Page 10 of Silver Fox's Secret Triplets
I closed my eyes and immediately regretted it.
The memory crashed over me without warning, as vivid as if it were happening again. Duncan's hands tangled in my hair, his mouth hot against my neck as he pressed me back against the stone wall of my parents' garden. The Fourth of July party had ended hours earlier, but we had lingered on the patio, sharingwine coolers and conversation that grew more intimate as the night wore on.
I had been twenty, raw from Jake's rejection and desperate to feel wanted by someone. Anyone. Duncan had been the perfect target—older, sophisticated, carrying the kind of quiet confidence that made women notice him across crowded rooms. I knew about his previous scandal, the headlines that had painted him as a predator who took advantage of younger women. But that night, sitting beside him as he listened to me ramble about college and my father's expectations, he hadn't seemed predatory at all.
He had seemed lonely.
When I kissed him, he pulled back immediately. His hands came up to frame my face, his expression serious and conflicted.
"Ivy, this isn't a good idea. Your father?—"
"My father doesn't have to know." I leaned closer, emboldened by the wine and the way his pupils dilated when I bit my lower lip. "Besides, you're not exactly averse to the age-gap thing, are you?"
It was a cruel thing to say, using his past against him, but I was young, ready to start my life, and hurting. I wanted him without apology. Or maybe I wanted him to prove that he wanted me more than he feared another scandal. Some would call that a "daddy issue."
"This would be rebound sex, Duncan. Not a relationship or something serious." I kissed him again, deeper this time, my tongue sliding against his until he groaned and pulled me against him. "No one has to know."
The wine had made me bold, reckless in a way I had never been before. When he tried to protest again, I pressed my body against his and felt him harden through his pants. The evidence of his desire dissolved whatever noble intentions he might have had.
What happened next was nothing like the gentle, awkward fumbling I had experienced with Jake. Duncan touched me like he was mapping territory he intended to conquer, his hands sure and demanding as they roamed over my body. He lifted me onto the stone ledge that bordered my mother's rose garden and stepped between my thighs, his mouth finding the sensitive spot where my neck met my shoulder.
I gasped his name and felt him smile against my skin.
"Tell me to stop," he murmured, even as his fingers found the hem of my sundress and pushed it higher. "Tell me this is a mistake."
But I couldn't. I was already lost, already drowning in the way he made me feel powerful and desired and completely out of control all at once. When he slipped his hand between my legs and found me wet and ready, I arched against him and begged him not to stop, and when he slid into me, my entire world tilted on its axis.
I ignored every self-preservation instinct I had and let him suck me in and spit me out—not once but three times that night. We found the blanket left draped over Mom's sunbed and made a nest in the shadowy spot of the yard not visible to the back porch, and he, more than anything else I'd experienced in life up to that point, made me a woman that night.
It was a blur of desperate kisses and whispered endearments, of clothes pushed aside and boundaries crossed. He took me there in my parents' garden, under the apple trees, with the scent of roses heavy in the summer air. It was wild and intense and perfect, and when it was over, I knew I would never be the same.
I opened my eyes and stared at the computer screen, my cheeks burning with the memory. Almost four years later, and I could still feel the phantom touch of his hands on my skin, stillhear the way he had whispered my name when he came inside me.
The pregnancy test two months later had changed everything.
I had been preparing for college abroad when the nausea started. At first, I thought it was stress from my upcoming internship interviews, but when my period was three weeks late, I knew. The two pink lines had stared back at me from the bathroom floor of my dorm room, and I had cried until there were no tears left.
The paid internship at the marine research facility in Bar Harbor had been a lifeline. When they offered me the position, I accepted immediately and told my parents I was taking a gap year to gain experience. My father had been furious, but my mother had supported my decision, probably sensing that I needed space to figure out my life.
I never told them about the baby. By the time I realized it was triplets, I was already too deep in the lie to find my way out.
The first year had been brutal. Three newborns, no sleep, and no help except for what I could afford to pay for. My father sent money regularly, enough to cover rent and groceries, but he never visited. He was always too busy, always had meetings or deals that couldn't wait. My mother called every week, begging me to come home for Christmas or Easter or just a weekend, but I always had an excuse. Work. School. Anything to avoid the conversation that would inevitably come if they saw the children who looked so much like their father.
My phone buzzed, pulling me back to the present. A text from Lauren telling me the triplets were asking for me, wondering when Mommy would come home. I stared at the photo she had sent—Sammy with chocolate on his face, Elena hugging her stuffed elephant, Chrissy building a tower with blocks—and felt the familiar ache of missing them.
I glanced at the clock on my computer screen. It was almost noon, which meant my mother would be starting her chemotherapy session soon. I had promised to be there, and there was no way I could concentrate on quarterly reports when she was sitting in that sterile room, poison dripping into her veins.
I pulled out a piece of paper and wrote a quick note.
Had to go to the hospital to be with my mother. Will make up the time later.
- Ivy
I left it on Duncan's desk on my way out, avoiding eye contact with his COO, who watched me with barely concealed curiosity. The elevator ride to the parking garage felt endless, and by the time I reached my car, my hands were shaking again.
The drive to Massachusetts General took twenty minutes in midday traffic. I found my mother in the oncology wing, already hooked up to the IV that would pump chemicals through her system for the next four hours. She looked small in the hospital bed, her normally vibrant presence diminished by the clinical surroundings.
"There's my girl," she said when she saw me, her smile brightening her pale face. "I was hoping you'd make it."
