by Edie Harris
“And distantly related to the Japanese Imperial family,” she mumbled.
“I see.”
Her hands fisted in her pockets. “What I’m saying is that they’re busy much of the time. It makes sense to hire others to cook and clean and whatnot.”
“Sadie?” Stepping closer, he cupped her face with those swallow-her-whole hands of his, and bent down to press cool lips to hers. “Let’s go have brunch.”
She beamed at him before grabbing his hand and leading him through the front gate. A moment after she punched the buzzer, Henrietta, one of the newer staff, answered the door with a murmured greeting. She took their coats and Sadie’s purse, and directed them to the front reception room.
Atsuko Koizumi-Bower—Aimi to her friends and family—bustled forward with a welcoming smile. “Sadako.” Sadie’s mother wrapped her arms around her daughter in a warm hug, whispering in her ear. “And you found a boy between now and when we saw you yesterday morning? Quick work, darling.”
“Mum.” Sadie blushed. “This is Ryan. Ryan, this is my mother.” Her gaze lighted on the tall, graying man who had just walked into the room. “And this is my father, Sir Nelson Bower.”
Bower. Her last name was Bower. How had he gotten to this point without learning her last name? Had he told her his?
Ryan wasn’t exactly sure how he managed not to freak out, because, from what he gathered, Sadie—Sadako, her mother had called her—was some kind of…of royalty. Either Japanese or English or both, since he didn’t really understand how that sort of stuff worked. So he shook Sir Nelson’s hand when prompted, listened when Sadie’s mom insisted he must call her Aimi and not “ma’am” or “Mrs. Bower,” and tried not to let relief swamp him when Sadie linked their fingers and led him into the elegant dining room. If he was eating, he would be far less likely to say the wrong thing, insult someone, and accidentally start an international conflict. Considering how crazy his last twenty-four hours had been, this didn’t seem outside the realm of possibility.
But when they sat down for the meal, conversation flowing easily between Sadie and her parents, a brutal pang of loss stabbed him through the chest. Last Christmas had been spent in his parents’ brick suburban two-story. He and Jon had bickered over whose turn it was to use the car. Jon had wanted to use it to drive his on-again, off-again long-distance girlfriend Melissa to the outlet mall in Aurora the next day, and Ryan had wanted to pick up a couple of buddies and go see Return of the King.
His mom had tossed the keys to the car on the table between them. “Boys. You know there’s only one way to solve this.” Hands on hips, smile tugging at her lips, she’d made a valiant attempt at seriousness with her arched eyebrow, the gleam in her green eyes a mix of humor and exasperation. “Arm wrestle. And, go!”
His dad had walked in the mudroom door, having taken the dog out to do its business, just in time to see Ryan slam Jon’s hand to the tabletop with a gleeful whoop. After rolling his eyes at their antics, their father had told Jon he could use his car. Both boys would get what they wanted.
Two weeks later, his parents were dead, the dog sent off to live with their grandparents in Rockford, and Jon had begun his downward spiral, coalescing in last night’s punch-throwing argument.
Sitting there at the Bowers’ fancy table, Ryan could barely breathe. When a brief lull fell in the conversation, he cleared his throat, shifting uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, but do you have a phone I could use?” He met Sadie’s inquiring dark eyes, and he was able to finally draw in air. “I think I need to give my brother a call. ’Cause it’s Christmas.”
Her gaze softened, turned liquid, and she pushed back from the table, shooting her parents a quick smile. He followed her into the hall outside the dining room, to where a cordless phone rested in a charging cradle on a low table positioned against the wall. “Good choice,” she murmured, rising on tiptoe to place a swift kiss on his cheek, then disappearing through the doorway as pleasure and pride twisted in his chest.
Drawing his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans, he withdrew the sticky note bearing his brother’s address and phone number in Cambridge. One deep breath later, he was dialing, and listening to the foreign ringing pattern on the other end of the line. Then— “Hello?”
Every tense muscle in his body relaxed at the sound of his brother’s voice. “Hey.”
“Jesus Christ, Ry! Where the hell are you?”
“London. Jon, I—”
“I have been looking for you all fucking night. All this morning. Where did you go? Why did you go?”
“You socked me in the jaw, bro. And then you locked the door.”
“Yeah, and then ten minutes later I opened the damn door to say sorry and expected to find you on the front step and you weren’t there.” It was then that Ryan heard past Jon’s fury to the panic beneath. “You just…weren’t there. Why weren’t you there, Ry?”
“I…” He swallowed around the lump in his throat, ashamed to feel stupid tears stinging the corners of his eyes for the second time in less than twenty-four hours. “You’ve barely talked to me this year. I figured you really must not want me there.”
“Not the first time I threw a punch at you.”
“First time you ever told me to go to hell when you did it.”
The other end of the line was quiet except for the faint rasp of Jon’s breathing. “I’m sorry.”
Ryan sighed. “I know.”
“I’m…I’m not in a good place, man. I—” A very subtle, very telling sniffle. “Can you come back? Please? I d-don’t want you to go.”
Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry. Sadie’s right around the corner with her royal family and there are servants, dude. Real servants. Don’t cry in front of the servants. “Yeah, I can come back.”
There was a hiccupping, broken sigh from Jon’s end, a watery sound that nearly cracked Ryan’s resolve. “Fuck. I’m a jackass.”
“Nah. I should’ve stuck around.”
“Damn right you should’ve.” That, finally, sounded more like his tough-as-nails twin. But Jon softened again a moment later. “We can’t be alone on Christmas, okay?”
“Okay.” Except that Ryan wasn’t alone on Christmas at all. He was with Sadie. Beautiful Sadie. Perfect Sadie. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. Promise.”
“Thanks, Ry.”
He placed the phone back in its cradle, staring sightlessly down at it as a deep, selfish melancholy stole over him.
At that moment, Sadie’s laughter, light and bright, sounded from the dining room, and his melancholy clarified into one vicious spike of insight: He didn’t want to leave her. Ever.
He paused in the doorway to the dining room, shoving his hands into his pockets as tension crept, insidious and Grinch-like, back into his shoulders. “I feel like I’m apologizing for everything today, but I’m sorry. Again.” He watched as Sadie rose from her seat, concern etched on her stunning face. “I need to catch a train to Cambridge and…be with my brother.” Even if he’d rather be with her, here in this uncomfortably opulent house with her parents and their delicious brunch and the servants, because he’d be able to wrap his mind around all the implications of that stuff eventually, but not if he left. If he left, he was probably never coming back. He swallowed around the lump in his throat. “Thank you for hosting me, Aimi, Sir Nelson.” His attempt at a smile was pathetic at best. “Sadie, I—”
But she was standing in front of him, her hands finding his and her head tilted back to look up at him. How was it possible, he thought dazedly, for a woman so petite to have taken up this much space inside him? God, this was going to hurt. “I need to call a cab.” But he’d need to find an ATM first, since he was pretty sure cabbies didn’t take plastic and he still only had his leftover change from last night’s train ticket.
“Don’t be silly, Ryan.” Sadie’s mom gave him a small smile from her seat at the table, not as vibrantly sunny as her daughter’s but genuinely warm nonetheless. “Our car will take you to
the station.”
He wanted to protest until he saw Sadie nodding, and his heart stuttered a little again at the thought of leaving her. But he always would have had to leave her eventually, right? This was simply sooner than expected. “I need to get my things.” His voice lowered, not wanting to embarrass her in front of her family on the off chance they didn’t know she was sexually active. “From your place.”
Without hesitation, she moved from the dining room to the front hall closet where their coats and her purse had been stored, rummaging within for a moment until she held out a key. “Just lock up and give it back to Victor when you’re done. Our driver,” she clarified at his blank expression.
He shrugged into his coat when she handed it to him, never taking his eyes from her, and she watched him with a similar intensity. The front door, and his brother in Cambridge, beckoned but there was a battle being waged inside him. It felt wrong to leave her, and the power of that feeling scared him. No one fell in love this fast, not even college kids, he reminded himself sternly. Love at first sight was a fairy tale, and goodness knew Ryan wasn’t living a storybook life these days.
Still, he settled his hands on her hips and drew her to him, his world rocked when she threw her arms around his neck with a quiet cry. Her kiss pleaded with him as she hadn’t attempted to with words. He lifted her until her toes dangled off the floor, holding her to him as tightly as he dared.
He’d been right—this hurt.
Eventually, he made himself set her away, though it nearly killed him to do so. “Call me?” she whispered, eyes wet.
He could do nothing but nod, their sudden fairy tale crumbling like dust as emotion knotting his throat. Stroking the backs of his knuckles over her cheek, he exited the Bower townhouse. A black Mercedes idled in front of the gate, exhaust clouding the cold December air as the engine purred, low and quiet. He walked to it, opened the door, and froze, unable to climb in until he’d turned and seen her again, slender arms curled around her sweater-clad torso as she shivered on the front stoop. Jaw clenched, Ryan gave himself ten seconds to memorize her, every sunbeam-infused inch, and slid into the backseat, gaze locked determinedly on the back of Victor’s head.
He never saw her run after him as the car pulled away from the curb, waving her arms and shouting, “Wait! You…you don’t have my number.”
He never watched her face fall when Aimi joined her on the sidewalk, curving a comforting arm around her daughter’s slim shoulders, as they both stared solemnly down the road at the retreating taillights.
He never heard her whisper, brokenly, “He doesn’t have my number, Mum.”
And, though he desperately wanted to, he never looked back.
FIVE
Los Angeles, Present Day
Sadie had forgotten how good he smelled. Clean and fresh, simple scents more closely aligned with products from the corner drug than a department store. Deodorant, bar soap, and aftershave. Add in the spice of his sweat, post-orgasm, and one whiff of Ryan Young spun her higher than any drug could possibly hope to.
She felt her lips curve, her expression smug as she nuzzled into the open collar of his white dress shirt, the tip of her nose finding the smooth hollow of his throat. That poor shirt had been so crisp, so clean when it had arrived at the theater, and now bore a shockingly red lipstick stain on the shoulder. One of her hands slid beneath the placket, between buttons. Her fingertips stroked over the soft cotton of his undershirt, itching to feel hot skin instead of fabric.
He’d had a nice amount of chest hair ten years ago. She remembered being startled at the sight of those tawny curls, when she’d urgently yanked his sweatshirt over his head, because until that moment, she hadn’t really felt like she was getting naked with a man. Until that moment, Ryan had been a guy, maybe even a boy. In wondering silence, she had settled her palms on his naked chest and allowed her fingers to sift through those curls.
Lust had gripped her. Real hot, wet, aching lust, for the first time in her life, and it was for the tall young man with the hair on his chest, who had been staring down at her like she was the best thing that had ever happened to him.
Was it selfish of her to wish he would look at her that way again? Was it selfish to want to strip him naked, right here in the storage closet, and ogle the hair on his chest as she had so long ago?
Probably so, but she was too delighted by this turn of events to worry that her greed was showing. To think, she’d been ready to give up on him, when they still had so much between them—passion, tenderness, potential. Whole worlds of potential, judging by the confessions that had spilled from him in the moments before they came.
He shifted against her, his long arms bracketing her body, hands planted on either side of her on the cabinet’s flat surface. “Your dress…”
She tried not to smirk. “I’ll let you drop it off at the cleaners, shall I?”
A little thrill shot through her at his quiet huff of laughter. “Sounds like a plan.” He paused. “Seriously, though, where is the stain?”
Dabbing gently with her fingertips, she found the wet patch he’d left on her gown. “Underside, near the bottom hem. No one will be able to see it beneath the sequins.” She grinned up at him and, too delighted with him to resist, teasingly nipped the tip of his nose. “Really, Ryan. A gentleman would have planned for this contingency.”
Pushing away, he began tidying his appearance, starting with his open fly. “I’ll admit, I wasn’t exactly thinking about containment.”
Laughing softly, still pleasantly buzzed with a sensual glow, she hopped off the cabinet and let her skirts fall to swish at her feet. “That was fun.” Such long-awaited, longed-for fun. A thrill shot through her at the thought that they could do this again as soon as the premiere ended—this, and more. She tried to remember the state of her bedroom, if she and Fiona had left it tidy, and decided Ryan wouldn’t care about how many shirts were on the floor, not after ten years of waiting to have one another again. “Would you care to—”
“I need to tell you something.”
“Oh?” She couldn’t keep the hopeful breathiness out of her voice.
Discomfort stole over his features. “You’re not going to like it.”
The scrape of chairs sounded suddenly from the projection booth, signaling movement. Not keen on the idea of spending the entire premiere in the storage closet, especially not now that new awkwardness had descended between them, Sadie pressed her ear to the door, concentrating on making out the employees’ words.
“—texted me. He says Wes Jackson just snuck out the back entrance.”
“Why would he do that? It’s his movie!”
“I know, right? Omigod, Janey. We have to follow him. Like, now.”
“But why?”
“Because Wes Jackson just snuck out of his own movie, dumbass. That’s fishy as fuck.” Rustling movement, footsteps, the squeak of hinges as the external door opened. “You owe me for getting you this job in the first place, so come on.”
“I don’t—”
“You do, and you know it. We’re going. Move your perky ass, bitch.”
After a few seconds of shuffling on the other side of the door that signaled the reluctant Janey’s exit, silence reigned. With a glance at Ryan, standing tall and serious behind her, Sadie cracked open the door and peered into the booth.
Empty. Grabbing her purse, she strode from the closet, fighting against the fear that had set in at his words. You’re not going to like it. It was going to be all right. It had to be all right, because if it wasn’t… If it wasn’t, she was going to need to book an immediate flight to London and cry her eyes out in her mother’s arms. Just like the last time. Facing him with what she prayed was a serene smile, she asked, “What do you need to tell me?”
“I was engaged once,” he said quietly, and watched the color drain from her face. Her mouth opened, then closed, and she shook her head, looking for all the world as though he’d slapped her.
Why did she have
to wear every emotion on her sleeve like that? Just out there for everyone to see, as if she didn’t care how much people saw of her innermost self? As if she had no secrets she wished to keep hidden.
He was angry with her, he realized. Freaking furious, as a matter of fact. How dare she be so hurt at the idea of him wanting to marry someone else? “Life moves on, you know,” he muttered, scowling. “I never asked you to wait for me.”
“I didn’t.”
Frown deepening, he straightened. “You didn’t?” His thousands of late-night searches scrolled through his head.
Sadie Bower single.
Sadie Bower dating.
Sadie Bower boyfriend.
Sadie Bower fiancé.
Sadie Bower husband.
Her delicate jaw clenched at the accusation in his tone, faint though it was. “No, I didn’t. I dated.” When he said nothing, she narrowed her gaze on him. “Just because nothing showed up on Google doesn’t mean nothing happened. What’s the phrase—discretion is the better part of valor?”
Scorn laced her tone, and Ryan knew that he had disappointed her all over again. “I’m sorry.”
Her hands fisted at her sides. “You keep saying that. I don’t think it means what you think it means.” Without giving him a chance to speak, she continued, “Because what it looks like—what it feels like—from here is that you…you thought I was waiting for you.” Anger crept into her voice, her accent haughtier, colder, than ever before. “You got off on the idea that Sadie Bower was tucked away in her lonely bed, pining for you like fucking Ophelia and debating the merits of slit wrists versus drowning.” Her eyes glittered with obsidian fire. “All while you, you, go off and ask another woman to marry you!” She trembled visibly. “You bloody hypocrite.”
Guilt and shame crashed into him, shaking the ground beneath his feet like an earthquake. She was right, because of course he knew he was a hypocrite. He’d known it for months. Why else would he have stayed away so long, when he knew in his heart what this woman meant to him, could mean to him?
