The memory made her cringe. She couldn’t imagine why she’d suddenly lost it and sobbed like a small child as soon as he’d put his arms around her. Sure, the news he’d given her had been a shock, but even so, she was usually way more self-contained than that. She didn’t let her emotions get the better of her, not these days. She wasn’t the little kid throwing a tantrum because her dad wouldn’t take her to New York, not anymore.
Chloe glowered at the TV, trying to interest herself in that instead of the memory of Van coming after her, all sleek muscle and long, lean power. Gaining on her with such ease, as if she was running in quicksand while he had nothing but hard concrete underneath his feet.
She’d only wanted to get outside, get some air. She certainly hadn’t meant to run like an idiot. But for some reason that glimpse of him behind her had turned her shock into a flood of adrenaline. Made her run and run hard.
And then he’d caught her, his arm like an iron bar around her waist, jerking her up against the intense heat of his body, holding her so tightly she could barely move. She’d almost forgotten about her father in that instant. All she’d been conscious of was the drumming sound of her heartbeat and his hard-muscled torso against her back. His naked torso. She’d trembled, unable to help herself, the adrenaline and shock turning into something else, that desire she thought she’d gotten over years ago.
It was all so wrong. First of all, she’d just had some pretty terrible news dumped on her, so she shouldn’t be feeling all hot for a guy anyway. Second, he was her foster brother. Third, there was the fact that she’d already been down that road with him when she was sixteen, and it had been hideous.
He’d been at home on leave a whole two weeks and she’d barely been able to speak to him, too dazzled and overwhelmed by pretty much everything about him. He’d noticed her weirdness, of course, no matter how hard she’d tried to hide it, and in the end she’d started avoiding him purely so she wouldn’t give herself away by blushing and stammering every time he tried to talk to her.
The only time she’d felt even semi-normal had been when she’d been out riding one afternoon and had accidentally met him doing the same thing. They hadn’t said a word to each other. He’d only met her gaze, a challenge in his eyes, and all her self-consciousness had fallen away. She’d grinned, turned her horse around, and raced him back to the ranch house.
He’d won by a nose, giving her the smile she’d remembered back from when she’d been a kid as he’d gotten down off his horse. But this time there had been something wild and wolfish about it that had set her heart on fire.
She’d had to turn her horse around and ride right back out again, because she simply hadn’t been able to deal with the intensity of her feelings.
Hell, she couldn’t deal with them now.
The woman on TV smiled and talked about a free necklace with the earrings, but only if you order right now, and Chloe scowled and turned the stupid thing off.
She didn’t want to be sitting there watching TV. She wanted to be at home, where she could go outside. Where she could work or go down to the stables and spend time with the horses. Where she could saddle up her favorite mare and go for a gallop, breathe in all the fresh Wyoming air.
Where she could do something with the hot coal sitting just behind her breastbone, burning her right through.
But she wasn’t at home. She was in New York, stuck in a house, a virtual prisoner, and that hot coal wasn’t going anywhere.
And all because Cesare de Santis had apparently targeted her.
Because you’re his daughter.
Her gut churned, reminding her that sitting here distracting herself with dumb TV wasn’t exactly dealing with anything.
Letting out a breath, she flung the remote down on the couch then pushed herself out of it, turning toward the doorway.
The night before, after Van had gotten back from the lawyer’s, he’d clearly wanted to talk to her about the bombshell he’d dropped on her, but she definitely hadn’t. So she’d locked herself in the bathroom and taken an extra-long bath. By the time she’d gotten out and had done a cautious check around to see where he was, she’d heard his voice coming from the office on the second floor. She’d taken a quick glance inside and saw him standing with his back to the door, looking out the window as he talked to someone on the phone.
A small part of her—still reverberating from the shock of the news and hungry for something, though she didn’t know what—had wanted to linger, to watch him, to listen to his conversation. But she’d forced herself to head upstairs and go to bed instead, avoiding him, avoiding everything.
But she knew she couldn’t keep doing it. If she wanted answers, she was going to have to face asking questions. And she did want answers. The basic facts. Because how was she going to make any decisions concerning the ranch when she didn’t know anything?
No, she had to know, and she didn’t understand why she was avoiding it. After all, it wasn’t as if it hurt that much. Not when she’d stopped allowing herself to be hurt by her father years ago.
Taking a breath, Chloe strode from the living room and began looking for Van.
He wasn’t anywhere on the first floor or in the office on the second, and she knew he hadn’t gone out that day, which left him somewhere upstairs.
The third floor had a living room and a small movie theater, and he wasn’t there, so she continued going up, past the bedrooms on the fourth, fifth, and sixth floors, to the seventh floor at the top of the house.
There was a massive bedroom, the floor-to-ceiling windows showing off magnificent views of the city, and a high-spec gym that not only had the same kind of views, but the added bonus of the view of the man working out inside it.
Chloe stopped in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe, everything in her head vanishing as she took in the sight of Van wearing nothing but a pair of workout pants, doing pull-ups on the steel bar above his head.
He had his back to her, his long hard body suspended, his biceps flexing as he pulled himself up, the play of his powerful back muscles mesmerizing her as he let himself back down. Then he did it again. And again. Up and down, every movement slow and expertly controlled.
She should say something, let him know she was there, but for some reason she couldn’t seem to find her voice. Couldn’t seem to stop looking.
His tanned skin was oiled with sweat, gleaming in the light pouring through the windows and bouncing off the white walls of the gym, every perfect muscle outlined. He was the ultimate female fantasy come to life, all wide shoulders, sculpted lats, and lean hips. And God, there was something hypnotic about the way he was raising himself up then lowering himself back down, something in the discipline required to keep those movements unhurried and restrained. Something in such an obvious display of strength.
You know how strong he is. You felt it yesterday when he put his arms around you.
Chloe swallowed, the memory from the day before returning yet again. His hot skin against her back, the power in his arm as it had curled around her waist, the feel of his hard torso pressed to her spine …
A helpless shiver went through her just as Van let go of the bar, landing lightly on his feet. He reached for the towel hanging on the bar above him, swiping it over his face, and without turning around he said, “Are you ready to talk now?”
She blinked. How did he know she was there? She hadn’t made a sound, she knew it.
He’s a SEAL. He has superpowers. He probably knew the moment you came into the gym.
Irritated at herself and not wanting to think about how he must know exactly how long she’d been standing there staring at him, Chloe took a couple of steps into the room and folded her arms. “I have questions.”
“Of course you do.” Van slung the towel around his neck and bent to pick up the water bottle sitting on the floor next to him. Then he turned around, and she was faced with that magnificent chest and the eagle-and-trident tattoo splashed across it, gleaming with sweat.
“You okay, pretty?”
The deep gravel of his voice and the pressure of his gaze made her feel oddly exposed, so she kept her attention on the buildings out the window. She wasn’t going to break this time, she just wasn’t. “I’m fine, thanks.”
There was a brief silence.
“Okay.” His tone was neutral, for which she was grateful, because if he’d pressed her, she might have turned around and walked right back out again. “Ask me your questions then.”
She took a small, silent breath. “How do you know it’s true? About Dad?”
“I think I said yesterday. There were test results proving his infertility in the letter I got. Plus there was also a paternity test.”
Oh yes, he’d said something about that, hadn’t he? She’d still been reeling from that first hammerblow, too shocked to take it in.
The coal behind her breastbone smoldered painfully, but she ignored it. “So it’s definitely true?” She made her voice sound strong, pulling her gaze from the window to look at him, to prove that she was absolutely and completely fine. Because this didn’t hurt. At all. “I’m really a de Santis?”
Van’s gaze was steady. “You are.”
There was a heavy finality to his tone that gave the words sharp edges. Yet there was also something in the way he’d said them, without hesitation or looking away, that showed he knew she was strong enough to take it.
She appreciated that, if nothing else.
“How?” she asked. “How did it happen? I mean, he didn’t tell me much about Mom, only that she was a barmaid in his hometown.”
Chloe had never known her and Noah hadn’t liked talking about her, but Chloe had managed to get the odd bit of information out of him. Charlie Price, the barmaid at the local pub in the town Noah had grown up in, and whom he’d been instantly smitten with. Theirs had been a brief love affair though, because Charlie had died of complications soon after Chloe’s birth. Noah didn’t talk about that either, and Chloe had always gotten the sense that her father still deeply grieved for her.
Van took a sip from his water bottle, and she found herself staring at the strong column of his throat, at the movement it made when he swallowed. And this time she didn’t fight the urge to keep on looking. Because that was far easier than listening to what she knew was going to be hard to hear.
“Okay,” he said, lowering the bottle. “So your mom wrote Dad a letter telling him she was pregnant and when he wrote back telling her that he was infertile, she admitted that she’d had a one-night stand the week before she and Dad had gotten together. The guy had only told her his first name—Cesare. Dad knew it couldn’t be anyone else but his old enemy. He got that paternity test not long after you were born, and the results were conclusive.”
There was a lurching sensation in her gut. She ignored it.
“So Cesare de Santis is my father.” The words sounded strange out loud, and came out thick, as if her mouth was full of cotton balls. “Okay, but if Dad knew, why did he keep me? When de Santis was the enemy?”
Van took another sip from his bottle before putting it down on the floor beside the weight bench, leaning his elbows on his knees. “You’re not going to like the answer to that, pretty. Are you sure you want to hear it?”
The lurching sensation got even worse, this time followed by a sudden flood of nausea. She gritted her teeth against it. “Tell me.”
Something changed in his expression, a golden glint in his eyes that she recognized from years ago, from when she’d fallen off her pony at that first riding lesson. He’d asked her if she wanted to stop, and she’d said no. He’d had that same glint then. The one that told her he was impressed, that he approved.
It shouldn’t matter what he thought of her, not when she’d told herself she didn’t care. Yet seeing that glint made her feel a little less sick.
“You’re right. De Santis was the enemy.” Van’s gaze was steady on hers. “But Dad thought that keeping his daughter would protect our family. A hostage so de Santis would leave us and Tate Oil alone.”
So that’s what she’d been? Her father’s little hostage? His insurance policy? The coal burning inside her flared in response, a bright spark of pain, and she had to dig her fingers into her upper arms to stop it from leaking out.
She thought she’d inured herself to all the ways her father had hurt her, but apparently she wasn’t as immune as she’d thought. Apparently she still carried a few shreds of hope around inside her. The hope that one day he’d keep at least one of his promises, that he’d show her she actually meant something to him.
Clearly that was a mistake, so why the hell was she still letting herself expect things from him? Why was she still letting him hurt her?
Van watched her silently, and that sympathy she recognized from the day before was back in his gaze, as if he knew exactly what she was feeling. It made her throat close up tight.
“I know it’s hard to hear,” he said quietly. “But you’re not alone, okay? Dad’s always been about looking out for the business first and foremost. Why do you think he adopted Wolf and Lucas and me? It wasn’t because he wanted kids to love. It was because he needed someone to protect his legacy, because he needed heirs.”
Something bitter edged his voice, distracting her for a moment.
“What? You didn’t want to be his heir?”
He shook his head. “Hell no. I wanted to stay in the military. Do my part to protect the country, not protect his bottom line.” The warm golden gleam in his eyes was gone, leaving behind a cold, green light. “That’s why I’m not going to be here any longer than I fucking have to.”
Chloe studied his strong, handsome face. Okay, so she wasn’t the only one with Daddy issues. Van had them too.
Curiosity stirred inside her and she was tempted to ask him what was really so bad about protecting Noah’s bottom line. But now wasn’t the time to have that conversation. He probably wouldn’t tell her anyway and besides, she still had other questions. “How long have you known? That Noah wasn’t my father?”
“Only since I got that letter. Like I said, he told me not to tell you about it, but I thought that was bullshit. I thought you needed to know.” He sat up straighter, his gaze piercing. “Was I wrong?”
She lifted her chin instinctively, as if the question was a challenge. “No. I’d much rather know the truth than be lied to. And Dad always did tell a lot of lies.”
Van’s gaze ran over her, doing that checking thing again, as if scanning her for injuries. She didn’t like it. It made her feel like she wasn’t as fine as she told herself she was.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she snapped. “I’m okay, I told you.”
He didn’t react, his cool stare meeting hers. “What other lies did he tell you?”
But she didn’t want to talk about that, not right now. Ignoring him, she said, “So I guess that’s why Dad couldn’t leave me the ranch, right? Because de Santis might potentially use me to get it for himself?”
“Yeah. That’s pretty much it. You’re de Santis’s target and while that’s the case, Dad couldn’t leave you anything.”
De Santis was targeting her. De Santis, her father, was targeting her.
That sickness twisted again inside her and she had to turn away all of a sudden, taking a few steps toward the windows, keeping her arms wrapped tightly around herself. “What did Dad think de Santis was going to do?” She had to force the question out.
“Think about it.” Van’s voice came from behind her, much closer than she’d expected, and then she became aware of his scent, the spiciness of a rain-soaked forest and the musk of clean, male sweat. It made it difficult to concentrate on what he was saying. “If you owned the ranch,
guess who your closest living relative is?”
“I get it.” She stared unseeing at the buildings opposite, her awareness helplessly centering on the man standing just behind her. “Dad didn’t want to risk leaving me anything in case de Santis had me killed so he could inherit it.” It was a brutal truth, but she saw no point in trying to soften it.
Van said nothing, but then he didn’t have to. It was obvious.
The building opposite began to waver, and it was strange how the expanse of brick seemed to shudder in the air while the ground beneath her feet remained completely stable. And then she realized that it was wavering because of the tears in her eyes.
This was stupid. Finding out she wasn’t Noah’s daughter didn’t change anything. Didn’t make any difference to a relationship that hadn’t really been there in the first place.
Yeah, but that blood tie was the only connection you had with him.
“Chloe.” Van’s voice held a warm note and she had a sudden, intense urge to turn around and put her head against that strong chest of his the way she had yesterday.
Not that she would. She had her pride. She wouldn’t let herself be vulnerable again and she certainly wasn’t going to let herself be hurt again, not by anyone.
“I know you keep wanting to make sure that I’m fine.” She turned around and met his gaze head-on. “Well, I am. Got it?”
* * *
She wasn’t fine, though. He could see it in the way she stood—the way her shoulders hunched as if bracing for some kind of impact—the tight expression on her face, and the brittle quality to her voice.
No, if anything, she was just barely holding it together.
But that was good. He didn’t want her to fall apart the way she had yesterday, because he wasn’t here to comfort her. He was here to protect her, and telling her the truth, giving her all the facts, was part of that. Plus, there was his weird physical reaction to her when he’d put his arms around her the day before, and he definitely didn’t want that coming back.
The Dangerous Billionaire Page 8