Claimed: The Dark Christmases Trilogy Read online

  The first thing I noticed was the comfortable mattress and sheets beneath me. I stretched and squirmed as my body rose to full awareness. The sort of light that was muted by clouds filled the room. Next, I realized I was naked. Finally, I became aware that I was alone in bed.

  I sat up fast with a gasp, but my heart stopped pounding like thunder as my eyes connected with Jasper’s. He was sitting in a chair by the window, watching me.

  “Good morning.” He looked as if he hadn’t slept a wink.

  My hand slid over the empty side of the bed. “Good morning.” I was sure I looked as worried as I sounded. “How did I end up here?”

  “I carried you in and put you to bed. I hope you don’t mind.”

  I shook my head emphatically. “Not in the least.” My gaze roamed the room. We were in the cottage, and I was in the same bed Jasper and I had made love in twice. “We didn’t go to the main house…”

  Jasper held up a book. I craned my neck to get a better look. The cover was made of green silk fabric, and the edges of the page were sprayed with gold paint.

  “It’s my mother’s diary.”

  I felt my entire face collapse into a frown. “Your mother’s diary?”

  He picked up the key that was on top of the round table he sat next to and held it up. “There’s an antique table in the foyer of this cottage. This key opened a hidden drawer.”

  “How did you know the desk held that drawer?” Just as I asked the question, I lost a handle on the portion of sheet I was using to cover my breasts.

  Jasper’s eyes veered down to my exposed tits. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, and he frowned as he focused on my face again. “I don’t know. I just remembered,” he said quietly.

  I felt as if I had somehow annoyed him by showing him my breasts. I wanted to apologize and let him know I hadn’t done it on purpose, but he dropped the diary on the table, stood, and pulled down his pajamas, freeing his erection.

  Then I understood his expression. The first time I’d seen it was when I accidentally took his mother’s space as my guest room and found him already in it, sitting in the chair. He’d glared at me as if he both wanted to fuck my brains out and scold me for doing something wrong. He’d looked at me the same confounded way again later when he tried to bully me into signing a nondisclosure agreement to not write about his family while taking residence at their house as a guest. I recalled how I’d stood up to him—how hot and bothered I had become just from being near him. Deep down inside, it had been clear to me that sooner or later, we would bang out our sexual desire for each other.

  I smirked naughtily as I cast my legs over the edge of the bed and trotted to the bathroom. “Wait, I have to pee.”

  It was the most inopportune time to fuck, but as usual, Jasper and I could hardly help ourselves. As I sat on the toilet, it seemed as if my pee would last forever. Did I drink that much liquid? I expected my period to start in a few days, and my stomach felt bloated as if my cycle was just around the corner. Jasper and I had done so much fucking without a condom—more without than with lately—that I wouldn’t have been surprised if I’d ended up pregnant. Interestingly enough, I didn’t feel as if I wanted to dodge that bullet. I’d never given a thought to the sort of mother I would be. The idea of having children scared me, though. I always figured if it happened, then it would be God’s will, and that was that, but I had definitely been testing divine will lately.

  The peeing finally stopped. I wiped and flushed the toilet. When I made it back to the bed, Jasper was lying on his back, his dick still up in the air.

  “Sit on it, baby,” he said. “I want to be inside your hot morning pussy.”

  Shit. That sounded so hot. I walked seductively toward him, and his eyes burned with lust. I could tell by the way his manhood tilted toward his belly that he was beyond excited. When I was close enough, he reached out and clenched my waist. What a strong man he was. Jasper pulled me to him. I straddled him, pussy already moistening, and he sucked air as I slowly came down on his cock.

  “Shit,” he whispered, eyes closed and head pressed back against the pillow.

  Jasper shifted my hips against his dick. He moaned, licking his lips. He went faster and faster. Then his eyes opened, and the fire in them set my body aflame. He was beyond turned on—the next thing I knew, he’d sat up, shoveled an arm around me, and flipped me onto my back.

  “Oh, baby,” he kept saying with every thrust.

  I was purposely silent as he fucked me good. I wanted to hear him. I knew this was for him, and it was okay. But then an “um” escaped me as his thick cock began rubbing against the rim of my pussy. Jasper’s manhood was a thing of magic. I clung to him tighter as he sped up the pace.

  He roared, grunted, then cried, “Fuck!” as he shivered with an orgasm. When his body stilled, he trailed kisses along the side of my face. “Thank you for that,” he whispered, and our tongues dove into each other’s mouths.

  “So…” I said while kissing.

  “So…” he whispered back.

  “What were you saying about a diary before… you know?”

  He chuckled, and I joined him.

  Jasper and I sat next to each other in bed as he read portions of Amelia’s diary. The first entry was about how Sally Preacher, Amelia’s personal maid, had given her the book for her birthday. Amelia wrote that Randolph never would have condoned it. He was too worried that people would find out who she really was.

  “Last night, he threatened to kill me and my son again. He’s a monster, not a man. I hate him. I hate him enough to kill him. I want vengeance,” Jasper read. He turned to look at me.

  I raised my eyebrows at him. “Wow, she had no love for him.” I turned on my side, and I could tell he was trying to avoid looking at my tits again. “By the way, was the FBI able to confirm her kidnapping?”

  Jasper swallowed and nodded.

  I reached up to run my fingers gently down the side of his face. “I’m sorry, my love.”

  He captured my wrist and kissed the back and palm of my hand, as he often did. “What did you call me?” He smiled just a little.

  “My love.”

  “I like that. Call me that often, please.”

  I felt my face beaming as I repeated “my love” until we kissed tenderly. I sighed hard as our lips parted.

  “Babe, we have to fucking focus. I don’t know if keeping you with me was the best idea.” His eyes did what they’d been trying to avoid doing—he glared at my tits. “I can’t stop wanting to be inside you.” His finger flicked my nipple, and then his hot mouth came over the tip of it.

  Holy shit. The sensation sent sparks through my pussy. “I catch your drift,” I whispered.

  “All right.” He rolled out of bed suddenly and was on his feet. “Let’s get out of here.”

  I felt my eyes grow wide. “Where are we going?”

  He opened the book to a certain page and flipped it around to face me. All I saw was Amelia’s cursive handwriting. Her script was elegant, practiced.

  “We’re going to visit my grandparents and ask them why they took the fucking money.”

  My mouth fell open. “What?”

  “My father paid them off.” He rotated the book so that the pages faced him and read, “Mama and Daddy don’t love me anymore. They were poisoned by Randolph’s money. They sold me to him. If it wasn’t for my son and the other children, I would kill myself, but they need me.”

  I was clutching the pearls I wasn’t wearing. “Holy shit, Jasper.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  “Holy shit is right.”

  Chapter Eleven

  I put on my second shoe, and as soon as my foot hit the floor, I looked up at Jasper, who had just gotten off the phone with the helicopter pilot. The two of them were planning the logistics of our flight off the property. The weather had kicked up again, and Jasper didn’t want to put our lives in jeopardy, but he wanted to get out of Dodge the fastest way possible.

  An uneasy
feeling had been brewing within me ever since Jasper announced we were on our way to have a talk with his grandparents. I sighed forcefully. “My love, you’re a thinker. Have you thought this through?”

  “No, but I’m tired of thinking it through. How about I let fucking raw emotion guide me for change.”

  I shook my head, wondering if he realized what he had just said. That didn’t sound like Jasper at all. But maybe he wasn’t supposed to sound like himself. His whole world had been turned upside down the moment he learned his mother had been kidnapped. I couldn’t imagine being in his shoes—not that mine were so spectacular.

  I was about to invite him to sit down beside me to cool off when my cell phone rang. I still had it set to only send important contacts through. I raised a finger, gesturing for Jasper to give me a second, as I reached for my purse.

  Jasper’s cell phone rang as well, and he swiftly answered his call. “Yeah.”

  Once I retrieved my device, I saw that it was who I expected it to be and eagerly swiped the green bar. “Hey, Branson.”

  “What the fuck!” Jasper roared and stomped out of the room, the phone to his ear.

  “Are you okay?” Branson asked.

  I grimaced at the empty space Jasper had left behind. “Yeah. That’s my boyfriend. He was on a phone call.”

  “Well,” he said in a tone that indicated that he didn’t need to address it further, “I came up empty. I ran the names and attempted to connect them with the Christmases and the large sums of cash that would be associated with each individual, and I found nothing.”

  “No Peter Turgot?”

  “None who would be in the age range of the student who informed on Asher Christmas. Also, there’s no Benjamin Dow who ever had those large sums of cash in a bank account. My professional conclusion is that these sources are bunk. I wouldn’t run that story if I were you.”

  Of course, he had no idea why I’d asked him to run those details. “Send me the invoice,” I said.

  “I’ll send it right away. Call me if you need anything else,” he said.

  I told him I definitely would, and we ended our call. Jasper was outside, speaking loudly, but I couldn’t make out his words. My phone chimed. The invoice had arrived, and I opened it—my inquiry had cost five thousand dollars. Branson was a superior investigator but expensive, and I was running out of money. I had to get to work soon. I was still getting royalties from my books, but each month, the checks were smaller. Whenever I did a public appearance, which was arranged by the publishers, my sales spiked. But I hadn’t done one of those in a long time. Regardless, I paid the invoice and then took a moment to think about what I would do next to help further my career.

  “Holly,” Jasper called. His tone was laced with a lot of anger.

  I shot to my feet. “What?” I shouted back.

  “Come here.”

  I grabbed my coat and purse and rushed into the living room. Jasper was sitting on the sofa, looking at the screen of the laptop on the coffee table.

  “What is it?” I asked as I approached him.

  He turned to look at me with his eyes narrowed. “What the fuck is this?”

  I scowled at the screen as I sat beside him. It was an article from JWR, and it included all the details I’d fed Kylie. She was careful to make sure that she only used information from my fake sources.

  I closed my eyes and shook my head. I was hurt and even more heartbroken than before. “I’m so sorry. I forgot to tell you I fed Kylie the fake story yesterday.”

  “You actually did it?”

  I nodded. “I said I would.”

  “But you should’ve informed me first.” Jasper folded his arms as he examined me.

  I tightened my mouth, avoiding saying what I was thinking. Before our current situation, I would have told Jasper to go to hell. I did what I wanted, when I wanted. But he was the one who’d informed me about Kylie’s dishonest acts. I owed him a strong degree of allegiance.

  “I apologize, my love. Things went so fast last night that what I’d done slipped my mind. But I should’ve told you before doing it. I was just so angry.”

  His frown didn’t ease, but that was okay. At least I felt better about getting that off my chest.

  “It’s fine,” he said. “We can actually use this to our benefit. But there’s something else.”

  “What is it?”

  “Bryn and Katie escaped from the compound. They’re in Nashville with Dale and Zach.”

  My jaw slackened. “Wow. You sent them to the same place?”

  He sighed remorsefully. “Yes.”

  “It must’ve been jarring for Katie to walk into a great big house and unexpectedly run into her twin sister.”

  “I considered how painful it could be for both of them, but I concluded the impact would be the same whether or not we were there. I had to prioritize.” His frown intensified. “What I hadn’t properly taken into account was how capable my sister is of creating a shit storm on top of a shit storm.” Jasper fell back against the sofa, rubbing his face. “Or maybe I’m just fucking tired of it all.”

  He looked so miserable, so human. I stroked his strong thigh, hoping to bring him comfort. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. I’ve never met someone who had so many irons in the fire. You have so many that it’s hard to focus on one.”

  Jasper studied me as if he’d been barely listening. “What if I give up?” he said, his expression the picture of pure misery.

  I rubbed his leg more fervently in an effort to really try to relieve his despair. “Give up what?”

  He shook his head. “I’ve been holding this shitty family together for as long as I can remember. All for some fucking secret that could destroy us.” His eyes narrowed even more as he tilted his head to the side. “And I’ve been asking myself why Arthur hasn’t come out with it. I’m decimating him right now, yet he hasn’t struck back.”

  I grunted thoughtfully. Jasper was watching me intently. Perhaps he could see me thinking. He’d just said something that made a hell of a lot of sense, and my professional instinct was putting the pieces together.

  “Your father…” I said.

  “What about him?”

  “He strikes me as a man who never intended to die. You said he was intent on teaching you the Roman way.” I tried not to roll my eyes at such ridiculousness. I had studied the Roman Empire in college, and I knew how they’d combined brutality with mind control. Jasper spoke of some of the abuses he had suffered, and I was positive there were more, probably a lot that he couldn’t remember. “You know what the Roman way is?”

  He snapped to the upright position. “Yes… where are you going with this?”

  “The Romans were masters at making the slave believe he deserved his station in life. They were the first fucking psychologists. They figured out humanity and used their knowledge to dominate.”

  “I know this,” Jasper gruffly said.

  “Then you know child soldiers are the most treacherous?”

  His eyebrows drew together as he pondered what I’d said, then he closed his eyes gravely. “Yes.”

  “You were a child soldier. You were—”

  Jasper held his hand up. “Just stop.”

  “Okay,” I whispered, believing I had gone too far down the wrong road. I wanted to back it up and drive down the right one. “How about I tell you what I think about the nature of your father and Arthur Valentine’s relationship?”

  He opened his sad eyes and nodded once.

  I was relieved that he wanted to hear it. “I think they both wanted ultimate power. Remember when Kat saw the photo of your father and called him Arthur? Well, first she vomited, and then she called him Arthur.” I didn’t want to forget to mention that part, because I thought the two had a lot to do with each other.

  “I remember,” he said impatiently.

  “I’m wondering if the two of them knew about what was going on in the house Kat was raised in. I’m also wondering if they were less at odds with
each other than they needed you to believe. They were not enemies. They were allies.”

  For a moment, Jasper looked at me as though I were speaking nonsense. “I think Randolph’s Benjamin Dow.”

  I jutted my neck forward. “Why do you say that?”

  “My father practiced creative accounting when it came to paying for shit he didn’t want tracked. I bet Benjamin Dow is one of the dummy accounts he set up.”

  “Will you be able to find the account?”

  He scratched his forehead and the back of his neck and studied me deeply. “Perhaps. And thank you.” His tone was firm and sincere.

  I turned my head slightly. “What are you thanking me for exactly?”

  He lifted me off the sofa and set me on his lap. “For being intelligent, beautiful, and the woman I love.”

  My mouth watered. I loved how we teased each other like this, our lips creeping toward each other and tongues readying for contact.

  Knock, knock, knock.

  We ripped our eyes off each other to cast our attention toward the doorway. The sound had awakened us out of our erotic haze.

  “Let me guess,” I whispered and cleared the frog out of my throat. “We’re on our way to Nashville?”

  He winked at me and lifted me to my feet. Then he wrapped his arms around my waist. Whoever was at the door knocked again.

  Jasper looked over his shoulder. “Wait a second!”

  And the next thing I knew, we were engaging in that kiss. But as my head danced in the clouds, I couldn’t help but wonder how in the hell Kylie Roberson knew to include Benjamin Dow in her email full of bullshit facts.