The Anchor Holds (Jupiter Tides #3)

Chapter 1

One

Eat Your Young — Hozier

CALLIOPE

T here was a monster in my house.

Technically, it was my brother’s house. But I paid rent. Not that he ever accepted it.

I opened an account in his daughter’s name where I deposited the above-market rental income he didn’t know about. She’d get it when she turned eighteen. Something which would likely infuriate my brother. A happy side effect.

Details...

“You’re home late for a town that closes up by 11 p.m.,” the monster observed.

He’d poured himself a glass of scotch, sitting in the armchair that faced the ocean, legs crossed, showcasing alligator loafers below the hem of his perfectly tailored trousers.

Though the light from the lamp in the corner only illuminated the room in a dim glow, I knew he was wearing a bespoke suit, black shirt, open collar.

A small brooch in the shape of a dove would be pinned to his lapel.

There would be two handguns in holsters underneath his suit, a knife strapped to his belt.

He wouldn’t need those weapons to kill me, though. Even though I was a black belt and had a gun stashed in the console table to my right, he could take me down with his bare hands in seconds. That was his job, after all.

He was known as ‘The Monster of Manhattan’ in certain circles.

A rather trite and overly dramatic title that made him seem like a serial killer. But I supposed he was a serial killer if you considered his body count.

My heart hammered in my chest at his presence, the scent of pine and spice assaulting my senses.

Any sign of unease, of fear, he’d spot. He was trained to notice these things.

Not that he needed training. This man, this monster, knew me.

Knew my every tell, my every secret, every inch of my body.

He’d learned it. He’d learned me when I was a teenage girl learning herself.

He understood me before I understood myself.

A trend that followed every change I’d gone through since then.

There was no form, no new shape or identity, that he couldn’t learn about me.

My nails dug into the inside of my palms hard enough to break the skin. I took a deep breath then walked to my bar, pouring my own glass of scotch.

“I was babysitting,” I finally responded, my back to him.

My voice didn’t betray an ounce of disquiet. It was calm, cool, as collected as it was in every boardroom I’d ever been in, facing billionaires used to steamrolling women at best and sexually assaulting them at worst.

Not once had I let one of those kinds of men intimidate me. I’d done what I do best; I’d shredded them in those boardrooms, taking all of their self-respect and power while they were busy staring at my tits.

I was paid handsomely for what I did because I was fucking good at it.

Not that those skills meant anything in front of Jasper—The Monster of Manhattan—Hayes.

“Babysitting?” he repeated as I turned, bringing the glass up to my lips. “Things have changed since you moved out of the city.” He said this mildly, as if he hadn’t been watching me, hadn’t known exactly what I’d been doing the second I left the city.

I studied him as I sipped my drink. This wasn’t the first time Jasper had come to visit me.

The first time was at my request. I had been drinking with Fiona, feeling adrift in Jupiter, restless for the trouble that couldn’t have been that bad when I’d looked at it in hindsight—through martini goggles.

He’d flown in a jet to see me the minute I’d texted him. Was in a SUV idling outside the bar by the time Kip had arrived to retrieve Fiona. That had made me feel powerful, like I had the monster on a leash.

But that had been stupid, cocky and fueled by vodka. I knew better than to think anyone could leash this creature. But I’d been bored, forced into a false sense of security by the idyllic surroundings of Jupiter.

I’d climbed into his lap then, riding him in the parking lot without care. Had taken him back to this very house, sunk back into old habits that both satisfied and repulsed me.

That night had excited me. Until he unraveled me, exposing all the places I’d been trying to cover, to change about myself. Reminded me why I’d distanced myself from Jasper in the first place.

I didn’t like who I was when I was with him.

“He wants you back at your desk,” Jasper said when I didn’t respond to him.

My blood chilled. We both knew who he was. The man I was running from. The man who ruined everything.

Power games. It was all power games. Me not rushing to fill the silence most people would squirm in.

Though I didn’t let it show, his words sent a cold sliver of fear through my midsection.

Jasper was here on an errand for his employer, one of the most powerful and dangerous men in the country.

He could have people killed in the blink of an eye.

More often than not, it was Jasper doing the killing.

I sat down in the armchair farthest from him, kicking off my heels in a faux gesture of relaxation.

My body was taut and coiled. I wasn’t armed, but there was a handgun in the cabinet beside me.

Or at least there had been when I left. Jasper was likely smart enough to search the house and remove any potential weapons before I arrived home.

If he was indeed coming to threaten me into submission, to drag me back to the city and back to the transgressions I’d sworn off—which I was trying to atone for.

Not that I was under the impression any amount of atonements, Hail Marys or good deeds could wash me clean.

The goal was just not to accumulate any more misdeeds in my ledger.

“He’s going to be disappointed when he realizes he cannot tell me what to do,” I told Jasper over the rim of my glass before I took another sip.

He watched me. Didn’t speak. Just watched.

I let him.

Let him undress me with his eyes. Let him relive the many things he’d done to me in the past. Let him tease me with the knowing that he could coax me into doing them right then, even as I was trying to shed the skin that had once tingled with excitement at his touch.

Half of me hungered for it—for him. Even then, knowing better.

Because I would never truly know better. Not with him. He’d gotten his talons deep inside me, and he could drag me into the abyss whenever he so wished.

His eyes were a swirling chocolate brown, almost black in the dim light. His brows were heavy, a slash in his left eyebrow from a bar fight when he was seventeen … over a guy who’d grabbed my ass.

He kept his chestnut hair in a bun at the nape of his neck, rather than the curtain that was perpetually falling across his face when we were younger. His jaw was sharp, angled, never with so much as a five o’clock shadow.

Jasper Hayes was exceptionally handsome. But that was just another detail. Adornment meant to distract, meant to reel in unsuspecting prey.

“No, he cannot tell you what to do, Calliope,” he replied, draining his drink.

“But I can. And for now, I’m content with watching you play house and watching him whine like a petulant toddler at not getting what he wants.

” He stood, buttoning his jacket. “There’s a time limit on that, though.

” He looked around the house again, his nose not physically turned down, but I didn’t miss the slight curl of distaste on his lips.

He did not like the warm, homey environment with pictures, personality and a stain on the sofa from my niece.

“There’s a time limit on all of this.” His eyes found mine.

“Before long, you’ll be back where you belong. ”

He let the statement weave through the air and morph into the threat—the promise—it was, leaving the scariest part unsaid.

Back where you belong … with me .

Then he was gone.

It was as simple as that. A drink shared with a man I used to love, now a demon working for the proverbial devil who wanted me under his thumb or dead.

I didn’t sleep that night. I couldn’t shake off the terror.

My time in Jupiter was limited.

And there was nothing I could do about it.

Unless I wanted to go up against The Monster of Manhattan.

And I would.

That’s what I was doing there, after all. When I wasn’t babysitting, managing accounts for my brother, day trading... I was searching the underworld for information that would save my life and bring down an international criminal organization and my childhood sweetheart.

Not that Jasper had ever been sweet, even when we were kids.

That’s why I’d fallen for him in the first place.

I met Jasper Hayes when I was sixteen years old. He was new in our small town, having been placed with a foster family in the area.

Our high school was unique in the sense that it wasn’t overly ruled by cliques. The star quarterback was also a mathlete, and how much money your parents made wasn’t a status symbol. No one gave a shit if you lived in a trailer park or if you had an in-ground pool, though the pools were nice.

The hierarchy of high school so overly portrayed in the movies of the late ’90s didn’t exist. Not in my town, at least. Sure, there were a few assholes, as there were anywhere, but bullying wasn’t an overly large problem.

The small town I grew up in was squarely middle class, no vast socioeconomic differences between classmates.

It was all so peaceful and vanilla. It made me a little sick, even at sixteen.