“Sammy! This is a surprise. You never call so early.”
“Uh-huh. I figured I’d remember what the sun looks like, is all.” Chuckling, I leaned back on my pillows. The sky above was starting to gain a pink-and-blue tint. “How are you?”
“Good, good. You saw me last night, not much has changed.”
Oh, a lot has changed, I thought dryly. “Right. I know, I just thought I’d check in anyway.”
“Honey, is everything okay?”
“Sure! It’s great! Why wouldn’t it be?” On impulse, I glanced at my locked door.
She made a tiny noise. “What are you not telling me?”
Moms didn’t have telepathic powers that I didn’t know about, did they? “Uh. Nothing.” Sitting up quickly, I struggled to change the topic.
My mother was much faster. “That boy last night.”
“‘Boy?’” I had to giggle. “Kain Badd, you mean.”
“What a name,” she said, a little softer than I understood. “What do you think of him?”
My jaw fell open, I saw it in the reflective surface of the metal trellis to my left. “I don’t know. He’s . . . loud?”
That made her laugh, and that soothed some of my nerves. “Is he nice to you?”
Thinking about how he’d fought tooth and nail with his own brother and father last night, I leaned into the phone. “Nice enough. Why are we talking about him?”
“I was just curious. I didn’t expect you to show up with someone last night. Especially not . . .” Whatever she was going to say, she stopped and recovered. “He rides a motorcycle. It’s very loud.”
I lowered my voice. “Now you’re not telling me something.”
“I’m not hiding anything, Sammy.”
“That means you are!”
She scoffed, then I heard her shuffling around. Her couch was notoriously loud. “If you were in any trouble, you’d tell me, right?”
Tiny palpitations attacked my heart. “Yes. Always.” It never, ever feels good to lie to your mother.
Whether or not she believed me, I could tell she was smiling when she spoke again. “I should go. It’s time for my pills. Will you come by again soon?”
The heartbeats got bigger, longer. “I’ll . . . try. Work is crazy, you know, and . . .”
“Right, right. Well, you just swing by when you want. Don’t put things aside for me, I’m fine.”
I didn’t believe that at all. “You got it. I love you, Mom.”
“Love you too—oh, the mail is here. Bye, honey!” The line clicked, the cell phone going black in my hand. I fingered the device, almost depressed at the idea of giving it up.
What was she about to tell me? It bugged me that she’d been dodging around something. Maybe she just didn’t like Kain. That wasn’t hard to believe. Though she’d acted very friendly with him.
There was noise outside my door; voices. Blinking, I stepped toward it, my fingers hovering by the handle. Who was Costello talking to?
The knob jiggled, Kain entering the threshold with a disgruntled expression. When he saw me, he pulled up short, his eyes flickering with too many emotions for him to snatch them all back.
Behind him, Costello stood tall. “You’ve got a visitor.”
“I can see that,” I said, working through the initial wave of delight. Seeing Kain was better than any sunrise.
He swept me into his arms, a tight weave of his biceps and seeking fingers. It was as if he couldn’t stop touching me, his need to explore and make sure every part of me was still here after being locked away overnight.
“Are you okay?” he asked into my ear.
Inhaling his pine-tree smell, I sighed. “I’m pretty good now, yeah.”
Kain cradled my face, looking into my eyes to make sure I wasn’t lying. “Dammit. This is all a huge mess because of me.”
“No. It’s my fault. I was the one who wanted to break out of here. You didn’t have to let me.”
“Of course I did.” Kissing my brow, he breathed me in.
“I shouldn’t have asked you. I should’ve found my own way out.”
That made him chuckle. “You’re so confident that you could have.”
“I’m pretty resourceful. Things tend to work out for me.” Waving around the room, I let the bitterness swim through my words. “I mean, check it out. I managed to get a beautiful, private suite fit for a queen, and all to myself.”
I regretted my joke when I saw how he grimaced. “If I hadn’t challenged Maverick, maybe he wouldn’t have gone this far,” he said.
Costello spoke up from the doorway. “You’re right. It’s not like you couldn’t guess what he’d do if you stood up to him.”
“Are you still here?” Kain shot back.
“I need my phone,” he said calmly.
Tapping Kain’s shoulder, I slid away. He clung to me, not willing to lose contact for a second. Stretching out, I held the phone out to his brother. “Thanks again.”
He took it, the device vanishing away. “I’ll leave you two alone.” Before he left, he stared pointedly at Kain. “Don’t do anything stupid. Please.”
“I’ll consider the warning.” He chuckled. Alone with me, he brushed his fingers through my bedhead. “You could have used my phone again.”
“I know, but I didn’t know when I’d see you.”
Pain dashed the heat in his eyes into pieces. “You thought I wouldn’t come here immediately?”
“I didn’t even know if you could.” No one had explained the details of my imprisonment. Not beyond that I’d be guarded and couldn’t leave. “Your dad seemed really pissed. For all I knew, he’d want to keep us apart.”
“He couldn’t if he wanted to.” His hands clasped mine. “But he doesn’t want to. He’s just wrapped up in what he thinks is best. Costello is right, I should have known he could do this if he was pushed too far. In hindsight, this isn’t a surprise.”
My forehead creased tightly. “This has happened before, hasn’t it?” The threads of evidence were all around me, I just needed to find the needle to stitch it all together.
“I really, really don’t want to talk about that.” Forcefully, he guided me toward the bed. “Is it awful that I just want to hold you against me until we forget about this damn mess?”
I wanted to say I couldn’t forget it. Instead, I let him pull me onto the blankets. “Is this how you handle your bad moods? You just cuddle a girl?”
“Nope.” Tugging me against his warm body so that we were spooning, he said against the back of my neck, “It has to be a beautiful girl. That’s the secret.”
He stroked the outside of my arm, the cardigan sliding down until he removed it completely. I was waiting for him to try and work me up—this man had a libido like no other—but . . . he never did.
Kain wrapped us in his arms and the blankets, and as the sun rose above and the world woke around us, we curled together like puzzle pieces left behind in the box. Alone like this, the bigger picture didn’t matter at all.
He really did want to just hold me. Every time I thought I understood Kain Badd . . .