“You’re not being fair,” she accused, and he hardened his heart at the desperation there. “The reasons I explained to you still stand. They’re still valid. Even more so now that this story leaked the way it did. Which, I suspect, was part of my parents’ reason for doing it. I’m unsure about my position with Farrell. Can Cain afford to keep me on with rumors of his supposed mistress working for him? And what about my professional reputation? Now more than ever I need to control the narrative and not allow them to steal that from me. To destroy years of hard work, to ruin how my coworkers and peers look at me. And while I haven’t slept with Cain, if it comes out that I did sleep with the other CEO of the company, it would undo everything. I don’t get a second chance at this. All I’m asking for is time, Achilles. You can’t just flip the script because it’s convenient.”
“Convenient?” He stepped closer to her, then stopped. Getting nearer to her so he could inhale her scent, touch her—that was a mistake. Then...fuck it. He eliminated the distance between them, not stopping until his chest pressed to hers, his thighs bracketed hers. She tipped her head back, meeting his gaze. He ached to brush his fingertips over her elegant brows, those sharp cheekbones, that trembling, sensual mouth. But even he had his limits. “You’re not the only one out on that limb, Mycah. I’m right there beside you. Fuck, I want to be there with you. Just like you told me to do with my brothers—let them in. Now I’m asking you. Let me in.Let me, baby.This—” he gave in, stroked a hand down her hair “—there’s nothing convenient about this.”
“Isn’t it?” she asked softly, her eyes dark with shadows, heavy with sorrow. “And what happens when you decide that I’m not enough anymore? That I’ve disappointed you? What then? What will I have left? My baby and my career. You’re leaving Boston, or have you forgotten that, too? I’ll co-parent long-distance, and my career, it’s the only thing I have complete control over. I sacrificed it before, for a man. And I nearly lost everything I worked so hard for. Nearly lost all trust in myself and who I was in the process. I’m not willing to do that again.”
Achilles dropped his arm. Took a step back. Damn near stumbled as pain and grief punched a hole in his chest, his heart. For him, for her.
For whom they could’ve been.
“You have so little faith in me—in yourself.”
A sense of futility swamped him, and instinctively he battled it, almost reaching for her, needing to hold her, make her see that if she’d just fight for him...
Love him.
He briefly closed his eyes and pressed his fist to his chest, rubbing the ache there. Her gaze dropped to the movement, and he stopped, walking past her to take her former place at the window, blindly staring out at the view that so many people would—and did—pay millions for.
And him? He’d give it all away to wake every day to her.
“It amazes me that you don’t see in yourself what I do. What everyone else does. You’ve been at Farrell for a matter of weeks, and already you have the respect of those who work under you and who are over you. I’m not minimizing your concerns, but I am saying that you’re not taking into account how fiercely people will go to bat for you because of their respect for your work ethic, your record and your character. And you as a person. You don’t just change procedures and cultures in a company, Mycah, you change people. You changed me.”
He turned, faced her. As the glutton for punishment he’d called himself before, he needed to look into her eyes for this.
“I arrived in Boston alone, closed off, mistrustful, bitter, angry and looking for the exit back to Washington. I’m still not what anyone would call a people person, but I have family now—brothers. And not just in name only. Brothers who I trust, who trust me, who I want to become closer to. Not only do they accept me but they want to support me. Like my game. Cain wants to fund it, distribute it.”
“God, Achilles, that’s wonderful,” she breathed, delight for him briefly dispelling the shadows in her eyes. “I’m so happy for you.”
“You gave that to me. Because you encouraged me to trust him and Kenan. I’m letting go of the past, of the hurts, the anger. And today, I told Cain I would stay in Boston.” As shock flashed across her face and her fingers fluttered to the base of her throat, a faint smile curved his mouth. But without humor. “I might have said I would today, but truthfully? I’d made the decision when you told me you were pregnant. I couldn’t be a part-time father. And by then, the thought of leaving had me sick inside. Because it meant leaving you. It meant leaving the woman I was falling in love with.”
“Achilles,” she whispered.
He shook his head, cutting her off. “This isn’t for you, baby,” he said. “It’s for me. I love you. And yes, maybe I’m not being fair to lay this on you, either. But I’m not asking you to do anything with it since at this point, you don’t believe you can—or you don’t want to. I settled for a half relationship in secrecy once. I won’t do it again. I want more. I want it all. Because I’m willing to offer you everything I have and am in return—a husband, a friend, a protector, a lover, a father to our baby. I deserve more than scraps of you.”
He glanced away from her, from the stricken expression that damn near brought him to his knees.
“Achilles, you don’t understand. Just give me—” She stretched a hand toward him, but when he stared at it, she slowly lowered her arm.
This was a matter of survival. And if she put that hand on him, he might not have the strength to do them both the favor of ending this before they hurt each other beyond repair. They still had to be parents to their baby.
“And then what, Mycah? Another month? Another excuse? I can’t.” He slid his hands into the pockets of his pants. “Please let me know when your next doctor’s appointment is. We’ll probably have to be more careful given the publicity with the story, but I won’t be shut out. I still need to be part of the pregnancy.”
She wound her arms around her torso, and after a moment, nodded. And after another longer moment, she turned and walked across the apartment, stepped into the elevator and left him.
How long he stood there, staring out the window, he didn’t know. But when he did stir, the pain, the sorrow crushing his sternum, hadn’t eased. Only this time, he didn’t have to face it alone.
Removing his cell phone from his pocket, he dialed his brothers.
Sixteen
Mycah glanced up from blindly studying her computer screen when she heard the knock on her open office door. She forced a strained smile, waving Kenan Rhodes inside, although her stomach tightened, and it had nothing to do with morning sickness.
He returned the smile, closing the door behind him.
Her belly pitched harder.
If they were going to fire her, they would send the charmer to do it. Sugar with medicine and all that.
She should be worried about losing her job, but as she met his blue-gray gaze, all she could think about was another man with those eyes. A man she hadn’t seen in two eternally long days and nights. A man she couldn’t evict from her thoughts. A man who’d entered her life, ravaged it like a midnight storm and left her irrevocably altered.
