Chapter 31 #2
But my fingers curl around the velvet exterior, and I stumble to the living room. The reality that Mason has sent the items, despite how we left each other, confuses me. It also fans a tiny flame of hope for a life that I know I shouldn’t build on.
He left the yacht the same day I walked out of his suite, and despite having my phone number, he hasn’t been in touch.
My heart lurches when it occurs to me, he could’ve made the dress and necklace arrangements the day I said yes and never got round to cancelling them.
I throw the box on the coffee table and pace my living room, torn between calling him and just turning up in D.C.
I pull out my phone and finger the buttons. My breath strangles with yearning at the thought of hearing his voice, but it’s the chance to see his face again, even if it is for one last time, that makes me put the phone down.
I’m going to D.C. And if there’s the smallest chance that I can see and talk to Mason again, I’ll take it.
* * *
Do not pass out. Do not fucking pass out.
I recite the words to myself as I lift the hem of my black sleeveless gown and quicken my steps. I’m ushered into the State Dining Room, where the Industry Innovators dinner is being held.
An accident on the Brooklyn Bridge held up the limo taking me to Teterboro Airport, and even the efficiency of travelling by private jet couldn’t save me from being late to the dinner.
“Right this way, Miss Benson.”
I follow the usher as we weave through tables holding seated guests. I keep my flame-hot embarrassed face down and pin a smile on my lips when I’m shown to the last empty seat in the room.
An elderly woman smiles at me and I smile back. “I’m so sorry for being late. There was a pile up on the Brook?—”
The words strangle in my throat when I look up into a pixie-like face and a pair of eyes I’ve only seen once before in a photo.
Cassie Sinclair, Mason’s ex-wife, is staring back at me with unabashed curiosity and an almost pitying smile on her lightly glossed mouth.
Shock lodges in my chest as I glance one along and encounter Mason’s dark, intense hazel eyes. He looks a picture of perfect and suave health, while I know my face is an unpleasant caricature of gold-fish-in-death-throes.
I can’t move. Or breathe. Or think beyond the fact that Mason has come to the dinner with his ex-wife!
Bile rises in my gut and settles at the back of my throat.
When the woman next to me addresses me, I nod and clasp my shaking hand in my lap.
Drinks are served. I gulp down fine white wine without a thought to taste or vintage. I respond to small talk with monosyllables and I don’t ever look back across the table.
The moment the announcement is made for a twenty-five-minute mingle before the awards ceremony starts, I jump from the chair and head for the door.
An usher steps in front of me, a solid wall of courteous muscle. “May I help you, ma’am?”
“Yes, I need to leave.”
“I’m sorry, guests are required to stay until the ceremony is over.”
Panic claws up my spine. “I can’t wait that long.”
“Is it an emergency?”
“Yes,” I say, then I remember I’m standing in the White House. “No.”
He frowns. “Which is it, ma’am?”
The thought of being denied escape fills me with horror. “Please, I really… really need to leave. I think I may be coming down with something.”
Concern streaks through his frown. “Okay. Come with me.”
Relief pours through me. I’m walking down what I think is the west corridor when an arm slides around my waist.
“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” Mason blazes in my ear.
“Get your fucking arm off me,” I whisper-scream.
The usher stops and turns. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes—”
“No, my girlfriend’s recovering from the flu. She just needs somewhere quiet to catch her breath. Can we go somewhere?”
“Of course, Mr. Sinclair. If you’ll follow me.”
I glance at Mason and see the warning in his eyes. I want to throw the mother of all tantrums, but I’m in the fucking White House, so I bite my tongue and follow the usher.
“This should do it, I hope. Can I get you two anything? A glass of water?”
“No, thanks. She just needs a minute.”
I keep my head down so the usher doesn’t see how livid I am. The moment he shuts the door behind him, my head jerks up.
“Your girlfriend ? You can say that with a straight face when your ex-wife, the woman you came here with, is just down the corridor?”
Mason strides toward me, looking far too dashing in his tuxedo. “Calm down, Keely?—”
“Do not tell me to calm down! Play your cruel games with her all you want, but I will not let you drag me into this.”
“Are you finished?”
“No, I fucking well am not! Why did you do it? For some sort of cheap thrill?” I exhale shakily, feeling pain from head to toe. “Actually, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know. All I want is to get out of here.”
“No.”
“What the fuck do you mean no ?”
His eyes gleam at the torrent of swearing, and I cock my eyebrow at him. “I mean you won’t leave this room until you hear me out. We have twenty minutes. Shall we talk first, or get your punishment out of the way?”
My face flames in anger, but my heart flip-flops like a foolish thing in my chest. “Lay a hand on me and I’ll kick your fucking ass.”
He nods solemnly. “Talk first then.”
“Yeah, talk to yourself. Leave me the fuck out of it. I’m leaving.” I reach for the door handle. His hand captures mine a second later.
He crowds me with a wall of heat and muscle, and I helplessly breathe him in, inhaling the scent I’ve missed more than I want to admit.
“I didn’t bring Cassie instead of you. I brought Cassie so she could meet the woman I’m in love with,” he says next to my ear.
I gasp, then sway against the door as dizziness hits me.
“Dammit, are you okay?” Concern colors his voice.
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t look fine.”
Cursing, he grabs me by the waist and lifts me from the door.
“Mason, put me down.”
He ignores me. Heat ripples through me when he sits and pulls me into his lap.
“I tell you I’m in love with you, and the first thing you do is pass out?”
“You’re not in love with me.” The pain that grips me when I say it makes me groan. “You can’t be.”
“Why the hell not?”
My heart tears wide open as I stare at him. “You know what I did. I gave my child away because I couldn’t cope. It wasn’t his fault, Mason. And yet, I couldn’t stand the sight of him when he was put in my arms.” I shudder in remembrance. “He screamed so loud I thought I harmed him.”
“Baby, don’t do this to yourself.”
“Why not? You know what I felt when he was taken away?”
He remains silent.
“Relief. I was glad he was gone.”
“If you truly were, would you be suffering as you are now? Would you not have gone on with your life, never giving him another thought? Instead, you’ve spent the last six years ripping yourself apart about it.”
He inhales, and I wonder if I’m imagining his chest shake beneath my shoulder.
One hand captures my chin and tilts my face up to his. His heart-stopping features explode across my brain, and I’m dizzy all over again. I want to touch him so bad that I curl my hands into fists to stop myself from reaching for him.
“What? You don’t want me to tell you how I feel because it’s not what you want to hear? Or because you don’t love me back?” His eyes are alive with heat. And frantic with apprehension. Deep with an emotion I don’t want to acknowledge, in case it’s a dream.
“Mason…”
“You know me, better than anyone on this earth. I’ve suffered a great loss and repaid it with acts that will stain my soul for eternity.
There’s a man locked up in a mental institution who will never be whole again because of what I did to him.
I have to live with that.” His head drops forward, and his forehead rests against my cheek.
“I left the yacht and stayed away from you because I knew it was wrong of me to ask you to live with it too. But I can’t do it, baby.
I know what hell feels like. Being without you has been beyond any pain I could’ve imagined.
I can’t go through life not knowing if there might be the sliver of hope that you’ll say yes.
That you’ll let me love you and worship you, that you’ll let me pay for what I did by allowing me to devote my life to you. ”
He lifts his head, and I see the sheen of tears in his eyes.
I shiver uncontrollably.
His face twists. “You can’t, can you?”
“Mason—”
“It’s okay.” His arm convulses around me. “I’ll let you go in a minute. Just… let me hold you for one last time.”
“Mason…”
“Please, kitten. Just one minute.”
I stay silent, let him hold me, let myself drown in the heat and joy and completeness of being with the other half of my soul.
When the minute is up, he groans. “God, what the fuck am I going to do?” His voice bleeds naked anguish.
“I love you, so you don’t have to do anything,” I murmur.
“What?” Disbelief echoes through his voice.
“I love you,” I say again. “If you can accept me and what I did?—”
“You have nothing to be agonized about. I’ll drill that into you for the rest of your life if I have to.”
“Oh, Mason.”
“Tell me you love me again.”
“Tell me first what Cassie’s doing here.”
He hears my irked tone and smiles. “I’ve had a lot of time lately to… mend fences. Cassie wanted to meet the woman responsible for making me human again.”
“Fine, but did she have to sit next to you? And why the fuck didn’t you warn me she was going to be here?”
“That seat was yours. She took it when I thought you weren’t coming. When we go back in, you’ll be next to me, where you belong. Now tell me you love me again.”
Of all the emotions churning through me, only one floats to the surface and I know it’s the truth that I’ve tried to resist since meeting this man. But saying it again, now, sets me flying higher than I ever thought I deserved to be. And it feels good. Deliriously good. “I love you, Mason.”
He groans and kisses me with a fervor that warms my frozen heart. I slide my arms around his neck, and he surges to his feet. He walks forward without breaking the kiss. It’s only when he sets me down that I look about the room.
“Where are we?”
He spins me around and slams me back against him. “Lincoln’s Bedroom.”
I gasp and reassess the elaborate furnishings. Sure enough, the room I’ve seen in books is laid out before me. I reach out to touch the antique bed cover and feel Mason’s hand lifting the hem of my gown.
My heart kicks up a thousand notches. “What’re you doing?”
“Delivering your punishment, of course,” he rasps in my ear.
I bite my lip to stop the groan of bliss that spirals through me. He gathers the cloth in one hand and pushes me forward with the other. My tiny thong is no barrier for what’s coming, and I gasp as the first smack lights up my ass and spreads through my body.
“Oh God!”
Smack .
“You knew this was coming, didn’t you, kitten?”
“Yes.”
Smack .
“Yes, what?”
Smack. Smack. Smack.
“Yes, sir. I love you.”
He groans. “God, I wasn’t going to fuck you now… Was going to take my time with you later, show you how much I’ve missed you, how much I love you. But your ass… I need you, baby.” He’s panting, and I hear his zipper open.
Love and fire, electricity and joy, light up my veins. “Mason, what if we get caught?”
“Then we’ll be the happiest jail birds in history.” He pulls my thong to one side and slides, thick, hot, and delicious, inside me. “Now shut up and let me love you. I have an award to collect.”