AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He looked puzzled then he smiled, one of those cynical twists of his lips she recognized from a month ago. ‘Yeah, maybe in a Disney movie.’ He laughed, the sound so bitter it gave her chills. ‘I wasn’t a little boy. I was eleven years old. No I meant, why the heck did I try to stop him when I was so damn mad with her that evening? I’d seen a group of local kids shooting hoops on a court across from the set after I’d tucked Jack and Becca into bed, and I’d been jealous and frustrated. I wanted to go hang out with them. But I couldn’t because I had to look out for my kid brother and sister. Why did we have to be dragged all over the country when I wanted to stay in one place? Why couldn’t I go to a real school? Why couldn’t I tell anyone who my old man was? I just wanted to be a normal kid like those kids were, doing normal kid stuff. And it was my mom’s fault I couldn’t. So why did I intervene when I thought Bartlett was hurting her?’
‘Because she was your mother?’ she offered, saddened by the confusion in his voice. ‘And because you’re a naturally protective person? And a good guy.’
His brows lifted. ‘Why would you think that, Ruby?’ he said, sounding genuinely perplexed by her observation. ‘I’m not a good guy, I always look out for number one.’
She thought of his brother and sister, who he’d put to bed that night, even though, like any eleven-year-old, he had been desperate to play basketball with the other kids. And she thought of The Royale, and how much better it looked than it had close to six weeks ago – the new paint and expertly repaired plaster work, the working toilets and no-longer leaky radiators … Even the boiler in her flat, which hadn’t packed up once since the day he’d repaired it.
‘And that’s never going to change. Because I don’t want it to,’ he said, and she could hear the warning in his voice.
He wasn’t selfish. He shouldered responsibilities rather than shirking them, responsibilities that weren’t even his, and had done ever since he was a boy. But she could see by the guarded expression he wouldn’t believe her if she told him so.
And anyway, this conversation wasn’t really about his mom, or Ross Bartlett or even that little boy who had done the right thing in a trailer in Georgia all those years ago,
and been punished for it.
What this conversation was really about was his imminent departure – the elephant in the cab that had been squeezed between them all night. The one thing he couldn’t talk about because if he did he would have to talk about them, when he was determined to believe there was no them.
For her, there was a them, there would always be a them, these few brief weeks something she would look back on for the rest of her life with joy and affection and no small degree of regret. And for that reason she refused to sour it now with a load of ‘what ifs’ that would just create more of the melodrama he hated.
She couldn’t change his mind about what was right for him, especially as those decisions had been made long before she ever met him.
The cab stopped at the curb outside The Royale and the cab driver hauled back the privacy screen. ‘That’ll be forty-five quid, mate.’
Luke unclicked his belt and reached into his pocket.
Ruby pulled a twenty pound note out of her purse.
‘Don’t even …’ He tugged a credit card from his wallet, added a tip into the cabbie’s card reader, ran the card down the reader then tapped in his code. ‘Tonight is on me.’
She nodded, having lost the will to argue with him. ‘Thank you.’ She shoved the twenty back into her purse.
He jumped out and took her arm, then slammed the door shut and bracketed her hips with his hands. He pressed his face into her hair, found the rioting pulse in her collarbone as the cab drove away.
‘Let’s go to bed. Talking about Ross banging my mom has got me horny.’
Ruby laughed, the teasing kisses making her skin sizzle and burn. ‘That’s a bit kinky.’
‘I know, I’m trying real hard not to dwell on how kinky.’ He lifted his head, then grasped her hand.
He drew her down the alleyway at the side of the building. Reaching the back, he jumped up and grabbed the fire escape ladder. Levering it down, he began to climb, with her hand still grasped firmly in his.
After they’d reached the first level, he hauled the ladder up behind them and locked it in place. Then he led her to the second level.
Shoving up the window at the back of her flat, he climbed inside and then reached out to help her through.
After closing the window, he flicked the lock. ‘I’m going to employ a locksmith to make this more secure,’ he murmured. ‘I don’t want anyone else calling on you late at night.’
Her heart burned at what he had implied without realizing it.
Very soon, there would be no reason to leave her window unlocked, because no one would be calling on her anymore.
Chapter 17
‘Ms Graham, Ms Ryan, thanks a bunch for coming in today and for putting together your presentation. Phil and I thought it was really cool,’ Jamie Callagher, the CEO of The Rialto indie cinema chain sent Ruby a relaxed smile. With his goatee beard, his messy hair and his more casual than smart hipster clothing, Callagher looked like Richard Branson’s geeky younger brother. Or rather, exactly like what he was – a movie buff who had managed to turn his favourite hobby into a money-spinning brand.
Cool? Had he said cool? Was that good, or code for crap?
‘I’m so glad you enjoyed it,’ Ruby said as the spiced caramel latte she’d been given by the receptionist turned into a spiced caramel nuclear bomb in her stomach. When she and Jacie had gotten the call to come back into the company’s head office this afternoon neither of them had been able to eat a bite.
