Guilty As Sin (Sin Trilogy#2)

Cricket smiled. “You need some vitamin D. I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”

I parked myself on a bench, determined to enjoy my cone and the sweet-tart taste of the passion fruit and ignore everything, including my own grief, for a little while.

I’d made it a whole five minutes before someone cast a shadow over me.

“You sit there like you don’t have a care in the world. Disgraceful.”

I jerked my head toward the voice coming from beside me and cringed.

Sylvia Riscoff.

The last time I’d seen her, she was screaming at me in the emergency room, and that wasn’t a moment I wanted to repeat.

I stood and spun around to walk the other way.

“Don’t you turn your back on me, girl. You better listen to what I have to say, because I promise you’re going to want to hear it.”

There was literally nothing I wanted to hear that Sylvia Riscoff could have to say, but that didn’t stop me from looking over my shoulder at her. She glared at me, her mouth pinched and brows drawn together.

“That’s right. Stop and listen. Because you need to realize that if my son tries to choose you over his family, he’s going to regret it for the rest of his life.”

I didn’t know what she was talking about, and I didn’t want to know. I turned and took a step, but she kept talking.

“If he tries to run away with you, his grandfather will cut him off without a dime. He’ll lose everything.”

I stopped again and turned toward her, still saying nothing. But Sylvia Riscoff didn’t need me to speak. She had plenty to say herself.

“You can tell me you don’t care. Pretend that you love him, but we both know the truth. His money is the only thing you care about, and if he turns his back on his family to be with a Gable, it will all be gone. His birthright will be stripped away. Everything he’s been groomed for his entire life. His very identity will be forfeit.”

The vehemence in her tone took me by surprise, and I stumbled back a step.



“Your mother already killed his father. Only a selfish little whore would take everything else away from him too.”

My stomach twisted into a knot as Mrs. Riscoff lifted her chin, stared at me for another moment, and then turned and strode away. She was done with me.

As I watched her disappear around the corner, my mind raced.

Lincoln knows he’ll lose everything if he chooses me, but he still keeps coming.

I blinked twice, and gelato dripped onto my fingers as a shocking thought occurred to me.

He must love me like crazy if he’s willing to give it all up.





46





LINCOLN





Present day

WHITNEY WON’T ANSWER her door or her phone, and she locked the interior door between our rooms. My next choice is either to break in or have someone stand outside her door so she can’t leave the hotel without me knowing.

I meant what I said before. I’m not going to lose her again. She needs to know that there is no choice to be made. I already chose her—years ago—and I’ve never given up.

I’m seconds from kicking in her door when my phone vibrates in my hands, but it’s not Whitney.

It’s my sister.

“What now?”

“Mother is causing a scene in the lobby, and I’m still ten minutes away. Everyone is afraid to approach her. Please get her out of there.”

“Now is not a good time, McKinley.”

“It’s never a good time to deal with her, but someone has to do it.”

“Fuck. Fine. But I’m stealing one of your employees to sit on the VIP floor. Whitney’s a flight risk, and I’m not letting that happen.”

“Do whatever you need to do, just get to the damn lobby and handle her.”

I hang up with my sister and jog down the hall to the bar. After I relieve the bartender of his duties and give him explicit instructions, I head for the elevator.

When I reach the lobby, a crowd has gathered in the atrium area where my mother is spouting off about the Gable whores to anyone who will listen.

She has officially lost her goddamned mind. My mother, the queen of never air your dirty laundry, is enraged enough to forget every single thing she’s ever drilled into me.

I rush toward her and bump into Jackie Gable. She grabs my arm.

“You need to take care of her. I tried to get her to go quietly, but . . . it just went downhill from there.”

“I’ll take care of it. I’m so sorry you had to hear this.”

I march up to my mother and wrap my hand around her upper arm. “You’re leaving.”

“You chose that whore!”

I pull my mother to the nearest employee-only door and drag her through it. As soon as it closes, she screeches at me.

“Don’t you dare drag me around like that! You’re my son, and you’ll respect me. That whore is ruining you!”

I pull out my phone to call her driver. “Pull around to the rear employee entrance. My mother will meet you there. You’ll return her to the estate, and you won’t take her anywhere else for the rest of the night. Understood?”

When I have the affirmative answer I need, I hang up and point toward the rear of the resort. “If you’ll follow me, Mother, it’s time for you to leave.”

The animosity in my mother’s glare could peel the paint off walls, but she marches ahead of me, still going off.

“If you think for one second she won’t drag you down with her, you’re wrong. You’ll drag the whole family into the filth surrounding her, and we’ll never be clean again. The legacy will be destroyed. All future generations will be tainted.”

“You’re being melodramatic, Mother. Now tell me—”

“I’ll tell you nothing! I won’t allow you to do this to us.”

“Unfortunately for you, you don’t get a say. If you would just let go of your hatred of the Gable family for two seconds, you would realize how ridiculous you’re acting.”

“That Gable whore murdered my husband. I will never forget what happened that night.”

Part of me wants to shoot back that he might never have been her legal husband, but I keep that to myself.

When we approach the employee entrance, I try to reason with my mother one more time. “No one will ever forget what happened that night. You can still grieve for your loss. For our loss. But you don’t have to place the blame on Whitney. She wasn’t there. She had nothing to do with it.”

My mother whips around to look at me, anger stamped on her features. “If you think for one moment that Gable women aren’t the downfall of Riscoff men, then you haven’t been paying attention. All I tried to do was protect you from her. From them. All she wanted was your money, and as soon as she knew you weren’t going to get a penny of inheritance from your grandfather, she turned to the arms of another man faster than you could blink. What do you think about that?”



So that’s what she told Whitney all those years ago. That I would lose everything if I chose her.

“When did you tell her that?”

“After your father’s funeral.”

I think back to what happened ten years ago, the events that are burned in my brain. As soon as I piece together the timeline in my head, I know my mother is wrong. Dead wrong.

I start laughing.

“Jesus Christ. Now it all makes sense.” I shake my head. “You didn’t drive her away, Mother. I did that all by myself.”





47





LINCOLN





The past

PLINK. The window stayed dark.

I found another small rock and launched it at the window of the upstairs bedroom I knew Whitney was sleeping in. I’d bribed the next-door neighbor’s kid who Jackie babysits some nights to get the information. Was I proud of it? No. But I’d do it again.

Tink. The pebble connected, but still no light.

I threw another, and finally, a dim glow lit up the room.

Come on, Blue. I gotta see you. Talk to you. Hold you.

I tossed another pebble, and it clicked on the window just before the sash slid up. Whitney stuck her head out, her dark hair a cloud around her face.

“Whitney.” When I said her name, she looked down at me.

“Lincoln? What are you doing here?”

“Bad impression of Romeo?”

“What do you want?”

“I need to talk to you. Please.”