Preston gasped. “Friends with benefits? Used to have? Were?” He repeated all the offending words Ethan had said.
“Don’t act surprised. You knew what we were,” Ethan said, voice cold.
“I didn’t know it was over.”
I felt my eyes widen, and I whispered, “You never broke up with him?”
“There was no relationship for me to break off,” he said gently.
“He seemed to think there was,” Beau pointed out.
“Who are you people anyway?” Preston asked, taking on a haughty tone. Reaching up, he smoothed his blue tie and then glanced at mine with derision.
I hated ties.
“This is my boyfriend whom I love and asked to move in with me.”
Beau made a noise and looked at me. “You never told me that.”
“I’ve been busy,” I retorted.
“Must be pretty convenient to have a lay in different countries. You got one in France too?” Earth asked, voice lazy.
I made a sound.
“I don’t have a lay in every country,” Ethan said, gritting his teeth. “I only have Fletcher. I only want him. I haven’t seen Preston in months. Certainly not since I got involved with Fletcher.”
“Don’t lie, lover,” Preston said, his voice smooth and sly.
Oh God, that word. The horrible images it conjured up. My stomach roiled, and I found myself grateful it was empty because, if it wasn’t, I’d already have emptied it on the shiny floor.
Ethan’s face went dark. The kind of dark I’d only ever seen Earth pull off. It scared me, made my heart pound.
“Ethan,” I squeaked, starting forward.
But he was already looking at Preston who also had noted the look on his face and was recoiling rapidly.
“I-I-I—”
“Lying is not becoming, Preston,” Ethan nearly growled. “And it’s also very dangerous. You know full well what I am capable of, so I advise that you do not push me.”
“Who says he’s lying?” Earth asked, not even blinking at Ethan’s wrath.
“Me!” Preston confessed. “I was lying.”
“Who to believe?” Earth practically sang.
My voice was shaky, but I spoke up. “I heard them earlier, before they saw me. I heard Preston say he hadn’t seen Ethan in so long.”
Earth grunted, glaring at Ethan. “Lucky bastard.”
“I think it’s best if you go,” Ethan told Preston. “Thank you for coming all this way to sign the papers. I will be sure my father meets you in the offices tomorrow to finalize everything. Despite the way our, ah, personal relationship has ended, I can assure you that I will respect the business deal as the professional that I am.”
Preston’s mouth dropped open. Closed. His brown eyes swung to me, assessing, glaring… judging.
Ethan made a sound, shifting between us to block me from sight.
I felt Preston glare even though Ethan stood in his way. “What’s he have that I don’t?”
“My heart.”
The silence that followed Ethan’s declaration was poignant. It filled the air until those shiny shoes of Preston’s clicked across the floor as he left.
“Make sure he leaves,” Ethan ordered.
I thought my brothers would laugh in his face. No one ever told them what to do. Especially Earth. Surprisingly, they retreated after Preston quietly, doing as E had asked.
“I’ll be right back,” Earth mumbled to me as he passed.
When they were gone, the space between Ethan and me turned awkward, the distance seeming much wider than the few feet it was.
“Why didn’t you call out to me? Tell me you were there?” Ethan asked, voice soft.
“Why didn’t you tell me you had a lover?” My voice was not nearly as soft as his.
He stepped forward, reaching out. I stepped back, denying him.
“It was before I met you. I saw no point in bringing it up.”
“Well, maybe if you’d said something, I wouldn’t feel like this right now,” I said, suddenly so tired.
“This is why I said nothing. I was trying to prevent you from being hurt.”
I snorted. Reaching up, I ripped at the blue fabric at my neck. “It always hurts worse when the words come from someone who isn’t you,” I said, giving a final yank to undo the tie.
He stepped forward. “Fletcher.”
The silk made a swishing sound when I pulled it from under my collar, but it was soundless as it hit the floor. “Do you know what it’s like?” I spat. “To walk around this ballroom as a misfit in your world, watching hungry eyes follow you, watching beautiful women press up against you and vie for your attention? To hear a man who is almost as beautiful and probably twice as rich as the women call you his lover?”
He made a sound, but I stepped forward, silencing whatever he might say.
“Have you ever imagined someone else rising over me in bed, blocking out the entire world so the only thing I saw was his face? Not yours. Someone else’s. Have you ever imagined someone else’s fingers sinking deep into my heat and me moaning a name that isn’t yours?”
“Fletcher…” His voice was stricken, and pain flashed in his eyes.
“That’s what it’s been like for me tonight. Seeing all these people your father approves of throwing themselves at you. And what do I do? I stand at the side of the room and disappear into my music so I don’t have to feel the hurt. So I don’t have to keep asking myself when you will eventually realize everything she said is true and abandon me.”
Shock reverberated through his eyes, mixing with the pain. His fingers dug into the backs of my arms, and his breathing was ragged. “I will never abandon you. I don’t want anyone but you.”
Inside his jacket, his cell phone began to ring. And ring.
He ignored it.
“But so many people want you,” I whispered, filled with an incredible ache. Lifting my eyes, I let him see the terrifying vulnerability that I couldn’t seem to get rid of. “How do I compete with that?”
A broken sound left his throat. My body was crushed into his. He held me tight, his palm pressing my head into his chest. The sound of his heartbeat was thunderous and intense. I could nearly feel it pound against my cheek.
“You don’t have to compete, sweetheart. You never have.”
The phone started ringing again, and I pulled away. “You’d better get that.”
“I don’t care about the phone,” he spat, reaching out to take my hand.
“I have to go finish my job.” I tugged free.
“Forget the job.”
I turned back, eyes flashing. “No, I gave you my word. I promised I would play tonight no matter what. I might not have much, but I am a man who honors his commitments.”
“And after?” he asked, insecurity lacing the words.
“I don’t know,” I whispered, turning to walk away.
“Fletcher!” he called, rushing after me, catching me in the doorway to the ballroom.
I was tugged around. Warm, oversized hands cupped my face, and he swooped down, capturing my lips in a heated kiss. Completely shocked, I gasped, and he used the opportunity to invade my mouth, to climb into my body and take over my senses.
Everything fell away, including my hurt and doubt and the gut-wrenching images of him with another. All that remained was the feel of his tongue rubbing mine, his taste bursting in my mouth and my body turning pliant against his.
I don’t know how long we kissed, but when he gently pulled back, my eyelashes fluttered. The soft golden light of the room created a halo around his head, and his eyes stared lovingly into mine.
“I love you,” he rasped, and even if I wasn’t in his arms, those words would be an embrace all their own. “You are my one true love and no one else. I won’t let you get away. You’re mine and mine alone.”
“Okay,” I said dumbly.
Hey, you try and speak when someone kisses you silly.
And in front of an entire ballroom, no
less!
Oh. My. God.
We were in the ballroom. Well, in the doorway. I blinked, trying my best to reach beyond this little bubble. I listened for laughter and music. For clinking glasses and busy waiters.
There was nothing.
Not a single sound.
Thinking perhaps I was still just swept up in only Ethan, I turned my head.
Everyone was staring as if someone had hit pause on the entire room.
Even the people who couldn’t possibly see us were quiet and unmoving, the entire room cast under some kind of sleeping spell.
My eyes went back to Ethan, and his palm rubbed the back of my head. “Y-you kissed me in front of everyone,” I whispered.
“I had to let them know who I belong to.”
“Mine,” I echoed.
“All yours.”
“But what about—”
He made a noise, dipping his head and kissing me once more.
“No one else matters,” he murmured against my lips.
This time, low murmurs began making their way through the room, bouncing up to the very high ceilings, circling the fancy chandeliers.
“We’ll work it out, okay? Together.”
“Okay.”
He smiled the kind of smile that made the corners of his blue eyes crinkle. My heart tumbled in my chest.
“I love you.” Then to the person standing closest, he said, “I love him.”
My face flamed. Surely, it was on fire.
“Go on, then,” he said gently. “Go finish playing so we can go home.”
As I walked, people parted automatically, creating a private path for me to travel. I thought their eyes might feel intrusive, that the words on their tongues would be sharp like barbs.
I didn’t feel their stares or even their words, which, frankly, were probably everything I thought they were.
All I felt in that moment was the tingle on my lips and the music in my heart.
51
Ethan
* * *
The phone in my jacket kept ringing. It was such an interruption to the fluttering of my heart.
Ignoring the obvious stares and shocked murmurs, I pulled it from my jacket to silence the incessant ring.
“What?” I barked into the line without even checking the caller ID.
“Abbott, thank God.”
The familiar voice reminded me I’d been waiting for this call, and the anxiety in his tone made the fluttering of my heart turn to something much more frantic.
“What is it?” I asked, immediately heading back out into the hallway, pressing a finger against my free ear to muffle any background noise.
“I ran the background check as requested.”
“Yes. Yes,” I hurried to say. “And?”
“And technically, Milly Brown does not exist.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, legally, there is no one in this city by the name of Milly Brown.”
“But I know her.”
“You know someone using that name.”
“Then who is she?” I demanded, frustration bubbling up.
“I had someone go into the Grimms and locate her. It was fairly easy. Apparently, the locals there think she’s scary. My man has been following her around since late this morning.”
“And?”
“And he was able to obtain a photo. I ran it through my system, which uses facial recognition. I have to say the results are… shocking.”
Nervous, I spun, looking through the doorway and into the ballroom. Fletcher was near the piano, violin already tucked against his shoulder, music pouring from his pores. I breathed a sigh of relief.
He is okay. As long as he’s okay, then everything else will be too.
“Just tell me.” I spoke urgently, pacing down the hall for more privacy.
“She resembles someone who disappeared from this area about twenty years ago. Emily Bronwin.”
Emily Bronwin… Why does that sound familiar?
Emily Bronwin…
Realization dawned. I gasped.
“She was the prime suspect in the kidnapping of the Cossgrove child. It was assumed she fled the country,” the investigator said.
“You’re telling me…” I stuttered, my brain trying desperately to make sense of what he was saying.
I looked back in Fletcher’s direction. He couldn’t be…
My mother said she wanted my father to know that a part of him was being raised by someone he hates.
Great gods!
“Ethan!” the man yelled in my ear.
My attention snapped back. I hadn’t even realized I’d drifted away, that I’d wandered around the corner. Sweat was gathering between my shoulder blades. My stomach sloshed wildly about.
Impossible…
“Ethan! Please listen to me.”
“I’m here,” I said, my grip tightening on the phone.
“I realize this is a bombshell, but that’s not the most important thing right now.”
“It’s not?” I asked, not realizing I should be bracing myself for something more.
“My man has been following her all day. You need to know where she is right now. You need to be warned.”
“Well, my God, man, spit it out! Where is she?” I yelled into the line.
“She’s at your hotel. She’s inside that ballroom… with you.”
A loud roaring filled my ears as the phone slipped out of my hand.
She’s here?
“Listen to me. I’m not sure how you’ve come to be involved with her, but if she really is this kidnapper, she’s highly dangerous. She’s also a roaring drunk. You need…” His words kept going, but I stopped listening, the chaos in my mind drowning out everything he said.
Milly Brown, aka Emily Bronwin, was here right now. Emily, the woman who kidnapped the Cossgroves’ child and disappeared into the night with him.
Fletcher was that son. He—he wasn’t a misfit after all. He was the Upper East Side’s missing prince.
Overwhelmed by every emotion, my hands shook, and my heart raced. I had to get to him. If she was lurking around, then there was no telling what she would do to keep her secret safe.
“Fletcher,” I whispered, turning to run.
As I did, something heavy smacked into my head.
Momentarily blinded, I swayed on my feet as the world spun around me. Grasping for balance, I grappled at air before dropping onto the floor in darkness.
52
Fletcher
* * *
I got lost in the music again. Despite the utter chaos surrounding me, despite the stares and curiosity trying to knock me off this stage, I was pulled under.
The music that always lived deep inside me, always there to remind me that hope was never completely lost, flowed up and out of the place I normally kept it hidden until it coursed through my limbs. Much like the sun, it chased away the darkness, providing warmth and light, giving me a reason to bloom.
I succumbed to it wholeheartedly, feeling compelled like never before.
The sheet music in front of me turned into nothing but a prop. The pianist, unable to keep up, eventually stopped trying. I played as I loved to, doing what came most naturally, and let the music be my guide.
This melody was wholly mine, the one that kept me going when life tried to bury me deep. I didn’t know where I’d learned this song. It was always just part of me. Perhaps it was the sound of my soul, as Ethan often said. Why else would I know it so perfectly? How else could I play it without ever having been taught?
I swayed with the heavy chords, bent with the melancholy notes, and then rose like a flower blooming under the shining sun when the tune turned cheerful. Swelling with emotion, my fingers moved over the chords, my arm smoothly navigating the bow. This song was like my calling card, a defining piece. When I felt like I was lost and alone, it would lift me up, whispering that out there somewhere, someone loved me.
Embracing everything I felt, I played on
, oblivious to the stares of wonder, the awed expressions, and the whispers of sensation. I didn’t play for them anyway. I did it because if I didn’t, everything I was would be lost.
From out of nowhere a shadow passed over the sun I felt, dimming its light and bringing a chill. The insidious way it wrapped around me made goose bumps lift on my arms and the hair on the back of my neck stand at attention.
The wicked intent was so strong it burst into the world I was so enraptured in, tugging me out and slamming me back into reality. Light flickered beyond the ballroom like a lightning storm in the middle of the night.
Standing just beyond the doorway, in the center of that tempest, was a familiar figure draped in black. The cloak seemed to move with wind that wasn’t there. Perhaps it vibrated with the intensity of her maliciousness. The oversized hood shielded her face, but I didn’t need to lay eyes on it to feel the unrelenting hate focused entirely on me.
I played harder, muscles burning, shoulders aching as if my beautiful melody could combat the darkness lurking at the edges.
It only seemed to make her more incensed as she reached up ominously to pull back the hood, peeling away the concealment to reveal her hollow features brimming with malevolence.
The ear-piercing sound the bow made when it scratched against the violin was that of nails on a chalkboard. The remnants of the song echoed through the quiet room as my chest heaved from the effort, and I stared at the woman whose figure had not disappeared.
She wasn’t a figment of my imagination. Those feelings of being watched had not been in vain all along. It was her. Lurking. Creeping. Proving herself as the villain I’d thought her to be.
She’d come for me. I wasn’t sure why, but she was here nonetheless.
Shattering glass broke the spell she’d cast, making me jolt and glance away. The entire crowd was silent, everyone collectively drawing breath.
A wail followed just behind the shatter, and I spun toward the sound.
Samantha Cossgrove swooned into Henry’s arms, her chest heaving heavily, her lashes fluttering wildly.
“Alexander,” she whispered, lifting her head, which appeared to weigh a thousand pounds. “Alexander.”
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