triumphant smile on her stepmother’s face was the last thing he had seen. The last thing he had ever seen. Beyond gray, amorphous shapes.
He mostly hung close to the walls in situations like this. He had a cane to help him navigate, but in a crowd this thick it was still difficult. Though, in a crowd this thick it was also normal to run into people. So there was that.
He could see sharp contrasts between light and darkness, but he couldn’t make out features or colors. Nothing subtle.
But when he had walked by her, he had caught her scent. And in that moment, he had seen so many things. Color and light bursting through his mind, vivid and sharp. Sun-drenched days in Tuscany, that had been hell on earth except for her. Soft, pearlescent skin that was too fine, too exquisite for him to touch. And yet he had. And that beautiful blond hair that her father had had a strange obsession with.
Glossy, impossibly long and always kept wound up in a bun so that no one could truly see it or appreciate it. Memory gripped him tight...
* * *
“Let down your hair,” he rasped against her throat as he kissed her, lying down on her large four-poster bed.
He begged her for that privilege, every night. The privilege of running his hands through her hair. Touching the silken strands, seeing her naked, her hair cascading over her pale body like a waterfall, light pink nipples just barely visible through the golden curtain.
She reached up, taking the pins out, obeying his command. In the past weeks since he had begun coming into her room he had asked her to do this for him every night, and every night she had complied. The fact that she never took it down before he appeared led him to believe that she enjoyed this game. Of his commands, and her acquiescence.
It was fine with him. He liked it too.
It was dangerous. This game. Easy to pretend that it was some sort of harmless assignation. That they might get caught, and might suffer a severe scolding. But Rafe was under no illusions. If he were caught with Charlotte, her father would have him killed. If Charlotte were found not a virgin, after her father had taken great pains to seclude her away from the rest of the world, Rafe would be killed. And possibly Charlotte, as well.
And so, he didn’t take her virginity. Rather, he pushed the boundaries every night. And every night she begged him for more. Every night, he declined. But he was becoming weak. He would not be able to hold out for much longer. And in truth, he didn’t intend to.
He simply needed to get to a place where he had shored up the assets he needed to be free of her father. He could hardly plunge Charlotte into a life of poverty after she had lived the cosseted existence of a gentleman gangster’s daughter. Michael Adair’s empire had the semblance of legitimacy, but it was anything but.
To most of the world he appeared to be a businessman. But that was only because the world didn’t look too closely. Not at fabulously wealthy, powerful men who could offer a great many favors, and do untold amounts of damage if they were crossed. It benefited no one to examine those things too deeply. And so nobody did.
Rafe knew all too well about the power men like Michael wielded. He knew too what it was to go from a spoiled, cushioned life to one of abject poverty. His father was not unlike Michael Adair. Oh, he might not be a criminal, but he thought nothing of using the people in his life until they were spent.
Until he had no more use for them but to grind them under his boot for fun. That was what Rafe remembered most about the father he hadn’t seen since he was five years old. How much he seemed to relish causing pain.
When he had kicked Rafe and his mother out onto the streets, the man had seemed to enjoy their distress. Or, if not that, then the fact he had the power to do so.
Power. Yes, men like that loved power.
And Rafe had spent many years with no power at all. Begging. Stealing. Doing whatever he could to help his mother survive.
He had begun doing odd petty crimes with a group of boys. Delivering packages that he never asked about the contents of. Things like that.
He’d ended up getting caught by the police and charged with running drugs, in spite of the fact that he was only a boy. And a boy who’d had no idea what he was handling at that.
It was through that arrest that he’d met Michael Adair.
It was only much later that Rafe had realized the man must have had a connection to the drugs. To the particular ring of petty criminals Rafe had been working with.
Michael Adair had not only given Rafe his freedom; he had also provided Rafe with an education, paying for him to attend one of the finest private schools in Europe. Rafe had accepted greedily. Uncaring of what it might mean in the future.
Michael had promised him someday he would collect the favor. And indeed, he had made good on that threat.
For years, he had done various errands for Michael in Rome. Until finally, he had been brought to the estate to apprentice under the man himself.
That was when he’d really gotten to know the man he’d aligned himself with. Had seen how hard he was. How entirely without morals.
Rafe had asked him once why he had shown such an interest in a young boy from the streets. Why he’d helped him at all, much less sent him to school and provided for him.
He’d said it was because he didn’t have a son. And he had thought perhaps Rafe was the protégé he needed.
Rafe might have been shocked or upset if he weren’t already the son of an amoral bastard. As it was, he just figured he might as well take advantage. At least this particular amoral bastard wanted to give him a hand up, unlike his actual father.
But after school he had started getting a deeper look at Michael Adair’s twisted empire. By then he was living at the estate and there was no leaving. Not without being killed.
The entire business made Rafe ill. Michael was ruthless. He didn’t care who was hurt by his business practices. And he was not above intimidation, or even murder to get what he wanted. He had a host of enforcers who meted out punishments on those who did not comply with his wishes. And Rafe could only count himself fortunate that he had not been forced to be part of that side of the business.
No, he was being taught the business. Because Michael had no son. And he wanted Rafe to be able to take control of the business portion, the front of house part of the empire.
But that did not mean that he found Rafe to be good enough for his daughter, and Rafe was under no illusions that it would be the case. Rafe had also decided that while he was content to get any education he could get from Michael, he was certainly never going to overtake the man’s evil empire.
No. He was going to escape at his first opportunity. And he was going to do it with Charlotte.
Then. Then he would make her his.
She shook her head, her hair falling around her in a silken wave. His stomach tightened. And he couldn’t breathe. He’d had more women than he could count. A side effect of being a young boy unsupervised far too early. One who looked much older than he was the moment adolescence had hit.
But none had ever affected him like this. None had ever made him feel as though his heart were being pulled
