Landon (Swanson Court Book 4)

by Serena Grey

  Landon

  Swanson Court Series #4

  Serena Grey

  This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination and have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, locales, or events is entirely coincidental.

  LANDON

  Copyright © 2019 by Serena Grey

  All rights reserved

  Sweet Acacia Press

  To my readers.

  You inspire me and encourage me.

  Thank you for your support.

  Contents

  Landon

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About Serena Grey

  Books by Serena Grey

  Landon

  This is a companion novel to the Swanson Court Series. Told from Landon’s perspective, it should be read after the first three books of the Swanson Court Series.

  Landon Court is a man who knows how to focus on the important things, namely, his billion-dollar hotels, and his brother–the only family he has left.

  His relationships with women are temporary and superficial, and he’s fine with that.

  Then Rachel Foster walks into his apartment.

  He thinks he knows who she is and why she’s there, and after one passionate night, he wants to see her again.

  But she’s not the person he assumed she was, and she wants nothing to do with him.

  Landon does not enjoy being lied to, and he’s used to getting what he wants. As far as he’s concerned, Rachel will not be an exception.

  Prologue

  “Mom?”

  I’m shivering, and my teeth are chattering. It’s so cold, and there’s a weird taste in my mouth.

  “Mom?”

  I’m lying in the grass, and my foot hurts when I stand. I’ve lost one of my shoes. My head hurts. My arm hurts. There’s mud on my hands and on my shirt.

  The road is silent and empty.

  “Mom!”

  This time, it’s not just my voice.

  “Mommy!”

  Aidan is crying. Looking around for him, I only see smoke rising from near the trees.

  I’m already running toward the smoke before I realize it’s the car. It’s upside down, and the front is smashed and twisted. Through the thick, gray smoke, I can see my mother. She’s not moving, and there’s blood in her hair.

  “Mommy!” Aidan cries again, and I hear the faint sound of his coughing.

  It’s hot near the car, and there’s broken glass on the ground. Something sharp pushes into my bare foot. It hurts. My knees hurt, too. Aidan falls when I unbuckle him from his car seat. He hits his arm and wails. I pull him out through the shattered window. He’s still coughing and crying as I carry him away from the smoke.

  A few steps from the car, strong arms grab me.

  It’s a man. He looks concerned. “Are you all right?” he says. “Here, let me take him.”

  “My mom…” I don’t finish the sentence. A whooshing sound comes from the car. I turn and run back to get her, but the man grabs me from behind, pulling me back as heat blasts from the car where my mother is still trapped.

  “Mom!”

  “It’s too late,” the man says, lifting me off the ground while I kick and scream. Other cars stop on the highway, and people emerge to watch the flames. I hear sirens. Aidan is still crying as the man carries us both away from the heat.

  “Mom,” I scream again. “Mom!”

  But it’s too late.

  Mr. Hayes comes to take us home from the hospital. His eyes are red. Beside me, Aidan is whimpering in his sleep.

  “Where’s Dad?” I ask Mr. Hayes.

  “He’s on his way.”

  We’re going back to the hotel, our home in the city. I close my eyes, remembering my mother driving, crying.

  I don’t want to leave. If you’re getting a divorce, I want to stay with Dad in the hotel.

  I wished we would turn back and go back home.

  And now we are, without Mom.

  “Oh, Landon!”

  Mrs. Hayes—Aunt Betsy—is waiting for us at our apartment in the Swanson Court Hotel. She takes a sleeping Aidan from her husband and clasps him in her arms.

  “Your father will be here soon,” she tells me in a gentle voice.

  “If he hadn’t left in the first place, Mom wouldn’t be dead!”

  My voice wakes Aidan, and he starts to wail again, asking for my mom. I run to my room and shut the door behind me. I’m lying in bed crying when Aunt Betsy comes in and takes me in her arms. I cry until I fall asleep.

  After dinner, Aidan joins me in my bed. When I close my eyes, I see my mother’s hair burning behind black smoke. I put my arms around Aidan, and after he stops crying and falls asleep, I do the same.

  When I wake up, my dad is slumped in a chair beside my bed, his head in his hands.

  “Dad?”

  He doesn’t reply. He’s crying. I want to get up and go to him, but I don’t because he’s crying so hard. After a while, he leaves the room.

  My dad doesn’t come back. Mr. Hayes takes us to Windbreakers, our house near the beach. Dad is there, but he stays in his room. My grandpa and grandma come from France. They’re old, and they stay until after the funeral.

  “You have to pull yourself together. Think of the boys,” my grandpa tells my dad.

  Dad doesn’t reply.

  “He blames himself,” Aunt Betsy tells my grandma, “but he will pull through it, for the boys.”

  He never does.

  My grandma and grandpa go back to France. We go back to the hotel. Aunt Betsy checks on us every day. Mr. Hayes hires more people to look after us. On weekends we go to Windbreakers, where my father remains in his room, shutting himself away from everyone, including Aidan and me.

  Chapter 1

  Across the table from me, Aidan is finishing the last bits of what used to be my salmon. He’s silent and focused on his food. I’m frowning in concern, thinking how ravenous he must have been. He wolfed down his food in record time before starting on mine.

  The new play he’s directing is likely taking a toll on him. As a teenager, when he was intensely focused on anything—exams, a school play, a girl—he’d forget to eat. Chuckling, I shake my head and take a sip of my Pinot Noir. Everybody calls me heartless, and yet here I am, worrying like a mother hen about my twenty-four-year-old brother.

  Aidan drops his fork and picks up his glass, taking a long sip as he leans back in his chair. His gaze goes to the wall-to-wall glass of the restaurant, through which the city lights shine like decorations on an endless Christmas tree. He says nothing and neither do I. When we have these dinners, verbal communication is not usual
ly the priority.

  My thoughts are interrupted by a waitress—young, with long black hair and honey-toned skin. She’s slender as a bone but adequately attractive. She walks toward our table, holding a bottle of wine with a napkin at the base. I watch as she passes by, detached in my assessment of her, but as she crosses Aidan’s line of vision, I see his interest is piqued, and he sits up, only a little, but enough to make me smile in amusement.

  I don’t bother to hide my smirk. “You can’t have grown tired of all the talented girls on Broadway.”

  “That would be impossible,” Aidan replies matter-of-factly. “New ones keep arriving every day.”

  His eyes are still on the waitress. She’s behind me now, but right in his line of sight. With obvious reluctance, he turns his gaze back to mine. Looking at him is like looking in a mirror, at a younger, more carefree reflection.

  He shrugs. “I’m allowed to appreciate beautiful women, even the ones who can’t act, sing, and dance.”

  “Appreciate away.” I chuckle, then add seriously, “I’ve heard good things about your play.”

  It’s his first time directing a play on Broadway. Off-Broadway he’s done, a couple of successful ones, but this is his first big outing, and while I don’t doubt that he’ll do great, I want to be sure he feels the same way.

  “There’s only been one viewing. Nobody knows anything yet.” He frowns. “I don’t want to talk about the play. How’s the hotel?”

  “Running.” I shrug. The Swanson Court is our family legacy. The multi-story hotel was built in the forties, soon after the war ended, under the supervision of my great-grandfather, Gabriel Swanson. A few years later, he almost lost it, but my grandfather, Alexander Court, saved the hotel and used his money to turn it into a world-class name in luxury. He also married Lily Swanson, Gabriel’s daughter, and changed the name of the hotel to the Swanson Court.

  I own it—most of it, anyway. Aidan has his shares, but it’s mostly mine, and I run it, too. In the ten years since my father died, I’ve expanded the brand across the country and made the Swanson Court name synonymous with luxury living.

  “I’m sorry I forgot.” Aidan’s voice cuts into my thoughts.

  I know what he means. “It doesn’t matter,” I tell him with a slight grimace. “I couldn’t care less if it’s my birthday.”

  My mind goes to a headline from one of the news magazines I saw this morning. Hotel magnate turns twenty-nine! it screamed above a picture of me leaving some event.

  Hotel magnate.

  When did that become my name?

  “I’m just glad we’re having dinner together.” I continue as Aidan empties his glass. “Next week I’ll be in San Francisco, and you’ll be knee-deep in the murky depths of perfecting your play.”

  “You’ll be here for opening night, though.” Suddenly he looks like a child again, hopeful. Is Daddy coming back?

  I blink then chuckle, banishing the memory. “Of course.”

  He grins. “If it bombs, at least you’ll be there to take me to a place where I can get well and truly wasted.”

  “Let’s hope it doesn’t bomb.”

  “Well if it does, I want to wake up in a suite in Vegas with no memory and at least three call girls who won’t care that I’ve forgotten their names.”

  Laughing softly, I swirl the wine around in my glass. “If everyone got that after a bad show, we’d see more of them.” I watch as Aidan’s eyes find the slender waitress again. “Call girls? You must be losing your touch.”

  He turns back to me and grins. “Maybe I’ve learned that the only women who understand the term no strings attached are those who expect to get paid.”

  He may have a point. My mind goes to my last, recently ended sexual connection. Cecily Feinstein, a curator at a prominent private gallery. Dedicated to her career, detached, and uninterested in a romantic commitment—just the type of woman I prefer.

  That lack of interest only lasted three months before the usual questions began.

  Where are we going with this?

  Where do you see our relationship going?

  And finally, the ultimatum. She asked me to commit to her or lose her, so I went with the second option. I don’t like hurting women, and the sheen of tears in her eyes when she told me she hoped she never saw me again still feels like an indictment.

  She’ll get over it. For women like her, it’s not the man that matters, but what he represents—the money, the prestige, the diamond ring. Some other guy will tick those boxes for her soon enough, and I’ll find someone else and enjoy what I can get before the demands for commitment get unbearable.

  “You have a point,” I tell Aidan. “At least with a hooker, everyone gets what they expect.”

  He chuckles, and when he looks at me, there’s a familiar, mischievous glint in his eyes. “I might just get you one as a birthday present,” he says. “To make up for forgetting.”

  I wouldn’t put it past him. “Thanks, but I’m sure I can manage.”

  He only shrugs. “Whatever you say.”

  My apartment is at the top of the Swanson Court Hotel in Manhattan, a luxurious three thousand square feet of space I don’t need, beautifully spread out over two floors. It’s vast and silent, and while the sense of solitude it provides can be overwhelming to others, I like it. I’ve never been the kind of man who’s afraid to be alone.

  Outside, the city is a mass of shapes and light. Up here, I can’t hear the cars and people, but I can hear the wind, whistling and forceful.

  Forceful. The word dances around my mind. Forceful, ruthless, single-minded—words the press love to use when they describe me. Cold, heartless, unfeeling—the words the women prefer. Words that reduce me from Landon Alexander Court, brother, friend, and whatever else I am, to just hotel magnate.

  Do I mind? Not really. I’ve been too busy planning how to expand the scope of what my father left to me and working to engrave the name of Swanson Court in every mind interested in luxury living—and even those who are not. I have expanded what my great-grandfather built and made it greater than he, my grandfather, or even my father ever dreamed.

  So, yes, I am single-minded. I am forceful. I am determined. I rescued Swanson Court from the brink of bankruptcy when my father died, and I am pushing further than even he ever dared to imagine. If ruthlessness is what it takes, I’ll be ruthless, with pride.

  Taking a sip from the brandy in my hand, I listen to the ice cubes clink against the glass as I lower it from my lips. Against the silence, I can almost hear the sounds from my memories—this now quiet apartment filled with light and laughter. My parents, the way they used to be a long time ago. Aidan, running around and sneaking off to torment hotel staff by showing up in places he wasn’t supposed to be. Love and family.

  All that’s left of that now is me and Aidan, now a man, no longer the reckless rebel he used to be.

  Thinking of my parents again, I drain my glass and turn away from the windows, suddenly restless. I need a woman, if only to distract me from the past. Cecily would have been perfect, but I can’t call her now. The last thing I want is for her to imagine that her ultimatum is working. I’ll have to find someone else, someone who won’t be interested in commitment, at least not for a while.

  Placing my empty glass on a coffee table, I retrieve my jacket from the back of a chair where I draped it when I came in earlier. I’ll go downstairs to talk to the hotel manager and thank the kitchen staff for the birthday cake that’s now chilling in my fridge. That’ll distract me from my thoughts for the time being.

  I shrug on the jacket and walk to the foyer, toward the elevator. The call button for the penthouse overrides all other instructions. On my floor, the doors don’t open unless a special passcode is entered from inside the car or I push the call button from inside my apartment.

  Once in the foyer, I hit the button, expecting to wait, but I’m surprised when the doors slide open at once. I glance inside the elevators, surprised, and my surprise turns to a
mixture of amazement, appreciation, and something else…something wild and insistent that flares to life inside me with a force I can’t quite explain.

  Inside the elevator is a girl. She’s slender, with pale skin, beautiful red hair flecked with gold, and mossy-green eyes fringed with long dark lashes. She has a good figure, shown off by a flattering green dress the same color as her eyes, which are right now trained on me, her expression a curious mixture of relief and apprehension.

  My first thought, before I remember Aidan and his promise to send me a hooker as a birthday present, is, Who the fuck is she, and what in God’s name is she doing here?

  My second thought, after I remember Aidan and allow my eyes to linger on the body under her dress, is, I’ll deal with Aidan later, but right now, this girl is exactly what I need.

  Chapter 2

  She looks as if she’s not entirely sure she wants to enter the apartment. In my imagination, hookers are confident, brassy creatures, but this girl…it’s almost like she needs me to put an arm around her and whisper reassurances in her ear.