Fall in line?
Cat's encounter with Sadiq left her sullen. Anyone who knew her knew that falling in line was the one thing she'd never do. The very idea went against the core of everything that was Catherine Little. He must know that. Know it and not like it. Did that mean Sadiq did not like her? Was he really saying that she needed to change to be acceptable?
All her hard-won assurance over past fears flew out the door at the very idea. Her fears over lack of acceptance now surged forward anew. Fears she kept well-hidden with a veneer of sneering disregard that secretly went no deeper than her skin. Did he see through her? Had he uncovered her secret? If he had, and had called her out on it besides, didn't that mean he knew her better than anyone else? Cat gulped back the sudden thickening to her throat. She lifted tear-drenched eyes to stare out her bedroom window, refusing to let it fall unchecked down her cheeks. Lucy was returning that day; there was no way she would be greeting her sister with eyes red from weeping.
Cat hid her glum visage with false cheer as she looked forward to the return of Lucy and her long-lost twin, Blaise. The only light at the end of her narrow tunnel. The sudden yearning to throw herself in her sister's arms and pour it all out had her heart sickening with impatience for her sister's arrival. But they were all restless like that. Mary Little being the worst, and her pacing to and fro setting off everyone else's nerves. She busied herself in the kitchen, preparing an elaborate lunch before marching out front in intervals to stare impatiently out the window, searching for Jace's Range Rover.
But then he was there, pulling up before their home. They all made for the front door at the same time and came tumbling out in undignified haste, no doubt making the very worst first impression possible on their long-lost brother. Uncertainty over their welcome had them diverting towards Lucy and drawing her in their embrace first, all the while peering at the six-foot-two-inches tall man, with dark skin and a shaved head. Tattoos covered a portion of his exposed skin as he swept out of the vehicle with nary a jacket. Blaise seemed unimpressed with the Melbourne winter chill. Muscles flexed as he dragged a bag out with him then let it drop heedlessly to the ground by his feet. He was stunning. Pride filled her at the sight of her brother, her gaze lifting to study his face. A chiselled jawline spoke of pure masculinity. A day's worth of growth darkened the skin across his cheeks. His blue gaze startling against his darker skin. They narrowed in apprehension, taking in an assortment of people that made the intimate circle of the Little family.
They allowed him a moment to take in their appearance before Mary pushed forward to helplessly wrap her arms about his muscular frame. The rest followed, more to use their strength to keep their mother from collapsing completely on weakened knees.
Cat felt her own knees wobble as her heart filled with the unexpected relief of having their lost brother back in the fold. She beamed a welcoming smile up at his startled face, ignoring the tears that now fell in a steady stream down her damp cheeks. If there ever was a time for a good crying, this was it. Her arms wrapped about him tighter, joining the others already squeezing the life out of Blaise Starr. Her own fears and worries forgotten in the welcome of the missing chunk of the Little family's beating hearts.
****
Sadiq the sadist. Two weeks in and there had been no further word from him. Breaking up with him left her empty. But that did nothing to stop her yearning for things between them to be once again hot and furious as before. Even now, the Sadist sat on her mind, playing his usual distracting tricks. She gave a half-smile, envisioning his naked torso slick with sweat, as it often had been after sex.
Cat pushed away from her window and got to her feet. Her stop had arrived. She got off the bus and made her way back home hurriedly. Her steps rushed due to the lateness of the hour and her lateness in turning up to her own birthday party. Seventeen years of age that day, but she felt no different. Other than the swelling tenderness about her breast and the bump below her ribs that was no longer so easy to conceal. Time was running short but that was not what had her picking up her pace to almost jogging speed. She was being followed. Again. But she was no longer certain if it was friend or foe who followed so closely after her. Concealed so carefully in the shadows. Dusk approached. That strange point in time where light meets dark. Twilight.
It was a long walk back. Longer than usual. Cat thought for certain that her home had intentionally moved further away. Making her journey all that much more arduous. So that it was with some relief when she finally slammed into her home and hollered out to all and sundry," I'm home!"
"Where have you been?" exclaimed Emily, rushing out to greet her. "Do you know I had to blow all these balloons myself? Even Lucy is not back yet. I shouldn't have to blow my own balloons."
"We're turning seventeen. Why are we even having balloons?" Cat asked instead, cutting into her verbal diatribe.
"Why not? You know I love balloons. There's no age restriction on them, silly," Emily stated dramatically and annoyingly.
"You're silly!" Cat returned, turning to go upstairs to get ready.
"Nope. I'm quite certain it is you who is silly," Emily called out, rushing up behind her. "I have laid out your new clothes on the bed. You're to wear only that. I am not risking my efforts in organising this party to your dowdy choice of clothes. After all, some idiot might mistake you for me. Then where would I be!"
Cat only shook her head at her nonsense. But she guessed she did owe Em for organising this party. The last party Cat would ever have as she was now, before the burden of motherhood overwhelmed her. She turned to Emily.
"Happy birthday, Em," she said softly, reaching to draw her bubbly sister into her embrace, all the while careful to angle her stomach away.
Emily screeched before flinging her arms about her sister. "Happy birthday to you too, Cat."
The party was underway soon after. The guests mostly family with the odd assortment of friends. Jace winked at Cat as he moved past. Blaise kept hidden in the shadows as much as he could, but the family were more interested in meeting the lost son than either of the birthday girls. Mary Little hovered protectively about him.
"Tall and strapping," declared the hard-nosed Aunt Kristen. Patrick Little's elder sister and ranch owner. She was the head of the family, widowed and childless. She took her role seriously and never failed to point out her younger brother's failures in raising his family. Failures that were usually imagined... until now. But Cat's secret was still in the bag, even if it won't remain so for long.
Cat fingered the lace around the edges of the table cloth behind her. Leaning back against the very end of the laden buffet table, she kept to the shadows herself as she surveyed the lively party going on around her. Only ten minutes in and she was already dead bored with her own birthday party.
Cat couldn't help recalling that one party in which she hadn't been bored. In which the caresses from a stranger had her not only aroused but had connected in a strange and unfathomable way. She lit up on the inside just recalling that one party in which she had truly been alive. That one party in which she had existed at all. She had been seen. She had been touched... and most importantly, she had been cherished. An experience she had repeated many times since, only never again at a party. But even those secret rendezvous with her delectable Sadiq were over.
And knowing that had her craving that feeling again like she'd never craved before. She yearned to feel his arms about her. His breath in soft pants against her skin. He was like a drug... an addiction she could not get around. Cat felt her frame rack in the slightest shudders simply from recalling him. His effect on her. Sadiq.
She thought about him all the time. He haunted her waking, and there was no sleeping. Cat bit back a groan of despair and busied herself with distracting thoughts, but the only thoughts that would distract her were those of him.
"Cat? Is that you, my dear?"
The hoarse and cracking voice of her aging Uncle Arthur shattered her secret bubble of delight. She was pulled back into reality and the crushing embrace of her senile uncle. She struggled to get out of his clutching embrace. His awful scented perfume attacked her nostrils. The cloying scent made her want to spew the contents of her stomach. Cat clenched her jaw tightly and held her breath. She spotted Emily's sly smile over her shoulder and knew she'd sent their uncle her way and vowed revenge.
Using her ultra-strong super strength—not—Cat wrenched free from his grip before she bit out through gritted teeth, "Aww Uncle Arthur. It's me again, Emily. Cat's over there by Aunt Simmons." Cat pointed blatantly at her devious sister. Ignoring the hurt looks Emily threw her way, Cat offered her an unabashed grin as she sent the humongous, bumbling Uncle Arthur ambling back her way.
Chuckling with laughter, Cat moved off before anyone else could pounce on her. It was moments later when she felt it. An unerring sixth sense that alerted Cat to his presence. She knew instantly he was there. She could feel it... feel him.
Cat glanced about the feeble excuse for a birthday party and saw that Em had disappeared. No doubt to escape Uncle Arthur, but then Lucy had not made a show of face yet, and Cat knew she was here somewhere. Her car could be heard arriving from a block away. Cat didn't doubt she was preoccupied with Jace. It still surprised her that it took this long for those two to fess up their attractions; finally openly admitting they were a thing. It had been painful watching them do their tippy toes dance of indifference. But Lucy's kidnapping had changed all that; the two were inseparable now. Cat was glad to have them come out about their feelings for each other. She didn't get Lucy's prevarication over the inevitable. To her, Jace and Lucy was a done deal, but there's Lucy Little for you—indecisive and clueless. And bent on making things worse by barking up the wrong tree, and boy was Richard Reeves ever the wrong tree. Then again, who was she to point fingers? That would be like the pot calling the kettle black. Besides, Cat was way off to a head start; she not only cavorted with the Prince of Sin, but was hopelessly obsessed with him as well. And let's not get started on the bun in the oven. Nope, there was no denying Cat was in a pool of deep shit. And all of her own making.
Cat moved towards the doorway that led from the back-garden to inside. She made her way to the front hearing voices... hearing his voice.
He was here.
On her birthday.
Her steps quickened still, taking her closer until her eyes set on him. She felt an unreasonable twinge of delight flood her being. The stark emptiness she felt before was suddenly overtaken by happiness. She would see him. Sadiq. Even the thought of his name sent a thrill of excitement riding down her spine.
Sadiq.
Cat deliberately deluded herself and resolutely ignored her inner voice that started blaring all sorts of warning noises. She just had to see him again. She needed to see him... just this once.
Then he was there. Even more stunningly beautiful than before. Cat shivered with a yearning she couldn't hide. Her eyes met and locked with his as she mentally stripped him out of his expensive suit that she eyed with distaste, then sighed with dreamy appreciation over the raw masculinity she knew was underneath.
"Cat!"
Cat reluctantly tore her gaze away to acknowledge Lucy. Lucy reached out to envelope Cat in a hug but then gasped out, "No!"
She looked at Cat with dawning horror and comprehension and Cat drew back in shock. This was not how she'd wanted her secret to be discovered. She was not ready. She was so not ready to be found out. Cat glanced quickly at Sadiq, but his gaze was hooded. She straightened her spine and raised her chin.
"Cat?" There was no mistaking the shocked question in Lucy's stare.
Cat simply glanced at Lucy and nodded.
"Oh my god!"
"What? What's happening?" cried out Emily, always anxious of being left out of anything.
Cat sighed, knowing she could no longer put off the inevitable. "I am pregnant," she said simply, ignoring Em's outburst of shock.
The room was silent then, but Cat only had eyes for Sadiq. She couldn't get a read of him still. He looked a little different from when she last saw him. Two weeks had brought about a lot of change. There was no longer any warmth in his gaze when he looked at her. Had he found someone else? If so why was he here? To rub it in her face. Jealousy clawed up her spine and Cat clenched her fingers, unwilling to reveal the talons that she would love to sink in beneath his perfect skin. Her breathing became heavy. Sadiq met the challenge in her gaze with a lifted brow. He didn't look carefree and deliciously dangerous anymore.
Now he only looked dangerous.
Dangerous and mildly amused... at her expense.
"Is this true? Cat!" The cry of shock came from Emily.
Cat winced. Hearing Emily's voice filled with the hurt of betrayal from her twin, in having kept this from her, had Cat cringing, not willing to look her in the eye. They were so close they often finished off each other's sentences. Yet here they were now were, facing each other with such animosity. Cat knew instantly that she would never forgive her. Never forgive her for not telling her sooner. Telling her first. Telling her three months back about this possibility or then telling her when she found out for sure.
But she knew now. She and everyone else in this room knew.
Cat turned back to stare at Sadiq. Helpless to deny herself that pleasure... Pleasure that got her into this condition in the first place. Seventeen and pregnant.
Her eyes widened in sudden bewilderment and then met his steely gaze of pure determination.
"Have you told Mum? Or Dad?" cried Lucy in shock. Cat stared into her dilated pupils with some degree of worry. But then only managed to shake her head. She hadn't told anyone. Anyone other than her doctor.
And Sadiq.
"What are you all doing here?"
Mum came in to hustle them back out and Cat was thankful for the distraction. She had been in real danger of succumbing to Sadiq's dark charm again. His stony expression had begun to irk, and she wanted what he had been in bed. Hot.
They were a match. He was kindling to her match, lighting within each other a raw fire. They burnt clean. They burnt blue.
Reluctantly, Cat tore her besotted gaze away from his magnificence and moved off to trail behind her mum. Her gaze rested on her petite but full form. She would have to tell her and soon. Tell her Dad. She would have to tell them all. But most importantly, she had to make it clear that her current condition made no difference to her plans for the future. She could do it all.
She would do it all.
Cat followed meekly behind as her mum led her straight to the birthday cake. Emily was already there, lighting the candles. Her hands shaking with barely repressed emotions. Thirty-four in all. They would blow them out together, like always. Each trying to snuff out more than their share. At least that was what Cat hoped would still happen. She tried to catch her sister's gaze, but Em was avoiding looking at her.
Cat took her place opposite Em and stared at her face as the crowd around erupted into the chorus of the birthday song. Emily refused to meet her imploring gaze, making her lower lip stick out in a tremble of unshed tears. Cat hated it when Em cold-shouldered her. It happened very rarely. But when it did, it left her reeling in fear of losing her regard forever.
Suddenly everyone was clapping, and Emily had leaned over to blow at the candles. Lost in her thoughts as Cat had been, she was too late to snuff out even one. Her eyes lifted in surprise to stare at Em. It was only after she'd sunk the knife into the cake and sliced out a price that Em deigned to spare her a glance. The anger in her gaze had cooled somewhat. Cat drew in a shaky breath, feeling relieved. Of everyone, she could handle disappointing Em the least. She was the one who had lived her whole life looking out for Em, but it seemed the tables had finally turned. Cat lifted a beseeching gaze to her sister, silently letting her know she needed Em more than anyone else. Em stared back silently, her expression guarded, then her gaze fell to Cat's stomach and when she lifted her baby blues back to meet their match, there was only awe and banked excitement in them.
Cat let out a shaky breath then she lifted her hands to clap loudly along with everyone. Cheering Em on. Cakes and birthdays were meant for Em. She was the light of any party.
Mary moved in to help Cat slice up the cake and Cat took a step back... then another. Her gaze now searching out Lucy's, only to find herself the object of her scrutiny. Cat gulped down hard. This had rapidly turned into the birthday party from hell. She didn't do birthdays as a norm, beyond accompanying Em in blowing out the candles, but she did have a speech to make. One she particularly wanted Sadiq to hear. His presence here was not without purpose, and Cat wanted to nip his intentions in the bud before they got out of hand.
"Thank you all for being here to celebrate Emily's and my birthday. As most of you know, Emily deserves the credit for such amazing arrangements. I want to thank her specifically for always being there, for always sharing her birthday with me," Cat said simply, pausing to gather her breath before adding, "I would also like to announce," she said, this time staring straight at Sadiq, "that I have been accepted into med school. It has always been my ambition to study medicine and become a doctor. I am happy to say that path is open and inviting my participation."
With that said, she looked away from Sadiq's intensely dark gaze to clash with the exuberant excitement in her mum's. Cat couldn't help grinning at her mum's happiness then made the same mistake twice. She enveloped Mary Little in a hug that moulded her against her frame. Her mother's gasp of shock was as audible as her immediate stillness was frightening. Despair rising, Cat trembled in her mother's arms, glancing over her shoulders seeking Lucy's help. Lucy met her imploring gaze with a quiet determination of her own.
Taking over the situation. Lucy herded them all back in. Mary reaching out to draw a bewildered Patrick in after them. A nod to Jace had him shifting to take over being the life of the party. His signature grin widened across his lips, drawing the attention of all present with his effortless charm. Blaise paused to pat him on his shoulder before he too moved in to attend what would be his first Little family sit-down, albeit more as an innocent bystander than the recipient of that sit-down.
Cat was marched in without ceremony and automatically plunked down onto her usual seat around the dining table. The rest followed suit. All but Sadiq, who had quietly but determinedly strolled in after them, only pausing long enough to acknowledge the warning in Jace's hardened gaze before he moved on in. The warning was subtle on all accounts, but no less meaningful. These were what Jace considered his people, and there was no way he was letting Sadiq do more damage than he already had.
"What's going on?" her dad questioned, looking about at all the tensed faces gathered around the table uncertainly. His smile of happiness over the news of Cat's acceptance to do medicine slowly fading from his lips only to be replaced with worry. Cat's heart thudded in her chest with rising anxiety.
Lucy caught Cat's worried look and threw her something of a reassurance with her grim smile.
"Care to explain?" Mum glared straight at... Lucy?
"Huh?" Lucy asked dumbfounded.
"You know! You all know! I saw the looks the three of you were exchanging. I am not stupid," Mum declared with rising anger.
"What the hell is going on?" Dad asked in utter confusion.
"Will one of you be telling your father or shall I?" Mum threatened effectively. None of them wanted her to tell Dad. That would be signing their death warrant, for sure. The level of drama, if she did the telling, would work Dad up to the point of handing out punishment before the telling was even done. The Little girls knew that for a fact and exchanged worried looks.
Lucy looked at Cat, expecting her to do the right thing. It was all her doing to begin with; it was her tale to tell. But Cat only looked pleadingly back at Lucy. Frustrated, Lucy turned to Em next, only to have Cat's pleading look mirrored back at her. So, Lucy dragged in a breath for courage and told the bald-faced truth, "Cat is pregnant."
There was a sudden pause about the room and then her mother spoke. The sudden roaring in Cat's ears blurring out the response that her mother gave. Cat was suddenly pierced with a look of utter desolation from every member of her family.
She didn't follow much of the proceedings. Her gaze tore away from the disappointment on everyone's face that she knew she was responsible for to seek out and immerse completely on Sadiq. He was the escape she sought from what hurt she had caused. He was her salvation and he didn't disappoint. His green gaze shone with a brilliance that arrested her attention and absorbed it wholly. No longer did she remain aware of her family about her or of their disappointment in her. She saw only Sadiq. His physical presence there in the room, dominating her attention. Cat drew in a ragged breath, the tightness in her chest momentarily easing as she breathed in traces of his expensive scent that seemed to travel in invisible particles in the air between them, heading straight for her nose. Tantalising her with memories of the erotic nights in his arms. The pumping of heartbeats, the wrangling of loose limbs slick with sweat, the heavy breathing of a couple engrossed in sex. Her heart thudded at the reminder of the reason they were all gathered about this dining table with disappointed gazes piercing her from all sides.
She bit back a moan, cutting her gaze away from his as she desperately resisted the urge to go over to him. This was not normal, whatever they had between them. It was all-consuming in its intensity and bent on levelling destruction to her natural good senses. Her eyes hesitantly lifted to peek up at him once more, unable to keep away from drinking him in at every opportunity. For once, Cat appreciated the value of having excessively long lashes. She used them shamelessly now. To hide behind as she peered at him surreptitiously. The smirk he gave her was dark and knowing, but then he tore his own gaze away.
His eyes were on her dad. Then her mum. Travelling on to linger on Emily before moving on to Lucy. Lucy, who met Cat's own beseeching gaze, and then with a heavy sigh took on the responsibility of the telling of Cat's sordid tale. The much that she knew, which thankfully was not much at all. Lucy related the one night she'd spent in Sadiq's arms on New Year's Eve. The night that left her pregnant with his child. A night which, to the best of Lucy's knowledge, had never been repeated. Cat was suddenly determined to maintain that charade. She couldn't bear to contemplate everyone's reaction if they knew the whole truth.
Cat gasped suddenly, tearing her gaze away from Lucy to stare back at Sadiq with dawning apprehension. His own widened with sudden understanding before narrowing in smug appreciation that he now held the upper hand. He now knew of her weakness. Knew it and was willing to use it against her. Her family was everything to her and Sadiq had the secret that could forever tear them apart. Cat stared at him with unbridled horror and his knowing smirk only widened with determination.
He now held the power to make her abide his every command and he was not above using it.