Solving for Nic (Self Made Men...Southern Style Book 2)

by Lexxi Callahan

  This time, she couldn’t leave it alone like she had the other night at dinner. Nic in pain was hard to get her head around. She’d never imagined anything could touch him, much less hurt him.

  “Nic.” She moved to stand next to him, not touching him but close enough to feel the electrical current running between them.

  “It’s a long story, Lizzie.”

  “I like stories.” She covered one of his clenched fists with hers and his grip on the metal relaxed.

  “Legally, he’s my father.” He sighed heavily, not turning to her but not as shut off as before. “His name is on my birth certificate.”

  “But he’s not your biological father?”

  Nic shook his head. “No.”

  “Do you know who your real father is?”

  He flinched before she finished the question and his hand tightened on the railing again. “When my grandfather discovered my mother was pregnant, De Santis paid Andreas Maretti a lot of money to marry her. They didn’t want the De Santis heir to be a bastard.”

  She watched him, the wind ruffling his hair and the line of strain around his mouth. He spoke the words like they were about someone else. There was no emotion. No anything.

  “Why didn’t she marry your real father? This isn’t the middle ages.”

  “He wouldn’t marry her. My uncle explained he didn’t want my mother exposed to his world.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “Believe me, Lizzie, as bad as Andreas is, my real father is infinitely worse.” Bitterness and resignation seeped into his voice. Emotions she would never have attributed to him.

  “That is so messed up.”

  “You’re right. It’s messed up.”

  “Why were you with Maretti if he’s not your real father? If your uncle has no children, why didn’t they…” She trailed off at the stricken look on his face. “Nic.” Her words were barely a whisper.

  “Are you sure you want to hear this?” he asked, reaching for her and pulling her into his arms so she was standing between him and the railing.

  “Yes.” Instinct told her he needed to talk, even if he didn’t want to.

  Her hands curved around the cool metal, as his arms went around her, his hands resting on the railing next to hers. Caging her in. She didn’t mind, sighing as he leaned into her.

  “The agreement was Andreas would receive his money in two lump sums. One when they married and the rest when they divorced. They agreed the marriage would last two years and he would receive a generous monthly allowance. Then Andreas decided he liked receiving the monthly allowance and the final payment was not enough. He delayed the divorce.”

  “He got greedy?” she asked.

  “No. He was born greedy. He got arrogant, thinking he could milk my grandfather out of more money. It worked for a while then my mother became terminally ill and died before he could divorce her. My grandfather cut Andreas off. No divorce, no settlement, no big pay out for Andreas.”

  “He took you instead?”

  His arms tightened around her. “And dropped me off at boarding school.”

  Lizzie’s eyes closed as she put the pieces together. “He left you there until your stepmother found out about you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your uncle or your grandfather didn’t do anything?”

  “Why would they? It was a prestigious boarding school, maybe not the one they would have chosen for me but Andreas was suing them for his settlement and maintenance for me. They decided to wait it out rather than pay him another dime. ”

  “You’re not serious?”

  Nic shrugged, his voice back to emotionless again. “He would’ve kept coming back for more, Lizzie. It’s who he is.”

  “So they just left you there? What about holidays? You didn’t spend those in Texas until you were ten so…”

  He was gritting his teeth and Lizzie felt her stomach drop.

  “Nic?” She blinked back tears as she turned and wrapped her arms around him.

  “I want to take you to Italy.” His voice was gruff as he changed the subject without warning. “I inherited my mother’s part of the estate when my grandfather died. Her villa is surrounded by vineyards as far as the eye can see.”

  Lizzie let it go, stamping on the heartbreak images of a small boy all alone at a boarding school at Christmas. Nic wouldn’t appreciate the drama. She pressed her face against his chest and felt the tension in him ease as she asked, “Do you have one of those vats? We can stomp on grapes.”

  He rested his cheek against the top of her head. “I’ll buy you one and you can stomp on grapes for me. It will be my own private vintage.”

  “Selfish,” she whispered, her eyes closing as she let the images build in her mind. She could picture an old terracotta villa surrounded by vineyards and tall cypress trees.

  “I’ll do the cooking but you have to do the laundry.”

  “I don’t do laundry,” she whispered. “I’m not domestic.”

  His mouth pressed against her temple. “Maybe I’ll take you to Milan for a few days, buy you more shoes.”

  She nodded, losing herself in the fantasy. She could learn how to do laundry. How hard could it be? “We could take your Ferrari?” She was kidding until his expression said there was a Ferrari at his mother’s home.

  “We’d take the helicopter, it’s faster.”

  “Helicopter?” She swallowed, her throat tightening as the fantasy got way too real. “You have a helicopter?”

  “Or two,” he admitted.

  Her hands lingered on his chest, her fingers tingling from the contact. She didn’t want to think about how different their lives were. He might come from a rarefied social strata but Lizzie had spent every Christmas of her life with her parents.

  “Don’t you dare feel sorry for me,” he whispered.

  She tightened her hold on him. “I don’t. I’m angry at them. Families aren’t supposed to be that way.”

  “I’m starting to get that.”

  She stepped back as much as the rail would allow. “Andreas is your stepfather? So Angie is…She doesn’t know, does she?” Lizzie whispered. “Don’t tell her, Nic. She doesn’t need to know. It doesn’t change anything, does it?”

  “No, it doesn’t change anything.” He stepped back from her and for a moment she didn’t want to let him go. “You want a drink?” he asked.

  “Sure.” She nodded. “Got any of those little umbrellas?”

  “I’ll check.”

  When he walked away, she wanted to chase him and tackle hug him until it was all better but she doubted it would help. She wondered if anything could make it better. She couldn’t imagine what Nic’s childhood had been like. Her parents had always been around. Always been there for her and she’d had Stefan, Jen and Rogan. She’d been surrounded all her life by a close loving family. Had Nic ever been surrounded by people who cared about him?

  It explained so much about him. Why he was so detached. Why the world never seemed to touch him. Now the things she’d thought were so sexy suddenly took on a bleakness. She wanted to scream at the injustice of it.

  Her breath caught again and her heart broke for real this time as all her childhood fantasies about Nic Maretti shattered around her. She clutched the rail before her knees could give way. He was not the fallen angel of her fantasies. He was human. A flesh and blood man with real feelings, no matter how deep they were buried.

  He was also a good man. He helped people without taking credit. He cared enough about his employees to learn their names and remember them. He defended and protected his family. He adored his nephew. He had a sly sense of humor and a way of getting her to do things she would never do on her own.

  The detached elegant European playboy billionaire façade began to crumble away along with the crush she’d had on him. The man left standing was a million times more complicated and fascinating. Lizzie would walk through fire for him if he asked her.

  Her crush faded with the sunlight, and
Lizzie fell hard, and fast, and forever.

  Chapter Eleven

  Had he completely lost his mind?

  Why had he told Lizzie Angie wasn’t his real sister? Along with all the other dirty secrets he’d never told another soul.

  If a brick wall had been handy, Nic would have introduced it to his forehead. He pulled the wet bar cabinet doors open and poured himself way too much scotch. He knocked it back and willed his brain to erase the memory of her pity.

  Nic didn’t need anyone to feel sorry for him. He’d spent a few holidays alone. Big deal. He’d also spent some with friends. It hadn’t been that bad. Character building, one of his professors had told him. Learning to rely on himself and trust his own instincts had served him well over the years. Yes, he would inherit a substantial fortune from his mother’s family, but he’d made more than he would ever need on his own.

  Nic had always considered himself self-made. No one had ever done a damned thing for him. He’d taken the miniscule amount of money his uncle had been forced to give him at eighteen and turned it into his own Empire. Nic Maretti did not need anyone’s help. He didn’t need anyone.

  He sank down on the nearest seat and brooded. He sipped his drink, then brooded some more.

  He might not need Lizzie feeling sorry for him, but if he was brutally honest with himself it didn’t feel as awful as he expected. He downed the rest of his drink, pushed to his feet, and tried to shake off the crazy.

  Except, the crazy felt kind of good. He might be losing his mind but there was a lightness to his chest and skin. The air around him felt sweeter. He groaned. He wasn’t losing his mind. He’d already lost it.

  He couldn’t believe he’d told her that Andreas wasn’t his real father. Hell, Pam didn’t even know that. The words had slipped out of him and it didn’t matter that some of the weight he’d carried for years had lifted off his shoulders too. He should have kept his mouth shut.

  As far as Nic was concerned, tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough. The sooner he got Lizzie back to New Orleans, the better.

  Pain squeezed his chest hard.

  He didn’t want to take her back to New Orleans. He didn’t want the week to end. He wasn’t ready to give her up. He wanted more time with her. He did want to take her to Italy and show her where he’d been born.

  He had no idea who he was anymore. Lizzie had him in a complicated tangle of emotions. She made him feel all sorts of things he had no desire to feel and as a result of the web she’d spun him into, now he was feeling pain and rejection he’d refused to feel since he’d stood at the warped glass window of an ancient dorm room and watched Andreas Maretti get in a taxi without once glancing back.

  He remembered feeling cold that day but not really caring as the taxi pulled away leaving him in a strange place for an indefinite period of time. His beautiful mother was dead. She was not coming back so there was no point in being homesick for the house she no longer filled with laughter and music. He remembered the last time she was able to speak to him. She told him to be strong and not cry. So he was and he didn’t. When the winter break came, most of the students returned to their families while Nic was left to spend his first Christmas after his mother died alone.

  When a large box had arrived postmarked from Italy, Nic had refused to open it. He’d given it to the staff that had stayed behind at school for the few students who had not gone to be with their families.

  With far more maturity than a six-year-old should have, he decided he didn’t need Maretti, or the De Santis family. They had ceased to exist for him until he broke his arm playing Rugby and Claudia had arrived, her heart in the right place but unaware of what she set in motion when she took Nic to Texas.

  He’d stuffed all those memories away years ago and had avoided feeling anything about his childhood for over two decades. He wasn’t about to start now. He didn’t like the way Lizzie was laying waste to the well-ordered calm he’d created when a grieving six-year-old boy had decided he didn’t need or want anyone.

  But he liked Lizzie. He liked spending time with her. Her sense of humor. He liked never having to tell her something twice. Most of all, he liked the way she wanted him. She trembled with need every time he got near her. She came alive when he touched her and never held back anything. She gave him everything she had to give and didn’t ask for anything back. She didn’t want anything from him. Hadn’t complained about a thing.

  Lizzie didn’t seem to care about his money, his name or his family connections. No, she wanted him. Just Nic. Not Nicolas De Santis Maretti. He wasn’t sure if he’d ever met anyone who was interested in him and not what he was worth. He’d been more relaxed and more himself this past week than he’d ever been.

  He dreaded tomorrow. He didn’t want to be alone. Feeling exposed for the first time in years, he decided the trip to Hong Kong needed to happen. He could get some distance and clear his head.

  He found her where he’d left her. She was leaning against the railing staring out to sea. She was lovely in the fading light as she scanned the horizon. An ache started inside him again and he forgot everything he decided minutes ago.

  “Ready to go back in?” he asked, when he joined her at the railing.

  “No.” She shook her head. “Everything is so peaceful here. How can you stand to leave this place?”

  Warmth spread through him at the sigh she released. He couldn’t stand to leave this place. He loved it here. He loved it more with her. “Sometimes I can’t stand to leave.”

  She nodded, but kept her face turned away.

  “Lizzie.” He was about to break every single rule he had about women. “Tomorrow—”

  “This week’s been great, Nic.” She spoke quickly so he couldn’t. “Let’s not ruin it with messy goodbyes.”

  He should have been struck dumb by his good fortune. A woman who didn’t believe in messy goodbyes? A few weeks ago that described his perfect woman. Now, watching Lizzie walk away from him, it pissed him off.

  So he went after her, throwing all his rules overboard. They were his rules. He decided when and if they mattered. He caught her arm and pulled her back around. “What if I’m not satisfied with a week? What then?”

  “What?”

  “What if it’s not enough?” The rules didn’t apply to Lizzie.

  Not enough?

  The words bounced around inside her.

  “Lizzie, tomorrow is not goodbye.”

  She backed away. “Yes, but I don’t think…” She forgot what she was going to say in the middle of the sentence.

  Concentration was impossible while he focused on her with such intensity.

  “You don’t think…what?”

  She was so tempted to give in but the longer she stayed with him the more it would hurt when it was over. “My life is kind of—”

  “Complicated? You’ve said that already. Mine is too. Try again.”

  “We hardly know each other.”

  “All the more reason I want more time with you.

  “For what, exactly? Sex?”

  “Sex? You think this is about sex?”

  She backed up when he moved. “Isn’t it?”

  A darkness seemed to roll over him like a thunder cloud. He lowered his face until they were eye to eye. “We have never just had sex, Lizzie.”

  He kissed her then, teasing the corner of her mouth, tasting the slight swell of her bottom lip before sliding his tongue inside to tangle with hers. “You feel that? Like you’re drowning and it’s not happening fast enough?”

  She nodded, tears burning at the corners of her eyes.

  “Is it always like this? Do you feel like you’re falling off the earth when the blue-haired boy kisses you?”

  “No,” she whispered, her lungs stopping when he smiled with smug satisfaction.

  He kissed her again. Her arms went around his neck and she ran head first into the blaze.

  “The others?” he asked, not lifting his mouth from hers as he teased her.

 
“What others?” She kissed him back and it took a second to realize he’d pulled back from her. Not physically. He stepped right back behind his stoic façade. She wanted to fall through the deck straight into the ocean and never come back.

  She opened her eyes and froze at the darkness in his expression. “What are you saying?”

  The chill in his voice told her she didn’t need to say anything. “What were we talking about?”

  “I knew you were inexperienced but…”

  Lizzie shivered as the chill leaked out of his voice and straight into her. She pushed away from him, but he didn’t let her go. “Why are you making this a thing?”

  “You’re twenty-one years old. How is this even possible?”

  Stunned he was angry, she felt her own temper start to sizzle. “Not that I owe you an explanation, but well, I…I told you we switched high schools after Katrina. There wasn’t anyone…”She wrenched away from him and he finally let her go.

  “Not even blue-haired boy?”

  Lizzie sucked down the outrage and resisted the urge to slap him right across his beautiful smug face. “He’s a friend, okay? I didn’t meet him until after…”

  “After?” He prompted.

  Lizzie shook her head. Not for all the tea in China was she going to tell him that he was the reason she’d never been with anyone else. She injected as much artic freeze as she could in her tone. “None of this is any of your business, Nic.”

  “None of my business?” He shook his head in disbelief. “Are you serious? You had plenty of opportunities and time to tell me. You rode up that elevator with me knowing I had no idea it was your first time. You should have told me, Lizzie. I could’ve hurt you.”

  His last words were like a bomb going off between them. Lizzie looked away. “I was afraid you’d stop,” she admitted, shattering the eerie silence between them. “I didn’t want you to stop.”

  He pushed his fingers through his hair and backed up to the railing. “I can’t believe this. That’s your excuse? You didn’t want me to stop?”

  She nodded. It had made sense at the time.