‘Are you nervous?’ he’d shot back, causing everyone else to laugh.
I’d admitted that I was, and of course that much was true. I was shit scared, actually, but I was certain that my past would work to help me, and I knew I’d use all that had happened to me as a child to become a positive role model. I wouldn’t be like my Dad; I would do the exact opposite. If I just kept that in mind, the rest of it would be okay.
I idly picked up my phone, not really thinking about what I was doing. Before I’d even considered my actions, I’d dialed a number. Riley. I’d promised to call her earlier, to tell her what happened at the press conference, but I hadn’t even prepared myself yet. She was likely going to ask all kinds of questions that she wasn’t going to like the answer to.
“Hello?” she said when she finally picked up. She sounded distracted, which wasn’t what I’d been expecting at all. I’d thought she’d be gagging to know all of the details about the conference, and I thought she’d be about ready to tear me apart.
“Hey, Riley,” I said. “I er…I just wanted to let you know that I’m home from the press conference.”
“Oh, okay. How do you think it went?” she asked.
“It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t the worst thing in the world, either,” I said.
It suddenly hit me just how much I wanted to see her. No, I needed to see her; needed her by my side to get rid of Serra’s shadow, which was still somehow looming over my mind.
“Can you come over?” I added.
“Are you alone?” she asked, finally paying attention. Her tone was cautious—clearly she didn’t want another run in with Serra, and I didn’t blame her for that. If I could avoid her, I’d do the same.
“Yes. I managed to shake her off,” I replied, chuckling awkwardly. This whole thing still felt like a touchy subject, and it was causing some sort of weird tension between us.
“Okay, I’ll head over now, and we can go through what happened at the conference.”
“Sure. Only if you want to,” I said, detecting a hint of caginess in her voice again.
Why the hell was I acting this way? Normally it was my confidence that attracted girls, and I used that to my advantage, but right now I felt like a twelve year old kid who had no idea how to talk to a girl.
“I do,” she insisted quickly. “I’ll see you in a bit.”
The feeling of unease didn’t leave me, long after we hung up the phone. Something was not quite right. What was going on in Riley’s life? Why did it feel like she was hiding something huge? I’d told her so much about my own life right now, so why was she keeping me in the dark? Surely we were beyond just a professional relationship at this point.
I wandered from room to room as I waited for her to arrive; my body restless until I could see her again. I found myself examining my stuff—the things that were always just there in my home, but I never really looked at. I’d hired an interior designer to make my place nice when I’d first moved in, but as I picked up some random odds and ends sitting on a desk in the spacious home office I’d strolled into, I realized that none of it was really me.
And that was how I stumbled across some old photograph albums.
They’d been shoved under some other books I’d haphazardly unpacked all those months before, and they’d been totally ignored since. I’d never wanted to look back, and I’d always had my eyes fixed on the future—onto me as a fighter—but Riley had undoubtedly changed that. Her arrival back in my life had shaken everything up, and now all sorts of emotions were flooding through me.
I wasn’t sure if I liked that or not.
My heart began to race as I flicked one of the albums open to the first page, transporting myself back into those memories. The first image was a happy one—me and Riley, aged about five, jumping in mud puddles. We were ecstatic to be around each other, grinning our little heads off in the photo. I couldn’t help but smile at the moment. We’d seemed so free back then. She’d always made me feel like I could take on the world, and in a way, she still made me feel like that.
The next page brought with it another memory, but not a good one. It was me and my father. He had his arms wrapped around the younger version of me, but even though this was supposed to be a tender moment, I could still see the strain behind my eyes. The alcoholism had been starting to kick in then; my mother’s death finally hitting him hard. She’d gone when I was too young to even remember her, but he hadn’t fully accepted it until then. It was as if he’d been suspended in purgatory and then suddenly decided to descend into hell.
The more he drank, the worse he became. His temper would flare up at almost nothing, and this eventually turned to physical violence. The more frequent this became, the more I began to rely on Riley. I sat back and remembered one of the more horrifying memories.
I raced to Riley’s house, the tears streaming down my cheeks. Blood was pouring from my mouth, and I knew if my father found me again, he’d give me a bleeding nose to match. He’d come back from the bar angry, and I hadn’t done the dishes on time, so he’d just flipped out.
There had been yelling—so much yelling—before he’d finally lashed out.
I was only eight years old, and I couldn’t get my head around why my life was so different to everyone else’s. No one else knew, of course. No one but her—my angel. I was too embarrassed to admit my shitty home life to any of my other friends, in case they confirmed my suspicions that it was my fault.
Riley looked up, hearing the sound of my footfall.
“Oh my gosh…Kaiden!” she shouted, her eyes wide with fear.
She jumped up from where she was playing in the garden and instantly rushed to my side. She threw her arms around me, giving me the love and comfort that I spent my days yearning for, and I sniffled, trying to stop crying.
“Let’s get you cleaned up again,” she said, squeezing my hand. She didn’t even care that I’d gotten blood all over her sweater.
She didn’t need to ask what happened, and I loved that about her. She just knew, and she accepted that this was an unfortunate part of our friendship. I knew she and her Mom had tried to intervene by calling social services, but they’d done nothing to help.
I staggered behind Riley, heading into her bathroom, and she grabbed the first aid kit. She got to work, dabbing Betadine on the cut above my lip and wiping all the blood away. I kept my gaze trained on her the entire time; lost in her eyes as she concentrated. She was only eight years old too, but we’d both been forced to grow up too quickly through my father’s behavior.
At that moment, I decided that Riley Solis would always be in my life.
The media and my fans thought I was a charming, happy-go-lucky guy without a care in the world. None of them knew the truth about my life and background. None of them knew that I got into fighting as a way to defend myself, and as a physical release from all the crap in my past. They all just saw me as a single personality; as the Kaiden Cross they saw in the cage. Riley knew the truth, though. I could trust her not to tell anyone, but it would always be between us, no matter what. It would hang over us forever in an unspoken bond.
Do I love her?
That thought popped into my head so quickly that it actually took me aback for a second. Love? No, whatever I felt for her, it couldn’t be that. I’d loved her as a kid in an innocent way, but I barely knew her anymore. The girl from my photo albums had grown into a woman; one with an entire life that I knew nothing about. It was impossible to love someone you didn’t really know.
At least that’s what I told myself.
My heart started to thump so loudly that I could hear the blood pounding in my ears. I couldn’t think about Riley this way. I needed to push anything like that aside, because we both had too much going on for any of this. Any romantic thoughts were only going to cause extra complications. I didn’t need that, nor did she.
Bzz. The downstairs buzzer sounded, meaning Riley had already arrived.
Shit. I’d thought she wouldn’t be
here for another fifteen minutes at least. My head was all over the place and my insides were dancing with emotion, and I wasn’t going to have any time to get my head straight.
“Erm…Riley?” I said over the intercom. “Come on up. I’m buzzing you in.”
As I heard her move up the stairs a moment later, I sucked in a few deep breaths, trying to calm myself down. She was here to discuss my press conference, my public image, Serra, and my baby. I should have stayed focused on that, and I’d been stupid to drag up bad memories. That was never going to end well. Riley was my PR girl now, not my best friend, and I needed to remember that.
Famous last words.
As soon as my eyes spotted her, I melted all over again. Why did she have to be so damned gorgeous? Her face was makeup-free but flawless, her clothes hugged every curve in the best possible way, and her hair hung naturally, making her look like a goddess. It was like she was trying to make it difficult for me to keep my attraction to her to myself, but at the same time, her beauty was effortless. She couldn’t help being so sexy, and I doubted she even knew the effect she had on men.
“Hi, Kaiden,” she said. She sat down, immediately making herself at home. “How are you?”
“Yeah, I’m all right. I wasn’t entirely honest with you on the phone earlier, though.”
“Oh?”
“Well, the press conference was actually kind of awful,” I admitted.
She nodded slowly. “Yeah, your manager filled me in on the main points of it, and I watched a quick video of it online before I came here,” she said. “Serra seemed to do most of the talking. She really took over, didn’t she?”
She was trying to say that I’d done a crappy job, but in a tactful way, and I nodded, unable to make eye contact with her.
“It doesn’t matter. We can still turn it around,” she added, accepting that there was nothing that could be done at this exact moment.
“I needed you today,” I said quietly. “I think the reason I sucked so badly is because you weren’t there.”
She didn’t say anything in response, only stared at me, and it was as if the room had been swallowed up by a black hole. Clearly, I’d worded that badly and made it sound like I was blaming her, but I couldn’t stop myself from letting the words spill out. I wanted her to know exactly how important she was to me and how much I appreciated her work, but I’d never been the best at phrasing things.
“I’m sorry,” she finally said, her voice breaking over her words. “You’re right. I should’ve been there. I just…”
My eyes snapped up as her voice trailed off. Why did she sound so sad? The way she’d apologized just about broke my damn heart.
“Hey, hey, I wasn’t blaming you,” I said. “I just meant that I feel better when you’re around to help.”
“I know, but I still should’ve been there. I had an important appointment, but I could’ve rescheduled it or…”
She trailed off as if she just couldn’t finish.
“Woah, what’s up, Ri?” I asked, racing to her side. I wanted to touch her; to wrap her up in my arms like she used to do to me, but something was holding me back.
“It’s nothing to do with work. Sorry I brought it up,” she said. She shook her head, obviously frustrated at herself. “We need to decide our next move for you.”
“No,” I said. “No more work stuff right now. It’s obvious that something has been troubling you for a while, so can we just put everything else aside for a moment and be Kaiden and Riley, like we used to be? I know we drifted apart, but we used to be friends, and we used to listen and help each other out. We can be that again. This doesn’t all have to be about work.”
She glanced up at me, as if she wasn’t quite sure if she could believe me or not. I nodded encouragingly, and eventually she must have decided that she could trust me because she finally started talking.
“My appointment was with a doctor.”
These words were like daggers to my heart. If she was crying over something her doctor said, it had to be health-related. I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting, but this wasn’t it.
“Are you sick?”
She shook her head. “No. A few years back, my Mom died of breast cancer, and my aunt has the same thing right now. I got tested for the BRCA gene mutations because it’s genetic and seems to run in my family, and it turns out that I have one of them. BRCA-1.”
It was unbelievable to me that Riley’s lovely mother had died, but in that moment, my brain was fixated on the possibility of losing Riley. I’d only just gotten her back. I couldn’t lose her again.
She brushed the tears away from her eyes as she continued. “So I don’t have cancer yet, but the chances that I’ll develop it at some stage are very high.”
“Is there anything you can do?” I asked, my mind whirling. Times were changing, and modern medicine could practically perform miracles these days. Surely there was something that could be done.
“Well, the gene causes a high risk for breast and ovarian cancers, and also uterine cancer in my family’s case. So I’d eventually have to have surgery to remove my breasts, uterus and ovaries, and the sooner I do that, the better. I won’t be able to have children after that, though.”
My heart seemed to drop into a pit in my stomach. All my recent issues centered on me becoming a father with a woman I couldn’t stand, and guilt washed over me in waves. How stupid and selfish I’d been. This entire time, Riley had known that her chances at natural motherhood were very slim, even if she tried her hardest, and here I was, soon to be a father to a baby which had resulted from a pure accident.
The fact that my baby had been unplanned didn’t make me care about it any less, though. I’d always love and care for my kids; I just felt like an insensitive prick now that I knew of Riley’s struggle.
My mind desperately wanted to find a solution for her, to make up for my shitty timing with my problem, but I was coming up with nothing, and she put her head in her hands, finally letting the sobs consume her.
“I’ll probably never have kids of my own,” she said, shattering my heart into a million pieces. Riley had always wanted a family—even more than me—and I hated to see that dream stripped from her. “I don’t want to freeze my eggs, I have this whole PR career getting in the way, and I don’t even have a boyfriend! It’s just never gonna happen for me.”
She was almost hysterical now, as if she was letting it all out for the very first time. “I either have to have a baby now and get the operation afterwards, or my child has to be created in a lab and implanted in a surrogate,” she continued, her voice trembling as she tried to calm herself.
“Well, that’s not so bad,” I said in a soothing tone, trying to calm her down. Deep down I knew that I had no leg to stand on, because my baby had been made the natural way. Okay, there’d been no love involved, but that made no difference.
She didn’t reply, so I went on. “There must be something I could do to help. I know some great doctors, and I’m sure they could refer you to some fertility special— “
“No,” she said, not even waiting to hear what I had to say. “You have a baby on the way, and you should make the most of that. You don’t need to concern yourself with all my problems.”
“You didn’t need to concern yourself with me when my Dad was beating the shit outta me as a kid, but you helped me anyway. Now let me help you,” I said quietly.
“No. This can’t be helped, trust me.”
“But…”
“I’m sorry, I have to go,” she muttered, grabbing her handbag. “I need to get home.”
“No, wait. Just stay and—”
“No, I really can’t.”
With that, she dashed out of the room, and despite the fact that she was a mess—upset and angry all at once—I let her go. She was upset and clearly needed time alone, and my presence was only making things worse for her.
I stood there staring into space for a long time afterwards, knowing that I’d somehow fucked
up in my attempt to calm Riley down, but still unsure of what I should’ve done under the circumstances.
The only thing I knew for sure was how much I cared about her, and as I thought about it, I realized that I might’ve been wrong earlier when I’d thought it was impossible to love her already.
Maybe I could love her…and maybe I already did.
Chapter 11
Riley
My mind was in a slightly better place the next morning, but only because it had to be. I needed to drag myself out of Kaiden’s mess, and out of my own as well, because I had a meeting with another prospective client to deal with. Eric was originally going to go—he liked to deal with new business—but he’d gotten called into an emergency shareholder meeting, so I’d been selected to go in his place.
I was about to have a lunch meeting with Mr. Halk—CEO of a major financial firm—to try and woo him into giving Wenden and Brown his business. It seemed like it was going to be an easy task, for which I was grateful. As I’d looked through all the previous communications, it seemed like this was practically a done deal already.
A nice simple job, just what I needed.
As I walked into the fancy restaurant where we were having the meeting, I allowed the confidence that I normally felt whilst doing my job to flow through me. Even though I wasn’t always the most naturally confident girl, I was damn good at faking it, and that attitude had secured me more than one account. Eric was always saying that I was one of his best employees, and I felt like I’d proven that more than once. It was only this messy situation with my health—combined with the confusing feelings that Kaiden had brought with him—that was making me feel on edge.
“Hello. Is there a reservation under Mr. Halk?” I asked the restaurant host.
“Let me see…ah, yes,” he replied, marking off something on a page in front of him. “You’re the first of your party to arrive. Would you like to take a seat, or would you prefer to wait at the bar?”
“My seat, please,” I said with a smile. I was glad to be the first one to arrive—I always preferred to be early—and I knew it would look a lot better if I waited at the table. Alcohol consumption at a bar before a business meeting never looked good.
Bad Boy Brit (A British Bad Boy Romance) Page 32