Chapter Fifteen
Caden glanced toward the hotel lobby for the hundredth time in twenty minutes. The three of them had claimed a quiet corner in the Park Plaza bar, opting to forego the table to sit in a cozy sitting area complete with a couple of couches, three chairs, and a large coffee table. They’d ordered drinks, Tess and Isaiah opting for red wine, while Caden had gone for whiskey, neat. He was in need of something a lot stronger than wine.
Tess and Isaiah continued to ignore him when he insisted that Rose wouldn’t know anything. When her grandmother had died, rather than take her in, the Hancocks sent her to boarding school, and had her spend holidays and breaks with his family. That was hardly indicative of the kind of relationship in which they would tell her about the location of an antique safe.
He’d called Devon as soon as they had returned from Monticello, telling him everything they’d discovered thus far. Devon was hesitant to put Rose and Caden in a room together, and he suspected the man had fought valiantly against this dysfunctional family reunion. Devon had even volunteered to ask Rose about the safe, but for some reason, Juliette insisted that the questions needed to come from Caden and his trinity.
And the CIA man didn’t have the final say in the matter. The Grand Master did.
No doubt she had called Wes and Rose to set it up. He was certain Rose would have refused. And like his complaints, her arguments would have fallen on deaf ears. Caden could just imagine the discussions held over who would keep her safe from him. After so much time with Tess and Isaiah looking at him like he was actually a decent human being rather than a monster, the idea of facing anyone’s disdain or horror made his stomach lurch.
In the end, all disputes were dismissed when the Grand Master insisted, claiming this line of investigation was the only logical course.
Caden wanted to say to hell with logic. Nothing about this reunion was going to be simple or comfortable. And to add insult to injury, Tess and Isaiah were sitting with him, completely clueless as to what they were about to witness. He’d tried to find a way to tell them about his relationship with Rose ever since Devon called to say the meeting had been set up, but every time he opened his mouth, words escaped him.
Of course, he’d had countless opportunities to tell them about Rose, but to do so would surely drive them away. At the beginning, that had actually been his goal. But now…God…now…he couldn’t stand the thought of them leaving.
Isaiah and Tess had given him their trust, and they looked at him like someone worthy of respect and love. That would change when they learned the truth.
“Caden?” Tess said, reaching over to place her hand on his bouncing knee. He hadn’t been aware of the nervous movement until her touch. “Are you okay?”
“I haven’t seen my brother in years.” That was factually true, but a bit of an understatement.
“Were the two of you close?” Isaiah asked.
They had been. A million years ago. But that was before.
Before the training began. Before everything went to hell.
“I’m going in with you.” Marek reached out and adjusted the collar of Rose’s jacket, making sure her neck was protected from the wind that whipped down Arlington Street.
Weston moved, using his body to shield her, further protecting her. It wasn’t exactly hard to understand this ridiculous protectiveness. Devon had called and a meeting had been arranged. Whatever task Juliette had given Caden and his new trinity, they apparently needed to talk to her.
She was going to see Caden again. She’d mourned him and buried him, if only in her mind since there’d never been a body. And when he died, she’d become Rose again. Not Darling.
Now he was back from the dead, and she had to face him.
Face the man who’d hurt her, pleasured her, and loved her even as she’d hated him.
Oh, and she’d married his brother.
Juliette had come to see her to set the meeting up. Rose had put up one hell of a fight, insisting she didn’t know a damn thing, but Juliette persisted. She’d told Rose that neither she nor Weston would find closure until they faced Caden. Rose hated admitting that Juliette was right. If it had just been her, she might have told Juliette to stick her closure where the sun didn’t shine, but Weston deserved the chance to see his brother.
“You don’t need to come in,” Weston said to Marek. They’d been having this argument on the short walk from the library to the hotel.
“You think I’m going to let you two go in there without me?” Marek smiled, and he seemed genuinely amused.
“No, I didn’t think you would.” Rose closed her eyes, centering herself. When she opened them, she was ready—her heart and mind shielded behind the walls she’d built inside herself. Walls she hadn’t used since she’d admitted she loved Weston and Marek and accepted that they loved her in return, in all her emotionally damaged glory.
Together they walked to the front door of the hotel. Rose waited as Weston leaned forward and opened it.
“Do something for me,” she whispered to her husbands.
“Anything,” they responded, nearly in unison.
Rose raised her chin. “Don’t let me kneel.”
Caden saw her the second she stepped inside the lobby. In the past, one glimpse of her beautiful face and he’d reacted, every instinct driving the Dom to the forefront.
He stopped jiggling his leg and leaned forward, no longer nervous. With Darling, he was in complete control. With Darling, he understood who he was.
But she wasn’t Darling anymore. She wasn’t his.
His gaze jumped to the man on her right and his stomach lurched. Devon had warned him that Weston was different, that he’d suffered serious, life-threatening injuries when their parents tried to kill him.
He’d been prepared for that. What he hadn’t been prepared for was that Weston wasn’t different at all. Physically, he’d changed, but there was no denying this man was his big brother, the guy he’d idolized as a kid.
He took advantage of their unguarded moment to study them. Neither Rose, Wes, nor the third man had seen him yet, and he was grateful for those few precious moments. They gave him time to ground himself. To dig deep for some semblance of control.
It ended when Rose saw him, her dark eyes shadowed, sad—and just as he had feared, terrified.
She was afraid of him. In the past she’d resented him, hated him, needed him, but she hadn’t been afraid of him. He was, after all, all she’d had back then—the only person in the world who’d understood her, and the only living person to say they loved her, as fucked up as that love had been. But now she knew what happiness was, what real love was, and she was terrified that Caden would take all that away from her.
She must have made a noise, or reacted in some way, because Marek, who had his hand on the small of her back, slid it around her waist, pulling her against his side, matching his steps to hers.
“We’re right here, Rose,” he murmured.
“I should kill him for what he did to you,” Weston growled.
“No,” Rose said. “He’s your brother first. You thought you’d never see him again.”
“Yeah, but—”
“It’s okay, Wes. My fear is mine to deal with. Your feelings for your brother are yours. Act on those.”
He looked at her, uncertain, but when she nodded, he picked up his pace and headed for the table where Caden sat with two other people—a man and a woman.
Rose watched at Weston stopped, looking down at Caden, who rose slowly. Neither spoke, and the moment seem suspended in time. Then Weston reached out and grabbed Caden, hauling him into a tight embrace.
Rose could see Caden’s face, and his eyes first went wide with shock before he squeezed them closed, fighting some powerful emotions.
“I wasn’t their only victim,” she said aloud.
“No, you weren’t,” Marek confirmed.
Caden soaked up the warmth of his brother’s embrace and prayed to God he didn’t break down in tears in front of everyone. He hadn’t expected the hug. In truth, he wouldn’t have blamed his brother if he’d thrown a punch or twelve. Caden deserved at least that. Probably worse.
“I should have come back sooner,” Weston said. “I’m so sorry, little brother.”
“I missed you,” Caden said softly, his voice husky with unshed tears.
Weston pulled away, giving Caden his first good look at his brother’s face. The scar, the false eye. He couldn’t begin to imagine how much pain Weston had suffered.
Weston gave him a lopsided grin that proved he knew he looked like hell.
Caden didn’t share the humor. “I’m glad I killed those bastards.”
Weston’s grin didn’t fade. “I was sorry not to get to do the honors myself.”
Caden tried to force the conversation with Weston to last, tried to find something else to say so that he could push away the inevitable moment when he’d have to look at Rose, who had arrived at their table with her third, a handsome Asian man, at her side.
The decision was taken away from him when Isaiah stood and stepped next to them. “I’m Isaiah Jefferson.”
Weston accepted Isaiah’s hand. “Big fan of your books.”
Tess laughed at Caden’s expression. “You really should read them,” she murmured, looking not at Weston, but at Rose. “And you must be Caden’s foster sister, Rose.”
The knot of anxiety churning in Rose’s stomach quieted as she blinked in surprise. “Foster sister?”
The pretty redhead looked unsure. “Um…”
Caden looked at her, and the force of his gaze was a familiar weight. “That’s how I described you.”
Rose realized she was staring not at his face, but at the third button on his dress shirt. Like a good submissive, she kept her gaze lowered and her chin up.
She exhaled and forced herself to look up, to meet his gaze.
Caden.
“I mourned you,” she told him.
“You shouldn’t have. I deserved to die.”
“Don’t say that.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Then I deserved to die too.”
Weston growled at her. “And you would have. You were killing yourself in slow motion.”
“I only threw one fire bomb,” Rose muttered.
“Fire bomb?” Isaiah glanced upwards, as if he could see the Park Plaza penthouse from the ground floor.
“Holy shit. This is like watching a play. Even better than that thing with Mrs. Hancock outside the library,” Tess murmured to Isaiah.
Everyone turned to look at her.
“Oh no, don’t let me stop you. This is good stuff. What did he mean, you almost killed yourself in slow motion? And I’m going to need all the details on that fire bomb. You should probably take notes, Isaiah. Beginnings of a great book.”
Rose had heard about people like Tess. The sort of people who didn’t wallow in sadness, didn’t go for high drama. The kind who laughed easily and somehow always managed to provide relief in the toughest of situations. She didn’t take herself too seriously and, by extension, she made sure those around her didn’t either.
She was exactly the kind of woman Caden needed. He’d gotten his Marek.
Rose smiled, really smiled, and held out her hand. “I’m Rose Hancock.”
“Tess Hamilton. Really lovely to meet you.”
With the tension broken for the moment, they finished introductions and then everyone sat. Caden still looked tense, and his body language was all over the board. One minute he was resting against the back of the couch, a hand each on Tess and Isaiah, the next he had leaned forward, elbows braced on his knees, his body still, his gaze focused and intense—a posture she recognized. One that made her want to double-check her own posture and start mentally preparing herself for whatever her master was going to do to her.
Both Weston and Marek tensed slightly when he leaned forward, clearly able to sense that in those moments, he was a threat to her, both physically and emotionally. Neither Tess nor Isaiah reacted.
He hadn’t told them about her—not the truth, anyway. She wondered why.
Marek rubbed her knuckles with his thumb. She smiled in gratitude and then said to them, “What did you need to ask me?”
Mercifully, Isaiah took the lead. Ever the writer, he was anxious to find the next clue, but more than that, Caden knew his astute partner was perfectly aware of the undertow. The clever, kindhearted man was throwing Caden a life jacket.
He was also fairly certain Isaiah’s writer’s block had passed, and he was now itching to get back in front of the computer to start tapping out the next mystery. Like Tess, he was intrigued by what had been said…and what hadn’t been said. Caden wondered how long until that fascination turned to disgust.
“I’m not sure how much you’ve been told, but we’ve been following a trail of clues and we’re stumped on the next one. We believe it has something to do with your ancestors, Rose.”
“What’s the clue?” she asked.
Isaiah gave her a rueful grin. “Hancock safe.”
She paused, clearly waiting for him to say more. When he didn’t, she frowned. “That’s it?”
“There was an omega sign at the end of it,” Isaiah said. “Does that mean anything?”
Rose shook her head. “My last name may be Hancock, but I can assure you, I know very little about my family. I spent my childhood with my mother and grandmother and when they died, whenever I wasn’t at boarding school, I lived with the Andersons.”
Her eyes darted to him as she said the last, and Caden tapped his hand on his thigh. Rose flinched and he stopped, swallowing heavily. Tapping his leg was—no, had been—a nonverbal command for her to lay over his lap so he could spank her.
Rose dug her nails into Marek’s hand and groped for Weston’s. Once she had ahold of both of them, the anxiety in her stomach eased.
Marek jumped in to fill the silence. “Have you checked their residences?” he asked Isaiah.
“That’s what I wanted to do,” Caden said. There was an expression on his face she’d never seen before—apologetic, anxious.
“They have at least three. If we break into one and don’t find the safe, they might beef up security at the other residences,” Isaiah said. “This safe is old and antique. Where would they keep something like that?”
Rose shook her head. “I’m sorry. I really don’t know.”
“Can you think of anything? A place that was important to them?” Tess asked.
That triggered a memory, something Rose hadn’t thought about in a long time. “When I was young, before my mother died, she used to travel all the time. I’d get postcards from all over the world, and every time I got one, my grandma would help me find the place it came from on a map. They were from all over, faraway places…except, more than a few postcards came from a little town near Santa Barbara. Las Cruces, I think. I remember those the best because I got upset that my mom was so close, but didn’t come home. I got postcards from this place a few times a year, and it was always the same postcard, a picture of a mission-style hotel, called Vista something. I had them with me at boarding school, and when I was old enough to put two and two together, I realized that she probably went there to meet the Hancocks—that this little town was where they felt safe to be a trinity.”
“So they didn’t live openly as a trinity?”
Rose shook her head. “His political aspirations would never allow that. They guarded their relationship with my mom fiercely. In truth, I can only recall seeing the three of them together a few times in my life when their social circles overlapped. And even then, the three of them didn’t stand together. My mother was always separate…like me.”
“I don’t understand why they didn’t take you in after she died.”
Rose smiled at Tess’ comment. It simply solidified what Rose had already figured out. Tess had grown up in a safe, loving home with adoring parents. People like that never understood parents who didn’t feel that way about their own children. Tess would be a good mom.
That thought jarred her as she glanced at Caden. Try as she may, she couldn’t picture him as a dad.
“They’d never claimed me as their own daughter, so it would have had to look like they’d adopted the child of a close relative. My father has his eyes on the White House, which means somewhere down the road, my true parentage would no doubt be seriously investigated by political opponents digging for dirt. Keeping me completely out of the picture was definitely the easiest way to avoid that.”
“So you think they spent time together as a trinity in Las Cruces?” Isaiah asked.
She nodded. “Yeah. I do.”
“Well then, that might be the best place to start,” Isaiah said. “If it’s not important or a dead end, at least we won’t alert the Hancocks by checking it out.”
“If you have to break into their houses, I’ll help,” Weston said. “We could split into teams, hit all of them at the same time.”
“No,” Caden replied harshly.
Rose’s heart leapt into her throat at the deep-voiced, angry sound. She dropped her gaze back to the third button of his shirt.
Caden’s chest went tight when he saw Rose’s reaction, so he hastened to add, “No one else is getting hurt because of me.”
“This isn’t about just you,” Weston said.
“I don’t care,” Caden said. “The Hancocks are dangerous. Rose isn’t going anywhere near them.”
Weston’s eyes darkened. “My wife’s safety is no longer your concern.”
Caden began tapping his thigh again, the response driven by anxiety.
Rose whimpered.
“Please stop doing that,” Marek said, his voice even, surprisingly kind.
Caden hadn’t considered what Rose and Weston’s third would be like. In his mind, he’d only pictured the two of them. He thought if the circumstances had been different, Marek would be someone Caden could come to like.
“Doing what?” Tess asked. “Am I missing something?”
Isaiah reached over and placed his hand over Caden’s. “You want to tell us who Rose really is to you, Caden?”
“Really is?” Tess’ forehead crinkled in confusion. “She’s not your foster sister?”
“She is,” Caden said, every single word felt like agony to speak. “But she is…was…Darling.”
The light of understanding dawned on Tess’ face. “But Darling was your…”
“Submissive,” Caden said. “I collared Rose. Claimed her. I took over her training.”
Rose closed her eyes and turned her head away from him. Her slender neck captured his attention, and he had a vivid memory of ordering her to kneel in front of his father and slipping a collar around it.
“I don’t understand,” Isaiah said softly.
“I thought it would protect her from my parents.”
“Well, that’s a good thing, right?” Tess asked.
Caden kept his eyes on his lovers, his gaze darting back and forth between them as he resolutely refused to look across the coffee table.
“No, Tess,” he said quietly. “It wasn’t a good thing.”
Rose’s head jerked back to him, forcing him to look at her. Her expression unreadable.
“It was wrong.” Caden looked directly at Rose. “I was wrong.”
Rose didn’t want to be here. Didn’t want to hear him explain what they’d been to one another to these strangers who were his trinity. She was embarrassed and that made her enraged. He’d reduce what they’d had, what they’d been through, to a few sentences. Maybe he was sparing her.
It made her want to reach out and slap him as she had Juliette.
Instead she sat passively, waiting…
Waiting for permission to leave.
Permission she didn’t need.
Rose held tight to Weston and Marek. They were her anchors, her guiding lights out of the darkness. She stood, and they followed her lead. “We’re leaving. I’ve told you everything I know.”
Caden rose to his feet. “Rose, stop…”
Marek drew Rose away from the seating area. She was grateful that he and Weston had remained silent, grateful that they’d understood she didn’t want to be rescued, but rather supported.
But they seemed to realize she was at her limit, so when Marek drew her away, she followed his lead gratefully. Weston stepped between her and Caden.
“Don’t give her orders, Caden.”
“I wasn’t…it wasn’t an order.”
“It was, because that’s the only way you know how to be. I understand it, and I’m sorry…so sorry, little brother, that I failed you. Both of you.”
Caden couldn’t reply, couldn’t find the words. Isaiah stood, reaching out to put a hand on his shoulder. Tess rose as well and took his hand in hers. Even after everything he’d said, they were still there, standing next to him, believing in him.
He didn’t deserve it. Even as he craved it, needed it, he knew that eventually, somewhere down the road, they’d see him for the man he truly was. The one who didn’t know how to love. Didn’t know how to be with someone without causing them pain. Seeing Rose again brought it all back. He’d merely been pretending, fooling himself into thinking he could make a life with Tess and Isaiah work.
“You protected Tabby, saved Rose. You didn’t fail, Wes. I did.”
His chest was constricted, his heart racing as he looked at Rose once more. Images of the years they had spent together crashed in on him. Only this time he saw it all differently. He thought he’d loved her, thought he was giving her what she needed to be happy.
All he’d proven was that he truly was his fathers’ son.
He stepped around Weston, walked right up to Rose before either of her husbands could push him away. He dropped to his knees, his head bent. “I’m so fucking sorry, Rose. For all of it. Sorrier than I can say, than I can ever make up to you.”
Rose let out a small sob, then to his shock, she was kneeling too. “I’m sorry I couldn’t love you.”
Caden didn’t respond, didn’t raise his head to look at her. He didn’t want her apology or her forgiveness. He deserved neither.
He felt the same cold loneliness that had besieged him after waking up in the hospital closing in again.
“Caden,” she whispered.
His eyes lifted, met hers.
Neither of them spoke again. They didn’t need to. They’d had years to perfect a silent language, the skill a necessity, one born of self-preservation when his parents were around.
The fear he’d seen earlier was gone, replaced with something he thought might be pity. So she knew the truth too. Knew he was a broken fool.
She graced him with a sad smile, then she stood, took her husbands’ hands and they left the hotel.
“Caden.” Isaiah held his hand down to him. Caden took it, not because he wanted to, but because it would be rude and hurtful for him not to.
“Are you okay?” Tess asked.
He nodded, even though it was a lie.
“So we’re going to Las Cruces?” Isaiah asked tentatively.
Caden could tell they had a million questions, but neither of them asked a single one. He could only assume he looked as gutted as he felt.
Isaiah, astute as ever, thought changing the subject would help.
It wouldn’t.
“Yeah,” he said, surprised by the strength in his voice. Right now, Caden felt weak as a newborn calf. “We can fly into L.A., catch a cab to my place, pick up my car, and drive to the hotel.”
On the East Coast, he’d been able to pretend he was someone else. It was time for the ruse to end. Time for Caden to accept the truth. Seeing Rose had reminded him of who he was. Who he’d always be.
It was time to go home, back to reality.