Wish on You (Bliss Brothers Book 6)

by Amelia Wilde

  This is huge.

  I try to act like it’s not.

  “The guy I was with…we weren’t a good fit. Too close in some ways, too far apart in other ways. One of those things you can’t see clearly until you’re out of it.”

  “I know something about that.” I keep stroking her hair, and she closes her eyes again. It’s so naked, so vulnerable, that it steals he air from my lungs. “Only in my case, I always get out too soon to know if it could have been…anything, or not.”

  “How would you even be with someone, if you travel so much?”

  “There are ways. Most of them involve more traveling. But not many women want a man who’s only on their continent a few times a year, and always headed somewhere new.”

  “I don’t know.” Everly shrugs one shoulder. “It could keep things spicy in the bedroom.”

  “Spicier than just being with someone?” I laugh. “I don’t think so.”

  “You never know.”

  “I know.”

  “You just know everything, don’t you?” she teases, and I bury my face closer to hers. She giggles, light and free, but then the giggle turns into a groan. “Come on.”

  “What are you talking about? Is there something I’m missing?”

  Everly opens her eyes and pushes herself up on one elbow. “The knocking, Asher. Somebody is knocking at the door. And I would really like them to stop and go away.”

  I hear it for the first time then—three heavy knocks, followed by Charlie’s voice floating up from the porch and in through the bedroom window.

  “I know you can hear me,” he shouts. “The documents came. Get out of bed and get your ass to the meeting room.” There’s a grudging pause. “And bring Everly. All spouses are required to be there, too.”

  The meeting room is bigger than Roman’s office and has a round table that has seats enough for all of us. We don’t use it often, and I know exactly why—it feels strange and official, like we’re a board of directors instead of six brothers who happen to run a resort.

  It’s even worse today, because it’s the six of us…and Everly.

  She clocks the situation at the same time I do, just inside the doorway to the meeting room. “I need a minute,” she says urgently, hooking her hand through my arm. She steers us right back out into the hallway.

  Beau’s the last one coming down the hall, and we almost run into him, she’s in such a hurry. Part of his drink sloshes out of the oversized martini glass.

  “Whoops,” he says, even though it was Everly’s elbow that made contact with his drink. “You guys coming to the meeting?”

  “Yes. We’ll be there in just a second.”

  He raises his eyebrows. “Don’t take too long, Asher. Charlie will drag you in there himself.”

  “I’ve got it.”

  He heads into the meeting room and Everly tugs me away from the door, dark eyes panicked. “I shouldn’t go in there.”

  “You have to go in there.”

  “Spouses included? Asher, we’re not really married.”

  “According to the state of Montana, we are married. If I don’t take you in there with me, the jig is up.”

  She snorts. “I can’t believe you said that.” The worry comes back to her face in an instant. “It’s still not right for me to be in there, and you know it.”

  “What choice do you want me to make, Ev?” There are no clocks in the hallway, but I hear one ticking by nonetheless. It’s loud as hell. “Do you want me to go in there and tell them you didn’t feel comfortable being in the room? They’ll ask questions. I promise you that. And those questions don’t lead anywhere we want to go.”

  She bites her lip. “Maybe we should risk the questions.”

  “For what?” Everly is making little to no sense. “This has nothing to do with you. It’s about our family trust. You don’t even have to pay attention. You can sit at the table and think of England and let all of the information go right back out of your head.” I take her face in my hands. “It’s going to be boring, Everly. Not a big deal. Just a boring business meeting. And you might not be my wife in a few weeks, but you are now. Plus…” Touching her scrambles my brain, and I start to lose track of my thoughts. “Plus, the trust clearly stipulates that spouses have to be in attendance for this. Nobody will want to lie about that, and I can’t ask them to wait three more weeks.”

  “No,” she agrees, and her gaze falls to the floor.

  I kiss her lips, dread curdling in the pit of my gut. We’ve had some awkward moments with my brothers—there’s no arguing that. But nobody has asked Everly to do anything but sit at the table. She does not have to speak. She only has to attend. Nothing about this should scare her to this degree.

  Unless she knows something about what’s in that trust.

  “I’m nervous too,” I admit. “I was the one who made everybody wait this long, so I’m not looking forward to sitting in this meeting either. But it’ll be done soon, and we can go on with our lives. Back to our regularly scheduled programming.” At least for the next three weeks.

  “Okay.”

  I take her hand in mine. Our fingers thread together like we’ve been holding hands for years instead of days, and my shoulders relax in spite of the anxiety throbbing in my skull.

  I’ve been the man behind the curtain for so long that it’s hard to be on the other side.

  But it’s time.

  It’s past time.

  When this meeting is over, my brothers will know more about what I know. They’ll have some insight into what my father worked on for most of his life. We’ll all find out what the hell was going on in Montana.

  “I’ll be right there with you,” I promise Everly. “Sitting right there next to you, struggling to pay attention to what I’m sure will be another dry business presentation by Roman.” This is an utter falsehood. I’ll be hanging on Roman’s every word, along with the rest of my brothers. But Everly’s face has gone pale, and it tugs at a vulnerable part of my heart. I don’t want to see her like this.

  She puts on a brave smile, then turns her face toward mine. “Good,” she says. “Good.”

  We take three steps toward the door.

  “Asher…”

  Charlie sticks his head out into the hallway. “So help me god, if you don’t get in here right now, I’ll…” He shakes his head. “I don’t know what I’ll do.”

  “After,” I tell her. “Tell me after.”

  14

  Everly

  “He’s got a document projector,” Beau says from the far end of the meeting room table. “This is next-level, Roman.”

  Roman stands at the front of the room, a portable projector set up on his end of the table. “Laugh it up, Beau.”

  “You don’t think this is overkill?” Beau sips at his drink. I wish I had a drink. What was I thinking, coming here without a drink? I wasn’t thinking, that’s what. I threw myself into the shower, threw some clothes onto my body, and tried one more time to avoid this.

  I just know something is in there about Montana—about my neighbors. And I tried to tell him. I tried to come clean. It was too late.

  Charlie sits closest to the front, arms crossed over his chest, staring at the empty screen.

  “I think,” Roman says evenly, “that we all want to be able to see what’s in these documents. And this is the best way to do that. If you don’t want to look at the screen, you can look at your printed copies.”

  That’s what the portfolios in front of every seat are, then. There’s one for me, which feels like plummeting off the side of the Grand Canyon. I’m still suck in that endless fall. The ground is going to be hard when I hit.

  We won’t know until we get access to the documents in the trust. Asher told me exactly when this would all come crashing down around us, and I didn’t pay attention. I was too busy thinking it would happen earlier, or later, or thinking about nothing at all except his body or his tongue or his eyes…

  I’m in love with a man, an
d I’ve been lying to him for days.

  “Is everybody ready?” Roman looks around the table at each of his brothers.

  “Yes.” Charlie bites out the word. The other brothers echo him, Beau bringing up the rear.

  “All right.” Roman hits a button on a phone next to the projector. “Bill, are you there?”

  “Right here, Roman.”

  “Bill, I’m here with all of my brothers and Everly Carson, Asher’s wife.”

  “Great. All I need is voice confirmation from each of you, and then you’re free to proceed.” Clearly, someone filled him in about Asher’s wedding, because Bill didn’t miss a beat.

  My mouth goes dry.

  “I’ll start. Roman Bliss here,” Roman says into the phone, his eyes flicking skyward. It’s the first time I’ve seen him do anything to suggest that all of this borders on the absurd. He’s been holding it together all summer, and this is all a bit much.

  I know that feeling.

  “Charlie Bliss,” Charlie snaps.

  “Huck Bliss,” Huck says, leaning back in his chair.

  “Driver Bliss,” Driver calls. “Hey, Bill. How’re you doing?”

  “I’m doing well, Driver,” Bill answers.

  Beau takes a sip of his drink before it’s his turn to answer and it goes down the wrong pipe. He gasps and coughs, pounding his chest, and Charlie glares at him.

  “I take it that’s Beau?” says Bill, a laugh in his voice.

  “Beau Bliss,” chokes Beau. “At your service.”

  It’s my turn, but when I open my mouth, my tongue sticks to the roof. I pry it apart, my face heating. Oh, god, this is the worst. This is the worst.

  “I—”

  I can feel all their eyes on me. Six sets of eyes, all roasting me like a pig on a spit. I cough and raise a delicate hand to my throat. Asher reaches out and pats my arm.

  “Everly Carson-Bliss,” I croak, several beats too late.

  “Asher Bliss,” Asher says quickly.

  “Got it,” says Bill. “I’ll file this along with your other documents. You’re good to go. Enjoy.”

  “Enjoy,” says Charlie under his breath.

  Roman disconnects the call. “Everybody open your portfolios.”

  Charlie snatches his up and flips it open, the cover connecting with the table with a loud snap. His brothers are slower, but not by much.

  I can feel Asher watching me.

  My hands tremble, but I try to force them to be steady while I reach for the blue portfolio with the Bliss Resort logo on the front.

  It’s horrible, to be holding your doom in your hands.

  Horrible.

  Roman starts at the beginning, and I’m shocked to discover that Asher was right—this is not a document that gets off to a rip-roaring start.

  Together, with Roman clicking through on the projector, we go through the structure of the trust. Charlie pulls a pen from one of his pockets and scribbles notes in the margin of his copy. Beau sips his drink and reads along from a reclined position, looking for all the world like he’s posted up on a beach chair with some chick lit and a cosmo.

  I would kill for a cosmo right now.

  “And that’s the end of the structuring section,” Roman says. “I’m not sure we’ve learned anything new.”

  “We have,” says Charlie, still writing.

  “Care to elaborate?”

  “I have,” answers Charlie.

  Roman waits another beat. “Moving on.”

  Everyone shifts in their chairs. This is the moment we’ve all been waiting for.

  Roman takes a deep breath and clicks through to the next page.

  There’s a low-key intake of breath in the room, and Beau whistles. “Is that the amount for this section up top there?”

  “It looks like it.”

  The brothers take this in. What do they mean? The words won’t straighten themselves out on my copy of the document, so I have no idea what they’re talking about.

  “Oh my god,” Huck says. “He started a university.”

  “Bliss University. Founded…this year.” Roman’s voice sounds like a hundred questions rolled into one. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Is that where the money was going?” Driver scans the page in front of him. “He wanted to have his own university?”

  “No.” Charlie has stopped writing and stares up at the copy on the screen. “Those accounts don’t intersect with the ones we use to run the resort.”

  “How?” Driver is incredulous.

  “Separate funding,” Asher answers from next to me.

  Charlie whips his head around to look at Asher. “That’s what you do?”

  “Fifty fifty. Part of the time, I check on his investments. The other part, I look for new investment opportunities.”

  “That’s what you’ve always said.”

  “That’s what I’ve always done. I just didn’t share the details.”

  “Why not?” Charlie asks, and then understanding dawns on his face. “Because Dad wanted it to be a secret.”

  “Ouch,” says Beau, a hand on his chest.

  Asher clears his throat. “The resort was the most important thing to him. He wanted the five of you to be able to keep your focus here. And my focus elsewhere.” He leans back in his seat and lets out a low whistle. “I didn’t know about the university, though. That’s a way bigger project than he led me to believe.”

  “You managed his investments without knowing where they were going?” Charlie raises his eyebrows. “Without telling any of us?”

  “It was what he wanted,” insists Asher. “And it was going to come out one day.” Pain twists itself into his voice. “If you want to fight with me about it, could we do it later?”

  I think Charlie’s going to go for the jugular, but after a moment he softens. “Yeah, Ash. We can fight later.”

  “Why’d he wait so long?” grumbles Huck. “I could have been king of the campus.”

  A chuckle rolls through the room. “I think you were king of the campus,” says Roman. “Okay. Next thing.”

  We work through a page that details the revenues from an oil well in Texas. A series of art galleries in Tucson. A women’s shelter in California. The university is by far the biggest project, and the brothers can’t stop whispering about it during the drier parts of the documentation. The amounts and details start to blur together, and the sick anxiety drains out of my gut.

  It’s not in here.

  Asher’s father, whoever he was, created an empire while he was alive. A sprawling, incredible empire, and he gave his sons the gift of simplicity.

  He gave Asher the hardest job of all. But as Roman speaks, I see the tension go out of his shoulders. He’s been working to fund all these projects, and now they’re out in the open. He doesn’t have to keep things from his brothers anymore.

  Envy spikes between my shoulder blades.

  The meeting room chairs are made with some kind of memory foam, but my butt aches anyway. I make it through three additional projects, then half-rise from my seat. “I’ll be right back,” I whisper to Asher. He plants a quick kiss on my cheek. I’ll sneak out to go to the bathroom, and then I’ll linger outside as long as possible. Catch my breath.

  I push my chair back from the table and put a bland smile on my face.

  I’m one step from the door when Roman’s voice comes to an abrupt halt.

  “And this next one…”

  “Oh, shit,” says Beau.

  I whirl around, the back of my neck like ice, lips buzzing with numbness, palms drenched.

  “The Bliss Ranch,” Roman reads. “In Paulson, Montana.”

  15

  Asher

  Fireworks.

  Fireworks in my ears, in my brain, in my belly.

  And they’re not pleasant fireworks. They’re fire and ash, falling over every inch of my skin.

  The Bliss Ranch?

  The Bliss Ranch.

  Everly stands frozen at the door to the meeting
room, staring at Roman like he just stuck a knife in her back.

  “What the hell?” Charlie looks from the screen to Everly, then to me. “The Bliss Ranch? Out in Montana?”

  It becomes clear in this instant that word has gotten out about the fact that I was in Montana.

  “Charlie, I don’t know anything about a Bliss Ranch.” I put both hands up. “Swear it on our mother.”

  His eyes go back to the screen, then settle back on my face. “Why do I get the sense that you’re telling the truth?”

  “Because I am.”

  “Are you?” Roman asks. “You’re telling the truth? You had no idea there was a Bliss property in the town you just visited last week?”

  “I had no idea. I went out there with an address and a set of vague instructions, and that was it.”

  “What were the instructions?” Roman’s voice is level, but I can tell he’s holding back.

  “To make sure everything was all right, and then get back to Bliss.”

  “That’s what kind of job you have?” Huck is wide-eyed. “You just knock on doors and check on people?”

  “I didn’t knock on the door of a Bliss Ranch. That’s…not where he sent me.”

  “Let me get this straight.” Beau leans his head back against his chair. “Dad sent you to this random town in Montana because he has a ranch there, but he did not send you to the ranch?”

  “No.”

  “Then where did he send you?”

  I glance at Everly, who is as white as a sheet. “A different address.”

  “Asher.” Roman locks eyes with me, and I can’t turn away. “We need a better explanation.”

  “I don’t have a better explanation. I went where I was told. I came back.” A bullshit explanation springs to my tongue—that my father sent me to a town where there is a Bliss Ranch, but it’s owned by an unrelated family and all of this has been a random and coincidental mistake.

  “You were gone all summer.” There’s a new edge to Charlie’s voice, and judging by the information on the screen, I deserve it. “We had all sorts of crazy shit happen here, and you were gone, and now there’s a ranch with our name on it in the middle of nowhere Montana and you’re telling us you had nothing to do with it?”