Sweet Temptation (The Sweet Trilogy #4)(102)

We’ll see.

I pace the kitchen and living room. I have practice tonight with the band, so that’ll be good. I need distractions, to keep me busy. Hopefully Anna Malone won’t be there.

I want the drama over with. I told everyone at work that my father died and I’d have to fly to Georgia for a few days. Thankfully that put them off from questioning my love life for the moment.

The lawyer rang me yesterday, saying he’d been instructed to contact me if anything ever happened to Father. His Atlanta estate is to be sold, Father’s body is to be cremated, and the insurance policy will cash out. As Richard Rowe’s only known family member and heir, I will be receiving the entire “sizable” payout. The lawyer used the word “sizable” several times.

Thing is, I won’t get to keep all that. Father will need the fortune to live his next life in style. I’ll get my cut, and then I’m on my own. Financially. But I’ll always answer to him.

I wish I knew where he was. The only good thing is that it takes quite a while to find a new body. At least that’s what I’ve heard. The Dukes are right picky. Father won’t be able to sniff Anna out if he doesn’t have a nose, so I don’t have to worry about him going after her just yet.

Belial told Anna to go on to college like she’d planned, and pretend to work. He thinks staying on the run will look too suspicious for her. Now that she’s not a virgin, Belial is hoping the Dukes will second-guess themselves.

I worry about Belial’s assumptions, but he’s known the other Dukes a bloody long time. I hope he knows their behaviors well enough not to put Anna’s neck on the line.

I shut the freezer door and order out for Thai. I hate standing around waiting and worrying like a useless git. In two days I’ll fly to Georgia to sign estate paperwork and retrieve Father’s remains, which are going straight down a toilet at the dodgiest petrol station I can find. But at least I’ll be in the east, on the go.

I slump onto my leather couch and grab a pad of paper and a pen, ready to scratch out some lyrics.

And then my mobile dings with a text.

It’s a picture from Anna. That’s strange. I open it and stare.

And stare some more.

Fucking hell, little Ann.

I ogle a picture of her tangled in a sheet, a knee up; her hip, thigh, and arse showing beautifully against a scrap of black fabric that hardly qualifies as knickers.

A low, long groan erupts from my throat.

She’s too sexy. It hurts to look at it, but I can’t stop. She’s too bloody far away. Why, why, why? My hands shake as I type.

OH GOD.

I stare. I type. What r u doing to me??

I am gobsmacked. I can’t believe u took a pic.

I stare. I cram my hand into my hair and pull. CANNOT STOP STARING.

Too much sexy. I can’t even . . . Just wait little vixen.

I fall over on the couch. F me. Ur so fn hot.

I think I might die here, a lump of lust. Ur in serious trouble when I see u again.

I stare. Serious. Trouble. I curl into a ball of pain and die.

A moment later my mobile chirps in my dead hand. I open it with trepidation. Thankfully it’s only words, and not more skin I’m not able to touch.

Baby steps for your nerdy girl, she writes.

The girl clearly underestimates the power of her bum and a seductively minimal pose.

Nerdy my arse, I type back. All the cold showers in the world can’t cure what u’ve done to me.

Cruel wife.

Sorry, she says, but I can see her smiling in my mind.

U r not. Leave me alone. I’ll b busy 4 a bit.

Cold showers . . . not again. I want to cry. But then a horrible thought occurs—I hope she doesn’t think I’m truly angry. I quickly type out another message.

PS . . . ilu.

ilu2, she says.

I catch myself smiling and shake my head. Sap.

Then, as much as I hate to do it, I delete each message one by one. When I get to the photo, I take one last long stare, groan deeply, and delete it. Then I trudge heavily to the loo, all by my lonesome, where I might die again. Sexting is dangerous business. I don’t recommend it.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

One-Track Mind

“The only heaven I’ll be sent to

Is when I’m alone with you.”

—“Take Me to Church” by Hozier

I’m at a bar with my bandmates at midnight, nursing a Jack and Coke and dodging pitiful looks from the blokes who think I’m broken up over Father’s death.

Honestly, I’ve been a bit of a disaster ever since the picture text from Anna. It sparked a single-mindedness in me, worse than ever before, and I cannot cope. No amount of Dead Daddy talk will make this raging problem of mine go away.

I keep thinking about our wedding night. We had less than twelve hours together, and yet it’s given me three days’ worth of nonstop memories. It feels as if I’m living in a fog of Anna.

Shite, I think I’m obsessed with my wife. I want to hide her away and keep her all to myself, always. That’s psychotic thinking, even by my low standards.

Oy, that damn picture.

My mobile buzzes in my pocket, sending my heart into race mode, as it always does these days. I dig it out and hold my breath when I see it’s a text from Anna.

Book a flight to Va tmrw.

Right. I don’t think Anna would send me a command like that jokingly. Not these days. Belial must’ve contacted her and said it’s safe. So I grin, because if all is well with her, she will pay dearly, in equal measure, for the suffering she’s inflicted with her sexiness.