Touch of Trouble (Touch Series) (3 page)

Nicholas hums. "
It's also referred to as a chamber, no?" 

"That’s true." I nod and look at the screen. "The Chamber…The Harem's Chamber…"

That will actually be perfect! Because we have the Club—the original club area—the Cave, soon the Cinema; yes, the Chamber will be super perfect.

Nicholas leans close and kisses my jaw. "The
Sultan's
Chamber, baby girl." I shiver. "A place where a Dominant can drown in pleasure, be surrounded by it, and snatch up a concubine or two."

I giggle, slightly breathless. And a
lot
turned on. "Only
one
for you,
Sir
." I look up at him a little accusingly. Playfully, of course.

"Of course." He smiles and grasps my chin, tilting it for a kiss. "
You're the only concubine I want." He winks at me and lets go. "But don’t think I haven't noticed the way you look at Dylan sometimes." There's mischief in his eyes, and I feel my cheeks heating up. I had no idea he'd noticed! "The Chamber would be a perfect place to watch him play with Cade, wouldn’t it?"

"
Oh,
yes
." I grin, excited. Which reminds me, I hope Cade and Dylan's second date goes well. I already know their first ended with them at Cade's house, and that was only a few days ago. But Dylan texted me the other day and told me they were going out tonight.

Nicholas ti
lts his head a little. "You'd tell me if you want more, right?"

"What?" My eyebrows knit together.

Now he appears guarded and careful. "More than watching."

Oh. Oh! No, no. I shake my head. "Eeek," I squeak and giggle just picturing it. "No!" I clutch my tummy, feeling all weird. "I admit that I like to watch, but—" I could never
ever
participate. I don’t like to share, and I don’t like to
be
shared. However, playing
near
Cade and Dylan would be
so
sexy. Especially since Cade is a Daddy Dom, too. "You're silly, Daddy." I snicker and bury my head against his bicep.

He rumbles a low, sexy laugh
and kisses the top of my head. "I'm incredibly relieved, too."

That makes me look up at him. "You don’t ever have t
o worry about that." Then I smirk a little. "You don’t like Dylan much, do you?"

Okay, maybe that’s taking
it too far, but I know Nicholas thinks Dylan is too mischievous. Sometimes, he'll run up to me at the club, poke my boob or something, and then run off again. To which Nicholas will dole out his punishment. But now that Dylan is—hopefully—with Cade, I think Nicholas will breathe a sigh of relief.

I just think it's funny. Dylan is a crack-up. He's cute, too. Silly sexy.
He's a twenty-five-year-old clown.

"That
boy is trouble." Nicholas grins wryly. "I sincerely hope Cade will keep him on a leash."

I shudder, a little intimidated by
Cade. He is
very
nice, but he's not like my Daddy. If I didn’t like Cade, I wouldn’t have set him up with Dylan. But, that said, he's very different from Nicholas. Cade looks like a bad boy. A biker. A
hot
biker, but a biker nonetheless. With tattoos, piercings, and a leather jacket to match. He always strolls into the club in jeans, a snug T-shirt, his dark hair buzzed super short, scruff on his sharp jaw, an unlit cigarette behind his ear, and stormy blue eyes that promise indecency.

I hope
Gabriella—another Little friend of mine—won't feel neglected, though. John, Gabriella's Daddy…I don’t really like him. I try to give him the benefit of a doubt since he's Nicholas's friend, but I don’t know. Lately I've seen John take "emergency calls" too often, and so he sometimes leaves Gabriella alone at the club. In the past, Cade looked out for her, but if Cade will be busy with Dylan…

Maybe
she'll open up to me more about it, although I won't be surprised if she doesn’t. We're kinda close, but she's closer with a few others. Sort of like I've grown so close to Evangeline and Brayden. I really like them, and I can't wait to see their collars when I get back home.

"What're you thinking abo
ut, baby?"

I sigh and stow away my iPad. "Brayden and Evangeline. I'm so happy for them, but I expected them to tell me about the collaring." Mark was supposed to collar them the day after Nicholas and I left for
Mexico, but when I talked to Evangeline, she didn’t mention anything.

"He postponed it," Nichola
s answers. "I spoke to Mark yesterday. He's bringing them with him to his house in La Jolla after the holidays, and he plans to do it there instead."

"Oh! I love that idea." I smile. "I hope they get married and have a bunch of babies."

Nicholas laughs through his nose and gathers me close. "Everyone should have a fairy tale according to you, huh?"

"Of course." I nod. "Do you know what my own idea of a fairy tale would be?"

That wry smile is back. "You've told me." He taps my nose. "A kitten."

Yeah… "Being married to you
and
having a kitten," I correct him.

*

When we board the flight to Oregon—Portland, more precisely—I need more to distract me. We're done talking about Switch, and I'm not ready to hear more about Nicholas's other clubs in the Bay Area, because we all know I'd get a bunch of ideas for projects.

It's probably best I only have one club to focus on at a time, and there will be plenty of opportunities
later for me to get creative with the other venues. I get so easily sidetracked. So, now he distracts me with the pros of going to Oregon. He helps me focus on the people in my family whom I actually like.

It amazes me a little to know that I still have family members on my side after Amanda had called everyone to say that I had "stolen" the love of her life. She really said that. I wasn’t there when Nicholas ended things with her, but I know
it was a swift breakup where Amanda blamed me for clouding Nicholas's judgment and he'd shown her the door.

And Amanda…God, she's such a conniving bitch. Her sister Amber, too, but Amanda was always the worst—a bully behind a sweet smile.

From the horrible night shortly after my thirteenth birthday when my parents died in a car crash, I grew up with Amanda's bullshit. She flashed that smile to Aunt Mary and Uncle Keith, and the second they looked away, she threw harsh insults at me. I didn’t belong in their family, she said. I was the black sheep. Everything I did was wrong. But because my mom and dad had recently died and my aunt and uncle had graciously taken me in, I didn’t have the energy to defend myself, nor did I want to cause problems.

I've learned to be completely honest since then, but around Amanda it's too easy to fall back on bad habits. For example, at Amber
's wedding…the second I found out it was my cousin whom Nicholas was dating, I remember telling him—
pleading
with him—to actually stay with her.

Can anyone really blame me, though? After all, when I was thirteen, Amanda was twenty-seven. She was an
adult
, and she acted like that. And what did it all stem from…?

Bitterness. Jealousy. Resentment. For petty reasons.

Amanda has always demanded to be in the spotlight, and she had just started her own company when we learned about the car accident. The plan was for our family to go to her "grand opening"—a party for the ad agency she'd started. Instead, it was replaced by a big funeral and mourning.

I had lost my parents. Aunt Mary had lost her sister and brother-in-law. Gramma Ida had lost her daughter and son-in-law.

Everyone forgot about Amanda's big day.

She
was bitter and resentful and took it out on me every time she came to her parents' house, which was often since they lived on the same street.

Three years later, Amanda moved her business to
San Francisco, and Amber went with her.

My first Daddy
Dom worked hard with me; he told me that while people in my life always deserved to hear the truth from me,
I
deserved the truth, too. As in, I'd be hurting
myself
if I lied—even if I believed the lying was for my own sake. He made me see that pleasing others was only good if I got something in return; life was about giving
and
taking, not just one or the other.

So…if Ama
nda and Amber do give me crap this weekend, the brat in me tells me it's only fair I give them crap in return. However, Nicholas has promised me that he'll protect me from them. That way, I can focus on the people I like, such as a couple cousins on my dad's side, Aunt Mary, Uncle Keith—well, he's only okay, because he's the one who has spoiled Amanda and Amber rotten, but he still likes me—my grandmother, and a few others.

*

When we get in the town car that'll take us to the hotel where my family is gathered for the holidays, most of my fears have been calmed, but I'm still super nervous. My gut tightens to the point where I clutch my tummy and burrow closer to Nicholas for comfort.

"Do you ever miss
Portland?" He's trying to keep me occupied with conversation, I think.

I shake my head no and hug his bicep. "
No. I left as soon as I graduated from high school for a reason." For years, I thought I was a nomad. Several in my family have nicknamed me Drifter because I've moved around so much. Sure, I love to travel, but…I'm California-focused now. It turned out I was only looking for the place where I belong. "San Francisco is home."

Nicholas hums
and kisses my temple, then speaks to the driver and idly plays with my fingers.

It's only a few minutes later that we arrive at the fairly large and upscale hotel, and even though we're not meeting my family until dinner, it's almost inevitable that we
'll run into someone in the lobby or…in the elevator, maybe.

Having shipped
our bags home from Mexico earlier, we only have one piece of luggage left, not counting our carry-ons. After thanking the driver, Nicholas shoulders his laptop bag and grabs the luggage, then places his free hand on my lower back to usher me inside the hotel. I clutch my own bag close and look around the Christmas-decorated, brightly-lit lobby, immediately spotting two of my cousins on Dad's side.

"Hello, Kayla." Michael smiles politely and gives me a friendly hug, and I exhale in re
lief. I hug his sister, too—Sarah—glad to have encountered allies first.

"This is Nicholas Ford, my fiancé." I smile as they shake hands; more than that, I smile at the small boost of confidence I feel. Just a few s
econds later, Michael's and Sarah's spouses join in, followed by more introductions. Sarah and Michael's wife gush over my ring—or more specifically, the yellow diamond that’s surrounded by smaller colorless ones—and I
really
enjoy that.

Then we part ways with the promise of seeing each other at dinner soon, and Nicholas and I
check in to our suite.

"Just so you know
" —I keep my voice down as we wait for our elevator— "I think we have five or six Michaels, three Marys, four Peters, two Sarahs, and three Brians in our family. Well, four now, I suppose, with Amber's husband joining the clan." I snicker. "We're not very creative with names, I guess."

"I'll try to keep up." Nicholas chuckles and ushers me into the elevator. "But I do remember meeting more than one Mary at the wedding last summer. We don’t exactly have that issue in my family."

That’s true. The Fords are a close-knit group, but it's small. It's really only him, his parents, his two sisters—Sydney is a couple years younger than Nicholas, and Lissa one year older—and their husbands and children.

"I liked spending time with them last week." I duck my head and grin, remembering how different this time was from the last. Nicholas's parents welcomed me into the family the first time we met
, months ago, but his sisters were wary of me and protective of their brother.

A
ll that melted away in Mexico, though. Lissa is still the mother hen as the eldest sibling, but she's also very sweet and maternal. Sydney…I snicker. Sydney is a spitfire, and we had a lot of fun together. I even found myself opening up to her about this trip over a few margaritas.
Pink
margaritas!

"Expect them to call you afte
r the holidays." Nicholas smirks into the kiss he leaves on my forehead. "They'll want to be involved in the wedding planning."

That makes me squeal behind my hand, because I'm super excited to get married to Nicholas.

"You're too fucking adorable." His eyes dance with laughter and love as I peer up at him, and I feel my skin flushing. He touches my cheek, the mirth fading, replaced by something softer. "Don’t ever change."

"Ditto, mister." I kiss his palm.

*

An hour and a half is all it takes for us to transform into a fancy-looking couple on their way to a nice dinner.