Page 42 of Sinful
I’m out of breath and my heart is hammering, but I did it. I finally stood up to Joshua Nix. I’ll pay for it, but right now, I’m exhilarated. I wait for him to dish out the punishment. Whatever Joshua Nix has got, I’ll take it, but he’ll never see me cry again.
“We’re going out,” he finally says.
“We’re going out? Where? Isn’t that dangerous?” Not to mention unexpected. He’s caught me off guard.
His voice is smooth like black velvet, and he’s much closer to me than he was a moment before. “It’s much more dangerous for you in here, Sin. You just have no idea how much.”
I swallow back the nerves as he runs his fingers softly through my hair. I’m startled by this sudden change in him. The gentleness in how his fingers caress my hair and then move down my cheek. I try to picture what he’s seeing and what’s going through his mind. This isn’t the angry Josh of a few moments ago. His knuckles continue their journey, caressing the side of my neck. My eyes close involuntarily and I find myself leaning into him. Warmth pools between my legs as I fall into empty air. Josh has already moved away.
34
NIX
Ihadn’t planned on attending this party, but I need to be with her away from Mercier and Dacre to be able to get my head straight. I won’t be alone with her. Where we are going, we’ll be surrounded by people, but it’s the perfect place to be able to think everything through. Somewhere I won’t make a stupid mistake because people will be watching, but somewhere no one will see the real us. See Sin. A masquerade ball. I’ll have the most famous woman on the planet beside me and no one will know. It’s risky, but a damn sight less risky than what Dacre pulled the other day. He’s a fucking fool. A fool that gambled thirty million dollars. Thirty million that he’s lost. He just doesn’t know it yet. He doesn’t know that his master plan to bring down his parents and Peter Waldgrave is never going to happen. Tomorrow I’m taking Sin home. Back to her father. If he’s not back yet, I’ll hand her to his security staff. All this bullshit over two million dollars. It’s not worth it. It never was. Tomorrow I’ll be free of her, but tonight. Tonight is my last chance to make her pay for what she did to me all those years ago and I’m not going to have Dacre or Mercier talk me out of it.
The yacht the party is being held on is owned by one of my parent’s oldest friends and unlike most of their friends that crawled into the woodwork the second I lost everything, Edward Bailey stuck around. Ten years older than me, he inherited his fortune at around the same time I lost mine. I find him in the VIP section surrounded with beautiful women, most of them models and actresses with the odd socialite thrown in. He’ll flirt madly with them then at the end of the night he’ll leave the whole fucking lot of them disappointed when he retires alone to the master suite where I know for a fact his secret husband and shitzu will be waiting. Just like everything else in New York society, Jonathan Bailey is a fraud. He’s been voted the world’s most eligible bachelor more times than I can count, and only a select few know about Dmitri and Fluffles.
His eyes land on me, then drift over to Sin. She’s wearing no makeup and her eyes aren’t concealed by the brown contacts Mercier gave her. The mask we were handed at the dock is the only thing hiding her identity.
“Josh, Darling.” He welcomes me with his arms wide and gives me what might appear as a friendly hug, but is really a way of interrogation. “What the fuck are you going with Lucinda Waldgrave?” he hisses in my ear. Of course he recognizes her. Edward never misses a trick. Plus he knows her.
“She’s not Lucinda.”
He turns to her, appraising her as she stands awkwardly in the corner. “Don’t fuck with me, Josh. She’s all over the news. A lame mask and some colored contacts might hide her from the masses, but the fucking paparazzi are here. All it takes is for one person to recognize her and you’ve lost your reward money. That is why you are with her, right? Please tell me it’s the money and not some fucked up plan for revenge.”
Edward is the only person in the world that knows just how hard I fell for Sin and how much she destroyed me. Dacre knows some of the story, but not all of it. He didn’t know me when I was dating Sin. He never saw the fallout, only the aftermath.
“They aren’t contacts. That’s her real eye color. She’s blind.”
His eyebrows furrow. “Blind? What did you do to her?”
“Nothing yet,” I grumble, annoyed that he thinks I did this to her. “A fucking infection or something. Who knows? I’m taking her back to Waldgrave tomorrow. I’ve been staying with Dacre at his parents’ apartment.”
He raises his eyebrows. “And tonight you thought you’d have one last fling with the girl that broke your heart? How poetic. And fucked up. Straight people pull the weirdest shit.”
“No weird shit, and no last fling, Ed.”
He looks me straight in the eye and I already know what’s coming. “So why are you here, Josh? Really? Don’t bullshit me.”
I came here to get away from Mercier and Dacre for a night and to have her all to myself with thoughts of revenge, but now, standing here in the stare of Edward’s question, I find that I don’t know what to do with her. I brought her to a fucking party, for fuck's sake. What exactly was I planning? I wasn’t. I only wanted to breathe. “I brought her here to have a good time. Isn’t that what parties are all about?”
Ed shakes his head. “Do what you want, but don’t do anything you’re going to regret in the morning. We have food, drink and after, you can take the guest suite. You know where it is.”
He knows me better than I know myself. This is the reason I really came here. I knew from the second the invite reminder popped up on my watch that Ed would give me a private room. A private room where I could finally get Sin alone. I’m buzzing with anticipation at the thought of it, and yet I still don’t know what I plan on doing with her when I do get her alone. I don’t know whether to hurt her and watch all the pain she caused me burn in her eyes or finally make her mine and do the one thing I’ve spent the latter part of my life dreaming about. Finally fucking Sin Waldgrave. It shouldn’t excite me the way it does. She’s been passed around men like a filthy whore for years, but she was mine first. Before the fame, she belonged to me. Tonight, one way or another, she will again.
“Thanks Ed.” I hear the audible tsk as I walk away. I don’t really care what Ed thinks any more than I care what anyone else thinks. Not tonight, at least. I don’t even care about the fall out with Mercier and Dacre. They’ll come around once I hand them their share of the two million dollar reward.
Sin is standing, practically staring at the wall. I thought she’d stand out a mile in the dress Mercier bought her, but from the back, she could be anyone. I study her, trailing my eyes up the back of her long legs and resting them on her perfect ass. I’m wrong. She couldn’t be anyone. No one, besides top models, has a figure quite so fucking perfect. Someone comes to talk to her. I recognize him as a two bit character actor that seems to have been in every movie, but hasn’t quite got the looks for the male lead. It doesn’t stop the overly confidant asshole thinking he’s good enough to talk to Sin though. I stride toward them, cutting between him and her. I can see by his expression that I’m about as wanted as a turd in a hot tub.
“Darling, let’s go outside and grab some air.” I steer her away from him and through the door to the outer part of the yacht. At the front, those not in the inner circle are partying hard. I’ve not seen them, but I’ve been to enough of Ed’s parties to know that the glitterati will be drinking, smoking and snorting anything they can get their hands on, and if I know Ed, there will be plenty of everyone’s drug of choice to go round. His parties are legendary. The police won’t come near this yacht. Ed practically owns them. Which means that the select, privileged few can get away with anything for one night. I can get away with anything. I’m salivating with all the dark thoughts running through my head. Tonight, one way or another, Sin will finally be mine.
35
LUCINDA
Iwas in love with Joshua Nix once. A long time ago, I dreamed about a night like this. Being in his arms at some swanky party was all I wanted, but now I’m here, everything about it feels ominous. The gentle sway of the boat has me unsure of myself and one wrong step could find me in the river. I can’t swim. One of the many things that I’m sure people will expect me to be able to do, but I can’t. The night air is cold as Josh leads me outside. Maybe wearing Mercier’s dress wasn’t the best idea after all. A revenge dress is no good as a floatation device and there’s barely enough fabric in it to stop the wind howling around my bare thighs.
“Where are we going?” I’ve never been on a yacht. Another expectation of me that isn’t real. Every step feels like I’m going to tip right over the side. Or maybe I’m just scared that Josh will push me. He’s been acting strange and aloof all night, not that I know any other behavior from him.
