Theirs to Love Read online

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Epilogue

  Come to Me

  About the Author

  Also by Sierra Cartwright

  THEIRS TO LOVE

  Copyright @ 2022 Sierra Cartwright

  First E-book Publication: July 2022

  Line Editing by GG Royale

  Proofing by Bev Albin and Cassie Hess-Dean

  Layout Design by Once Upon an Alpha

  Cover Design by Once Upon an Alpha

  Photo provided by DepositPhotos

  Promotion by Once Upon an Alpha, Shannon Hunt

  All rights reserved. Except for use in a review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission of the author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Adult Reading Material

  Disclaimer: This work of fiction is for mature (18+) audiences only and contains strong sexual content and situations.

  It is a standalone with my guarantee of satisfying happily ever after.

  All rights reserved.

  DEDICATION

  For Team Can-Do for saying, I’ve got you. I see you. I appreciate you. Bev, GG, Cassie, Linda. And especially Shan, I’m sending you all the snacks you want!

  CHAPTER ONE

  Energy leashed, but barely, Drake Griffin paced the confines of the conference room on the second floor of the Braes, an ultraprivate club owned by the Zeta Society. The unobtrusive building, set behind iron gates, was in an exclusive area of Houston. It was a place where high-stakes deals were negotiated and signed.

  He would know. He’d inked plenty of deals inside these hallowed walls.

  As one of the city’s boldest hotshot lawyers, he’d outmaneuvered even the best of the best on behalf of his clients.

  Yeah, he was a cutthroat. Though he wasn’t widely liked, he was respected, and he’d take that above warm and fuzzy feels all day, every day.

  Tonight, though, mattered more than any other deal he’d been involved in. This time, he had something personal at stake. Not just a shitpile of old family money but also his reputation.

  After tonight, his star would be forever hitched to Everett Parker’s.

  At one time, they’d been more than acquaintances. Drake considered the other man to be among his small circle of friends. They’d golfed together, shot hoops on the weekend, bounced ideas off each other. And they’d discovered they shared an interest in BDSM. Since they both appreciated the same type of submissive—dark haired, beautiful, and curvy—they’d occasionally teamed up to Top the same woman.

  Now Parker despised him. Not that Drake blamed him.

  He’d been the one responsible for knocking the kingmaker off his lofty and laudable perch. Until Drake came along, Parker had enjoyed a ridiculously long run of success. His uncanny knack for predicting political winners had earned him the nickname of the Oracle. In a short amount of time, he’d gotten a supreme court justice through the nomination process, managed to get several members of the president’s cabinet confirmed, and helped elect a US senator and dozens of House members. Not to mention the way he’d stacked the state legislature in favor of the governor.

  Then Bob Finglas, candidate for office, had hired Drake to lead his opposition research team.

  For at least the tenth time, he checked the face of his high-tech watch. The digits changed to 9:01 p.m. Which meant Parker was late.

  No call. No explanation.

  As someone who billed by the minute, Drake’s time was, quite literally, money. Since the two had met in person no less than a dozen times to hammer out every single detail, Everett knew Drake despised tardiness. The slight was no doubt meant to tug on Drake’s temper—something that was never very far beneath the surface.

  Needing to take the edge off his growing frustration, he glanced at the very expensive bottle of whiskey and two glasses on the sideboard. A gift from Julien Bonds. It was meant to be opened after Everett and Drake signed the thick pile of papers in the middle of the long, polished table. The fact they had to meet at the club—neutral ground—rather than in one of their offices, said a lot about each man’s reluctance to yield power.

  But Bonds thought a partnership between the two men was a brilliant idea. And the Genius almost always got what he wanted.

  Almost?

  Right.

  Julien Bonds got whatever the hell he wanted—fuck the very real consequences. And in this case, Drake was certain that meant his sanity.

  9:02.

  He stopped pacing and dragged his hand through his hair, dislodging a lock that fell across his forehead. At five after, he’d say fuck it all. If Parker couldn’t even fucking be bothered to show up, Drake would grab the luxury single malt and exit the building. He’d tell Bonds to send the bill to Parker.

  With twenty-seven seconds remaining, Parker pushed open the door. “Evening, Griffin.”

  No acknowledgement of his lateness and certainly no apology.

  Not that Drake expected one.

  More because decorum dictated than any real congeniality, the two shook hands. Both men were wearing rings that signified they belonged to the Zetas, a secret society. Members were often referred to as Titans. The ranks were comprised of world leaders, Pulitzer Prize winning authors, famous playwrights, scientists, researchers, futurists, politicians, doctors, lawyers, judges, and most of the richest people on the planet. Their symbol was Athena’s owl, and emeralds served as the talisman’s eyes. And now the gems flashed in the bright overhead lighting. “You’re late.”

  Ignoring the comment, Everett glanced around the room, taking in the two chairs that Drake had placed across from each other, the stack of legal paperwork, the closed blinds, and then the whiskey bottle with a bow on top. “Bonds?”

  “None other.”

  “Optimistic bastard.”

  Seemed Drake and Everett had finally found something they agreed on.

  Without taking a seat, Everett dragged the manila folder toward him and flipped it open.

  “Everything is in order.” Of course it was. A legal hound through and through, he’d personally overseen every fucking one of the billion details. And there’d been a fucking pile of them. Months’ worth.

  Distrust tattooed in Everett’s eyes, he looked up. Maybe because his suit was black or a trick of the lighting, his eyes seemed dark, more gray than blue. “I’ll see for myself.”

  Drake strode to the back of the room where the staff had provided coffee service, a charcuterie board, sodas, and a carafe filled with water. Fruits and veggies floated on the top. Who the hell needed cucumber in their drink?

  He opened the small refrigerator and found an energy drink. Much better. He needed to remain sharp. The way Everett was reading each page, the night promised to be long.

  “I’ll have coffee.” Everett glanced up. “Thanks.”

  Screw you. Drake hadn’t offered. This meeting was getting worse by the minute. “Didn’t you read the files Smytherson sent over?” One of Bonds’s most trusted advisers. Someone both he and Everett had agreed on.

  “I did.”

  The words hung in the air. They weren’t an accusation exactly but close enough. “Look, Parker—”

  “Might as well get comfortable.” Everett shrugged out of his jacket and hung it on the back of a chair. “I plan to.”

  Fuck. He’d been hoping to go to the Retreat, a nearby BDSM club, at some point this evening.

  After taking a seat, Everett picked up the first page.

  Because he was anxious to get back to his real life and have this in his rearview mirror, Drake actually poured his would-be partner a cup of the rich, strong-smelling brew.

  “A splash of cream, if you don’t mind.”

  Drake clenched his back teeth. If this deal didn’t get done soon, he’d need to see a dentist.

  Everett barely looked up when Drake delivered the beverage. Instead of taking a drink, he slid the cup and saucer to one side and continued to read while Drake paced.

  Half an hour later, Parker took a break to remove his cufflinks. The gold clanked against the wood, the sound seeming to reverberate off the walls. Then he turned back his shirtsleeves.

  “For fuck’s sake.” His hold on his temper finally fracturing, Drake shoved a chair into the table. “Not a word has changed since you last read the document. And you goddamn well know it.”

  Somehow Parker managed to raise a single eyebrow.

  “Look…” Drake sighed in frustration. How he wished he’d dropped in to the Braes’s fitness center before the meeting. He’d have been less agitated if he’d burned off some of his e
xcess energy. But as always, his schedule had been packed, and today he’d started an hour before dawn.

  In the years since he’d taken down Parker, they’d never discussed what had happened. “Think what you will. I’ve never been dishonest in my dealings with you.”

  “You want to go there?”

  The animosity between them was as thick as it was seemingly insurmountable. “Maybe we should.” For better or worse.

  “You could have given us a heads-up.”

  “And give the kingmaker the opportunity to convince me to bury the information for the greater good?” Whatever the hell that even was anymore. At one time, he might have been young enough, idealistic enough, to believe in some higher good. “Politics is a dirty and dangerous game.” Parker knew it better than Drake did. “I did my job.”

  “All’s fair?”

  “You’d have done the same fucking thing.”

  “Would I?”

  Dripping with meaning, with accusation, the frigid question hung in the air.

  Everett slid the untouched coffee to one side and returned to his reading.

  “Call me when you’re done.”

  “You’re sure I won’t make any addendums?”

  “Fuck, Parker. Is our entire partnership going to be like this? We have to be able to trust one another.”

  “At one time, I trusted you.”

  “Look—” Damn it. Drake had wanted tonight to be a new start. But without addressing the past, was that even possible?

  Everett sat back and pressed his palms together. In thought? Judgment?

  “Do you want an apology?”

  “Since you don’t see that you did anything wrong, no.”

  “Employing trackers is as old as time.” Meaning Drake had directed the campaign to hire people to follow Everett’s candidate around twenty-four seven and note her every move.

  “It is.” Everett tilted his head to one side in acknowledgment. “But not when you were once an advisor to Allison’s campaign.”

  “I helped you vet her before her first term. Not the same thing.”

  “You knew our strategies, her weaknesses. You went to great lengths to point them out.”

  That much was true, and something he was good at. It helped him shore up his clients more than once.

  But when it came to Allison Danbury, no one would have guessed the sitting senator would be caught in a compromising position with a male staffer half her age—one who’d dated her daughter.

  When an anonymous tip had been sent to Drake, he dismissed it. The Allison he knew prized her family above anything else.

  “You’re good at what you do. The best, as Bonds says. But there’s a reason not a lot of people like you.”

  Drake had never been burdened by the need for anyone’s approval. “If it hadn’t been me, it would have been someone else.”

  “Maybe. The fact is, you knew my playbook and how to deploy the information.”

  He shrugged. “Parts of it. Not the entire thing.” But the Finglas media team had done an exceptional job of deploying the intel in the most effective ways possible.

  Scandalicious—an online news/gossip site—broke the news twelve hours before early voting started, which meant it would steal headlines across Danbury’s district.

  Every day, more salacious details were dripped.

  Because Parker had been in control, spinning the story as only he could, she’d responded with class and dignity, all the right words, and heartfelt remorse. Shockingly Allison’s early-return numbers were higher than expected. Her team, including her husband, planned a hell of a party to celebrate her victory. Everything crashed around them as results from the outlying precincts trickled in.

  “At best your behavior was a conflict of interest. Immoral, even.”

  “Immoral?”

  “It was a shitty thing to do.”

  “Her behavior was shitty. She had a husband and kids.”

  Still regarding him, Everett tapped his index fingers together. “You’re sitting in judgment of someone else?”

  Drake tried to hide his wince. He was no saint, and everyone knew it.

  “She did damn good work for her constituents.”

  Much better than Bob Finglas was doing in the same position. “The point remains. Someone tipped off the campaign. Right or wrong aside, she should have been more circumspect.”

  “After what was done to you?”

  The barb found its mark, and Drake clenched his fists at his sides. Lorraine’s betrayal still stung, even years later. “They’re not comparable.” Who was he trying to convince? Himself? Or his skilled opponent?

  Ignoring Drake, Parker flipped to the next page.

  In frustration, Drake dropped into a seat and finished his energy drink. Then, caffeine and God only knew what other chemicals zipping through him, he drummed his fingers on the desktop.

  “I’m afraid I’m distracted enough that I’ve lost my place.”

  An hour, seven minutes, and three seconds later, Everett picked up the manila folder and straightened the pages. “Everything appears to be in order.”

  “Good.” The thrill of closing a deal humming through his veins, he pulled out a pen from inside his jacket pocket and offered it to Parker.

  “You go first.”

  Yet another power struggle.

  Still, he was hungry as hell, and that was enough motivation for him. He drew the packet toward him and signed all the places Smytherson had marked with a yellow sticky arrow.

  While he’d been doing that, Parker took a pen of his own from the suit coat still hanging from the back of his chair.

  Then, time slowing, the ink scratched the page for the last time.

  The deal was done. Thank fuck. “We need to get Marcella in here.”

  Marcella was the photographer many Titans used. Because of her exceptional talent and attention to detail, she was often booked months, if not years, in advance. He and Parker had paid a pretty penny to have her on standby for this evening. But Scandalicious would have photos to go with the scoop that would hopefully be the lead article in their morning update.

  Before her arrival, Drake checked his hair and fastened the top button on his suit coat. Parker stood and stretched in some crazy ass yogalike ways before turning down his shirtsleeves and threading the cufflinks back into place. He’d just shrugged into his jacket when Marcella strode in, camera in one hand.

  They exchanged perfunctory greetings. After all, Parker’s delays had kept her waiting also.

  “Let’s get some with you shaking hands.”

  Both had practice at this kind of pose—holding it, and smiles, for an eternity.

  After snapping the shutter a dozen times, she glanced up at Parker. “Pretend you’re happy about this, Everett. Even if it’s just for the picture.”

  He flashed a quick smile, but it faded damn fast.

  “You get that?”

  Marcella checked the screen. “Good enough.” Then she suggested other shots, including one with the whiskey bottle on the table between them. “Figures. That’s the winner there. I’ll send you edited photos by midnight.” Then she narrowed her gaze. “And a bill for the overtime. I’m late for my next gig.”

  “Blame Parker.”

  “I would. Except everyone knows you’re a dick.” She shrugged before wiggling her fingers and leaving.

  The door slammed behind her. Silence hung, dragging into seconds.

  “Everyone’s a fucking critic.” Drake lamented.

  “You earned the reputation.” Parker shrugged. “Dick.” Then he exhaled and grinned.

  “I guess we’re partners.”

  “My name’s on a deal with the devil.”

  Drake was a hard callused man who prized winning over everything. Marcella’s comment shouldn’t have stung. And Parker’s shouldn’t have landed at all. Yet there they were, chinking the armor he’d cloaked himself in since he’d been a child.

  “Might as well drink the whiskey.”

  Parker hadn’t said they should toast or celebrate. His tone dragged with a reluctant resignation. “You pouring?”