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‘What happened, Lukas? Was it what they did to you when you were kidnapped?’ She lifted her hand and touched her fingertips to the scar on his cheek. She stroked the ruined skin, the shimmer of tears in her eyes only destroying him more. ‘Is that why you’re so terrified of letting me in? You’re still traumatised by those events?’
He grasped her finger, dragged it away from his face and shook his head.
He owed her this much. She deserved to know how broken he was. So she could protect herself.
He stared out at the ocean, the ghostly shadows as the moon rose over the horizon shimmering over the sea. The luxury surroundings here were in sharp contrast to the dingy, dirty room where they’d once kept him—but he felt just as trapped, just as helpless.
His stomach tightened into hard knots, sweat dampening the linen of his shirt as pain seared his skin. But it wasn’t that memory that had haunted him in nightmares for years afterwards. And made him feel so worthless.
‘I used to wet the bed after it happened, afte
r I was home again,’ he said, his voice rough to his own ears. ‘I had nightmares, of course. I still struggle with elevators. I’m not great in confined spaces,’ he added, realising she was the first person he’d ever been able to admit that to. ‘They kept me in a root cellar. I was terrified—of course I was. But the truth is, apart from the one time they cut me, to persuade my father to pay up, they mostly ignored me.’
‘Did you get counselling?’ she asked, with the fierce compassion in her tone that he had somehow come to adore, to rely on, without even realising it. ‘To handle the trauma?’
He huffed out a laugh, the sound as raw and hopeless as he felt. ‘Not precisely. My father—who was generally a distant figure in my life—sent for me one day to go to his offices in Manhattan. It had been over a month since the kidnapping and he was annoyed that I was still wetting the bed. And that my school reports hadn’t improved. He told me, in no uncertain terms, to snap out of it. That I was his heir. And not just because I was the older of the two of us, but also because he believed I had the better temperament. Alexei was like our mother, he said. Wild and flighty and easily diverted. A hedonist who didn’t know the meaning of responsibility or restraint.’
‘But the two of you were only seven years old!’ she said, aghast.
He shoved his fists into the pockets of his pants, the evening breeze cooling the clammy sweat on his skin.
‘You know what’s weird? I never questioned that assessment. It never even occurred to me that maybe Alexei’s subsequent behaviour—the drinking, the drugs, the women, the reckless pursuit of pleasure at all costs—was as much of a plea for our father’s affection as my own behaviour. I always bought into the lie that it was because Alexei was infertile—or thought he was—that he never believed he had anything to live for. But the truth is, Alexei knew long before that, just like I did, that our father didn’t give a damn about either of us.’
‘What happened when you went to see him, Lukas?’ she asked.
‘He told me he’d chosen not to pay the ransom. The Feds had requested he make it available, to facilitate the sting operation they had in mind the day after they’d cut my face. But he refused. He boasted about it to me.’
‘What?’ The horror etched on her face tore at that place deep inside he’d kept hidden, protected, buried for so long. Ever since his father had sat him down in his office and told him he wasn’t as important as Blackstone’s business reputation.
‘It wasn’t the money, he told me, it was the principle of the thing.’
‘That scumbag.’ Bronte’s fury seemed to pierce the numb feeling that had permeated his life for so long.
But he resisted it. He didn’t want to feel. Didn’t want to open himself to that kind of hurt again.
‘The truth is I’ve spent my whole life trying to be the same cold, ruthless bastard he was. And I’ve succeeded.’
Grasping his face, she dragged his gaze to hers. He stiffened, startled to see a tear roll down her cheek. Her face flushed with anger.
‘That’s nonsense, Lukas. You’re not cold or ruthless. And, just for the record, you were worth every single penny of that bloody ransom.’
He clasped her hands, hopelessly torn by the urge to pull away from that fierce love and the desire to sink into it at the same time.
‘You have to understand, Bronte, I can’t love you,’ he said, the words coming out on a husky breath, because now she knew exactly how broken he was. ‘Because I’m simply not capable of that depth of emotion. Not any more.’
* * *
Oh, Lukas. You idiot.
Tears welled in Bronte’s eyes but she blinked them back. She mustn’t fall apart now, or she’d never be able to say to him everything that needed to be said.
‘I don’t know what you think love is, Lukas. But it isn’t some grand romantic gesture; it’s all the little things you do to show people you care about them, that they matter to you.’
‘Are you trying to tell me you’re happy to love me, knowing I can never love you back?’ he said, sounding frustrated now and so confused. ‘Because that’s nuts.’
‘No,’ she replied. ‘That’s not what I’m saying.’
‘Then what are you saying?’ he said, his voice rising with frustration. But she could hear the anguish beneath, and the insecurity. And it was all the opening she needed.
