“It didn’t look like just a dance. Dad said he thinks the two of you are having a thing.”
Damn Jules and her big mouth. “Not really.”
“But a little bit?”
“A little bit,” I admit.
“He’s a nice boy,” Mom says. “I’ve always liked him.”
That surprises me; I thought she might not approve of us getting together, because he’s been married before.
“He is a nice boy,” I reply, trying not to think about him telling me earlier that he was thinking about fucking me in this dress. “He’s a sweetie.”
“Does Leon know?”
“God no. Please don’t tell him.”
She chuckles. “Okay.”
I reach up and kiss her cheek. “I’m glad today went well.”
“Me too. It was a great place to get married. I’m happy for Leon and Nix that it went so well.”
“And it’s not over yet.” It’s Dad, behind us, bringing us both a glass of champagne. “Here you go, ladies.”
“Jeez,” I say, accepting the glass. “I’m already seeing two of everything.”
“If you can’t get drunk at your brother’s wedding, when can you?” he says cheerfully.
“It’s strong stuff,” my uncle Charlie says, joining us. “I just knocked Ophelia’s fascinator askew by waving my hands around too energetically. She’s not best pleased. And anyway, who came up with the term fascinator? It’s an odd word.”
“It’s from the seventeenth century,” I point out, conscious that Ryan is nearby, sipping from a glass of whisky and listening. “It was a lacy scarf that woman fastened around their head. It was supposed to give women an alluring air of mystery.”
“Well, Ophelia doesn’t need it,” Charlie says, looking across at his wife, who looks gorgeous in a long pink gown. “She can be alluring wearing nothing at all.” His eyes glaze over.
“Charlie,” Mom scolds. “You’re sixty now. You should be slowing down by now.”
“It’s her fault,” he says. “What’s my libido supposed to think when she’s still as gorgeous as the day I met her?” He walks over to her and bends to kiss her. She exclaims in surprise, then puts her arms around him, leading the rest of us standing around them to cheer.
“I hope I’m as happy as that in a relationship when I’m sixty,” I say with a distracted sigh.
Dad changes the subject, asking Hal, who’s just walked up, about the rugby that’s on tomorrow, and the conversation moves on. My gaze slides to Ryan, though, to discover him watching me. He smiles, and I smile back. I’m not going to think about the future. I’m just going to concentrate on tonight, and let tomorrow take care of itself.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Ryan
The hour grows late, but the party’s in full swing, and nobody seems keen to bring the evening to an end.
It’s been a great day. I’m so pleased for Leon and Nix that everything went smoothly, and everyone appears to have enjoyed themselves.
After the fireworks, I lose Clio for a while as she gets whisked away by the girls to dance again, and I end up sitting out on the terrace with Leon, Stefan, Hal, and some of our friends I haven’t seen for a while, catching up on all the news and talking about everything under the sun.
Every now and then, there’s a slow dance where the guys rejoin their partners, but Clio’s not short of young men eager to get close to the beautiful bridesmaid, so I leave her to it for a while, and she seems happy enough.
I dance with a couple of old aunts who are there on their own, and then I spot my sister sitting to one side in the dark, her feet on a chair, a glass in her hand that looks as if it’s holding water, but I suspect is vodka. Not long ago, I saw her finally dancing with Stefan. Judging by her self-imposed exile, it didn’t go well.
I walk over to her. “Come and dance with me,” I say.
Jules shakes her head. “No thanks.”
“It wasn’t a question.” I hold out my hand. “Come on.”
She gives me a sulky look, and I thoroughly expect her to argue with me, but to my surprise she takes my hand and stands, and I lead her to the dance floor. They’ve turned the lights down now, and the old sixties love song only adds to the dreamy, late-night atmosphere. I slip my other hand onto Jules’s waist and we start dancing. She’s a little unsteady on her feet. Her face is pale.
“What happened?” I murmur.
She shakes her head, studying my tie.
“Jules… I saw you dancing with him. What did he say?”
She inhales a slow, hiccupy sigh. “I waited all evening for him to ask me to dance, but I could see he wasn’t going to. So in the end I asked him. He was too polite to say no, but I could see that he didn’t really want to.” She clears her throat. “I know I’m not his type. But I just thought… there’s something in the way he looks at me sometimes… I’m sure he likes me. I’m convinced of it. Or I was. So I asked him—whether he wanted to get together.” Her face turns scarlet. “And he turned me down.”
I wince. “Ouch. I’m sorry.”
“And not even politely. He was so cool, Ryan. I felt an inch high, as if I was fourteen and I’d had a crush on my brother’s older best mate. Which is sort of the case, I guess.”
I sigh. “I think—for whatever reason—he’s reluctant to date his friend’s little sister. I think maybe he’s worried what would happen between him and Hal, and at the Ark, if it didn’t work out between you.”
But she shakes her head. “No, it’s not that. He was very clear that he doesn’t find me attractive.”
I feel the first prickle of annoyance toward Stefan. He practically admitted to Hal and me that he hasn’t asked Jules out because she’s our sister. Why didn’t he just tell her that was the reason?
Because he knew she wouldn’t accept it. He hurt her feelings on purpose because he knows that tomorrow she’ll wake up determined to forget him.
Her bottom lip trembles. “So that’s that, I guess.”
“Fuck him,” I tell her. “You deserve better.”
“I do. I really do. After Connor…” She bites her bottom lip hard, a little unsteady on her feet. “I think I’ve drunk a bit too much.”
“Join the club. Difficult not to when there’s so much great booze around.”
She rests her cheek on my shoulder. “Why is it so hard?”
“What? Love?”
“Hmm.”
I sigh. “I don’t know.”
“Are you going to see Clio when you get back to the Ark?”
“I don’t know. Probably not.”
“She likes you,” Jules says.
I look across the room to where Clio is sitting with Poppy and their moms, Ophelia and Georgia. Someone’s been giving out crowns made from battery-powered fairy lights, and she’s wearing hers now. She looks like a fairy princess. “I know,” I reply.
“I mean, she really likes you.”
“We’ve only had one night together,” I point out. “It’s hardly the basis for a long-lasting relationship.”
“If you want her, Rye, you should at least try to see if it works. You shouldn’t just throw away that chance.”
We turn to the music, and I spot Stefan standing by the bar. He’s watching Jules, but as he sees me look at him, he knocks back the last of his whisky and strolls off outside to join Hal and his friends. I sigh.
Jules moves back a little and releases my hand. “I think I might go to bed now.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah, I’m dead tired.” She smiles and lifts up to kiss me on the cheek. “Thanks for dancing with me.”
“Anytime, sis.”
She squeezes my hand and walks over to Nix to say goodnight to her. A few minutes later, I see her leaving the ballroom. She hesitates in the doorway, glancing across at where Stefan’s sitting with the others. He looks up and meets her gaze for a second, then looks away. She turns and walks off in the opposite direction.
The music changes to another slow song and the
band’s singer declares it’s the final dance of the night. I decide enough’s enough and walk across the dance floor to where Clio’s sitting. She looks up as I approach, and I hold out my hand. Poppy grins at me, and Ophelia and Georgia both look amused, but I keep my gaze on Clio, and I don’t mind the flush that creeps into her cheeks as she takes my hand and rises.
I lead her onto the dance floor, turn her to face me, and slide my arm around her waist.
“Hey,” I say, as we begin to move.
“Hey.” She looks at where my hand is holding hers. I brush her thumb with mine.
“Had a nice evening?” I ask.
She nods. “It’s been a lovely wedding.” She glances through the window at Stefan. “I saw you dance with Jules. Did she tell you what happened with Stef?”
“Yeah. He told her he wasn’t interested in her, and she needed to move on.”
She makes a frustrated sound in her throat. “For fuck’s sake.”
“I know. I’m tempted to go out there and drag him by his hair to her and force him to apologize, but I don’t think it would do any good.”
“You wouldn’t be able to budge him, for a start.”
That makes me laugh. He’s a couple of inches taller than I am and built like a brick khazi, as my dad sometimes says. “True. But I meant more that I don’t think we’re going to be able to change his mind. He’s made his decision, and we’re all going to have to accept it.”
“Poor Jules.” Clio looks sad. “She really likes him.”
“Well, I think he’s hurt her feelings—purposefully—so that’s going to be the end of it one way or another.”
“She’s tired of being hurt.”
“Yeah.” Aren’t we all? We’ve all had broken relationships. Noah jokes sometimes that the Ark is a sanctuary for broken people as well as broken animals, and we all laugh, but it’s true. It’s part of life, unfortunately. Any relationship involves an element of risk that it won’t work out.
It occurs to me then that up until this point, Clio and I have managed to sidestep hurting one another. We spent one night together, and even though I think it’s clear to both of us there could be more between us, breaking it off now would mean avoiding too much hurt. We’d both put it down to being lonely and being isolated together, and it would become something we’d remember with fondness as the years went by and we moved on with our lives.
She really likes you, Jules told me. And I know she’s right. Clio and I have done our best to ignore any attraction between us, but it’s been there, like an invisible thread between us, a promise we were eventually unable to ignore. And if we sleep together again, it’s going to be harder to make the break. If we make the break. I think of Wellington, of the possible job offer on the horizon, of Clio’s restlessness and need to spread her wings, away from her family. There are so many roads we could take. Sometimes I wish there was a big fat arrow pointing at the right one. But life has never been that kind.
My thoughts are blending from a mixture of tiredness and alcohol, and I know it’s pointless to try to think straight. I slide my hand into the middle of Clio’s back, my breath whispering across her cheek.
“We shouldn’t go to bed together again,” I say.
“I know,” she replies. And with those two simple words, I know she understands, and she feels the same way I do.
We don’t say anything else for the remainder of the song. When it finishes, Clio moves away, and then there are a few minutes of chaos as everyone starts collecting their coats and purses and heading toward the exit, as the evening comes to an end.
It’s cool outside, and the girls shiver in their thin dresses. As I pass Clio, I offer her my jacket. She nods, and I place it around her shoulders, then leave her to walk back slowly with the others, as I check with Hal that everything’s sorted. I help him with some final things—collecting any forgotten items and giving them to Jackie to hold until the morning, shepherding all those guests who are staying in the city into taxis, checking with Jackie and the rest of her team that she knows where to put the leftover wedding cake and presents. It takes us about thirty minutes, and then finally we call it quits, and Hal and I begin walking back to the Lodge.
“Where’s Izzy?” I ask him, shoving my hands into my pockets and shivering in the cool breeze.
“In our room; she went to bed a while ago.” He hesitates. “Don’t tell anyone, but we found out she’s pregnant a couple of weeks ago.”
I stare at him in delight. “Hal, that’s fantastic!”
He grins. “It happened quicker than we thought it would. We both assumed she’d take a few months to fall, but hey, I’m not complaining.”
I stop and give him a bear hug, and he hugs me back. “Don’t tell Mom and Dad,” he says as we move apart. “She’s only eight weeks and I know there’s some horrifying stat about a large percentage of pregnancies at this stage ending in miscarriage.”
“I won’t. I’m sure everything will be fine.”
He sighs. “I hope so. It’s only now you realize how many things can go wrong. I’m trying not to fixate on the negative, though. You’ve got to enjoy it while it happens, or what’s the point?”
I nod in agreement. We walk slowly through the Alice Garden, where Leon was married earlier today. The sky is clear and full of stars. I hear a kiwi call out somewhere to the north, a plaintive cry that makes me sad.
“Did you hear about Jules and Stefan?” I ask him.
He raises his eyebrows and shakes his head, so I tell him what happened.
“Fucking idiot,” he says.
“Yeah.”
“Is she okay?”
“She was a bit upset. Understandably so. He hurt her feelings. Intentionally.”
Hal looks across the lawn, at the water in the fountain, filled with stars. “I’m disappointed in him.”
“I guess we shouldn’t pass judgment when we don’t know the whole story.”
“Maybe.” He runs a hand through his hair. “Now I’m with Izzy, I understand Noah more. When you’ve been that happy, you want everyone else to experience it, too.” He glances at me. “Are you seeing Clio again?”
I sigh. So much for us keeping it a secret. I think everyone except Leon knows. “Probably not.”
He nods. “Shame.”
“Yeah.”
“You’d be good for her.”
“I don’t know. She’s got stuff she wants to do.”
“Like what?”
“I… don’t know that I should say…”
He frowns. “She wants to leave the Ark?”
“She wants some freedom. She’s the baby of the family and everyone treats her like it. She wants some respect, and to be honest, I think that’s fair.”
Our feet scrunch on the gravel as we cross to the Lodge. “Yeah, I guess,” he says.
“It’s not that she doesn’t love her family,” I add. “But she’s surrounded by people with strong opinions, and it’s not always easy to follow your own path when that’s the case.”
He gives me an amused look. “Are you trying to be polite?”
“Yeah.”
“What has she said about me?”
“Only that she’d like to have worked in a zoo, but she knows how strongly you feel about them, and that she’d never hear the end of it.”
He slows to a halt by the door and studies his shoes. “I suppose I can be a bit over-enthusiastic about the topic.”
I slap his shoulder. “You wouldn’t be you if you weren’t over-enthusiastic.”
“Thanks, bro’.”
“Anytime.” I grin at him, and we go inside, into the Lodge.
There’s a party atmosphere inside. Most people’s doors are open, and laughter and light spill out from the rooms, while there’s a clinking of glasses as someone pours more champagne. Someone tells me Leon’s already carried Nix over the threshold and their door is shut, but Hal bangs on it as he passes and asks Leon if he wants any tips, and Leon yells back to fuck off, and everyon
e chuckles.
I accept a glass of whisky from Fitz. Hell, what’s one more? And I look around for Clio. I can hear her voice; she’s in a room further down the corridor.
I’m tired. I need to go to bed and call an end to the night. But my feet move of their own accord. I stand in the doorway and lean against the frame, looking in. She’s there, talking to my mom and dad. Charlie and Ophelia are there too, and Matt and Georgia, as well as Summer and Zach. I lean my head on the doorpost and watch Clio as she laughs at something Dad’s said, and I feel a twist, deep inside.
Desire sweeps over me. I want her, more than anything. I hunger for her. I want to feel her beneath me again. Jeez. Why is life so hard?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Clio
It’s late, but oddly I don’t feel tired. It’s been such a wonderful day, and part of me feels as if I could party all night. I don’t want the day to end. It’s been a magical weekend, and as much as I love the Ark and I enjoy my job, I don’t want to go back to the real world, where there are hard choices to be made.
But people are starting to yawn, and gradually everyone begins to drift away. Hal hugs everyone, then joins Izzy in their room. Poppy and Fitz are next to vanish. Summer and Zach have already gone back to their family room. After Erin dozes off in the chair, Brock calls it a day and ushers everyone out of his room. Charlie and Ophelia go back to theirs and Mom and Dad finally retire.
Ryan, Stefan, and I finish off our drinks in Albie and Remy’s room, and then we say our good nights and eventually head out to our own rooms.
I’m a few doors down from Ryan. I haven’t had the chance to talk to him alone again since our dance, when he said we shouldn’t sleep together again. I know he was right, and that’s why I give him a quick smile as he pauses in the act of opening his door, and then I go into my room and let the door close.
I lean on the wall and pout. I was looking forward to sleeping with him again. He promised he was going to fuck me in this dress, while wearing his suit. I want him to. It’s dumb to worry about what’s going to happen tomorrow. What happened to living for today? A comet could plummet from the sky and obliterate the Earth tomorrow. Well, it could happen. If it were to, I know I’d be regretting not marching up to Ryan’s door, hammering on it, then dragging him back to my room to do inexplicable things to him.
My Wicked Billionaire (The Billionaire Kings Book 6) Page 16
