“When are you due?” I asked Athena who was sitting across the table from me.
She rubbed her stomach, a wistful smile edging across her face. “Two weeks. Can’t come quick enough now.”
“Do you know what you’re having?”
She shook her head. “Ryker didn’t want to know. As long as it’s healthy, I honestly don’t care what we’re having. I’m more worried about the birth itself. I’ve already told my doctors to line up all the drugs.” She laughed.
Ryker cut his gaze to her, his eyes filled with the sort of adoration every woman craved. “I’ll be right there, Thea.” He placed his hand over the top of hers and kissed her temple. “And I promise I’ll try not to faint.”
“Helpful,” she drawled, but her eyes said it all. There was a couple madly in love.
The conversation stilled as Barbara came into the dining room carrying an enormous, two-tiered chocolate cake covered in candles. Oliver’s daughter, Annie, could barely contain her excitement, and she nudged her sister, Patsy, almost salivating at the idea of stuffing their faces with the sugary treat.
“Daddy, look at that,” Annie exclaimed. “I want a huge piece.”
“Is that so?” Oliver tugged on her ponytail. “Well, as it’s Uncle Upton’s cake and not yours, you’ll have to ask him if he’s willing to share.”
Annie pouted and then turned her attention to Upton. “But he can’t eat all that by himself. He’ll be sick.”
Upton chuckled, leaning back to give Barbara enough room to set the cake down in front of him. “You can share with me, Annie bear, as soon as I’ve blown out the candles.”
He did, and then we sang Happy Birthday, much to his chagrin, but he endured it without grumbling too loudly.
The conversation fell to a low hum as we ate dessert. Annie wolfed down her cake despite Oliver’s best efforts to slow her down. Patsy ate hers much slower, savoring every mouthful, her eyes falling shut each time her lips closed around the spoon.
Annie pushed her plate to the side and then twisted in her seat toward Zak. “Why are you in that chair?” she asked, an innocent enough question for a child of her age. “Is there something wrong with your legs?”
Oliver looked horrified. “Annie Ellis!” he exclaimed. “Apologize right this second.”
Zak smiled and motioned with his hand to show Oliver he wasn’t remotely offended. “It’s all cool,” he said, turning his attention to Annie. “There’s nothing wrong with my legs,” he explained. “It’s the communication from my brain to tell my legs to work, that’s the problem. I hurt my back, and so the message isn’t getting through, and that’s why my legs have forgotten how to move.”
“Oh.” She leaned her head to the side, studying him. “How did you hurt your back?”
“Well,” Zak said. “I went to watch a band play, about fifteen months ago now, and a bad man wanted to hurt us. He set off a bomb, and I got hurt.”
Upton sucked in a breath, his gaze pinging between me and Zak.
And then he put two and two together.
“He was there?” he whispered in my ear. “The same concert?”
I nodded. Shit. I should have anticipated this coming up tonight, but I’d been so excited planning everything, it hadn’t occurred to me. I’d meant to tell him, eventually. My intentions to keep it from him were honorable, but, too late, I realized my mistake. And now, the cat wasn’t just out of the bag—it’d peed all over the table.
“And you didn’t think to tell me? You didn’t think that piece of information was important for me to know?”
The tone of his voice hardened, as did his eyes. Two amber orbs filled with hurt that I’d kept something so huge a secret.
“I wanted to,” I stammered. “It just never felt like the right time.”
Upton pushed his chair back and shot to his feet. He dabbed a napkin to the corners of his mouth, then threw it on top of his half-finished birthday cake. “Excuse me,” he said to no one in particular.
I scrambled to follow him. Damn, he walked fast. “Upton,” I called to his retreating back. “Wait.”
I broke into a run, and then someone clasped my arm. Sebastian.
“Leave him for a while,” he said. “I take it he didn’t know your brother suffered his injuries at the same concert?”
I shook my head.
“Ah. Maybe you should have mentioned it before tonight.”
“That’s not the half of it,” I muttered.
“Oh? Care to elaborate?”
I dug my fingertips into my temple to stave off an impending tension headache, then blew out a slow breath through pursed lips. “Not really.”
Sebastian grinned, then put his arm around my shoulder. “Come on, I happen to know where Upton keeps the good brandy. You look like you could do with one.”
I allowed him to chivvy me along. We ended up in the library. Sebastian went straight to a cabinet in the corner and crouched, returning to his feet holding two crystal glasses in one hand and a bottle in the other. He set the glasses down and poured two healthy portions, handing one of them to me.
“Thanks.” I sipped, the liquid burning my throat, but it did halt the wobble in my legs.
“You should take it as a compliment that he got a little pissy,” Sebastian said. “It shows that he gives a shit about you.”
I smiled faintly. “I’d rather have gotten through the evening without upsetting him. It’d all gone so well. Maybe I shouldn’t have invited Zak. It’s just he doesn’t get out as much as I’d like, and he and Upton really hit it off when they met, and I wanted to do something nice for them both.” I allowed my legs to buckle and sank into a nearby chair.
Sebastian perched on the edge of the adjacent couch. “And you did. We haven’t all sat around together since before Upton’s accident. We’ve tried. Believe me. Yet where every single one of us failed to reach him, you succeeded. Don’t underestimate how much of an achievement that is.” He took a deep swallow of his drink. “I remember saying to Garen after your interview that I had a good feeling about you. And I love being right. It feeds my ego. Looks as if you’ve earned that large bonus nine months ahead of schedule.”
I chuckled despite the weight of regret pressing heavily on my chest.
“He’ll get over his hissy fit in no time,” Sebastian continued. “He’ll just want to know why you didn’t tell him about Zak. I must admit, it’s interesting that you invited your brother, even if you did want him to get out more. You must have considered the possibility of questions, especially knowing kids would be here. In my experience, children aren’t usually backward in coming forward.”
“I didn’t,” I confessed. “I honestly didn’t.”
But was that true? Maybe my subconscious had forced me into this position. I’d been struggling for a while about how to tell Upton of our intertwined pasts. Perhaps this was my subconscious mind’s way of forcing the issue.
“Zak isn’t the only thing I kept from him,” I said, my head bowed. I set the drink on a nearby end table and rubbed my forehead. “God, this is all such a mess.”
Sebastian leaned forward, curiosity swimming in his slate-gray eyes. “We might not know each other very well, but I’m a good listener if you want to talk.” He laughed. “Actually, that’s a lie. I’m a terrible listener, but I’ll do my best.”
My smile came slow and didn’t last. “I was supposed to go to that concert with my fiancé. I got caught up at work and couldn’t get away in time, so I asked Zak if he’d go with Marin. They got along really well, and he was happy to do it.” I covered my face with my hands as pain filled my chest, squishing my lungs, and making it difficult to take a full breath.
“What happened to your fiancé?” Sebastian asked gently.
“He died.” My voice came out all muffled, but I couldn’t seem to remove my hands from my face, almost as if I was hiding my shame. “It should have been me. If I’d gone like I was supposed to, then Marin might be alive and Zak wouldn’t be paraly
zed.”
A sob crawled into my throat, but I forced it back down. Tears did nothing. I’d shed enough to fill a bathtub, but not a single one brought Marin back or gave Zak the use of his legs.
Silence filled the room, the only sound Sebastian’s steady breathing.
Finally, he spoke. “Well, aren’t you two quite the pair?”
I dropped my hands and met his gaze. “We have more in common than most, yeah.”
“And yet you’ve never told him any of this, have you?”
I shook my head, then pointlessly added, “No.”
“Why not? Why tell me and not him?”
“Yes, Izabelle,” a cold voice filled with bitterness said from behind me. “Do share.”
18
Upton
Belle’s head snapped in my direction, and her neck and cheeks flushed with color. I hardly spared her a glance, instead locking my gaze on Sebastian.
“Get out,” I snapped.
He immediately rose to his feet and ambled across the room, unperturbed by my foul mood. As he passed, he patted me on the shoulder. “Go easy, yeah?”
I ignored him, waiting until he’d crossed the threshold, then I kicked the door closed with the heel of my shoe. Seconds scraped by with neither of us speaking. Belle kept her eyes trained on one of the enormous floor-to-ceiling bookcases that spanned an entire wall in my library, filled with books I’d never read but aspired to own anyway. First editions, classics, thrillers, crime novels, and even the odd young adult romance book purchased for Jenna to read when she came over for a visit.
Might as well donate those to a local bookstore now.
What the fuck am I musing about romance novels for?
I crossed the room and helped myself to a glass of single malt imported from Scotland. They distilled the best whisky in my opinion, and I had it shipped over from the UK by the case. It wasn’t as if the enormous transportation costs made even a dent in my bank balance.
“Upton, I—”
“Why did you tell him and not me?” I kept my back to her, studying the amber liquid, almost the same color as my eyes, sloshing up the sides of the glass as I twisted it in my hands. “I knew there was something, and after our picnic, I asked you to talk to me when you were ready. You agreed, yet you decided to tell Sebastian instead, a man you hardly know.”
“It just came out.”
I set down the glass and turned around slowly, jealousy roaring through my veins. She told Sebastian. Sebastian. I glued my hands to my sides. If I didn’t anchor them there, I’d smash one or both right through the drywall, and I refused to show her how much her betrayal hurt like a motherfucker.
Every day, for months, she’d arrived at my house, all the while knowing that she and I had so much in common and yet she’d chosen to stay silent, as if it was a dirty little secret that mustn’t ever be mentioned. I’d given her so many opportunities to talk to me, shared my own hurt and anger over losing my father, and what Jenna’s death had done to me, and yet she’d still played her cards close to her chest.
Until tonight.
And she hadn’t opened up to me. No, she’d bestowed that gift on my best friend instead.
“I thought we had something.”
She leaped to her feet, her arms stretching toward me in a pleading manner. “We do. We do have something.”
I snorted. “No, we don’t. We can’t have. All this time… all this time, Belle, the hours we sat on the patio talking and laughing. The conversation we had about my father, the things I shared with you about Jenna, and yet you failed to mention anything about your links to the concert that killed my sister, killed your fiancé, ruined my face, left me with a back full of scars, and stole the ability for your brother to ever walk again. And then one brief chat with Sebastian and you’re spilling your guts to him when you couldn’t to me. Tell me, does that sound like we have anything to you? Anything at all?”
“Please,” she begged. “Just listen to me.”
I flexed my jaw, grinding my molars loud enough that she had to be able to hear them. I almost walked out. Almost. But in the end, I wanted to see how she wormed her way out of this. I picked up my half-finished glass of whisky and took a seat, one about as far away from her as I could get. Crossing my right ankle over my left knee, I stretched my arm along the back of the couch and gestured to her with my drink. “I’m listening.”
She swept a hand down her face then, with a heavy sigh, chose to sit in the chair, the message from my stiff body language hitting its mark.
“When I first started working here, I had no intention of telling you anything about me. I had a job to do, and I was going to do it to the best of my ability. My personal life was none of your business. And then, as you warmed to me, or at least stopped trying to make me quit, I realized that I wanted you to accept me for me, not because our lives were connected in the most horrifying of ways. Our experiences are too similar, Upton. And so I made the decision not to tell you. To have you come around on your own, and not because you felt some kind of kinship because we both lost someone we loved at the same event.”
“That’s a ridiculous reason,” I scoffed.
“No, it isn’t.” She scraped a hand through her hair, tugging out several strands that fell onto the arm of the chair. “After it happened, I received so many messages from other victims. Some, like me, weren’t there, but had family who were. Other messages from those who were injured themselves. They wanted to reach out, to form connections with someone they felt understood them. But I didn’t want to surround myself with horrific reminders. I didn’t want my head full of their stories. I had enough trouble managing my own. And when I got this job, and I met you… you were so broken. All I wanted was to fix you, but I wanted to do that without you knowing that when I said I understood what you were feeling, I really meant it. It wasn’t just words, but spoken from a place of empathy. Only those who went through what we did can truly understand.”
“That still doesn’t explain why you found it so easy to tell Sebastian and not me.”
She shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose. “The longer I kept it from you, the harder I found it to confess. Something Sebastian said made me think that there’s a possibility on some level that I invited Zak to force the conversation, but…” Her voice trailed off, and her chin lowered to her chest. She nibbled on her thumbnail, her focus absolute.
“Perhaps it’s Sebastian you want, not me,” I said bitterly.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped.
“Ridiculous? Is it?” I hit back, completely lost now to the green-eyed monster. “If it was so easy to tell him and not the man you’ve been tangling tongues with for weeks, then maybe he’s the one you want. Although I should warn you that he’s in love with his brother’s girlfriend, and so you might have a hell of a job of trying to divert his attention. Still, worth a shot, yeah? Bag yourself a perfect billionaire rather than one who’s as fucked-up as me.”
Her jaw dropped, and she gave a slow, disbelieving headshake. “How could you?” she gritted out. “Do you think so little of me?”
I shrugged. “If the boot fits.”
Color drained from her face, and her body seemed to crumple in on itself. She unsteadily got to her feet. “If that’s what you really think, then there’s nothing more to say,” she whispered.
She smoothed a hand over her abdomen and walked away, her shoulders bowed, spine curved.
As if I’d been in some kind of trance, I came to, horrified at the words I’d spoken.
What the fuck are you doing? Don’t let her leave. Not like this. Not over something that’s eminently fixable.
The opening of the door propelled me to my feet. I reached her in one second and slammed it shut, then planted my hands on either side of her head. I buried my nose in her hair and breathed in the scent of her shampoo. Peaches. Whenever I thought of Belle, peaches always came to mind, the smell of the sweet fruit in her hair, on her skin.
“Don’
t go.”
She turned around slowly, hurt swirling in her green irises, darkened and dull rather than vibrant and full of life. “You hurt me.”
My chest throbbed with pain, and I hung my head. “I know.”
“Did you mean it?”
“No.”
“Then why say it?”
Shame flooded me. “I was jealous,” I admitted.
Her eyes glistened, and she’d never looked more beautiful. “Oh, Upton.”
God, I want her. Right here, right now, despite a room full of guests down the hall.
I crashed my mouth on hers, my kiss tinged with a combination of punishment and apology. My hips pinned her to the door, trapping her in place. If she wanted to escape now, too bad.
Her arms snaked around my shoulders, her fingertips playing with the hair at my nape. Earlier, I’d lost myself to jealousy. Now, I was lost in a haze of passion and raw, unbridled need. My hands clawed at the hem of her dress, almost as if they belonged to another. I broke off the kiss only to allow me to hurriedly unzip it, and it dropped in a pool of material at her feet. And then I was right back on her, drinking from her as if I needed this to survive.
Maybe I did.
I unclasped her bra with one hand and slipped my other inside her panties, groaning at what I found there. Heat, so much heat. And wet, soaked, just for me. I pushed one finger inside her, quickly following up with another. She rocked her hips, riding my hand, our noisy breaths mingling together.
Flicking open the button on my trousers, I reached inside and freed my dick. Damn, I was ready to blow before I got anywhere near her pussy. I tried to think of other things, less sexy things, but my mind wouldn’t stay there. Surrounded by the smell, the taste, the feel of a woman after so long, and one I’d dreamed for weeks of fucking, had me raising her. I hooked her thighs around my waist, shoved her panties to one side, and lined up my cock with her entrance. One push forward, and I was balls deep.
“God, fuck, you’re tight.”
I didn’t wait for a reply, kissing her again, my tongue thrusts keeping time with my hips. My thighs trembled from excitement and the strain of holding her up. I withdrew, then slammed into her over and over and over. She clung to me, meeting me every inch of the way. Using the door to take some of the strain, I cupped her breast and, somehow, managed to lift the erect nipple to my mouth. When I sucked, she cried out, and her pussy clenched around me.
Enchanted: A Billionaire Romance (The ROGUES Series Book 4) Page 12
