It Started With A Lie: A forbidden fake-boyfriend Cinderella romance (The Montebellos Book 5)

by Clare Connelly

  “I’ve never understood how the six of you manage to work together so closely, without ego getting in the way.”

  “We’re a team.”

  Her heart lurched at the simple, beautiful description. “Even Gabe?”

  He lifted a brow and she winced.

  “I’m sorry. It’s just – he’s rarely around.”

  “No.”

  She shook her head once. “Please forget I said that. That was rude.”

  “Not at all. Observant, in fact.”

  “It’s hardly observant to notice that one sixth of you doesn’t come to the London office for more than an hour at a time, and only then perhaps twice a year.”

  “Gabe is – he marches to the beat of his own drum.”

  “But it works.”

  “Yes, it works.” Something crossed his expression, as though he wanted to reveal something more, but then he smiled, a little forcibly.

  “Well, I’m glad you were the one who got sent to London this time,” she said with a wink, and he laughed, a sound that flushed desire through her body.

  “As am I.”

  Her smile slipped a little, and she reached over for his hand, catching it and squeezing it with her own. “No regrets?”

  His eyes seemed to be mining hers for information, and then he was shaking his head. “None. You?”

  She thought about that for a moment. This was her boss, and there was an inherent difficulty there, but no, she could say with complete honesty she had no regrets.

  “I think this was inevitable,” she murmured in response.

  He made a soft noise, encouraging her to continue.

  “I don’t know. I can’t explain it. It’s not as though I’ve ever looked at you before and thought – that I wanted –,” her skin flushed as she tried to express her desires in words. “More,” she settled on, dropping her eyes to the centre of the bed.

  His chuckle showed he understood.

  “But when you came to pick me up on Thursday, I just felt this…spark.”

  He flipped his hand, squeezing hers now.

  “I ignored it, and was determined to keep ignoring it, but then we ended up in this tiny room –,”

  “And tinier bed,” he interjected with a grin.

  She nodded. “And it just felt like fate was telling me to bloody go for it for once, you know?”

  His eyes sparked with amusement but his features bore a mask of contemplation. “I’m sorry that he made you feel undesirable.”

  She frowned.

  “You said, last night, that you wanted to feel like a desirable woman ‘for the first time’.”

  “Oh.” She’d forgotten about that. In the heat of the moment she’d been completely honest and open, sharing her deepest fears with this man.

  “Well, I do now,” she mumbled awkwardly.

  “You were with him a long time.”

  Her sigh was soft. He wasn’t going to let this go, and surprisingly, she found she didn’t actually mind as much as she might have thought.

  “Four years.”

  “You weren’t intimate often?”

  Her cheeks stained pink. “It wasn’t like that. Our relationship was – we were – I mean, yes, we slept together.” She scrunched her face up. “This is weird. Talking about him —us— with you.”

  Something sparked in the depths of his eyes but his features didn’t shift.

  Strangely, his silence encouraged her to continue. “I suppose passion wasn’t a defining feature of our relationship.”

  “What was?”

  “Friendship.”

  “Ah. An excellent basis for a romantic relationship,” he said with a hint of sarcasm.

  She bit down on her lip. “It is, actually.”

  “Perhaps,” he conceded. “I’m no expert in lasting relationships.”

  Questions sparked inside of her. “But you’ve had girlfriends.”

  His lips twisted at the term; she refused to feel embarrassed.

  “Lovers,” he amended.

  “I don’t mean sex. I mean actual love.”

  His eyes flashed with something she could best describe as pain. “No.”

  She frowned. “What about the woman you were with, the one you say you destroyed? You didn’t love her?”

  He compressed his lips, tension radiating from him.

  “You asked me about Ashton,” she reminded him.

  “And you were happy to discuss him.”

  “Not happy, exactly,” she fired back.

  “What happened with Katie is personal. Private. I won’t discuss her.”

  Bronte nodded quickly, hoping it would cover the searing pain beneath her ribs. The rejection was intense. He’d drawn a line sharply, putting her back in her box completely. They might be lying in bed together, naked and intimate, but this was just sex. There were parts of him that weren’t open to her, and nor should they be.

  Just because she felt as though she would tell him anything he asked – give him anything he asked – didn’t mean he felt the same way. It was a timely reminder.

  His voice softened, but it did nothing to undo the painful stitch in the region of her heart. “I’m not proud of my behaviour back then. But it’s done, and talking about it can’t change what happened.”

  She nodded uneasily. “I understand.”

  Silence fell, but it wasn’t a comfortable silence. The intimacy of a few moments ago was gone, lost to the awareness that this was all a ruse. A sense of emptiness flooded her, because he was wrong about friendship, wrong about it being a poor basis for a relationship. If sex was all that you shared, what happened when the sex was finished?

  She propped up on her elbow, so that she could see him better. “When you usually do this, I guess you don’t spend the night.”

  He scanned her face, waiting for her to explain further.

  “Is it like – you go to a woman’s home, or hotel, or whatever, have sex, then leave?”

  He laughed, a short sound. “There’s not really a rule book.”

  “But you don’t do this – stick around for the weekend, making small talk about past relationships.”

  “There’s nothing ‘small’ about what happened with you and Ashton.”

  “Or you and Katie,” she jabbed back, her eyes darkening to a shade that was like the ocean in the wake of an electrical storm.

  “No.” A short concession.

  “I guess I don’t know how to have sex with someone then pretend I barely know them. Is that…is that what you expect me to do?”

  Consternation was obvious in his features.

  “I expect you to be yourself.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  His lips twisted into a semi-frown.

  “I can’t box up my curiosity. You’ve told me about some woman whose heart you broke and you’ve told me more than you realise, too. You’ve told me that she’s the reason you don’t get close to women, she’s the reason you don’t trust yourself to care for someone. You think being myself isn’t wanting to understand what happened?”

  “I get your curiosity; that’s perfectly normal. But I won’t indulge it. End of story.”

  “Got it.” She nodded a little jerkily, wondering at the strange painful sensation besieging her entire body. She pushed away from him, out of the bed.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To brush my teeth. It’s late. I have to be a bridesmaid in the morning, remember?”

  At the bathroom she paused to offer him a smile, aiming to defuse the growing tension. She wondered if it was realistic, suspected it wasn’t, and decided she didn’t care.

  She was pissed. And she had every right to be. He’d shut her down with a sledgehammer, because he hadn’t expected the question. He hadn’t wanted to be reminded of Katie again. He’d already thought of her too much this weekend, thought of what he’d done, how he’d treated her, what they’d lost, what could have been. How he’d hurt her.

  It was something he’d never told a
nother soul. Not his brothers, cousins, Yaya, friends, no one. Oh, they’d known about the engagement, and then when it had been called off. But when anyone had asked for details, he’d simply said ‘it didn’t work out’. As though that encompassed the true horror of it all.

  Perhaps he hadn’t wanted people to view him as a man who was capable of cheating on his fiancé. Or perhaps he hadn’t wanted the sympathy that would come from them knowing about the baby they’d lost, too early in the pregnancy. He hadn’t wanted them to look at him in a way that would weaken his determination to get on with his goddamned life, pretending he wouldn’t always feel an ache low in his gut whenever he thought of that perfect, but tiny – too tiny – baby that had been born without breath.

  Had he done something wrong? Had he missed something? Could he have got Katie better medical care? He thought he’d found the best obstetrician in America, he thought he’d done everything right. But he hadn’t, obviously, or their son would have made it.

  He pushed out of bed with frustration, wishing the familiar stone of grief would dislodge, just for a moment, so he could focus on Bronte, and not hurting her as well. That was the last thing he wanted.

  She was in a vulnerable place; he needed to treat her with kid gloves. But he hadn’t expected her to hone in on the one subject he guarded ferociously.

  He’d already surprised himself by revealing too much about it to Bronte. He’d done it to push her away and now he was still pushing her away, but this time, it felt wrong. He’d seen the hurt in her eyes and wanted to change his mind, to tell her everything, anything to undo the pain there and make her smile again.

  But once the pain was gone, and she heard what he’d done, she’d look at him as he did himself. She’d judge him. She’d possibly even despise him. And he wasn’t prepared to risk that.

  She was going to look like a zombie.

  She stared at the wall, breathing softly, not moving, not wanting to do anything that might wake him. It was hard enough to lie in the bed without touching him, but a single movement would brush her leg to his, or worse, her bottom to his cock, and she knew she’d explode like a live wire. Because awareness of his every single damned movement was flooding her. His deep, rhythmic breathing, the shift of the sheet across her body as he moved. Muscles she barely knew existed were vibrating inside of her, begging her for something – and while she knew what, she wouldn’t submit. She wouldn’t wake him. She wouldn’t ask him to touch her again.

  She didn’t regret sleeping with him; she regretted believing it could mean nothing.

  “You need to sleep.”

  His voice was a gruff command. She stiffened, wondering if she was silent, he’d think he was wrong.

  A second later, the lamp on his side of the bed flashed on, casting the room in a pale gold shimmer.

  Apparently not.

  “I’m sorry.”

  The apology was something she hadn’t expected. She rolled over in time to see him drag a hand through his hair, and her heart gave a funny little tremble at the sight of Luca like this. His jaw was covered in stubble, his hair spiking in a thousand different directions, his expression sincere.

  “What for?” Her voice croaked; she cleared her throat.

  “For shutting you down before.”

  She nodded slowly. “You made it perfectly clear that whatever we’re doing is just sex. Sex doesn’t include swapping intimate life stories. It’s fine.”

  “It’s not fine.” He frowned.

  She lay with her head on the pillow, watching him, her eyes heavy even as her brain was wide awake.

  He sighed. “It’s not even a big deal.” She didn’t believe him. “Katie was – a girl I met a few years ago. She was a waitress at a restaurant I used to go to. She was sweet; made me laugh.” A divot formed between his brows as he frowned. “One night, I was in the restaurant having dinner. I stuck around at the bar ‘til her shift finished; she came home with me.”

  Bronte knew he had a lot of experience with women, so it was completely illogical to feel a blade of jealousy slash through her, particularly given the temporary nature of what they’d done.

  “It was nothing.” He shook his head angrily. “Just a bit of fun, you know?”

  Like she was. Bronte shifted her head against the pillow, a half-nod.

  “And then about six weeks later, she came to the New York office, looking for me. She was pregnant.”

  Bronte drew in a deep breath, pushing up a little. “With your baby?”

  “Yes. Funny enough, I never questioned that. I just presumed that it was my child, because she said so.”

  Bronte waited.

  “I mean, I’d taken precautions, but there she was pregnant, and so I got to know her better. She was living in a run down share house in Brooklyn; I moved her into my condo. We spent a lot of time together. I came to care for her, and she fell in love with me.”

  Bronte could hardly breathe.

  “With a baby on the way, and given how she felt, it made sense to get engaged. I proposed, she said yes.”

  “How come I’ve never heard any of this?”

  His expression was haunted, and she wondered if he was going to stop talking. She shouldn’t have said anything!

  But a moment later, he continued, though the words were drawn from him with obvious remorse. “It wasn’t widely known. And only a week after we got engaged I – we argued. I –,” he focussed his gaze on the wall opposite, his expression like steel. “I went out. Got drunk. Went home with a woman I’d hooked up with a few times in the past.”

  Bronte couldn’t help her surprised gasp. She tried to muffle it, but saw the way he reacted: the tightening of his jaw, the clenching of his teeth.

  “I didn’t sleep with her Bronte. I came to my senses, but it was close.” He ran his fingers over the sheet, pulling at it between his forefinger and thumb. “I wanted to. I wanted to pretend I wasn’t getting married, wasn’t having a baby.” He dropped his head forward. “As the child of an unhappy marriage, a child who wasn’t wanted by his parents, I think I panicked at the idea of bringing a baby into that environment. Like it was history repeating itself.”

  “Oh, Luca,” she shook her head. “You were trying to do the right thing. And you did. You didn’t sleep with her. You didn’t cheat.”

  “That’s a matter of semantics. I went home and told Katie what had happened. We argued. Two days later, she went into labour. Our baby was born. The most perfect little boy, Bronte, with these tiny little hands and feet, and a nose just like Katie’s, and a chin like mine.” He shook his head, his voice thickened by emotion. “But he wasn’t breathing, and he wouldn’t breathe. The doctors tried so hard, but there was nothing they could do.”

  Bronte’s ribs sawed as she sucked in a breath over the forming of a sob.

  “I wanted to support Katie. I wanted to be with her, even if just so we could remember our son together, but she left.” His eyes briefly dropped to Bronte’s face. “I can’t say I blame her.”

  Bronte’s eyes sparkled with tears.

  “She went off the rails. Drinking. Drugs. For a couple of years I looked out for her, checking her into rehab a few times, but she’d always check herself out again as soon as I left the country. And now I have no fucking idea where she is, Bronte. No idea. And do you know why?”

  “Why?” She mouthed.

  “Because I let her think I was the kind of guy who could give her some fairy tale happily ever after crap. Because I let her fall in love with me. Because I made her think I loved her. A sweet, innocent, beautiful waitress, for God’s sake, because I couldn’t just keep it simple.”

  “She was pregnant,” Bronte whispered. “You wanted to look after her.”

  “Right. So I could have moved her into her own place, not my spare room. I don’t know jack about relationships, but I’ve always known I hated the very idea of love and marriage, so why the hell did I propose to her?”

  A single tear spilled from the corner of Bronte’s e
ye. “You wanted to make her happy. That’s a good impulse, Luca.”

  “Happy? I didn’t even come close.”

  “It sounds to me like losing the baby is what drove her over the edge.”

  His eyes shifted to Bronte’s for a second then he turned away, reaching for the bedside table. To turn off the light?

  No, he reached for his wallet instead, opening it and pulling out a small envelope. She frowned, watching as he slid his finger under the triangular flap and unfolded it, before pulling out a small photo. “This is him.”

  Her heart hammered as she reached for the photo, a lump of grief hard in her throat. The baby in the photo looked like any other newborn. Sweet and pink with a shock of black hair, eyes closed as though he were simply sleeping. She ran her finger over his cheek, sadness gripping her. “I’m so sorry, Luca.”

  He dipped his head in a silent nod.

  “He’s beautiful.”

  “We named him Mattia.” He cleared his throat. “It means gift from God.”

  Another tear slipped down her cheek.

  “It’s perfect.”

  He put his hand out and she passed the photograph back, watching as he tucked it into the envelope and replaced it in his wallet, the action easy, as though it was one he did often. Her stomach squeezed at the thought of that – the knowledge that he must look at this photo often and think of his poor son.

  “Katie was a mistake. I thought it often, like I was living a lie, but I went on with it, and I hurt her. I swore I would never lie to another woman about how I felt. I’d never pretend I was capable of love and all that stuff people seem to want, because that’s just not me.”

  Her heart stammered with a rush of sympathy for him. She felt his pain, and she knew that he was hurting himself, perhaps as a form of self-flagellation, a punishment for what he perceived as his fault.

  “Nothing you did would have caused this. The baby – that’s not because you hurt her feelings. It’s not because you guys fought.”

  “It didn’t help,” he said quietly. “The stress. The uncertainty. I promised her the world and then ripped it away from her again. Don’t you see that? I was a bastard to her. I broke her heart.”