Wherever It Leads
Page 24
“You make me happy too,” he whispers, his voice a little shaky.
“Do I?”
“You have no idea.”
“Good.”
I twist in his arms and rearrange us so that my arms are around him. We lie like that for a long time, the only sound our breathing and the fountain trickling in the corner. I begin to drift off when I hear his voice.
“Brynne?”
“Yeah,” I mumble, fighting to keep my eyes open. Despite my attempts, they grow heavier and heavier.
“I want to talk to you for a minute.”
“Okay . . .” I accept the fact that my eyes are going to have to stay closed, the relief in not trying to hold open the heavy lids is bliss.
He blows out a heavy, defeated breath and I struggle to come out of my twilight.
“I really want to talk to you. It’s important.”
“Okay.” But I don’t move. I figure he can talk and I’ll listen while I’m snuggled up.
“Can you sit up?”
“Yeah . . .” But I don’t. Instead, I drift off into a dream about a woman with an elephant necklace.
My hips rise, craving contact. Fenton’s hovering over me, teasing me, tempting me with every fiber of his being. He grins, that flirtatious, come-hither look that causes my core to clench every single time.
“You want to know?” he asks, his voice rolling past his lips. “You want to know, rudo?”
“I want everything,” I groan, pushing his hips towards me. “I want it all.”
“Do you?”
His face becomes fuzzy, his skin vanishing under my touch. He’s replaced by a stream of light and my eyelids flutter open.
I’m in his bedroom, the sunshine filtering in through the blinds. The fountain has been turned off and Fenton’s side of the bed is empty. I can smell his cologne in the air and smile as I close my eyes and let it permeate my senses. The notes hit every part of me, from my groin to my heart, and I know I’ve slipped too far into the rabbit hole to climb back out. I feel too good in his bed. I don’t know where this is going, but I’m on board, ticket in hand, heart on the line.
Rolling off the mattress and onto the floor, I notice his briefcase is missing. I swipe my robe off the chair in the corner and begin my search of the house for my man.
“Fent?” I call out, entering the living room. The sea is a brilliant blue, seagulls circling over the water. I could sit on the deck and watch it all day, and I just might do that if I can convince him to sit with me. “Fenton?”
I peek into his office and he’s not there. He’s not in the kitchen either, but there’s a note next to the Keurig.
Brynne,
I had to run to the office this morning. I’ll be back as soon as possible. Please be here when I return. I really want to talk to you.
Fenton
I run my fingers over the ink, his writing just like him—controlled, masculine, and striking. I slip it into the pocket of my robe and pop a coffee pod in the machine and await the delicious nectar of the gods.
Reading his letter again, something triggers a memory of him wanting to talk to me last night. An unsettled feeling washes over me. What would he want to talk about? Something in his tone last night right before I drifted off tells me it isn’t something I necessarily want to hear. He was too calm, too heavy, too serious.
I have no idea what he could want. Everything has been amazing.
Grabbing the steaming mug, I head back to the deck and get comfy in a chair. It’s so peaceful, the sun so high in the sky I’m guessing it’s closer to noon than an acceptable time to wake up on a weekday. A few people are on the beach below, walking a dog along the shore. They hold hands, letting their arms swing between them.
That’s what I want, I think to myself. Some day, when everything settles down, I want the ease of the couple on the beach. The comfort, the unhurriedness, the trust they seem to have.
Fenton has made me realize there’s so much more out there than I ever dreamed. He’s the hero in a movie, the dapper hunk that whisks you off your feet. The one all the girls want and somehow, he seems to want me.
No, he does want me.
That’s the thing—he doesn’t leave any doubts in my mind. I don’t question it like I did with men before him.
He. Wants. Me.
My lips twist across my cheek as I take a sip of my coffee and remember the way he looked at me from this very chair last night. I brush the lingering uneasiness out of my mind. Whatever he wants to talk about, we’ll discuss and deal with and move on.
A ringing sound chimes inside the house and I place my mug on the little glass table beside me. It rings again and I get up and venture back through the house. I try calling Fenton to see if I should answer, but it goes immediately to voicemail.
Standing on my tiptoes, I look out the peephole. A delivery guy in brown is standing holding an envelope. He goes to ring the bell again. I take a deep breath and open the door a sliver.
“Can I help you?” I ask.
“I have a package for Fenton Abbott.”
“He isn’t here right now.”
The man glances at the envelope in his hand. “This doesn’t require a signature. Do you want to take it?” he asks impatiently.
“Oh! I . . . uh . . . sure.” He hands it through the crack in the door and scrambles back to his truck.
Locking up behind me, I head to the kitchen and toss it onto the counter. It slides across the marble and smashes into a basket of fruit, causing apples and pears to go rolling across the hardwood floors.
“Shit!” I scoop them up and inspect the damage. Kind of bruised, but not too bad. Popping them back into the basket, the label on the envelope catches my eye. It’s blue and white, a bold, official looking emblem that I think I’ve seen before.
A ball presses in my throat, a feeling of anxiety lodging itself in my windpipe.
I flip the manila envelope around until the label is facing me. There’s nothing outstanding about it, nothing that seems out of line. Just a package to Nzou Ltd in care of Fenton.
Shrugging and blowing out a breath of relief, I wander back through the house and take my place again on the chair. The sun is warm against my legs and face, but the wind coming over the water keeps it perfect. I soak up the rays, breathing in the fresh air, but I can’t knock the feeling of something being off.
My mind scrambles, trying to locate the source of the anxiety. No matter how long I think, what I think about, nothing sticks out. Not one thing.
I down the rest of my coffee and make a mental note to call my doctor and get another dose of the anti-anxiety medicine I was on for a while earlier this year. I haven’t needed them in a few months. I always try to not need them, to not depend on them, but sometimes it’s necessary and I don’t want this feeling to spiral out of control and leave me bedridden like it did before.
Heading inside to grab another cup of coffee, I figure I’ll go ahead and call the doctor now. Nip this in the bud. My phone is on the coffee table in the living room, so I grab it as I go through. With one hand, I search for my doctor’s number. With the other, I insert a fresh K-Cup and push the magic button.
I turn around and lean against the counter while I scroll my contacts list. I don’t see the number anywhere. Standing, my elbow snags the corner of Fenton’s delivery. My gaze travels across the package once again.
Nzou Ltd
C/O Fenton Abbott
Wait . . .
I spin the envelope as the Keurig shuts off behind me.
Why does that ring a bell?
No, it can’t be.
My hand trembles as I pick up my phone and proceed to drop it against the counter top. Grabbing it again, I call my mom. She answers on the second ring.
“Mom?”
“What’s wrong, Brynne?”
“Hey, um, I have a question.” My voice shakes like a leaf in an autumnal windstorm. I keep looking at the letters. “Why is the name N-Z-O-U familiar to me?”
The phone slips right out of my hands and smacks against the marble. I make no effort to pick it up. I can hear my mother’s voice, asking me if I’m okay.
I’m not sure, Mom . . .
“Brynne! Answer me!” she shouts from a few feet away.
I choke back the bile in my throat and try to stay calm. “I’m here,” I say as collectedly as possible.
“What’s going on with you? Why did you call to ask me that?”
“No reason,” I laugh and even I don’t believe it. “The name just popped in my head randomly and I couldn’t figure out where I’d heard it before.”
“I mentioned it to you the other day, I think. But why did you think of it? It’s a rather odd name.”
Nzou. Mandla. Ruma. Pano.
My shoulders lift and fall dramatically, but I don’t speak. I can’t. My mind is spinning so fast, tumbling out of control, that I can’t put together a response.
“Brynne Meghan Calloway. Answer me. Something is wrong with you and I know it.”
“I’m fine, Mom,” I lie. “I have to go. I need to get a hold of Presley—”
“Brynne . . .”
“No, I’m really all right. I’ll call you later, okay?”
“If you don’t call me back tonight, I’m coming to see you. Do you understand?”
“I do. Love you.” I click off the phone before she can push any father.
Dragging the envelope back in front of me, I do a triple check of the words.
Could it be a coincidence? Why would Fenton have business with Brady’s business? Did he know Brady? Is he just checking on things, like he did Grant?
Filling my strangled lungs with precious oxygen, I try not to jump to conclusions. I know Fenton. There’s nothing to . . .
I startle at the sound of the door opening and shoes on the entryway floor. My breathing still, my heart pounding wildly. I wait with a sense of overwhelming dread as the footsteps grow closer.
And there he stands all composed in his suit. He assesses me with a swift eye, placing his briefcase down on the floor. The snap of the metal against the wood makes me jostle, my hand moving to my throat.
Guardedly, he moves his eyes to the counter and rests them against the envelope. His lips form a thin line before he meets my gaze.
I feel it. I feel his desire to bolt from the room, the same one I’m fighting. I want to know what this means, but, then again, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to be crushed, humiliated . . . I don’t want to hate the man standing in front of me. The one I’ve started to fall in love with.
“How’s your day?” His tone is clinical, like he’s walked into the office and asked his secretary is she’s having an all right afternoon.
He makes no movement towards me, not the typical reaction for him when he sees me. He usually is touching me in some way within a minute and now he seems like he’s encountered a wild badger.
“You okay, Brynne?”
Hauling in a breath, I nod. “Yeah.”
He seems a bit relieved. “Good. What have you done today?”
“Woke up. Got some coffee. Sat outside a while.” I pull my robe tighter around me, needing some sort of barrier between us. “Received this envelope for you.”
I slide it across the island. He doesn’t touch it. He just glances down at the address label and soaks in reality. When he looks at me again, his eyes are wide.
That sparks my panic. My jaw drops as I try to breathe, try to force air down my constricted throat. My hearing gets blurred, the sounds as he takes a step towards the counter and lifts the offending package dulled by my rapid heartbeat in my ears.
“Did you open this?” he asks.
“No. Should I have?”
He blows out a breath and flops the envelope back on the marble. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you for a couple of days.”
“Now seems like a good time.”
“Brynne . . .” He looks at the ceiling and then squeezes his eyes closed. “Can we go sit down in the living room?”
“Nope. We can do it right here.”
There’s a good few feet in between us and I add a few more by going to the other end of the island. I have a sick, vile feeling in my stomach that this is not going to be a good conversation, and I don’t want to be so close to him that he can touch me.
Watching his face pull together, reminiscent of being in pain, my heart cracks. I hate seeing him like this, unsmiling, unjoyful. And I have to remember why he feels this way and not go to him, comfort him like I want to, even now.
“I don’t know where to start,” he laments.
I wait for him to continue, to look at me, to say something, but he doesn’t. All that comes out of him are tension-filled exhales and that’s not getting us anywhere.
“Tell me this,” I say, my voice sounding way more controlled than I feel. “Why does that envelope say Nzou on it?”
His gaze snaps to mine, his face ashen. He starts to come around the island, but for every step he takes towards me, I take one back.
“Brynne . . .”
“Why?”
Both hands on the counter, he eyes me warily. “Nzou is my company. I own it.”
My entire body goes weak, my shoulders slumping forward. It makes no sense. “Did you know that’s the name of the company my brother works for? It’s the parent company of his contractor. Of Mandla. Did you know that?”
Again—silence. But he doesn’t have to respond because his silence says it all.
He knew.
Of course he knew. He had to know.
I, too, hold myself steady with both hands against the counter. “Fenton, I . . . I don’t understand.”
“Your brother . . . Brady,” he gulps, “he’s employed by Mandla, a subsidiary of Nzou.”
“I . . . how . . .” The room spins, wobbles, shakes as I try to force the information into a puzzle that makes sense. “I don’t understand.”
“Mandla is a security company working in Zimbabwe.”
I think I’m going to pass out.
My eyes clamp shut to stop the room from rolling and to stop myself from having to watch his reaction. I need words. Only words. Only the truth.
“This can’t be happening,” I mutter, resting my head against my forearms.
“Mandla was a company of my mother’s. She was from Zimbabwe, from a family of British immigrants. My father met her there on a hunt, like I told you.”
“Pardon my lack of manners,” I say, popping my head up, “but I don’t care about your parents right fucking now.”
“Right. Okay. So Mandla was my mother’s way of pumping my father’s money back into her home country. It was a humanitarian-only company at first, but after she died, we had a group of our people fired on by insurgents. A couple of them died. It’s gotten really murky there in recent years. I knew I was going to have to provide better security for our workers, so I expanded our repertoire to include security as a whole.”
“Fenton,” I sigh, irritation thick in my voice. “Cut to the chase.”
“Brady went with us as a medic in the humanitarian aspect of the mission. Just like you already know, he was helping an injured child when he was abducted.”
The pain on his face matches mine. It’s a cool, twisted vision of grief and I wonder why, exactly, he’s hurt. Does he know more than he’s letting on? Is he sick about having to come clean? Did he know my brother?
“I . . . oh my God,” I sigh, my eyes filling with tears. Anger keeps them from spilling over, an intensity that just builds. “How long have you known who I am?”
“Not long,” he swears, his voice abnormally steady.
“Why didn’t you tell me this?”
“I tried. I wanted to tell you, Brynne, but I was afraid—”
“Afraid of what?” I say, feeling the fury roll through my veins. I latch
on to it, grab on to the feeling of being bamboozled by this good-looking liar. “Afraid of telling me the truth? Afraid of telling me you’re the one that left my brother to die?”
“No, Brynne, no . . .” He comes towards me, but I hold up a hand and laugh in his face.
“Don’t come near me,” I seethe. My words pound into him and he takes them with every ounce of the insult I injected. I can see them sear into his consciousness, burn a hole in his heart, and I hope it hurts like hell. “How dare you? How dare you . . . I don’t even know how to put it into words!” I shout. “Are you some kind of sadist?”
“Brynne, stop,” he pleads.
“You stop. I can’t even process this!”
Everything is rocking in my head—ideas, thoughts, possibilities, theories smashing into one side and then the other. I can’t make sense of any of it.
I watch his features fall, his shoulders slump forward as he watches me work through this information. All I know is that I hate him. I hate him in so, so many ways.
I pick up my phone and type in a text to Presley. I get a reply immediately that says she’s on her way.
“When did you know?” I ask, biting the side of my cheek. The pain is quick and welcome, offsetting the numbness that threatens to overtake me.
“When your mother called in Vegas,” he chokes out. “You told me Brady’s story and I started to put two and two together.”
“That’s why we came home?”
He nods.
“How could you do this to me, Fenton? How? How could you let me . . .” My lip quivers, the anger evaporated. The look on his face starts to break me and I won’t let that happen.
Running into the master, I shut the door behind me. I need space. I need privacy. I need to go home.
He pounds on the door behind me. I hear the words he’s saying—that he’s sorry. That he wants to talk to me. To let him in. But I don’t. I can’t. Letting him in would betray my family, and I’m not going to do that.
Tears fall across my cheeks, so hot they sting, as I get dressed. I cram my things back into my bag and look longingly at the bed where, just a few hours before, I lay with him and had all kinds of silly thoughts about what might be, where this might lead. None of the options were this.