by K. M. Scott
FALL INTO ME
K.M. SCOTT
Wealthier and more powerful than most men his age, Tristan Stone merely has to give voice to his desires and whatever he wants is his. Money has given him the ability to say nothing and no one is beyond his reach.
Except for Nina. Stripped of her memory after an accident, she doesn't remember the man who loves her. Now he must find a way to show her why she fell in love with him, but the past is always just a step behind, threatening to take her away forever.
Unsure of everything about the past four years, Nina believes Tristan loves her. But will the secrets he holds tear them apart just when she needs him most?
Fall Into Me is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are the products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to events, locations, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
2013 Copper Key Media, LLC
Copyright © 2013 Copper Key Media, LLC
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
Published in the United States
Cover Design: Bookin It Designs
eBook ISBN: 978-0-9891081-6-4
Adult Content: Contains graphic sexual content
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter One: Tristan
Chapter Two: Tristan
Chapter Three: Nina
Chapter Four: Nina
Chapter Five: Tristan
Chapter Six: Tristan
Chapter Seven: Nina
Chapter Eight: Nina
Chapter Nine: Nina
Chapter Ten: Tristan
Chapter Eleven: Tristan
Chapter Twelve: Nina
Chapter Thirteen: Tristan
Chapter Fourteen: Tristan
Chapter Fifteen: Nina
Chapter Sixteen: Tristan
Chapter Seventeen: Tristan
Chapter Eighteen: Tristan
Chapter Nineteen: Nina
Chapter Twenty: Nina
Chapter Twenty-One: Nina
Chapter Twenty-Two: Tristan
Chapter Twenty-Three: Nina
Epilogue: Tristan
About The Author
Chapter One
Tristan
"I thought you understood how this had to end."
Looking down the hall at Nina's hospital room, I eyed with suspicion every person who walked in and out. Pressing the phone to my ear, I listened as the man on the other end repeated himself and added, "We've given you more than enough time, Tristan. This has to end."
"I won't do it. I told you that. She's no threat to you, Karl."
"You're not thinking with the right head, son. If anyone finds out about the evidence she has, everything your father worked so hard to attain will be gone. Are you prepared to let that happen? We aren't. Take care of this. Or we will."
"She has nothing. I've checked everything she owns and there's nothing. Let her live in peace."
"With you, happily ever after, like some storybook ending? I told you that we can't afford to have any loose ends. There's proof somewhere. Those of us who supported your father all those years won't be taken down by your schoolboy romantic ideas."
"And I told you there's nothing to prove whatever my father was doing. He's dead and Nina's father is dead. Let whatever happened end with them."
Karl was silent for a long time. "We've told you what we want. You decide how this is going to happen. Or we will."
I pressed End Call and stuffed my phone back into my suit coat pocket, disgusted with Karl but more with myself. How had I let this get so fucking far?
All I had to do was find the papers Karl was sure her father had showing what my father had done. I was still in the dark about what exactly Joseph Edwards thought he'd caught my father doing, but I didn't care anymore. Whether it was some tax scam or real estate deal gone bad, it didn't matter. All I cared about was keeping Nina safe from the likes of Karl and the other board members who thought of nothing but protecting their own hides.
"Mr. Stone?"
I shook off my phone call and saw one of Nina's nurses at my side. "Yes?"
"It's time for her to leave. She's all ready. Her ribs might be a little sore at first when she gets back to her daily activity, but that's to be expected. I've told her to just listen to what her body's telling her and she should be fine. Now we just have to wait for her memory to come back."
Nina appeared in the doorway of the hospital room where she'd spent the last five weeks. Seated in a wheelchair, she wore her black yoga pants and white sweatshirt and had the pink roses I'd given her that morning in her lap. Her blue eyes lit up when I stepped out from behind the wall.
"Hey! The doctor said I'm ready to roll."
Bowing deeply, I looked up at her and smiled. "Your chariot awaits, my lady."
The press was out in full force when I pulled the Jag in through the gate at the bottom of the driveway I'd had installed the week before. Cameras flashed on all sides of us, making Nina bury her head in the space between our seats. Snaking my arm around her to hold her close, I hoped this first introduction to my world hadn't made her wish she'd had anywhere else to go.
I leaned my head down and whispered next to her ear, "Don't worry. We'll be home in a minute and we won't have to deal with them again, Nina."
The gates closed behind us and I raced up the driveway, wanting all that bullshit with the paparazzi left back there in the past. Fucking vultures. Like anyone should want to see pictures splattered all over the gossip pages of a man bringing a woman home from the hospital after a car accident.
Nina lifted her head and sat up straight in her seat to look at the house as I stopped the car. "This is where you live?"
"Where we live," I said, gently correcting her.
She turned her head and the look on her face was a mix of uncertainty and disbelief.
As I shut off the car, I flashed her a smile. "Don't worry. It's cozier than it looks."
"Uh huh." She looked unconvinced.
I grabbed her coat and walked around the car to help her out, watching her crane her neck to take in all of the house as I placed my black leather jacket across her shoulders. Looking up at me with those gentle blue eyes, she asked, "I really live here? With you?"
Nodding, I smiled. "You do. In fact, you like this house more than the other one."
She stopped walking and stared straight ahead. "There's another one?"
I shrugged. "Well, it's a penthouse at the Manhattan property, but you told me you liked this one better."
"Wow. First the car and now more than one house. Jordan wasn't kidding when she said you were loaded." Nina fell silent and grimaced. "Sorry. That sounded worse than I meant it to. She just said you were wealthy."
"Wealthy. Loaded. It's all the same. I just hope you're comfortable here."
With a tiny chuckle, she said, "I can't imagine anyone couldn't be."
Rogers met us at the door and bowed. "Miss, it's wonderful to see you again."
Nina studied him for a moment and then smiled meekly, obviously not remembering him. "Hello."
"Get the bags from the car, Rogers."
As he passed us, she looked up at me and frowned. "I guess I've met him before? I don't remember."
"The doctors said it could take some time. Give it a chance."
Nodding, she tried to put on a brave face, but I saw in her eyes she was disappointed. I stood there staring down at her and wishing I could make things be
tter, wishing I had the power to turn back time to before that night when she ran away and...
I pressed a smile onto my lips and extended my hand toward her old bedroom, my heart heavy from the words I was about to say. "Your room is right down this hall."
Nina looked around the entryway and then at me, her eyes wide. "It's beautiful here, Tristan."
Faking enthusiasm the best I could, I said, "Thanks. Let's get you settled in."
I gently placed my hand on the small of her back, a tiny gesture I did out of habit before I remembered for the first time that day that she and I were basically strangers in her mind. She didn't react as I kept my hand against her and escorted her to her wing of the house, and I wanted to at least believe it hadn't bothered her that I'd done it.
Opening the door, she looked around in amazement at her room, her mouth hanging open, just as she'd looked the first time she saw it all those months ago. "Wow, this is great! I thought maybe you were showing me to the servants' quarters or something, but this is as nice as the other part of the house."
Her words cut like knives. To her, I was just some man who paid her to work for him. She had no idea how much I wanted to take her back to our bedroom on the other side of the house, the one she belonged in. The bed she belonged in right next to me.
"You aren't my servant here. This is your home, Nina."
I tried to disguise the hurt in my voice, but it was no use. She heard it too and turned around from looking out the window to face me. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to say the wrong thing. I didn't mean to make it sound like you'd treat someone like a servant. This is all so new to me."
"Don't be sorry. I'll leave you to get settled in. If you need anything, I'm just on the other side of the house."
I wanted to reach out to touch her hand, to take her in my arms and tell her how much I loved her, but she wasn't ready. I didn't want to scare her off. I knew I had to be patient and hopefully if I was, when she finally started to remember things, she'd also remember how much I loved her.
My insides felt empty as I walked toward my side of the house, alone again as I'd been for so long. I had work to do, but my heart wasn't in it. I didn't care about reporting to the Board as I had to soon at the quarterly meeting. I didn't care about anything involving Stone Worldwide. What did it matter anyway?
I sat down at the desk in my room and looked out the window at the unseasonably warm December day full of sun. All I could think of was that in just over a week the date I'd chosen for our wedding would pass without mention because she didn't remember the day held any special meaning. Nothing like the biggest day of your life going unnoticed.
"Tristan, I've arranged for dinner at five, as you ordered."
Something in Rogers' voice told me he hadn't come to find me to talk about dinner. Closing my eyes, I leaned my head back. "That's fine, Rogers. Thank you."
My words were met with silence, but he didn't leave. I'd avoided Rogers for weeks, knowing what he thought, but I wasn't going to escape this discussion about Nina. Opening my eyes, I turned to see him standing there staring down at me. "Is there something else, Rogers?" I asked, knowing there was.
"I'm simply wondering what I'm to do regarding Nina."
I hated the way he could refer to a human being in the same tone as he'd use to tell me he believed the gutters needed cleaning. Looking into his dark eyes, I leveled my gaze full of disgust on him. "What you're to do regarding Nina? Speak plainly, Rogers. I'm not in the mood for the butler talk. You've known me since I was five years old, for fuck's sake."
Rogers nodded his head slowly, and when he raised his gaze to meet mine again, it was one of doubt. "Nothing has changed, Tristan. Your father is still the one responsible for her father's death and you're still Victor Stone's son. The son of the man who killed Nina's father. Things are the same as they were the night she drove away from here."
I didn't need Rogers to tell me all of this. None of it had ever left my mind since that day Karl had confirmed what I'd found in my father's secret files. I'd lived with the knowledge that my own father had been the architect of Joseph Edwards' murder just as I'd have to continue living with it for the rest of my life.
"I don't need you to remind me of any of this, Rogers. What the fuck am I supposed to do?"
"About what, Tristan? You can't fix what your father did. No one expects you to."
"I don't care about fixing anything Victor Stone did. I care about taking care of Nina, not because of what happened to her father but because I love her. Why is this so difficult for you to understand?"
Rogers stood there staring at me, his face full of judgment. "Because you haven't loved anything or anyone since the accident."
Looking away, I watched out my window as a porcupine walked slowly across the grass. "I'm not incapable of love because of a plane crash. Are you saying you don't believe I fell in love with her?"
"I have no doubt you love her and she loved you. You've been given a second chance to make things right, Tristan. If you do not, I can't see how your future with her could end any differently than it did before."
"All I need is time," I mumbled as I watched the porcupine continue to make his way across the lawn toward the trees on my side of the house.
"Time for what? You must tell her the truth. If you don't, you'll be making the same mistake again and the outcome will be the same as last time."
Time. If I could find the evidence Karl believed existed, then Nina could be safe and never have to know about my father's heinous crime. Never have to know that I was the son of the man responsible for taking her only parent from her.
Turning back to face Rogers, I stood to get to work. "Thank you, Rogers. That will be all."
I saw the disapproval in his eyes as he turned to leave, but I didn't care. I wasn't going to let Nina find out the truth of her father's death. Her memory loss meant I could spare her that. It was the only good thing to come from her accident, and I intended on protecting it, no matter what.
All I needed was time.
At five o'clock I sat in the dining room waiting for Nina so we could eat dinner together as we had every day we'd been here in this house. I'd had Rogers instruct the cook that tonight's meal was to be duck in the hopes that maybe having that would remind her of the time we spent together at the penthouse. I knew it was probably grasping at straws, but what else did I have?
I waited for twenty minutes, watching the steam slowly fade away from the dishes before I was forced to admit that she wasn't coming. Of course she wasn't. She wasn't coming because she didn't remember that this was something we both looked forward to each day. That too was gone.
Loosening my tie, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes in frustration. I couldn't go on like this. It was like being sent to a country where everyone had forgotten the language except that one lonely soul who kept speaking even though nobody understood him, hoping one day he'd find just one other person to comprehend his words.
I pinched the bridge of my nose and felt the stress ebb away for a moment. Maybe I was just kidding myself. Maybe it was time for me to forget that language too.
If I could forget, I may have tried. But I couldn't. Rogers had been right when he'd said I hadn't loved anything or anyone since the accident. He was only partially correct, though. In truth, I'd never loved anyone before the accident either. Not like I loved Nina.
She was my everything. I needed her like I needed air to breathe. I doubted she'd even known how I truly felt about her before the accident. She was unlike anyone I'd ever encountered. Never before had another human being made me want so much more than the things my money could buy me.
All my life I'd been blessed with everything I could want, and it had made me hard and greedy. Nothing meant anything when you could have it at the drop of a hat. I'd learned that was one of the curses of money, but for a long time didn't care. Cars? I'd gone through dozens with not a thought about why I shouldn't. Homes? They came and went without any feeling or connection t
o them. Women? I could have who I wanted, when I wanted, and how.
And I did. Victor Stone's money paid for whatever I desired, and it didn't matter how fucked up it was. No worries. Money can make anything happen and then make it go away, if someone chooses. I let my cock lead me to places filled with desire, sex, and whatever else I could want. It was all so easy. How often had I fucked someone merely because I could, not because I felt anything for them?
It always amazed me how eager women were to please when good old Benjamin was sitting in my pocket. All it took was flashing the money clip once or twice.
Running my hand through my hair, I shuddered at how many times it had only taken a few bills for me to get everything I wanted or more, if that was what I craved. It all came so easily. A blonde, maybe her friend or two, and as much blow as I could get my hands on. Then it was just a matter of stuffing the junk up my nose and fucking as many women as I could.
And it had felt so fucking good. Life was mine to enjoy, and enjoy it I did. What's that saying about life and letting the juices run down your chin? I had juices enough to last a lifetime.
Then one day all the good times were gone. I was the lone survivor of a plane crash that killed my family. I'd watched my parents and twin brother die around me, listening to their agonizing cries for help and not being able to help them or myself as I waited to suffer the same fate.
I was allowed to live, and what did I do with that gift? I closed myself off from the world and turned into what I'd never wanted to be. The CEO of Stone Worldwide. Shrink after shrink promised with just a little more therapy that I'd find the answer and realize life was worth living again, as if they feared at any time I was going to kill myself. What they didn't seem to understand was there was something worse than dying.
Living.
Having whatever your heart desired and it never being enough to overcome the emptiness that ate away at you every day and night until you felt hollow inside. Dealing with the guilt that every member of your family had been taken away and you were left like some shining monument to Darwinism, as if being alive was some achievement I'd strived for and attained. All I'd done was sit there in that plane seat. That steel bar that had plowed through my brother's heart hadn't been able to find mine not because I was crafty or clever. It wasn't because I was lucky either.