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“I know that, but I had to try.People have died.”
“You came here because people have died.”
“I keep saying that.”
“But it’s not everything. It’s not the whole reason.”
“It’s the reason I was willing to come here and I know you might not believe me, but considering our past, this wasn’t easy for me.”
“Because I left or because you regret what happened between us?”
“Does it matter? I was one of them to you then and I’m one of them now.”
He considers me for several long few beats. “I know that you have a trust fund from your father. Take it and run. Get the hell out now because you’re right, even watching from a distance, and I am, there’s a problem at Kingston.”
I have a fleeting moment of fear that he knows because he’s somehow involved, but I shove that idea away. He’s not behind this. I know too much about what really is happening to believe he’s behind this. “What do you know that I don’t know?”
“To get out. I got out. You need to as well.”
“I don’t get my trust fund until I turn thirty-five and my mother loaned it to your father.”
“You’re fucking kidding me.”
“No. No, I’m not.”
“Then leave them and come here. I’ll give you a job. You can make your way just like I did. Unless you don’t trust your ability to make your own way?”
“Don’t be an asshole,again. I was planning to leave. I told your grandmother right before her heart attack.”
“And that made you feel guilty?”
“What part ofpeople have dieddo you not understand? How many times can I say that before you take it in? I can’t just walk away and your grandmother really has changed. She’s old. She can’t handle this alone.”
He doesn’t immediately reply. He just stands there, looking at me, seconds ticking by before his gaze sweeps my mouth, his body so close to my body, and Lord help me, I think he might kiss me. I think I want him to kiss me, but he doesn’t. He pushes off the door. “The job offer stands. Safe travels, Harper, because we both know you won’t stay.”
My lashes lower with the rejection I’ve felt not once now but twice with this man. I open my eyes and force my gaze to his. “Thank you for seeing me.” I open the door and exit, my knees weak as I rush through the offices and toward the elevator. I punch the button and the doors open, allowing me to rush inside, but once I’m there, alone in the car, reality hits hard.
Iamalone. Eric isn’t going to help me.
Chapter seven
Eric
Istand there in my office, staring at the doorway, hot and hard, with the scent of Harper’s perfume in the air, the memories of her naked and in my arms in my mind. I still crave her. I have always craved her, but we aren’t even close to a possibility. She’s on top of the Kingston throne. I will never kneel to that throne, and yet, she has stayed with me all these years. Maybe becauseshe’son that throne. Maybe because she’s untouchable. Maybe because she has those damn beautiful eyes. All I really know is that me wanting her this fucking badly makes her a weakness that every Kingston, perhaps her included, would happily use against me.
And while I want to believe her intentions are pure, six years in the folds of that family makes that a difficult sell. I’d also like to believe that I know more about what’s happening at Kingston than her, which would make her visit authentic. I scrub my jaw and cross to my desk, where I grab my briefcase and head for the door. I have a deal to close and money to make for a man who deserves his success.
By the time I’m in a hired car on the way to the bar in Grayson’s apartment building, I’ve replayed every word of that conversation with Harper ten times, but I keep going back to Gigi, that bitch of a woman who all but ensured my mother’s miserable death. I hate her at least ten degrees deeper than I do my father, who at least saved his punishment for me, not my mother. The car drops me at my destination and I walk inside to find Grayson in his normal booth.
He lifts the bottle he’s ordered, an expensive-ass whiskey I welcome right about now. “I thought you might need this.”
“In duplicate,” I say, settling into the booth as he fills my glass.
I down the contents and pull a contract from my briefcase to get to work. “Where were we?”
“Where were we? Talking aboutHarper.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
