The Billionaire's Muse Complete Series Box Set

by M. S. Parker

  Iggy nodded. "I don't know if he's a match, but Mom isn't, and my dad..." She lifted her chin, a familiar stubborn glint coming into her eyes. "I don't want Jace's money, and I understand if he doesn't want to meet me, but if he'd just agree to be tested..." She shrugged, looking as helpless as I felt.

  "It's advanced." Veronica picked things back up. "So, the chances of her finding a non-relative match before–"

  The tears came now, and no matter how shitty of a mother she'd been to Jace, I had no doubt this show of grief was real. Even if it wasn't, I wouldn't let a child suffer because her mother was immature, and her brother was a jackass. My own feelings and pride didn't matter, not when compared to this girl's life. I'd do whatever I needed to do to get her the help she needed.

  Twenty-Five

  Jace

  This sucked.

  For the first time, I actually had true sympathy for what Alix had been going through this past month. He'd gotten involved with someone he shouldn't have and found inspiration in her...and then she left him, taking his inspiration with her.

  Technically, Savannah hadn't left me, but she had betrayed me, so I counted it the same.

  I'd already finished several pieces for the show, and even though I preferred not to, I'd use them if I must, but I was done making them. I wouldn't touch another piece of clay again. I shouldn't have gone back to it in the first place. I was a talented painter, and that would be enough. It had been enough for more than twenty years.

  Except now I was back to where I was before she came. Standing in front of my paint-spattered canvas, waiting for something to strike.

  I'd been tempted to drink myself stupid last night, if only so I didn't have to think about what happened, but I'd been too cautious, too concerned that I'd lose sight of all the reasons why I'd been right to end things and I'd go after her. I'd tell her that I still wanted her, despite what she'd done.

  So I hadn't gotten drunk. But I'd needed something to distract me. I considered going to Gilded Cage, but the very thought of being with another woman turned my stomach. And since art hadn't offered me a refuge, I turned to physical activity. I'd fallen asleep almost as soon as my head hit the pillow...only to wake two hours later from the most intense erotic dream I'd ever experienced.

  That was pretty much how my night had gone until dawn when I'd finally given up on real sleep. Things hadn't gotten better once I got up though. I'd shoved everything related to sculpting into the studio closet and pulled out my painting supplies.

  And that's pretty much where I'd been stuck.

  When my phone rang, I was frustrated enough that I snatched it up without even looking at the screen. "What?"

  There was a pause, then a familiar voice. "Damn, what's stuck up your ass?"

  "Alix?"

  "What's wrong?"

  "Nothing." I closed my eyes. "Sorry. I didn't sleep well last night. What's up?"

  Another pause, and I could almost hear him debating whether or not to push the matter. Fortunately, he decided not was the better path to take.

  "Can you meet up in an hour at Café Carlyle? I have important news to share, but I want to do it in person."

  It wasn't until after I agreed and ended the call that it hit me. Alix sounded happy. He hadn't sounded happy in a long time, which meant that something had changed. Maybe he'd started taking pictures again. Which meant that I had hope for my own work.

  When I arrived at the café, my friends were already there. I'd had to clean up, and traffic had been a bitch, so it'd taken me longer to get there than it should have. Alix was beaming from ear to ear as I sat down, clearly eager to share his news.

  "Sine's back."

  All three of us stared at him, but it was the still simmering anger inside me that made me speak first. "How is that a good thing?"

  His eyes grew darker, but he didn't snap at me. Instead, his voice got strangely soft. "Her mother collapsed. That's why Sine left. She didn't think to tell me until her plane landed in Ireland, and by then..."

  His expression twisted with a dozen different emotions, not the least of which was self-loathing. Then he shook his head and took a long drink of whatever was in his cup.

  "None of that matters, not anymore. She came back yesterday and told me everything. We worked it out."

  "I'm glad for you," Erik said, tapping his thumb on the table. "Really, I am, but I'm not sure why this was–"

  "She's pregnant."

  He could have dropped a bomb and it wouldn't have had more of an effect. This time, it wasn't me who spoke first, but Erik. He only said Alix's name, but it seemed to jar his cousin out of the slight daze his announcement had left him in.

  "She flew back as soon as she found out," he said and looked at each of us in turn. "And I proposed."

  "Fuck," I breathed as the other two seemed to struggle to know what to say.

  That girl had practically destroyed Alix by leaving him without a word, then she came back, announced she was pregnant, and now they were getting married. Was I the only one thinking this was an awful idea?

  Erik leaned back in his seat. "I have to admit, Alix, I'm a bit surprised."

  That was one way to put it.

  "Sounds like you're rushing things," Reb added. "I mean, you've only known her what, two months, and she was gone for one of them?"

  "Why do you even believe her?" All eyes turned toward me, and any other time, I would've stopped there, but my head wasn't exactly on straight at the moment. "She could've been with some other guy, found out she was pregnant, and decided to try to pass the kid off as yours."

  "Jace," Erik snapped.

  Even Reb looked shocked, which was saying something because he was usually even more cynical of women than I was.

  Alix, however, didn't looked pissed, which freaked me out almost as much as his little announcement had.

  "I'm the one who fucked up," he said. "Rather than trust that she had a good reason to do what she did, I jumped to conclusions, lashed out, and made the stupidest decision of my life."

  I almost winced as that hit way too close to home. "You at least asked for a paternity test, right? I mean, please tell me you're at least being smart about this."

  To my surprise, he actually laughed. "You really don't get it, do you? There's being smart, and then there's having your head so far up your ass that you miss out on the best thing that ever happened to you." He leaned back in his chair, his expression growing even more serious even though the new light didn't leave his eyes. "I love her. I loved her pretty much from the moment I saw her. And I didn't stop, not even when I was furious at what I thought she did. It killed me when I realized what really happened. And when she forgave me, when she said she loved me..."

  A lump formed in my throat as a desperate sort of hope twisted my heart.

  "We're getting married in two weeks." He gave us a wry smile. "And then we're going to Ireland in the fall for a big Catholic wedding."

  "Better you than me," Reb muttered, pressing the heel of his hand into his temple.

  "You'll see," Alix said. "Just wait."

  "Like hell I will." Reb reached for one of the appetizers. "I'm happy for you and Erik, finding these women you guys are head-over-heels for, but I'll be damned before I let some woman lead me around by the balls."

  Erik shrugged. "Trust me, my balls quite like the attention Tanya gives them."

  Reb rolled his eyes. "You two are pathetic."

  "Perhaps." Erik got this disgustingly heart sick look on his face. "But she's worth it. Worth all of it."

  Alix nodded in agreement. "When you find someone you can't stop thinking about, can't get enough of, when no distraction is enough, you'll understand that there's no excuse good enough, nothing that could ever come between you and the woman you love."

  Nothing. Right.

  But that didn't apply to me because they were talking about being in love.

  I wasn't in love with Savannah.

  I didn't fall in love. Not after watching
my mother use men. Not after Bianca had used me and left me.

  No, I didn't believe in the sort of love Erik and Alix claimed to have found. The fact that Savannah even spoke to my mother for two seconds had proven that she shouldn't be trusted.

  Right?

  I let my head drop onto the table with a hard thunk.

  Fuck.

  Fuck.

  Fuck.

  What had I done...again?

  Twenty-Six

  Savannah

  When I was sixteen, my four-year-old cousin, Patrick, died because no donor had been found in time to save him from kidney and liver failure. He'd been adopted as a baby after having been left at a firehouse in Indianapolis, so there'd been no biological family to get tested after he was diagnosed at just two years-old. My family had done everything they could, even loaning my uncle and his husband money to hire a PI to try to track down Patrick's birth mother. We'd all been tested to see if we matched since a single kidney and a partial liver could have saved his life, but none of us had. Because of Patrick, I registered as a living donor as soon as I turned eighteen.

  I'd gone through almost all of the testing process two years ago for a ten-year-old with CLL, but her older brother made it home from his deployment before my donation had been necessary. He'd been a better match.

  It was Patrick I'd been thinking of when I told Veronica and Iggy that I wanted to see if I was a bone marrow match for his sister. I promised myself that when it came back negative, I'd swallow my pride and call Jace to beg him to be tested. I didn't know Iggy, but I wasn't going to let her die without doing everything in my power to make sure she lived.

  Except when my information was pulled up and matched against Iggy's, it was a match.

  I started volunteering in hospitals after my cousin's death, and I'd kept it up when I moved to New York. I'd organized blood drives and marrow drives, done fundraisers and written informative pamphlets. Which meant that the moment I decided to do everything I could to help Iggy, I'd started making a list of all the people I met over the last few years. I might not have had the sort of money or influence that Jace wielded, but I had some personal connections that I had no problem using.

  It was thanks to those connections that, what would normally have been a four to six-week process of testing had been reduced to Iggy checking in Saturday evening for prep while I checked in this morning for my own final testing and prep. The transplant would take place tomorrow morning, and I'd be home tomorrow night or Wednesday morning. I had no idea how things had gotten accomplished so quickly, but I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

  "You do know you're crazy, right?"

  I gave Everett the best smile I could manage. Just because I was willing didn't mean I wasn't a bit nervous.

  He grabbed my hand as he leaned onto the bed. His eyes were full of concern...and a little anger.

  "That bastard doesn't deserve to have you doing this for him."

  Okay, a lot of anger.

  When I'd gotten home Saturday night, I told him everything, then made him promise to not go after Jace. The last thing I needed was for my friend to end up in the ER with a broken hand because he'd beaten the shit out of my former lover. It was only my request to have him at the hospital with me that kept him from being the overprotective big brother I'd never had.

  "I'm not doing it for him," I reminded Everett. "I'd never be able to live with myself if a seventeen-year-old girl died because I was too pissed at the half-brother she didn't even know to do what was right."

  Everett scowled, his fingers tightening around mine. "He didn't deserve you."

  "I'll agree with you there," I said lightly. When he gave me a skeptical look, I continued, "We were both in the wrong the first time he blew up at me, but I know I didn't do anything wrong this time. Whatever issues he has, they're all on him."

  A nurse came in and Everett excused himself to make a call. By the time he came back, she was finished, and he was smiling.

  "You were talking to Cal," I guessed, happy for my friend.

  "Guilty." He grinned as he plopped back down in his chair. "Back to–"

  "No..." I held my two pointer fingers into a cross as if warding off the ghost of that topic. "I don't want to think about Jace or any of that. I'm doing the right thing here, I know that, and nothing is going to change my mind. What I need from you is a distraction."

  He was quiet for a moment, then nodded. "I can do that."

  "Good," I said. "Now, distract. Tell me how that amazing boyfriend of yours is doing."

  The puppy dog expression reappeared. "He got that promotion I was telling you about last week."

  "That's great!" I reached over and grabbed his hand.

  "It is," he agreed, squeezing my fingers. "In fact, they gave him a huge account with the promotion, and he's going on a two-week trip to Greece in September to meet with the company heads face-to-face." After a moment's pause, he added, "And he wants me to go with him."

  "That's wonderful," I said sincerely. "I'm so happy for you."

  While I could see that he was still worried about me, the light in his eyes was one hundred percent genuine. The emotion that squeezed my heart was part joy at seeing my friend so happy...and part grief that I wasn't able to experience the same thing.

  Maybe someday, but not right now. It'd be a while before my heart recovered enough to even think of being with another man. Anger hadn't burned away what I felt for him, no matter how much I might've wished it would have.

  Twenty-Seven

  Jace

  Why wasn't she answering her damn phone? Or at least responding to a fucking text?

  The moment I left Café Carlyle on Saturday night, I'd been trying to reach her, to ask her to see me so I could properly apologize. But her calls had gone straight to voicemail, and the texts I'd sent left unanswered.

  I deserved nothing less, I knew. The first time I acted like a jackass, she'd forgiven me. This time, I didn't deserve her forgiveness. She'd done nothing wrong. It had all been me.

  It had occurred to me more than once as I waited for her reply that maybe I should walk away, should leave her alone. She deserved someone who would treat her better than I was capable of doing. Someone who wasn't going to assume the worst of her because of the other women he'd known.

  But I didn't want to be that man anymore. I wanted to be a better man, one who might be able to eventually make peace with her. Be worthy of her.

  My thoughts ran ragged through my mind, around and around, reminding me of all the ways I'd failed her...and of how miserable I would be if I couldn't at least convince her of how sorry I was. Even if I never won her back, maybe she wouldn't hate me.

  I spent Sunday painting in the hopes it would distract me enough to keep me from calling or texting. Not artistic painting. I had no heart for that at the moment. No, I'd painted one of the guest bathrooms. It had been eggshell, and now it was alabaster.

  On Monday morning, I went to Savannah's apartment, hoping to catch her on her way to work, but she didn't come out. No one did. I paced in front of the building, my agitation growing with every passing hour. By noon, when she still hadn't appeared, I reluctantly went back home.

  Except home didn't offer the solace I wanted. All it had was reminders of what I'd lost. Rooms where I'd made love to her. Furniture full of memories of what it had felt like to be inside her, above her, behind her. And all those sculptures of her, of that amazing body, of how she made me feel. There wasn't a single one of them that hadn't been inspired by her.

  Which meant I had no chance of escaping her.

  And yet another night of broken sleep and dreams of her.

  When I woke up, I knew there was one more place I could find her.

  I was halfway to Abel Updike's office when a stout middle-aged woman stepped in front of me.

  "Mr. Updike isn't seeing anyone right now," she said firmly.

  I looked down at her and reminded myself that nothing that happened was her fault.
I'd gotten myself into enough trouble projecting my issues onto other people. I didn't need to take things out on this woman too.

  "I need to talk to him." I wasn't rude, but I certainly wasn't backing down either. "Tell him I'm here."

  Something on my face must have told her that I wasn't going to walk away, because after just a few seconds, she sighed and shook her head. "He's just eating his breakfast. I'm going to step out to get him some coffee. If you happened to slip inside while I'm out, well, there's nothing I could do to stop it."

  I waited until she disappeared before I went into the office. Abel was behind his desk, the front of his shirt dusted with crumbs and sugar. He glared at me as I shut the door behind me, but didn't tell me to leave.

  "Where's Savannah?"

  He shrugged as he swallowed. "Not here."

  I waited for him to elaborate, but when he didn't, I stepped closer to his desk. "Where is she?"

  "Home would be my guess." Abel brushed off his shirt and pushed back from his desk. "But even if she was here, I'd tell you that she can't give you a preview of her article. That isn't how we do things around here. So if she promised you that you could have some sort of final say–"

  I held up a hand and gave him a glare to back it up. "I just need to talk to her. You say she's at home?"

  "I said that would be my guess," he corrected. "Or she better be, because I don't just let people take two weeks of sick leave if they're going to use that as a way around not using their vacation time–"

  "Wait." My stomach dropped. "Savannah's sick? Sick enough to need two weeks off?"

  Had I upset her that badly? That didn't sound like the tough woman I'd come to know. Something had to have happened since I last saw her. Something that had made her take that much time off. Had something happened to her family?

  The questions hit me one after the other as I waited for Abel to give me some answers. When he didn't, I stepped around the desk. "What's wrong with her?"