Broken Bonds (Club Imperial Series)

Broken Bonds

Book 2

A Club Imperial Novel

By Katherine Rhodes

Book 2 continues the A Club Imperial Series

After the vicious attack on Emmy, Nathaniel has enlisted the help of his brother and Club Imperial’s owner to make sure her secret life doesn’t make the headlines, or interfere with the justice her attackers deserve. And to make matters worse, Emmy wakes up with absolutely no memory of what she has been through.

Recovering from her injuries at Nathaniel’s sprawling estate, Emmy deals with all of the changes in her world: new friends, a different lifestyle, a new boyfriend and a brand new threat.

With a simple phone call, her past crashes head-long into her present. Her mother suddenly reappears in her life and brings with her all the terrible things she thought she’d left behind. Old scars are ripped open and Emmy’s not sure she can survive the pain again.

She has to let Nathaniel go to protect him from the hell of her past…

But he’s not walking away.

Content Warning: Intended for 18+ Audience, may contain explicit details or scenes

No part of this work may be used, stored, reproduced or transmitted without written permission from the publisher except for brief quotations for review purposes as permitted by law.

This is a work of fiction.

Any resemblance to real characters, places

or events is purely coincidental.

Copyrighted ©2014 by Katherine Rhodes

ISBN-13: 978-1495430282

ISBN-10: 1495430286

Published by Beau Coup Publishing:
http://beaucoupllc.com

Tech Assistance by Added Touches:
http://addedtouches.com

Cover Design by: JRA Stevens

License Notes

This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

To:

Kristen

for reading even when it was handwritten

Chapter One

Nathaniel W:
I’m tired of the word complicated.

E Westerly:
I got baggage, baby. A whole cargo plane full of it.

E Westerly:
I am the living personification of FUBAR.

Nathaniel W:
So meet with me. Tonight. Explain your FUBAR-ness.

E Westerly:
No. I told you that. I have to work tonight. I need to.

Nathaniel W:
You need to?

E Westerly:
You want to know about me? I need control. I need routine.

E Westerly:
And the club gives me that.

Nathaniel W:
…but you’re willing to talk to me?

E Westerly:
Yes.

E Westerly:
I don’t make any promises about this, though. Not a one.

Nathaniel W:
When can I see you?

E Westerly:
We’ll see what we can do about tomorrow night.

E Westerly:
Remember I’m going to Boston Sunday.

Nathaniel sent the last YouTube video he had picked out to explain what was going on in his head. He tossed the phone on the chair next to him, put his head in his hands, and let a string of curse words which had been funneling through his brain. He told Emmy he loved her and she was pulling
this
shit.

The phone flew back at him, landing on his lap. Mary lowered herself into the seat next to him. Letting out an exhausted breath, she smiled at him. “I hate this boot. I really do. Stupid broken foot. You would think someone who’s been dancing for twenty years would have a little more grace. I can’t wait to get rid of it. Where’s Emmy?”

It was Nathaniel’s turn to let out a breath.

“Oh. Trouble in paradise?”

He laughed. “The last thing we were in was paradise, Mary.”

“So where is she?”

“She’s working.” He bit the words out.

Mary looked around, waving at Althea. “Tell you what,” she said. “I can’t dance and your alternate partner isn’t here. Buy me dinner and let’s talk. You look like someone shot your dog and I think you could do with some chit chat.” She foisted herself out of the chair. “Come on. You’re rich. Take me somewhere nice.”

Nathaniel cracked a smile and stood, offering his arm. “Pushy old woman.”

“You are lucky you’re cute.”

He helped her out the front door and pulled the car around for her. When he climbed out to open her door, she whistled at his ride. “What is
this
?”

“It’s a Mustang Shelby Cobra, 1967, fully restored.”

“You drive this around?” Mary was genuinely stunned.

The car was painted candy apple red with two racing stripes down the center. He was very proud of it. He and Victor had spent months restoring it with their father. “When the roads aren’t coated with salt, yes. Otherwise, I drive a sensible pickup.”

Mary laughed. It took only a few minutes to get to Grand Concourse and he helped Mary back out of the car, handing the keys to the valet. “If there is so much as a fleck of pollen in a different spot from where they are now, I will hand you several body parts. Understood?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir,” the valet said, grinning like an idiot with the keys to a motorhead’s wet dream in his hand. Which, was exactly what he had. Nathaniel knew how coveted the car was, and how much he’d been offered for it, but it was the sentimental value which meant more.

Mary limped into the restaurant on his arm, looking around at the cavernous room. “Wow, gorgeous. My stingy husband would never take me here.”

“Then you bring him here,” Nathaniel said. “My treat. Have them charge it to me.”

“What?”

“I have a standing account.” He shrugged. “I bring clients here all the time for lunch. I’ll leave a note that you’re allowed to charge to my account whenever.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes, of course.”

Nathaniel found a curious look on Mary’s face as they were seated. “What’s wrong?”

“I never really thought about it.” Her voice was low. “How rich you are.”

“That’s because you’ve been dancing with me since I was a juvvy recovering meth-head.” He laughed. “You knew me just after the worst part of my life and this money thing came on much later.”

“I did miss you while you were in the Air Force,” Mary said. “So, if you don’t mind me asking, how much are you worth?” Nathaniel hesitated. “You don’t have to tell me, never mind. Sorry.”

“No, it’s not that.” He gestured for her to wait while he gathered his thoughts. “It just seems so ridiculous an amount.” He knew the number. Nathaniel trusted Mary as if she were his own mother, but sometimes he was embarrassed by the huge amounts of money he raked in simply by buying grain and potatoes and other failing businesses.

“You’re a very generous, intelligent man, Nathaniel,” Mary said. “You should be proud of what you make, what you do.”

“Five hundred and eighty million, roughly,” he said, barely above a whisper.

Mary’s eyebrows shot up. “That much?” Nathaniel nodded, then shrugged. “I knew it was a lot, but I didn’t realize…” She smiled at him. “Well, Frank and I will be taking advantage of your account here. Often.” He laughed as he handed her a menu. Mary started studying it. “So, what happened with Emmy?”

Nathaniel let out a sigh. “It’s so damn complicated.” Ha.
Thought you said you hated that word?

Mary peered over the menu. “We have a nice meal ahead of us, so buckle down and get to explaining.”

He decided today was not the day for adventurous dining. He closed the menu and put it on the table next to him. Mary glanced through the offerings, but it was clear she was waiting for him to tell his story.

“I wish I knew what really happened.” He could hear the frustration in his own voice. “She just freaked out on me.”

“Does it have anything to do with your brother and Greg?”

Nathaniel felt his anger rise. “Does everyone know about that?”

“Gossips are bitches, Nate.”

“It might…I don’t know. I just know she, uh…” He looked at her, hesitating. “Well, we were. Um. She and I—”

Mary laughed. “Spit it out.”

“Jeeze, Mary. How am I supposed to talk to you about this?”

“I have three children, and I know how it works,” she said.

Nathaniel grimaced. “It’s not really that simple.”
And there it is again—that complicated thing.

“Yes, so you’ve said,” Mary answered.

Mary wasn’t giving up. He took a deep breath. “Ok, so Emmy is kind of kinky. And, we were exploring some of that last night. It was pretty intense stuff because, well…I didn’t want to think about what I had just done to my brother’s life. I wanted to reciprocate some of…” He sighed, waving his hand. “You know. And since she did it to me, I thought that she would like it as well.”

Mary waited.

Nathaniel huffed. “Fine. I rang at the backdoor and she freaked.”

Mary let out a huge, echoing laugh but quickly remembered where she was and slapped a hand over her mouth. She managed to get a hold of herself. “I’m sorry. Did you just say you rang at the backdoor?”

Nathaniel couldn’t stop the flush in his face. He averted his eyes. “Yes.”

Mary folded her hands and put them on the table. She paused a moment, collecting her thoughts. “Nathaniel, if you’re going to play with kinky stuff, you can’t use euphemisms like that.” She was calm and firm. “First off, they are hilarious and it sets the wrong tone. Sex is personal, not humorous. Well, it can be funny, but not in the way
that
phrase implies. You need to be straight up when you’re talking about limits. If you prefer medical, then use the medical. If you’re being naughty, then use the graphic words. So, she treated you to some anal play, and you thought if she gave, she might want to receive.”

Nathaniel nodded. “I can’t believe I just admitted that.”

Mary waved him off. “Sex is natural, as long as you’re cool with it. Which is where I’m going. Did you guys talk about your limits?”

“Oh, my God, Mary.” He sighed. “Did we talk about limits.” He put a hand to his forehead. “Hard limits, soft limits. Things I didn’t even know existed.”

Mary stilled. “She’s not just kinky, is she?”

“Why would you say that?”

“No one talks about hard and soft limits. Just limits. Unless...” Nathaniel wanted to walk away. He could feel the blood draining from his face. “She’s a little bit more than you expected, isn’t she, Nathaniel? She’s introduced you to a whole other world.”

He put the napkin on the table. “I need to go.”

Mary grabbed his elbow and held him in the chair. “Sit. I’m old, not stupid. I’m also not here to judge you. I’m here to help you get back the woman you so clearly love. If you want to explore and even be a part of that kind of stuff, that’s your business. But, something went wrong. What? Why?”

“I don’t know and that’s the problem,” Nathaniel said.

“Exactly. Let’s walk through this. Everything else to that point had been normal?” She rolled her eyes. “Relatively speaking.”

He nodded. “Intense, but normal.”

“And she freaked when you tried to reciprocate?”

“Yes.”

“Then, your action bothered her,” Mary reasoned. “Either the anal play or your attempt at reciprocation.”

“She’s never reacted that way before.”

“You said you talked about limits,” Mary said. “Both of you, or just yours?”

“I...don’t remember. I thought she was right there with me.” Nathaniel looked over at the older woman. “She’s a force to be reckoned with, Mary. Do not cross her, she will take your ass down in the worst way she can think of. I just saw Greg go down. I know she wants to take down Tyndale-Dayton.”

“And yet...”

“And yet, she has things to hide. She will not, under any circumstances, remove her bustier. She is in charge, even when I think I’m in charge. And now this.”

“So, there’s something she needs to tell you.” Mary paused as the waiter came back and put their drinks on the table. “Even if you’ve already talked about this, you need to talk about it again. You, or she, missed something here. Something big that needs to be out in the open between the two of you.”

“She said she’s willing to talk to me, but she doesn’t want to make any promises.” Nathaniel took a sip of his wine and wished it was a gulp.

“Nor should you, Nathaniel,” she advised him. “You don’t know what it is she’s hiding. It could be earth-shattering, or it could be totally inconsequential to you.”

“Mary, I really do love her.”

The admission rocked him to his core. He’d said it, but hearing it said to someone who had no stake in the relationship made it somehow more real, more—just more.

“I know you do.” She smiled at him. “You’re crushed by this and I’m sure you sent her some very sweet texts. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were flowers.”

“Flowers! You’re a genius!” He pulled out his phone. “Flowers on her desk tomorrow morning.”

Mary shook her head, laughing lightly. “So where is she now?”

“Working.”

“Working?” She was confused. “Did you leave her at the office?”

“No, at her second job.”

“Why does your brother’s high-paid business admin have a second job?”

“Because she really likes it.” He wanted to add a mocking answer, but held his tongue. He loved her, he wanted to understand her. Mocking her was not the way to win her back.

“Where does she work?”

Nathaniel smirked. “Imperial.”

Mary covered her mouth with an astonished hand. “The nightclub?” He nodded. “Oh, wow. Nate, you really hooked an interesting one.”

He nodded. “That I did.”

“Well, it’s a nightclub. With a bar. Why don’t you get a drink after dinner and see if you can catch her tonight, before another day goes by.”

“You know...that sounds like a plan.” Nathaniel sat up in the chair and looked over at his dining companion. “Now, if we can avoid talking about my sex life for the rest of the evening, I think it would make for a better meal.”

“Agreed.”

~*~*~

Nathaniel couldn’t believe how many people had sidled up to the table to flirt with him. Again.

He had been at the table just over two hours. Some of the women, and most of the men, were subtle; others were blatant and some were so determined he’d called a security guard over. It was about quarter to midnight when, this time, a man approached the table and sat down without invitation and without preamble. The man placed an Old Fashioned glass with whiskey stones and rich golden scotch in front of Nathaniel and himself.

Through the darkened glint of the room, Nathaniel looked over at his new table companion. He was a blond, Germanic man with blue eyes and quite a build. He had a comfortable, no-nonsense air about him, and Nathaniel felt he was someone he would do business with on only a handshake, without fear of being cheated.

Finally, he recognized him as the man in black, whom Emmy had spoken to the first night. The first night when he had come in with Jillian.
Wow. Different lifetime
. “Franz, right?” Nathaniel picked up the tumbler and swirled the whiskey in the glass.

“Correct,” he affirmed. “What brings you here tonight, Mr. Walsh?”

“Nathaniel,” he offered. “A mutual friend.”

Franz smirked, sipping the whiskey. “You are persistent, I’ll give you that.”

“I have to be.” He considered the play of light through the whiskey. “She means the world to me.”

“So I’ve gathered.” Franz glanced across the room casually. “She’s got another client waiting, then you can take her home. I trust you are going to talk out whatever the hell this is?”

“She’s agreeable to that, according to the last text she sent.” Nathaniel tried to keep the bitter anger out of his voice.

They sat quietly for a moment, each sipping the whiskey. Franz spoke again. “You should know you’re taking away one of my oldest and dearest friends. Whatever it is you’re offering her is making her think about leaving this place. No one has ever been able to get under her skin like that. No one.”

Point blank, Nathaniel asked, “Are you a friend or competition, Franz?”

“A friend,” Franz answered. “I’d like to think that of both of you some day.”

“I wouldn’t mind. Especially if your taste in scotch always runs this way.”