Beautiful Beloved (7 page)

Chapter Six

Max

I stared at my brother the next morning as he took a bite of toast and scanned the business section, oblivious to my inspection. It had been too long since our last visit—longer than we’d ever been apart. Marriages beginning and ending, careers growing, babies born, family obligations, and a myriad of other obstacles had kept me from England and him from the States. Though I was only ten months older than him, seeing him here brought back the older-brother protectiveness his calm stoicism had always triggered in me.

Because he rarely said otherwise, I needed to make sure he really was doing all right.

He looked thinner, but fitter, too. I meant it when I said divorce suited him. Instead of seeming beat down by the taxing drag of the proceedings, it seemed as if a literal weight had been removed from his shoulders. His face was less shadowed, mouth less drawn. He smiled easily again.

Of all my siblings, Niall and I were the most similar physically but dissimilar mentally. We were both tall, had tended toward athletic builds, and had our father’s lighter brown hair. But whereas it had taken me years to get my head on straight about school and birds and the bleeding enormous what-to-do-with-my-life decisions, Niall was born thinking like a little engineer: logical, calm, meticulous. I’d worked my way through most of Manhattan’s single women; he’d married the first girl he kissed. I had barely found a single job I loved until I met Will and we started the firm together; Niall had excelled in civil engineering so early he’d been the second in command at the London Underground when he was only twenty-eight before being wooed away to a private firm. I spoke freely, shared too readily, loved perhaps too openly. Niall considered every word before he let it out, held his private truths close to his chest, and had never been with a woman who let him love openly at all.

“How’s the ex-monster?” I asked.

“Portia’s mostly off doing whatever it is she does,” he told me, letting out a quiet laugh. “I get the occasional note about needing to fix this or that at the flat.”

I felt the familiar protective heat rise in my chest. “She can hire out for that. Lord knows she has enough of her own money, as well as yours.”

“She can, indeed,” he agreed with the genuine smile of a man finally liberated.

I hated what Portia had done to him. She’d started with a shy, sweet, and devoted teenage Niall and left us with a deeply emotionally reserved version of the same man. I didn’t mind his reserve; I didn’t even mind his new emotional discipline. I missed the lad with the easy dimpled smile and enormous, curious eyes.

But fuck it. He was here in my flat, finally coming back to life.

“You should have fucked Teena Smith at Robbie’s party when I told you to,” I said to him.

He barely missed a beat: “
Oi,
this again. I was already with—”

“Oh, fuck Portia. Teena would have bounced on your knob for days.”

He laughed, scratching his jaw. “A bit too eager, though, yeah?”

“Eager with a cocksucking mouth and great tits.”

“Great tits,” he agreed ruefully. “Bloody great tits.”

“Who had great tits?” Sara asked, walking into the kitchen to grab her coffee.

“Teena,” Niall and I answered in unison.

“The one I should have shagged,” Niall explained further.

“And it’s unfortunate he didn’t,” I explained. “Portia would have married that insufferable arse Richard, and Niall would have been a sex god in uni instead of saddled with a wife and mortgage.”

He hummed, blowing over the surface of his hot tea as his eyes returned to the paper. “Maybe.”

Sara looked at us with a sweetly quizzical grin before leaving again.

“So.” I brought my coffee to my lips.

He smiled without looking up. “Hmm?”

“Good to have you visit.”

My brother nodded, sipping his tea. “Been too long.”

“Everything good across the pond?”

Shrugging, he said, “Same, I suppose? There’s a chance I’ll be back in a few weeks’ time for a summit here.”

“Yeah?” I said, a little more eagerly than I’d intended.

He nodded. “I’ll be around a bit more, you see. So you might as well just bring up whatever it is you’re working up to.”

“Oh, you mean the thing about how you’re watching the child tonight while I take my woman out for some fun?”

He brought his toast to his mouth and smiled around it, “Yes, that thing.”

“We’ll be out late,” I warned.

“I certainly hope so.” He maintained eye contact, eyes wry and knowing as he chewed, swallowed.

“I’m not going to tell you what we’re doing, if that’s what you think.”

He laughed, shaking his head as he poured some more tea. “Well, until you said that, I assumed it was just dinner. Now I think maybe I’d rather not know.”

Sara brought Anna out into the kitchen, making her way over to me, but Niall wiped his mouth and his hands with a napkin before he reached for the baby. “Come here, love. Guess who gets to watch you tonight?”

Sara folded the baby in his arms and turned to the fridge, pulling out a bottle of milk. “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “Might kick you out myself.”

She smiled at him gratefully. “Well, I’m leaving around six, but there’s plenty of bottles in here for the rest of the night,” she said, looking at him over her shoulder. “We use this bottle warmer. See?” She put the bottle in, pushed the button, and we all watched as it began to steam, and then beeped when it was done. “Easy.”

“We’ll manage fine,” he said, taking the bottle and expertly shaking it to warm the milk evenly as he looked down at Anna again. “Won’t we, princess?”

Watching him like this, I realized how much more experience he had with babies than I did: between our eight siblings there were seventeen nieces and nephews, and Niall was the favorite uncle to them all.

Sara put her hand on his shoulder. “Thanks for doing this.”

He waved her off, making one of his stiff, dismissive grunts.

“That’s awkward Brit for ‘you’re welcome,’ ” I said, laughing as I waited for Anna to push the bottle away and cry for Sara.

Niall gazed down at her as he offered her the milk. “That’s a girl. Who’s a good baby?” He bent and kissed her forehead. “Ah, but she’s a hungry one, isn’t she?”

I gaped at him, at her tiny hand clutching his thumb as she drank happily.

Bloody hell.

If my daughter had one superpower it would be the ability to locate her mum from several rooms away. If Sara were anywhere in the house, Anna wouldn’t dare take a bottle from me.

I scowled at Niall. “You must smell like a woman.”

“Piss off,” he said to me, still using his baby-soothing voice. “Why is your daddy such a wanker, hmm? I’ve got a hundred nieces and nephews and he expects I can’t give this tiny miss a bottle?”

Laughing, I stood and cleared our dishes.

“Baby girl knows which uncle’s gonna spoil her rotten,” Niall whispered just loud enough for me to hear. “Who wants a pony? Is it you? You do? I’ll make sure you get a pony.”

I groaned, smacking the back of his head as I walked past him to go find Sara.

“You’re welcome, wanker,” he sang sweetly.

I found Sara in the bathroom, putting on the pair of diamond earrings her father sent after Anna was born.

Bending to kiss her neck, I said, “I’ll have Scott come for us here at eight—”

“No.” She turned to face me, running her hands up my dress shirt and straightening my collar. “Don’t.”

I blinked, tilting my head as my stomach dropped. Had she changed her mind? “You don’t want to go?”

Her smile was a sweet reassurance. “Of course I do. But I want to meet there. Scott can bring me. You come separately.”

She wanted to leave for the club separately? “But we’ve always gone together.”

“I don’t want to drag anything behind us when we leave. If he picks us both up here, we’ll fuss over the details of leaving Anna, we’ll talk about her in the car. I think I’m going to take her out and do some back-to-work shopping then head to your mom’s. I’ll coordinate with Niall. Scott can get me there and I’ll see you at Johnny’s. We can just be
us
tonight.”

“You sure?”

She pulled her lip between her teeth and smiled around it before whispering, “Yeah, I’m sure.”

Innocence, anticipation, lust, and something sweeter than pure sugar. It was everything I loved about Sara distilled into a single expression.

“Right then. I’ll meet you there at nine.”

I left for work, expecting to see Sara at lunch, or even get a call from her as I usually did during the day, but knowing I might not. I suspected Sara might want a little distance today to help put her in the right mind-set, and I was right. A text came just as the office was clearing out, to let me know Niall was picking Annabel up at Mum’s flat and she would meet me at the club, as planned.

The distance was odd, but also thrilling.

I went home, showered and dressed, and walked through the rooms of my empty flat. Niall had rung to say he’d be back with the baby shortly, and I had to admit that I agreed with Sara, it would be better if I left before they got here. Annabel was in excellent hands, and Max and Sara as parents could be put on hold for a few hours.

There was nothing left to do; it was time to meet my wife.

My phone buzzed on my way out, a text from Johnny:
Use the front door.

We always came in through the back hallway and directly into Room Six. Having performed dozens of times at the club, Sara and I were recognizable to nearly everyone who would be there on a Wednesday night. Johnny wanted her to walk in, right in the middle of all of that?

My protective instinct flared.

Did Sara request this?
I replied.

Shut up. In a fucking meeting.

This was as good as a yes; if it was for any other reason he would have said so.

Laughing, I replied in eight separate messages:

It’s

A

Shame

About

Your

Tiny

Shriveled

Dick

Once I confirmed with our driver Scott that he was picking Sara up at my mother’s flat, I called for a cab to get me over to the club, Red Moon. I’d put on something simple, not knowing how Johnny would have the room set up for our return to the club. I wore black trousers and a simple pressed gray check button-down shirt. It had been so long since we came in through the secretive front entrance that I was actually nervous—wanting to make sure I remembered how to get down there: with a key, down several flights to the receptionist. Except standing at the desk waiting my arrival wasn’t Lisbeth, but a stunning redhead who circled the desk, hand outstretched.

“I’m Trin,” she said, smiling in welcome. “You must be Mr. Stella.”

I fucked my wife for everyone to see in this club. It seemed a little odd to be so formal. “Max, please.”

“Lovely to meet you.” She gestured to the heavy steel door that would lead into the club itself. “Mr. French is very much looking forward to having you and Mrs. Stella back in the rotation.”

I smiled, arching a brow. “The pony play and multiple ménage scenarios are growing a little tired?”

She laughed, shaking her head. “I think the regulars like your story,” she said. “It’s sweet. It’s different from everything else we get in here.”

And of course it was. What other married couple would let their most intimate moments play out in such stark display for complete strangers? Who else would invite the world into their sex life?

But being back here, even in this unfamiliar anteroom to the main event, felt deliciously surreal. I could smell the mix of wood polish and leather emanating from the other room. I could hear the faint beat of music pounding through the enormous door. It was a sensory trigger for me, being here, knowing how Sara would get off on being watched, and how I would get off on watching her bloom. It never ceased to amaze me that her greatest turn-on was exhibition, given that in our everyday life she was beautiful but unassuming, brilliant but endlessly humble.

“How’s the baby?” Trin asked, pulling my attention away from the door and back to her face.

“She’s brilliant, yeah,” I said, feeling my grin split my face. “Home with my brother.”

Her eyebrows rose wickedly. “You have a brother?”

“I do,” I said through a laugh. “He’s tall, a genius, and has enough repressed sexual energy to power this club. I should give you his number.”

Trin tilted her head before finding a card in the top drawer of her desk with her name and phone number. “Give him this.” She turned and gestured that I lead us to the door. “Mrs. Stella is inside. I don’t want to keep you.”

Through the door, the club opened into a large main room, dimly lit with wall sconces and lined with a lavish, intricate wallpaper of subtle stripes and swirls. Velvet curtains hung beside a number of small alcoves surrounding low tables, making the entire room feel both lavish and faintly medieval. A small bar stood in the corner, where I remembered, but the design of the room had been modified so that the stage was directly in the center, rather than jutting into the floor from one far end of the expansive space.

Sara was tucked into an alcove in the middle of one long wall, sipping a cocktail and looking surprisingly comfortable all on her own here. She watched the show—a woman stripping to a slow beat while a man behind her was tied naked to a chair.

It was surreal how quickly my brain switched from the daily reality of diapers and investors, bottles and contracts, to the present reality of a private—and rather illegal—space where only the most well-connected and wealthy clients came to indulge their darkest voyeuristic fantasies. It didn’t seem odd that the woman performing was stripped down to a long string of pearls hanging heavily between her small breasts, or that the man had begun quietly begging for pleasure. All around us, people sipped drinks and talked in low voices or simply sat and watched the main show, waiting for the individual rooms to open for the audience.