"Why? You know I would never accept it."
"If I didn't," I insisted, "I wouldn't have taken this job at Kiefer Knightly. I would be able to stay in New York and take care of my family."
"Is that what you want?"
Brandon leaned over and grabbed my hand. I couldn't pull away, locked as I was by his earnest blue gaze.
"Because I can make that happen," he continued. "I can get you a job at whatever firm you want. I would do anything for you, Red, if I knew it would make you happy."
He squeezed my fingers. It felt like he was squeezing my heart. A few more tears fell, and reflexively, I squeezed back. I hated this.
I considered the option. I could let him help in this way. I could take a fancy job in New York, where I could stay close to my dad and keep him out of trouble. Take the New York bar exam instead of the Boston one.
But the truth was, I hadn't only taken the job in Boston just to pay Brandon back or to afford my dad's treatment. These were the excuses I'd used to ignore the real reason: that I was terrified I'd never see Brandon again.
"Do you want to leave Boston, Skylar?" Brandon asked. His eyes, having lost all their fieriness, were wide and searching.
"No," I whispered. The dam broke. Tears flowed freely down my cheeks, and I couldn't stop them. "I miss you so much. Everything hurts. I see you everywhere, even places you're not. And then, when I had to––"
I cut myself off before I admitted my worst secret. I pulled my hand from Brandon's warm grasp and covered my face, wishing more than anything I were not in the middle of a crowded restaurant full of curious onlookers.
When I dropped my hands, I was surprised to find that Brandon had left his seat and was squatting next to my chair. He pulled my head down to his broad shoulder and let me cry into the sleek lines of his suit jacket as he hushed me softly. I grasped at his lapels, inhaling the sweet, familiar scent of him, desperate to be close. It felt so good. And yet, it hurt so, so much.
"Shh," Brandon crooned in my ear. "I got you."
God, I was such a basket case. The doctor had told me it would take a while for my hormones to settle down; clearly, she was right. Brandon, to his credit, acted like there was nothing strange about holding me while I bawled in the middle of one of the ritziest restaurants in New England.
"I'm here now," he murmured again, gently stroking my back. "It'll be okay, I promise."
When I finally got control of myself, I pushed reluctantly from his chest and sat up, dabbing at my eyes. With one hand balanced on the back of my chair and the other on the table, Brandon had me effectively caged with his warmth. He flashed a slightly toned-down version of his signature thousand-watt smile, but one that was meant just for me. It was a little bit sad, a little bit hopeful, and a little bit something special. My heart melted even more.
He raised a big hand and pushed a loose strand of hair behind my ear. The hand lingered, and instinctually I pushed my cheek into his palm. Tenderly, his thumb stroked my skin.
"Skylar, I swear to God," Brandon said, his voice cracking slightly. "I never meant to hurt you. Do you believe that?"
Slowly, I nodded.
"I...I can't do anything about the mistakes I've made," he continued. "But...I would do anything––anything––to make you happy. Do you believe that?"
He leaned in and pressed his forehead lightly against mine. I closed my eyes again and took in his clean scent. Then I nodded once more.
"I love you, Skylar. Do you believe that?"
I opened my eyes. Brandon was perfectly still; only the rise and fall of his chest betrayed his calm.
"Do you love me yet, Red?"
Another tear fell down my cheek. Those words, which had been at the bottom of every mea culpa letter he'd sent, tugged at my heart more than anything.
"I do," I whispered. "I'm so angry at you. At myself. But I don't want to fight it anymore, Brandon, because I do love you, so, so much. I never stopped."
Brandon closed his eyes this time as he exhaled. When he opened them again, his eyes were alight.
"Thank fucking God," he breathed before he closed his mouth over mine in a kiss that seared every cell in my body.
My arms wrapped instinctually around his neck, pulling him closer. I no longer cared that we were the center of attention in a room that had gone suspiciously quiet. I just wanted close again. I wanted to be where I belonged.
A loud throat-clearing interrupted our reunion all too quickly.
"Um, sir?"
We started apart and looked to where the waiter stood awkwardly, holding our plates of food.
"Your dinner, sir," he mumbled, clearly wishing he were literally anywhere else.
I giggled, swiping again with my napkin at the tear stains that had likely ruined my makeup. Brandon shook his head sheepishly as he stood up.
"I think we'll take it to go," he said with a wry smile. "Charge it to my account, and have it sent up front, will you?"
The waiter nodded, his nervous face darting back and forth between Brandon and me before he left to box up our food. I finished dabbing my face with the napkin, while Brandon watched with a kind, yet guarded expression.
"Sorry," he said. "Do you, ah, want to continue this elsewhere?"
I glanced around the restaurant. People were no longer even trying to hide the fact that they were staring at us.
"Yeah," I admitted. "I definitely think that would be best."
~
We left the restaurant with a veritable picnic basket in hand, as the staff had been kind enough to box up our food and even what remained of the bottle of wine I'd barely drunk, all packed neatly into a silver paper bag.
"That's good stuff," Brandon said when I'd expressed my surprise at the wine-to-go. "You don't want to waste it."
It wasn't until much later that I discovered it was a five-hundred-dollar bottle. Waste not, want not, I suppose.
David pulled up in the Mercedes, but instead of leading us to it, Brandon turned to me with a somewhat shameful expression.
"This is embarrassing," he admitted. "But I have to ask you to take a different car."
I bit my lip. Apparently, this evening hadn't ended the way I thought it had.
"Oh," I said. "Okay, then."
Brandon quickly reached out to grip my hand. "No, no, it's not like that, Red. I-–do you mind if I come over?"
I brightened. "Sure."
He delivered an ear-splitting grin that practically lifted my heart out of my chest.
"Great," he said. Then he shifted uneasily. "But we'll have to travel separately. I already had the concierge here call you a separate town car just after mine. Miranda...well, Kieran thinks there's a good chance she put a P.I. on me. It wouldn't be good for you or me if she saw pictures of us together."
There was an awkward pause at the mention of Brandon's still-pending divorce, a long process that his ex-wife had been stringing out for years, but which was undoubtedly taking even longer now that she had discovered my presence in his life. Part of me didn't completely blame her; Brandon Sterling was a hard man to get rid of once you'd let him in.
I looked back at the restaurant with sudden clarity. The Martin, aside from being expensive and impressive, also had excellent security. No wonder Brandon had wanted to meet here.
"I'd like to say that if it's too much for you, you can leave," Brandon said quietly as he reached out to stroke my hand shyly. "But I'm just too selfish for that, I guess. Or else not strong enough."
I said nothing. I couldn't promise that I would forget everything that had happened between us, or even that I would be okay with the fact that he wasn't yet divorced. But I wasn't going anywhere again.
Brandon pulled me to him and tipped my head up.
"Are you really here?" he asked as he brushed a thumb across the outer edge of my jaw and then toyed with the strand of my hair that kept falling out.
Behind us, the maître 'd studiously turned around.
My mouth quirked. "I am," I said.
"But these things...we do have stuff to work out." My stomach clenched. I hated to admit it, but there were things I would have to tell him too.
"We can work it out, Skylar," Brandon said vehemently. The arm around my waist squeezed, like he was afraid I'd bolt.
"I want to," I said softly.
I placed my own hand on his cheek, tracing my fingers across the stubble covering the strong bones of his cheeks and jaw. My thumb brushed over his full mouth, and he bit it lightly before letting go. Something else tightened deep in my belly.
"We will," he stated firmly.
Brandon kissed me again, more softly than before, but no less potent. It was the kind of kiss that tasted of love, not lust, the kind that could last for hours. The kind I could completely lose myself in.
Much to my regret, however, Brandon broke away. "Wait five minutes, then go out to take the next town car that pulls up. I'll see you at your place. Wait in the lobby for me, will you?"
I nodded, and he strode through the doors out to his car. I looked out the window for any signs of a flash or even the reflection of a lens. If there was someone watching Brandon, they did a good job staying invisible.
My heart sunk a little as I watched the Mercedes drive off. We weren't doing anything wrong, and yet...some part of me felt like a dirty secret. Which in a way, I realized with a cringe, I had been all the time.
~
Chapter 10
Twenty minutes later, I exited a town car after trying and failing to tip the driver, who had already been generously paid and then some. Brandon arrived a few more minutes after that, and rushed into the building as soon as I opened the door for him.
"Hey," he said with an awkward half-smile. "Thanks for waiting. I'm sorry about the run-around."
I shrugged. "It's fine."
We glanced around the homely lobby of my apartment building, one of the older ones around the North End. It might have been decent once, but the black-and-white tiled floors were covered with a thin layer of grime, and the once-white walls were equally dingy and cracked in places. A row of stained brass mailboxes lined the wall across from a staircase made of abused white granite. It was a far sight from the big, fancy house on Beacon Street.
Brandon, however, didn't seem to notice. He followed me up the two flights of stairs to my floor, humming with recognition while his sharp eyes took in everything.
"I hope your neighbors don't threaten to call the cops on me again," he said as I unlocked my door.
I giggled. "I doubt it. Just don't go yelling my name at two a.m."
"Only if you promise not to run away," Brandon said, reaching around my waist and pulling me backward against him.
His touch seemed to melt away a few layers of awkwardness, and I softened into his warm body against my back. I didn't know what we were doing, exactly. In the space of an hour things between us had gone from being defined, if miserable, to completely nebulous, although hopeful.
"Deal," I said, and opened the door.
I flipped on the lights inside, and Brandon looked around curiously.
"Roommate?" he asked, nodding at Eric's bedroom door, which stood open and revealed a plain, queen-sized bed made up with gray linens. His bed was even neater than mine. Eric was nothing if not fastidious.
"Yes," I said as I removed my coat and hung it on the small row hooks by the door. "He's a new associate of yours, actually."
"He?"
I turned around to find Brandon now frowning in the direction of Eric's bedroom, as if he expected Don Juan de Marco to walk out of there.
I smirked. "You're not going to turn into the gorilla-jealous type, are you? Because I'm not the one who had a secret wife for four months."
Brandon exhaled heavily through his nose. "All right, all right," he relented. "I guess I deserve that. But if he tries anything, he's fired."
"Oh, he'll definitely try something. Just not on me. He's practically my brother."
Brandon didn't appear comforted by the thought. After pulling off his suit jacket and hanging it next to mine, he examined the tiny living area, taking in the sofa, the TV, the kitchenette, and two-person table. It didn't take long. He turned back to me.
"It's nice," he said. "Smaller than your last place."
I glanced around and shrugged. "It's temporary." I had promised Eric we would only be in this situation until my dad was done with his treatment and I could afford a place of my own.
"When did you move in?"
"Last weekend."
It took Brandon exactly five seconds to walk around the small space, the leather soles of his shoes whispering across the worn wood floors while he checked out the windows, the peekaboo view down the brick-corridored street, the interior of the bathroom. When he was done, he smiled.
"It's nice," he said again. "Where's your room?"
I pointed toward the closed door behind him, and after I nodded that he could go in, he opened the door to peek in there too.
"Did you paint it yourself?" he asked after I turned on the light.
"Yes."
Behind him, I stood unaccountably nervous in the doorway. My furniture had all arrived; now, instead of an empty room with a futon on the floor, everything looked nicely put together, even if the space was a bit cramped.
"What's that?" Brandon pointed at the piano in the corner. It was still closed and covered with a blanket; I hadn't touched it since its arrival.
"My mother sent it," I replied. I sat down on the corner of my bed. "A graduation gift, I guess."
"Your mother? You mean the one who..."
"I don't talk to very much because she abandoned my dad and me? Yeah, that's the one."
Brandon frowned at the instrument, then walked to the piano, as if touching its sleek surface through the faded blanket would make it more real.
"Why do you think she gave it to you now?" he asked.
I kicked my shoes off and pulled my knees up under my chin, tucking my skirt up behind them. "I don't know, to be honest. She says she's coming to town next month and wants to see me."
Brandon nodded. "Yeah, there are a lot of events going on in July." He looked up, suddenly alert. "They aren't involved with the DNC, are they?"
I raised my shoulders. "I have no clue. Why?"
"No reason."
We fell into an awkward silence again as I was reminded just how little I still knew about the world Brandon inhabited most days. I had thought I knew him so well, but the reality was that the few months we had together occurred inside a cocoon, a world encased in his luxurious house on the Commons, consisting mostly of his couch or his bed, where we alternately worked, studied, made love, and only occasionally emerged for a meal or two. I hadn't met any of his regular friends and acquaintances, and he had only ever met Jane, my best friend, once or twice.
I sighed. I didn't know what we were doing right now, but if it was actually going to work, there was some serious truth-telling to be had. At least, the truths we could share, I noted with a pang.
Would it have had blue eyes or green? Red hair or blond?
The questions rose in my mind before I could stop , and I shuddered. My heart contracted as I willed the thought away. I hated keeping something so big from Brandon, but I didn't even know where we were going right now. I wasn't ready to take the chance that something I did could push him away again. Maybe I'm too selfish, he said. Maybe I was too selfish too.
"You're awfully quiet over there, Red," Brandon said. "Could I convince you to play for me? It's been a while."
I blinked, surprised by the request. Slowly, I shook my head. "Not now."
I hadn't actually played since the last night I'd spent at his house, when he'd surprised me with a lavish piano before asking me to move in with him. And I'd said yes too, but less than twelve hours later had met his wife, when she had walked in on us in a fairly compromising position. And by compromising, I mean completely naked and all over each other in the middle of his kitchen.
"What happened to the pi
ano at your house?" I wondered.
Brandon sat down at the far end of the bed and leaned back into a stack of throw pillows. He chewed his lip for a moment before replying.
"I had it sent back. You said it was too big anyway, remember?"
I nodded. It had been insanely big, a concert grand fit for Carnegie Hall, not someone's living room. Easily the most insane of all the crazy gifts he'd tried to give me. My fingers strayed to the silver cuff, the only one of those gifts I'd accepted, the one he'd given to say goodbye.
"I guess your mom beat me to the replacement," Brandon said regretfully, watching my fingers.
I looked back at the piano. "Well, don't worry about it. I'm not sure I'm going to keep it anyway. It feels funny to accept such a massive gift from her."
Brandon smirked. "I'm glad I'm not the only one you have a problem accepting gifts from."
I rolled my eyes. "Nope, just the one I refuse them from the most."
"Come here."
Brandon sat up and tried to tug me next to him, but I pulled my arm out of his grasp, opting to stay at the end of the bed and face him instead. He watched carefully.
"You want to talk," he observed. "Why don't you just say what's on your mind, Red?"
I narrowed my eyes.
"She's on the chase now," Brandon mock-narrated my thoughts.
I rolled my eyes. "You don't think we need to talk?"
"I'm guessing you'd like some better explanations about Miranda. And maybe about Messina too. Am I right?"
I crossed my arms irritably, but nodded, short and quick.
Brandon laid back into the pillows. How could he could make himself at home so easily? Even in my own room, I felt completely out of place in this moment.
"All right, then," he said. "I'm an open book. What do you want to know?"
"I want to know why you never told me about Miranda."
The question popped out before I had time to think, surprising even me. I would have predicted my first question would have been about Messina. But no, I realized, I was still pretty damn upset about the fact that Brandon was married and had chosen not to tell me.
He sighed. "Going for the jugular, aren't you?"
"Don't do that," I snapped. "Don't do that thing where you deflect my questions and try to be charming."
Legally Mine (Spitfire Book 2) Page 11