Chapter 7: Call It a Breakup Fuck 🌶️🌶️🌶️

Holden had spent last night out on his balcony chain-smoking until the pack ran out.

He hadn't been ready for any of this. He hadn't been ready to see Sloane Bellamy in his city, hadn't been ready to fuck her in a goddamn bathroom on instinct, hadn't been ready for any of the thinking that came after. He half-regretted what he'd done in the stall.

He'd come down here this morning to check on her. Not even with a plan. Just to look at her. And the second he'd parked, he'd seen her draped across another man like the closing scene of a film.

His eyes cut to Sullivan Ashby. Sullivan didn't blink. Held his eye and let his mouth tilt up, slow, all teeth.

"Got a problem with that, Mr. Ashworth?"

Sloane glanced between them. The temperature in the parking deck had dropped about ten degrees. They were a heartbeat from the kind of confrontation that ended up on a society blog by morning.

She slid her arm through Sullivan's and squeezed. Pitched her voice up sweet. "Sullivan. Granddad's waiting. We have to go."

Sullivan let his eyelids drop, tossed Holden a sideways look.

"That's right. Granddad's waiting to meet his future granddaughter-in-law."

He didn't even spare Holden another glance. He took Sloane's hand and walked her out of the garage.

Holden stood there and watched them go until they were gone. He could feel the tendons in his fingers locking. The blood behind his eyes hammered.

She'd been screaming his name in a stall less than twelve hours ago. Now she didn't even look at him.

Sloane Bellamy. Truly something.

The Ashby Estate was a Tudor-style mansion on the North Shore — all slate roofs and walled gardens, the kind of property that had been in one family since before the Civil War. Granddad Ashby had thrown the eightieth on the grounds and invited every old-money name in Chicago, plus a few from St. Louis and Indianapolis who still sent Christmas cards. The man liked his crowds.

Sloane followed Sullivan into the main hall and the room cut its volume in half. Every head turned to look at the eldest Ashby grandson and the woman behind him.

The interior was old-Federal money — dark wood paneling, an original oil painting of the family patriarch over the mantel, three-tier crystal chandelier dripping over a center receiving room. Fresh white roses spilling out of every crystal vase. The whole top tier of Chicago society, the ones who knew each other's portfolios down to the cent, were standing in twos and threes, drinks in hand, sniffing for gossip the way they sniffed for trades.

Sullivan took her hand and pulled her toward the main chair. She walked through the whispers without flinching.

"Sullivan," she said quietly, "is Hadley going to be here?"

He hesitated for half a beat. The mask stayed on. "Yes. She's coming to meet the woman I picked over her."

Granddad Ashby was sitting in a tall mahogany chair by the fireplace, snowy white hair, sharp blue eyes, posture like a man twenty years younger. He looked up when they came over, and his whole face creased into delight.

"There he is. There's my boy."

Sullivan dropped into a half-crouch beside the old man's knee, the way he hadn't dropped at anyone's knee in a decade. "Granddad, I missed you."

Granddad Ashby ruffled his grandson's hair, laughing. "Damn kid. Where you been hiding for a year?"

"Yeah, Sully," Vivian Cole — Sullivan's aunt by marriage — chimed in, "your granddad's been wasting away missing you."

Sullivan smiled at his aunt. Then he stood, took Sloane's hand, and pulled her forward.

"Granddad, this is the one I told you about. Sloane Bellamy. She's mine."

Sloane was a beat behind. She caught up, smoothed her face into something polite and composed.

"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Ashby."

Before Granddad Ashby could answer, Vivian had stepped over and taken Sloane's hand. She pulled Sloane an arm's length away and looked her up and down, the way only a woman from a certain kind of family knew how — appreciative, and also calibrating.

"My God, Sullivan. She's a stunner." She glanced over her shoulder at Granddad, then at Sullivan. "No wonder he kept turning down everyone I introduced him to. He had this hidden away."

Sloane stayed quiet, smiled the smile she'd been practicing.

Granddad Ashby looked at her for a moment longer. He'd had her vetted six different ways the moment Sullivan had first mentioned her name. Nothing on her record. And the woman in front of him had the kind of bone structure his late wife had had, plus a quiet about her. He liked her.

He didn't believe in marrying for mergers. Mergers were for boardrooms.

He gave Vivian a small nod. Vivian patted Sloane's hand and floated off into the next room.

"Folks couldn't make it back from the coast in time," Granddad Ashby said. "Marcus and the rest. Today's a small thing. But while we have you here — let's do the welcome gift right."

Sullivan moved a half-step closer. He looped his pinky around hers behind her back. A small, casual thing. He was telling her: easy, breathe.

Vivian came back carrying an antique walnut jewelry box, mother-of-pearl inlay across the lid in a pattern of vines and birds. She handed it to Granddad Ashby. He flipped it open.

On the velvet lay a heirloom emerald-cut diamond bracelet. Eight stones in a delicate gold setting, the central stone the kind of size that only came out of a vault.

"Come here, young lady," Granddad Ashby said.

Sloane lifted her wrist. He fastened the bracelet for her himself. Her wrist was small and pale, and the stones threw light all the way up her forearm. Gorgeous.

Granddad Ashby patted her hand. His voice softened.

"Be good to him. He's a hard one to love."

She smiled. She was about to answer when there was a stir at the entrance of the room.

A polite cough at her elbow. The Ashbys' butler.

"It's the Ashworths, Mr. Ashby. The younger one."

"My apologies for the late arrival, Mr. Ashby. I hope you'll forgive me."

That voice — bored, drawling, the kind of casual that only somebody who knew he could afford to be late ever pulled off — Sloane recognized it from the parking lot.

Holden.

The room parted to make space. He walked through them at his own pace, an entire procession trailing behind him — three men in suits, each carrying a long rectangular case or a crate. He stopped six feet from Granddad Ashby's chair, lifted a hand, and let the procession set its cargo down on the floor in a row.

He'd brought enough to outfit a small museum. Sloane glanced at the boxes — paintings under dust covers, what looked like a heirloom decanter set, a leather case the right size for an antique watch — and felt her stomach turn over. The Ashworths and the Ashbys had no business with each other. There was no diplomatic reason for Holden to be standing in this hall.

He had come for her.

"Granddad Ashby, my father sends his regards. Many happy returns of the day."

Granddad Ashby couldn't quite place the connection between the two families, but a guest was a guest, and the Ashworths were the Ashworths. He smiled.

"Good of you to come, son. Stay. Eat."

Holden inclined his head.

Sloane was watching him, and he knew it. He was in a navy bespoke suit, a small silver lion lapel pin on his jacket, the late-morning light catching it. His face was a flat, unreadable thing. Last night's whole catastrophe might never have happened.

Then his eyes lifted and locked onto hers.

"Look at that. Sullivan, this is who you've been hiding."

A small, polite laugh from the front of the room. Sloane's spine went cold. She'd known he hadn't come here for the cake.

Vivian, useful as ever, leapt in. "You two know each other, Mr. Ashworth?"

Holden's mouth tipped up. "No, ma'am. Just crossed paths a couple of times."

Sullivan stared at him, dead-eyed. "Always so thoughtful."

Sullivan settled an arm around Sloane's shoulders, squeezed. "Granddad, I'm going to take Sloane outside for a minute. Show her the gardens."

Granddad Ashby waved them off. They got two steps before Holden bowed at the waist toward the old man.

"Then I'll get out of your way too, sir. Excuse me."

Sullivan walked her out the French doors and down the gravel path to the gazebo by the koi pond. Once they were out of earshot, he stopped, leaned a hip against the gazebo railing, and gave her a long, sideways look.

She pretended not to notice. "What?"

He arched a brow. "Are you really not getting it, or are you pretending."

"What."

He picked up a Granny Smith from the basket on the gazebo bench and tossed it lightly between his hands. "My family and his family don't speak. Today — that whole circus he just walked in here with — that was for you. Your ex is a romantic."

She didn't answer.

He sighed, took a bite of the apple. "Sloane. You don't deserve this much trouble." He leaned in and breathed warm against her ear. "But you're mine now."

She held still and looked at him. Said nothing.

A man in a black suit came hurrying out from the house, murmured something in Sullivan's ear, then stepped back to wait.

Sullivan chewed his apple. "I have to go play host. If you don't want to be in there, stay out here and walk around. I'll come find you."

She smiled. She brushed her hair off her shoulder, set her hands on his lapels, pretended to fix his tie. She leaned in close and pressed her mouth to the white of his collar, deliberately leaving a smear of her lipstick there for the room to see when he walked back in.

"Don't be too long."

She let him go.

Once he was gone, the gazebo was very quiet. Cicadas. The koi flicking in the pond. She wandered off down the path, plucked a long blade of grass, twirled it between her fingers.

Today she was a prop. Sullivan needed a girlfriend on his arm so Granddad would stop trying to lock him into a merger marriage with the Whitlock daughter. He needed someone who wouldn't get attached. She fit the bill.

She rubbed her thumb over the diamond bracelet on her wrist and felt a small mean twist of guilt. The man was eighty years old. He'd just told her to be good to his grandson. And she was wearing a bracelet that would never belong to her, given to her under false pretenses, while the man who'd actually broken her heart was three rooms away making a scene.

She kept walking. The gravel turned to flagstone under her heels, and the flagstone curved between the rose bushes toward the back of the property where the old grotto was. Cicadas vibrated in the green. The day was too bright.

She got to the mouth of the grotto when an arm slid around her waist and yanked her sideways.

She lost her footing, hit the stone wall of the grotto with a dull thud, and a familiar smell of cedar and tobacco closed over her.

He pinned her wrists above her head with one hand. The other went flat against her hip. He pressed her into the rock and put his mouth at the back of her neck.

"Sloane." His voice was wrecked. Slurred. He bit her neck, careful of the marks already there. "So you're the future Ashby granddaughter-in-law now, are you?"

She struggled. Got nowhere. "Holden. Let go."

"Mm. No."

He nipped at her earlobe and dragged it slow between his teeth, a perfect imitation of how he'd been inside her last night.

Her knees softened.

"Sloane. You let me fuck you yesterday and you're meeting his family today? Is that the move?"

She was breathless and angry. "Why the hell shouldn't it be? Just consider it a breakup fuck."

He went still against her. Then his hand came up and cupped her jaw, tipped her face sideways, made her look at him.

"What if I don't accept that?"

She panted, glaring up. He had her wrists pinned and his body was a wall. There wasn't air in the grotto. "Why the hell do you get to accept or not accept anything that has to do with my life?"

He licked her lower lip. The smile he gave her was lazy and mean.

"Show me a little of the wild girl I remember. Let me fuck you one more time. Then I'll accept it."

She glared at him.

"You're just trying to fuck me again."

He laughed, low. "Yeah, baby."