His hand pressed on me harder, and his eyes flashed. “If you think I’m waiting for tonight, you’re mistaken.”

  I had to stop, lean against Kash for a second. His hand smoothed down to my hip before sliding up my back, and he caught my nape. He held me still, positioning my head back, and he dropped a kiss to my mouth. He held me there, his lips demanding over mine, but then he groaned. His body tightened, and he forced himself to lift up again.

  “You make me want to forget the world.” His lips whispered kisses to the corner of my mouth and up my jaw before he found the crook of my shoulder.

  I was shaking. He wasn’t alone.

  I placed a hand to his chest, needing to help hold myself upright. He centered me, and his hand found mine, covering it. He lifted his head up again, a deep raw need in his depths as he raked me over again. “You okay?”

  I shook my head. I couldn’t talk. I knew what I had to do.

  He started forward.

  But then I did. I knew exactly what to say.

  “Wait.” I pulled him back.

  He faced me completely, and I spoke low, because I wasn’t going to repeat myself.

  “You and me, tonight, you’re not driving anymore.”

  His eyebrows pinned together.

  “We’re talking, and when I say ‘talking,’ I’m referring to using our vocal cords to make sounds that can string along sentences.” I stepped close, my hand on his chest. I felt him stiffen, but I wasn’t done. “If you and me are going to be a you and me, we’re actually going to be a you and me. That means you talking, me talking, you listening, me listening. Equal. Got it?”

  And I didn’t wait. This time, I led the way outside.

  FIFTY-THREE

  There were people everywhere. They were wealthy, privileged, powerful, and I was officially freaking. Forget that they were here for me, though I knew that was just the excuse. When Peter Francis threw a party, people came. That was the sentiment I felt, and I knew it was true as I saw three politicians, a mega pop star that I was fangirling over inside, and—oh boy—a queen of a television network. She was laughing with a group of television anchors and my mom.

  My mom?

  I stopped walking. Kash stepped next to me, following my gaze.

  He chuckled, but it was strained. He hadn’t said a word about my “talk” to him. “Why am I not surprised to see Chrissy Hayes fitting in like she owns this house?”

  I threw him back a frown. “Speaking of that, have you gotten a feel on the dynamics between her and my dad? And Quinn? They’ve all been tight-lipped about letting any of that out. It’s weird.”

  He shrugged, tugging me forward now.

  A server went by with champagne, strawberries inside, and I snagged two. I wasn’t even going to pretend I got the other one for Kash. He wouldn’t drink, so call me Two-Hands Fister. It was my party. I could drink if I wanted to.

  “I think there’s history between the two that neither wants to talk about,” he said.

  As soon as people started noticing us, conversations quieted. Eyes turned to track us. One would think they were watching me. Nope. I wasn’t buying it. All those gazes were on Kash, then dipping to his hand, which was now on my back as, yep, I was holding both of my champagne glasses. Classy.

  I could fix that. I quickly drank one of the glasses.

  Kash was pulling me over to where Matt was sitting. He was with his usual group of friends, sitting on the lounge chairs by a glass-enclosed fire pit. Matt jerked his head up in a nod, grinning as we drew nearer. He moved to meet us, separating from his group, and one of his hands went into his tuxedo pocket. “You two look fucking smashing.” His eyes were twinkling. He looked me over. “Shit, Bailes. You look hot, even for a sister of mine.” His lips tugged further upward and he motioned around the entire backyard. The party tables were set up on the bricked patio, behind the mausoleum, but the people had spread so they were standing on the greens that were a part of the estate’s private golf course. A few even were on the basketball court, and I saw a couple kids running around shooting hoops at the far end. Cyclone was with them.

  Seraphina was standing in a group of other girls. I made a mental note to find out the names of each and every one of them. I remembered the online journal I hacked from Seraphina’s account. It hadn’t boded well then, and it boded even less now.

  Big protective sister was here to stay.

  We stayed with Matt and his friends, friends who were very keen and interested and now suddenly all wanting to be friendly with me. Shocker. They were also noticing the hand that Kash kept on my back.

  I liked how we were.

  I wasn’t leaning on him. He wasn’t claiming me. He didn’t pull me to his side, but he was next to me. There was some space between us, but his hand was behind me in case I needed him. It was almost perfect.

  Matt sometimes stood on my other side, sometimes maneuvered in front of us so it was the three of us and his back was keeping everyone else out. Sometimes he just moved aside and grinned when people came over to “meet” me.

  It was his friends first.

  Fleur and the third girl in her trio with Victoria were next, though no V.

  I figured Victoria was around somewhere.

  Torie and Tamara were at the snack table, then at the edge of our circle. They were laughing with Chester and Tony. Torie glanced over at one point, sharing a look with Kash before skimming to me and giving me a smile. She tipped back her champagne glass and turned back to whatever Guy was saying. He had replaced Chester at some point.

  The more time passed, like a clock ticking off every second, the more tense I grew. I hadn’t moved out of our spot, but I knew it was coming. Then it came.

  Conversations quieted as Peter nodded hello to the outer circle first, moving toward where Matt, Kash, and I stood.

  He paused, looking uncertain for the first time. His eyebrows dipped together. He raked a look over Matthew, then Kash, and coming last to me. His lips thinned and he settled his shoulders back. His head rose a centimeter and he cleared his throat.

  “Are you ready?”

  Matt stepped back, glancing to Kash, who moved forward.

  Kash asked, “For what?”

  Peter looked to him. “I was going to introduce her to people.” He paused, just the slightest of pauses, dropping his voice low. “You know I have to.”

  “You don’t have to do a thing.”

  Peter pressed his lips together, the exhaustion coming from him for the first time. I noticed an extra line of bags under his eyes. “I do, actually. It’s the only way to make it right, for her. You want something long-term with her, you know this will make things easier. If I don’t walk around with my daughter, at a party for my daughter, it’ll look like I don’t want them to address her as my daughter.” He kept giving Kash a meaningful look each time he said that phrase.

  His head lifted again. “Networking isn’t something I enjoy, and I know you hate it, but it’s a necessity. It might not be for you and where you are going to be in the hierarchy, but Bailey’s not that lucky—or unlucky, however you prefer to see it. If I don’t walk around with her on my arm, she’ll look like an embarrassment and”—his eyes flickered to mine—“she’s anything but an embarrassment.”

  Now he turned right to me, focusing on me, only me. “This is overdue. She deserves this respect.”

  Tears.

  My throat was swelling up.

  This was not boding well for me.

  I needed a joke. Stat.

  Matt grinned, seeing my predicament, and leaned in. “Yeah, sis. Don’t choke. Suck it down. Be a Quinn.”

  Peter threw him a disgusted look, his eyes flaring. “Are you kidding—”

  Matt gestured to me with his drink. “It worked.”

  A laugh burst from me, and I was coughing, trying to get the rest of those annoying things out of me. I was damn near hacking. Could not process. Could not think, feel. It was robot time.

  I touched Kash’s arm, not surprised at how tense he was. “It’s just a roundabout, then I’ll be back.”

  His scowl never left his face, but his eyes flashed over my shoulder to Dad. “Don’t introduce me.”

  Introduce Kash? Then I saw what he meant.

  Peter—I was adjusting here. Dad/Peter … I was going with Peter now—nodded, saying, “Fine.”

  My dad/Peter, myself, and Kash behind me.

  My dad introduced me to people. Some, I tried not to swoon, because—hello—they were huge names. It was the ones in the tech world that had my knees buckling. A couple government officials and the few celebrities, they had my stomach all fluttering, but they didn’t pack the punch of the cyber conglomerates.

  My dad introduced me, drawing me forward to the circles. I shook hands, kept a nice smile on my face, and every second question I was asked, I responded with one in the same vein.

  Everyone was nice, but I wasn’t the only reason they had come. As soon as the introduction was done, and sometimes before it even started, their eyes trailed behind my shoulder.

  They all wanted to know Kash.

  A few tried. The government officials tried to reach out for a handshake, but Peter moved in with a question or a comment and the attention was diverted.

  When we were done, I snagged my fifth champagne. I was heading left. Peter grabbed me and veered right, and I heard Matthew snorting somewhere behind me. I tried to throw him a glare, but then Peter was leading me to my absolute nightmare.

  I should have been prepared. I was prepared.

  I knew this was going to happen, hence the five champagnes, but then everyone was being moved farther down the backyard. Peter was leading me to the top of the patio/deck area, so—gulp—it was like we were on a stage.

  This. Right here. Worst nightmare ever.

  I so wasn’t prepared.

  I was suddenly realizing how much I hated attention—like, dreaded it. Like I made an entire career plan so I wouldn’t get attention. Ever. And here I was. I was also remembering the benefits of not being known as Peter Francis’s daughter. Yeah, yeah. I couldn’t have it both ways, being claimed as his daughter and not getting attention. It was what it was. But I could gripe about it, couldn’t I? So I was griping. Actually, I was drinking. I was almost done with my fifth champagne, and as Peter was talking, a microphone was placed in his hand—did we really need that?—and I was trying to catch the eye of a nearby server. Refills, sir. Refills.

  “… are moments in life that we will always remember, and the day I heard I had another daughter was one of them.”

  I was clueing in, and I saw how Peter stood to the side, a smile on his face, no sparkle in his eyes, and the microphone in front of his mouth. He was grandstanding. He was making a show here. This was supposed to be just an announcement, just to tell them who I was and how happy he was that I was a part of his life. That wasn’t what he was doing.

  He was lying.

  He’d been told from the beginning.

  My hand clenched my champagne glass and I fought to keep from weaving on my feet, but he was lying. I hated that. Detested it. It wasn’t one of my big rules. I was pretty lenient on the whole being-fake charade. But right now, hearing the father who hadn’t acknowledged me in forever now acting like I was this big, grand surprise to him—I was gritting my teeth.

  I wanted to tear into him, rip that mic out of his hands, and tell everyone the truth.

  He kept on, so damn smooth. “She wrote to my office, and we didn’t take her seriously.” A har-har-har laugh from him. The crowd joined in, thinking he was hilarious.

  What was going on here?

  He was kind, then kind again, attentive even, and now this? I was not following a thing, not at all. Nothing was making sense to me.

  My blood was starting to simmer.

  His eyes hardened, seeing my confusion, but he kept his voice so light and happy. How did he do that?

  He was saying, turning back to the crowd behind him, “And then we realized that she truly was my daughter, and no one could imagine the whirlwind that happened after that.”

  Damn, he was good. He almost sounded sincere.

  The simmering was moving to the next stage.

  His voice was low, husky even. “We had hoped for some privacy while we got to know each other, but it’s time now.” He turned, facing everyone, his free hand holding up his champagne. “Join with me as I toast, as the entire Francis family now has one more member, my daughter.” He turned back, his eyes warming, now being genuine, and he blinked back a tear. His voice broke into the microphone, but it only added to a swoon effect. I saw some of the women wiping away tears of their own.

  I shot past the boiling stage. There were flames.

  “Welcome, Bailey. I want the world to know about you. I want the world to love you as much as I already do.” And then he couldn’t say any more. A second tear was sliding down his face, and his Adam’s apple was bobbing up and down as he tried to control his emotions.

  He just stopped.

  He sighed, raised his glass up, everyone else raising their own, and he was beaming at me as he took a drink.

  Lies. All the fucking lies. I was sick of them.

  A cheer rose up from below us, then Peter was moving toward me. He wrapped me in his arms, hugging me, and he whispered into my ear, out of everyone’s sight, “I had to keep with the script our publicist gave me, but I meant every word. I already do love you, and I am so happy that you came to us, even if it was in an unorthodox way.” He pressed a hand to the back of my head as I resisted, but shit. I was weak.

  I hugged him back.

  I felt the emotion rippling through him, and damn if that didn’t do something to me. I was melting, so I pulled back. “Thank you.” It was all I could get out.

  He blinked away a tear, then someone called his name and he stepped away.

  How fitting.

  FIFTY-FOUR

  “You were supposed to never be a problem.”

  A chill went down my back and I turned. I was standing on the back patio, a bit of food in my stomach, so the full buzz I’d felt earlier was just a nice, small tickle. We were into the night hours, though I’d lost track of time. Everyone was having a good time, myself included. It wasn’t something I’d expected, but I wasn’t stopping it, either. The publicists’ lying speech aside, I’d been moved by how moved Peter had been at the end, and that feeling stuck.

  And I let it.

  Cyclone was still running loose with his friends. I saw Seraphina giggling with her friends. I still wanted to look into them, but she seemed happy that night. Chrissy was in full flirt mode, an older man and her had been sitting at the same table for the last hour. I’d never seen her laugh so much, so I was enjoying it.

  Kash even relaxed.

  Matt’s group had gone inside for a while but then returned a half hour ago. They took up residence around the same bonfire as earlier. All were sitting, lounging. The fire was going, the flames licking over the crystal rocks inside. Drinks had been flowing. Laughter as well. A few of the girls were around. I recognized Fleur, sitting on Matt’s lap, leaning back, with his arm around her hip to anchor her in. She kept sneaking glances at Kash, though. The third friend was on Chester’s lap. Torie and Tamara had taken off, saying their good-byes to me before letting me know they were heading to Naveah, and the rest talked about ending the night at the club, if I wanted to join.

  To say that I was surprised Quinn was the one approaching me would have been an understatement, but then I clued in to her words and all that died down. Yeah. Not so surprised now.

  She was stepping out of the open patio doors, still looking amazing. Her hair was swept up, pinned to the top of her head in a form of hair crown. Loose tendrils fell down, framing her face. Her makeup didn’t look smudged at all. With her blond hair, the light blue of her dress, she was giving me an ice queen look, and that chill just doubled when I saw the calculation in her eyes.

  She wasn’t drunk at all. Oh no. Those eyes were alert, sober, and there were plans, so many plans in them.

  I glanced over, reassuring myself that Kash was within shouting distance. She couldn’t do anything to me, not here, not with everyone so close—though the sounds of the party were still loud. The DJ had been playing for the last two hours, and trailing my gaze past her and into the house, I saw that the inside was empty for the moment.

  “I wasn’t supposed to be a problem?” I needed a drink. Right? Maybe not. Maybe I needed to have as much of my faculties as possible for this conversation, because I was feeling it wasn’t going to go well.

  “No.” She stopped next to me, turning to take in the entire backyard behind us. She lifted her head, drawing in a good breath of air, and her eyes closed for a moment. Opening them, her head held high, she turned to face me. Her side rested just so slightly against the railing behind us. Her lips tugged up, that small grin not inviting at all, and she moved even closer, dropping her voice even though no one was near enough to overhear. “Peter and I have had problems since the beginning.”

  I relaxed, slightly.

  She was confiding in me. Opening up. That was a good sign, right?

  But my gut was still tightening up, and my instincts were telling me to get away from her. Instead, I reached for the railing and held on, my hands wrapping around it.

  A soft laugh from her, and she dipped her head down. “Peter’s a cheater. Always has been, even with his first wife. Colleen wasn’t even that bad of a wife, but it didn’t matter to your father. He was an up-and-coming tech genius. Everyone in Silicon Valley wanted a part of him. Then his mother back in Saint Louis fell ill and, well, you know what happened after that. He and Colleen hadn’t ended things, but it was in the works. It was a matter of time.”

  She stopped, a hard glint coming back to her eyes. Her mouth pursed together, pinching.

  A rougher note fused with her tone. “Peter loved his mother. It devastated him when she took her last turn for the worse, and he wanted to spend more time with her. Said he’d just be out there for the time being, that nothing would change. He was going to leave Colleen.”