It seemed a little formal that her son would need an invitation to dinner, but Winston was unfazed by the question. He sauntered forward as if he owned not only this space, but time itself, as if physics and boundaries had no bearing on his greatness.
“I came to discuss something important with you.” He spoke to her, but his eyes were on me. Clearly, he’d inherited that same implacable expression from his mother. “Get rid of the girl and meet me in the office.”
“Winston,” she said before he could turn on his heel and leave. “I’d like you to meet a dear friend of the family, Bianca.” Winston turned to face again, but it wasn’t until his mother said, “Bianca Belcante,” that his gaze narrowed.
“I’m short on time here,” he said flippantly, but he studied me with shrewd eyes before stalking out of the room.
Well.
So.
My first-time meeting one of my half-siblings wasn’t exactly a Hallmark commercial.
Expecting some tender moment was silly and naïve of me, yet I couldn’t shake the trickle of disappointment that slid down my spine and made me shiver.
Caroline dismissed me perfunctorily after that, dabbing her mouth with a napkin that probably cost more than some of my coats before she slid out of her seat and down the hallway to her office.
I sat there at the table in the massive room feeling the silence close in on me. Life with Brandon was rarely peaceful and I missed his constant babble, the hum of energy a seven-year-old boy was capable of producing. I resolved to call Lion Court again, hoping Walcott or Henrik might pick up and take mercy on me by letting me speak with him.
My bare feet were quiet on the plush carpet as I entered the hallway and moved toward the grand staircase up to my room. The path didn’t take my by Caroline’s office, but curiosity compelled me toward the closed door.
I didn’t trust anyone anymore.
Not after Dad left us with nothing.
Not after Tiernan tried to use us for his own wicked plots.
So there was no way in hell I was going to blindly trust Caroline, even though once, a long time ago, my dad had. Clearly, he’d lost trust in her too if he’d strayed and fallen in love with Aida.
I stopped a foot away from the door and leaned closer so they wouldn’t be able to see my shadow beneath the doorframe if they thought to look for it.
“––This is why it’s important you are nice to the girl, Winston.” Caroline’s voice was muffled through the door so I had to strain to make it out. “You would have known how to comport yourself if you listened to my message.”
“I was caught up.”
“With work, I hope.”
“With Ash, if you must know,” Winston retorted sharply. “And I don’t have to be anything to your charity case. As far as I’m concerned, this is your mess and I’m holding you responsible for cleaning it up.”
The strike of hard footsteps echoed through the door and I scampered away with my heart beating in my throat, almost choking me.
Was he referring to me when he spoke of Caroline’s mess?
Why would she feel compelled to take me in? It certainly couldn’t be because she knew I was Lane’s illegitimate child. I didn’t think even a saint would want to raise their deceased husband’s bastard and Caroline didn’t strike me as the forgiving type.
So why?
A ripple of unease moved through me as I hurried up the stairs.
It seemed I’d jumped from the pot into the fire and I had no idea how to escape the flames.
4
BIANCA
My bedroom at the Compound wasn’t unlike the one at Lion Court. It was wallpapered in a pale gold with scrolling embellishment, the bed an ornate affair with a blue quilted headboard and silk curtains tied off at each of the four posts. The bedroom of a princess, not the pauper I’d been most of my life.
I didn’t like it.
In fact, I didn’t like the Constantine Compound much at all. It was too well-groomed, too clean and perfectly decorated. I preferred the creative, atmospheric chaos of Tiernan’s gothic mansion to the austere perfection of Caroline’s wedding cake topper of a home.
It was cold when I opened the door to the room after dinner and stepped into the dark interior. I didn’t remember leaving the French doors open to the Juliette balcony, but I walked over to them, grateful for the cold, bracing air over my flushed skin. I wasn’t used to feeling so ill-at-ease, so worried about miss-stepping. There was something about Caroline that demanded adherence to her rules, but I felt as though I hadn’t been given a list.
A headache started to throb between my temples as I sank onto the edge of my bed. I flipped on the Tiffany lamp on the bedside table so the room was filled with a gentle golden glow before I flopped back against the thick duvet.
“What did you expect?” I asked the canopy over the bed, as if it held the answers. “Real life isn’t a fairy tale. These people don’t owe me anything and if they knew the truth…”
“If they knew the truth, Bianca,” a familiar low and cultured voice purred from somewhere in the room. “You’d be dead.”
I jumped up from the bed, searching the dark corners of the room for his presence. My heart beat so loudly I was horrified I wouldn’t hear him sneak up on me. I tried to hold my breath as if that would help.
Still, I couldn’t see him.
For a brief moment of terror, I wondered if I was going insane. If I couldn’t purge myself of Tiernan Morelli’s presence even though he deserved never to be thought of again.
But then something strong and cool wrapped around my ankle from under the tall bed and yanked my foot out from under me. I fell to the ground with a garbled cry that no one would hear in the colossal, mostly empty home. My back hit the plush Persian carpet with a thud that sent the breath catapulting from my body.
Before I could orient myself, he was on me.
Crawling from beneath the bed like some nightmarish monster in the night, Tiernan pressed the entire length of his body to mine, hands manacling my wrists and pressing them up above my head. I was too shocked to put up much resistance and by the time it occurred to me to struggle, I was caught irrevocably in the cage of his body.
And then, for a small moment, I forgot everything but the feel of his heavy form crushing mine to the ground and the way that ignited something in my core. The scent of him in my nose, masculine and heady, and the sight of his face, scarred yet so handsome it took my breath away in a different way than my shock had before it.
If I craned my head up just a little, I could lick that ropy scar just as I had only days ago.
It was shocking how much could change in a single week and how fast nostalgia could grow.
“Hello little thing,” he whispered with dark satisfaction as he stared down into my face. “I thought it was time we had a talk.”
“I called the house a thousand times to talk to Brando, you could have spoken to me then! This doesn’t feel like talking,” I snapped, writhing against him in an effort to buck his weight off me, but Tiernan was two hundred plus pounds of finely-honed bulk. He wasn’t going anywhere unless he wanted to.
His thick brows cut into his forehead as he pressed his groin harder into mine, pinning me still at the same time making me feel his half-hard bulge. “If you want to skip the talking, I can be convinced.”