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‘I try to give as many weekends and afternoons as I can. We have a little team that carries most of the load. I do what I can.’
‘Is that what you would like to do?’
‘More than anything! Just doing it a few evenings doesn’t feel like enough, but I can’t get time off work to give more. As it is, my father hates it that I do it. “A waste of time” is what he calls it.’
Emma would never forget coming home from university and telling her parents that she’d decided to volunteer. Her father had told her that she’d proved that she wasn’t one of them. That if she could waste time with schemes that made no money, then she had plenty of time to dedicate to the company. Money came before all else to Peter Brown, and Emma knew that would never change.
‘Then do it, Emma,’ Alex said.
‘I can’t, Alexander.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because I’m a Brown. There are expectations. I can’t just go off on the charity path—it doesn’t work like that.’
‘Emma, life is too short to just do what’s expected of you.’
Emma shrugged. ‘Do you have any siblings?’
Alex huffed a laugh. ‘No, the closest thing I have to a brother is Matt, a friend of mine. It was just my father and I until I went to boarding school, and he was always busy.’
‘That sounds lonely...’ Emma thought that at least she’d had Maddison, and sometimes even her mother. She was suddenly struck by the image of a lost blue-eyed boy and her heart broke.
With a wave of his hand, Alex brushed the image aside. ‘It’s no easy thing for my father, being who he is.’
There was admiration in his words. Emma wondered what it must be like to admire one’s father. As awful as she felt every time she thought it, she couldn’t see a single decent thing about hers. And she knew why.
‘I never wanted you. You were just a mistake your mother refused to fix.’
Just a few words, callously tossed her way, had had her believing she was unworthy of love. But love didn’t exist, so what did it matter?
A warm hand taking hers had her returning to the present. To the piece of pure perfection who was looking at her with so much warmth and heat that she wanted to lean into him. Because, as she was quickly realising, Alex was her favourite distraction from all things real and painful.
‘Would you like to go?’ he asked.
‘I think we should.’
In barely any time at all they were back in the limousine and the door was shut. Emma didn’t even notice that, and nor did she notice Alex holding her firmly against his side. A scene at the entrance to the residential tower was captivating her. A father was holding the hands of both his daughters, then he stopped and knelt to tie one of the girl’s shoelaces. He gave her a little hug and the other little girl jumped onto his back. Smiling broadly, all three of them disappeared into the building.
She was still staring after them when the car began to move. How she had craved that kind of affection growing up, and never once received it. Watching that little family, she thought it seemed like such an easy thing to do. Be happy. Maybe it was. Maybe the problem was her. After all, it was only her that her father couldn’t love.
Whatever it was, Emma was done with dwelling on it for now. She had just had the most amazing evening in a very long time after all.
Alex nuzzled Emma’s neck, coaxing her back to him.
‘Where have you gone?’ he whispered in her ear.
‘Nowhere I need to be.’
She turned around and kissed him with a savage intensity that had him rueing how quickly they were approaching his apartment. Not that it mattered. Even as the car slowed he didn’t let her pull away. The only break in their connection came when the door was opened and he led her into the elevator. And then his lips were on hers once more.
When the doors dinged open, he scooped her into his arms and somehow managed to get them back into his penthouse. He only set her down once they stood in the middle of his apartment, taking her face in his hands.
‘I don’t know where you went to just now, Emma, but that’s not where you belong.’
He had noticed the desolate look on her face and he didn’t care to see it again. Not when there was so much life and passion in her.
A warning bell sounded in him, saying that he was starting to care for her more than he should, but he ignored it—because only a monster would not be moved by that expression. And, no matter what else Alex knew himself to be, cruel wasn’t one of them. He knew cruelty, and he wouldn’t wish it upon anyone.
