night. I am putting you on because you're the best researcher I've worked with."
That was an even better compliment than knowing that I was pleasing him in bed.
That other confession made me feel like a sex goddess.
The one about work though made me feel like I actually was a valuable member of his team.
His other colleagues were helping him with this as well.
We had garnered at least five members on our team who were researching the Scott-Elliot collection. And they were all renowned academics.
"Thanks," I said.
"That's more like it. By the way," he said, his gaze on his laptop. "My family wants to meet you."
"Your family?" Every time he spoke of his six siblings, he spoke in warm tones that only made me think he had a better relationship with them than with his mother. He seemed fond of them all, his four youngest especially.
"They, uh, learned about us getting married and want you to be there at our next meetup. My siblings have an annual brunch thing they throw. My father used to host it, and since he died, it's been my brother keeping the tradition alive."
"Do they know our marriage is a sham?"
"They do. They don't care. Two of my siblings got married in a similar way, so of course everyone thinks it's true love."
"I don't mind meeting your family since mine barged into your house. It's only fair."
His eyes brightened. "You want to go? You don't have to. It's not that important."
"Do you want me to go or not?"
"I do! I would love it."
"Then it's a date."
◆◆◆
OPULENT DID NOT BEGIN to describe his brother's home.
The brunch was being hosted at Levi's eldest brother's New York townhouse, and it was the most beautiful place I've ever been in.
It hit me then how rich Levi was. While his house in Northride town was nice, it was a functional place designed for one man to live in.
This was like walking into a modern-day palace.
His brother's wife, Aire, greeted us when we came in.
"You must be Elvira," the brunette woman said as we came in. She gave me a big, warm hug. "We have heard a lot about you."
Levi chuckled nervously. "Where's Nolan?"
"Putting Forrest to sleep. The others are already here. We are on the terrace."
Levi took my hand and led me inside. Walking confidently, like he knew the place. When we reached the terrace, we saw pretty much all of Levi's siblings together with what I assumed to be their spouses and girlfriends spread around in groups.
Raine was the first to notice our arrival.
The moment he waved, everyone around him and the rest on the terrace turned to face us.
I felt like a spotlight was shone on me.
I reached for Levi's hand. He squeezed me and led me to his family.
We went to Raine's group first. "I thought you'd never arrive," he said in a voice tinged with an upper-class British accent.
"Who is this you're with, Levi?" The playful note in his voice was unmistakable, and I might have played along if it weren't for my nervousness.
"Elle, say hi to Raine. That's hisfiancée,Willow." Levi motioned to a beautiful Raven haired woman. "And that's Tyler," he said, pointing to a man slightly younger than Levi but older than Raine. "My brother. The second of my mother's sons and the fourth in our family overall."
"Hi," Tyler said, vigorously shaking my hand. "We've heard a lot about you."
"Interesting," I said. "Aire said the same thing."
Levi nudged Tyler and moved on to the man standing next to him. He was a lot closer in age and looked very similar to Tyler. "That's Sebastian, or Seb as we call him. Fifth on the Hawthorne family tree, but third and last child of my mother's."
Seb gave me a handshake, though his was much gentler. He flashed a bright smile. I'm so glad to meet you at last.
Levi dragged me away to the other group, where four other people were chatting together.
Two men and two women. They were clearly couples.
Each man had a hand on the woman's waist. One couple—a blonde woman with a tall man I had vaguely seen before in the news—were in the middle of sharing a story to the other couple: a man who looked similar to Levi and a light-skinned black woman.
The man with the black wife was Carey. The second oldest Hawthorne. His mother, according to Levi, died. And his wife's name was Thalia. She was very warm, and so was Ivy, the second to last sibling before Raine. And the man she was with was Damien Sinclair, her husband.
As soon as he finished the introductions, who I assumed was the eldest sibling, Nolan, came out to the terrace, a train of servers carrying trays of food following him. "There's Nolan," Levi said.
"How do you all keep track?" I said, watching Aire instruct the servers where and how to place the food.
"We're used to it," Levi said.
"Don't be fooled," Damien said. "Ivy sent the wrong gift to Tyler last Christmas."
"Well, Ty and Seb are one person, really," Ivy pouted. "Who can blame me?"
"I still have a hard time keeping up with the birthdays," Thalia said.
"But you never forget mine," Ivy said. "Sometimes when I am feeling tired, I still think about that spa you sent me. Ah," she closed her eyes, a smile on her face.
"So you're doing your PhD, I hear?" Thalia said. "What's your thesis about?"
I nodded. "It's about Africans in medieval Europe. Your brother-in-law has been of great help."
"Beauty and brains. The only woman good enough for my nerd brother," Ivy said.
I felt heat creep up my cheeks.
"Brunch is ready," Aire shouted.
We all swarmed to the prepared table in the middle of the terrace.
It was a beautiful array of different types of dishes.
"The theme is breakfast around the world in eighty dishes," Aire said.
"The dishes aren't eighty, but there's eighty different ingredients.
At the top is New Zealand, going down next is South Africa, I'm eager to try thevetkoeks, then next is Tanzania," she pointed to each dish naming the country of origin and when she was finally at the end she said, "And finally Greenland. "
Everyone clapped. "You really outdid yourself this time, Aire," said Ivy.
"It's Magnus you should thank. I came up with the concept, and he did the rest." She gestured to a buff man in a black chef's uniform who was busy smoking some meat on a grill.
"I am going to steal your chef one of these days," Carey said.
Nolan chuckled. "I would love to see you try. Aire and Magnus have become such good friends that if I were any other man, I would have thought they were having an affair."
"If I were to leave you for anyone, you know it would be Magnus," said Aire. Both Magnus and Nolan chuckled as though she had referenced some inside joke. "Well,"she darted her eyes around the table, "dig in."
"I thought you would never say the words," Tyler said, leaning over to grab a tong and reach for a vetkoek.
Everyone else followed Tyler, and soon we all had full plates.
The food was delicious. I took a bit of everything, following Levi's cue.
I thought as fancy high-class people they would be fussy about table manners, but I soon discovered they didn't care about that sort of thing.
The Hawthorne family was pretty relaxed, casually chatting to each other and not caring about which fork one uses.
I turned to Levi. "Your family isn't what I expected."
"What did you think we would be like?"
"I don't know. Snobby. I mean, you literally come from aristocracy."
"My mother wasn't a good first impression, I have to admit."
"Your mother was lovely!" I protested.
He scoffed. "You saw her good side."
"Does she have a bad side? She seemed like an amiable woman."
"She's trying to be a different person. We'll see how long that lasts." The vitriol in his voice was enough for me not to probe further.
By the time we were done eating, the sun had become too hot to tolerate, so we went inside, where Aire and Nolan had several parlor games planned. We were paired into teams, and Levi and I scored high marks on Charades and Pictionary, beating everyone else.
"It's not fair," Willow said after I guessed Levi's charade in a second. "You two are like historians. Of course you will get it."
Levi chuckled. "The construction of the Eiffel Tower is hardly a vague historical event. You're just jealous that we're in sync."
Willow harrumphed. "If you beat us this round, you're off the wedding guest list," she said playfully.
"Then I will have to return my gift," Levi said.
Willow's eyes widened. "You can't do that. Tell him Raine."
Raine was busy shuffling cards, and without looking up, said, "You can't do that."
We beat them again in the next three rounds. "Take that!" Levi screamed at Raine and Willow when I guessed correctly again.
Raine pouted. "That's it. You're dis-invited."
The two brothers started playfully arguing about whether to remove Levi as a groomsman. The other siblings, Carey, Tyler and Sebastian joined in.
"I've never seen him this carefree," Nolan said. I jumped. I had not seen him settle next to me. He had a glass of brandy in one hand and a cocktail similar to the one I was drinking in the other. He handed me the fresh cocktail and took my empty glass and placed it on the table beside him.
"Thanks," I said.
"I mean, he can be playful, but not to this extend and I think it's all thanks to you."
I shook my head after taking a sip of the delicious drink. "Trust me, I didn't do anything. Our marriage is not—"
"Real. He married you because of a clause? Trust me, if my brother didn't want to marry you, he wouldn't have. He would have found a way to get that money, clause or no clause."
My heart skipped a beat.
"When Levi wants something, he gets it."
His words had a clear double meaning that I felt was going over my head. If he was insinuating that Levi wanted me, then he was wrong. Maybe physically. But emotionally? Our relationship was not like that.
"Our father wasn't a very nice man." Nolan sipped his brandy.
"And he left many scars on all of us." He discreetly gestured to Ivy and Damien, who were whispering stuff to each other.
Ivy giggled at whatever Damien had said to her.
"Those two were separated for years, and my father cut her off for going through with her pregnancy.
He didn't even know he had a son until a few years ago.
" He gestured to Carey and Thalia, who were also sitting on the same chair, Thalia on Carey's lap, showing him something on her phone.
"And I cannot begin to tell you how he manipulated those two.
But Levi, he gave all his wrath to Levi for being 'weak'.
Sometimes I wish I were there to stop him. "
"Levi told me when your father basically put him into hospital, he tried to restrict you from seeing him."
Nolan's jaw ticked, and he took a sharp swig of the brandy.
"Yes. He thought cruelty would make us stronger.
It only broke us." His eyes went dark as though he were remembering something horrible, then he shook his head and said, "I am glad he's happy.
They all should be." His gaze went to Seb and Ty.
Then he flashed a smile. Hopefully, I'll be seeing you at "Willow and Raine's wedding. "