He’d get too close to my secret and I couldn’t let that happen.
19
Niall
I was out of ideas. Officially, I was done. I didn't know what the hell else I could do to get Eddy to trust me. At this point, it was probably useless because I had tried everything. Short of kidnapping her and holding her against her will until she agreed to love me, what else was there?
I paced my hotel room. The television was on and whatever program was playing was blaring loud, but I could barely hear it. It had been about an hour since I had dropped her at her friend's place. She was supposed to be here with me. Being back in this hotel room would have been a lot more bearable if she was here with me. I offered her a place to stay and she said no. I offered her room service, and the spa and she still said no. She might have loved her friend and wanted to spend time with her, that was a possibility. It wasn’t that she thought I was unbearable and didn’t want to spend any time with me unless she absolutely had to.
Was that the case? Was I simply detestable to her? Because at this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if the answer was yes. It felt like it and she wasn’t giving me any indication of the opposite.
So, there it was. She hated me. She’d do anything to stay away. The thought of staying with me, even with unlimited perks on offer made her skin crawl. I would never have pushed her to do something she wasn’t comfortable with. I wanted her to be comfortable… with me, but it looked like that wasn’t possible. There was no way to keep Eddy close to me. She just didn't want to be.
Well, now what? I was back in my suite and I had the rest of the day to kill. I quickly checked the time. It was late evening. The socially acceptable time to get stinking drunk. Perfect. The bar should have been restocked since the last time I had stayed here. I started heading there to check, when my phone rang. It was all the way in the bedroom. Checking who was calling, I read Charlie’s name. Oh, joy. Did I really need a sermon from him before I drunk my sorrows away tonight? Well, why not? It wasn't like he was going to be able to change my mind.
“Yeah?” I asked, walking back out of the room, towards the bar.
“Hey, what's going on? Where are you?” he asked.
About to indulge in the unhealthy coping method that had been keeping me afloat for the last decade of my life. “Where am I? Where are you?” I asked.
“We’re in London.”
“I thought you guys were going on a tour.”
“Brenna wanted one more day in the city. That's why I'm calling. Are you around? Let's get dinner.”
Dinner? That sounded good. Technically the only meal I had had was breakfast this morning with Eddy. I wasn't necessarily hungry but the other activity I had in mind was sitting around in here and drinking alone. The suite was empty and the buzz from the alcohol always wore off. Charlie had his moments, but I ultimately liked spending time with him and I liked Brenna. It would be nice to see her again. The choice was clear.
“Where are you guys? Where should I meet you?”
Charlie told me to meet them at an exclusive French restaurant about twenty minutes from where I was in an hour. I went to have a shower and change once I got off the phone. The closer I got and the time we were supposed to meet, the more excited I was to see them. As far as my family members went, Charlie was the most tolerable. I actually liked Brenna. They were good together. I saw Charles in that kind of role; the husband and father role, way sooner than I ever saw myself in them, but I never thought he'd end up with a woman like Brenna. She was completely removed from the aristocracy and all its fakeness. She wasn't a socialite, a model, nothing like that. She was beautiful, sensible and unmoved by Charlie’s money. Inevitably, thinking of her made me think of Eddy, but I quickly shook the thoughts off. No use now. It was over.
I took a shower and I passed on shaving, keeping the stubble on. I kind of like the way that it made me look. It added a little something to my face, not that I needed it, but it looked good. I got changed and headed out the door. At the restaurant, I was shown to the table where Brenna and Charlie were waiting for me, chatting over an open bottle of wine. Charlie saw me first but then did a double-take.
“Niall, you're here.”
“Aren't you expecting me?”
“No, I mean you're actually on time.” I went over and hugged Brenna.
“Seeing as you’re ungrateful for my consideration, I won’t do it again.” I hugged my cousin. He held me at arm's length, looking at me.
“What?”
“No whiskey on the breath either. My God, who is this and what happened to my cousin?”
I laughed politely at his joke, sitting down.
“Is everything all right?” he asked.
Well, if I really got into it, we would probably be here all night. I turned my attention to Brenna.
“How have you guys been?”
“Everything is great. This trip has been amazing.”
“I bet it’s amazing getting away from the kids a little while,” I said. They had gotten pregnant at the beginning of their relationship and then again immediately after. They made cute kids but I wouldn’t be able to take it. Hats off to them. At the moment, the kids were being doted on by their two very attentive grandmothers.
“You're not supposed to say that as a parent.”
“It doesn't mean it’s not true.”
“Your nieces are fine, thanks for asking,” she said, laughing. The kids were adorable, but I wasn’t rushing to make any offers to babysit.
“Tell me, is your husband still the nagging old woman that I know him to be, or have you managed to rehabilitate him?”
Brenna laughed. “I'm doing my best, but I don't know. I'm just his wife I'm not a miracle worker.”
Our table was in almost complete privacy, a little bit away from the other tables in the dining room; no doubt the best table in the house. Only the best for Charlie. After so many years of it, you tended not to notice the preferential treatment that you got because you were rich or well-connected. I was grateful for when it came in handy. Getting an exclusive table at a reservations-only restaurant was nice but it was better when you got to throw that weight around for a good cause.
“So why are you in London, Niall?” Charlie asked.
“Do I need an excuse to visit my hometown?”
“Normal people don't, but you do. What's up?”
The relationship between Charles and I was closer to being brothers than cousins. He knew all about the way I had grown up and the resentment that I had for my family because of it. I knew I could tell him anything and now that extended to his wife. Both of us had lost a parent while we were growing up, my mother from me and his father for him. While my parents, then father after my mother had died, had more or less let me exist independently, Charlie had had the opposite problem with his mother. She had helicopter-parented him well into his twenties, trying to micromanage his personal relationships. She had lined up a bevy of pre-approved women for him to marry, setting him up on date after date with various vapid airheads, each of which he ended up not calling after the first date. When his mother found out about Brenna, she threatened her to stay away from her. It had taken him nearly cutting her off from his life to get her to accept Brenna has his choice. Funny how now I was going through a similar situation.
“My father called me here.”
“What was the reason?” Charlie asked.
“It's time, he said. He found me a wife and he asked me to fly over here to meet her.”
Brenna laughed. “So, it’s a family thing, not just your mother,” she said to Charlie. “Don’t even think about doing that with our kids.”
“Wait, start from the beginning. How did this happen?” he asked me.
I told them. “It started with a letter. My father sent me a letter asking me to come home; said it was an emergency. We don’t talk so I treated it like it was important. He wouldn’t go out of his way to talk to me unless it was, or that was what I thought. I show up and
he tells me that I have to get married. He had someone on the cards for me already, a woman named Lisbeth Lane. Apparently, she and I have been betrothed since childhood. Our parents promised us to each other all those years ago and now it’s time to walk down the aisle.”
“Is this the fucking 1500s? Who does that?” Brenna asked.
“Lisbeth Lane?” Charlie said, looking like he was trying to recall the name.
“That is insane. How is he even allowed to do that?” Brenna asked.
“He isn’t. I’m not letting him.”
“Why her? Who is she?”
“Lisbeth? He said that he is indebted to the Lane family.”
“What did they do for him?”
“Fuck if I know.”
“It sounds like your dad has a secret,” Brenna said. We all went silent as our food arrived and the waiter asked us whether we were alright.
“It has to be something big if he’s marrying you off,” she said. That was what I thought too but what could I do if the man wouldn’t tell me what it was? He just insisted that it was time for me to grow up and finally stop bringing shame to the family name, but that couldn’t be the full extent of it.
“He didn’t tell me.”
“It must be good then. I bet he’s like, a spy or something.”
I laughed. “A spy? No way.”
“We aren’t in a Bond film, babe,” Charlie said to his wife.
“Did he sound mad when he was telling you all this stuff?” she asked me.
“He’s always angry when he talks to me.”
“Your dad has friends in high places. I bet he’s friends with presidents and kings and stuff.”
“They’re all as insufferable as he is.”
“He’s involved in some kind of international smuggling ring. Drugs or like tigers and stuff.”
I laughed. “He’s not smuggling anything. That would actually be interesting. He hasn’t got anything quite so exciting going on in his life”
“Maybe…oh! Maybe he has a secret family and the Lanes are threatening to expose him.”
“Again, he couldn’t have anything that interesting going on in his life without me knowing about it. Even if he never loved mum, he doesn’t have it in him to have a secret life.”
“I bet he lost a dare,” she said. Both Charlie and I laughed.
“If I have to marry a woman because my father lost a dare, I’m going to riot.”
“Uncle Patrick is clearly serious about this, or else he wouldn’t summon you across the ocean. I reckon its politics or money, if not both.”
“Bribery, do you think?” I asked.
Charlie shrugged. “Perhaps. He has a seat in the House of Lords. Maybe it has something to do with that. Something that could risk his seat or title and in order to maintain them, you have to get married.”
“Whatever his corrupt dealings are, I don’t see why I have to be punished for them.” That didn’t sit right with me. It was possible but I didn’t like to think of my father being corrupt. I didn’t know why. It wasn’t like I ever looked up to him. Whatever was in his past was starting to affect me now and I didn’t like it. Charlie’s logic tended to be good though.
“What’s the woman like?” Brenna asked.
“Who?”
“Lisbeth, did you say her name was? Oh, can I find her online?” she asked, taking her phone out.
“Probably. I don’t know what her family does.”
“What’s she like. You’re so opposed to being with her, I want to know what she’s like.”
“There’s nothing wrong with her, objectively. She’s pretty, a lot of people would think so but a few bulbs short of a sunbed if you know what I mean.”
Brenna laughed. “That’s so mean Niall. She’s really pretty,” she said, showing Charlie the pictures that she had turned up on her phone.
“I wouldn’t marry a woman simply because she was pretty. And besides, she isn’t even my type.”
“You might as well. How much luck have you had searching on your own?” Charlie asked.
“Says the man who turned down an entire army of women for arranged marriages.”
“I had a prospect. You don’t.”
Who said that I didn’t? Eddy didn’t count so he was right, but I didn’t want to think about it. She wanted nothing to do with me, but I wasn’t letting him know that.
“She seems eager to marry into the family. Maybe I’ll do her a favor and give in.”
“Do not marry that woman out of pity,” Brenna said.
“I won't. I don’t want to marry her at all. She, however, doesn’t know this yet so I have to meet with her to tell her.”
“Settling down will do you good regardless,” Charlie said. That was the happily married father in him talking. I believed that he felt that way. He and Brenna had a great relationship, but he couldn’t compare what he had with her to what I had with Lisbeth. I had nothing with Lisbeth.
“Maybe, but it won’t be with her.”
“With who then?” Brenna asked. “Is there someone? There is,” she said when I stalled too long before answering. She was good. Either that or I was obvious.
“Someone I met before all this mess,” I said.
“Is that really all you’re giving me?” she asked. I shrugged, keeping tight-lipped. “She’ll be lucky to have you.”
Charlie scoffed. “A drunken gambler with no family values? The picture of an eligible bachelor,” he said. Brenna rolled her eyes.
“Be nice, Charlie.”
I laughed. “Don’t worry, Brenna. He’s right.”
“It’s about time that you owned up to it.”
“I do have family values, just not for this one.”
20
Edwina
“What in the world is going on with you lately?” Missy asked. I fingered the trim of the pillow I was holding, lying on Missy’s bed, feeling like a child being scolded for bad behavior.
“Well…”
“And I want the whole story. Don’t make excuses and don’t cut anything out. This is the man you ditched me for before and now you’re back with him?”
“I’m not back with him, let’s start there.”
“Have you been staying with him?”
“No…”
“Didn’t you say he had a fiancée?”
“Do you want me to tell you what happened or not?” I asked her. She pursed her lips but calmed down.
“Okay, tell me.”
I sighed, glad the interrogation was over for now. “First, I have something to tell you. Well, to ask you.”
“What’s the matter?”
Here we go. I hated to ask friends for money, even though I knew Missy would let me move in on a permanent basis with Riley and Prue if I asked her to let me. I couldn’t take advantage of her like that, but I had no one else to ask. I needed the money. There was no more wiggle room. Money, and a very large sum of it was the only thing that was going to make this better. After that, I was no longer wrapped up with Niall and I could figure out a way to pay her back on my own time.
I wasn’t sure where my money hangups came from. At a time like now, when my back was against the wall, why was it still so hard to put away my pride and ask for some charity? I had grown up fairly comfortable and the sole reason for my marriage to Russell was his purported riches. Marriage was supposed to be a partnership but for me it was a solo show. I had to sustain myself, emotionally support myself, comfort myself. I was by myself when I found out that I was broke. I was by myself now, still broke while Russell was peacefully six feet under.
Missy was safe. She loved me and she’d never judge me for my choices and their consequences, especially not at a time like now.
The best way to do it was to just get it out.
“I’m having some issues with money right now,” I blurted out.
“Oh, babe, why didn’t you just say something?”
“I don’t like asking you for money, you know that.”
“Your despicable ex-husband left you damn near destitute after torturing you for five years,” she said.
“That’s no excuse,” I said.
“One day, you’re going to see that man for what he was and what he did to you. There’s no shame in being a victim, Eddy. It wasn’t your fault and it doesn’t define you.” She got up and walked over to the sofa where her handbag was. “How much do you need? I’m writing you a check.”
“It’s just that I’m not liquid right now. My money’s tied up in assets and I have a debt to pay on a watch I acquired lately,” I said, remembering the night I won the watch and hoping she wouldn’t ask for more details.
“How much?” she asked, checkbook in hand.
“Don’t write it right now. That feels weird.”
“How much?” she said again.
“Twenty-five thousand.”
Missy stalled for a moment, lowering her checkbook. “Oh.”
“I know. It’s my fault.”
“You mentioned a watch?”
“It’s a classic Patek Phillipe, that’s why it’s so expensive. It was useless to me as it was so I tried to sell it and ended up getting much less than it was worth. Now, I’m trying to get it back and the broker won’t give it to me for the price he sold it to me.”
“What? That’s absurd. How did that happen?”
“It was my mistake.”
“How much did they give you for it?”
“Just ten thousand for a thirty-thousand-pound piece.”
“They shouldn’t have sold it to you for that much. That’s robbery.”
“It’s a little late for that now,” I said.
“Well, I can’t give you that much just now, but I can go to the bank in the morning.”
“Thank you so much. I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t absolutely need it.”
“I know. Don’t worry about it, really. I’m here for you, whatever you need.” She hugged me. Thank god for her, truly. I didn’t know what I would do without her. Save for Prue and my son, she was all that I had. I was no longer in contact with my family. They didn’t bother checking up on me and the feeling was mutual.
Admit You Love Me: A Secret Baby Romance (Irresistible Billionaires Book 2) Page 12
