He nodded sadly. “I know that now. Letting you go was the worst mistake I’ve ever made, and believe me, I’ve been paying for it since. That’s why I came to talk with you tonight. Not a day goes by that you aren’t on my mind. I just can’t get over it. I ruined what we had, and that’s going to haunt me forever. It doesn’t have to be that way, though…” he trailed his fingertips down her arm again and gazed longingly into her eyes.
“We could fix this. We could make it right. I know you still feel something for me. I can sense it. I can feel it when we’re close, when I touch you…” he leaned closer and took her hand in his, lifting it to his mouth. Closing his eyes, he slowly and tenderly kissed her fingers and then looked up at her with pleading eyes. “We’re worth a second shot, aren’t we, baby? Come on… think about it. We could be so good together again.”
She hesitated for a long moment. Feeling the long-gone but not forgotten draw of his lips on her skin, she remembered how it used to be between them. Him always wanting her, him loving being a couple with her and making her feel so physically desired. Something in her mind caught then, and she lowered a brow thoughtfully.
That was just the thing, she told herself. He had always made her feel physically desired, and that was delicious when it was happening, but he hadn’t really made her feel like he wanted her as his wife, only as a lover – someone smart and beautiful to have on his arm.
He had made her feel like she was good enough to have around as a companion but not enough to be elevated to the lofty and worthy position of his spouse. She’d never been quite enough to make him want her that way, and she had finally realized that she was worth far more than the value he placed on her. It was why she had finally had to give him an ultimatum and break away from him, and she knew that it never should have come to that.
She knew that if he had truly loved her and appreciated her, she never would have had to take it to the red line, and when he’d failed to cross it, she knew that she had to put herself and her future first. She’d left him, and she’d started her own family. Now, there he was, sitting beside her and begging her for a second chance.
It made her feel so many different things. It made her feel justification that he might have finally realized just how good she was, and she hoped that maybe he could finally see in her what he should have been seeing in her all along. She wondered if he was just lonely and feeling his age and his dwindling options for a life partner and was hoping to cash in on their history and use her as a last chance saving grace. She wondered if he really meant it, and if he had somehow grown up and become immeasurably more responsible and genuine.
Narrowing her eyes, she lifted her chin and spoke the core of the myriad of thoughts rushing through her mind. She had to know the truth, if he could manage to speak it to her. “Why are you really here? What is it that you really want?”
He raised his brows innocently and shrugged. “What? I want you, and I want to see about trying to be a family.”
Doubt cast a shadow over her, and she eyed him closely. “You want a family. Now. After I tried to get you to commit to one for so long, and it was the last thing you wanted, now you’re going to come to my home and sit here and tell me that you want to have a family?”
Damien nodded. “Yeah… well, a lot has changed for me. I want a family now. I know you have kids already, but you don’t have a guy around, right?”
She shook her head subtly. “No, there’s no one in my life. It’s just the kids and me.”
He gave her an encouraging smile. “Well, then see? That’s perfect. That will work out. We can get back together and give it a try. I mean, maybe it could work out. How bad could those kids be anyway, right? It would probably be okay. Not that big a deal.”
Fire surged through her in a flood. “How bad could the kids be? Did you really just say that to me?”
Damien waved his hands in the air before him like he was trying to stop traffic. “No, wait. Baby, I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant.”
She vaulted up off the couch and stood over him, glaring down at him, her hand curling into a fist. “No, don’t try to backtrack on this. You just said what you were really thinking. You just gave yourself away. You’re not here for a family. You’re not here to become a dad or to have kids in your life. You’re here to try to get me back so you can have me just the way you did, and you’re so desperate to try to get me back that you’re willing to try to put up with the kids in order to get what you want, and what you want is me and only me. Well, that’s not going to happen.”
Aleisha turned, marched to the front door, and yanked it open, spinning on her foot. She looked back at him. Damien was gaping at her from his seat on the sofa.
“Get out,” she growled at him. “There’s no place for you here, and it’s time for you to leave.”
He rose from his seat and walked to her slowly and carefully as if he was attempting to approach a dangerous and wild animal.
“Hey, come on now, baby, it’s not like that! Don’t be like this, baby. I’m here trying to talk, trying to find a way to get us back together again. I didn’t… I didn’t say that right about the kids. I wanted you to know that I want to try to be a father to them and a husband to you. I just… I said it wrong. Come on. Just calm down and let’s talk about this like two adults, right? Let’s try to find a way to work this out.
“We can do it. I don’t know much about kids, that’s all. I meant that it wouldn’t be too bad to give it a try. It might even be good if we give it some time and you give me some room to try to get used to it. That’s all. It’s just different than anything I’ve done before.” He reached his hand out to her, and she pushed it away.
“Don’t touch me. You can’t just walk in here after all this time and expect me to let you in. You can’t be gone all that time and just show up again and think you’re going to step into this role of husband and father that I begged and pleaded with you to be before, when you didn’t want anything to do with it.
“What do you think is going to happen here? You think you’re going to walk in here and just take over as the husband and father and be the head of the family? No. No way. Here’s what you don’t understand. The kids and I, we have a life. We have a good life, all on our own, without you, without anyone else. If you come in here, you’re only going to mess it all up, and I’m not about to let that happen. Now, get out.” She jabbed her finger toward the space in the hallway and clenched her jaw.
He furrowed his brow angrily and drew in a deep breath as he stood taller and pushed his chest out. “You don’t get it, Aleisha. I’m here trying to make a future for us, and you just can’t see it. I’m not going to give up on you, but you don’t get it. I’m not done trying to work this out with you. I’m not done trying to get you back.
“I’m going to convince you. I’m going to make you see it. We’re better together, and I’m not going to give up on you or us. I’m going to change your mind, one way or another. If you don’t give us a chance now, things are going to get serious. You’re about to make a big mistake. Take a minute to think about this, and let’s make it real right now.
“I want you, and I’m back here to get you, and if that means I have to have the kids around, then I’ll work that out, but I’m not letting you go again! Now, think carefully about this! I’m being serious about us, Aleisha. You’re mine, I want you back, and I’m willing to do anything to make that happen!”
“Get out!” she raised her voice and glared hotly at him. “You had your chance with me and, you blew it! It’s never going to happen again! You leave now, or I’m calling the police!”
He clamped his jaw down tightly, shook his head slowly as if she had just gone much too far, and then he turned and strode angrily from the room. He looked back at her as he passed through the doorway. “I’m not giving up on you. This isn’t over.”
She slammed the door and locked it, growling furiously at his audacity. She hadn’t seen him since right before she had decided to have
the babies. He’d tried to get in touch with her a few times through emails and texts, but nothing in person. She wondered why he had decided that he had to have her back in his life and that he didn’t want to let her go.
It was crazy. He had always been the one to come after her when she’d leave, but then, when he’d had her, he hadn’t seemed to want her for more as than a lover. It was maddening to her. She might have fallen for his smooth lines and romantic tenderness a few times before, but he had been out of her life for a year and a half, and she wasn’t about to let him back in. She had herself and her babies to think of, and the last thing she was going to do was let her ex back in to destroy what she had so carefully built.
The phone rang, and she went to her coffee table and swiped it up in her hand in frustration, wondering who could be calling her so late, and hoping that it wasn’t Damien.
“Hello?” she asked, swiping her finger over the screen and answering in the least gruff voice that she could manage.
“Hello, Aleisha? This is Julie. I’m afraid I won’t be able to come in the morning to watch the children for you. I’m so sorry for any inconvenience. This shouldn’t come up again, however.” She sounded sorry, and Aleisha felt her shoulders fall.
Standing there with her hand over her eyes, she wondered what else could possibly go wrong that night. “Alright. Thank you for calling me. I guess we’ll see you the day after tomorrow.”
Chapter9
When she had ended her phone call with Julie, she dialed Kyle’s phone number, hoping that she wasn’t interrupting him in the middle of anything and that it wasn’t too late to call. Biting her lower lip, she waited for him to answer.
“This is Kyle,” his voice came through clearly and evenly.
“Kyle, it’s Aleisha. I’m so sorry to bother you. I’ve just gotten a call from my babysitter, Julie… the one that you hired. She said that she can’t come in tomorrow. I’m at a loss for a sitter, and she didn’t offer any alternatives, which is unusual. I would have thought that the agency would provide a short notice replacement, but she said that no one else is available.” She sighed and sank down onto the sofa, rubbing her free hand over her forehead.
She could hear a soft smile in his voice. “That’s alright. You know what, I was planning on working from home tomorrow anyway, so why don’t you just bring the kids over here, and we’ll both work from my place. I have an ideal space for them, as it turns out. Will that be alright?”
She blinked in amazement and dropped her hand, lifting her head and staring forward. “Really? That’s going to be alright? You want me to bring my twins over to your house and work with you from there? All day?”
“Yes, that shouldn’t be a problem at all. It should work out just fine. You’ll see when you get here. It’s kind of difficult to explain over the phone, but it will be good. I’ll see you in the morning then, alright?” He sounded as if it were nothing at all in the world for him to have solved her issue in a breath.
She felt as if everything in her had suddenly stopped short. “Yes… that… I guess that will work. Thank you so much! If you text me your address, I’ll be there in the morning.” It was as if he had lifted the entire weight of the world from her with nothing more than a finger.
“Wonderful! I’ll see you in the morning. Goodnight, Aleisha.” He ended the call, and she stared down at the phone in her hand. As simply as that, it was fixed. There was no worry, no panic, and no hassle. She set the phone down and walked to the twins’ room to get a bag readied for them for the next day.
When that was taken care of, she went back into the living room and sank down onto the sofa, picking up her wine glass and her book, and wondering incredulously about the hour that had passed since she’d set them down to answer the door. It had been a strange evening indeed, and she didn’t want another interruption at all for the rest of the night.
Taking a sip of her merlot, she leaned back and closed her eyes, savoring the rich velvety flavor of it, letting it flow down into her body and soothe her as she opened her book and her eyes and began to read where she’d left off. The words didn’t really find their way into her mind, though. Her thoughts kept straying to that tall, dark-haired, blue-eyed man who seemed to make everything in her life better.
When morning came, it was easy enough to load up Harry and Hailey and drive to Kyle’s. She’d known that he was a billionaire, but nothing could have prepared her for the home that she reached at the end of her directions.
She turned off the city road and drove her car up a winding driveway that turned through beautifully landscaped woods. She came into sight of the house and was stunned at the size of it. It was multi-storied and multi-faceted. There were varying sections to the front of it, just as there were varying levels in the height of it.
It was built of massive slabs of slate and gray stone on the lower levels of the outside, along with polished golden timber. There were windows all over it that looked as if they must be floor-to-ceiling in most places.
The driveway she was on wrapped around in a wide circle before the front door. She pulled up near the door and got out, shaking her head in amazement at the home that seemed to stretch so far on both sides as well as back from her car. She was just getting into the back seat to pull a sleeping Harry from his car seat and hold him in her arms when she was startled by a low and gentle voice behind her.
“Can I help you?” Kyle asked, standing close to her.
She looked up at him in surprise. He was wearing jeans that hugged his body right where they should and a soft pullover sweater that seemed to want to cling to his figure as well. She tried not to make it obvious that she was looking at him, but he had seen her, and when their eyes met again, she felt her cheeks warm.
Aleisha tried to play it off innocently. “You’re not wearing a suit today!” she smiled as he reached for Harry and the baby bag that she pulled from the car.
He chuckled a little as if he knew that she hadn’t been looking at his clothes as much as she had been looking at his form. “It’s just us here; I thought I’d stay casual.”
She walked around the car and opened the other back door, giving a glance over her shoulder at the house. “You have an incredible place.”
His eyes never left her. “It is incredible. I never forget how lucky I am to live here like I do.”
Giving him a light smile, she reached into the backseat and lifted Hailey out, straightening her little blue and white dress as she settled her into her arms. She’d dressed the children nicely, knowing that they would be around her boss all day. She wanted to make a good impression on him that she was a wonderful mother, and making sure that the twins looked good in their matching outfits was the first step toward doing that.
They walked into the house together, and she looked around as he led her toward a flight of stairs that went up to a second level. The outside might have looked like there were several different rooms inside, but the inside was all wide open and bright.
The living room was sunken about a foot, and had three sofas and two armchairs all facing each other, forming a big square, with a glass coffee table at the center of it. There was a grand piano in the corner of the upper living room floor, set near a twelve-foot tall window that was open to the forest landscaped yard outside.
A fireplace about eight feet wide and four feet tall was set into a rock stone chimney that had a marble sitting edge all the way around it, and acted as a sort of barrier, standing between the living room and the dining room that was beyond it. She could see that the kitchen was off near the other side of the dining room, but they were heading up the stairs, and her point of view was blocked.
To the left of the stairs, she saw a long, open hallway that had several doors, at least five, between the front door and the area of the house that she couldn’t see any longer where the kitchen was. All the doors were closed, and she wondered what could possibly be behind them.
Aleisha followed Kyle to the next floor up and saw that there
was a landing that reached all around the level, going into different rooms, while still looking over the living room below. At the other end of the landing was another flight of stairs that went up to another level, but she couldn’t see anything beyond the stairs as there was a ceiling there.
He walked from the stairs toward the back-left corner of the house and into a wide room. When she stepped into the room, she stopped immediately in the doorway and looked around.
“What… what is this?” she asked in wide-eyed astonishment.
She was standing in the doorway of a nursery that was big enough to hold at least four babies and all of their things. Set up in opposite corners at the other end of the room were two cribs, and all of the décor was set for a boy and a girl. There was a big, oak, gliding rocking chair with a thick, soft spread laid over it, two changing tables near each of the cribs, and a big playpen not far from her.
The cribs were adorned with mobiles, and near the cribs there were two different bookcases filled with children’s books, and two toy boxes, probably filled with toys, she guessed, as she looked around. All of the décor matched; it was all different characters from children’s stories: Winnie the Pooh, Alice in Wonderland, The Giving Tree, and many more. The characters were painted along the walls, and different pieces from the stories were set about the room.
The Billionaire's Twin Fever (MANHATTAN BACHELORS Book 1) Page 10
