“I don’t deserve this,” he said. “I didn’t deserve it then and I don’t now.”
“Well, probably not.” I tried to make a joke, but it didn’t register. Not even a little. “Clayton,” I breathed and touched his face. Cupped his cheeks with my palms, ran my fingers over my lips. “If we decided what we deserved you and I…we’d live on scraps. Because that is what we’re used to. That’s what our fathers have conditioned us to expect. They taught us with every breath that our love was never enough. That what we wanted didn’t matter. But…I want more. I know it’s not love. And maybe you won’t ever love me. But I want you to choose me. The way I’m choosing you.”
He kissed me. So fast and hard our teeth clicked together and my lip got caught in the middle. “I choose you, too,” he said, and it wasn’t love. But I wasn’t expecting love. This was better. This was safety and security. Love was a fallacy. A castle made of smoke and mirrors.
This felt like a promise.
“That night in the dressing room, when you gave this to me the first time, I didn’t know what to do,” he said. “Because I’d never been given a gift before.”
“You’re kidding,” I said, and he shook his head.
He still had my hand and I curled my fingers around his, the watch something we held together. A promise we were making.
For you. Forever.
He rolled me to my back, his lip curling in that smile that lit me on fire from the inside.
“I know what to do now,” he said.
“What’s that?”
“Never let you go.”
21
VERONICA
We were still in bed. We’d been in bed for hours. There had been food delivered that we ate in bed and then more lovemaking. And then both of us did a little work—from bed. It seemed possible that we might not leave this king-size planet we were making. I was even taking calls from my sisters.
I hung up the phone and bit my lip.
“What?” Clayton asked.
“It’s…I don’t know.” I looked down at my phone, the new contact information for Sabrina still on the screen.
Clayton touched my chin, pulling my attention. “Tell me, Ronnie.”
He wanted to fix this for me and I did love that about him.
Love. I still felt giggly thinking about it. Well, giggly and really fucking nervous.
But I wasn’t sure how this could be fixed.
“Sabrina’s back.”
“Back where?”
“The ranch. She quit the show.”
“Whoa.”
“I know.”
“And Bea-“ I stopped right there. Bea was a heartache. “She went back to Austin. There was no way they could stay in the same house together.”
“I can loan her some money. Just until the paperwork is done for the inheritance and the trust.” The paperwork was going to take another six months, easy.
“I can’t take your money.”
He rolled me to my side so I was facing him. “I’m a rich man, Ronnie. I can take care of you and your sisters without the damn company or the inheritance.”
I narrowed one eye at him. “Are you bragging?”
“No. I’m telling you I’ve got your back. You don’t have to be worried. None of you do.”
This was next-level seduction. The idea that I could not only make my sisters whole but stop running after them with my safety nets was unbelievably comforting.
“You don’t have to.”
“I know. But I want to.”
“I can take a loan…just for Bea to get her out of trouble. Until all the paperwork is done for the trusts.”
“My wife is not going to pay me back for the money I give her.” He shook his head.
“I just…I don’t know how to do this.” And I didn’t. To lean on him like this. To accept help. I wasn’t good at it.
“Say thank you, that’s all.”
“Thank you.”
He kissed me. Sweetly. “That was really hard for you, wasn’t it?”
“You have no idea.”
Clayton rolled over onto his back and stretched his arms up over his head. I ran my fingers down the muscles of his arm, down to his armpit. He flinched away, smiling.
“You’re ticklish?” I cried.
“No,” he said.
“You are. You’re ticklish.” I ran my fingers over that sensitive skin again and this time he laughed, but when he tried to pull away I wouldn’t let him. “This is ticklish,” I said as he tried to worm away from me and my fingers.
He clamped his arm down, trapping my hand flat. I was lying on top of him and we were nose to nose.
“Uh-oh,” he said. “Now what are you going to do?”
I kissed him. His beautiful smiling mouth. I didn’t want to break this mood, but talking about it, this felt…so different from last time. Like I was in love with a different version of the man.
But I couldn’t help it. I leaned back. “What do you think would have happened if we’d gotten married last time?”
“What do you mean?”
“Would you have told me about your father? Or about the deal you made with my father?”
“About my father, yes. About your father, probably not.”
“Why?”
“What would be the point of hurting you? All I’ve ever wanted was to not hurt you.”
“But you understand I’m a grown woman and I’d rather have all the information and get hurt than be lied to.”
He nodded. “I do understand that. Can I kiss you now?”
“You may.”
He kissed me and kissed me and I melted against him, my exhausted and actually pretty sore body warming to the idea of another round with Clayton. Then he leaned back.
“Sabrina,” he said. “She needs something to do.”
“Yeah. That would be helpful, probably. Keep her busy.”
“Can she plan our wedding?”
“We…” I couldn’t even finish the thought. Because when it had just been a business arrangement, the wedding hadn’t seemed real. But now it seemed…very real.
“Have you changed your mind?” he asked, and I could see him bracing. He had blown his protection apart and he was raw and vulnerable. My heart pounded against my ribs.
“No,” I said. “Just…the wedding, the marriage wasn’t real to me before. You know?”
“No,” he said. “It’s always been real to me. Marriage to you is what I have always wanted.”
“The million-dollar business is just a perk?”
I was teasing him, but he cupped my face in my hands again, holding me still. “It has been you and only you since the minute I met you.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “I don’t even know when we met.”
“At King Industries. I’d just gotten the job in the mailroom and I was bringing some things up to your dad’s assistant. You and Bea came walking out and you were…I don’t know how to put it…it’s like you were glittering.”
“Glittering?”
“I said I didn’t know how to put it, but you and Bea were arm in arm, walking toward the elevators and you were laughing. You were just the prettiest thing I’d ever seen.”
I put my head down against his neck, hugging him with my whole body. “Why didn’t you ever say anything?” I whispered.
“I didn’t know how,” he said. “You were this wish I had to keep secret. This thing I couldn’t want. But then your father started talking about that ridiculous arrangement and I saw the other men he’d told about it start to gear up, and then it became more about protecting you from them. And protecting you from your father. That was something I could do.”
“Clayton,” I sighed, melting into him.
“And…” he tightened his arms around me “…I regret that you never got your day. Your day to be the beautiful bride.”
“Well,” I said, “if we let Sabrina plan the wedding it will be the event of the year.”
“Do you want that?�
�
“I want you,” I said. “And I want to be married and I want my sisters to be safe and happy.”
“A lot of birds with one stone,” he said.
“Okay. I’ll call Sabrina. But we better have some parameters in place or she’ll have us leaving in hot-air balloons.”
“As long as I’m leaving with you, I don’t care.”
So. I was getting married. And as soon as we asked Sabrina to plan it, it became exceedingly real. She put us on a schedule and made lists. She made lists of lists. The wedding was set for June 17, literally one day after Dylan’s deadline. And the fact that we only had a few months to plan it seemed, according to Sabrina, like an impossible mission.
“It can be small,” I told her. “It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”
She gasped so hard she nearly passed out. “Not a big deal? Bite your tongue, Ronnie. You’re a King. We are a big deal.”
No one had heard from Dylan. And that seemed about right, if a little sad. Dylan wasn’t coming back. He didn’t care enough to save us or ruin us. That’s how little the King sisters meant to him.
Bea, Sabrina, and I all pretended we didn’t care. And I couldn’t speak for them—but I cared a little bit.
Bea was furious with me. Absolutely livid.
She still accepted the money to pay off her debt. But it wasn’t easy and I felt bad for her, I really did. The number of times she’d had to swallow her pride had undoubtedly been a few too many.
Then change, I thought.
But she helped me pack up my stuff from our Austin house.
“I can’t believe you’re not going to be here,” she said, putting books in boxes. “It’s like the house will be haunted.”
“It won’t be that bad,” I said. But she gestured to the walls, where I’d taken down the artwork I was going to take with me to Clayton’s condo. The half-empty walls did seem a little haunted. “Maybe you should find a little apartment,” I said. “Something closer to downtown.”
“If I’m moving, I’m leaving Austin,” she said. “Too many bad memories.”
“You can stay with us—”
“With you and Clayton? Are you joking?”
“Then the ranch?”
“With Sabrina?”
“You know, beggers can’t actually be choosers, Bea,” I snapped, and she looked away, back to the bookcase. “I’m sorry,” I said.
“No. I am. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m such a mess and I can’t ever seem to clean up on my own.”
“What can I do?” I asked.
“You’ve already done enough. Too much, probably. I’ll figure this out on my own.”
I forced myself to keep my mouth shut, because she did need to do this on her own. That it was hard for me was my problem.
“You should just take this bookcase,” she said.
“Clayton has tons of bookshelves.” The silence after my words was deafening. “He’s going to be my husband,” I said. “I wish you could move on from what happened. I have.”
“Listen to me,” she begged. “Please. You’re forgetting what it was like because you’re drunk on sex. But this guy lied to you. Over and over again. I’m telling you as a person who’s had way too much experience with liars—he won’t stop.”
“He had his reasons and they were complicated.” I said. I hadn’t explained Clayton’s relationship with his father except to tell her that Dale made our father look like Mr. Rogers. “He’s kind of like a feral cat. I’m just trying to get him up on the porch.”
“You’re comparing your fiancé to a feral cat in an effort to convince me to approve?” she asked.
“Well, you’re a little feral yourself.”
She didn’t like that.
“Does he love you?” she asked. “Has he actually said the words or are you convincing yourself he feels something because you need him to feel something?”
This was such a weird sore spot. On one hand, what did the words matter if I was so happy? And he was happy, too?
But on the other—the words really mattered.
“It’s complicated,” I said.
“Yeah,” she said. “That’s how you know it’s bullshit.”
“Look!” I snapped. “I know you’ve had shit luck with guys. I know you’re bitter. I get it. But I am happy, Bea. I am…so happy. Can’t you just be happy for me?”
Her silence was awful and I almost reached for my keys and my purse. We didn’t fight like this and it broke my heart, but I didn’t know what to do. I was happy with Clayton and I needed her to see that.
“Okay,” she finally said and stepped over the couch to get to my side so she could hug me. “Okay. I’m just…scared for you. I’m scared for me. Maybe I’m just scared.”
“I’m not,” I said. So delighted it was true. I was nervous. Anxious.
But I wasn’t scared.
And I should have been.
Clayton and I rented a truck and brought back my things from Austin.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said. “We can look at places in Austin.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” I said. “Your job is here. So is mine, now. My sisters.”
“Anytime you want to look at a place that isn’t this place,” he said, “we can.”
“I know.” I kissed him and we fell back on the blue velvet couch we’d just moved into his condo. “But I like this place.”
“I like this couch,” he said as our bodies settled into each other. We’d become excellent cuddlers over the last few weeks. Making up for lost time, maybe. I didn’t know, but I loved it.
“It’s an excellent making-out couch,” I said.
My phone buzzed and he dug it out of the pillows behind our heads before handing it to me.
I sighed heavily.
“What’s wrong?”
“Sabrina. She’s got another couple of places she wants me to look at.”
“For the wedding?”
“Yeah. You’re lucky I’m saving you from this.”
“You don’t want to get married at the ranch?”
“I do, but—”
He grabbed the phone out of my hand and answered it.
“Sabrina, it’s Clayton. I’m fine, thanks. You?” Long silence. Really long silence. “Well, about those site visits. Veronica and I talked and we’d really like to get married at the ranch.” Silence. His brow furrowed and I laughed silently at his expression. “I don’t think that will be a problem. No. I don’t. We don’t invite three hundred people, that’s how.” He lifted his eyebrows and looked at me. “How many do we invite?”
“Two hundred,” I mouthed. “No. One hundred and fifty.”
“One seventy-five,” he said and then pulled the phone from his ear so I could hear her freaking out. “Nope. I’m sure,” he said. “If anyone can do it, you can.”
And then he hung up. And it was handled.
“Nice going,” I said.
“Well, I know you have a hard time saying no to Sabrina. Bea, too, for that matter.”
“What?” I said. “I say no to them.”
He arched that eyebrow at me again.
“They’re all I’ve got,” I said.
“I know.” He kissed my nose. “If I had sisters I wouldn’t say no to them, either.”
“You will have sisters,” I said. “In a few months.”
And, swear to God, the joy on his face made my heart trip all over itself. “I guess you’re right,” he said, still smiling. “Bea’s gonna hate that.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. At least he understood what he was up against.
I love you, I thought, but I didn’t say it. For a moment the déjà vu was dizzying. It was as if no time had passed, and I was the girl keeping her mouth shut, too scared to tell him how I felt. Too scared to be embarrassed.
I opened my mouth to say the words, knowing he might not say them back. Knowing he might not even feel what I felt. But he kissed me, filling my mouth with his breath, and I swallowed
my words.
Back with all the other words I’ve swallowed. And I tried not to be disappointed with myself. I tried not to care. But I was lying to myself.
Again.
There’s still time, I told myself. I’m not making the mistakes I made before.
I was not the girl I’d been. And he wasn’t the man he’d been.
We were different. We were.
We had to be or we were doomed from the beginning.
His hand slipped up my leg, under my skirt, until he cupped me in his palm. For a second, I squeezed my legs together. I didn’t know why. But I was gripped by a sudden panic.
“Let me in,” he whispered against my cheek. He kissed the throb of my heartbeat in my neck. His fingers pressed against me.
You already are, I thought. You’re already in. You always have been.
Tell me, I thought. Tell me you feel something for me. Tell me there’s something more here than just sex. Than just me loving you. Tell me…
“I want you so much,” he said. “This skirt, Ronnie. All day this skirt has been killing me.”
It was a red skirt with black X’s and O’s on it. It was silly and made my butt look big, but I loved it. And, apparently, so did he.
Was it embarrassing that that was enough? Whatever. I opened my legs and let him in and his touch was enough. For this moment. For me. It was more than enough.
22
VERONICA
Sunday morning I rolled over in his king-size bed to find him looking at me.
“Good morning,” I said, trying to point my morning breath away from him, but he came in for a kiss anyway. “How long have you been awake?”
“Not long.”
There was something going on behind his eyes. “What’s up?” I asked.
“It’s Sunday and I usually go visit Dale on Sundays.”
“Oh,” I said. “That’s cool. I’ve got a lot of stuff I need—”
“I’d like you to come with.”
“To meet your father?”
“Dale. To meet Dale.”
There had been changes over the short time we’d been together. Changes I never saw coming. A softness and a willingness to be slightly out of control. But this…this seemed big.
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