She wasn’t ready for this. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him. It wasn’t that she didn’t want a relationship, she realised. It was that she wasn’t ready.
But that realisation made her wonder—did she want to be ready? Did she want him to be ready? She’d spent the last hour trying to make Finn see that his reasons for not wanting to ever have a new relationship didn’t hold up to scrutiny. They were based on fear, not a choice. Were her reasons the same? For years she’d kept her relationships exactly how she wanted them: non-committal. Non-threatening. And they’d left her kind of...empty. If she wanted more out of a relationship, she was going to have to give more. And that scared the hell out of her.
Maybe she shouldn’t be trying to help Finn. Maybe she should be leaving him with his illusions because that would be safer for her. With both of them running scared from a relationship, she was doubly safe. If she made Finn face up to his issues and put aside his fears, there was one of her defences gone. If doing that made her see that her own approach to relationships was making her unhappy and needed to change, then there was the second front defeated as well.
But somehow that seemed less important this evening than making Finn feel that he was safe. That he would still be safe if he decided to take a chance on a new relationship. That marriages ended and houses got sold and the world didn’t fall in. He would never be as vulnerable as he was as a cold, hungry child again. And not because he was rich, right this minute. But because he was tough and worldly and had—as he always did—people who loved him, who had his back. She wanted him to know that he could take a chance on falling in love without fearing that he was putting his children at risk. That the fears that he had been carrying around didn’t need to control his decisions or define his future. She would put her own fears aside for now, if it meant helping him.
Which was pretty much a one-eighty from the shouting match that she’d thought she was preparing for when she had found that money in her account. But it was so clear to her that the money had nothing to do with his faith in her abilities. She believed that he believed in her. His doubts were all in himself. She knew that she couldn’t change that by herself, but she hoped that by pointing out what was so obvious to her, he would start to believe her.
‘Why are you so invested in this?’ Finn asked her and she had to admire the way that he was turning the conversation away from himself. It was what she wanted to do now—to take a swerve rather than face up to her own feelings. But she wanted him to be brave, and that meant that she had to be brave too, no matter the consequences. Wasn’t that what they’d been doing with one another since she’d arrived? Being brave.
‘Why do you think?’ she said. ‘Because I care about you. I think these fears are keeping you from being happy. I want you to be happy.’
‘Because of what happened last night? Because you want more.’
She shook her head, smiling. ‘You know that’s not it, Finn. I said I didn’t and I meant it.’
‘I know that’s what you said. Was it true? Is it still true now?’
She could turn this around on him again, if she wanted. She could be all Do you want me to want you to want me? and they could continue going round in circles all night. Or she could tell him what she was actually feeling and see if he was going to put himself out there with her.
‘I don’t know what I want. Before last night, if you’d asked me, I would have sworn that I want to keep things casual. That I don’t want to get too involved. Not just with you. With anyone. Today... I’m not sure. I’m not sure that my reasons for keeping my distance in relationships are good ones. I need to think about that some more. Now, are you going to be honest and tell me what you’re feeling too? Or am I out here on this ledge on my own?’
He came back across to the counter, leaned on it, their body language mirrored across this great hunk of granite.
Pretty pathetic that this is the closest I’ve been to someone for years, she thought to herself.
Yes, they had been physically closer last night—but this here was the real scary stuff.
‘People fall off ledges all the time, you know,’ Finn said. ‘Gravity is pretty unforgiving. They hurtle down and smash onto the ground below. Who walks into that situation willingly?’
She smiled at the metaphor because he was really throwing everything that he had at resisting what was starting to look pretty tempting to her.
‘Everyone does, Finn. People do it every day. People pick themselves up after divorce, or harassment, or any number of other horrible situations, and they try again. Because what’s the alternative?’
‘Is that what you’re doing?’ he said, answering her question with a question. ‘Trying again?’
She shrugged because at this point she honestly wasn’t sure. ‘I don’t know. I’m thinking about it. But you’re leaving me hanging here.’
‘I care about you too.’ Holy crap. He was tiptoeing out onto the ledge. ‘You know that I care about you, Maddie. But I don’t know how we decide to do this. That all the reasons—all the really good reasons—we have for not doing this don’t matter any more.’
She thought about that for a second.
‘Tell me what you think about my reasons then. Why do you think I’ve been fighting this?’
He smirked, and she knew how clearly he saw her. ‘Because you like to be in control. Because someone took that from you once, and now you guard it with your life. Because you think that any man who shows you attention is only interested in one thing.’
She nodded, amazed that hearing those words coming from him could make her smile.
‘Do you think I’m right?’
He stared at her longer than was comfortable. ‘I think you have every reason to want to protect yourself.’
‘But?’ she prompted.
‘But I think I’ve proven to you that not everyone who looks at you sees you that way. Some of us see you. And you deserve a chance. You deserve a chance to be happy.’
‘So, to summarise, you think I should take a risk. But you’re not prepared to take one with me?’
Oh, they were really doing this. Her heart started pounding and she could feel the heat in her cheeks as her face flushed. They were talking about their feelings and acknowledging that this was about to get complicated. And for all her pushing him to be brave, she was terrified. Of this. Of him. Of getting hurt if she decided she wanted to be brave again too.
But what was she afraid of, really? Now that she understood Finn, she trusted him. She had trusted him with her body last night, and today she knew she could trust him not to hurt her, because he wanted her. All of her. Everything that she brought to a relationship. He had seen the darkest, most fearful parts of her character and he hadn’t flinched. The only thing that he had done that had made her mad was to give her the money to pursue her academic ambitions. It was hardly a capital crime. She calmed her breathing, felt her face gradually cool, and then threw down the gauntlet.
‘So, what are we going to do about this?’
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
WHAT WERE THEY going to do about it? Right now, half his brain was voting enthusiastically for heading straight back upstairs, directly to his bedroom, saving the talking for later. They’d done pretty well communicating that way last night. But it had hardly made things less complicated.
What if Madeleine was right and he was holding back because he was scared? Was that who he wanted to be—someone who missed out on the thing that they desperately wanted because they weren’t brave enough to take a risk?
And, God, did he want her. He had wondered yesterday if maybe this blinding lust was the result of a very long dry spell as much as it was about her—but he couldn’t have been more wrong. He wanted her even more now than he had before and he couldn’t imagine existing in a form that didn’t want her. How had he thought that he could just walk away from feelings like that?
‘You’re right. I’ve been scared. I am scared. Divorcing Caro was the biggest knock to my upward trajectory since as far back as I remember. It floored me. And I was terrified that I was going to lose everything—that the business would fail and I would fail and it would be a slippery slope back into poverty.’
Madeleine watched him in silence, her expression serious as he looked for the words that would explain why he had taken so long to give in to the feelings that had been assaulting him since she had walked back into his life.
‘And then you showed up and there was this connection between us and I knew it was something powerful. Something important. Something I knew I wouldn’t want to stop, if it started.’
‘Which is why you’ve been fighting it.’
‘Yes. I mean, fighting it pretty ineffectually, but yes.’
‘I think after last night we can agree neither of us did a great job at that.’
She smirked, and he felt it all the way in his gut. But he had been fighting it for a good reason. Because his life had fallen apart last year, and he had been scared in a way he hadn’t felt since he was a kid. In a way he never wanted his own children to experience.
‘I can’t promise that if we try this it will work, Finn. There’s no guarantee.’
‘But you want to try?’ he asked.
‘Do you?’
God, why does this have to be so hard? Finn thought. Why does it have to be so scary?
He couldn’t imagine contemplating this sort of risk for anyone but Madeleine. But, scary or not, he couldn’t see how he could walk away now. He had fallen in too deep without even realising it. How could he walk away when he had had a taste of what it was to see someone and be seen? To have peeled away one another’s fears and defences and looked one another in the eye, knowing that the only thing that would get in their way now was a lack of courage.
He knew that Madeleine had courage by the bucketful. She was the one that had brought them to this point. He didn’t want to be another person who let her down.
‘I don’t need guarantees, Madeleine,’ he said, examining his feelings, boiling it down to what really mattered. ‘I just need you.’
She looked at him for a long moment. ‘Why?’
He held her eye and knew exactly why she was asking. Knew how many times people had looked at Madeleine and assumed they could know everything about her by the way that she looked. He also guessed from the confidence in her posture right now and the hint of a smile at the corner of her mouth that she knew exactly how brilliant he thought she was. If she wanted to hear it out loud then he would tell her. He didn’t want her to ever think that she had reason to doubt how he felt about her.
‘Because you’re brave. And determined. And fiercely independent. And you like my kids and we have the same taste in pizza. Because my home and my office and my life seem dull when you walk out of them. Because last night was incredible in a way that I’ve never felt before. And yes, you’re beautiful. You know I think that, but I hope you know how unimportant that is to me.’
The smile spread across her lips, upwards, to crease faint lines around her eyes.
He laughed, walking around the kitchen island, suddenly desperate to have her close. She turned on the spot, following him with her eyes as he came closer, until she had her back to the counter, leaning back on her elbows as he stopped in front of her. He could lean in now, take her lips with his and, if the previous night was anything to go by, he wouldn’t have another coherent thought until morning. But he wasn’t ready to lose his mind just yet. Not when his senses were so damn delighted with what was right in front of him. Madeleine settled into her lean against the counter and quirked an eyebrow at him. She was going to wait for him to come to her. Good. He wanted to drink her in a little. Soak in the promise and potential of this moment before they jumped in.
He rested a hand either side of her waist, trapping her against the counter, but he still didn’t lean in. Not yet. Instead he looked at her—looked inside himself at the riot of sensations that she provoked in him. But at the centre was a stillness, and he knew without having to think about it what that meant. He lifted a hand to her jaw, his thumb following the path of her cheekbone, his fingertips settling in a sensitive spot behind her ear.
‘Nice speech,’ she said, her arms lifting to rest gently on his shoulders, her gaze flicking between his eyes and his lips.
‘I’m not done yet,’ he said when his lips were just a breath away from hers. ‘I love you. And I’m going to want you for ever. I hope that’s okay with you.’
He felt rather than saw her smile.
‘I think I like the sound of that. Because I love you too, and I wasn’t planning on letting you go.’
EPILOGUE
‘BELLA! HART! GET back here!’
Madeleine sat with Jake, watching Finn and Josie chase after the twins as they headed for the garden gate, running with their cousins.
‘Still time to change your mind,’ Jake said with a smile, and Madeleine rolled her eyes.
‘Just because you want to keep him all to yourself.’
‘Are you kidding? He’ll be at mine all the time once you’re married. Anything to get away from the ball and chain.’
She hit her brother on the arm and relaxed back in her chair as she watched Finn trying to wrangle the kids back into the garden.
‘Honestly, though, sis, I’ve never seen him happier. You either. It’s good to have you back.’
She felt her eyebrows pinch as she looked at her brother. She hadn’t even realised Jake had seen how sad she’d been for so many years. And wondered, not for the first time, just what he’d been hoping for when he’d sent her to stay at Finn’s place. Stupid interfering brothers with their insight and good instincts.
‘Yeah, well, I guess he’s all right really.’
‘I should hope so,’ Finn said behind her, making her jump. ‘Otherwise I’d have to ask them to take that marquee down.’
‘And tell the two hundred guests to stay home,’ Jake added.
‘And send back the cake.’
‘Enough, you two,’ Madeleine said. ‘God, what have I done?’ She shook her head, laughing. ‘I’m not returning the cake. Fine, I’ll marry you, even though you’re really annoying. But I’m uninviting Jake.’
‘Deal,’ Finn said, leaning in for a kiss.
‘Gross.’
But Madeleine grabbed Jake’s hand before he could walk off.
‘Seriously, though, little brother. He’s a good one, and I’m not sure I would have seen it if you hadn’t dangled him in front of my nose for, you know, the last couple of decades. I love you, and I owe you.’
Jake pulled her in for a hug before holding her out at arm’s length and taking a long look at her. ‘You’re welcome. I’ll redeem my Brownie points in babysitting time. I’m just glad to see you both happy.’
Finn pulled her into his lap as they watched Jake go over to battle with the kids, all six of them, and he wrapped his arms tight around her waist.
‘Did I mention that I love you?’ Madeleine asked, turning her head to look up at Finn.
‘Once or twice,’ he replied with a smile, dropping a kiss on her nose. ‘But I can probably stand to hear it again.’
‘I love you,’ she said again, her voice turning serious. ‘And I’m going to stand in front of all of those people tomorrow and tell them. But really, as long as you know, nothing else matters.’
‘I know,’ he said, bringing up a hand to cup her face, brushing a kiss high on her cheekbone. ‘The same way that you know that I love you. More than I ever thought possible.’
She turned to watch Jake and the kids, the marquee for her wedding set up for the morning, her whole future playing out in the garden of their new home.
‘I’m so glad you were brave,’ she told Finn, and he pulled her in a litt
le tighter. ‘When I was out on that ledge, hoping that you were going to come for me.’
‘How could I not be when you’d shown me how it was done?’ he said softly into her ear.
* * *
If you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Ellie Darkins
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Her Billionaire Protector
by Nina Singh
CHAPTER ONE
ADAM STEELE KNEW he was in the right line of work. But days like this, he wondered if perhaps he should have gone in a different professional direction. He had no right to complain. Providing personal security for the A-listers of the world as CEO of Steele Security Services had certainly provided him with all sorts of riches, both material and personal. But every once in a while, an assignment arose that he just knew was going to be a giant pain in the—
Before he could complete the thought, the elevator pinged and the shiny stainless steel doors swished open. Adam entered the empty elevator and punched in the number to the top floor.
Assignments borne of requests for personal favors always made him wary. That personal connection often led to complications and distractions. And distractions could be deadly in his line of work.
Reunited by the Tycoon's Twins Page 14