“But you don’t want it.”
“Not everybody gets everything they want.” He reached up to tug on a lock of her hair. “Not even spoiled rich boys.”
She refused to smile at his joke. “Alex...”
“Hey, let’s forget about Drake Media for one day, okay? It’s Christmas and I haven’t even given you your present yet.”
“Stop trying to change the subject. You got me a present?”
Chuckling, he reached into the inside pocket of his coat and drew out a long, narrow box wrapped in shiny silver paper. “I did.”
“I didn’t get you one. Since we were barely speaking to each other a week ago, you didn’t make it onto my shopping list.”
“Don’t worry about it. That thing you did in the shower yesterday is the best present I’ve ever gotten.” His lips brushed against her cheek just in front of her ear, sending a little shower of sparks through her body. God, Gemma was right. He filled her up with sparks, and she loved it.
“Oh, my God, stop that.”
“Are you blushing?”
“My entire Italian Catholic family is twenty feet away from us right now.”
“You are blushing! This is the best.”
“Shut up!”
His voice lost its teasing lilt, slipping into that low, coaxing timbre that made her knees go liquid. “Open your present, Jess.”
Slipping the fancy red satin ribbon off the box, she lifted the lid. Her breath caught in her throat as she took in the contents. Nestled in a bed of white velvet was a bracelet, a delicate row of silver links, with two charms in the middle. The charms were a tiny dragon, enameled in green, and a shiny silver knight in armor.
“Alex...how did you do this?”
“Magic.” He took the box from her hands and lifted the bracelet out, draping it over her left wrist and going to work on the clasp. The charms bounced gently against the heel of her thumb, the silver chain glinting in the bright winter light. “I thought you might like a little reminder of how we met. The second time, anyway. And to answer your question, yes, I’ve figured out I was one of the narcissistic knights you were talking about.”
“You’ve redeemed yourself since then,” she muttered.
“And you said we were irredeemable. Glad to hear I managed it. Because this knight hasn’t stopped wanting to fight for you, even though I know you can fight your own battles.”
Damn him and his stupid, swoony chivalry. As she stared at his bent head, watching the winter sunlight playing across all the shades of brown and rust and gold in his hair, the emotion hit her straight on with the force of a battering ram. I love him. I love him so much. Emotions this powerful couldn’t be the work of a few days. She must have always been a little bit in love with Alex, and just too stubborn and blind to admit it to herself.
“I still don’t know how you did this.” It seemed safer to talk about the gift than everything the gift might represent. If she started down that path, she’d be blurting out her “I love yous” before she knew it and it was probably—definitely—too soon for that.
“It wasn’t a big deal. I saw it online, I made a phone call, arranged a few things, and here it is, right where it belongs.”
No big deal. He just moved mountains and had the perfect gift flown in on a jet or something, just to give it to her on Christmas Day. How had she spent so many years oblivious to his generous heart?
“It’s perfect,” she whispered. And maybe it wasn’t the “I love you” about to burst from her heart, but it was true nonetheless. Everything about this moment and this man was perfect.
“Merry Christmas, Jess.”
Reaching up, she took his face in her hands and stood on tiptoe to press a kiss to his lips. “Merry Christmas, Alex.”
Chapter Thirty
“Why does your father keep so much food around when he’s never here? Hasn’t he been gone since last week?”
“Lucia’s terrified he’ll starve to death if she doesn’t shower him with food.”
“He’s got six kinds of ice cream in his freezer.”
“And he doesn’t even eat the stuff.”
Jess turned away from the fridge, holding a pint in each hand. “Well, I’m happy to take care of that for him.”
Alex plucked them from her hands, setting them aside and backing her into the counter. “Maybe I should take care of you first.”
She’d just sunk into his kiss, losing herself in the hot sweep of his tongue and the delicious press of his body against hers, when somewhere behind him, someone cleared their throat. Her startled scream was muffled by Alex’s mouth before she shoved him back.
Dan Drake stood in the doorway, looking freshly pressed in his expensive suit and tie.
“Dad.” Alex eased back from Jess enough to face his father. “Didn’t expect to see you here tonight.”
Dan’s face twitched with amusement. “Obviously. Jessica, nice to see you again.”
“You, too,” she murmured, her insides twisting in embarrassment.
“We were watching a movie up in the media room and got hungry,” Alex explained, finally shifting back enough to allow Jess to slide out from between him and the counter. “I thought you were flying back tomorrow.”
Dan shrugged. “I’d seen everything I needed to, so I took off.”
In the few moments since his father had entered the room, Alex had transformed. His playful smile was gone, replaced by a somber, serious expression. He stood up straighter, an unmistakable rigidity in his shoulders and spine. His eyes, sparkling with humor just seconds ago, were hard and flat. If Jess didn’t already know him, she’d be too intimidated to ever approach him.
Time to make an escape and fortunately, she had an entirely legit reason. “Alex, I think I left my phone upstairs. I’m going to run up and get it. Nice to see you again, Mr. Drake.”
“See you downstairs?” Alex said quietly, brushing her hand as she passed. She nodded and slipped past Dan Drake to scurry up the stairs. Her phone was right where she’d left it—in the Drakes’ private in-home movie theater—after texting Gemma earlier.
She was almost to the last turn on the stairs when Alex’s voice floated up to her. She didn’t mean to listen in, she only hesitated a moment on the landing, torn between hurrying down before Dan started up or encountering him on the stairs. Before she could make a move either way, they were already in the middle of the conversation.
“How was the Brazil network?”
Dan sighed, stripped of his usual bonhomie when there was no one but Alex there. “They’re a disorganized mess down there. The network has plenty of potential, but they’d need a complete overhaul in their organization if they’re going to be competitive.”
“Sorry to hear it. So we’re passing?”
“No, I had the lawyers make an offer.”
“But—”
“It’ll be perfect for you,” Dan said.
“Me?”
“Sure. ClickNews is coming along fine. You’ve learned the lay of the land and they don’t need you anymore. Once you spend a year or two down in Rio bringing this network up to scratch, there won’t be anything about the business you don’t know from the ground up. You’ll be ready to come on board at HQ.”
Jess held her breath, waiting for Alex to tell his father no. No, he wouldn’t rehab his new station. No, he didn’t want to know this business from the ground up. No, he wasn’t leaving ClickNews. He was staying, and transforming it into something so much better than it was now. Something real.
But Alex didn’t say any of those things.
“Let’s see what Brazil has to say about the offer first.”
“They’ll say yes,” Dan said, his usual swagger returning. “Everybody says yes to me.”
“They sure do, Dad.”
“You’ll love Rio, Alex. A guy your age, with n
othing to tie you here... Rio will be your playground.”
Her heart tightened painfully in her chest. Me, she mouthed silently. Tell him I’m here.
When she heard Dan start climbing the stairs, she forced her frozen limbs to move, not wanting to be caught listening in. She passed him on the steps, her eyes meeting his fleetingly. It was unmistakable, the challenge she saw there. He knew she’d heard everything. He was daring her to fight him for Alex. Was this as much about shaking her loose as it was about some stupid TV station?
“Have a good night, Jessica.” Dan smiled—that dead-eyed shark smile—and dropped his gaze from her to Alex, where he stood waiting for her at the foot of the stairs. Jess couldn’t make a sound in reply as she rushed past him down the stairs.
“Find your phone?” Alex asked. He was holding her ice cream haul. Jess wasn’t the least bit hungry anymore. She waved her phone in the air and forced a small smile.
Wordlessly, Alex led her around to the stairs to his apartment. The silence between them felt brittle and sharp. He must have known she heard that conversation, and she waited for him to explain himself, but he didn’t seem inclined to say a word about it.
“What do you want?” he asked once they reached his apartment and he’d set down the ice cream. He was talking about flavors, but that’s not what she heard.
“I’m not hungry. So Brazil?”
“Huh?”
“You’re moving to Brazil?”
“Don’t worry about it. These deals take forever to get finalized.” He still hadn’t looked at her.
“But—” Frustrated, she threw her hands in the air and spun away from him. “That’s not the point, Alex.”
Finally, he faced her. “Why are you angry? It’s just some deal my dad is making. It has nothing to do with you.”
She spun back, face flushing with emotion. “Oh, really? He’s plotting to ship you off to Brazil for two years and it has nothing to do with me? You didn’t see the way he looked at me. I think it has a lot to do with me.”
“My dad has trust issues, Jess. He doesn’t know you like I do. I promise, he’s not out to get you.”
She wasn’t so sure about that, but it was hardly the most pressing issue at the moment. “Okay, fine, he’s not sending you to Brazil to get rid of me, but the result will be the same either way, right? Because you’ll be there and I’ll be here.”
Alex held up his hands to placate her. “Look, anything can happen. Nothing’s definite.”
“Anything? Like you telling your father once and for all that you don’t want to take over his company?”
Dropping his eyes to the floor, he slumped against the counter. “I told you, I can’t do that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“I thought you understood the obligation, Jess. You, of all people.”
“I understand obligation, but I don’t understand you doing something that makes you so miserable. Yes, my sister took on the bar so Livie and I didn’t have to, but the day I see it making her as unhappy as Drake Media makes you is the day I tell her to quit. I’d rather give up the bar forever than let her spend her life tied to it that way. What about ClickNews and everything you wanted to do there?”
“I told you, that was just some fantasy. It’s never going to happen.”
“Why not?”
“Because this is my job! This is my life!”
“Running a TV station in Brazil? What about us?” Her courage momentarily flagged. She knew how she felt about him, but how could he possibly feel the same if he could just walk away like this? “I know this just started, Alex, but I thought it was important—”
In seconds, he’d shoved off the counter and closed the space between them, taking her face in his hands. “It is important. Listen to me, Jess. You matter to me. More than you can imagine. And that’s not going to change, no matter where I work or what I do. Jess, it’s just a job. Maybe not my dream job, but who gets that? Lots of people don’t love their jobs. I’ll make it work for me. We’ll be okay.”
He was back, her Alex, the one with the brilliant, alive eyes, the one that had been conspicuously absent for the past half hour—the one she loved so much that it hurt. It hurt, because she could see what he couldn’t. This Alex and the one who belonged to Drake Media couldn’t forever share space. One day, one of them would lose. And if it was her Alex...well, then she would lose, too, wouldn’t she? She’d lose him.
Gently, she wrapped her fingers around his wrists and pulled his hands from her face, folding them in hers. “Will we be okay, though?”
“Jess, come on—”
“No, see, here’s the thing.” She had to fight to get the words out when her throat closed painfully around them. “I love you.”
His expression was nearly the end of her, so stunned, tender, happy... “Jess—”
“I love you. This you, standing in front of me. The you I talked to online for all those weeks. The real you. The you with passion and principles. And, Alex, I’ve seen what your father’s company does to you.”
“It’s work. Of course I’m different at work.”
“No, not like this. The minute you enter that world, part of you dies. You become a stranger.”
“You’re making this a bigger deal than it is. It’s just a job.”
“It’s about more than a job! You’re ready to sell your soul just to make someone else happy. You’re abandoning your principles, yourself, everything you love, and for what?”
“What do you want from me?”
“I want you to stand up for yourself. Stand up for me! If I’m not that important to you, if you’re not that important to yourself, then I’m not sure what I’m doing here.”
“Are you saying you’re going to break up with me if I go to work for my father?”
Just hearing him voice the words caused a painful knot in her chest. She didn’t want to lose him. But would she have a choice about that in the end? She was only herself—just Jessica Romano from Brooklyn. Could she really take on Drake Media and Dan Drake himself and win?
“I don’t know. I’m just not sure...” It was hard to get the words out, or even breathe. “I guess right now it’s hard to see what kind of future we have together in this scenario.”
“Jess—” He sounded like she’d punched him in the chest, her name just a painful exhalation.
“Look, I’m going to go.”
“You’re leaving?”
“Not for good.” She shook her head, because she wasn’t even sure if that was the truth or not. “I just need to think about this. And so do you, Alex. Think about what really matters to you.”
Chapter Thirty-One
The day Alex had first met Jess—and she’d raked him over with that judgmental gaze—had been the first time he’d ever felt inadequate. Up until that moment, his life had unfolded before him easily. Nothing had been impossible to acquire, no one impossible to charm.
Then he’d run up against the stone wall of gorgeous Jessica Romano’s idealism and found himself utterly wanting in every way that mattered. In the intervening years, he’d worked hard to be better, to be more than a handsome rich kid. He thought he’d done it. In many ways, he had.
But it seemed, in the end, she was still demanding more of him than he could give. What he saw as living up to his obligations, she saw as a fatal weakness of character, and he wasn’t sure they could ever close the gap.
She wasn’t wrong when she said he was sacrificing part of himself to his job. This was the price to be paid for all the advantages he’d been given. That was something he’d long ago made peace with. And she probably wasn’t wrong about what Drake Media would turn him into. So maybe she was right about the rest, too. Maybe there was no future for them as he moved further down this path. Maybe, he told himself grimly as he made his way to ClickNews the next morning, his feelings for he
r were just a symptom, part of his reluctance to close the door on that part of himself forever.
But everyone had to face their fate eventually. No one said it would be easy. For him, if it meant leaving Jess behind, it was going to tear him to pieces.
Seeing Chase the moment he stepped off the elevator at the office didn’t improve his black mood one bit. It was the first time he’d laid eyes on him since Jess’s revelation, since he’d learned Chase was betraying them all. The urge to barrel straight into him and pummel him into a wall was nearly overpowering. His right hand flinched, half curling into a fist of its own accord. He was supposed to be above violence, but right now, beating the shit out of Chase sounded like an awfully satisfying way to deal with his anger and frustration.
But it wouldn’t help Jess, and, despite how things ended last night, he was determined to undo the damage Chase had done to her. If he could return her life to her—if he knew she was where she always wanted to be and happy—maybe it would make leaving her behind easier. Doubtful, but maybe.
So for now, he suppressed his animal snarl of rage, plastering on that winning smile that fooled the whole world, and advanced on his former best friend.
“Hey, buddy, how was your break?”
Chase broke off flirting with the receptionist to turn and clap him on the shoulder. “Alex! Ah, you know. The British Virgin Islands with the parentals. Boring as shit. Although at least this time, they didn’t talk my ear off about finding a job. I have you to thank for that one.”
Another smile that felt like swallowing glass. “They have a lot to be proud of, huh?”
Chase’s two older brothers were already successfully working in his father’s boutique investment firm. Chase, always the slacker, the disappointment, had been under pressure from his parents for years to get his shit together. Guess he decided lying and theft was his career path of choice.
“They’re off my back, that’s all I care about. Hey, how was the break? Did you go to Brazil with the old man?”
Of course Chase was keeping tabs on his father. Ass-kissing suck-up. “No, I stayed here. Went up to Killington and did a little skiing.” The lie slid easily off his tongue.
The One I Love to Hate Page 24