As usual she dismisses my friends at Cole Security. She never liked King and the guys. She would have preferred me to marry someone like this Crawford guy. If she was fine, King was a SEAL, she wanted him to have a rank, be more of something she could show off, have an ambition that would make me be the wife of someone important.
“Look mother, I understand and I’m glad you decided to protect me. Thank you.” I’ve told her a lot of bullshit over the years but this one might be the biggest one. After pushing me to be his daughter, they throw me away the moment they need his life to look flawless. I was never the perfect doll they needed me to be like my sister. Fucking Dex Crawford is lucky not to stand in front of me or I would rip his head off. But being angry at a stranger won’t help me face my family and deal with the duplicity I feel my life is. Stepping away after giving my mother the respect she thinks she deserves; I decide to call Oliver, hoping he can anchor me in the storm I feel inside of me.
“You okay?” he asks.
“I’m better now. I asked my mother some questions and I don’t think I was ready for the answer.”
“Hmm. Let me get a car and pick you up,” he says without a hint of hesitation.
“No, I’m fine. I’ll take an Uber and meet you later.”
“Tessa,” he grumbles. “Let me be here for you, sweetheart.” My heart becomes mush at the term of endearment.
“No really, I’m fine. But I have a name for you, the guy who told my parents to make me disappear from their life.”
“Go on. I was going to call my guy to see if he knew who could have been working with your stepfather.”
“No need. His name is Dex Crawford and it seems he’s the son of a friend of my family.”
“Shit,” Oliver says right away.
“Do you know him?” I ask while twisting my hair in a ponytail.
“Yeah,” he drags his answer, “he’s the same guy I wanted to contact about your stepfather. Knowing him he’s already two steps ahead and knows what I’m doing in Virginia. He’s helped my friends a lot.”
“The Darling Devils?”
“Yes.”
“Like the guy does PR for rock stars and CIA directors?”
“Look, let’s discuss it tonight. What I want to tell you now is that I want to take your lips and kiss them softly, and if you let me, maybe I could bring you home after our date?”
Home.
The smile I had on my face since I heard his voice falls.
Home is the place I shared with King. The place I sold and is not mine anymore. Home isn’t where I live now and spend most of my sleepless nights.
Home isn’t the VanHorn residence either.
Home is nowhere I belong.
“Tessa, I can be there in ten minutes.” Oliver insists, alarmed by my silence.
I twist my fingers and take a big breath in, “I’m fine, sorry. Just I don’t really have a home and…”
“Say no more,” he cuts me off, “I know. Let me rephrase what I just said. Maybe I can bring you back to your apartment or to my motel?” His voice drops and my desire spikes.
“Okay,” I whisper, “but maybe this time we can talk afterwards?”
“Yes,” he laughs, “I promise not to play the mute and to talk to you. In fact, I promise to tell you everything you need to hear to turn you on and talk dirty to you the whole time I fuck you, Tessa. I promise to make you so wet with my words, you could come on demand. I promise that even after you come, you’ll drench my dick, my fingers and anything else I decide to put inside you because my words will continue to turn you on long after we’re done fucking. So yes, Tessa, I will speak. And I can’t wait. Seven pm. Be ready.” He hangs up and for a moment I stay in the backyard of my parent’s house, shivering with pleasure and craving his words until my mother pops her head out.
“Please don’t sit in the grass like a hippie. We pay a lot for it to look great. Next time, use a chair.”
“Of course, mother.”
“Would you be joining us for dinner? I need to know.”
“No mother. I have a date.”
“A date? With whom?” I love to crash her hopes.
“With Dereck. Remember Dad’s partner?” Of course, she does. But she would never admit it. In my mother’s world, this is a betrayal. I’m choosing to spend the evening with someone she wishes was dead instead of having supper with her. In mine, it’s just a mic drop. “So I’ll be going, and I’m not sure when I’ll come back now that I know I’m a casualty for Andre’s campaign to rule whatever he decides to rule.”
“You’re so dramatic, Tessa. Always were.” My mother goes back inside without a goodbye. This will be the only tell that she’s pissed at me. Standing up, I leave with a smile on my lips, knowing what I have to do next and feeling free and not guilty anymore to do so.
Chapter Twenty
OLIVER
Beautiful.
There are no other words to describe Tessa.
Walking toward me in a skirt showing more leg than usual, it seems like she’s floating. Her hair is loose and flowy like a river of gold, her step is light and bouncy, and her eyes are dancing with a bliss I have never seen there before. Something made her happy, and I hope it could be the idea of me sliding inside of her. I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with me, a man can dream though.
“Hey, Blue-hair,” I greet her trying to keep my cool. Having worked all day on trying to find a trail on her stepfather, she hasn’t left my mind for one second.
Infatuated with the idea of us, I got hard just at
