Shadow: Lust and Lies Series Book 1 Read online

  “What did you say, Wesley fucking Berlin?” Mason yelled.

  I didn’t flinch, and I didn’t move from the spot that I stood on. Kyler and Martin were jogging over to try and calm things down. This had gone on for years, and I was tired of it. I was at my snapping point, and it was evident Mason was too. His use of “Berlin” instead of “Van Doorn” proved that.

  “I said, ‘fuck you,’ Mason. I’ve been on the receiving end of your shit for years, and I’m sick of it. I haven’t done a goddamn thing to you, and you treat me like the enemy. My last name is Van Doorn, not Berlin. I haven’t been ‘Berlin’ since my teens.”

  Mason grabbed me by my shirt and pulled me closer to him then punched me in the stomach. I doubled over while I heard Martin and Kyler yelling at Mason.

  “I treat you like the trash you are, Berlin. You’ll never be a Van Doorn.”

  I stood upright after I caught my breath.

  “I’ve done nothing but be supportive and thankful for this family. I’ve never done anything against you!” I yelled.

  Mason pulled out of Kyler’s grip and charged at me, knocking me to the grass. He punched me in the chest, and as I shoved him off of me, he slapped me on the side of my head.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you, Mason?” I reached for the side of my head while Kyler pulled at Mason.

  “Come on, Wes! Let’s go! Fight back!” Mason hollered as he was pulled off of me.

  I quickly stood and brushed myself off.

  “Come on, Wesley, I know you know how to fight.” Mason was in Kyler’s grip. I guess Martin had gone inside to get Thom and Dean and they were all heading over. Shit. “You know how to fight. Why won’t you hit me back, Shadow? Show me what they taught you down on the docks,” he snarled.

  “Mason! Knock it off, man!” Kyler stood between Mason and me and tried to push him back toward the house.

  “You were a little fighter, weren’t you…WB6?”

  I really couldn’t even stand to be around him.

  “Mason!” Thom yelled and grabbed him by his arms.

  “Why won’t you fight me? Are you afraid it’ll remind you of your time on the docks?”

  I turned and started to walk towards Martin’s car.

  “Coward!” he yelled.

  I stopped and turned to face him. Thom, Dean, and Kyler were pulling Mason toward the house. I walked over to them and looked Mason in the eye and told him that I wasn’t a coward.

  “Then why wouldn’t you fight?” he asked.

  “I hate fighting! Kids died fighting on the docks! I let them fight me when we had to. I never hit one of them. I made it look like I was fighting back! I never fought any of my brothers on the docks…and I’m not going to start fighting brothers now either.”

  “You’re no Van Doorn, Wesley. You’ll never be my brother.”

  “That is enough, Mason. What is wrong with you?” Thom asked as they went into the house.

  Martin came over and brushed off the back of my shirt. I flinched as he hit a sore spot on my back.

  “Shit. Sorry, mate,” Martin said as he carefully straightened my shirt in the back. “I think he’s high, Wes. Too many tablets.”

  I nodded and turned to head back toward Martin’s car.

  “Wes!” Thom came out of the house and over to us. “I’m sorry about Mason. I really don’t know what’s gotten into him. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. He just pissed me off.”

  “Mason could use a dose of your maturity level. After his display of a lack of maturity tonight, I’m having second thoughts about him meeting with Chloe Olsen tomorrow,” Thom said.

  “He was going to meet with her?” I couldn’t hide my shock. “If this is such an important first meeting, why would you send Mason?”

  “Mason was going to accompany Dean. He’s next in line after Dean. By age, anyways. So, he was going to accompany him.”

  I nodded and looked away. Of course, that’s how this sort of thing went. Initial meetings were handled by Dean and typically Mason. I just thought something of this magnitude would have been different. And Chloe deserved someone better than Mason.

  “Would you like to take his place, Wesley?” Thom asked.

  I was shocked and stunned that Thom had offered me this opportunity. And I would have jumped at it if it hadn’t been with Chloe. She’d recognize me and realize I had been withholding information from her. There’d never be a chance for me with her. I mean, there really wasn’t anyways, but that would surely sever any chances. Not only would my chance be gone, but the chance for my family to do business with the Olsens in London would also go up in smoke.

  “Me?”

  “Yes, Wesley. You can go and watch. You can learn and take everything in.”

  “I…wouldn’t feel right about it. Kyler and Martin are next, before me. If ever, me.”

  Thom put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my eyes.

  “You are my son, too. You may be the youngest and had a different last name for a little while, but you are a Van Doorn. But I’m not going to push you into this. Your progression will happen naturally. I’ll send Kyler with Dean.”

  Relieved, I nodded. It was honestly the right thing to do. Kyler was next in line rank wise, and he should be the one to go.

  “You and I will get together this week, and we’ll talk about whatever is on your mind, Wes, okay?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  Martin and I headed to his car to begin our drive home. It was quiet until we reached the halfway point.

  “I don’t know how you managed to not pound the shit out of him, mate.” Martin shook his head. “Seriously, Wes. He’s been a dick for years. You had the chance to take a swing at him in defense. But you didn’t.”

  “Nope.”

  “Why, mate?”

  I sighed and turned my head to look out of the side window and tried not to let my head run off to the docks.

  “You know how I feel about fighting, Martin.”

  “I know, Wes. But if you ever had to defend yourself—”

  “Don’t worry. If I had to, I could.”

  I think Martin picked up on my tone. I didn’t want to talk about this. My head was already a mess, and I needed to sort it out quickly before seeing Chloe again. As soon as we got to our apartment, I raced inside and took a quick shower since I had been rolling in the damn grass.

  I grabbed a few tablets and put them in the tiny parchment envelope before I left my room. With my head as foggy as it was, it wouldn’t bother me at all if she didn’t want to take them tonight.

  At this point, I didn’t even care if we fucked. I just wanted to be with her.

  “Heading out, mate?”

  Martin was in the kitchen when I walked out of my room to the main room.

  “Yeah. My night shift of watching Chloe Olsen begins.”

  “Alright, man. Take it easy,” Martin said as I headed to the door. “You’ve got the best task out of all of us, mate.” I turned to look at him, then he said, “Following the sexy ass from London. Chloe’s hot as fuck.”

  I smirked and headed out the door. I felt as though I needed constant movement right now so instead of the elevator I took the stairs. I made my way on foot to Chloe’s hotel and used the time it would take to walk to clear my head.

  Martin was right though…I had the best task of following Chloe. But now I was running into a problem. My head and heart were both focused on two separate things: one focused on Chloe while the other focused on my family.

  I wanted both and was trying to figure out a way for this to be possible.

  17

  Wes

  June 2018

  I checked my watch as I breezed through the doors of the hotel lobby. It was just a couple of minutes after 7:00 and I was thankful that after everything that happened at dinner tonight that I was only a few minutes late.

  I spotted Chloe sitting on one of the plush lobby chairs focusing on her phone. When I reached her, I placed m
y hand gently on her shoulder and then took the empty seat next to her.

  “Hi, gorgeous,” I greeted.

  “Hi, Wes,” Chloe beamed.

  It made me feel pretty damn good knowing that she was excited to see me. Her beautiful smiled touched her eyes.

  “I’m sorry that I’m a few minutes late. It’s such a nice evening out, so I took advantage of it and decided to walk.”

  “I just sat down a few minutes ago, so it’s not a problem. Shall we?” Chloe motioned with her head toward the restaurant.

  I stood and held my hand out for her to take. The silkiness of her skin made my heart skip a beat. Once we were seated and had ordered our dinner, I reached across the table and let my hand rest palm upwards near her goblet of water. I hoped she would place her hand in mine, but I didn’t have to wait long. With her hand in mine, I gently tightened my grip on her hand and lightly stroked the top of her hand with my thumb.

  Chloe looked at me the way no other woman ever had. Her eyes held a certain amount of longing, I think. Who knows, maybe I was the first guy to treat her as something more than Gareth Olsen’s pretty daughter.

  “How was your meeting this afternoon, Chloe?”

  She smiled and then shrugged her shoulders as she looked up as if she was assessing for the first time today how their meeting really went.

  “Well, it was okay, I suppose,” she sighed.

  Her hand didn’t tense in mine, so I didn’t think she was nervous, or uncomfortable talking to me about this.

  “Just okay?”

  “It was about what I expected, Wes.” Chloe looked away briefly and then back at me. “My father wasn’t very hopeful about business with this company due to their facility.”

  Inwardly I smirked when she made their ecstasy lab sound like a real pharmaceutical business.

  “No? Any idea why he had you meet with them?”

  “I think he was hoping that it would turn out better than the rumors he had heard. Or at least he had hoped the rumors weren’t true.”

  I sipped from my wine glass before asking her if there were a lot of rumors running around about the company she met with today.

  “Yes. Their products aren’t always good or consistent.”

  Chloe’s way of making this business sound legit made me smile. She was trying, and I was starting to feel really guilty for knowing the truth but letting her dance around subjects.

  “What do you mean that they aren’t always good? Do you mean, like, fresh or something?”

  Her forehead wrinkled as if she were trying to figure out how to explain this to me. I knew what she meant though because she alluded to it last night. The tablets from Heines weren’t pure one hundred percent of the time. And the fact that the Olsens know that will most likely put the Heines family out of the running.

  “Yes, kind of. It’s like ordering a latte from a coffee shop, and you like it so much that you go back the next day to get another. Only the one you get doesn’t taste as good as the one you had the day before.”

  I loved the way she made ecstasy sound like lattes. She was really trying to help me understand, though I understood perfectly. I had to let her off the hook some.

  “So to sum it up, it’s just not consistent. Or it’s not consistent enough to deal business with,” I deduced as I reached for my wine.

  “Exactly,” Chloe said with a smile. “So, how was your attention? Did you think about filling my mouth?”

  My cock twitched in my pants as I stared at her. Chloe’s head was tilted to the side ever so slightly, revealing the playful glimmer in her eye.

  “Filling your mouth may have crossed my mind today,” I teased.

  I tried to keep a straight face, but when Chloe’s smiled broadened in a huge smile, and she laughed, I couldn’t avoid laughing.

  “Well, I’m glad it crossed your mind,” she laughed.

  As we ate dinner, we continued chatting. Chloe’s beautiful accent made it so easy to listen to her talk.

  “So, do you get along with your older brothers?” I innocently asked.

  I felt a little guilty still playing “getting to know you” questions that I already knew the answers to. At least I knew some of the answers.

  “Yes, they’re my best friends, too,” she laughed again and waved her hand in the air. “They’re overprotective at times, but I think that goes along with the big brother job description,” she fondly added.

  Chloe’s fingertips traced imaginary patterns on the tablecloth and she seemed to get lost in a memory for a moment or two. I didn’t interrupt her, but instead I watched her as she smiled with her private memory.

  I’d never really opened up to anyone about my family much, though I hadn’t had anyone around who would ask. I thought about Mason. Mason’s approval was one that I was working so hard to earn. I knew he didn’t care much for me, and I understood. I wasn’t blood-related. In this family, blood relation meant a lot.

  “My brothers are great. They watch over me a lot and check out all the guys I date,” she laughed, but it hit me in the stomach.

  Would there ever be a chance of me meeting them? My days with Chloe were dwindling down, and I had to decide how to approach the last few days she had in Amsterdam. This was the most fun I’d ever had with a woman, and it was also the most comfortable I’d felt.

  After we finished eating, we strolled through the lobby, and I asked her if she was in the mood to go for a walk or get a drink at the bar across the street.

  “Wesley, I would just like to spend time with you, so it doesn’t matter what we do.”

  It made me feel good to know that this woman wanted to spend time with me. I hadn’t had a lot of that in my life. The woman in the windows never really cared. I was nothing more than a way for them to pay their rent. I meant nothing to them. Chloe was different though.

  From my pocket, I pulled out the small parchment envelope that contained two tablets. I held it by the end that closed over to seal the envelope and waved it back and forth in my hand. Chloe’s eyes shot up to mine, and a small wicked smile spread across her face.

  “Van Doorns?” she asked hopefully.

  “Of course. Chloe, I told you that I don’t do these often and when I do, it’s only Van Doorns. It’s all I trust.”

  Her smile didn’t fade as she held her palm out to me. I emptied a tablet into her hand and glanced around the lobby. Near the reception desk was a large glass water dispenser, packed with lemons. I motioned at it by nodding my head in that direction and we walked over. I took mine first and then Chloe swallowed hers. She slipped both her hands in mine and rested her head against my chest.

  “I want to spend as much time as I can with you, Wesley.”

  “Good to hear because I’d like to spend time with you as well.” I brushed my thumb over her hand as we casually strolled through the lobby.

  “Would you like to spend some time filling my mouth, Wesley?” Chloe seductively asked.

  I could feel my face warming, and my dick began to stiffen in my pants. We headed to the elevator and made out all the way up to the floor of her suite. Chloe was much braver than I was. I kept my hands on her waist, but she was bold enough to unzip my pants and let her hand dive inside. Her hand feverishly rubbed on my rock hard cock over my boxers while she panted words in between our kissing.

  “God, Wesley...I’ve wanted...to taste your cock...all day long.”

  The elevator chimed as it came to a smooth stop. Briskly, we made our way to her suite, and once the door closed behind us, I pinned her body between mine and the door. My hands tangled in her hair as our mouths crashed against one another. Her kiss still tasted like the sweet Moscato she had over dinner.

  Chloe’s hands finished untucking my shirt and worked on unbuttoning it. Her hands moved fast, and she yanked my shirt off my shoulders. I untangled my hands from her soft brown hair and took my shirt off the rest of the way. Kisses cooled my skin as soon as her mouth left them on my neck, chest, and stomach. Chloe stopped mov
ing in the desired downward direction and hovered around the top of my pants. She ran her tongue along my waistline from my right hip to my left. As she dragged her tongue over my skin, chills ran up and down my spine.

  “Mmm, damn, Chloe,” I hissed.

  Chloe slid her fingertips inside the waist of my pants and guided me to move toward the door. With my back against the door, Chloe quickly unbuttoned my pants and yanked them and my boxers down to my ankles. She took my cock in her hand and spit on the head.

  “Fuck, Chloe.”

  That was quite possibly the sexiest, dirtiest, and most erotic thing a woman had ever done to me. She worked her saliva up and down my shaft as I held my breath while looking downward at her. Her hazel eyes were glued to mine as my cock slid in and out of her hot mouth.

  Her lips and tongue felt beyond incredible. I knew the tablet that I had taken earlier was enhancing this experience. I tried to put off coming as long as I could, but the sensations were too much for me to resist.

  “Chloe, I’m going to come,” I panted.

  She moved her lips all the way down my shaft until her nose and mouth were flush against my skin. Oh, fuck. My cock was so hard, and when she started to make swallowing motions with her throat, I lost it.

  My hands quickly found their way to her dark colored hair and I wrapped her locks around my fingers while I came.

  “Fuuuck!” I grunted.

  Chloe swallowed my load as quickly as I could fill her mouth. It was so fucking sexy to watch. From her kneeling position on the floor, she seductively licked her lips while maintaining eye contact with me. Chloe pulled my pants and boxers up then zipped my pants. She buttoned them before she stood up.

  “Well, I don’t know about you, Wesley, but I could use a drink.”

  My head made a thudding noise as I leaned it back and laughed.

  “After we have a nice, stiff drink, you can bring me back here and have your dirty way with me, Wesley.”

  I smiled and took hold of her hand. Together we headed downstairs to the bar for that drink she was seeking. The bar was bustling and Chloe and I were lucky enough to find two bar stools next to one another at the bar.