Page 123 of Hell Hath No Fury
INHERITANCE
AMELIA WILDE
CHAPTER ONE
Charlotte
Mason’s side of the bed is cold.
I know that almost before I’m fully conscious. I’m not cold. I’m as cozy as I’ve ever been. He shut the bedroom door behind us and took me directly to the ottoman in front of the fireplace. Do not pass GO. Do not collect two hundred dollars. Do not do anything but get railed by your husband.
Okay,that’sdirty. I turn my flushed cheeks into the pillow, suppressing a giggle. Which is strange. I’m no longer an innocent young girl. I’m a grown woman, but I didn’t realize how falling in love would change me. I didn’t know that I’d continue to have a massive crush on my husband after we got married. It’s been especially powerful since I got pregnant. I can’t get enough of him.
I feel swoony at the sight of his body.
Which he didn’t let me see much of tonight, courtesy of the blindfold.
Fine. He didn’tjustfuck me. He did other things first.
So I feel good.Reallygood. Sexed-up and warm-in-bed good. Not everything is sunshine and roses with Mason’s family lately, so I’m a little guilty for feeling this good.
Not sunshine and roses? That’s an understatement.
Today was Gabriel’s birthday. This family loves parties. They love giant birthday cakes. They love get togethers. It’s a tight-knit love. And yet this day was marked by… absence. ApparentlyGabriel refuses to have his birthday celebrated. No gathering. Not even a private family dinner.
I haven’t always gotten along with the middle Hill brother. He was suspicious of me when Mason and I got together, and honestly, he had every right to be.
My dad played a huge role in ruining his family.
But we’ve made peace. It’s clear he loves his family. It’s clear he was only trying to protect Mason.
And at the weekly Hill family brunches, he’s usually charming and funny and wry.
He didn’t come to brunch today. He insists on spending the day alone.
Completely alone.
Elise stopped by a little while after we were finished eating, but she seemed distracted.
Thinking about Gabriel, probably. The two of them have a strange, complicated attraction.
I sit up in bed, smiling at the secret twinges inside my body from a long night of lovemaking.
One of Mason’s T-shirts is at the end of the bed, and I tug it on. I’m not showing yet. Not at all. But my body feels different. Loose clothes are like heaven. Anything tight or constricting is…
Well, notactualhell. I’m just more sensitive to it, I guess. I’m more sensitive to everything. Including the fact that his side of the bed lost his heat.
I pad through the house. Mason lives in a penthouse overlooking Central Park. I live here, too, obviously. I’m still getting used to the idea that it’s mine. I spent a long time fighting tooth and nail to keep my parents’ house from going into foreclosure. The run-down mansion, emptied of most of our things, was all I had to callmine.
It was worth it, in the end. After my father died, I helped my mother sell the house. Because of the work I’d done—and anupswing in the housing market that came at just the right time—she was able to cover her remaining debts and buy a small place in the city.
I didn’t tell her that Mason was the one who bought the house. Initially, I told him he should tear it down. Wipe away all the bad memories. Build something smaller there. I told him I didn’t care.
Then one day, he asked me to go for a drive with him. At first, I didn’t know where we were going. The house Mason used to live in isn’t far from where I grew up. I thought he might be taking me there.
Instead, we turned into my old driveway and went through the front gates.
I was astonished at the driveway alone. All the cobblestones that were the bane of my existence had been taken up, and the long circle drive had been repaved with smooth asphalt. The trees had been trimmed. A circular garden had been planted in the stretch of lawn in front of the house.
