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I raised a hand to his cheek, pulling his suddenly uncertain eyes to me. “There is no one in this world who could replace you in my life, Greyson. Not now, not ever.”
He laid his hand over mine, gifting me one of the smiles he saved for me. A little lopsided and a lot sexy. “Break a leg, reina.”
Certain he believed me, I made my way to the microphone and hoped that this was the start to the mending we so desperately needed.
* * *
An hour later, and with Dominic busy talking to an old friend, I made another circle around the room. By the time I finished, my face hurt from fake smiling, and I was desperate for some water.
“Drink?”
The voice was darker, more seductive than it had been on the side of the road, but I’d have known it anywhere.
Nate.
“You’re a hard man to find.” I turned around, brows creasing when I found him dressed in Gilded’s uniform. “You serve here?”
How did we miss the fact that he worked for us? Greyson was going to have a meltdown.
“Bartender, actually. I’m covering a break.” Nate handed me the drink, eyes dropping briefly to my dress before they met mine again. “You look lovely. Am I allowed to say that?”
I couldn’t help my grin. “I don’t mind. Your honesty is refreshing.”
Refreshing and unnerving. How easy would it be for him to share his secrets with the world, for him to be manipulated into sharing what wasn’t his? I didn’t want to believe Nate would do that, but everyone was fallible. Even kind farm boys moonlighting as Good Samaritans.
He grinned, the slightest hint of a dimple peeking out, and stepped closer. “I didn’t tell anyone.”
“I believe you. I still would’ve preferred you come back with us.” I neglected to tell him it kept me up at night. He didn’t need to know the hold he had on me.
Nate shook his head. “I’m fine at home, really. I just wanted you to know that your secret’s safe with me.” Someone called his name, and he sighed. “I have to get back.”
My hand reached for him automatically. I didn’t want him to go, and that alone had me pulling away. I didn’t do emotional connections, certainly not with strangers when my world was diving into chaos, but something about Nate pulled me in. “Be careful.”
He gave me one last long look I couldn’t decipher before he slipped between two bodies and disappeared into the crowd.
Wandering away, I sipped gratefully on what I realized was water until I found myself at the edges of the dance floor and looking face first into my own personal nightmare.
Greyson had Aislynn in his arms, dancing her expertly across the dance floor. When she laughed at something, he smiled down at her, soft and sweet. They looked happy. Carefree.
In love.
It wasn’t real. I knew that, but it still felt like someone had ripped my heart out and laid it at my feet.
A throat cleared at my side, but I didn’t look away. Sean O’Bannon was hard to miss, even from the periphery. Brawny and bearded, the Irish lord smiled as he lifted a glass toward his daughter. “They look good together.”
The heavy suggestion in his voice made my head throb. “They do.”
“They’d make handsome babies. Little princes to take over my empire.”
Absolutely not. “He’s not a stud to breed out,” I snapped.
O’Bannon laughed. “No, but he is an eligible man in your family, and she’s of marrying age.”
The idea of anyone marrying Greyson was absurd, but Ash? I looked at them together, her light to his dark. Moody and cheerful. Beautiful opposites. The thought of them together, of his ring on her finger when it would never be on mine, shattered me. Only years of practice kept my shoulders back and my face from showing it. “You want to be family, O’Bannon?”
He shrugged. “Worse ways to unify.”
Considering he’d offered himself and every one of his sons to me at one point or another, I wasn’t so sure. He was awfully desperate to combine forces for a man running the second-largest territory in the city. It didn’t sit right with me. “I’m not going to speak for Greyson.”
