Chapter 23

Nix was distant. He cherished me at every opportunity with kisses, cuddles and sex… but his mind was elsewhere. Even on the drive to my mum’s house in Surrey, he didn’t speed like usual. He was careful, attentive.

This was him before learning that Clara and him were over.

Though she was the last thing on his mind. The investigation intoAlv’saccident had closed this week, and the report was imminent.

Whenever it was mentioned, wheneverCris’ name came up, he looked away and his responses became monosyllabic.

Until last night when we’d come up with a statement for him to release depending on the outcome.

And with going home… I wasn’t much in the mood for talking either.

But I paused the murder mystery podcast I had put on. He frowned.

“I need to tell you something,” I said when the maps on his phone told me we were only ten minutes away. “About Clara.”

He looked at me as we went down the country lane. “Go on.”

“She wants to break it off,” I confessed. “She’s over it.”

“Good,” he said with a decisive nod. “Post it right now.”

“What?” I asked with a laugh. “That’s not how we do things.”

His tone remained serious. “That’s how I want to do it. Right now.”

I was glad I was holding his phone. “Nix, that’s so dramatic for an apparent four-month relationship. I’m not letting you embarrass yourself like that, especially with your Day in the Life interview — that heavily features her — coming out next week. We’ll just wait for her to be seen with someone else.”

“I want everyone to know we’re not togetheranymore.”

I rolled my eyes. Some things really weren’t going to change with this man.

“As your publicist, I’m saying no—”

“What? You’d rather people think I was with someone else still? That if we get caught—”

“If you’d let me finish my sentence — turn left here — you can, however, delete all your photos of her on your accounts.”

“Oh,” he said, spinning the wheel and making the turning with a frown. “Okay. Yeah. Do that.”

So, knowing the rest of the way to my parents’ house, I swiped off maps and onto Instagram. It was during that swipe I saw all notifications had been silenced.

“You have all of your notifications off.”

“Yeah, well, you’re on my phone.”

I blinked, staring down at the phone that was suddenly very heavy in my hand. His Instagram only had three pictures of him and Clara and I deleted them in silence before staring out of the window.

Why would he turn everything off if I was on his phone?

Was the ex who was sending him death threats at it again?

“What’s wrong?” he asked, laying his hand on my thigh. “ We don’t have to stay at your mum’s the whole time if you don’t—”

“Why? Why not let me see who is messaging you?”

He shook his head. “Have a look.”

“I trust you—”

“Have a look.”

So I opened up his texts, only to see twenty from his mother, a couple from Abbe, a few from someone called Andrew in French.

“I just didn’t want it to distract you from giving me directions,” he said and added with a laugh, “we both know how awful you are at giving them.”

Good point.

“Your mum has texted you a lot. Shall I read them out to you?”

“No,” he said quickly. “It’s okay. She’s… we’ll have to have a talk about my mother.”

“A talk?”

I knew something was up there. But I wasn’t about to say something when I knew that from eavesdropping.

“She’s… my mother is complicated.”

Welcome to the club.

“So you also turned off your notifications so I wouldn’t see her texts,” I concluded.

“Partly,” he admitted with a wince.

“And when will this talk be?” I asked, kind of wanting the distraction from how quickly we were approaching my childhood home. “Because, not sure if you’ve realised, but you’re about to meet all of my family. And I don’t know a thing about yours.”

He breathed in deeply, grip tighter on the steering wheel. He reached over to place his hand atop mine on my thigh. “You’re right. My mother… fuck. This is going to sound dramatic. My father is… not in the picture. Mostly. My mum left him when I was really young. It didn’t end well. My dad is…” He looked over at me, eyes desperate. “He’s a criminal. Treated my mum like shit. It wasn’t that she walked away from him. She ran.”

“A criminal?” I parroted, putting my other hand on his.

He nodded, his attention back on the road. “He’s a piece of trash. I was too young to remember what really happened, but I know she’s suffered enough.”

“Is that… is that why you do so much for the domestic abuse charities?”

“Yes. If she didn’t have my stepfather… if we were without money, god knows what would have happened.”

His stepfather ran hotels throughout Europe before his passing when Nix was a child.

“I’m sorry,” I said quietly, squeezing his fingers with mine.

He squeezed back. “Is this it?” he asked, bending to get a better look at the cottage as we drove through the open, low gate.

I’d spent the first eighteen years of my life there before university. I knew every nook and cranny of the stone-brick house, every square inch of the surrounding gardens, and could give a good guess at what was at the bottom of the pond.

I knew how my parents’ bedroom looked with a hospital bed in it.

I knew how isolating the house was, miles away from the closest town.

From the ambulance.

Before, it had always been full of such warmth.

Since Dad died, it had cooled.

To almost icy temperatures.

Nix’s car pulled up on the circular drive next to my brother’s and my mum’s. The difference between the hotshot lawyer and Nix’s red convertible was laughable. There was rich, and then there was rich . Nix had changed the car he hired after I commented how I never wanted to drive it again. Instead, he got one that reminded me of the convertible we’d taken to the intro sequence months ago.

My brother was stupidly successful. I only aspired to be half as much.

The curtain twitched from the living room as Nix pulled out the suitcase we had packed together. We were only staying three nights and I still had clothes here from the last few months of Dad’s life when I’d moved in to help out.

Ben opened the front door with a large grin as if I hadn’t seen him only a couple of days ago.

“Alright,Liv?” He whistled as he saw the car. “Damn, Nixon, that’s a nice set of wheels.”

Nix shrugged, dragging the suitcase behind him on the gravel. “Does the job, doesn’t it?”

I shook my head at his modesty. “The heated seats are to die for.”

“Need to set up the GPS, though,” Nix grumbled and threw a thumb over his shoulder at me with a fond smile. “This one got us going in circles.”

“Only twice!” I defended as we went into the foyer and Ben closed the door behind us.

The loud boom of it closing used to be the comforting noise of someone coming home. Now, it just sounded like entrapment.

Ben chuckled. “She has no sense of direction whatsoever.”

We walked up to my room on the first floor before resting our suitcase against the wall. Nix looked around the room with a secretive smile. “Teenage Olivia.”

My room was painted light pink. Framed certificates were nailed into the walls, and embarrassingly, a poster of an emo band was on the back of the door. It hadn’t closed yet, so I’d have to sneak that down before we went to bed.

“Very different to the flat,” he commented.

“Oh yeah, congrats,” Ben said, turning to avoid looking at me. “Heard you’re moving in together.”

The little stirrer. Maybe he’d forgotten that time I’d nearly drowned him in the pond.

Maybe he needed a damn reminder.

“Thanks, mate,” Nix said and patted him on the shoulder, still looking around. “Just made sense. She practically had a diary lock on her front door.”

Ben laughed and nodded. “Well, at least one of our guests of honour is funny.”

“One of them?” I asked.

“Mum and her boyfriend have just nipped out to get something,” Ben said. “I wanted to be here to give you the heads-up.”

I scowled but Ben only shrugged.

He’d subtly popped that in the conversation, hadn’t he? The heads-up should have been before we left the apartment.

Because I wouldn’t have come to this drama episode.

“But also needed you here so you couldn’t back out.”

“ Boyfriend ?” I shrieked.

“Very new boyfriend, as well.”

“Mum has a boyfriend ? ”

Nix stepped back, no longer between my brother and me. It was only just a year since Dad had died.

“Dad is barely—”

“Dad is dead,” Ben said stiffly. “And Mum deserves to be happy. Not with this guy, but, at least she’s getting back out there…”

Fucking mummy’s boy.

“He’s only staying for dinner,” Ben continued. “I doubt we’ll ever see him again.”

“That’s even worse,” I snapped.

Nix watched us, head spinning between our interaction.

“She’s here all alone,” my brother argued. “It’s not exactly bustling with life out here, is it? Five miles from the nearest town. She needs some company.”

“You offered for her to move in with you!”

“Livie,” Ben said, glancing at Nix. He was right, this wasn’t a conversation to have here and now. “She’s lived in this house for thirty-three years. She is sixty-two. She doesn’t want to move to central London .”

Damn, I hated that he was right.

“Anyway,” he said with a forced smile, “Mum’s made cheesecake, so that’s a plus. You’ve got about an hour of privacy until she said dinner will be ready. She’ll be back for then.”

He winked and, closing the door, pointed with a wicked smile at the poster I’d planned on hiding.

“Wow, that… is different,” Nix said, frowning at it.

Their huge hair, side fringes and striped black and white socks really did juxtapose the rest of the room.

“They still have some great songs.”

He laughed once, sat on the bed and spread his arms out. I fell into his lap and he pulled me into his chest. “It’s got to be shit your mum being with someone else.”

“She… I can’t describe my mum. She always loved Ben far more than me. And Dad… I got on with him so well. We called each other every day. I really miss him and…” I took a deep breath. “He died here. In their bedroom on the ground floor.”

He squeezed me. “I’m so sorry.”

I thought of my father every day. I didn’t talk of him though, knowing it would make me a blubbering mess.

I let him hold me, feeling like an absolute child for how I’d acted. Mum did deserve to be happy. Even if it meant some random man joining us for her birthday dinner.

To be fair, I’d brought my own random man.

“Let’s just enjoy ourselves the best we can,” he said.

We both knew that would be difficult.

His phone beeped, notifications no longer silenced.

“I need to call my mum,” he said quietly. “Is there somewhere I can go?”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, got off him and straightened my skirt. “Go anywhere. There’s a bathroom down the hall on the left. Or the living room we went past.”

“Can I go outside?”

“Sure,” I said. “There’s a little bench over by the pond. I’ll give you a tour when you’re done.”

“Thank you,” he said, kissed me and left.

I unpacked our things before tearing down the poster and rolling it up to store away. This place was somewhere I avoided. Ben made such a good brother, the life and soul of the house as Dad had been, trying to distract me from my thoughts.

Sometimes, I worried he spent so much time worrying about me and Mum that he didn’t get a chance to grieve himself.

“Do mostStormSprintriders have security?” Ben asked at my door ten minutes later.

I was scrolling through my phone, lying in bed. “What?”

Ben went to the window and looked down, pointing to the pond. I sat on my heels, peering over to see Nix standing there, pacing back and forth, looking exasperated with a deep sigh and shake of his head.

“My French is rusty, but he’s definitely going on about a security issue.”

When we lived in France for months at a time for Dad’s job, Ben excelled at his French. He was always far better than me.

I shrugged, joining him. Nix was pacing up and down by the pond. “He’s having the apartment set up with a camera system in the foyer.”

“The foyer?” he asked with a blink. “God, look at you. That’s a whole world away from where you were before.”

Nix hung up and started dialling another number.

“He’s very protective,” Ben commented.

I gave him a dry look.

“What?” he asked, hands up in surrender. “I’m just saying he clearly cares about you. More than I thought. So… guess I’m here to say I’m sorry.”

“Being together isn’t easy,” I admitted. “Keeping it a secret and…I didn’t realise how jealous a person I was.”

“He is a celebrity,Liv,” he stated the obvious.

“Oh, I completely trust him,” I said with a laugh. “The man is obsessed with me, Ben. But that doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt me when I had to see him kiss Clara.”

Nix started a third phone call.

My phone came to life on the desk that my brother and I were leaning over.

“Shit,” I muttered as the text fromCrislit up my screen.

CRIS: Report’s out. Emailing it to you now. As we expected, nothing bad about Nix, but the problems aren’t over.Nazmin’shandling asCiclatiissue.

I breathed a sigh of relief before loading it up to read. Then I turned to my brother. “Nix had his lawyers write up something but would you mind checking it over?”

“About what?”

“Nix is paying for a news story to go away,” I said, grateful I’d had to do nothing more than meet for an awkward catchup with Adam in the coffee shop. I’d invited Victoria to ease some of the tension and fluttered my eyelashes a little. “We’re nearly at a sum, but I wanted your opinion on what they’ve written up.”

He sat on my bed. “Send it over.”

So, he sat and read through that as I read through the report. A lot of it was technical, but it stated very clearly NixonArmaswas not at fault.Alv’sbike slid into his path, he didn’t have time to react and was catapulted off his bike.

The majority of the report was about the helmet fitting. If it had been altered, and therefore not come off, he would have been in much better shape.

It wasn’t Nix’s fault.

I didn’t realise how heavy it had been on my shoulders, but with this confirmation, I felt like my airways were clear, like the emotional turmoil was gone and I could finally sleep.

Nazminpinged over her press release forCiclatiand I sent her the one forCiclatiSport and Nix.

She called me, and we discussed the best strategy to use as well as the answers Nix andLucashould give when asked about it.

Lucawould be devastated. His team had a hand in his cousin’s condition.

When I asked her about the helmets for the race next week, she only told me they were being handled.

Nix walked into the room while I was trying to callLucafor the fourth time. He was so level-headed, so mature but this was enough to throw anyone off balance.

Nix was leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed when he cleared his throat, drawing our attention. He had a soft smile on his face as he looked me over.

“You reading it?” he asked.

“For the second time,” I said, closing the lid of my laptop and sitting up. “Your name is mentioned a total of three times. Once, for saying you were part of the collision. Second, detailing the impact it had on you, throwing you off your bike and, third, reaffirming it was not your fault.”

“Yeah,Crisjust said so on the phone. They’re doing a press release of it next weekend at the Austrian race.”

“Contract looks good,” Ben said, passing me back the tablet he had read it on.

“We’ll need to get them to sign it sooner rather than later,” I told Nix, going to his side. He wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me close. “They catch wind of this before and they might still publish.”

He nodded and bent to kiss me on the head. “I’ve got my manager on it. Told him I wanted it sorted today. But everything is going in the right direction.”

“Everything is going in the right direction,” I agreed.

“So, like I said, let’s try to enjoy ourselves,” he said and rested his chin on my head.

Ben dismissed himself.

We probably didn’t have long until my mum and her boyfriend got home, so I made quick work of his belt, getting to my knees.

When I was with Nix, it was just the two of us.

Problems were outside of our bubble.

And I needed our bubble so badly.

He closed the door as I pulled out his cock and he laughed when he saw the absence of the poster. “I’ve already seen it, Livid. Not sure if you realised, but I helped you— fuck, ” he swore, head thrown back, as I took him in my mouth, no messing around, down to the hilt. “I helped you pack up your whole flat. I’ve seen the majority of your possessions. Did you see the certain one I packed?” There was the mischievous smirk I loved.

I gave him one long lick up his shaft. “I was pleasantly surprised.” I licked my hand before holding his length and running my grip up and down, teasing the slit of his cock with my tongue. “And grateful you picked the quietest one.”

I nodded in the direction of the bedside table before giving one long suck.

His hands tangled in my hair as he grunted, softly guiding me up and down his length.

“That’s such a good girl,” he cooed. “Taking me all the way. You’re perfect.”

But, again, I sensed that distance. That distraction.

I was going to take it all away.

His focus would only be on me.

So I completely slowed. Normally, we had our roles. He was in control, but today… he needed me to be. For the moment.

Instead of taking him, I ran the tip of my tongue up his underside, so lightly, in the hopes it would tickle. Torment. Tease. Like he did me.

His cock twitched.

When I reached the top, I slid my lips over the smooth head, sucking it in, swirling my tongue around it as I gently held his shaft.

“You’re such a fucking tease,” he groaned, watching me with intense eyes, his fingers massaging my scalp, inadvertently pushing my hair in my face.

“Make me not a tease, ma?tre, ” I dared.

His touch stilled and I took him fully again, slowly, slowly, dragging my lips back up.

And, finally, he acted.

He roped my hair around his fist and forced a brutal rhythm down my throat, causing me to gag over and over.

“Livid, how do you do this?” he groaned, voice deep. “How do you do this to me? The world could be fucking ending and I’d still be here, uncaring and hard over you.”

My eyes were watering as he fucked my mouth, panting and moaning. I was so wet.

He grunted and released me. “Damn, you’re so fucking good.”

I looked up at him with a grin. “Oh, am I?”

“Get on the bed. Naked.”

I whipped my clothes off, left my underwear on and crawled back up the bed.

He looked me over with a frown. “That’s not naked, Livid.”

Ugh, those first few times he called me that it had heated my blood. Now, it did so in a very different way.

“Take off all of your clothes. As pretty as these are,” he said and pulled the elastic of my lace thong back before releasing it, “I want your naked body up against mine. I have probably about fifteen minutes of you in this house without your mother listening and I will take full advantage.”

I bit at my bottom lip, my breath shuddering. “We’ll hear the car on the drive. We might have longer.”

“Off, Livid. Off, now.”

So I unhooked my bra, eyes on his, before pulling it off and letting it drop on the floor. He was still dressed in his top, his jeans around his ankles, but I knew that our agreement in the bedroom was that I didn’t question him unless I was after a punishment.

He didn’t have enough time to punish me.

“What if I wasn’t done with your cock?”

He snorted, kicking off his shoes and lifting his top off his back. Ugh, even the way he undressed made me hotter. “You are far from done with my cock.”

It glistened from my spit as he knelt on the edge of the bed, his hands running from my ankles up to the top of my thighs and down again. “I like to cherish you like this. Adore you.”

“How about, instead… you fuck me?”

“So needy,” he crooned and dipped his head for his tongue to skim my clit. He had learned how to tease me until I squirmed, begged, gasped, moaned, cried for him to ruin me.

He knew I needed to be teased and, fuck me, he was the best tormentor, always bringing me to the edge.

His tongue savoured me, slow and short licks before his fingers pumped away inside of me.

I was trying to hold back my moans, biting hard on my lip, but when his fingers pressed into that spot, I cried out. He didn’t let up, though I slammed my hand over my mouth.

He pouted, looking confused with a small frown as he watched his fingers please me. He licked his thumb before pressing it to my clit and making me flinch. “I want your brother to hear. He’s protective of you. I want him to know how I will ensure every part of you is looked after with me. I’m sure he’ll really value how many times I can make you come.”

Perverted. It was perverted.

But my hand slipped from my mouth.

There were no words to argue with as he went back to lapping me up. My hips were grinding against his face, a mixture of trying to get away because I was so sensitive and trying to get closer.

He shattered me, wave after wave unrelenting and I was crying out his name and pleading for him to fuck me.

And it would be a miracle if my brother didn’t hear.

“God, your sweet little cries nearly have me come in you.”

“Please,” I begged, voice raw, clawing at his arms. “Please, please, please. ”

“I’ve never fucked a girl in her childhood bedroom,” he said. “I’ve never been with someone when their family might hear.”

“I don’t care who hears,” I said, reaching for him and wrapping my legs around him, pulling my hips up to feel the silkiness of his cock. “God.”

“Mmm, Livid,” he said into my mouth but there was that distraction again as he reached away from me. “ J’aibesoindetoi. ” I need you.

I let go to fall on the bed, relieved when what he had gone to grab was his belt. He wrapped it around my wrists before attaching me to the headboard.

There he was. Mine again .

The low buzz filled the room as he pulled out the vibrator he had secretly packed from my bedside drawer. “This will be hard and fast,ok? If you don’t want your mum to walk in.”

I nodded eagerly and, over my panting chest, watched him push his cock into me. He filled me so completely, forcing my eyes to roll once he was fully seated in my walls.

“ Putain,putain, ” he groaned. “You like watching me fuck you, don’t you?”

I nodded again as he gently slid in and out of me.

“ S’il te pla?t, s’il te pla?t, baise-moi comme une salope. Ta salope ,” I begged. Please, please, fuck me like a slut. Your slut.

Talking in his native language did something to him. It added a wildness. He flipped me over, the restraint of his belt tightening, and he entered me again with a strong thrust that jolted me forward with a yelp.

His hips snapped forward, loudly slamming into my ass, his balls slapping up to me.

And then he pressed the vibrator to my clit, his other hand on my hip, helping his thrusts remain hard and fast.

The vibrator, his deep thrusts, all of it had me coming again.

We’d become fan favourites of vibrators. Nix wasn’t one to shy away from them, knowing they were asurefireway of making me come.

“Damn,” he purred. “ Je veux te briser. ” I want to break you.

“ Brise-moi, ” I chanted. “ Brise-moi. ” Break me.

Rising to the challenge, he pressed the vibrator further into my clit, the pulsing making me contract around his cock. I cried out as I came and the next thing I knew, Nix was shoving my panties in my mouth.

He grunted as I continued to come around him, breaking just as I’d asked him .

He leaned over, dismissing the vibrator, his hand around my throat and groaned in my ear, “ Tuesuneputainedementeuse. ” You’re a fucking liar.

With his other hand on my hip, he pulled me into his thrusts, and I cried against my gag, completely helpless to how he fucked me.

He came with a growl, gripping my ass. “Fucking hell, Livid.”

My breathing was out of control, trying to spit out my knickers. He reached over to pull them out.

“I am furious with you,” he said, voice low. “Furious.”

Face down in the pillow, I only nodded.

“So, I’m going to keep you tied up here until my cum drips down your thighs,” he threatened.

“Yes. Okay. I can do that.”

“Don’t you mean, ‘ Oui.Ok.Jepeuxfaire?a? ’” He repeated my words in French and I closed my eyes, trying not to laugh. Oh, I had fully fucked up. “Because I’m pretty certain you didn’t just learn a line or two to say while we fuck.”

I would have if I didn’t already know the language.

His cum started to run down my leg and he scooped it up with a finger before wiping it on my waiting tongue. On the third feeding, I sucked his finger into my mouth, releasing it with a loud pop.

His eyes rolled into the back of his head. “Fuck sake, Livid. Don’t make me hard again when your mum just pulled up.”