Restless (Fractured Farrells: A Damaged Billionaire Series, #4)

by Mallory Crowe

  “You should never make a deal when you have this much to lose.”

  “Say yes while you can. This offer won’t always be on the table.” The confident words were belied by the fact that she was still leaning on him for support. She could probably stand on her own at this point, but she didn’t want to move. Which made her wonder how far she would’ve gone if he hadn’t stopped.

  She would’ve regained control of herself eventually. Probably. Maybe.

  “I need to leave for a while.”

  Ashley leaned back until their foreheads didn’t touch. “Where are you going?” He could help her here. She could convince him here. This connection they had, whatever it was, was tangible. It was real and binding. But if he left, he could convince himself it didn’t exist. That he could help her some other way.

  What if Geoff sent the cops back? Or, worse, what if Geoff showed up himself?

  “Logan was released from prison this morning. I need to be at the office and get things ready.”

  Well, hell. She couldn’t get between him and his family. Maybe if he were anyone else, but Alex always put his family first. If Logan truly was getting out of prison, she was lucky Alex was even talking to her at all.

  Ashley’s hands fell from Alex’s shoulders, and she stepped back. “I’m glad you’re getting your brother back,” she said honestly.

  Alex was quiet for a moment, and she couldn’t help but think he was looking for a way to let her down easy. “I’m going to think about it,” he finally said.

  “What?” She didn’t know whether she was misunderstanding him or just imagining things.

  “Your offer. I’m going to think about it.”

  Before she could say anything, he disengaged from her completely. “Make yourself at home while I’m gone. Jones will get you anything you need.”

  9 Years Ago

  Ashley took the stairs two at a time. She couldn’t be in this house for one minute longer. Even with the massive square footage, oversized windows, and tall ceilings, she felt suffocated and surrounded.

  So she ran to the only place she could even pretend to have freedom. She reached the wall at the edge of the property. The waves creeped up and down, but the swells weren’t that tall. Maybe a foot. She dropped her towel, and the warm summer sun mixed with the cool breeze on her skin. The suit was as modest as a bikini could be, but she still felt exposed.

  She always felt exposed here. This was supposed to be her home, but every day things just got worse. Taking one long, steadying breath, she let gravity take over as she tipped forward and jumped into the ocean.

  The cold water was like a slap in the face, but Ashley didn’t mind. It was refreshing. It was real. The ocean this far north was cold. She knew it. It didn’t pretend to be anything different than cold. She forced her muscles to work through the cold and started to swim away from the wall. The waves seemed bigger now that she was swimming through them, but she pumped her legs and reached forward with her arms.

  It felt so good to be able to truly stretch. Even if she knew she’d have to turn back soon enough, she was out in the water now, and everything was going to be okay.

  “Ashley!” she heard in the distance.

  She stopped mid-stroke and turned right as she saw the big splash in the water. Then a head bobbed up and down and she realized that splash was caused by a person. She kicked and pumped her arms as she swam back toward the wall. A second later, she got a better view of the person crazy enough to jump in with her. Alex.

  It was harder to swim back because the current was against her, but Alex swam toward her, and they met in the middle. Before she could say anything to him, he set an arm around her waist and started to pull her back toward the wall.

  What the—? “Stop!” She tried to turn in his arms, but there was nowhere to get leverage, and when she struggled too much, they both ducked under a wave and came up sputtering. “Leave me alone!”

  “I’m saving you, you idiot,” he said between breaths as he kept kicking toward the wall.

  “Saving me!” A wave hit her and she blinked to clear her eyes.

  Alex reached the wall and grabbed onto the ladder with one hand while the other still held her tight. “You can’t swim in here, you moron. All it takes is one stray current and you’ll be halfway to Manhattan in minutes.”

  “You’re the moron who jumped in after me!” She grabbed a rung of the ladder and faced him. The water had been cold before, but now that she was half out of it, the air felt like little needles stinging her skin. “I’ve been swimming my entire life. I can handle some waves.”

  “You’re going to lose feeling in your muscles before you even decide to turn back. Fuck, Ashley, we have a pool for a reason!”

  “An infinity pool. It makes you think it goes on forever, but it’s a lie. At least the ocean is the ocean.”

  Alex stared at her as if she were insane, and she had a feeling she’d finally rendered him speechless.

  She shook her head and another wave pushed up against them, refreezing the skin that got splashed. The warm air was negated by the breeze, and Ashley gave up. So much for her taste of freedom.

  She started up the ladder. It was a four-foot climb to the top, and she tried not to think about the fact that she was only in a bright, neon-pink bikini and Alex was getting a front-row view of her backside as she climbed. Once she got inside, she could go into her room and die of embarrassment like she wanted.

  Except he had more than just imagination to guide him. He’d actually seen what she looked like naked. Crap. Not the memory she wanted popping up right now. She reached the top of the ladder and ran for her towel, wrapping it around herself as Alex climbed over the edge of the stone wall. Except her anger at him faded when she saw him.

  He was fully dressed in jeans, a shirt, and even his sneakers. The shoes were what did her in. He didn’t even stop to take them off before he jumped in. He thought she was in trouble, and even knowing the currents were dangerous, he acted immediately. Stupid man.

  She held the towel out to him. “Here,” she said as the breeze got stronger and her hand started to shake.

  His brows drew together as he glared at the towel without taking it. “You’re the one who’s half naked.”

  “And your clothes are soaking wet. Not exactly warm. Just take the towel, Alex.”

  “There are closets full of towels inside.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I’m trying to thank you!”

  “Thank me by not getting hypothermia in the middle of fucking summer!” he shouted back.

  Ashley let out an exasperated sigh and threw the towel on the ground. If he wasn’t going to take it, she sure as hell wouldn’t use it. Wrapping her arms around herself, Ashley half walked and half ran across the yard and to the back door. When she pulled it open, she could see Alex close behind, holding the towel in his hands, but not using it to dry any of his still dripping clothes or hair.

  She pulled the door open and carefully walked over the marble floor so she wouldn’t slip and cause even more embarrassment.

  After two right turns and a left, she was at the laundry and storage room. She grabbed a few towels out of the closet and handed one to Alex as he followed her in and wrapped another around herself. She’d convinced herself she wasn’t that cold, but once the soft cotton was warming her up, she started to shiver in earnest.

  She still held the towel out to Alex, hoping he’d actually take the stupid thing now, but all he did was glare angrily at her as he pulled off his soaking wet shirt and slam it onto the ground. As he reached for the button of his pants, her first reaction was to look away, but it was already too late. She’d seen more than she ever wanted to see already.

  Why did he have to be pretty? He was already rich. Wasn’t that enough? For some reason, she thought Alex would look like Walter. A little pudgy and soft. Kind of like a man who knew he didn’t have to do anything to get a woman as pretty as Nadia to “love” him.

  But Alex had the sculp
ted chest and stomach of a man who had no qualms about jumping fully dressed into a supposedly dangerous ocean to save someone he didn’t even like.

  He took the towel from her hand, and she gave him a few seconds to cover up before she allowed herself to look again.

  “Want to tell me what the hell you were doing out there?” He wiped his hair and arms down. He still wore boxers, which she supposed covered as much as a swimsuit would. But Ashley couldn’t help but feel as though she were doing something she shouldn’t be.

  “I was just blowing off some steam.”

  “Next time can you go out and get drunk like a normal teenager?”

  “That’s illegal.”

  He scoffed and she had a feeling legal didn’t mean much to him. “Didn’t stop me.”

  “I feel like my entire life is spinning out of control, and I don’t think poisoning myself until I’m literally not able to make decisions would make me feel better.”

  Alex shook his head as he wrapped the towel around his waist. “Then you’re not drinking right.”

  One second, he scolded her for swimming in the ocean; the next, he tried to get her to drink. Well, no one ever accused the Farrells of making sense. She needed to get to her room where she could work on the intense process of pretending this day never happened.

  She started to go past Alex, but he reached out and grabbed her arm. “Why were you really out there? Why did you want to be in control?”

  She thought about telling him it was none of his business, but she sighed and decided to tell him the truth. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t noticed. “I wanted an escape because Nadia didn’t come home last night.” And considering Walter was out of town on business, that meant Nadia had probably been out all night partying and ended up who knew where for the night. Knowing her mother’s appetites, it probably wasn’t on a friend’s couch.

  Alex, for his part, played the gentleman. “I thought she might be visiting friends.” Ashley cocked her head and raised a brow. “Fine. I hoped she was visiting friends. I wasn’t going to say anything to Walter.”

  “Guys like Walter will always find out. Even if he isn’t keeping tabs on my mom, someone will tell him. People love to tell someone bad news.” This wasn’t the first of Nadia’s marriages that Ashley had seen fall apart. She knew the phases all too well. She pulled her arm free from Alex’s grasp and he let her go.

  “Ashley,” he called as she reached the end of the hall.

  She stopped but didn’t turn.

  “Don’t do something stupid like jump in the ocean again, okay?”

  She scoffed at his warning. “Alex,” she said. “Don’t do something stupid like go jumping in the ocean after random women.”

  One Week Later

  “What do you mean you’re getting married?”

  Alex knew sooner or later one of his brothers would show up, but this was sooner than he ever expected. As in less than an hour after he’d even told anyone. Less than an hour after he’d even admitted it to himself.

  “Nathan,” he said carefully as he continued to pull folders out of the filing cabinet next to his desk. Even though Robert was no longer taking as big of a role at Farrell Enterprises, Alex hadn’t been able to move into the bigger office. His own office was still on a corner and even though it was marginally smaller, the trouble of moving hadn’t been worth the few extra square feet.

  “I thought you’d be with Logan.” When he’d called the youngest brother to tell him about the trouble Logan and Julie were in, Alex had expected Nathan to rush to the side of the brother he hadn’t seen in ten years. Not show up at the office to interrogate Alex before he could even get out of the city.

  “Trust me, the office isn’t my favorite place to be, and you know I wanted to see Julie.”

  “Not Logan?”

  “I trust Logan to take care of himself. Some guy just tried to kill a friend of mine. That worries me.”

  Alex thought back to how protective Logan had been over Julie. Thought about the crazed look in his eye when Julie had been threatened. “I don’t think you need to worry about Julie anymore.”

  “I’m picking up on that. Which is why I’ve decided to move my worrying onto you. Which is especially disturbing since I don’t make a habit of worrying.”

  Alex had to agree with that. Of all his family he expected to question him first, it would be Robert. Nathan was dead last on the list.

  But these were all questions he should get used to answering. No time like the present. “Okay, then. Yes, I am getting married. Yes, it’s to Ashley. What more do you need to know?”

  Nathan raised his brow in the way that let him know that he wasn’t about to take any of the bull Alex was feeding him. “I remember Ashley, you know. I was in Europe the summer Walter and Nadia were pretending they could have a functional marriage, but I met Ashley a few times.”

  “A few times a long time ago,” pointed out Alex. Whatever he thought he knew about Ashley, a lot had happened in the last nine years.

  “She’s pretty,” said Nathan. “Very pretty.”

  Even though it was a compliment, Alex knew it wasn’t a good thing. “You think I saw a pretty face and started throwing engagement rings around?” That reminded him. He needed to pick up a ring. Fuck. Did he surprise her with it? Or would she want to pick it out? It wasn’t as if he knew her tastes. With her mother, it had been easy. As long as it was pretty and sparkly, Nadia was happy. Ashley had never seemed that simple.

  “I think it’s not like you to get married to a woman none of us had any idea you were seeing. I hate to say this, but it sounds like something I would do.”

  Alex scoffed. “You’d never get married.”

  “Yeah, but if I did, it would be under some stupid circumstance like this. Come on, Alex. You can tell me anything. Does she have something on you? Is she pregnant? Because we can make sure the kid has a great life without needing to attach the ball and chain to you.”

  Alex wanted to be offended at the idea, but he knew if the roles were reversed, he’d be asking all the same questions. “I’m not being blackmailed, no one is pregnant, and if you ask me again, I won’t be nearly as nice about it, understand?”

  Nathan held up his hands in surrender. “Won’t ask again.” But Alex could tell that Nathan’s mind was still working and trying to solve the riddle. “So you just had a hankering for marriage?”

  “I’m old enough. I want to have kids before I’m geriatric. Ashley is gorgeous, I get along with her, and she knows our skeletons more than most. I don’t see a downside,” he lied. He still had just as many doubts as he’d had when Ashley had first banged down his door. Only now he admitted that he wasn’t strong enough to turn her away.

  This way he could help her and still have her to himself. As much as he liked to think he was a modern, progressive man, the caveman part of him couldn’t wait to get back to the house. To tell Ashley that she was going to be his and he wasn’t going to ever let her go.

  Nathan still didn’t look convinced. “You know I’m the king of bad decisions. But I also know I can rely on you to be there to tell me that I’m making a mistake. Don’t you want the same from me?”

  Alex grabbed the last of the folders he wanted from his drawer and slammed them on his desk. “If I wanted your opinion, I would’ve asked.”

  “And if I were a shitty brother, I would’ve waited until you asked. But luckily we’re at Brady Bunch levels of closeness right now.”

  Alex grabbed the last few papers he thought he’d need during his excursion with Ashley and packed it all into the roller bag he’d brought with him. He knew he didn’t have to explain himself to Nathan. Hell, of all of his family, Nathan had the least right to come into his office uninvited and start asking for explanations.

  But it was worse because Alex didn’t have any good explanation to give. How could he tell Nathan that after all the lectures and talks they’d had, Alex had almost done something a thousand times worse? Even though he’d kept hi
mself from Ashley when she was fifteen, he’d never felt victorious or as if he’d regained his control. Instead, all he felt was like he’d missed out on something. Something that could’ve been great.

  Alex made his way to the elevator without looking at Nathan, but he heard his brother following him.

  “I’m not expecting a wedding gift,” he told his brother. They both stepped into the elevator once it reached the executive level.

  “Good, because I suck at getting presents. Apparently Doug Williams wasn’t too impressed with the box of condoms I gave him at his wedding. But I knew that marriage wasn’t going to last and figured the less kids the better.”

  Alex tried not to smile at that little stunt. And it wasn’t a little box of condoms. It was an industrial case with thousands. Even though it was a dick move, it was Nathan’s way of wishing the couple lots of sex and a stress-free divorce. Sweet in his own asshole way. “I think you not giving us a wedding gift is your wedding gift.”

  Nathan patted him on the shoulder. “I knew you’d understand.” When the doors opened, Nathan walked out first and turned so he was walking backward while he talked to Alex. “Whatever you do, remember to prenup the hell out of it, and for the love of God, don’t have kids with this woman.”

  “With Ashley.” It wasn’t as if it was a stranger he’d never met.

  “With that woman. I already have to deal with Colin fucking Carter being a member of the family. I don’t want to have to pretend I like anyone else. I’m not that good of an actor.”

  That was a lie. Nathan could lie with the best of them, but Alex knew where his brother was coming from. “I know what I’m doing,” said Alex.

  Nathan snorted and shook his head before he turned right as they reached the revolving door at the front of the Farrell Enterprises building. At the street, Alex’s car was waiting for him. One of the employees had grabbed it from the parking structure for him. He nodded his thanks to the man and slipped him a tip.

  “You’re going to leave me alone and visit Logan now, right?” Alex put his bag of documents into the backseat.