It was only back in the trailer after the long drive home, snugly tucked into the princess bed she’d outgrown years earlier, that theotherfeeling took root.
Survival.
It warmed her, knowing she’d outsmarted a force as terrible and ancient as the sea. It made her feel like a fighter. And as the months passed, the fear receded, leaving only the feeling of triumph—a hot blaze in her chest that fueled her through the long northeast winters, driving her right back to the shores the following year, waves nipping her toes, her nemesis whispering an invitation she could never refuse.
Charley hadn’t thought about those trips, about that feeling, in more than a decade.
But when she woke up in her late father’s Park Avenue penthouse the morning after the auction, her body still aching with desire, the memories rushed back in a blink.
Because that feeling—the undertow, the danger, the pure exhilaration of touching the edge of death and living to tell the tale—was exactly how it’d felt to be in the stranger’s arms.
In Dorian Redthorne’s arms.
And just like all those trips to the Cape, Charley found herself wanting to go back to him, forgetting the danger, remembering only the survival. The wicked rush. The desperate need to feel the blaze of heat in her chest, again and again…
In a fit of frustration, she threw off her duvet and hit the remote for the blinds, flooding her bedroom with light.
But even as the bright morning sun burned away the last of her erotic dreams, darkness crept in along the edges.
Charley glanced at the suit jacket draped over her reading chair. Rudy hadn’t said another word about Dorian last night, but her uncle was like a dog with a bone. There was no way he’d let it go—not after hearing about the Whitfield.
She had no idea what he was planning—only that hewasplanning. All Charley could do now was brace for the storm… and hope like hell she survived.
* * *
“Someonehad a good night.” Sasha breezed into the kitchen with a grin that lit up the room, her blond ponytail swishing across her shoulders. “And that someone needs to spill it, especially since she stood me up for vampire movie night.”
Charley’s cheeks burned, but she recovered quickly, forcing a playful eye-roll. “If you call schmoozing with a bunch of art stiffs a good night, I feel sorry for your future boyfriends. Sorry I didn’t text—that auction dragged on forever.”
“Are your pants hot? Like, on fire?”
“Excuse me?”
“Because you’re such a liar!” Sasha poured herself a coffee, dumping in about half the sugar bowl and enough almond creamer to turn it beige. In a singsong voice, she said, “I know your faces, Chuck. And that…” She swirled her finger in front of Charley’s eyes. “…isnotthe face of a woman who spent the night schmoozing.”
“You’re a regular private eye, aren’t you?” Charley stuck out her tongue.
“Was he cute, at least? What’d y’all do?” At the granite-topped breakfast bar, she took the seat next to Charley, stirring her coffee with trademark Sasha exuberance, spoon clinking against the mug like a bell. “I’m not leaving this room until I get the scoop—starting with the dude’s name.”
God, I need more caffeine for this conversation…
Unlike her big sister, Sasha was an open book. She talked in her sleep, sang in the shower, thought and daydreamed out loud. She dideverythingout loud, full blast, no holding back. Charley admired that about her, but it also made her feel like a total fraud. There was a lot Sasha didn’t know about Charley’s life, and as much as Charley loved her, she needed to keep it that way.
The girls had different fathers, and since Charley’s mother had split and moved to Florida when she was six, searching for a man with, quote,potential, Charley didn’t even know Sasha existed—not until Mom called up one day with some sob story, trying to extort them. Charley’s father told her about the call afterward—broke the news that Charley had a baby sister.
Charley was unfazed. She was twelve years old by then, and her father and the crew he’d put together over the years—Uncle Rudy, Trick, Welshman, and Bones—were the only family she needed. As far as Charley was concerned, Mom could take her new family and jump off the closest pier.
But five years ago—about a week after her father’s death—a young girl showed up unannounced at Charley’s building, shivering and hungry, eyes wild with the kind of desperate, bone-deep fear no fourteen-year-old should ever know.
Charley didn’t recognize her, but in her backpack—shoved in with a bunch of tattered clothes and a dog-eared romance novel the girl had found on the bus—was an envelope with Charley’s name and address. The letter inside was from their mother.
It was full of bullshit about wanting a better life for Sasha, about how wrong she’d been to keep the sisters apart, but the truth Sasha shared later was much more sinister. Mom was using again—a habit she’d nursed long before she left Charley and her dad—and her dickbag, drug-dealing, boyfriend-of-the-month had driven Sasha to the Greyhound station in Jacksonville that morning, getting her a one-way ticket to New York.
Don’t come back,the boyfriend warned.You’ve upset your mother enough. Nothing left for you here.
I understand if you don’t want me,Sasha had said to Charley.But maybe I could have a sandwich? Then I’ll figure something else out. Please—I just need to eat.
Charley’s life may have been fucked up, but she’d never been hungry. In that moment, it didn’t matter that Charley was raised in a life of crime, that Sasha was a stranger, that her own mother could be so cruel. She vowed, right then and there, her sister would never know that kind of hunger or helpless fear again.
