“Daphne? You need a ride?”
“No,” I blurt, then amend. “Well, actually yes. That’d be great. But really I need a favor. Something delivered.”
A smile spreads across his face. “Well, then, I’m your messenger.”
Thirty-Five
Present Day
Logan
I pace the sidewalk outside Daphne’s apartment. I made it all of about six hours after leaving her at the funeral before hopping in the truck and driving like a bat out of hell back over here.
I might’ve hated her father but she loved him.
And I remember how broken she was when she lost her mother. How lost she was and how she clung to me like I was the only thing that made sense in her shattered world.
Things were so simple back then. I punched the buzzer again but she doesn’t respond. Is she not home or just not responding to me?
The sun is dropping below the horizon and with it, the temperature, but the cold doesn’t touch me. I’m already numb from days replaying our last fight in my head.
“Nobody hurts me the way you do.”
Why do I even think she’s here? She’s probably run back to Adam. The thought is acrimonious and bitter going down.
But even as I tell myself that, I don’t believe it.“Trust me when I say I didn’t betray you. That I would never betray you. Trust me. We could have everything, if you would just trust me.”
I shake my head, growling, and a couple of pedestrians startle and scuttle away.
That’s right. Run from the madman.
I tried to go back to the castle. Tried to get on with my life. But I just have to make sure she’s okay.
The street lights switch on. I turn up the collar of my great coat. When I close my eyes, I see Daphne’s small form at the memorial service. I reach out as if I could touch her, as if my thoughts could conjure her. But when I open my eyes, she’s not here.
I pace a few more times, kicking pieces of trash into the gutter before I face her door, and the truth.
She’s not coming. Tonight I’ll be alone.
Better get used to it.
And just like that, the isolation that is my life hits me with full force. Endless days and nights of me rattling around that huge castle, alone and empty. Soon I really will be a mad old monster.
I turn and almost knock over a slender man in a great coat. He clings to me to keep from falling and I set him upright without cussing him out. My good deed for the day.
But once he’s standing on his own, he keeps hold of me. “My gods,” he feels the muscle in my arms. “No skipping workouts for you. At least, not arm day.”
I open my mouth to snarl and he holds up the last thing I’d expect. A rose.
And that’s when I recognize him. He’s the man I saw Daphne talking to at the most recent Ubeli ball. Armand. I pulled him aside and told him I was her secret admirer. I asked him to give her the message to meet me in the labyrinth along with her mother’s favorite rose. It feels like a lifetime ago now even though it couldn’t have been more than a month.
But now he’s handing me that exact same species of rose. Then he leans in, kohl-lined eyes twinkling.
“I have a message for you.”
“A message,” I repeat, fighting the urge to step back. What the hell is this guy playing at? What’s his game? He keeps holding the rose in my face until I snatch it away. “Is this it?”
“That’s half of it.” He hands me a roll of paper tied with a red ribbon.
I’m itching to study both the rose and the note, but not with him watching. “Who are you?”
“Me? I’m just a messenger.” He nods at the items I’m holding. “She wanted me to give you these.”
She? “Who?”
“You know who.”
Fucking riddles. I jerk off the ribbon and unroll the paper just enough to read the first part of the fancy script. Avicennius Grant…
I jerk my head up. “Is this...?”
“Daphne’s Avicennius grant. And I believe that second piece of paper is her college diploma. One of them.”
Sure enough, the paper reads Awarded to: and follows with Daph’s full name. “I don’t understand.” What the hell is this? How did he get these? Is he trying to threaten—
“Come on, Wulfe. You can do better than that. Daphne is smart; she deserves someone to match.” He taps the papers. “She sent these clues.”
Her award and diploma? How are they clues? “Why would she send these?”
“Fine,” Armand sighs in disappointment at my failure to play his made-up game. “I’ll spell it out for you. This is all she has left. And she’s giving them to you. Get it?” He cocks his head to the side, studying me.
When I still don’t give him a satisfactory answer, he just shakes his head and waves his hand like he’s done with me. “She wants to see you. You better hurry. She shouldn’t be alone.”
“Where is she?”
“You know where.” He gives me a patient smile. “Where did those papers hang?”
I answer automatically, “In her bedroom at...”
The man touches two fingers to his forehead and flicks them at me before striding off.
I whirl on my heel, crushing the papers in my hand. Only to smooth them out carefully once we’re in my car.
“Sir? Where are we headed?”
“Thornhill.”
Thirty-Six
Present Day
Logan
I give directions and ease back in the seat, clutching my rose like a gold ticket. My invitation back into Daphne’s world. Back to where we began.
So much has happened, though. It’s not like we can just go backwards. Just because her father died, am I just supposed to forget the pictures…the betrayal?
But maybe, for one night, none of that matters.
She shouldn’t be alone. What did Armand mean by that? Is she… I shake my head. Daphne isn’t like my mom.
But when the driver pulls up to Thornhill, it’s dark. No light in the windows. Including the ones I broke.
Shards of glass line my throat when I think of Daphne seeing how I smashed her childhood home.
“Should I wait, sir?” the driver asks.
“No. Come back in the morning.” Even if Daphne isn’t here, I’ll stay. I’ll spend the night in the only place that ever felt like home…and then only for one night. Because I was with her.
The floorboards creak and puffs of dust rise like ghosts. I turn in a circle, remembering when this place was beautiful. I never should’ve bought it. I ruin everything I touch.
“Daphne,” I whisper. The stairs groan under my weight. But then I see it—a flicker of light in the far corner of the house.
In her old room. Of course.
“Hello? Daphne?”
“In here,” she calls.
I rush down the rest of the hall and stand dumbfounded in the door. Daphne stands in the light of a single candle. The weak flame casts more shadows than light, emphasizing the dirty smudges on her face and furrows of exhaustion under her eyes.
She looks so beautiful.
“Welcome to my humble abode,” she waves a hand around her dark and dank room. She’s taken the curtains I ripped down and made a bed in the corner. Next to it is a table with a broken leg, propped up with books, that holds the candle. “It’s not much, but it’s all I’ve got, for now.”
She’s grinning.
“Daphne...are you okay?” She shouldn’t be alone, Armand had said. With everything that’s happened, has she suffered a mental break?
“Never better.”
I cross to her, reach out to touch her flushed cheek, but my finger hovers in the air. “You’re freezing.”
“I’m fine. I was cuddled up with some of these fine curtains before I heard you.”
I’m already removing my overcoat. “Let’s get you warm.”
“No more trials? No more labors of Hercules?” she murmurs as she lets me wrap her in the dark wool. It drapes around
her like over-sized wizard robes.
“No. No more games.” This time, I do touch her face. Her skin is cold, but not as bad as I thought. “What are you doing here?”
“Here? Well…” she laughs, her head falling back, which makes her hair cascade in a lush black waterfall. She looks so carefree, it’s freaking me out. Especially when she continues, “Dad’s estate is in probate. My townhouse was actually a perk of working at Belladonna so now that I’m no longer there, I don’t have a—”
“Wait...you’re not at Belladonna?”
“Nope.” Her head tilts to the side as she stares at me. “Where have you been? Didn’t you see the news?”
I could hardly miss it. The business newspapers in particular reported her termination as CEO with glee. “I thought they’d just demote you.”
“Oh no, they were real thorough about throwing me out.” She doesn’t seem concerned. She squats and pulls up the over-sized sleeve so she can rustle around in a half empty knapsack lying beside her makeshift bed.
A few seconds later, she holds up a protein bar. “Hercules bar? They’re actually pretty good. They have ten times the daily dosage of every vitamin, which is overkill and might possibly make a person sick, but I can’t resist the ones dipped in chocolate.”
She studies the bodybuilder on the package. “You know, if the reclusive dom gig doesn’t work out for you, you could probably model for this company— ”
“Daphne! What happened? Why are you—” I look around at the shambles of her dark room.
“Living like a homeless person in my former home?” She doesn’t lose that light-hearted smile. “Well, when did we last speak? Oh yeah, the night you walked out on me because someone drugged me and took photos of me half-nekkid. The night before my dad died.”
Her matter-of-fact tone doesn’t stop each statement from slamming into me like a bullet. Drugged her? What the—
“Our relationship is super fucked up, Logan,” she adds, and smacks her lips as she eats the chocolate bar. “But,” her voice softens. “I’m glad you’re not wearing the mask. I saw you at the funeral without it.”
“Enough.” I growl before she continues in this ridiculous vein and compliments my neck beard. “Daphne, nothing’s changed between us. Tell me why I should trust you.”
“Oh, so now you’re willing to listen?” she raises a brow.
I swallow. “I was wrong. I should’ve listened before.”
“Yes, you should’ve,” she says, settling cross-legged on the pile of curtains. “From the very start and every time afterwards, you should’ve listened to me before flying off the handle. I know I didn’t handle things well and you had reasons for your questions. Good reasons. But I didn’t deserve what you did to me.”
“You liked everything I did—
She waves a hand impatiently. “I’m not talking about all that. I did love that. I do. I love everything you’ve given me. The truth is, Logan, I love you.”
She loves me. Bright sunshine bursts inside my chest even as a voice in the back of my mind screams, can’t trust her, can’t trust her, can’t trust—
“But part of becoming the woman you’ve helped me discover, is that I refuse to be treated badly. I’ve done everything in my power to prove my devotion and loyalty. But it’s never enough. You’ll always believe outside voices over mine. I was drugged, my privacy violated, and you believed my accusers over me. Do you know what that feels like?”
Just like that, I feel like I’ve been kicked in the gut. I never even thought about that before and—
“Remember that night in the labyrinth?” she continues relentlessly. “Remember what happened to me?”
I crouch down to get closer to her level, and also because I don’t feel so steady on my feet as the pieces come together. “You fainted. You were drugged.”
She touches her forehead with a finger and flicks at me. Much like Armand did. Have they been hanging out?
Jealousy snarls through me but I push it aside to process what she’s saying. “You were drugged.” I can’t believe I didn’t guess it before now. Maybe I am as slow as Armand insinuated.
“Yep.” She pops the ‘p’. “You get one guess as to who did it.”
“Adam.” I straighten in the doorway. My hands come up as if grabbing an imaginary man to rip apart. “I'll kill him.” I told myself I was going to that engagement party to protect her but all I did was leave her vulnerable. All I could see was my stupid revenge and he, he—
Daphne rises too and approaches me without fear. “That’s not the whole story. After you and I had our little conversation, I got news that my dad was dying. I had no idea his health had gotten so bad. Adam didn’t want me to know.”
“What?” I feel my face and neck flaming red. Like gasoline poured on my rage.
“It didn’t work. I talked to dad before he died.” She cups my face in her hands. Her touch calms the Beast. “Logan, he told me he was sorry for how things turned out. For what he and Adam did to you.”
“He...did?”
And the blows just keep coming. I barely get my balance before another blow all but knocks me off my feet.
“He did.” Her voice is gentle. Kind. “Unfortunately it was too late for me to get more details, so I could get proof or a confession against Adam, but if we dig, I bet we can find it.”
We?
My heart leaps. She’s talking about the future. Our future. But I failed her, over and over. How can she—?
“So that’s everything that happened,” she says, “until Tuesday happened.”
“What happened Tuesday?” Fuck, I’m not sure how much more I can take.
“That’s when I met with the board. They voted me out. But I still gave them copies of this.” She spins around to dig in her bag until she comes up with a sheet of paper, neatly folded.
I snatch it and read it with my phone’s flashlight. “You...resigned?”
“Yep.” Her voice turns more serious. “I have nothing, Logan. Not a thing. Just two dead parents, my degrees, and the Avicennius grant. Except that I sent you those two pieces of paper. So, technically, nothing. I have nothing, Logan.” She doesn’t look sad or bitter. She looks… calm. At peace. “I’m finally free. Completely free.” She flops her arms outwards. “It only took losing everything,” she laughs.
It doesn’t change the fact that she’s squatting in the ruined shell of her childhood home. Like a homeless person. Even in my great coat, she looks cold.
I’ve been the world’s biggest asshole.
This, in front of me, is my Daphne, the same as she ever was. Innocent of the world’s malice. Pure in all the ways that matter. She wasn’t trying to play rivals against one another or win fame or fortune. She has nothing and yet she still manages to be happy. And after everything I did, she can still look in my monster’s face and without batting an eye tell me she loves me.
She’s a fucking angel gracing this earth in a sexy-as-sin body.
“Anyway, I just wanted to tell you that. Thank you for coming.” She pats the pockets of my coat, pulls out the papers and the rose. “I had a hell of the time convincing Armand to leave me here. He made me swear up and down I’d call him if you didn’t show up.”
“I’ll call him,” I say quickly.
“Are you jealous of Armand? Don’t be.” She lays everything on the table, then pulls on a pair of gloves. They look too large, but at least it’s something. She still looks cold, though. I don’t like it.
“You can’t stay here,” I say gruffly.
She raises a brow. “You’re kicking me out?”
“Yes… No! I’m not kicking you out. I mean, you should be at the castle, with me.”
“You hurt me, Logan.” Just a whisper, and it’s a dagger through my chest. I stumble back and lean against the door frame so I don’t fall to my knees.
“I know.” I tear a hand through my hair. My face feels naked without the mask. “I don’t trust easy. Or at all.”
“You have
n’t had reason to,” she murmurs.
“No, don’t do that.” I point at her. “Don’t make excuses for me. I’m a monster.”
“You’re my monster.” She sways forward slowly, carefully, as if approaching a wild animal.
“I don’t know what I can do to earn your forgiveness.” I can’t believe all this time I was trying to make her prove her love and devotion to me, when I should have been begging at her feet the entire time.
“You don’t have to earn my love, Logan. I’m giving it to you.”
And I sink to my knees. “Daphne.”
She kneels and hugs me, snuggling her head to my chest. Her weight over my heart...it’s everything.
“I gave everything up for you,” she whispers. “Belladonna. The patents…I’m not with you for them. I’ve let them all go. I want you for you.”
“I don’t know what I did to deserve this.” She’s breaking me, doesn’t she realize that? No one ever wants me. I’m a shit. I’m worthless. My own mom didn’t think I was worth sticking around for. No foster family ever wanted me. Even Dr. Laurel threw me away when I became inconvenient.
There’s no way this goddess could actually want the dirty little boy whose mom couldn’t even remember to feed him.
But she clutches my face and forces me to look her in the eyes.
“You woke me up. I get to live my life starting now. And I choose you.” She shivers, and I stop fighting my protective impulses and wrap her up in my arms. Or maybe I need it as much as she does. I need to hold her and feel that she’s real. I still can’t believe that happiness like this could actually be in reach for someone like me.
“Stay with me, Logan,” she whispers and I hold her tighter. “I don’t know who I am, or what I’m going to do, or where I’m going, but I want you. Not because of the patents. Not because of our past. Because of who you are …and who we could be.”
Thirty-Seven
Present Day
Daphne
The creaking floor wakes me. I blink in the honeyed morning light.
Billionaire’s Captive: A Beauty and the Rose Box Set Page 34