Chapter 22

Ethan

When Becka arrived, I knew that I would be able to have her that night. She was worried for Oliver, of course, but she was also longing to trust me. To trust someone. I told her what she needed to hear, and I turned on the tv to show her that the world was on to Neurotova and to her relationship with Oliver.

When she asked about dinner, of course I put together my favorite dish. When the news mentioned her name, that was just the stroke of luck I needed to push forward. I took her hand in mine. I felt my arousal immediately, and I sensed it in her as well. I knew that what I’d wanted from the moment I first saw Becka was going to happen.

“I forgot to make dessert,” I said, my voice low. I nodded toward the freezer. “I think there’s ice cream in the freezer, though.”

She was looking at me, her lips in a playful, flirty smile. “I suppose ice cream could work,” she said. “Or, you know, whatever.”

I nodded. “Whatever happens to be my favorite dessert,” I said. Her fingertips were cool in my hand, but the rest of her hand was warm. I imagined feeling her warm hands on me and being able to caress her soft skin. For a moment, Oliver crossed my mind. Well played, Brother, I said to myself inside my head. You always did know how to pick the perfect woman.

Becka wasn’t the first woman we’d shared. All the way back to high school, women had been equally entranced by both of us. More often than not, we’d also been drawn to the same type of woman. I thought back to the first time I’d found out that Oliver had stolen my girlfriend. Senior year of high school, I was over at my girlfriend’s house. I found her dress for the prom. When I asked her about it, she said that we needed to talk. She’d gone with Oliver instead.

I took a deep breath and pushed the past back into the past where it belonged. The only thing that mattered now was right in front of me, and, right now, Becka was all mine. I pulled my hand from hers and we continued to eat while we watched the Neurotova Scandal, my partner’s idea, unfold.

I had to hand it to the media; they sure knew how to blow a story out of proportion to an epic degree. They were focusing entirely on the least important elements, which was great for me, because they happened to be the most titillating. Who cares about animal experimentation when a CEO is getting banged by his personal assistant, an up-and-coming researcher with a prominent reputation at the local university?

I leaned in, pushed her plate out of the way, and I kissed her.

Becka

His lips on mine were both a complete surprise and the most right thing that had happened that day. I found myself kissing him back, feeling my guilt and my arousal battling each other in an all-out war that I truly wasn’t sure who would win. I stayed on my chair, but I leaned in toward him as our kiss grew deeper, and he put his hands in my hair, partially on the back of my neck. His warm hands sent shivers up and down my spine, and I felt the space between my legs come alive and begin to grow wet.

He pulled back. “Is this okay?” he asked, looking into my eyes.

“Yes,” I said, my arousal winning the round.

“I’ve been wanting to do that since the night I first saw you in your class,” he said breathlessly. “I’ve never held out so long on something I wanted.” He looked as though he was almost saying that as much to himself as he was to me, and I felt my heart reach out to him a little more.

“I noticed you in class that first night,” I said, remembering how all of the women had fawned all over him not just in my class, but at the restaurant he had taken me to. I shook my head. “What do I have that all of the other women who chase you don’t have?”

He had an expression on his face like twenty answers had all flown into his head at once and he wasn’t sure which to choose.

“You didn’t chase me,” he said finally. “And that intrigued me.”

Nothing about Oliver. Nothing about competing with his brother. Not that he would necessarily tell me, but… the look on his face was sincere.

“Should we finish dinner and then go have our dessert?” I said. The wine had made me bold, even more bold, perhaps, than I had been in the bar with Lisa. I had no doubt that spending time with her this weekend had influenced me and that influence would come in handy with Ethan tonight.

We finished our dinner quickly, then Ethan washed the dishes while I went to check my phone. Still no message from Oliver. I felt a now-familiar pang of worry, but I brushed it off. Ethan had told me what had happened, and he had been mostly honest with me so far.

I reminded myself that Ethan’s problem was with Oliver, not with me, and he wouldn’t hurt Oliver. At least, I didn’t think so. But, the fact that Oliver hadn’t tried to contact me was getting a little alarming. Even when we had fought, he had texted me several times. Now, he was out of the country and he knew that the world was crashing in on itself around here… but he didn’t care to text me?

Unless he can’t, a voice warned in my head.

Stop it, I told myself. You’re not in a movie. This is real life. Real people. I brought my phone with me and walked back to the kitchen. Ethan was there, drying off the countertops with a towel.

“Ready to go upstairs?” he asked, picking up a fresh bottle of wine and two fresh glasses.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I said, which may have been the most honest thing I’d ever said in my life.

He nodded and I turned, walking ahead of him though I didn’t know which bedroom we were going to. I tried to ignore the strange energy I was feeling emanating from the walls of the foyer and the staircase as we climbed the stairs to the first guest room. I’d never been in this room before, and I shook my head when Ethan opened the door.

“What?” he asked.

“Is every room in a wealthy person’s house modeled after a museum?” I asked.

“You can come see my condo sometime,” he said, smiling. “Not a painting or piece of old fabric in sight.” I imagined Ethan’s place and believed him. I saw his condo as a stainless steel, impersonal abode with all of the luxuries of money but none of the personality or warmth of humanity. I looked around. There were a dozen roses each in two vases on either side of the bed, and a third vase on a table. Candles burned throughout the entire room.

“Come,” he said, interrupting my thoughts. He led me over to the table at the side of the room and we sat down.

“You planned this whole thing,” I said slowly, watching his reaction. I expected him to deny it, but, to my surprise, he grinned.

“Of course, I did,” he said. “You wouldn’t be here any other way, would you?”

He had me there. And, before I could say another word, he leaned in and kissed me again. This time, he stood up and stood me up with him, pulling me close to him. I pressed my body against his and felt myself melting toward him. I snaked my arms up his torso and around his shoulders while his hands found their way to my ass.

He squeezed me toward him, then he picked me up. I put my legs around his waist and I giggled. I opened my eyes and looked down at him; he looked up at me. Then, he threw me onto the bed, somewhat forcefully. He climbed on top of me and pinned my hips between his knees.

“I don’t like looking up at a woman I’m about to make love to,” he said, looking down at me with an expression of superiority.

“I like this position just fine,” I said. He smiled and began to kiss me again. This time, his lips found their way to my neck and my collarbone. I pulled my shirt away from my neck, stretching it, wanting to rip it off of myself to give him access to my chest and stomach. He paused and looked at me, then pulled my shirt off in one motion over my head.

“That’s better,” he said, and kissed the space between my breasts as he reached for my bra with his hands. He pulled my breasts out of their cups and began to massage them, his warm hands drawing out my already hard nipples.

He slid my pants off and, for a moment, let his hand linger between my legs. My body responded to him before my brain could, dropping my legs open to him. He pulled off his jeans and smiled, continuing to kiss me, then he sat up and yanked off his shirt.

I gaped at his beautiful, hard chest. Chiseled muscles already glistening with sweat in the candlelight. The shadows played on his body and his face, and I felt absolutely overcome with desire, blind to anything around me except for Ethan and his body on mine.

He leaned in to kiss me again. His tongue found its way into my mouth and, just as he dropped on top of me, pressing himself against me, his phone buzzed on the night table.

“Fuck,” he said. “Hold on.” He sat up and moved to the edge of the bed, looking at his screen. He glanced at me. “I’m sorry, honey, I have to take this. It’s really important.”

“No worries,” I said as he answered. I got up and opened the armoire, not surprised to find a fluffy, white spa robe inside. I slipped it on.

“I’ll go get us some more wine,” I mouthed to him. He nodded at me, an expression of frustration on his face and… maybe anger? I left the room quickly, closing the door behind me. I didn’t want him to think I was eavesdropping on his conversation.

I tried to listen through the door for a moment, but there was no sound. Either the door covered the sound well, or he was being especially quiet to make sure I didn’t hear.

I walked into the kitchen again and turned on the light. The wine was in a separate room off of the kitchen in the opposite direction from where the breakfast bar was. It was a wine cellar that wasn’t a wine cellar, but it had been designed to have the look and feel of an underground, castle cellar.

I opened the door and turned on the light. I scanned the bottles for something that didn’t look like it was a million-dollar collectible—I figured the less dust the better—and selected a bottle of pinot noir. I turned… and it was then that I saw the blood.

“What the…” I muttered, setting the bottle down and looking at the floor. There were drops of blood that seemed relatively fresh, meaning they were dry but still mostly red, on the tile floor. I followed them to the door and saw a bloody handprint on the door jamb. I gasped and stepped back.

I listened for any noise but didn’t hear any. My heart was pushing a thousand miles a minute. Ethan hadn’t had any band-aids on, and this was too much blood for a minor cut, anyway. The blood… could be Oliver’s. I felt nauseous, the lasagna from dinner suddenly a rock in my stomach working to excise itself. I was torn between wanting to search the house for Oliver and wanting to run away.

Clearly Ethan was lying—again—and I’d almost gone all the way with him! I shook in disgust and wiped my mouth with my hand, though there was no way to rid myself of the memory of Ethan’s lips on mine.

I slowly turned the light out in the wine cellar and turned back to the kitchen, moving as quietly as I could toward the foyer. My phone was upstairs along with my clothes, but that was a problem I couldn’t think about right now. Right now, I needed to get out of the house, and I needed to do it while Ethan was still on the phone and didn’t know I had seen the blood.

I turned out the kitchen light and made my way through the dining room toward the foyer. The dim lighting and moonlight shining through the windows gave me enough light to walk by. I could run next door, I figured, or flag down a car. I needed to get to the police, even if that meant essentially turning myself in.

I was about to open the door from the dining room to the foyer when it disappeared in front of me. My heart jumped into my throat and I felt a scream working its way into my throat. In place of the closed door stood Ethan.