Flawed

  When we get to the bed, he takes his time sliding me down his body to the mattress. Once he lets me go, I expect it to get easier to think—to breathe. But then his fingers—long and elegant and just a little rough—are on the bare skin of my knee, my calf, as he arranges my leg on the pillow.

  “Comfortable?” he asks, after a minute, and his voice is husky, jagged. Just a little off.

  “Yeah. Thanks.”

  “Good.” He backs up a couple of steps, nods toward the door. “I’m going to go get some sleep. I was up all night and I’m about to drop.”

  “Oh right. Thanks again. For everything.”

  “No problem. You can hide out here for a couple of days, until the press dies down and you’re ready to go back to your real life.”

  This is it, the opening I’ve been looking for. This is my chance to tell him that I can’t go back, that my father has completely cut me off from the only life I’ve ever known. But even as I open my mouth to explain everything, I can’t get the words past my too-tight throat. Miles made it very clear in the kitchen that I’m already a fuckup in his mind. The last thing I want to do is make it worse.

  It shouldn’t matter what he thinks of me, and God knows I don’t want it to matter. But for some reason it does. Which is why I just nod when I should speak, just look at him when I should be explaining everything.

  “Do you need anything before I go to sleep?” he asks after a second. “Maybe something to drink?”

  “No.” I finally force the word out. “I’m good. Besides, I’m not an invalid. If I get thirsty, I can get it myself.”

  “You should stay off that foot as much as possible. At least for today. Give the butterfly bandages a chance to work.” He nods at the nightstand table, where the remote control for the TV is resting. “Watch some television or something. But no gossip shows. You don’t need that.”

  I groan because of course Alexander and I will have made E! and God only knows what else. “I definitely won’t be channel surfing.”

  Miles must believe me, because he doesn’t say anything else. Just gives me a wry smile and a little wave before ducking out the door.

  And then I’m alone, with nothing to keep me company but the million and one recriminations currently ripping through my brain.

  Why did I even go to that stupid party last night?

  Why did I talk to Alexander?

  How did I not know he had a sex tape of us?

  And maybe the worst thought yet, why didn’t I just sleep with him?

  I hate myself for even thinking it, hate myself even more because there’s a part of me that wishes I could go back and do just that. That wishes I had brought him into my apartment and fucked him the way he expected. Fucked him the way the old Tori would have, before I started trying to clean up my act.

  I never got much pleasure from those hookups, never got much but the temporary cessation of loneliness that came from being skin-to-skin with another person. And so what if I’d have woken up this morning hating myself for going backward, for undoing all the work I’ve done these last few months? At least I’d still have a condo and a car and a phone. At least I wouldn’t be here, in last night’s party dress, begging Miles to have sympathy for me.

  Just the idea makes my skin crawl. I hate begging anyone for anything, hate even more the idea of being dependent on someone. Yeah, technically my father paid for my lifestyle while I looked for a job, but it was my trust fund that really paid—a trust fund that was set up for me by my grandmother and that legally became mine over two years ago. The fact that there’s also a loophole in it—one that says he oversees it until I’m thirty and therefore is technically within his rights to take it all away—doesn’t make the money any less mine.

  In theory, anyway. In practice, it’s totally not mine because if it were, I sure as hell wouldn’t be sitting on this bed trying to figure out what the hell to do.

  I glance down at myself, see the pink dress for perhaps the millionth time this morning. And suddenly, just like that, I can’t stand it touching me for one more second. Any more than I can stand the fact that Alexander had his hands all over this dress—all over my body—minutes before he leaked the video that would ruin both my life and whatever self-esteem I’ve managed to build up these last months.

  I left my bag downstairs, of course I did, but I know that Chloe—or, let’s be real here, Ethan—keeps a robe in each of the guest room closets for people to use. It’s not ideal, but it’s good enough for me. Hell, a towel from the bathroom is good enough for me at this point if it means I get to take this stupid dress off.

  With that thought in mind, I push myself off the bed and half hop, half hobble my way into the bathroom, where the closet is located. Sure enough, there’s a long white robe hanging at the front of the closet. I grab it and hobble back toward the bedroom. But halfway there, I glance at the mirror and shit. Just shit. I’m still wearing last night’s makeup, though most of it is pooled under my eyes or running halfway down my cheek.

  Jesus. It’s a miracle Miles could even look at me with a straight face. All of a sudden the dress seems the least of my problems.

  Embarrassed, annoyed, horrified, I hop over to the sink. Then all but drown myself as I splash handful after handful of water onto my face.

  Eventually all traces of mascara and thick black liner disappear, as do the remnants of foundation and fuchsia lipstick. But that just means I’m left with myself when I look in the mirror. With plain old Victoria with her too-pale skin and her too-brown eyes.

  My mom always bemoaned my eyes when I was growing up, always told me how she wished they were cornflower blue like her own. I used to obsess about it when I was younger, like some white, uptown version of Toni Morrison’s Pecola Breedlove. I even got colored contacts in high school, hoping to please her. But it turns out that fake blue eyes are worse than real brown ones, at least in my mother’s book, and in the end I had to settle for the knowledge that she knew how genetics worked. If she’d wanted a blue-eyed baby so badly, then perhaps she shouldn’t have married a man with brown eyes, no matter how thick his wallet was.

  When my face is finally clean, I dry myself off with one of the towels hanging next to the sink, then hobble back into the bedroom, the robe clenched in my hands. I drop it on the bed, then start the awkward twisting and turning that’s necessary to pull down the back zipper of my dress.

  It takes a minute, but I finally get the little tab pulled down enough that I can slide the dress off my torso and over my hips. I’m just stepping out of it—clad in nothing but a pair of hot-pink panties—when the door to my room opens without warning.

  And I’m left staring straight into Miles’s wide sapphire-blue eyes.

  Chapter 8

  Miles

  Fuck, she’s beautiful. It’s the first thought that runs through my head as I stare straight at Tori’s naked body.

  I mean, sure, it’s no secret that she’s a hot, sexy woman—her bright, brash, in-your-face looks are one of the first things anyone notices about her. But looking at her now, seeing the creaminess of her skin, the light-pink tips of her breasts, the bold patterns of the ink that decorates so much of her torso—she’s breathtaking. Spellbinding. Impossible to look away from, no matter how much my manners are screaming at me to do just that.

  I expect her to gasp, to cover herself, but this is Tori, the woman who gives as good as she gets. Who doesn’t back down. Who may retreat for a little while but who doesn’t know the meaning of the word surrender. Which is why—despite what I expect her to do—I’m not actually surprised when all she does is stand there staring back at me, shoulders straight and chin lifted in obvious defiance.

  “See anything you like?” she asks after several seconds pass and neither of us moves.

  After my first involuntary sweep of her body, I keep my eyes pinned to hers. “I thought you were going to stay off that foot.”

  “I thought you knew how to knock.” She quirks a brow. “Guess we were
both wrong.”

  Without breaking eye contact with me, she reaches toward the bed and picks up a long white cotton robe identical to the one I found hanging in my closet when I first moved in. She shrugs into it, belts it loosely at the waist.

  I’d be lying to myself if I said I wasn’t sorry to see all that gorgeous skin of hers covered up, even though it makes it a lot easier for me to think—and breathe—now that her small, perfect breasts are no longer on display.

  “I brought your bag,” I tell her, dropping the duffel bag she’d left in the foyer at her feet. “And Chloe’s slippers, as promised.” I hold up the fluffy pink things.

  “Oh right. Thanks.” She takes a step toward me, but I close the distance before she can, settling one hand on her lower back as I guide her deliberately toward the bed. As I do, I try not to think about how much I’d like to tumble her onto that bed.

  About how much I’d like to unknot her sash and slip that robe from her shoulders.

  About how much I’d like to drop to my knees in front of her, spread her legs, and eat her out until she comes on my tongue at least twice.

  Because I suddenly do want all that—way more than I should—I bend over and put the slippers next to her feet. Take a deliberate step back. Then another and another. She’s here because some asshole just abused her trust. The last thing she needs is for a man she despises to make a play for her, too. I may be a jerk, but I’ve got enough class not to put my hands on a woman who obviously doesn’t want me to. No matter how hard it is to keep my eyes off the delectable sliver of skin showing between the lapels of her robe.

  “Is there anything else you need?” I ask as I move abruptly back toward the door.

  She shakes her head, her eyes gleaming with an amusement that says she knows exactly how hard it is for me to ignore the sudden hardening of my dick. “I think I’m going to lie down, try to take a little nap. I didn’t sleep well last night, and this morning has been a total shit show.”

  She stretches then, and her robe falls off her shoulder, exposing more creamy skin and gorgeous ink. And that’s when I turn tail and run. A man only has so much self-control, after all, and I’ve always had a thing for ink on skin. Especially when the ink—and the woman it’s decorating—are as bold and beautiful as Tori is.

  Her husky laugh follows me into the hallway and I pull the door closed a little harder than necessary.

  She despises you, I remind myself—and my dick—as I make my way down the hallway to my own room. Not to mention the fact that she’s feeling vulnerable and alone right now. The last thing she needs is her best friend’s brother suddenly getting a fucking hard-on for her.

  I repeat the words like a mantra as I head into my room. It should work—I’ve never been one to lust after a woman I can’t have—but there’s something about the way she was looking at me, something about the wicked little twist of her lips at the end there—that gets me going despite my best intentions.

  I need to sleep, but my dick is way too hard for that right now. It’s way too hard for anything but fucking right now, if I’m being honest, and since that’s not an option I walk into the bathroom and turn on the shower. Then I step in without waiting for it to warm up.

  The brutal cold hits me hard, has my head ducking and my shoulders hunching in in an effort to protect myself. It does nothing to calm my suddenly raging erection, however, and as the water finally warms up I brace my forearm against the shower wall and wrap my hand around my dick.

  As I begin to stroke, slow and steady, images of Tori flash through my head.

  Tori all dressed up in that hot-pink dress and those crazy high heels, her leg wrapped around my thigh and her body pressed to mine.

  Tori stretched out on one of the chaise longues around the pool downstairs, her chocolate-brown eyes covered by thousand-dollar sunglasses and her million-dollar body uncovered by the skimpiest black bathing suit I’ve ever seen in person.

  Tori in tight jeans and a tank top, hair a sexy multicolor and ink glowing on her shoulders.

  And lastly, Tori standing in the middle of that bedroom in nothing but a pair of hot-pink panties, her dress around her ankles and nipples peaked and hard.

  Fuck. It’s that image that does it, that revs me up and has me working myself harder and faster. For a moment I think about sucking her nipples, about pulling one and then the other into my mouth and sucking until they’re red and swollen and diamond-hard. Until she’s crying out and clutching at me, her body convulsing on my fingers.

  Shit. Fuck. Damn. She’s so fucking hot. So fucking gorgeous, with the elaborate roses tattooed across her shoulders. I can’t believe how hot she’s gotten me or how much I’d give to be touching her right now instead of myself. To be slipping my hands over her breasts and down her stomach. To be licking my way along her ink. To be sliding my fingers through her slick folds to play with her clit until she comes screaming my name.

  Fuck. Heat slams through me at the thought, pools at the base of my spine and licks along every nerve ending. My dick is aching, my balls burning, and I speed up my strokes even more, tugging harder and faster as I imagine putting my mouth, my hands, my cock on Tori. As I imagine coming in her hand, between her breasts, in her pussy, on her lips.

  It’s the last image that fucking gets me, that revs me up and sends me careening over the edge of an orgasm that is both brutal and all-consuming. I come hard and long, pleasure tearing through me as hot water beats down on my bowed head and shoulders. I come and come and come, Tori’s name on my lips and her image emblazoned on my brain.

  When it’s over, I slump against the cold tile of the shower wall and struggle to steady myself. To get my breath back. It’s harder than it should be and for long seconds I just stand there, forcing my weak knees to carry me. Forcing myself not to think about Tori on her knees in front of me, her full red lips wrapped around my cock.

  I don’t know how long I stand there, but it’s long enough for my legs to steady and for the water to run cold again. Shivering, I do a quick wash, then shut the water off and climb out.

  After drying off and pulling on a pair of athletic shorts, I check my laptop to make sure my bots are still crawling through the ’Net, searching for the video. They are, so I execute a couple of quick corruption commands to add to their seek-and-destroy mission, then crawl into bed.

  Tori isn’t the only one who needs a nap.

  But as I stretch out and close my eyes, all I can see are Tori’s melted-chocolate eyes. Her fuck-me red lips. Her beautiful, beautiful breasts.

  I roll over with a groan and punch my pillow. I don’t know what the hell is going on here, but it needs to fucking stop. Otherwise I’m going to spend the next few days in a state of perpetual exhaustion—and horniness. And frankly, I just don’t have the energy for either.

  —

  I must have fallen asleep eventually, because the next time I open my eyes, the clock beside the bed reads three fifteen. There’s an annoying noise buzzing next to my head and I’m still groggy and disoriented enough that it takes me a few seconds to register the sound as coming from my smartphone. It takes a few seconds more to register that the vibration means it’s ringing.

  I reach for it with a groan, mumble hello without even checking to see who it is. But then, I don’t really have to. I’ve been expecting this phone call all day.

  “Thank God you picked up!” Sure enough, it’s my sister, sounding more stressed and frantic than I’ve heard her since the whole debacle went down with Ethan’s brother, Brandon, last year. “I need you to do me a favor. I need you to go check on Tori. Have you seen the Internet? Of course you’ve seen it,” she continues, answering her own question. “I’ve been trying to get ahold of her all day, but she’s not answering my texts or calls. I even tried to message her on Facebook and I got nothing.”

  “That’s because she’s taking a nap. The whole fiasco of today really wore her out.”

  “Of course it did. The whole thing is a nightmare. I swear
, if I could get my hands on Alexander Parsons right now I would—hey, wait. How do you know she’s taking a nap? Are you with her?”

  I’m not sure if I’m insulted or amused by how surprised my little sister sounds. “Yeah. She showed up here a few hours ago, looking for someplace to get away from the reporters. She didn’t know I was living here.” I do my best to keep my voice neutral, but there’s a part of me that wonders if there’s a reason my sister didn’t tell her best friend I was staying in her house. Like, maybe she’s ashamed of trying to build some kind of relationship with me because of our shit past.

  I would never blame her for it if that was the reason. After everything she’s been through, she deserves to let me into her life as much or as little as she pleases. I’m just grateful she’s forgiven me for my part in what happened.

  But just because I’m grateful, just because I understand her reticence, doesn’t mean it doesn’t also hurt a little. She was my baby sister for a lot of years, and for a lot of years it was my job to look out for her, to protect her. Often it wasn’t easy, as she somehow felt the same way about me, and the fact that I blew it so spectacularly is something that will haunt me for the rest of my life.

  “She didn’t?” Chloe sounds surprised. “I’m sure she was at dinner a few weeks ago when we discussed you moving in. She must have been playing with Violet or something. Anyway, how is she? It’s not like her to dodge me like this. The rest of the world, yes. But me, no.”

  “I told you, she’s worn out. I’ve been sleeping for the last few hours, but the last I heard she was planning on taking a nap. Do you want me to go wake her up?”

  “No, let her rest. Why should I make her wake up and face this mess any sooner than she absolutely has to?”

  That’s pretty much my thinking, too. Still, I feel honor-bound to tell her, “Tori’ll be okay. She was shaken when she got here, obviously, but there’s a core of steel under there. She’ll get through this.”