“I get that.”
Sophie shook her head, not convinced Lucien did get it. He’d left the house furious and returned almost ready to fight Dylan’s corner. Dylan, or Matthew, or whoever he was, was clearly a very accomplished liar, because Lucien didn’t suffer fools gladly.
Still she couldn’t find it within herself to be mad at Lucien for wavering. She’d watched him grow close to Dylan over the months, and it had warmed her to see those bonds of friendship.
Over their years together she’d watched him learn to open his heart, first of all to her, and then to Tilly, and over time he’d encompassed Kara in his circle of trust. Dylan had brought something new and unfamiliar to his life, a sense of brotherhood and friendship that he’d never before known as a grown man. It wounded her to think he was going to lose that, and it wounded her to think that Dylan wasn’t the man she’d honestly believed him to be.
She’d thought him a better man. A man worthy of Lucien’s trust, a man worthy of Kara’s love.
“I need to go home too,” she said gently. “I need to go back for Kara. The staff at the boutique are ready anyway, it’ll just mean bringing the handover forward a couple of weeks.” She’d already spoken briefly with Aida, their assistant manager, after Kara had left, and set the wheels in motion for her own early departure. Their flights were arranged, and Esther was packing Tilly's things up as they spoke. She knew Kara well enough to know that she wouldn’t go running to her family and friends for support when she arrived back in England. She’d try to shoulder her burden alone, most likely drowning her sorrows in the bottom of countless wine bottles. Sophie had been there herself, and she shuddered to think what might have become of her if Kara hadn’t come to her rescue with her unique blend of common sense, good humour and tough love.
“I’ll have to stay on here, for a couple of weeks at least,” Lucien said, disgruntled but resigned. He accepted immediately that Sophie needed to be there for her friend. For their friend. “There’s no way Dylan’s in any position to come into work.”
“Do we still even call him Dylan?”
Lucien studied her face. “He’s still the same man, Sophie,” he said, and the despondent expression in his eyes sliced through her heart. “Sometimes good people do bad things for good reasons.”
She stared at him for a long time. “And do you think he had good reason?”
Lucien shrugged. “The jury’s out. Go home and take care of Kara. She’s the one who matters right now.”
Chapter Forty-Two
As it turned out, Kara hadn’t sought comfort in the bottom of a wine bottle. Not because she didn’t want a drink, but because she wanted one so much she feared that she’d drown her own lungs in alcohol if she let herself pour so much as a glass. She had previous form in heartache, after all, or somewhere on the scale, at least. When Richard had jilted her at the altar, she’d anaesthetised the pain and humiliation with liquor. She knew now that it didn’t really help. She’d thought at the time that she couldn’t possibly feel worse. She also knew now that she’d been very, very wrong.
Loving and losing Dylan Day made what Richard had put her through seem like a walk in the park.
The transition from loved to lonely had all happened so fast. Two weeks on and she was still reeling from the impact of that night on the beach, nurturing a glowing ball of pure hatred for the man who’d melted her heart and then stamped all over it.
He’d been so very, very lovely. How could it not have been real? Never for one second had she harboured even the tiniest of doubts, yet their entire time together had been nothing more than a fabrication.
Her emotions veered wildly between the raw, gaping misery of loss and fury hot enough to want him dead. How dare he? How fucking dare he? She’d lost any faith in her own ability to know the bottom from the top, he’d robbed her of her self respect and dignity right along with her heart. Twice already she’d looked up flight information to Ibiza, half certain that she wanted to go back and face him, to make him tell her what she’d done to deserve it. Had he been looking for someone to lay the con on and judged her gullible enough to be the one? Someone to warm his bed in the absence of his wife? But why go to all that trouble? He could have found any number of willing women on Ibiza without needing to woo or lie. He was the beautiful boss of a sex club - if anyone could get sex without trying, it was surely him.
Was it just the thrill of the chase that turned him on? Or did he get his kicks from lying, from watching her fall into his web of deceit?
All of these thoughts and many other, darker ones filled Kara’s brain on a loop until she held her head in her hands and cried, needing the haranguing voices to stop.
He was married. He was divorced. He had a child. The child wasn't his. The child was his. He'd lied about so many things that she had no clue which amongst them were the truth anymore.
She didn’t get up from the kitchen table when she heard Sophie’s key in the door, but she was relieved to hear it none the less, grateful always for her friend’s quiet, strong solidarity at her side.
Sophie came into the room, flicking the kettle on as she passed it, toting carrier bags from which she began to unpack fresh food. She unravelled the soft woollen scarf from her throat and wound it instead around Kara’s neck, ruffling her friend’s hair. She swiped the cold cup of coffee from Kara’s hands and replaced it with a fresh one for each of them.
“Did you sleep last night?”
Kara lifted one shoulder. “Some, I think.” She sipped the hot drink and sighed, pulling the folder on the table towards her and flipping it open.
"Remember we talked about the possibility of opening some stand alone boutiques over the next couple of years? I've been doing some research and I think it's got potential." She sifted through the paperwork quickly, frowning. "I made some lists..."
Sophie reached out and stilled Kara's increasingly erratic hands. "Kara, stop."
"No, it's here somewhere. I made lists... locations..."
Sophie squeezed her fingers, knowing full well that Kara was using work to block out thoughts of Dylan. "Okay," she said. "We'll find the list, and we can talk about work if you want to, but you can't pretend that this hasn't happened forever, you know?"
Kara withdrew her hands and propped her forehead in them instead.
"It's all I've got right now, Soph." She sighed heavily. It wasn't all she wanted, but it was all she'd got. Every time Sophie came she battled with herself not to ask questions about Dylan. Today, she lost her battle.
“Have you spoken to Lucien today?”
Sophie nodded. They spoke all the time. She stroked her wedding ring beneath the table top, wishing he was here instead of still wrapping things up on Ibiza. A one-night honeymoon wasn’t what they’d had in mind.
“And is he still there?” Kara asked tonelessly, and Sophie didn’t need to wonder who she meant. She faltered, wondering how her friend was going to take the news.
“For now. He told Lucien yesterday that he’s decided it’s time to move on.”
Kara let the information sink in. “Move on where?”
“He didn’t say. Back to the States, I expect?”
The man Kara had thought she knew wouldn’t head back to the States. A slow, cold creep of panic stole over her bones.
He was going to disappear, and she’d never see him again.
But so what, she hated him.
He was going to disappear, and she’d never get the chance to force him to answer all of the questions that haunted her.
But he wasn’t worth even one single moment more of her time.
He was going to disappear, and she’d never have the chance to beat her fists on his chest until he was as black and blue on the outside as she was on the inside.
But he didn’t deserve to feel the touch of her hand ever again, even in anger.
He was going to disappear.
Dylan needed to disappear. It had been two weeks since Kara had left, two weeks since Billy had ar
rived.
It seemed a lifetime longer on both counts. He needed to step up to the plate and make a plan for the future, find some place to lay down roots for Billy, a job with regular hours.
The baby had turned his entire world upside down and inside out. He wasn’t just a tiny person. He was a mini-dictator, and Dylan his foot soldier as much as his father. The first few days had been a living hell of not knowing why Billy was screaming or how to make it stop, but little by little, he was learning to read his son’s cues. He wasn’t confident that he was doing a very good job, but he did at least feel pretty sure that he could keep Billy alive and well, which was several significant steps forward from the day Suzie had left him literally holding the baby.
He owed most of his new knowledge and a big debt of gratitude to Lucien. He’d fully expected to find himself unemployed and unwelcome, but Lucien had turned out to be a measured, loyal friend who didn’t turn away in times of trouble. Dylan knew that Lucien had found himself caught in the most delicate of positions, and his admiration for the other man deepened ten-fold as he observed how he managed to remain true to himself without feeling obligated to entrench himself on one side or the other.
Instead of firing him, he’d given him paternity leave. Paid paternity leave. Company rules, he’d said.
No big deal, he’d said.
But it was a big deal. A big, huge deal. It was the gift of precious breathing space, of time to get a handle on the enormity of what had happened to him, to get to know his baby, to grieve for the love he’d lost.
Billy was the most effective distraction imaginable when he was awake, but when he slept, Kara came. She came to Dylan in his daydreams and in the snatches of sleep he managed at night, sometimes smiling, sometimes furious, and beautiful all the time. His whole body ached with missing her, as if he’d been trampled by wild horses.
The only time of day when he could find any solace at all came at sunset. Most nights, Billy’s fledgling routine allowed for him to be fed, winded and bathed by then, and they’d developed a habit of sitting up on deck, one man and his baby, to watch the horizon darken.
Billy seemed able to sleep easiest held skin to skin, his tiny chest against his daddy’s, his blanket tucked around him until just his small round face and wild-child hair poked out above. Dylan often found his own eyes closing too, drifting into a doze along with his son.
It was there, in that exact position, that Kara found him, two weeks and two days almost to the hour after she’d left.
Chapter Forty-Three
It was the way he cradled the damn baby that made her cry. All of that big, powerful strength rendered gentle and tender by the presence of the infant in his arms. How could a man who held a baby with such infinite care be the same man who’d broken her heart?
Kara wiped her fingertips over her damp cheeks, glad that Dylan was sleeping. He didn’t deserve to see her tears.
She wavered, uncertain, considered walking away. She’d come here in anger, with an outraged sense of unfinished business, fury that he’d left her feeling a million times worse than Richard had. If she let it go by the wayside without ever setting the record straight, she feared that she’d never trust her own instincts again. Her self respect was a cause worth fighting for. But now he was here in front of her, she realised she’d come for something else too. She’d come to be near him one last time: her traitorous heart hadn’t yet completely cast him out and the knowledge of this scared her witless. If he opened his eyes now and lied some more, would she believe him? Her faith in herself was on the floor because of Dylan Day.
Then he opened his eyes.
“English.” He spoke on the softest of intakes of breath as he looked at her, and the expression in his eyes confirmed Kara’s fears. She was in trouble, because she could see him going through the same overwhelming emotions that she’d experienced herself a few minutes earlier. She saw it all play out on his face: incredulous surprise, the bright, against-all-odds flare of hope, and then the bitter, crushing weight of disappointment.
Kara didn’t speak because she found herself out of suitable words.
He glanced down at the sleeping baby, and then back up at her.
“I’ll go and put him in bed,” he said, getting up carefully. He turned back before he disappeared inside, uncertainty on his face. “I’ll be a couple of minutes…please don’t go.”
And there it was again, that hot ball of tears burning her throat. She didn’t answer him, just turned away and sat down in the low deck chair he’d vacated. The heat from his body warmed hers.
Yes. She’d wait.
Below deck, Dylan laid the baby down in the makeshift cradle he’d fashioned himself over the last couple of days. He could have bought one, but the idea of a shopping trip with a baby in tow terrified him, and besides, he'd needed to keep his mind busy during Billy's naptimes. It’d never grace the pages of a design magazine, but it was good enough, and that needed to be enough, for now at least.
Kara was here. He’d worked hard on resigning himself to the fact that he’d never see her again, but she was actually here, right now, here on his deck, cowboy boots and all, and he had no idea how the hell to play it.
He unfolded a second chair on deck a few minutes later and sat down alongside her. The answer was simple. He would play it straight. He owed her that at the very least.
“Why are you here, Kara?”
His question held no trace of confrontation, more a resigned sense of defeat.
“To hear the truth from you, I guess.” Kara shook her head, her eyes on the horizon. “I need to know why. Was it all a big game for you?”
“Kara, no…”
“I wake up every day and wonder how I could have been such a monumental fool. I thought I knew better, but it feels like I’m the girl who never learns her lessons. My father. Richard. You. Is there something about me that marks me out as a pushover, Dylan? Something pathetic, needy?”
Deep frown lines creased his brow.
“I lied, Kara. I lied and you believed me, which makes you a good, trusting person, which is a fucking miracle given the number of people who’ve let you down. That I’m the latest name on that damn list kills me.”
“I hear you’re planning to disappear,” she said tonelessly. She’d come here to reclaim her self-respect, even if it meant stripping him of his. “That makes you a man who lies and then runs from his problems. Not exactly daddy of the year material. I should know, I grew up with a father like that, remember?” Anger made her harsh, and she twisted to look him directly in the eyes. “I don’t envy your child.”
It was a lie. She did. She envied the baby that he’d get to spend every day with Dylan.
But every one of her words hit their target, and he took her arrows because she had every right in the world to hate him.
“Can I tell you the truth?” he asked.
“Oh, that’s funny, coming from you,” she said. “You mean the sob story about your evil ex-wife dumping your newborn baby on you? Don’t bother, I’ve had it all relayed second hand already.”
Dylan nodded. “I figured you would have heard.”
“So what else is there I need to know?”
He sighed heavily, his head leaned against the wooden sidebar of the seat as he looked at her. “I’ve apologised to you a million times over in my head, Kara. For not finding the right time to tell you all my fucked up, ugly truths, for not giving you the choice to walk away from me, for the fact that you had to find out in such a cruel, humiliating way.”
“You should have told me yourself,” she said quietly. “I’d have believed anything you told me.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. It’s not a pretty life back home, Kara.”
“You think I’m that shallow?” she said. “I’d rather have ugly truths than pretty lies.”
He nodded. “That’s the thing, Kara. The lies weren’t for your benefit. They were for mine. It was a fairytale. My fairytale. One where my brother hadn’t died, where I had
n’t married a woman I didn’t love, one where I didn’t lose everything I ever owned.” The fierce longing in his eyes held hers. “I needed a holiday from my real life, but I didn’t count on you. You were so much more than a holiday romance. You made me want to be Dylan Day forever.”
“I wanted you to be him too,” she whispered, her tears threatening again. She’d loved him so very, very much.
He looked at her, brittle and broken, and he knew that the moment had arrived, finally, to do the right thing by the woman he loved.
“Kara, I miss you every day. Every morning. Every night. All of the time.” He badly needed her to know how very much she meant to him.
“I know it doesn’t matter now, and I know you can’t come back to me, because it isn’t just me any more. It’s me and Billy. Billy and me. ” The river deep conviction in his voice made her envious of the baby for the second time that evening. “I’m a father, Kara. I have a son. I’ve been all kinds of stupid, but you’re wrong about one thing. I’m not going to be a bad father to Billy. Maybe I suck at it right now, but I’m learning. He stops crying when I hold him, so I figure I must be doing something right. And I’ll get better. I won’t lie to him, or let him down. I’ll do the best I can and hope like hell that it’s enough.”
It was the speech of his lifetime, the protective words of a new father who loved his child, and for a few seconds they stared at each other, shell-shocked. She made his heart ache. He made her heart break.
“Go home Kara. Go home and be happy, because you deserve to be more than anyone else I know. Go home knowing that I truly fucking loved you. You didn’t get it wrong. I didn’t fool you, and the next man who loves you won’t automatically be lying to you. He’ll be the luckiest guy in the world. Don’t run away from love because of what I did. I lied about many things, but never once about how I felt about you.”
Kara stopped trying to hold her tears in. It was a battle she’d never win, and Dylan was barely hanging on himself. He reached out and brushed the back of his fingers over her damp cheek.
Knight and Day (The Knight Erotic Trilogy, book 3 of 3) Page 19
