by Leroux, Lucy
A corner of Peyton’s mouth turned up. “He came in with his baseball bat. He was on the team at the time—and he didn’t come alone.”
“Who did he bring with him?”
Peyton’s smile was wide now. “Calen. He brought his bat, too.”
Liam had swaggered in like he owned the place. The men had risen to their feet at the sight of the bat, but they hadn’t been scared. They had been ready to fight. They hadn’t known fear until Calen walked in whistling, his bat braced against the nape of his neck, hands hanging over it like boys did when they didn’t have a care in the world.
The men hadn’t recognized Calen right away. Not until Liam had introduced him. “Liam told them Calen’s name and that, yes, he was one of those MacLauchlans.”
Ethan whistled. Though it had waned in recent years, Calen’s father, Colman MacLachlan, was still a name in the city’s underworld. For all intents and purposes, Colman was retired, but back then, just the mention of his name would have been enough to give men nightmares.
“I thought Liam had always been against Calen trading on his father’s reputation.”
“He was…is. As far as I know, it’s the only time he ever asked Calen to use it that way.” She huffed. “And it worked. The minute those three knew who they were dealing with, they almost wet themselves. They were small-time thugs. Colman ran almost a third of Boston at the time.”
The men had left in a hurry shortly after, but not before Calen assured them he would be in touch regarding her father’s debt. To this day, she wasn’t sure if Calen had paid it off in cash or threats. It was equally possible he’d traded a favor from his father. Neither Liam nor Calen would discuss it with her afterward.
After the intruders had left, Liam had found her shivering in one of the kitchen cabinets. Calen had patted her hair awkwardly while Liam packed her things for her. They had taken her to the B&B. Afterward, they left again. Only that time, it had been to find her father.
Donny had been scared of Liam and Calen enough to check into rehab. Too bad it hadn’t lasted. He would always fall off the wagon after a few months.
There was a long silence as Ethan digested everything. “Well, it’s nice to know Liam wasn’t always an asshole.”
She took a deep breath, hiding the small shudder that racked her body. He had that wrong. Liam wasn’t an asshole. He was what she, Maggie, and Patrick had made him.
Liam had been a few weeks shy of his eighteenth birthday when his parents died. He’d stalled the powers-that-be long enough for him to come of legal age. The minute he did, he took custody of his younger brother and sister, making sure they stayed together despite the kind, but ultimately misguided, intentions of distant relatives and the state.
Every flashy magazine profile written about Liam had mentioned how he’d taken charge of his two siblings, but the reality was he’d assumed responsibility for Peyton, too.
Burdened with three underage kids, Liam had slaved away at the B&B, not settling for keeping the place afloat. Instead, he’d insisted on expanding, using Calen’s legitimate contacts—the friends Calen made at university—for seed funding on what had become one of the world’s most exclusive hotel chains.
“Liam also paid my tuition in high school,” she said after a long silence. “My scholarship had dried up halfway through. Liam arranged to take over the payments without telling me—right around the time he opened the first Caislean hotel here in town. I only found out about the arrangement because one of the school counselors let it slip. I also wouldn’t have been able to pay for college without the hotel. The Caislean paid for it as part of a work-study program.”
The words came out without heat. Back then, she had been furious when she discovered the truth. It wasn’t that she hadn’t wanted to work in the hotel anymore, but she’d been determined not to rely on Liam and the Tylers anymore. College would have been her fresh start, at least until she discovered she couldn’t pay for it. Not until she’d been offered that work-study program.
“Don’t bother getting all worked up over it,” Liam had told her when she’d confronted him about it. “We need you, and you need us. Besides, it should be a moot point. We’re practically family.”
Family. The word soothed and stung at the same time. Belatedly, she realized Ethan was still talking.
“If he wants to ruin his life with that cold fish, it’s his business,” he said. “But you deserve someone who can focus on you and not the empire they’re trying to build.”
Peyton remained quiet. This evening had been a disaster. She felt eviscerated, but there was almost a strange sense of comfort in a pain so overwhelming it wiped her numb.
“Eva offered me a job.”
Ethan’s head snapped quickly to her. “She did?”
“Yes. An amazing one, if I can land it.”
“That sounds great. Your talents are wasted working at a hotel. I mean, it’s challenging in its own right, I’m sure, but I couldn’t even pronounce half the words in the title of your thesis. I’m sure it would be a nice change, too.”
And there would be the added bonus of not having to see Liam every day. Ethan didn’t say it aloud, but he didn’t have to.
“It’s in Silicon Valley,” she said.
“As in California?” He sounded disappointed. “Well, that’s quite a big change of scenery,” he said after a long minute.
“I’m going to take it.”
“Ah.”
With the salary Eva quoted, Peyton could pay off every cent she’d ever taken from Liam…and she could pay off the others he didn’t know about, the ones her father had left her with a few bookies in Southie.
Ethan didn’t say anything until he had pulled up in front of her office building. “So, how would you feel about a visit in a couple of months?”
Peyton blinked. “I’m not sure,” she whispered.
Ethan leaned over, getting close enough to unclip her seat belt. “Why don’t you think about it and get back to me?”
“Uh…”
He shrugged, the winsome smile still on his face.
“I’ll think about it.” Peyton didn’t know what made her say it, but she didn’t feel like taking it back.
This time, Ethan reached all the way across her, brushing against her long enough for her to feel his heat. He unlocked the door. “You do that. I’ll be waiting for your call.”
Chapter 4
Peyton reared back, dropping the box cutter as her index finger began to bleed. She pulled off the mangled piece of packing tape she’d been trying to remove with a hard yank.
“Frak,” she swore, putting her injured finger in her mouth to suck on the tiny wound.
“It’s an omen,” Maggie said, setting a half-filled box on her bed. “It means you shouldn’t move to California.”
Peyton plastered a bracing smile at her best friend. “You love San Francisco. You’ll visit me, and I’ll visit you.”
She snaked out an arm, wrapping it around Maggie’s neck. “And I shouldn’t have to tell you this—but it’s likely we’ll see each other just as often. You’ve been so busy lately with the new hotels, traveling all the time anyway. It’ll be almost as easy to meet there as here,” she added, stretching the truth.
She didn’t add that Maggie’s time was also limited due to a happy marriage. Her husband Jason was Ethan’s partner at the FBI. Although they had been together for a couple of years, the pair still acted like newlyweds.
“It won’t be the same,” Maggie said, a hairsbreadth away from whining.
“I know. But we’ll both get used to it. This is too good of a job opportunity to pass up.”
Maggie pouted. “I know you want to work in your field now that you have your degree, but there are tech firms here in Boston.”
“Not like this one.” Peyton held up another sweater. “What do you think? Should I bother taking these?”
Maggie reached over morosely to finger the thick wool. “Samuel Clemens said it best. ‘The coldest winte
r I ever spent was summer in San Francisco’. So yes, take all the sweaters and the down vests.”
Peyton snorted softly, then started putting the sweater in the box. She loved Maggie like a sister, but this was for the best. Peyton couldn’t stand being here, working at the same hotel with Liam day in and day out.
Putting on appearances was exhausting. She felt as if someone had dug out her insides. Peyton was little more than a walking shell now, one capable of walking and talking and even smiling, but a shell, nonetheless. Leaving town, avoiding the man she’d loved her whole life, was her only hope for recovery.
How she was going to do it was still something of a mystery. She’d built her whole life around the Tylers and the hotel chain they’d founded. She’d given up holidays, worked on her birthday, had come in when she was blind sick and had to be sent home, all because Liam had, too. And she had wanted to be near him.
Now he was going to marry someone else. Peyton had to leave for her own sanity. Besides, it was long past time for her to strike out and try to build a life of her own. She should have done it years ago.
Plus, it was only a matter of time before Maggie announced her first pregnancy. It might be a few months or years, but it would happen soon enough. Once it did, Peyton would see even less of her friend. Yes, she felt guilty she wouldn’t be there when it happened, but Maggie had the support of an awesome husband and two involved older brothers. There was also a large number of hotel staff who loved the youngest Tyler like a daughter or a granddaughter. Maggie was going to have all the help she could possibly need.
“Are you sure it’s a good idea to move in with Dylan?” Maggie asked, naming a mutual school friend who had offered Peyton a room a twenty-minute drive from her new office.
“I think it’s a great idea,” she said with a little more enthusiasm. “He’s got a three-bedroom house all to himself almost next door to Adstringo. He’s also in the start-up world, so he knows what kind of waters I’m going to be navigating. I’ll get to pick his brain nightly. Plus, judging from his last couple of calls, he’s still the same Dylan. Living with him is going to be fun.”
Dylan Nguyen had been one of the few other scholarship kids at Eastwood Prep, but he hadn’t finished. He was expelled a few months shy of their senior year for selling a dime bag of marijuana to one of their fellow students.
“Liam has hated his guts ever since he found out he got kicked out,” Maggie reminded her.
“Then it’s a good thing Liam’s not the boss of me,” Peyton quipped. Not anymore.
Maggie wasn’t letting it go. “Even Trick thinks he’s shady.”
“That was high school stuff. Dylan wasn’t charged with any crimes.”
That would have been too public for their fancy private school. Instead, Dylan had been quietly expelled. A few weeks later, he’d gone to live with his maiden aunt in Novato, California. Like Peyton, Dylan had been into computers. They’d stayed in touch despite the Tylers’ general disapproval of him.
Peyton’s continued contact with Dylan was something Maggie hadn’t understood. But she’d been taught to view life as black and white. Peyton had been raised in the grey. And she was never going to hold that kind of past indiscretion against Dylan. Like her, he’d clawed his way into the light. She admired him.
Her best friend’s lower lip wobbled, but she nodded. “I could kill Caroline for announcing the engagement at your party. You wouldn’t be moving now.”
Peyton stopped packing. She hurried over to embrace Maggie, squeezing her tight. “You can’t blame her. She was excited, the way any newly engaged person would be.”
In fact, it was the most amount of emotion she’d ever seen Caroline display. It made Peyton realize she didn’t know the other woman at all. She hadn’t wanted to. Caroline Wentworth was reserved, but perhaps if Peyton had made an effort to get to know the other woman, Peyton would have been able to accept Liam was never going to be hers long before this. Instead, she’d buried her head in the sand and had subsequently been surprised when she’d been run over by a truck.
“It wasn’t her fault or his,” Peyton murmured, backing away to study her empty shelves. There was a small jewelry box left on the bureau. She opened it, studying the only item left inside—a silver charm bracelet.
As jewelry went, it wasn’t valuable. Nevertheless, the charm bracelet was one of her most precious possessions. It had been a gift from Liam. He’d given it to her on her seventeenth birthday, back when he still did all his own shopping.
His secretary chose his gifts these days. Last year, she’d been given a thousand-dollar watch. She’d tossed it in a drawer unused, well aware he hadn’t selected it personally.
Peyton reached into the box, running her index finger over the string of charms. There was a book, which she had later learned was passport, as well as world-famous monuments like the Eiffel Tower and a tiny Taj Mahal.
She always wondered if Liam had bought it because he knew she wanted to see the world or if it were a random purchase. “Promise me something.”
Maggie wiped her eye surreptitiously, trying to hide the fact she was near tears. “Anything.”
“Don’t hold any of this against your brother. None of this is his fault. And you should give Caroline a chance, too. She’s going to be your sister-in-law.”
Peyton knew she didn’t have to ask her best friend not to mention her hurt feelings to the man. Maggie still honored the blood oath never to mention Peyton’s unrequited love to another living soul, which she’d taken at fourteen. The fact everyone knew was her own fault. She simply couldn’t hide the way she felt when she was near him.
“Do I have to?” Maggie asked, perilously close to whining. Peyton’s best friend had never liked the cool ice blonde. She enjoyed trashing the other woman with Peyton when they were alone, but now she wondered how much of that was simply her friend being loyal to her.
Maggie grumbled something under her breath.
Peyton turned. “What was that?”
Her friend sighed dramatically. “I’ll try if she tries being human for a change—and if she stops being so damn condescending. She actually lectured me on the best way to flip rooms last week, as if we didn’t have that down. Our hotel is five times bigger than any of theirs.”
Peyton laughed. “How dare she!”
Well, an effort was all Peyton asked. Caroline had never gone out of her way to cozy up to Maggie. Her singular focus had been Liam. Ultimately, it would be up to him to facilitate a relationship between his sister and his future wife. His comfort and well-being was no longer her concern.
She put the jewelry box back on the shelf, the bracelet still inside.
“Aren’t you going to pack that?”
“Later,” Peyton lied.
She couldn’t take any mementos of Liam with her. It was going to be brutal, but a clean break was what she needed.
Chapter 5
“What did you just say?” Liam had just spent eleven hours on a plane, and all he wanted to do was shower and go to bed, but his brother Patrick’s report about the hotel wasn’t making sense.
Trick sat behind his desk, his feet propped up on the edge. His brother’s usual elegance was a bit frayed at the corners. He should have been in bed hours ago, too. Ever since he’d met his wife, Thalia, Patrick had been getting up bright and early every Sunday morning to attend Catholic services with her. At first, Liam had thought it was Thalia’s influence, but he’d been surprised to learn Trick was the one behind the regular church attendance.
Liam wasn’t sure he was comfortable with his brother’s newfound faith. The sudden resurgence of customs abandoned after their parents died struck him as odd. The trappings of the Church felt alien and stifling to Liam now, but he wasn’t going to make a big deal about it to Trick. His brother was a grown man. He was expecting his first child for fuck’s sake. And Liam would rather chew his own leg off than talk about his feelings.
Trick rubbed his face. Sundays were now his longest day
. “I said the hotel is at ninety-four percent capacity. The new schedule has improved room-turnover efficiency by an average of two minutes, and I’ve started interviewing candidates to replace Peyton.”
Liam pulled off his tie. Confused, he threw it on his desk. “I don’t understand. Why do you need to replace her?”
Patrick’s mouth was turned down. He tapped the leather blotter with the tip of a ballpoint pen.
“We need to replace her. She took another job. She told me and HR last week—the day after you left for Singapore.”
Liam’s stared at his brother incredulously. “What the hell are you talking about? What job?”
Trick leaned back in his chair, meeting Liam’s eyes with a flat expression. “You didn’t seriously think she was still going to work here after getting her degree, did you?”
Of course he had. Peyton was an institution here. He’d built this hotel with her and his siblings. She’d been with them since the very beginning, doing whatever was needed.
When they’d been struggling to keep his parents B&B open, he’d complained their website was buggy. Their archaic online reservation needed an overhaul, but they couldn’t afford to pay a programmer. A ten-year-old Peyton had taught herself to program in HTML on his old laptop to code a new one. She’d later learned Java, Python, and C++—all before finishing high school. Peyton was irreplaceable.
Liam leaned over to put a hand on the front of his desk. Inexplicably, he suddenly felt a little lightheaded and his skin felt clammy. “Peyton can’t leave the Caislean. This is her home. We’re her family.”
His brother snorted. “Technically, we’re not…and I don’t think we can top the offer she received.”
Liam scoffed. “If it’s a question of money, we can up her pay. That’s not an issue. We’ll offer her stock if we have to,” he said, suddenly wondering why he hadn’t thought about it before.
Trick was strangely quiet, just watching him. “I don’t think that’s going to be enough. Eva headhunted her personally.”