When Fates Align

by Isabelle Richards

  Her face softens. “If the roles had been reversed, I probably would have been catatonic. But I have a feeling that’s not what you’re about to tell me.” She looks full of nervous anticipation, as though she’s hoping I won’t say something dreadful and preparing herself in case I do.

  “All this buildup is making this far worse than it should be. The bottom line is she made a pass at me, and I rejected her. Max walked in and thought it was more. We had a row. That’s it. I don’t think Isla actually fancies me. I think… to be honest, she’s more like a bloke. She’s would shag through something traumatic to avoid actually having to feel anything. In her own disturbed way, I think she was trying to help.”

  She folds her hands in her lap. “Yeah, I could see that. She gives off that ice queen vibe.” She takes a deep breath. “Is that all?”

  Sliding out of my seat, I kneel before her and take her hand. “Yes. Like I said, it was nothing, but I wanted you to know. I don’t want there to be anything between us.”

  “Look, I’m sure if I really thought about this, I would be bothered, but I don’t want to think about it,” she says. “I don’t want to imagine what you went through or think about what that felt like. If I never have to think about those four days again, it’ll be too soon. If you wanted to fuck her or did fuck her, I trust that you would tell me the truth rather than blow smoke up my ass out of pity.”

  This is not the reaction I expected at all. “I didn’t—”

  “I’m not done,” she says, holding up her hand. “You held me, covered in piss and blood and death, and never let me go no matter how foul I smelled. You don’t do that for someone you simply care about. You wept in my arms. You didn’t just shed a few tears—you sobbed as though someone had ripped out your heart and put it through a meat grinder. You don’t do that for a woman you kind of like. You don’t go to war with a cartel for some chick you’re banging. You had a million chances to get out, Gavin. You could have let them sell me or kill me, but you didn’t. Because you love me.” She gestures to me and smiles. “You’re you. Woman are going swoon at the sight of you. But I know that no matter how many women bat their eyes or show you some leg, you. Love. Me.”

  It’s as though everything I’ve been telling her for months has finally clicked into place. Since we met, she’s kept me at a safe distance as though she was waiting for me to foul up or change my mind. But somehow she’s lifted the veil and is finally seeing me for what I am and not what she expects me to be. It’s a bloody miracle.

  “Marry me,” I blurt.

  “What?”

  “Marry me. Make me the happiest man on the planet to know that you’ll be mine today, tomorrow, and forever. Promise me I can wake up to that beautiful face every day for the rest of my life. Bestow upon me the honor of making you smile until you have deep laugh lines and crinkles around your eyes. I want a lifetime of tripping over the shoes you’ve left at the front door and finding toothpaste tubes you finish but never replace. Marry me and promise I’ll never have to live another day without you.”

  She places a hand on each side my face then pulls me to her. She kisses me. Everything in that kiss tells me this is right. In my whole life, I’ve never felt something this right. We’re pure synergy. My lips still hum when she pulls away.

  “Marry me,” I whisper. A smile creeps across her face, and warmth overtakes me. This is what it feels like to be truly happy.

  “No,” she says, her smile unwavering.

  Her kiss. The look in her eyes. Her smile. They all say, “Yes.” I must have misheard. “What?”

  “I want all of those things. But we don’t need to be married to have them.”

  I swallow and sit back on my heels. She looks surprised by my withdrawal then grabs my hands as if to draw me back in. But I can’t. I’m still reeling from the blow. My hand lays limply in hers.

  “Marriage is about obligation,” she says. “Our relationship is about choice and love and faith. Don’t you know you have me? Every day, today, tomorrow, and forever. But the difference is, you won’t wake up to me because you have to. Each night, you’ll get to choose if you want to see this face when you wake up, with my horrible morning breath and frizzy hair. And when you kiss me in the morning, I’ll know it’s because there isn’t any other place on the planet that you’d rather be. A piece of paper will never give us that.”

  I’ve never wanted something so badly in all my life, and she’s made it clear I can’t have it. A year ago, I would have agreed with her. After my debacle of a marriage to Brooke, I never expected to want to enter into that farce again. But I know now that my marriage was a farce because I didn’t truly love Brooke. I married her because I thought we could make a life together, but that’s not love. I can’t live without Lily, and what’s more, I never want to. My heart aches for her, longs for her, craves her. She’s in my blood…

  And she doesn’t want to marry me.

  She kisses my hand. “Please stop looking so disappointed. For the first time since my parents were alive, I believe that someone truly, deeply, and unconditionally loves me. I feel confident and comfortable and safe. This is huge for me. Can we celebrate that?”

  I’m gutted, but she actually looks happier than I’ve ever seen her. How can I not revel in that? Shouldn’t her happiness be enough?

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Lily

  “Ahem,” Mason says from the door.

  God bless that man—his timing is impeccable. Five minutes ago, I felt so proud of myself, as if I’d crossed a huge threshold to maturity and self-evolution. Now I feel as if I’ve stepped in dog shit. No, worse than that. I feel as if I stepped in dog shit then tracked it into the house and decided to do the twist on one of Gavin’s zillion-dollar antique rugs. Every time Chubby Checker told me to twist again, I really ground that shit deep into the fibers. No amount of Resolve would get that stain out.

  So when Mason says, “Miss Harrington has arrived,” I jump out my chair and run to the front door. Yes, of course, I’m excited to see Em, but more than anything, I needed to get out of that room.

  She’s shaking the rain off her Burberry coat when she sees me. “You bitch! Don’t ever do that to me again!”

  She hugs me so tightly I can’t breathe, and when she pulls away, her eyes are red and glassy. Em doesn’t cry. Ever. Not at Nicolas Sparks movies, not at ASPCA commercials about abused puppies. In the ten years I’ve known her, I’ve never seen her even well up until today.

  I pull her back into an embrace. “I’m okay. Promise.”

  “But for how long?” she asks into my hair. “When will this crap end?” She brushes her thumb over the purple bruise on my face. “They really went to town on you.”

  Footsteps echo in the foyer, alerting us that we’re not alone.

  Em takes a deep breath and pulls away. In an instant, the flush is gone from her cheeks and her eyes are clear. “Well, if it isn’t my British boyfriend!”

  Gavin kisses Em’s cheek. “Hello, my darling. How was your flight?”

  “Too long,” she says. “But I really need to freshen up. Point me in the direction of my room?”

  I raise an eyebrow. “You’re staying? Here? You know there isn’t a masseuse or twenty-four-hour room service, right?”

  “Gavin told me you’re playing dead, so it’s easier for me to just stay—”

  She’s cut off by Max’s booming voice as he tromps down the stairs. “Yo, Gavin! Isaac just texted about some major crisis at Edwards. He said it’s imperative we get down there.” He’s looking as his phone as he takes the last few steps. “If we leave now, we’ll sit in three hours of traff…” He trails off when he sees Em. Clearing his throat, his body goes ramrod straight. “Emily.”

  I wince from the severe edge to his tone.

  “Maximus.” The sharpness of her tone rivals his.

  I look back and forth at them, watching their battle of non-verbal assaults: narrowing of the eyes, flaring of the nostrils, setting of the jaw. H
ostility sparks in the air around them, but no words are spoken.

  “Well, then. It looks like I’m needed elsewhere,” Gavin says, breaking the silence. “I’m not sure how long this will take, so perhaps you and Em should order take-away. Don’t wait on me for supper.”

  Without waiting for a response, he kisses Em’s cheek then mine, then he and Max bolt out of the house as though it’s on fire. Em and I stare at the door as it closes.

  I’m about to ask her what all that was about when Mason clears his throat. “If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you to your room.”

  She pats my shoulder. “Take a load off, I’ll be back.”

  Twenty minutes later, she finds me in the study. “This is some place he’s got. A little opulent for the sake of being opulent, but that went with the territory in the early nineteen hundreds. Ostentatious was very fashionable at the time. Is that a real Van Gogh out there?”

  I nod. “My mother had a print of that hanging in our living room, and now I’m living with the real one. It’s crazy.” I look around with disdain. “I can’t wait to get out of here. Something about this place just creeps me out. Maybe it’s that I know the people who lived here were asshole warmongers. Gavin told me that his great-grandfather, the one who built the house, made a killing selling weapons to slave traders. Every time I touch something I like, I wonder how many slaves were sold to pay for it.” I shudder.

  “You know my stance on the subject. Give that money to good and make clean money that doesn’t make your skin crawl when you spend it.” Em’s father ran one of the most successful Ponzi schemes in history. He probably could have kept going for years, but her mother found out, and he killed them both. She sits next to me on the sofa. “Do you know where you’re going to go yet?”

  I tuck my legs underneath me and shift so I can look at her better. “Not back to the flat, that’s for sure. I think once this settles down, we’ll look for a new place. But who knows when that will be.”

  “So,” she says while scanning the room, “does this dump have a bar? Because after what I just saw in the foyer, I think we have a lot to discuss.”

  I walk to the wet bar. “What you saw? How about what I saw? What was that between you and Max?”

  She digs in the pocket of her slacks and pulls out a quarter. “I’ll play you. The first one to lose goes first!”

  I grab shot glasses and a bottle of tequila. “You’re going down!”

  Ten shots later, we’re tied ten for ten. I’m mid-shot when Mason knocks on the door.

  “There’s far too much food in the kitchen for me to permit you to order take-away,” he says.

  I miss the shot, and the quarter goes flying.

  “Yes!” Em shouts. “I’m still the Quarters Queen.”

  Mason flashes me a sheepish smile. “Good. Now that your game is over, dinner will be in the dining room.”

  I shake my head. “Kitchen. I refuse to sit at a table that seats twenty-four. It’s ridiculous.”

  Mason tsks me. My desire to be informal makes him uncomfortable. Even though as a person he’s very rustic and simple, he’s accustomed to taking care of people with refined tastes and high expectations. He just doesn’t know what to do with me.

  Mason gestures to Em. “We have guests.”

  “Yes, and Em spends enough time in stuffy dining rooms with obscene amounts of silverware at each place setting. She needs me to help her keep it real.”

  She points at the Alberto Giacometti sculpture. “Yeah, because there’s no better place to keep it real than a palatial mansion with twenty-million-dollar sculptures.”

  I shove my finger in her face. “Shut it. Now, to the kitchen!” I say as though I’m leading a charge. Then I trip and fall flat on my face.

  Mason helps me to my feet. “I think we’ll skip wine with dinner tonight.”

  The spread Mason puts out is simply amazing. His Lancashire hot pot may be my most favorite food on the planet. People who say British food is terrible clearly haven’t had his. While we eat, I fill Em in on Gavin’s impromptu proposal.

  Her fork clangs as it hits the table. “You said no?”

  “Don’t look at me like that! You think marriage is a useless and antiquated institution.” I point my fork at her. “Don’t judge.”

  She wipes her mouth with her napkin. “I’m not sure you’re thinking clearly. Do you think this is a PTSD thing? There are five stages of grieving—maybe there’s five stages of getting over trauma? Clearly one of them is breaking the heart of the most perfect man to have ever walked the face of the earth.”

  My jaw drops. “I didn’t break his heart! Stop blowing it out of proportion.”

  She scoffs. “The man asked you to marry him, and you said no. How do you think he feels? Jolly good?” she asks in a near-perfect London accent.

  “It’s not like I broke up with him. We’re still together. Stronger than ever, really.”

  She shakes her head as she cuts a piece of lamb. “If you think that, you’re more delusional than I realized.”

  “You’re not being fair,” I snap.

  She holds up her hands. “Walk me through this then. Because after everything you’ve both been through, after what he said to you, I don’t get it.”

  “It’s not what you think. It wasn’t like I panicked or freaked out at the notion. At Christmas, the idea of a proposal gave me the sweats. I couldn’t commit to anything because I kept waiting for everything to fall apart. I was waiting for the next curveball fate would throw at me.” I pick up my water glass and take a sip. “Now, after everything that’s happened, I think fate can go fuck herself. I’m not afraid of tomorrow because I know whatever it brings, I can handle it. I’m not going to waste another second of my short, precious life worried about shit that doesn’t matter. If we’re going to be together, I want to know he’s with me because he wants to be with me, not because he made some silly vow.” I put down my glass. “I thought you of all people would understand.”

  She smooshes a piece of potato with her fork. “Well, maybe I’m changing. This whole experience has been eye opening for me.” She looks me in the eye. “It’s nothing like what you went through, so don’t think I’m trying to equate the two.”

  I wave her off. “I know that. Just tell me what happened.”

  She lays her silverware on the side of her plate then pushes it forward. “I was woken up at seven in the morning by my buzzer going haywire. I assumed it was that little shit downstairs fucking with me before he got on the bus, but it was Max. He was a mess. He looked like he was about to collapse and I thought he was just that drunk, but he was just that devastated. You were dead, or so we thought anyway.”

  Even though we’ve both had enough to drink, a little more can’t hurt for stories like this. I pull the cork out of a bottle of red on the sideboard and pour us each a glass.

  “I was shocked,” she continues. “I didn’t really believe it. The news didn’t feel real. But for him, it was really sinking in and he couldn’t handle it. I tried to comfort him the best I could, but you know me—I don’t do that well.” She looks down as though she’s ashamed.

  “You slept with him,” I say quietly.

  “Yes. That’s how I show comfort.” She tucks a lock of her chestnut hair behind her ear. “When it was over, he started spilling his heart out to me. Talking about regret and loss and how his whole world was just turned upside down. He was reaching out to me, practically begging for me to be there for him, and I just couldn’t.” She sniffs and blinks several times.

  “What did you do?”

  She finds my eyes, not masking her pain. “I told him to tell the maid the sheets needed changing on his way out, and I got in the shower.”

  I gasp, and she winces. I know this is hard for her; I don’t need to make it worse by judging her. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

  “I deserve it. I was deplorable. It was all too real, too intense. He really needed me, and I had no idea how to help him, so I ran
like a coward. If I helped him, I’d have to face it myself, and I wasn’t ready to do that.” She takes a sip of her wine. “It didn’t hit me at first, you know? Didn’t sink in. To be honest, I didn’t want it to, so I avoided thinking about it by getting on a plane to Miami. Friends I know were having a yacht party. There I was, on this huge, beautiful ship surrounded by five hundred ‘friends,’ and I’ve never felt more alone. I pulled out my phone and scrolled through the numbers, and there wasn’t one person I could talk to about how my best friend was dead. Not one.”

  Her lifestyle was bound to catch up to her at some point. I just wish she hadn’t had to learn that lesson so painfully.

  “You wanted it this way,” I reply. “You carefully crafted your life so that you’d be popular but insulated. You never wanted anyone close to you.”

  She looks at me over the rim of her glass. “Yeah, well, all I am now is isolated. It scared the crap out of me. If I lost you, I’d have no one. Anyone who’s ever pushed to get in, I shut them down or hurt them so badly they’d never want to see me again.”

  My mind flashes back to the gala. Em had two wonderful men pining for her and she couldn’t handle the sincerity of their affection, so she broke both of their hearts. That’s always been easier for her than letting anyone to get close enough to see how broken she really is inside. Besides me, no one knows the real Emily Harrington. I’m still not sure why I was given a pass to the real Emily Harrington, but I pray for her sake she changes that. It’s only a miracle that I’m still here. I can’t bear to consider what her life would be like if I had died.

  She takes a sip. “The moral of the story is you can’t die. I can’t lose my only friend. So let’s put a stop to this cartel business, shall we?”

  I give her a quick rundown of what Nigel and his troop have been up to.