Beautiful Illusions Read online

  She tries to maneuver her way into the crowd, but I pick up her hand and speed her to the back of the gargantuan tree in the corner, where it’s just us and a floor-to-ceiling window exposing the snow dancing outside on this magical winter night. It’s colder here. The sound of the party is slightly muffled, and, for a second, it feels as if we’re in an alternate universe.

  “Emmy.” I brush my fingers over her soft hair, holding her gaze as if I were holding her hostage, and in a way it feels like I am. “I don’t know the reason you’re here. It’s none of my business. But I won’t sleep at night if I don’t tell you that I think you’re worth the energy. I think you’re worth a lot because you’re a human being.” There I said it. Usually I’m up for a good game of cat and mouse, but something tells me she’s not playing. She’s one hundred percent feline, and her claws are out, ready to slice anyone who gets in her way. “And in the event no one has ever told you these things, let me be the first.” She eyes the party like she’s getting ready to bolt, so I pin her to the window with my elbows. Her breathing grows erratic, causing her chest to heave and ripple. Her eyes never leave mine. “I think you’re beautiful, Emmy.” I’ve never uttered those words to a girl before, at least not without thinking they were my ticket to the nearest mattress. But something in me demanded I tell Emmy, after all I mean it. I’m not sure I’ll ever get the chance again. “I think you’re stunning as hell. I think you’re far more amazing than you give yourself credit for, and the world—my world is already a better place because you’ve been in it for a few short hours. I’ve got a warm cabin you can stay the night in—alone. I’ll find somewhere else to couch surf. Don’t leave, Emmy. And for God’s sake, stay away from anyone with the name Warren McCarthy.”

  Tears glitter in her eyes as she pinches a wry smile. “Wow, you almost sound like you care.”

  “That’s because I do.”

  “Why?” The muscles in her jaw flex as if she were angry.

  “Because you’re a person. And every person on the planet should hear those words once in a while.” I brush my hand over her cheek with an ache in my heart I didn’t know was possible. “I don’t want to see you hurting yourself or your body.”

  A lone tear rolls down her face, and I don’t hesitate wiping it away. I push my thumb to my mouth and taste the salt.

  Her lips tug in a crooked grin, and she blinks up at me as if she’s never seen another human do that.

  She closes her eyes briefly. “I’m not crazy about what I’m about to do next, but I think I’m going to have to kiss you.” Her teeth graze over her lip as she tries to hide a smile. “I mean, we are under the mistletoe. Is that okay?”

  “No,” I say it flat. Her eyes round out with surprise. I cup her cheeks in my palms. I don’t ever remember wanting to be with a girl as bad as I do Emmy. “I’m the one who’s going to kiss you.”

  “Has anyone ever told you, you have control issues?”

  “Only in bed, and I take it as a compliment.”

  Her mouth opens as if she were going to lob some smart comeback at me, and it misfired. Her breathing picks up. Her lips twitch, calling me toward them.

  I hedge in close until our noses almost touch. Her warm breath showers over me in soft, minty waves. I can feel her wanting this. A tiny part of me wants to hold back—make her wait for it, teach her a lesson for all that snark, but who am I kidding? It’s me that’s being schooled here. Emmy had me at feather duster.

  Our lips find one another, soft at first then in a detonation that feels as if it were years in the making. Emmy’s lips—I sigh right into her mouth. They’re so fucking soft. I take my time just moving my mouth over them. Emmy tastes like an exotic cocktail, mint and strawberries. Her tongue touches mine then retracts as if she licked a flame. I probe in and lure her back. She lays her tongue alongside mine as if holding my hand, and I draw her into my mouth, beg her have her way with me. Then she’s in me. I’m in her. We wrestle it out in a tumultuous exchange as if bantering in the best way possible. All of her hurt—her desperation to belong—it’s palpable in these hot, hungry kisses. I can feel her pain, taste it. And then she loosens. Emmy’s body molds to mine, and she gives a soft moan right into my throat.

  The party rages on, but Emmy and I make that magical spot behind the tree our home as we linger in a sea of kisses that feel far more erotic than any mattress moves I’ve shared with other girls. This is far more intimate, far more gut wrenching for my balls than any sexual encounter I’ve ever had.

  I’m not sure what brought Emmy to my doorstep tonight, call it a Christmas miracle—call it destiny. All I know is I’m going to make sure she’s safe, wanted, and cared for, right here in Loveless—right here in my arms if she’ll let me.

  But something tells me she won’t.

  Emmy is an injured bird spiraling through the night, falling from the sky—from grace—and things never end well on a violent descent.

  I want to help her. I’m going to.

  After all she called it.

  I can be a bit controlling.

  2

  Stay with Me, Stay

  Demi

  Dark clouds curl in the night sky like smoke as we get a small reprieve from the storm. There always seems to be a storm brewing in my life, so the reprieve catches me off guard. Before my father died, my life was ordinary, filled with unremarkable days, bathed in a splendor that one could never appreciate while it still abounds. Even though we were wealthy, my father never spoiled me. I went to public school. He drove a pickup, and we shopped meagerly. Our home was a token leftover from the grand era of my mother. Outside of living in something the size of a hotel, my life was preciously ordinary. Then he was gone, and the dark days came. Nora pelted me with her wrath like acid rain, and soon Josh joined in on the fun. A pressing desolation sets in. Those pink walls close in on me, heavy and cloying. A distant memory of Winter Haven lingers in the back of my mind—the façade once covered with climbing roses had become blanketed with thorns.

  “The storm’s taking a break—just in time to get home.” Gavin ushers me down the walk to his pickup and helps me in.

  I give several hard blinks before adjusting to where I am—to Gavin. His eyes are clear as a reprieve. I’m still spinning, still drunk off his heady kisses.

  “You sure you’re okay with this?” I ask as he slips in beside me. Gavin’s eyes illuminate a clear sky blue in the dark, and the mere sight of him sends a searing heat pulsating to the inside of my thighs. “I can stay in the boathouse. It’s not a big deal.”

  “It’s an icebox. If you don’t mind waking up with a frozen set of lungs and the sound of an angelic choir, you’ll be fine.” He glances over with those piercing eyes that glow in the night, and my stomach detonates with heat. “Besides, I wouldn’t let you.”

  “Oh, really? You wouldn’t let me?” A laugh flutters from my chest. “And what if I insist?”

  “I’d have to wrap myself around you to make sure you’re warm.”

  I’m amused by this man who thinks he has the power to let me do things.

  “So I don’t get a vote?” I bite my lip while my eyes drift down his neck, to his shoulders the size of a doorframe. He must have played football at some point, and if not it’s a shame. Not that there’s anything blatantly shameful about him. This is Gavin, the same man who decided to pin me behind the Christmas tree and feed me his kisses—his tongue, for an hour straight. Best gift ever.

  “Nope. Sorry, sweetie.” He squints into the road as if he were trying to remember a dream.

  “Thank you for making your stance on women’s suffrage and feminism, crystal clear.” I run my finger over the fogged window and make half a heart. I’m not some bra-burning feminist, but I’ll wave a flag every now and again if I feel the need. Anyway, I’m just toying with Gavin. I’m still too amped up to be myself around him—with anyone really.

  He examines me for a moment before smoothing his hand over the wheel.

  “Is that what this
afternoon was about? Women’s rights?”

  “Yes.” Nora and all of her madness rush to the forefront of my mind. I blow out a breath. “More to the point—suffer-age.” In the truest sense.

  “You just made up a word.”

  Now I’m the one studying him. I seemed to catch him off guard with my quasi-poignant observation. If I keep serving up my brain cells on a platter, he’ll start to probe. I’ve taken a few courses at the local community college with a fake I.D. Reeva provided. If I ever do get my father’s company back from Nora, I want to have the business sense to run it. Plus, I just like to learn. I like books, the weight of them in my hand, hugging huge stacks as if they were a body, taking in their scent. I get high just walking through a bookstore. But I’m not here to let him in on any of that. The less he knows the better off we both are.

  “Oh, hun”—I channel my inner Eva—“I don’t know a thing about the English language.” A dull smile threatens to bloom on my lips. “I make up words all day long for the hell of it.”

  “I’m not buying it.” We drive under a lamppost, and his features illuminate a bright peach as if he were lit up from the inside. “Where’d you go to school?”

  He’s determined to sodomize my gray matter with his inquisition.

  “On the mean streets of Manhattan. I took a crash course in anatomy and learned how to make it rain money while down on my knees.” It takes everything in me to keep from quoting lyrics to an Alicia Keys’ song. The truth is, I’ve never been to Manhattan. My father and I planned on going for my sixteenth birthday, but he never quite saw fifteen, and my sixteenth was spent… Anyway, I’ve never made money rain while on my knees or any other position. I don’t mind the lies. In my case, they’re miles better than the truth. They taste like sugar pouring from my lips. And, the truth? Well, that’s just the vomit of yesteryear.

  I squeeze my eyes shut, and I’m greeted with a thing of horror from the past. Pink walls, pink walls…

  “Hey, you okay?” Gavin taps my knee, and I startle to see the road stretching, narrow as a pin. The snow peppers the landscape with a sublime silence that can only be found in quiet places like this. “I was just saying, I’ve got a fireplace you could roast a deer in. The cabin heats up pretty fast. It’ll feel like a bear has wrapped itself around you. How’s that?”

  “Maybe I don’t want a bear.” It comes from me catatonic. I take a deep breath and perk up. “Maybe I just want you.” I’m not sure why but the only way to pull my head out of the Nora gutter is to pole vault onto the nearest penis I see. I graze my lip with my teeth as I study his frame. God, he’s gorgeous. There’s no way I’m letting him couch surf at a friend’s tonight. Gavin is muscular, unnaturally so—ripped into hard contours that press against his dress shirt. His chest expands as he considers the innuendo. Surely he knows who he’s bringing home. I’ve been around the block. Hell, I’ve done the block—not in the way he thinks, but nevertheless.

  I force myself to avert my gaze before I end up on his lap. The smoky clouds disintegrate to nothing, revealing a patch of clear night sky like a peephole into Heaven, and I sink in my seat a moment at the thought of what my father—my mother might think. The lead weight of regret settles in my chest at what almost happened today. For some reason a monetary exchange for sex feels as if I’d be skewering both my parents’ hearts—I know it would mine. It’s the kind of thing you don’t live down or forget. You have to own something like that. Even if you beg forgiveness, deep down, you’re still the lowest kind of whore. But then again, according to Nora I’m the human equivalent of dirt.

  “We’re home.” Gavin pulls into the garage and kills the engine. His eyes glint into mine with a white glossy flash. “Just so you know, I’m not taking advantage of you, Emmy. I’ll keep the cabin heated and give you all the food you want—but I promise, I’m not crossing a line.”

  “Do you always play hard to get?” I ask as we get out, and he barks a laugh that echoes in the tiny chamber of the one car garage. “I bet that just whips the girls up into a frenzy.” When he said he almost denied me that kiss, my adrenaline pierced through my skull, and it was all I could do to keep from dropping to my knees.

  “Does it make you want me more, sweetheart?” His voice drops to its lower register and strums its rhythm all along my quivering thighs. Gavin is a master at seduction.

  “Maybe—yes.” I don’t usually dabble in the truth, but, when I do, it’s like pulling my intestines out by way of my throat.

  He catches my gaze in the dim light, and I can feel the power draining from me. Men who could steal my wit, the strength that comes from the lies I feed myself, are the most potent of the species. Hell, Gavin has danger written all over his six-foot two frame.

  My cheeks burn with heat, and a dull, indiscernible ache travels from the pit of my stomach to my chest, spreading like a slow-moving fire through my limbs.

  “Don’t worry.” He brands his eyes over mine. “There’s not a thing you can do to turn the tables tonight. I’m keeping my distance, and so should you.”

  “Wow, I feel like I’ve just been scolded. I kind of like that.” My cheek glides up one side, and I stop the smile like swatting a fly. “Is this the part where I call you, Daddy?”

  He opens the door to the house, and the sound of his deep-throated laugh vibrates over me. I don’t need a fire. His laughter alone could warm me.

  Gavin lets me in first. In a nutshell, the cabin is small—literally a nutshell. I’ve already been introduced to his sister’s old room where I’ve parked my duffle bag and feather duster. I don’t have anything with me but a pair of jeans and an old CU sweatshirt that belonged to my father. I’m pretty sure the French maid outfit I squeezed myself into can retire—or burn. Reeva is going to spit a bucket full of rusty vibrators when she learns of my inability to read a simple address. But, in my defense, I set my sixty-four-ounce Double Gulp right over the damn thing, and the ink bled across the page like a slow suicide.

  Gavin bends over to get the fire going, and my eyes track down his well-worn, well-fitted jeans. God. This man is built for speed, and traction, and all things that involve two very naked bodies. Who knew stopping at the Circle K would set my night in such a mouthwatering trajectory? If his jeans rode a little lower, I could answer the age-old question of boxers or briefs.

  “What’s on your mind?” The fireplace explodes as a brilliant blaze lights up the room.

  “Nothing much.” I’m pretty sure thinking about Circle K and Double Gulps qualifies as exactly that—nothing. And I doubt he wants to hear my inner debate on boxers or briefs. Gavin seems nice, wholesome, despite the fact he oozes testosterone. I’m not sure how I got so lucky to end up in the wrong boathouse. I don’t believe in destiny, hearts, or rainbows that lead to gorgeous soul mates in lieu of prospective johns, so there’s that. In my universe fate takes a giant shit over you then sets you on fire before sending your stepbrother in for some aggressive anal sex sans the KY.

  “And you?” I take a seat on the navy couch. The corduroy is worn, soft as velvet. There’s a slight squeak emanating from deep inside as if it’s been sat on one too many times, and, for a moment, I imagine Gavin buried deep inside me, making this sofa sing a song long into the night.

  The entire cabin is homey, done up in dark cozy hues of forest green and deep submarine blues. An old oak table and chairs look as if they’ve been hewn right from the trees outside, and they might have been. His furniture might be dated, but it seems well cared for. The wood still holds a fresh polish. The tabletop is wiped clean. Gavin, here, sure takes care of the things under his charge. I’m sure he’d do the same for any lucky girl.

  “Nothing usually means something.” He’s still trying to tunnel in, reach into my brain with his bare hands and run his fingers over my thoughts as if they were written in Braille. I’ve never had anyone so adamantly demand to know what I was thinking before. Maybe I should tell him about the couch singing us a song?

  “You want a drink?�
� he offers.

  “No, thank you.” I flick my heels off and strum my fingers over the seat beside me like a hunter trying to lure her prey.

  Gavin glides in with both the obedience and enthusiasm of a Golden Retriever. His lips pull back with a grin as if he’s been waiting to do that all night. There’s a boyishness about him that makes me want to wrap my arms around his waist, strong as death. His smile, his every move—it all feels genuine.

  “So now what’s on your mind?” He relaxes his arm across the back of the sofa, much too far for me to mistake as flirting.

  “I was just thinking what a good boy you are. You know, you’re nice.”

  His brows flex. “You say ‘nice’ like it’s a bad thing.”

  Reeva comes to mind. “It can be.”

  “You seem nice.” His eyes squint out a smile all their own, and that negative devil that lives inside my head, that replica of Nora, accuses him of laughing at me.

  “I’m not nice, Gavin.” Any good-natured affect I may have exhibited dissolves. “I’m the opposite of nice. I’m all darkness and no light. So if you think you’ve found yourself a Christmas miracle, a sinner you can wash white as snow, you’re sadly mistaken.”

  A moment of silence slices by.

  He rests his chin in his hand and thumps his lips with his forefinger. He bears into me, and my skin sears under the supervision of his gaze.

  “Who tells you these lies?” His jaw clenches as if he’s in pain. “You’re nice Emmy, I can tell.”

  “If you really believe that, you have bad ‘people radar’ because, for one, I’m a liar. Are liars nice?”

  He doesn’t flinch. Instead, he continues with the bored enthusiasm of a police interrogation, “What’s your last name?”

  “What’s yours?” I’m pretty sure I don’t owe him my bio, but a part of me wants to spill it all, right from the beginning. I can start with once upon a time I killed my mother.