His Secret Heart (Crown Creek) Read online

  “- So I feel like I have a right to know what brought him here."

  I blew out a long, whistling breath. I’d never met a more frustrating person. My head was spinning and I couldn’t decide between laughing at her or strangling her. “I dunno, I guess I thought this was the best place to start my new career as a serial killer.” When her eyes widened, I rolled mine. "Calm down. Haven’t I already proven I'm not a bad guy?"

  I glanced at her. I’d asked it like I didn’t care at all what she thought. But I did want to know.

  I didn’t get why I wasn’t throwing her out of here. She was pissing me off. My blood was boiling.

  And I liked it.

  The more she got under my skin, the more I wanted to keep her there. I was angry, yeah, but anger was something I hadn’t felt in a long, long time. She had me laughing and shouting when up til now I’d felt nothing but numb detachment. She had me wanting to kiss her hard and then take her over my knee. Last night, when we’d gotten together, it was because I was thinking about what Beau would do.

  Now I was thinking about what I wanted.

  Her.

  Those snapping blue eyes. That tangle of hair. That challenging sneer on her perfect little mouth. "So what is it?” she scoffed, one hand on her nicely rounded hip. “Are you running away from your problems?"

  I leaned against the kitchen counter. “No,” I stonewalled, enjoying how red her face was getting. “I’m camping."

  “Ha! I’m right, aren't I? You're having one of those breakdowns that the tabloids are always talking about. What is it?” She smirked. “Exhaustion?”

  "I'm getting pretty goddamn tired of questions, so yeah, maybe it is.”

  "Poor you,” she deadpanned. "Hiding from your problems in the woods."

  “Seems to me you're doing the same thing,” I pointed out.

  She made a hissing sound. "I don't have to take this." And headed for the door.

  "You do if you wanna stay dry," I pointed out, moving to intercept her.

  She rolled her eyes. “Some kind of camper you are.” She gestured around the trailer. “Can't even give up your luxury for one second can you?”

  "You're taking advantage of this luxury right now, Sky Knight.”

  The new last name seem to hit her like a smack in the face. Her eyes widened, then narrowed. She was close enough that her warm breath traced a path across my face. We were both breathing hard, the heat of our frustration filling the entryway. I stepped down one step and blocked the door. She lifted her chin so we were nearly eye to eye. "Fuck you," she hissed.

  “I already told you I wasn't going to do that," I growled back. But I lowered my lips, noting the way that she tilted her chin up to match the angle of mine.

  "Yeah? Well you missed out."

  "I learned long ago not to stick my dick in crazy. It would be pretty fucking crazy for me to fuck one of the Knights. Dirty little secret or otherwise."

  With a gasping cry, she yanked her head back, but I matched her movement on instant and caught her lips.

  Her mouth seared to mine. Rough, hot and angry, it was a war in the form of a kiss. She attacked first, raking her nails down my back hard enough to make me hiss. But I countered by tangling my fist in her hair and yanking her head back. “So this is it?” I growled as I nipped her earlobe. “This is what I have to do to get you to stop asking questions?”

  “I knew you wanted me,” she spat back.

  Cursing, I covered her mouth with mine again. “I just want quiet,” I hissed against her lips, then hissed again when she bit me. “Goddamn…” I cupped her ass and lifted her up. She wrapped one leg around my waist, then the other.

  My blood rushed in my ears, hot and dangerous. This was bad, the worst thing I could do. I needed her to stop me. But she was urging me on, grabbing my hand away from her breast and shoving it down between her legs. The heat of her made me dizzy. I unzipped my jeans and pressed her against the wall, lifting her higher. My old basketball shorts were already too big on her. All it took was one head-spinningly sexy shimmy and she was open to me.

  “Tell me to stop,” I warned her.

  “Don’t you dare stop.”

  “Fucking hell,” I swore as I sank into her.

  She was hotter and tighter and sweeter than I could have ever dreamed. This was dangerous. I didn’t know her and even as I thrust into her again and again, some alarm bell went off inside of me.

  “Turn around.” Without waiting, I pulled out of her and spun her around so that her breasts were pressed flat against the wall. “Come on,” I groaned, reaching around to the front of her and finding that hot space with my fingers. I gripped my cock tight with my other hand. “You’d better come for me. I want to feel you on my fingers, you hear me? Come on my fingers like a good girl. I’ll even let you ask me more questions.”

  She keened, arching against me as I moved my fingers, and then reached behind her to close her small hand around my cock. I was still slippery from being inside of her, and the combination of her fast-moving hand and the feel of her clenching around my fingers as they slid in and out of her had me at the edge in an instant.

  When I slid my thumb over that tight little nub of her clit, her head fell back. She rose onto her tiptoes, crying out.

  The blood roared in my ears and I pulled back, catching myself just before I lost control completely.

  She staggered and I caught her around the waist with one arm. Her eyes were still heavy lidded, but not closed. She was watching me. “You didn’t…”

  “It doesn’t matter.” I was throbbing, aching, out of my mind crazy to just let go… and what? I closed my eyes and pictured painting myself on the smooth rise of her ass cheeks. It would be so easy to use her to get off, the way she had just done to me.

  Why had I stopped myself? “I’m fine.”

  Color rose to her cheeks. This was the second time I’d held back with her. I didn’t know how she felt about that. I didn’t know how I felt about it either - except it was the strangest combination of satisfaction and shame.

  Satisfaction I’d made her come. Satisfaction because she’d lost control but I hadn’t.

  Shame because she deserved better than this. A rough, sloppy finger-fuck against the wall of my trailer? How low had I sunk?

  For a fleeting second, I allowed myself the fantasy of laying her out on my bed and making love to her. Slowly and properly.

  The way a good man would.

  Not an asshole like me.

  The thought made me loosen my grip on her. “Fuck," she panted as I lowered her back to the floor again.

  "Yeah, that's what happened." My mind was still reeling.

  She pressed the heel of her hand to her eye . “I can't believe I just fucked Finn King," she murmured, as if to herself. “Again.”

  “I can't believe I just fucked Bill Knight’s secret daughter.”

  She glared at me, fire in her eyes. “Asshole,” she breathed.

  I nodded, unable to look her in the eye. “I warned you.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Sky

  The ground felt especially hard that night.

  I thrashed and turned, squirming inside of my sleeping bag. Every rock and pebble, every rut and divot in the uneven ground, seemed to be right underneath my body. Poking into me and denying me sleep.

  And I was already sore to begin with.

  I flopped back onto my back and threw the cover off. And just laid there, panting.

  My skin felt too tight - bruised and swollen, like an overripe peach. The chill of the cold night air soothed the burn of my overheated skin a bit. But not enough to make it go away.

  The marks his fingers had left on my body still smoldered. Waiting for me to notice them so they could blaze up and remind me of everything I had just done. If I closed my eyes, I knew Finn's face would be right there. I just didn’t know what expression it would wear.

  Would it be the one of open, desperate yearning? The one I saw right before I broke apart
over his fingers, coming so hard I was sure I’d lost my mind?

  Or would it be the closed off, angry one? The one I saw right before I ran the fuck away, sprinting across the wet grass with no shoes and only the one sock I could find before shame made me bolt.

  I had no idea. And frankly, I didn’t want to see either one.

  So I kept my eyes open.

  That was the second time he’d pulled back like that. And why? The first time it had happened, I’d thought he’d changed his mind. That he’d regretted the idea of having sex with a fuck-up like me.

  But then he’d done it again.

  I knew he wanted me. I saw it written in every tense line on his face. And I knew I wanted…

  Well..

  What did I want?

  The cold air on my skin was clearing my head. Enough that I could see the sobering truth.

  I wanted to lose myself. It didn’t matter where. Or how. Or with who. I wanted to numb the pain. And Finn was better than any drug or drink I could find.

  He was also as dangerous

  It was clear he was shattered. A broken man hiding away from the world and the wild success he’d been a part of. He dodged my questions and made up stories until I had no idea which one was true. He was maddening. Frustrating. He was sarcastic and moody and evasive. A mind-fuck wrapped in a mystery.

  He was the living embodiment of my turmoil.

  And I kept going back for more.

  I rolled to the side and drew my knees up to my chest, suddenly cold. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” I whispered into the dark.

  Self hatred was seeping in. I yanked the cover back over me and closed my eyes, expecting to see Finn’s face waiting for me. It would make sense that I’d dwell on him, since tomorrow I would be packing up and moving on. Where, I had no idea yet. But there was no way I could stay here. Not when he was so close by. Not after I’d left my dignity in his trailer along with my other sock.

  I closed my eyes. But instead of his face, it was the funeral home that leaped out at me. Like it had been lying in wait, holding off until I was still and alone. The picture snapped into focus with crystal clarity and I whimpered.

  There had been five of them. Four men and a woman, all around my age. My brothers. My sister. All of them with my father’s eyes staring at me with pure hatred.

  It was my sister - my sister, I had a sister - who’d done the talking.

  She’d known about me.

  My brothers didn’t. I don’t know how it was that came to be the case.

  But she was aware of me. She just didn’t want to think about me. And I'd denied her that.

  The funniest part was her surprise. Did she I wouldn’t come to the funeral? She'd definitely hoped I wouldn’t. But she should have expected me. When my Dad confessed to her in whatever fit of deathbed honesty he'd been seized with, she had to wonder about my whereabouts. Right?

  Or had she’d hoped I’d fallen off the face of the earth, never to be spoken of again? Whatever her hope had been, it was dashed when she was confronted by my existence. A real, solid, living, breathing result of father's infidelity.

  Her delusions, like mine, had fallen to pieces the moment we locked eyes in front of our father’s coffin.

  I’d been shocked.

  She'd been angry.

  And probably still was.

  I didn’t go to the cemetery. I didn’t see my father’s casket lowered to the ground. They’d - she’d - denied me that closure. Just like I’d been denied the life she was angry at me for disrupting.

  I whimpered again. It was too much to think about. Too enormous to take in. Once again my mind skipped over the full extent of my father’s betrayal and settled on something easier.

  Jealousy.

  Without thinking, I brought my knuckle to my mouth and bit down. Hot anger was pushing away the chill of gut-wrenching sorrow and I was glad of it. Because jealousy was easier. I’d much rather be pissed off than crying. And rivalry with the siblings I’d only just found out about? That was an easy thing to get pissed about.

  Everywhere I’d looked in that room, I’d seen the evidence of the life of stability he’d bestowed on them. He’d lived in their house with them nearly full-time. Along with the wife he’d loved dearly, if the obituary was to be believed, and who’d died only a few years back. My brothers, my sister, they’d grown up with two parents who were well-known and well-regarded. He’d given them roots.

  I’d had none of that. He’d given them everything and me only moments. Little pieces doled out carefully and stingily. Out of that, I’d tried to build a life. I’d tried to grow roots, but the ground underneath me wasn’t solid enough for them to take hold. I’d tried to build an identity out of the leftover scraps thrown my way. But it was like trying to weave cloth out of cobwebs.

  Was it any wonder, then, that I was doing the same thing right now? Grasping at something thin and breakable, something I knew had an end date? Finn was unstable.

  Of course I was clinging to him.

  I hugged my knees tighter.

  I knew how this would end. I saw it clearly, because it had happened so many times before. And in so many forms. I’d weave these scraps of fulfillment together and wrap myself in them like a blanket. It would be tattered, and full of holes, too thin and insubstantial to ever keep me warm. But I’d stay under it, shivering and clutching it tighter and tighter around me until it fell apart.

  And I’d call it love.

  Shame nipped along the edges of this hard-won clarity. It heated my cheeks and urged me to do something self-destructive. I wanted Finn. I wanted him like I wanted junk food and bourbon. I craved a cheap, destructive hit. I wanted to ride that familiar roller coaster of drama and upheaval, and pretend that pain was love.

  I wanted chaos.

  How many times had I done this before? I brought up the old memories, flipping through those scraps of fleeting connection. An actor just before he was leaving for the West Coast to try his hand at Hollywood. A lighting tech with an ex-wife and a gambling problem. A musician who crashed with me any time our tours overlapped.

  I chose the ones who were only passing through. Who could never give me all of themselves. Impermanence was my permanent state.

  And not just with men. With my life too. I spent it touring. Living life at full throttle while on the road. The all day, all night, all consuming schedule. Driving twenty straight hours until I was sure my eyes would bleed from exhaustion. Hopping from company to company. Always the new girl. Always reinventing myself. Always the one on the outside. I formed wild, beautiful friendships that ended the second the curtains came down and the tour was over. And I had to scramble to find another one before I went broke.

  Connecting with people and then losing them. Over and over. My phone contacts were clogged with the people I’d lost.

  This was the legacy my father had handed me. Chaos I'd mistaken for a life. Chaos I'd mistaken for love.

  But I didn’t have to live with the scraps anymore. I could stop the chaos right now, and free myself from my father's shitty legacy.

  I just had to figure out how.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Sky

  I must have slept, because I woke to the screeching of some very pissed off blue jays and the growling of my own stomach.

  I groaned and sat up, rolling my shoulders around and testing my body. I was sore. But more importantly, I was hungry.

  And needed coffee desperately.

  After searching through the detritus strewn across my tent, I managed to cobble together an outfit warm enough to venture outside in.

  “Now,” I muttered. “Where the fuck are my shoes?”

  I clapped my hand over my mouth. And then groaned anyway when I remembered where they were.

  Kicked under Finn’s bed.

  “Fuck,” I hissed. Did I dare go over there and knock on his door?

  I shook my head. After last night, I’d already filed him away. He was another entry to the file ma
rked ‘Bad Decisions’ to be boxed up and never thought of again. I was leaving today anyway. I would get another pair. Somewhere.

  First though, coffee.

  I found that if I ran fast and on the balls of my feet, I didn’t feel the cold as much. So I sprinted down the dirt road, past the mostly emptied out lots, to the main building at the center of the camp.

  “Hi!” I burst in to the store, startling the woman behind the counter. “Do you have coffee?”