Page 8 of Scream (Duchess & Devils #1)

Parker.

“Miss Winters?”

She’s doing that thing again, where she just stares out of the window, toes facing inward, hands in her lap, thumbs rotating around each other, worrying her plush bottom lip.

We’ve been sitting in the Escalade outside of her family’s jet for almost an hour now, and she hasn’t moved, other than her thumbs.

She asked me for a minute, and I obliged her with fifty .

But it’s the second time her fiancé’s stuck his bruised face out of the plane and stared at us.

“Miss Winters?” I repeat myself, doing my damnedest not to reach over and touch her like I want to, like every cell in my being is dying to do.

I want to break whatever demons are raging on in her mind, take them for myself.

Hell, I have so many already but what’s one more? If they’re hers, I’ll take them all on.

“Hmm?” She deadpans to face me, green eyes the color of moss blink at me, as though the fog in her mind is barely clearing up, still gnawing that bottom lip of hers.

God, she’s so beautiful. She was beautiful before, just so goddamn annoying and loud.

Now… now there’s this… I don't know how to articulate it. She’s lost in her mind a lot, but when she’s clear, she’s lethal .

Lethal in court, her words, her demeanor.

She's incredible to watch - and I'm the luckiest bastard that gets paid to do so.

“Giordano has arrived and is on the plane. They’re waiting for us.”

She blinks as if she’s trying to make sense of what I've said. Her head lifts in a subtle nod. “Yes, thank you, Parker.”

I love the way my name sounds on her lips.

“Are you ready?”

“It’s showtime again, isn’t it?” She blinks again, looking down at her gloved hands, then back at the plane wistfully, reaching into her bag and putting on her sunglasses.

The exhaustion etched across her pretty face makes her look older.

Wiser. Like she’s kept so many secrets they’re all weighing her down.

It makes me want to put the Escalade in drive and make a run for it just so she’d feel free… even if only for a little while.

She used to laugh a lot.

I can feel that same exhaustion from here and it bothers the hell out of me. “Just for the weekend.” I assure her and then, because I know her, “What’s the lie?”

The corners of her mouth lift slightly but it’s enough to be a genuine smile. I love that I can do that for her. “Work call?”

I grin. “Work call sounds fine.” I get out, rounding the vehicle to open her door but Maksim, the giant, beats me to it.

“About goddamn time, do you know how long we’ve been waiting?” Maksim growls, one eye still partially bruised from his fight last weekend. I can’t wait to see Matilda’s face when she takes in her soon-to-be son-in-law in such a state.

“Charming as always, Mr. Giordano. And yes, fifty-one minutes,” Sabrina replies. “I had a work call,” she lies as I grab her luggage from the back. “It ran a little longer than I liked. But you should understand how that goes.”

He makes a face before turning around that tells me he doesn’t believe her one bit.He’s either intuitive or is starting to notice her tells. I’m not sure which one bothers me more.

We board the jet, me sitting beside her in the luxurious seat, Maksim on the other side of the cabin facing us.

The plane takes off and as soon as we’re in the air, Sabrina puts her hair in a messy knot on her head and reaches down to grab her trusty briefcase.

“Oh no!” she sighs, searching in every pocket.

I hold in my grin and pull out her extra glasses case from the inside pocket of my suit jacket - ironically next to my gun.

Maksim stares with narrowed eyes as she takes them from me, and I hide my smirk.

“Honestly, Parker, I don’t know what I’d do without you.

Thank you.” she says, opening the black Armani case and slipping the light pink, cat-eye see-through frames on.

They’re large on her pretty face, but she makes them look good.

Except she hands them to me. I reach into my top suit pocket and fish out the microfiber square, clean them for her and give them back.

“ Thank you,” “please,” “it’s showtime .”

It’s what she says a lot these days.

She pulls her lap desk out of another bag and folds her shapely legs up, crossing them to hold the lap desk.

She puts her tablet and other stationery items on top and silently begins to work, tapping her pen against her lips and then writing in her loopy cursive.

She goes back and forth between her notes to typing on the screen, getting lost in legal jargon.

I have to remind her to take sips of her water bottle otherwise she’ll go hours without any. Mentally, I’ve gone from being her guard to being her caretaker. I don’t mind it.

“So, you wear glasses?” Maksim says from across the cabin.

“Only while reading smaller print. A lot of these prenups have very fine print, and I need to be able to read them,” she replies, not even looking in his direction.

It’s a lie. She has astigmatism and was not a candidate for Lasik.

She wears contacts but not on long flights because they dry up badly and make her eyes burn.

But that’s information she’s only shared with me and Matilda.That’s alright. I keep her safe. I keep her secrets. I like it that way.

Again, he looks at her as if trying to figure her out then, “Good to know my future wife wears glasses. Imagine someone asks me to get them for you and I had no fucking clue you wore them.”

Sabrina sighs. “Thankfully, Parker here knows where they are. And thankfully, I’ll only be your wife on paper , Mr. Giordano.”

“It’s a very real ring on your finger, and for the last fucking time, it’s Maksim . Quit with the Giordano shit.”

I prefer her to call him by his familial name, which makes it less real for me.

But I don't say that. I simply watch as she highlights a passage and then types something into her tablet. She hands it to me, I read over it, tell her it looks fine, and hand it back. I don’t know jack shit about law, but I learned it from her.

Well, I let her explain most of it to me so when she passes something by me, I can either nod or make some kind of face to let her know it doesn’t make sense to me.

I have what I like to call an honorary degree from Sabrina Winters University. I graduated top of my class. Well, almost. There are a few… other things I need to learn to get my Masters. Then I want to go back and get my PhD.

By this point, Maksim looks either irritated as hell, or like he’s going to be sick, and I want to laugh.

The flight attendant comes back out, asking if we’d like a drink. When he orders two fingers of Johnnie Walker Blue, the attendant replies they don’t have alcohol on board.

Sabrina, finally acknowledging him completely, looks taken aback by his appearance. “Christ, you look ghastly. I’m so glad this is how you’ve decided to introduce yourself to my mother. Best foot forward and all.”

“Why is there no alcohol on this plane?”

“I don’t allow alcohol.”

“Are you in recovery?”

She barely flinches at the brass in his tone, I doubt he sees it, but I did. I sit up a little straighter and square my shoulders. “Sure, you could say that.”

“What is it? Poor little princess couldn’t handle her liquor and had to go to rehab one too many times?”

I should punch the fucker, but it isn’t my place. Not now, anyway. But when the time comes, I'll be ready.

Sabrina blinks at him, no sign of frustration or irritation.

She's choosing her battles. Handing me her glasses to clean again, she just looks up at the flight attendant and smiles that perfect fucking smile I fucking hate. The same one she's been throwing on for the last two years. I still don’t fully know what happened after that fuckface dropped her off, claiming she was drunk as fuck at the front door of her mother’s house.

I just know whatever happened changed my little spitfire into a dwindling ember.

I hand her back the glasses as she says, “Macy, see if my father has a bottle in his bedroom, would you? Lower left cabinet by the bed.”

Macy , a little older lady with not much going on in the appearance department, more church mouse than anything, comes back not five minutes later, bottle and tumbler in hand, also placing a smile on her face but the awkward tension is still in the air.

She serves Maksim the amber liquid and then goes back to her place.

Sabrina bends again and searches for her headphones in her bag.

She places them over her ears, and I hand her her phone so she can play the low classical melodies she’s been into lately, because yes, she left her phone behind with her glasses as well, and I pocketed it all for her for when she needed the damn thing.

As smart a beauty she is, she’s also forgetful as fuck. But that’s okay. I got her.

Sabrina works diligently for two hours straight, and the longer she works, the more Maksim glowers at her.

Especially when she hands me her glasses to clean every thirty minutes like clockwork.

When she's done, she packs everything up neatly.

I get up and grab her favorite throw blanket and pillow from the overhead compartment and hand them to her.

She thanks me, not taking off her headphones.

She lays the seat down and turns on her side.

I'm guessing she sees the way Maksim is glaring at her, practically seething, and she decides to face me instead.

“ Ogre ,” she mouths, and I contain my smirk.

We land just a few hours later and when she wakes up, she heads to the restroom to freshen up. She comes back sans glasses and hands them to me. I clean them again before I pocket them. I keep them safe.

As soon as we arrive in Kensington, where the Barclays usually stay when Matilda is absorbed in writing a book to get away from the usual city noises and people coming to visit, it feels like coming home. Vast fields of green everywhere, fenced in cows, goats, that type of stuff.

While it ain’t Georgia, it’s pretty fucking gorgeous.

I like it better than their house in Chelsea.

They also got another place in Wales, but this practical mansion is my favorite.

It takes me almost two hours to run the entire grounds in the mornings.

There’s a little pond and the groundskeeper, Howard and his wife, Beverly, live in a small cottage towards the back of the property.

They always invite me in for tea and breakfast when I’m done.

Looking in the rearview mirror, I see Maksim still looks grim but a lot less pale now that we’re no longer in the sky, and Sabrina is tense again.

I know she’s mentally preparing herself for all the questions.

It’s been a while since we’ve been back, and I watch in the rearview mirror as she plays with the tips of her gloves.

Maksim notices it too but doesn’t say anything, just goes back to staring out the window, only side-eying her every now and then.

She’s oblivious to him in a lot of ways - mostly the way he looks at her with slight interest, probably picking apart her every move and tick.

I pull up to the wrought iron gate of the Barclay estate, type in the code, patiently wait for the gate to open, and drive through.

“How is she today?” Matilda asks when she finds me in the kitchen, grabbing a water bottle from the fridge when she comes back from giving them a tour of the place. She’s got renovations going on and I can hear the construction workers going on about their business.

I lean against the fridge, uncapping the bottle, taking a long sip before answering her.

What do I say to the woman who employed me to watch over her daughter after her daughter’s best friend was brutally attacked and left for dead on the safest college campus this side of the Mississippi?

That even though there are times she’s slipped away from me; I’ve still been able to track her – except for the one time she sent me out, and I went all over London trying to find minty pads, only to find out they don’t exist?

And when I finally got back to Chelsea, she was being dropped off drunk as fuck and then…

“She’s fine, a little tired from the flight, as can be expected. ”

Matilda nods, contemplating my words. “And the… fiancé? He’s a bit dreary, isn’t he?”

I grin. “You thought the same about me when you hired me.”

“Yes, but your qualifications surpassed your gloomy appearance,” she grins. “Besides, my daughter needed the best of the best, and that’s exactly what you are, Savage. Never doubt my faith in you.”

It’s high praise coming from a woman like Matilda. But she’s seen the changes in Sabrina as well. Not the same as I have, but then again, a good mother knows.

Which makes me feel guilty as shit. If only she knew.

“You’ll keep an eye on her still, won’t you, Parker?”

“Yes ma’am.” At this point, I'd work for free. Between what they’ve been paying me for the last four years; it would be doable.

“Good. She needs you. And she’s going to need you. I know he isn’t a part of the Syndicate, thank whatever god there is for that small mercy, but this man… I looked into him, you know.”

I arch a brow. “Yeah?”

“My old Sabrina could handle a man like that, then leave him heartbroken and shattered to pieces, then easily walk through those pieces and onto the next.”

“And now?”

She shakes her head softly, her signature honey blonde hair moving along with every shake. “Now, I just don’t know anymore.” Her voice is sad and low as she looks out the kitchen window, then moves toward the stove with a sigh. “Tea?”

“With a dash of diabetes,” I smirk.

Matilda groans. “You are devilishly handsome, Parker. I hope you know that. If I were twenty years younger…” she trails off, flirting shamelessly like older women do, and I grin.

“If you were now , Mrs. Barclay.” I wink, innocently flirting back. Because at the end of the day, somehow, Matilda Barclay knows I only have eyes for her daughter.

Matilda turns a bright pink and chuckles out a type of titter you only hear in schoolgirls, and I don’t mind ruffling her old, posh feathers. She clears her throat, “Now, now, Parker. You know I’m very happily married. ”

I laugh again. “I know. Your hair’s been in disarray since you came back from Derek’s office. Kiss me if I’m right, Tildy, but is that a paperclip in your hair?”

She reaches up and sure enough, she pulls a paperclip out of her gold tresses. She leans over, I bend, and she places a kiss on my cheek. “Cheeky badger. Come, let’s get your dreadful sweet , iced tea.”