by Leslie North
He steeled his heart. He remembered the name Elliott Brock. He remembered Drakar, his sister, and the woman before Brandy—the woman he had thought he loved—who had attempted to steal everything from him. And it suddenly made this part easy. “We’ll work out the prenup,” he said. And I’ll give you more than you will have earned by selling me out to my competitors. “We’ll speak to the judge. The child will inherit everything, and this whole situation will have worked itself out.”
“Situation?” Brandy repeated. Now her eyes weren’t just startled—she looked skeweringly at him.
“Can I expect you to cooperate?” Max asked point-blank.
Oh no he didn’t.
He did not just propose marriage to her like it was a business transaction.
A part of Brandy wondered if she was still dreaming as she stared at Max Benton kneeling before her in the garden. He was handsome enough to be a prince waking her in a fairytale, but she found nothing about this whole situation charming. He wore his cold non-smile, and the diamond ring he held before her appeared to wink maliciously. Everything and everyone seemed to be conspiring together in one big joke at her expense.
“No,” she said.
“No?” Max repeated. He stood suddenly, and although she could feel the beginnings of a real heartbreak taking root in her chest, Brandy had to admit to feeling wickedly satisfied by the confused expression on his face. He had expected this to go his way, of course—no doubt about it.
Well, she was about to throw a wrench into his plans.
“I’m not going to marry you, Max,” she said. “But I’ll keep living here, the same way I assume you’ll keep living here.”
“I have no plans to go anywhere,” he agreed through gritted teeth. The ring was still out, but it was clear he had already forgotten its existence.
Brandy wished she could forget it, too, as she soldiered on. “So I’ll settle permanently in the east wing,” she concluded. “Or the west. We’ll live in separate rooms, but they’ll be next door to each other. We’ll have meals together. We’ll do all the things that… that a normal couple would do.”
She felt foolish suggesting it, but could it really be any more foolish than Max must feel, standing there with the ring she had refused to accept?
Brandy flushed with embarrassment and looked away. He would reject her, she thought. An eye for an eye. More than that, she had just made him a counteroffer that was completely…
“Done.” Max snapped the clamshell box closed and turned. “Meet me in the kitchen, and we’ll discuss the fine points of our arrangement over lunch.”
As soon as he was gone, Brandy buried her face in her hands.
Oh, she was such a fool. Any romantic in her right mind would have rejected his proposal out of hand and likely asked to never see him again—any romantic who wasn’t in love with his money, anyway. Max Benton was a callous, selfish, business-minded, life-ruining…
I’m in love with you! Her heart called after him desperately, long after he had quit the garden. Can’t you see I’m in love with you?
But she had to think of their baby now. She knew that. She would stay open to a possible arrangement, one that would bring them closer together—but she could never accept his proposal so long as he saw it as a transaction. As an easy fix. That might be acceptable or even beneficial for Max in the long run, but she had no doubt it would be bad for her and the baby.
If she was going to have a family, she wanted to do it the right way. She wanted to do it for love.
And, probably far worse, it was Max Benton that she loved.
11
“We’re celebrating, baby!” Frank Munson, her agent, crowed over the phone.
“Sounds like you’ve been celebrating already, Frank,” Brandy chided gently as she swept her belongings off her bed and dumped them into her purse. “I thought we agreed to meet at one! How long have you been at the Boar’s Head waiting for me?”
“Don’t worry about it.” She could almost imagine Frank waving his hand as he dismissed her question. “Just get down here and help me drink some of these pints, will you?”
Brandy winced. “I can’t promise anything.” Of course she would be drinking only water or the like—having a baby on the way—but she still hadn’t told her agent she was pregnant. She wasn’t showing yet, either, but just to be safe, she had put on a silk blouse with plenty of room to spare around her midriff. She could already tell that her breasts were starting to swell… and so, too, could Max, by the hungry looks she sometimes caught him sending her way.
But hunger didn’t equal love. And although he had moved into the east wing of Landon Castle to join her and the baby, they hadn’t exactly been their most affectionate with one another in recent days. Or physical. Brandy blamed the hormones surging through her for that particular craving, but her head and heart were already at work trying to steer her without the aching wants of her body trying to interpose themselves.
“Brandy? Did I lose you, sweetheart?” Frank wondered over the speakerphone.
“Coming!” she said breathlessly. She snatched her phone up from where she had dropped it on the bed; then, at the last second, she remembered the reason for their meeting. The manuscript! She pulled the collected stack of papers along with her and barreled out the door. “I’ll see you soon, Frank.”
“I’ll be celebrating without you!” her agent laughed, and then they hung up the call simultaneously. Brandy couldn’t help the ecstatic smile that bloomed across her face. They had just been offered a contract for her latest suspense novel written under her thriller pen name, Elliott Brock, along with movie rights. She wasn’t just flying; she was soaring.
It surprised her how much she yearned to see Max in that moment, to share her good news with him. Max rarely took an interest in her writing outside of teasing her for it, but despite the research he claimed to have conducted on her their first week together, Brandy didn’t think he had discovered the secret of Elliott Brock. It might amuse him—or, God forbid, even impress him—to know that she was secretly critically acclaimed for her…
Her soaring came to an abrupt end when she missed the last step on the staircase and fell, hard. A strangled cry escaped her as a voice screamed at her in the back of her mind: the baby! Protect the baby! She managed to partly overturn herself mid-fall, landing sideways on her forearm, catching all her weight and holding it off her ground. Her left ankle paid for the maneuver, however, and sharp pain like hot knives blistered through her. Brandy hissed and clutched her leg. The papers of her manuscript were scattered all around her.
Max. “Max?” she called out in a panic. Her desperate plea sounded as if it echoed throughout the castle, but no response came to her besides the rebounding of her own voice. “Max!”
Nothing. Brandy raised herself up after a moment, wincing all the while. She reached out to take hold of the bannister to help her stand and bit back a scream when her ankle almost gave out beneath her gently applied weight. “Max!” she shouted in a panic now. Something was really wrong. She didn’t think it was broken, but a twist or sprain seemed likely. Trying to calm her breathing, Brandy fished inside her pants pocket for her phone. Even if he wasn’t home, she could call him. She was sure he’d come running home after hearing the news of her fall…
But all she came up with was his voicemail. No matter how many times she dialed him, Max didn’t answer. Her panic and fear at being left alone after a potential injury to their baby soon began to fade, and a growing sense of anger took over in its place. More than anything, she was angry at herself. You’re calling the wrong number, she thought.
She next dialed for a cab instead.
Fifteen minutes later, as they were backing out of the driveway, she saw Max’s Rolls-Royce pull up on the opposite end of the lawn. Brandy shoved her sunglasses up her nose and pretended not to notice out of the corner of his eye when he got out of the car. He stood watching, tall and aloof, as the taxi drove away. His expression was inscrutable from t
his distance, but she hoped he was as confused and frustrated as she felt. She thought about firing off a text to let him know she was headed to the doctor, but it seemed almost mean-spirited at this point to do so. She could fill him in on what had happened later.
Besides, as much as a part of her yearned to see that overprotective side of him, she couldn’t afford to arouse it now. She had an ankle to bind and a meeting to get to. And she had their baby, whose health and well-being had come to trump all else.
Max could sit tight and twiddle his thumbs in the castle he coveted while he waited for her.
He followed her.
God, he hated himself for doing it. But he did it all the same. After Brandy left in the cab and he tried to call her—realizing only then that he had missed multiple calls from her already—he drove off after the cab. She had about a ten-minute head start, but Glen Ridge was small and sleepy, and the Rolls-Royce kept a steady pace behind them
You’re acting crazy, Max told himself, and he couldn’t agree more. But if Brandy had experienced some sort of emergency while he was out… if the baby…
The cab pulled up outside the town’s doctor’s office, confirming his worst fears. Max stayed in his car, too scared to move, watching her hobble in, leaning on the cab driver. He tried calling Brandy again, and when she didn’t answer, he got out of his car.
When she came back out the front doors with a wrapped ankle, a crutch, and a relieved smile, Max wasn’t sure if he should feel relieved himself. Had she fallen? Was she all right? She should be going straight home to rest; surely that’s what the doctor had told her…
But the cab had a different destination. What he saw when he arrived at the café stunned him. Brandy got out, and after a brief and cheerful conversation with the driver, limped up to the café. A kindly patron held the door for her, and she thanked him with a nod.
Max watched from his car. Brandy moved directly to an occupied table by the window; the man sitting there rose and hugged her profusely.
They were laughing. Deal is done. Time to celebrate.
The man pulled Brandy’s chair out for her, waved off something she said, and headed toward the front counter. Another man joined Brandy, then, and Max’s blood ran cold.
Drakar.
12
It was as if he had forgotten how to read.
Days later, Max stared at the leading article in the morning paper, uncomprehending of the words he had by now read over and over again.
New release. Security program. His own name, and the name of his tech company, were nowhere in sight.
But his competitor's was.
Drakar. Max stared at the grainy photo and could too easily picture the other man's face in all its villainous resolution. He had seen it for himself a few days ago, after all, in person, fixed across from the face of the woman he had been foolish enough to fancy himself in love with.
He had talked himself out of confronting Brandy at the time. He had spent many a sleepless night lying awake, listening to her shift in the bedroom next door to his. It was obvious that she lay awake, too, but he never went to her, and she never came to him. Now, he thought he knew why. Her business with him was concluded. She had everything she had set out to gain from him: the security program he had spent the last year slaving over, his castle, and a lifelong assurance that he would provide for her in the form of their child.
He had lost. Again. Despite all his attempts to harden himself, he had continued to repeat the mistakes of the past. He would suffer again for it now.
But he wouldn't suffer alone.
"Gavin." His first order of business was to call his friend: the man he had been building the security program for.
"I know. I read the paper," his friend cut in quickly. That's what Max had always admired about Gavin: he never beat around the bush, having almost a psychic ability to know what those around him were about to say. He was always a few steps ahead mentally, and that saved Max time. "It's similar, but not exactly the same, is it?"
"Close enough."
"You don't think it's coincidence? Of course Drakar would suspect you're working on something... you don't think he came to market with a worse product just to try and head you off?"
"Has his company reached out to yours?" Max demanded.
"He called my mother." He could almost hear the shrug in Gavin's voice. "But I've already scheduled the three of us a meeting. No way we're buying from Drakar, and I hope you're ready to explain why."
"You know I can provide every explanation in the world for why you should avoid that son of a--"
"You should probably know in advance that my mother doesn't appreciate strong language in her business meetings."
Max grimaced, then forged on. He hung up not long after and gritted his teeth. The paper still sat before him, its headline—and Drakar’s face—mocking him. His coffee had gone cold beside it.
"Max?"
He didn't so much as glance up at her voice. He realized vaguely that Brandy was standing in the kitchen doorway. Maybe instinct had warned her against entering.
"Max, are you all right? You don't look—"
"Get out," Max croaked.
"I beg your pardon?" Brandy sounded as offended as astonished. Really, she was a terrific actress. Had been all along. Max finally pulled himself from his consideration of the paper to look at her properly. She was a transfixing woman, but he was free now. He saw it all clearly.
And he wouldn't be taken in again.
“I saw you with him,” he said.
“Who?” Brandy faked confusion seamlessly as she blinked at him. “When?”
"If it weren't for the baby, I'd throw you out," he assured her. "Judge's orders be damned. You've quite overstayed your welcome in my castle, Brandy Jackson."
"Your castle?" There was fire in her eyes as she crossed to the counter and took firm hold of it. Max rose from his stool to match her bristly posture. "Max, what the hell has gotten into you? You've been acting so strangely that I—"
"Quit playing me," he hissed. "Your game is up, and the gig is over. I know you're Drakar's woman. Do you miss him, living here in this dank old castle with me? Do you warm his bed, too, when you aren't too busy stealing from me?"
It was a good thing his coffee had gone cold, because it was suddenly painting his front. Brandy held the emptied mug, quaking with rage, eyes burning with unshed tears. "I'm done," she whispered.
"So am I." His own voice had dropped to a matching whisper. "I can't believe I ever offered to marry you."
"I can't believe I ever considered accepting."
On that devastating note, Brandy turned and ran from the room. Max sank back down wearily onto his stool and ran frustrated fingers through his hair. He wanted to wake up from this, but he couldn't. The woman he loved had betrayed him, and now she was gone. Precisely where he needed her to be.
Then why did he suddenly, desperately, want her back?
Brandy locked herself in her room. She spent the majority of the afternoon muffling her distraught sobs in her pillow. No way in hell was she going to give Max the satisfaction of knowing he had made her cry.
Where had these accusations come from? Brandy knew about his past, about the ex-girlfriend who had conspired with Drakar to steal his work. Even Bettina hadn't escaped that painful episode in the Bentons' legacy; she herself had been a casualty to the conniving Drakar, who had manipulated and used her to get closer to Max and his security company.
But this wasn't the past. This was now. And Brandy had done nothing to warrant his suspicion besides exist in the castle that was meant to be hers.
"I'm done," she whispered again to her pillow. She realized she was speaking to her unborn child, to the little soul she carried inside her who was getting a front row seat to her mother's heartache. Well, no more. "I've—we've—overstayed long enough, trying to make things work. But I can see now that it's impossible."
She sat up and gazed out the window at the lush world outside, what had on
ce seemed an enchanted life. She knew now that she would give up the castle. It was the least of the things she would lose—and besides, she didn't want to deal with Max and his lawyers in a courtroom setting. There would be plenty of time for that once the baby was born, she was certain. There would be more negotiations... more contracts... their own child would be a piece of disputed property.
How could she ever have allowed herself to wish that things would work out with such a man?
She had an overwhelming urge to call Lucy, but she already knew what her best friend's solution would be. Lucy would want her to come home and live with her.
But how could Brandy ever hope to explain that home wasn't in the States anymore? She had fallen in love with Glen Ridge, with the castle that was meant to shelter and protect her and her family. Now, she had to give it all up—all, save one thing. Brandy touched her stomach, drew strength from the new life she carried inside her.
Then she picked up her phone and called.
"You're what?" Bettina exclaimed on the other line. "And my brother said what?"
"I'm sorry I didn't say anything earlier. It might be easier to explain this all in person," Brandy said sheepishly. "And... and I could use a break from the castle while I figure things out."
"I can do you one better than that," Bettina replied with complete assurance. "And I can help you get out of there for longer than just a break. Move in with me. Pack your things, and I'll call you a cab."
"Bettina..." Tears stung Brandy's eyes as she gazed out at the clouds gathering over the horizon. "I don't know what to say." An afternoon storm was on its way; then why did she feel as if it had already come and gone?
"You don't have to say anything," Bettina assured. "Just tip your driver for me. I know you're good for it after that book deal you just signed."
Brandy choked on a little laugh and swiped at her eyes. She hadn't even found an opportunity to tell the man she lived with the good news; now, it hardly seemed to matter. What was her newfound fortune, compared to Max's? He had eyes for his company, his success, only.