by Sierra Rose
He hesitated again before letting out a humorless laugh. “Your three-month sentence is up, Abby. Consider it time served. You’re no longer required to love me.”
“But I do, Nick. I do love you.”
Even as the syllables tumbled out, I was shocked to hear them. It was the first time either one of us had dared to confess it, those little words that had been too big for two fearless people, so powerful that they now froze Nick where he stood, like a wide-eyed statue in the setting sun. A deafening quiet rang out between us, even louder than the splashing of the tide against the beach, but he didn’t seem capable of breaking it. The paralysis went on so long that I feared he would suffocate for lack of breath.
“Uh...Nick?”
His lips parted, and I braced for the quintessential Nicholas Hunter reply, but all that came out was a quiet, bewildered voice with a mousey-sounding question: “Why would you say that?”
A literal ache throbbed deep in my chest in the wake of his vulnerability, the almost childlike innocence he exhibited in response to such a basic fact. “Nick, how could I not love you?” I asked, and this time, I reached for him without restraint. Wrapping my fingers tentatively around his wrists, I pulled him a step closer.
“But you left,” he said softly, his mask cracking for a split second, just long enough for me to see the hurt I’d caused. “If you really love me, how could you—”
“I’m sorry,” I said flatly, not ready to offer him anything more. I certainly couldn’t explain my real reason, couldn’t possibly tell him that I panicked over my unspoken pregnanancy. At the very least, I could apologize, and I owed him that, because the last thing I ever meant to do was pour any hurt into those beautiful eyes of his. “I-I shouldn’t have done it, just run away,” I said, the words tumbling out of me faster than I anticipated. It was as if a dam had burst, releasing a flood of insecurity. “Nick, what we were doing was...crazy. Not only that, but the whole city was in on it. That hotel was full of all your father’s guests, and I just didn’t think I could take being paraded around in front of them again, another giant spectacle—”
He interrupted by closing the distance between us and pulling me into his arms. His entire body relaxed in utter relief as he held me against him, breathing lightly into my hair. “I know,” he said softly. “I know.”
It felt so good to let all that out, even if it wasn’t everything he was entitled to know. It was really only a half-truth; the other half was growing within my body and hiding deep in my mind. Still, there was truth there, to some degree, and I had to do something to remedy the pain I had caused.
“I’m sorry,” I said again, burying my face in his chest. “I couldn’t... I just couldn’t—”
A hand came up to stroke the back of my hair, soothing away the panic and lulling me into a reassuring calm as I breathed in silent gasps of his intoxicating scent. “Don’t be sorry,” he murmured. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For putting you through all that.” His arms tightened, crushing me even closer still. “Abby, you should’ve told me. If I knew, I would have found a way to get you out of it. I could’ve told them you had food poisoning or something.”
I pulled away and let out a sudden laugh, remembering my own evasive plan. “I taught you well, grasshopper.”
He stared back with a tentative grin. “Apparently not as well as I’ve taught you, Abby-san.” He spread his arms, gesturing at the vastness of the deserted South American beach. “Peru, Abigail? Really?”
I blushed and stared down at my toes that were still buried in the sand. “It was the first flight out of town,” I defended with a shrug, then flashed him a look of sudden curiosity. “Hey, that begs a question.”
“Shoot.”
“Fancy running into you here.”
“James let me borrow his plane.”
I shook my head. Amazed, but not surprised all at the same time. Of course he did. Because like every kid who grows up in a privileged sandbox, you silver spooners learn to share your eight million-dollar toys. Your daddies can always buy you new ones if you break ‘em, right?
I covered my face in an effort to disguise a groan that suddenly sprang up within me, and I felt a red heat in my cheeks. “Nick, I ruined everything. We finally got out from under your father’s thumb, and—”
“Hey, I don’t care about any of that.” He pulled my hands away from my face, forcing me to look in his eyes. “You’re going to get on that plane with me. You hear me? More than that, I want you to want to get on that plane. I want you to...come home.”
Home? I pondered, another first for the two of us, as the shared penthouse had been little more than a mailing address before.
“I’ll do whatever it takes to get you there.” His eyes shone with sincerity, burning deep into my own. “But only if it’s what you want. I hope you know I’ll do anything in the world for you. I’d never make you stay or go someplace you don’t want to be.” He pulled in a shaky breath as he offered me one final out. “Don’t worry about sparing my feelings. Just tell me what you really want. You’re not obligated to go back. If you want, I’ll get back on the plane and fly back by myself, and you can, uh...” His eyes roved manically out toward the water. “You can stick around here and become a beach bum or some sort of oyster fisherman or—”
I cut him off with a kiss, the most freeing kiss we’d ever experienced, like coming up for air. It went on for what felt like an eternity, as passionate as it was tender, so long that before we allowed our lips to part, the sun dipped beneath the water. Before we knew it, we were under a blanket of stars. It wasn’t until the moon glittered its silvery whiteness upon the little beach that we finally pulled away.
Our eyes sparkled as we shared a long, silent look, but then Nick cocked his head toward the parking lot and offered a little grin. Together, we walked through the sand, with his arm wrapped around my waist, my sandals dangling from my wrist, and a pair of beaming smiles lighting our faces.
“So,” I asked as we climbed into the sports car he’d rented at the airstrip, “how did you find me anyway? I could have been anywhere in the world.”
He pulled on his seatbelt before reaching over to pull mine across my body and click it. “The second we decided to get serious, I had my people install a tracking device in one of your teeth.”
I grinned, froze temporarily, then nervously grinned again. “DPS, huh?”
“What?”
“Dental positioning system?”
He gave me a wink. “You’ll never know which one. I think we’ll patent them, call ‘em, uh...Inspysors.”
I suppressed a little giggle as the engine revved to life.
“But seriously, it wasn’t hard. I tracked you down with a few phone calls. And for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why you went to Peru, so I had to come. I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“I should’ve known I could never hide.”
Nick didn’t pull out of the parking lot. Instead, he glanced down at his hands before giving me a thoughtful look. “I know I said I understood, but... Well, now I’m confused. What exactly made you decide to leave?”
I paused for a moment, trying to come up with a plausible excuse, and I found my perfect answer in an echo of the words he’d said to me on the beach. “It made sense at the time.”
Our eyes met, and his face softened with a pensive smile. Then he threw the car into gear, stepped down on the gas, and we shot off into the night.
Chapter 3
I slept the entire way back to New York. The emotional and physical exhaustion of the day finally caught up with me. By the time I woke up, we were circling above Manhattan like a chrome-plated eagle, searching for the best place to land.
I glanced around for Nick and, much to my surprise, found him sitting in the cockpit with the pilot, a pair of giant headphones nestled within his golden-brown hair. Their heads were bent together, and it was hard to hear much of what they were saying, but I disti
nctly heard someone say “Your father...” before Nick gave a sharp shake of his head. A few seconds later, the plane curved off in the opposite direction, to an airstrip on the far side of the island.
As Nick clapped the pilot on the back and slid off the headphones, I quickly scrambled back to my seat; I certainly didn’t want him to realize I’d been eavesdropping, and to be honest, I wasn’t completely sure what I’d heard anyway. By the time he reemerged through the cabin door, I was already putting on a good act, spreading my arms open and letting out a wide yawn.
“Morning, sleepyhead.” He flashed an affectionate grin and settled down beside me, wrapping his long fingers around my shoulders in a sweet massage. “Sweet dreams?”
From pilot to masseuse. Is there anything this man isn’t good at?
I closed my eyes and leaned automatically into him. “Bad ones actually.” I peeked up at him through my lashes. “I dreamt I got this crazy idea in my head and took off to Peru, just left everything I care about behind in a city of smog.”
Nick’s eyes met mine, and his fingers tightened, giving me a little squeeze. “That crazy idea ended okay though.”
An automatic flush swept through my body, warming my face with a tentative smile. “Yeah, I guess you could say that,” I said, although the secret that really drove me down there remains. Pushing that precarious thought purposely from my head, I glanced out the window. “Where are we going?” I asked, feigning surprise. “Aren’t we headed back to the penthouse?”
On any other day, Nick would have seen through the false surprise at once, but on this particular occasion, he was too busy pretending himself. “No. I, uh...” He raked a casual hand through his hair. “Actually, I’ve got another condo, on the far side of the city. I thought we might go there instead.”
I shot him a questioning look.
“Less press and everything,” he quickly explained and justified.
Less press? Translation: less of Daddy Dearest, who’s surely waiting for him back home with his claws out, ready to pounce. Nevertheless, he had a point when it came to the media.
My entire body stiffened, then deflated with a soft sigh. “I’m sure those media maniacs will be all over this like frenzied sharks,” I said. A painful wince shot across my face, a preemptive echo of the flashbulbs and screams soon to come. “Talk about a bad dream. That’ll be a nightmare.”
Nick pursed his lips but said nothing at first. He had a tendency to protectively sugarcoat things every once in a while, but he was never one to lie. The press was going to be horrible, and we both knew it. “We’ll stay inside as much as we can, send the staff out for anything we need,” he finally assured me.
Wow, that sounds like fun. House arrest for the man who can’t stand to be in the same country for longer than any amount of time.
He caught me staring and shrugged, as if it couldn’t possibly matter less. “I’ve dealt with bad press before, Abby. We’ll handle it.”
I flashed him a weak smile and rubbed my eyes. Sure, it was a kind sentiment, but I could tell that there was a lot that wasn’t being said. Certainly he’d been a victim of press bullying before, but we’d never been through it together, a whole other thing entirely. I knew the press would treat us 100 percent differently as a couple, especially because we were really unofficial Manhattan royalty who appeared to be struggling. I was sure it would be a media blowout the likes of which we’d never seen. Inquiring minds would want to know, and every tweet, blog, and Facebook post would be happy to oblige them with all sorts of so-called news about us as soon as they sank their teeth into the first tasty morsel of gossip they could exaggerate or distort for shock value.
“This is the captain speaking. Please fasten your seatbelts as we prepare to land.”
As if reading my thoughts, Nick kicked my shoe, settled back in his own chair, and flashed me a little grin. “Whatever it is, it can’t be as bad as Argentina.”
My eyes narrowed into an automatic glare as the recollection struck me, the two of us trapped with four Washington Post journalists during the rainy season, four reporters who really hated getting wet.
“That was different,” I snapped, fighting back a reluctant grin. Argentina had long been a sore subject for Nick and me, one of those hot-button issues we seldom brought up. I staunchly maintained that the entire incident was his fault, but Nick just as staunchly maintained his innocence. “We were trapped in a fishing village, and they had no signal. By the time the boat came back, you’d already rescued Henry from that rabid parrot. There was no way he’d print a bad story about you after that.”
Nick pursed his lips, wisely choosing not to push the envelope. “Well, what about Prague? Surely nothing could beat that.”
My eyebrows lifted slowly, and I sat up a little straighter in my seat. “Do you really want to bring that up, now that you have a girlfriend?”
The smile vanished from his face as he placed the old story in an incriminatingly new context. He shifted uncomfortably as the memory of a Bohemian princess died in his eyes. “No, ma’am,” he decided.
A sudden smile broke through my teasing, and I fought the need to jump him right there in his chair. I guess boarding school works. Those manners pop up at all the right times.
The plane skidded to a stop on the slick runway, and the moment thankfully passed.
Whether Nick had delivered us there to avoid his father or not, it was a brilliant move in terms of the press. I didn’t see a single photographer as we hurried down the fold-out stairs and into a waiting Town Car. This, coming from a woman whose career it’s been to spot them, I thought with a smirk and a shake of my head. The driver took off without a word from Nick, and less than a minute after landing, we were flying down the dark New York streets.
A baby. You’re going to have a baby, his baby, my mind taunted when I glanced over at my backseat companion. You have to tell him...sooner rather than later. He deserves to know, damn it!
For a split second, I almost spilled the beans about our little bambino. Despite all my planning and excruciating self-control, I almost blurted the big secret right there in the Town Car. However, just as I opened my mouth to speak, Nick loosened his collar and slid half a foot closer to me on the leather seat, then closed his eyes and leaned his head back in utter exhaustion. “I missed you,” he said, words that caught me completely off guard, stopping mine in their tracks.
I cocked my head curiously to the side.
He flashed me a crooked grin. “Less than a day, Abby. I already missed you before a whole day even passed.” He ran his fingers up over his face, chuckling quietly at his own uncharacteristic dependence. “What the fuck have you done to me, Wilder?”
No, not now. I can’t tell him now.
My confession vanished on my tongue as I scooted closer to him and slipped discreetly under his arm. “I believe they call it...whipped.”
He laughed again, and something about the sound of his chuckle sent a host of shivers up my spine. Nick wasn’t exactly a whipped kind of guy, so I knew that little joke was going to come back to bite me, one way or another. Not only that, but Nick tends to bite hard!
“Whipped, huh?” he repeated, as if the word amused him greatly. “Whipped, whipped, whipped.” He turned it over on his tongue a few more times and smiled. “I’ll have to remember that.”
Yep, I’m in big trouble.
“So... What are we going to do about your father?” I asked quickly, trying to change the subject. It was a question we were going to have to answer sooner or later, and I figured it was probably better to get it out of the way ASAP. “I mean, I don’t even know what happened after I left. Did you end up going to the party?”
A sudden chill seemed to hang in the air, as if the driver had turned the air conditioning on full blast.
“No, I didn’t,” Nick said after a sigh, stiffening. “I assumed it’d look less conspicuous if we were both no-shows. I’m sure my father will appreciate that logic.”
He spoke quickl
y, as if eager to be done with it, but I’d known his family long enough to understand the extreme sacrifice in those words. For him, “less conspicuous” might have been a valid excuse, but there was obviously a bit more to it than that: He was purposely giving Mitchell Hunter another target on which to center his rage. If only I had gone AWOL, he would have called out the bloodhounds and had me offed right then and there. On the other hand, with both of us absent, he wouldn’t know where to place the blame, and he’d have to cut his disappointment in two equal shares anyway.
As I pondered that, I felt a slight tightening in my chest, and my eyes misted over with tears. Even when Nick thought I was completely fucking him over, he still did all he could to protect me. That’s the father of my child...and that’s why I have to tell him!
“We’re here.”
For the second time that evening, the confession died on my lips. My head snapped up, and I gazed curiously at the classic New York brownstone. It was really no different than the ten or twelve others on the block, pricy but not prohibitively so. It was an unfamiliar place to me, because even during our two years of working together, I’d never seen it.
He glanced up at the smooth, ivy-covered stone before offering me his arm. I took it without a word, and together, the two of us proceeded inside.
“What is this place?” I murmured, crawling out of the car behind him.
“It’s my hideaway,” he said softly, “the place I go when I wanna stay in the city but prefer to have some time to myself, away from all the hustle and bustle. The deed’s in someone else’s name, so no one knows about it. I paid for this pad in cash when I was seventeen.”
He rifled around in his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. A second later, the two of us stepped into a shadowy living room that smelled inexplicably of cinnamon.
“This whole place belongs to Eric Silverton,” he continued. “No press, no cameras, and no chance that we’ll be disturbed if...” he said, trailing off suddenly when the lights flicked on.