Page 45 of Heartless (Scathing Hearts #1)

Jake

I stepped into the kitchen, and it went quiet.

Sienna’s loveliness shone through her soft gaze. “I’ve only just realized everyone had met your father before the accident, and I was asking about him.”

I took the seat at the head of the table beside her. “He would have turned you into a hiker like he did with Bianc.”

Gasping, she twisted to face Bianc. “Were you not scared of bears?”

Bianc laughed. “No, for me it was snakes, so James told me to stomp my feet. I looked like a right idiot military-marching through the woods before he took pity on me and told me he’d never seen one.”

Cam grinned and pushed her chair back. “I remember that day. Jake, beer?”

“Yes, please.”

“Can I get one, too, Cam?” Sile asked.

“Sure.”

Sienna’s glass of wine was half full, so was Bianc’s.

After Cam had returned to the table with a bottle of wine and our beers, I lifted mine in a cheer. “To James Adrian Rhodes.”

While more memories of my dad were shared, Sienna curled her fingers around the stem of her glass. “He sounds awesome.”

Cam nodded. “He was. He didn’t visit often, but when he did, it was fun.” Her gaze dropped to her bottle. “But anyone who met him could sense the deep loneliness inside him. He never said anything but sometimes he would just be kind of faraway and sad.”

Sienna’s hand found my wrist, and she slid her fingers between mine.

While I kissed the back of her hand, Cam’s eyes lifted to mine. “I’m sorry, Jake. You probably don’t want to—”

“I’m good, Cam. And you’re right. He was sad.”

Sienna’s hand tightened, and my chest expanded. The kitchen fell into a bittersweet commemorative silence.

With my eyes on my beer, I said, “He moved before he died. I was holding his hand, and his fingers clenched.”

When they all turned to me, I took a swig of my beer. “It was just a physical reaction. The last jerk of his dying body.”

Cutting through the heavy stillness, Sienna’s voice was soft. “Or maybe he was saying goodbye.”

The back of my throat burned. “Baby, no one knows exactly what happens when—”

“So, if no one knows, who’s to say that your dad hadn’t found the only way he could to say goodbye to his son?” She curled her other hand over mine, and her gaze drilled straight through me. “He loved you, Jake. He was saying goodbye.”

Emotion choked me. I tugged on her hand and pulled her out of her chair and onto my lap. She looped her arms around my neck and touched her head to mine while the others quietly left. Locking my arms around her, I dove into the scent of her neck. Then I wept at the loss of my father.

And she held me. Held my soul.

When I shifted back, her soft hand went around my face. Her face was flushed and wet. She’d been crying with me.

I cupped her nape. “Sienna baby—”

Her body tensed, and she dipped her chin. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to get some rest before dinner.”

My pulse raced. Forcing my arms down, I let her go.

****

Sile and I had fired up the grill for dinner while the women were relaxing by the pool.

“You good?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

His hand clamped on my shoulder. “The girls are getting hungry. Want me to take over the grill?”

“Wanna keep that fat head attached to your shoulders?”

He grinned. “Would help.”

From our elevated standpoint we could see Bianc and Sienna, both wearing bikinis, lying side-by-side on the daybed while Cam had claimed the two seaters across from them.

He pulled a couple of beers from the cooler and set one on the side table.

“Someone said to me, ‘the woman who owns you will bring the best or the worst out of you. Your only choice is to pick which.” He jerked his chin. “Brother, you gotta stop fucking up with Sienna.”

I turned the slab of meat on the grill. “Never got a problem with being called out for the asshole I am before. Thrived on that shit. Then, she comes in, and with one fucking smile, she... Fuck.”

Smirking, he placed the icebox full of seafood on the table. “If you want her sweet ass in your life, you—”

“The fuck you’re looking at her ass for?”

My friend shook his head. “The best and the worst, brother.”

Couldn’t help but laugh with him. “When are you going to do something about Bianc?”

Like every time she’d been mentioned, his expression hardened. “The princess of The Family.”

She was. Unwillingly, but she was. “She’s Bianc.”

“Yes, she fucking is.”

I clapped his shoulder, and we got to work on dinner.

****

Sienna

Night had fallen. Everyone had left, and Bianca had retired to her quarters, leaving Jake and me in front of the sleepy fire.

After the delicious, barbecued surf-n-turf, we’d all moved to the family room where I’d learned more about Jake’s father through the people who loved him.

Jake had taken a seat in the corner of the sectional before he’d pulled me close and wrapped his arm around me.

Curled up against him with my cheek on his chest and my legs folded under me, I was falling asleep.

When I yawned, Jake kissed the top of my head. “Let’s go to bed, baby.”

I sat up. The blighting grief had dimmed from his eyes. “All right. I’ll see you tomorrow."

As I unfurled my legs to stand up, Jake touched the side of my neck. “Stay with me tonight.”

“Jake, I didn’t come here for—”

“I just want to hold you.”

His tone was almost pleading, and I remembered the torturous loneliness of the first night after Mom had died, so I gave in. “I’ll be five minutes.”

Jake’s forehead touched mine. “Thank you, baby.”

After getting ready, I came out of my room.

Jake was crouched in front of the fireplace attending to the embers.

He took my hand and led me through the lowly lit hallway toward the front living room.

In his bedroom, we stopped by the side of his bed, and standing beside me, he removed my robe and pulled the duvet back.

Half asleep, I climbed into bed while he went to the bathroom.

A few minutes later, the mattress dipped, and the bedside lamp switched off, plunging the room into darkness.

Jake’s arms wrapped around me, and I was enveloped in his scent.

Our bodies intuitively clicked around each other, so I was sprawled over his side, and my face was against the base of his throat. Nuzzling deeper, I cocked my knee up.

He was naked.

And he was hard.

Very.

Oh. I held my breath. Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea.

The rumble of Jake’s voice strummed against my body. “Can’t help it. Sleep, baby.”

****

The graze of a warm hand sliding up and down from the back of my bent knee to the crease under my butt drew me out of sleep.

I kept still, enjoying the gentle waves of shivers the slow back and forth was triggering while my body had started to soften.

His palm pressed into my naked bottom while every muscle of his body hardened. “Kitten.”

God, he was warm and strong. If I stayed, I knew that within seconds, the world would become just the two of us. But then, we would get out of bed.

His mouth grazed my forehead. All I had to do was to move my head a few inches. Not even that. I rolled away from him and sat up on the edge of the bed with my back to him. As I pushed on my knees, his arm banded around my waist. The warmth of his skin against mine elicited a luscious frisson.

“Sienna.”

I shut my eyes. “Let go, Jake.”

“Baby—”

“Please, let go,” I whispered.

His arm spasmed before it unfurled, and I was free. I reached for my robe thrown at the foot of the bed and slipped it on.

“Sienna, look at me.”

I slowly pivoted to face him. His back was against the headboard. I forced myself to ignore his glorious chest and the obvious mount his erection was forming under the pale green sheet.

His arm extended, and he opened his hand. “Come here, kitten.”

I clasped my fingers in front of me. “Bianca’s leaving today, and I want to spend some time with her.”

Then, I fled to my room.

****

Jake

I set the box of my father’s things the nursing home had delivered earlier this morning on the coffee table. Sile, seated on the arm of the couch with his arms crossed, was eyeing the quarters’ shut doors.

“All good, brother?”

“Lenny told me some asshole she’s been seeing asked him for her hand in marriage.”

“And?”

“He likes the guy. Italian, old money, into arts. He’s driving her to the airport to give her his fucking blessing.”

Bianc was her own woman, but her uncle’s opinion mattered to her.

The doors of the quarters opened. Cam came out first, followed by Sienna, and Bianc, who rolled her case against the wall beside the door. A cell pinged. Bianc pulled her phone from her purse.

“Zio Lenny’s here.”

I grabbed her bag, and we headed out. The women followed while Sile tailed the group. Zook’s chauffeured car came to a stop, and he unfolded from the back seat. After shaking Sile’s and my hand, he kissed Cam’s cheek and pecked Sienna’s.

“Hello, bambina.”

“Hello, Lenny,” she replied softly.

Bianc hugged Cam then fell into Sienna’s arms. Her hands went around Sienna’s face, who grinned.

Gliding toward me, Bianc smiled before throwing her arms around me.

I pecked her head. “See you soon, trouble.”

When I released her, she turned to Sile. “Bye, caro.”

He jerked his chin in response.

The fucking best and worst.

Bianc started toward the car where the chauffeur and Zook waited.

Halfway there, she pivoted and marched to Sile. She gripped the back of his neck to yank his head down and kissed him. And he kissed her back like a man starved, lifting her clear off the ground.

“Oh my God,” Sienna murmured before she whipped a wide grin at Cam.

Back on her feet, Bianc kept her grip on his neck. “Coward,” she whispered.

Then, without another glance back, she got into the waiting car.

Pissed as fuck, he tracked the disappearing car. “Cam, ready to go?”

“I’ll get my purse.”

While the two women walked arm-in-arm into the house, I followed him to his truck and stood beside him.

“Need to check my passport,” he said.

“Italy?”

“Yep.”

“Need help?”

He jerked his chin at the front door where Sienna and Cam were whispering animatedly at each other. “You’ve got your work cut out here.”

After they’d driven off, Sienna and I went back inside the house.

In the family room, she neared the coffee table and glanced over her shoulder. “What’s this?”

I sat beside the small crate. “Stuff that was left in my father’s room at the house.”

Pointing at the box, she said, “Can I?”

“Sure.”

“I don’t remember seeing pictures in his room.”

“I had them taken down.”

Her brows furrowed, and her head tilted to the side. “Why?”

“Looking at them made me angry.”

“Angry or sad?”

“Both.”

Her face softened before she pulled out one of the framed pictures. “What a beautiful family.” She turned it toward me. “How old were you there?"

It was the last picture of us all together. Dad and I had our arms around my mother, who was standing proudly with both her hands on a rounded belly. “That was a week before my seventeenth birthday.”

Still holding the frame, she picked up another picture I knew well. My parents’ wedding day.

“They look so happy. Are you going to take them with you to the penthouse?”

I hadn’t thought of it until now. I got up and stepped closer. “They didn’t like city life.”

A small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “Why am I not surprised?”

When I pecked her nose, she dropped her head and shifted back.

With her arm curled around the two photo frames, she ambled to the fireplace and touched the mantel.

“Here? Your family in the family room.” After I’d placed the urns side-by-side, she handed me the two frames.

“Now they’ll be with you when you come home. ”

My gut clenched. She was killing the old me and rebuilding me one soft look at the time.

I reached for her, but she strolled to the bay window. “This view will come back often in my stories.”

That sounded like a fucking goodbye. Coming behind her, I twisted her to face me. “Baby, you can come here as often as you like. This is your home if you want it to be.”

Her small chuckle was wistful. “In a Stockholm Syndrome kind of way, I guess it is.”

When she pulled away again, the back of my neck tightened. “Sienna—"

“We should go. Give me five minutes.”

The ride back home was two and a half hours. I’d make it good with her.