Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
He only knew that it roused with a fierce and demanding need to young Master Ashton, in ways it had never roused to anyone else.
“There,” the nurse said, and snapped the suitcase closed. Her smile was skeptical, her voice dubious, but she remained pleasant and polite, expression almost frozen. “All ready. Your checkout paperwork is finished, Mr. Harrington, so you’re free to go. We’ll forward your records of care here to your regular physician.”
Calvin Harrington only made a tired sound, nodding forward in his chair. Brand stepped forward without thinking to take the handles of the wheelchair, but Ash shoved his body in the way with a fierce look.
“I’ve got it,” he hissed, and took the handles to ease the wheelchair forward.
Brand inclined in a bow. “As my young Master wishes,” he said, and exchanged a nod with the nurse as he took the suitcase, instead.
As long as they were getting out of here and getting Ash home, he didn’t care.
They made a quiet procession, moving across the dew-dampened sidewalks in the chill predawn gloom, the sky that strange luminous shade of washed-out night that came when the stars had set but the sun was just beginning to whisper golden morning-song. Ash pushed the wheelchair almost too slow, as if he was afraid of pitching his father forward, but before long they were in the lot—where a sudden bright flash nearly blinded the night.
A camera.
Ash jerked, flinching; Calvin Harrington didn’t even respond. Brand hissed under his breath, positioning his body to shield the Harringtons as he pulled the back door of the Mercedes open.
“Get in,” he said, pressing his hand to the small of Ash’s back.
Ash balked. “But Dad—”
“I will handle your father,” Brand said, as another camera flash went off in the dark, from somewhere beyond the bushes ringing the main drive. “Get in.”
Ash watched him with doubtful eyes for one moment longer, then ducked into the car. Brand bent to carefully bundle Calvin Harrington into his arms, lifting him from the wheelchair and easing him as quickly as he could into the backseat without jostling him when he felt as though he were made of straw, thin and ready to snap. Harrington stirred enough to fix him with an irritable look, but seemed to understand the necessity when he kept his mouth shut and didn’t struggle as Brand buckled him in, then slammed the door shut.
A few more flashes came as Brand folded the wheelchair and stowed it in the boot along with the elder Harrington’s suitcase. He shut the boot, straightened, and flung a searching look toward the source of those bright bursts of light. He couldn’t make anyone out, but he knew they were there.
Bloody vultures.
He slid into the driver’s seat, started the car, and backed the Mercedes out of the drive. The drive back into the city was as silent as a funeral march, and when he glanced in the rear view mirror he found the elder Harrington asleep, Ash staring out the window with a brooding and vacant stare, the faint gold of sunrise washing him in the colors of whatever memories haunted his heavy brow.
It was nearly seven by the time Brand turned the Mercedes in at the estate and pulled it through the roundabout. An unfamiliar car was in the drive, a little blue Prius with a rental sticker on the bumper. He frowned, but busied himself with helping Calvin Harrington out of the car and into his wheelchair. The moment the elder Harrington was safely settled, Ash took the wheelchair again with possessive insistence.
Brand sighed, gathered the suitcase from the boot, and followed his young Master up the walk.
Yet before they reached the front door, it opened; a woman stepped out, small and plump and trim in a neat pencil skirt and stylish leather boots and a slouching cashmere sweater. Her graying black hair was swept up out of her amber face, but a few tendrils drifted across her brow, swaying with her rushed, pattering steps as she came tumbling down the steps and pulled Ashton into her arms.
“Ash,” she said softly, her accent making a lyrical sigh of his name.
Ashton went stiff, arms held out from his side, eyes wide; they darted to Brand as if pleading with him for help, before he finally creaked into motion and wrapped his arms awkwardly around the woman.
“…okaasan?” he croaked, while Calvin Harrington stirred, lifting his head, staring at the woman with haunted eyes.
“…Amiko?”
Ah. So this was the runaway mother who had made such headlines over a decade ago, when she’d publicly abandoned Calvin Harrington and her son to return home to Japan. Brand had been in the UK at the time, but the scandals of American new royalty tended to make even the gossip rags back in the old country; he’d thought little of it at the time, the stories sensationalized to make her sound quite terrible indeed. It was hard to see the salacious rumors in the warm, smiling woman who stood on the red stone cobbles and hugged her son so tightly.