Chapter 9 #2
My eyes lock on Mason. He sits in the corner of the room fresh from a shower, dressed in a tight white T-shirt and black jeans.
He takes me in, his eyes roaming my body.
I do a little two-step as my stomach knots.
I want to rush him, demand he take me back to bed for the day.
He raises a brow as if challenging me to voice my thoughts. He can read me too well.
I don’t want to go home.
“Everyone out,” he states, his eyes stuck on me.
“Fuck off, Lowell,” Elliot retorts, rooting himself deeper into the sofa, clearly too comfortable to move.
“I’ll call a taxi. Do you girls need one?” Charlie asks.
“Yes, please,” I reply.
“No, not you. We have our date,” Mason says, running his tongue along the front of his teeth. He comes to stand beside me, blocking my view from the others. I frown as I look around him, all of them standing to leave.
“Our date isn’t until seven thirty. I need to go home and get some fresh clothes.”
“You don’t need any clothes, and it’s gone seven thirty, so technically we’re late.” He gives me a boyish grin, and I relax a little.
“This evening, Mason. I’m going home to change first.”
“No. You’re not.”
Lucy gives me a wave as she starts to leave the room, and I shake my head at her. Is she really going to abandon me with this demanding ass?
“I’ll call you, babes!” she states, disappearing with everyone else into the elevator.
“You’re infuriating,” I mutter, crossing my arms over my chest.
His lip tips up at the corner, eating away at my defensiveness. Damn it. Why is he so hot?
“What would you have done today? If you’d have gone home?” he asks, his voice softer now.
“I don’t know, got myself prepared for this evening, caught up on some sleep.” I look at him as if that’s his problem. “Try and find something to wear.”
“Sleep first then.” He nods towards the stairs. “Back to bed.”
I hesitate, unsure of his motive. “I could just go home and sleep.” But I want to stay. “Are you coming with me?”
“You could go home, and you can, but then I will have to come and pick you up again later and that seems pointless.” He steps closer. Pulls me closer. “And no, I have things to attend to today. I’ll be back in time for our date.”
“You’re leaving me here?”
“I won’t be gone long. Get some sleep.” He leans in, placing a tender kiss on my forehead. It’s sweet. A softer side of him that I’ve only had small glimpses of shining through.
Then he ruins it. I squirm as he pulls away, pinching my nipple through the white fabric of my dress. “I could see these from the other side of the room. Elliot was looking too.” He scowls, and it’s all sorts of adorable.
“Ouch! Elliot didn’t even know we were here.” I lean away, using my hands to protect my sensitive buds.
“Montgomery doesn’t miss a set of tits, especially not those.” He eyes my chest, walking backwards away from me.
“I totally noticed,” Elliot groans, reminding me he’s still buried in the sofa. He stands, grabbing his clothes and throwing me a wink as he starts dressing.
“Don’t leave me here,” I call out to Mason.
“You’ll be fine, Pi—” His eyes tighten and he pauses. “Make yourself at home. I won’t be long.”
And then he is gone, with Elliot not far behind him.
Mase
Am I mad to leave her alone in my home?
I suppose this is one way to test her. Does that make me an ass?
I’ve not let a woman sleep in my bed since Cara.
I thought I could trust her, but what a piece of work she turned out to be.
She was my hardest lesson learnt when it comes to the do’s and don’ts of casual sex.
I should check in on her, make sure she’s sticking to our agreement.
The thought of Nina in my home, amongst my things—it shouldn’t feel so right. Something tells me I can trust her, and maybe that makes me a fool, but the primal need to protect her, to fuck her, keep her close, is overwhelming. I didn’t even use a condom.
What was I thinking?
She is fast becoming my only thought, and that’s a dangerous thing, and the fact I’m about to go shopping on a Saturday in central London should tell me all I need to know on the matter.
I sit in my car, considering where I should go. I know what I need. I just don’t know where to start.
I hesitate as my thumb hovers over the contact. Fuck it. I hit call and put the phone to my ear.
“Mr Lowell?”
“Alice, I need your help.”
Nina
I sit on the sofa scrolling through the channels but not paying any mind to what’s on the screen. It’s becoming clear that I don’t like being in this place alone. Maybe it’s because of the first time I was here, or maybe it’s because it’s so big.
Does Mason feel the same way? Being here alone all the time must be awful. What does he do in his spare time? What do you think, stupid? God, he even told me he has sex ‘regularly’. Who brings that shit up straight after sex? How embarrassing.
After getting fed up with the TV, I start to wander around the penthouse. He told me to make myself at home, but it seems like a rude thing to do.
Boredom wins out in the end, and that’s on him. He shouldn’t make me wait.
The rooms are all beautifully decorated, and I’m sure someone has spent hours making it look magazine-worthy. Yet there isn’t anything personal—no photos on the walls. No mess. You wouldn’t know it’s lived in. Like the kitchen, it’s equipped with top of the range appliances, but they look unused.
I come to the only door left at the end of the hall, the one that sits between the gym room and entertainment room.
The catch clicks as I test the handle, and I feel a wave of excitement rush through me. I feel like I’m doing something wrong when I’m not.
Pushing open the door, I find an office.
It’s smaller than I’d expect in comparison to the other rooms. A desk sits in the centre with shelves lining the entire left wall. Some sit empty, and some are filled with books and photos.
I lift a picture frame and smile wide at the image. Charlie, Elliot, Lance and Mason. They sit on the back of a yacht, legs dangling into the infinite blue ocean that lies calm beneath them as the sun sets in the distance.
All four men are completely different in their individual styles and personalities—all equally as hot—it makes me wonder how they met. Lance, although he seems friendly, still confuses me. He’s made it clear that he is just as unsure of me as I am of him.
Elliot I can’t even take seriously enough to figure out. And Charlie seems to be the most complex of them all. He seems so closed off yet always aware and watching, he shows a soft side towards me and the girls, and it’s not forced or fake when he asks you a question. He genuinely wants to know.
My eyes find Mason in the picture, the only one I want to understand.
I feel like I have so much still to learn about him.
I have seen his temper, a switch that goes from tender sweet man to dark, brooding beast with little influence.
First in his altercation with Joey, then when he came to me at the gym, and last night when he left to see Scar—always so quick on the defence.
Other than his unreasonable, possessive attitude towards me and his need to get his way in every situation so far, I’d say he hides his emotions well. He doesn’t say much with his words. But those moments when we are alone, just the two of us, I see a different man. A tender man.
I drop down into the desk chair and scan the contents. Sat off to the side is another photo, this one of a family, and the resemblance of the father and son is uncanny. I reach for it, smoothing my fingers across the polished frame.
This is Mason’s family. His foundations.
They stand outside of a beautiful sprawling home, a tiny baby in the arms of the mother, a young boy standing at his father’s feet, proud hands placed on his son’s shoulders.
My heart aches as a wave of untamed jealousy floors me.
What I would give to have a dad. A sibling.
A mother who loved me more than herself.
Mason may have lost his mother at a young age, but if even for just this one day, the day this photo was taken, the look in the woman’s eyes as she looks at her son, her hand rested on her husband’s forearm, a baby in her grasp.
Even if for just that one moment they were happy, then he already had more from her than I’ll get in a lifetime from my mother.
His father may stand proud—the man of the family—but his mother’s love visibly runs through each one of them like a thread, tying them all together with a simple look, the slightest touch.
Why is this hidden? Is this where he spends all his time? If I had these memories, I’d plaster them all over my home to remind me.
A bittersweet smile comes to my face. Because I do have photos like this one, us on holiday, in the back garden, trips to the zoo. Just not with my biological family.
I put the photo back into place, shutting the office door as I slip out. I grab my phone and go to Mason’s room. I pull open the balcony door and sit down on the lounger, looking out over the city.
John answers on the second ring, always there, unconditionally, no expectations.
“Hello?” his warm voice soothes me.
“Hi, it’s me.”
“Nina. How are you, darling? Maggie, Nina is on the phone!” he calls out to his wife.
Tears pool in my eyes as realisation sinks in. “I’m okay,” I hesitate.
“That’s not all that convincing. What is it, love? Do you need help with the studio this month? You know it’s not an issue.”
I smile through unshed tears, two words, and he knows, prepared to trample anything in my way.
“It’s not the studio, John, I just… you know how grateful I am, don’t you?
For everything you and Maggie have done for me.
I wouldn’t be half the person I am without you both.
You gave me everything I could have wanted in a family.
You believed in my dreams—invested in them even.
” I pause, feeling silly for rambling. “If I had the choice at a do-over, to be born again into a different family, a different mum, I wouldn’t.
I’d always choose the hurt that led me to you.
I’m so thankful to you both, and I’m sorry I haven’t told you that before. ”
“Well, that’s enough of that. You’re going to make an old man cry,” he says gruffly. “Are you sure you’re okay, Nina?”
“I am. I promise.”
“Nina, hunny.” Maggie’s voice croons, my throat constricting as a fresh wave of tears spring to my eyes. God, what is wrong with me today. “You’ll be here tomorrow for lunch, I hope?”
I smile, pushing the wetness away with the palm of my hand. “Yeah.”
Something sharp digs into my hip as I roll in the bed. My eyes slowly open in the dimly lit room, the sun almost lost to the horizon and out of sight for the day. I sit up, looking at the array of items spread on the bed.
I pick up the luxurious looking hamper, filled with washes, bath salts and perfumes.
What is all this?
My hand finds a sleek black stiletto buried under my side, and I sit up to find a beautiful beaded gold dress lying at my feet.
It looks expensive. It all looks expensive.
Pushing back the covers, I climb from the bed but stop short at the dresser when I see a note sat beside an ice bucket, champagne open and at the ready alongside a lone flute.
I take a deep breath, trying to dispel the unease that comes with the gifts.
Don’t make me wait, Pixie.
I’ve already waited long enough.
My head tells me to leave, that I can’t be bought with gifts—money. But my treacherous heart doesn’t care. It beats fearlessly in my chest, begging me to stay. To try, for once. To be more for him.
Whatever he needs me to be.
I grasp the bottle, pouring myself a glass before I grab the hamper and head for the en suite.
I need to armour up first. If that tortured look in his eyes tells me anything, it’s that his demons like my own—won’t fight fair.