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“He’s always been ambitious,” Redmond says with a proud gleam in his eye.
“We were walking home one night, and I was wearing high heels,” I say. “He went up to a total stranger and paid her to trade him her flip-flops. Paid her a hundred dollars for them too. I didn’t even have to ask. He just did it. Like it was nothing. Because he wanted me to be comfortable.”
“They don’t make them like us anymore,” he says with a wink.
“I’ve kissed a lot of frogs in my life,” I say, “so to speak. But your son? He was the first one who actually turned out to be a prince.”
Redmond chuckles. “Don’t tell him that. It might go to his head.”
I smile. “I don’t think it would.”
Dorian is anything but arrogant—unlike Burke.
“Anyway, your son is the first person who ever made me feel seen and heard and valued and wanted,” I say. My throat tightens with the gravity of those words, with the gravity of everything I’m giving up because of this arrangement. “I think about the night we met all the time. It was one of the most profound experiences of my life. And no matter what happens, no matter which way our lives take us, we’ll always have that. What we shared will forever be ours and no one else’s.”
Redmond straightens his shoulders, exhaustion and contentedness washing over him.
“Well,” he says. “I think that’s the perfect way to end a lovely conversation, don’t you?”
I yawn, covering my mouth with the back of my hand.
It’s been a long day, and it’s going to be a long seven weeks.
“Good night, dear. Sleep well,” he says before shuffling off, his glass of water in his hand.
I linger a moment longer in the dark kitchen, the space lit only by the light over the stainless steel range along the far wall. I let my words play in my head, wishing Dorian could’ve been there to hear me but knowing I’ll never be able to speak these words out loud for the rest of my natural life.
Only the last thing I expect is for my wish to come true.
“Ohmygod.” I gasp, clutching at my chest, when I spot the masculine shadow seated at the breakfast nook in the corner. “How long have you been sitting there?”
He rises, slowly, stepping out of the shadows in his white V-neck shirt and navy-blue sweats, slung low on his hips. But it’s his piercing turquoise gaze that steals the remaining air from my lungs and anchors my feet to the cold marble floor.
“Long enough,” he says.
And with that, he disappears into the next room.
He heard everything.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
DORIAN
Present Day
“I didn’t know you were in here.” I stop short in the doorway of the sunroom where Briar is curled up near a window, paging through some paperback as rain pelts the glass beside her.
True to her glittery self, she’s everywhere.
Even with all the square footage on this island, I can’t seem to get away from her no matter where I go.
She closes her book and sits up. “I can leave.”
Lightning flashes and an angry growl of thunder follows, rattling the windowpanes and reverberating through every inch of the space around us.
We lost power half an hour ago. Burke and Maurice went to find out why the generator didn’t kick on, and Nicola took the kids to the family room to distract them with their iPads.
I thought I’d find my father in here. He tends to pass the time in this room during storms, calling it the “best view in the house” with its three walls of floor-to-ceiling glass.
“No, stay,” I tell her. Hooking my hands on my hips, I draw in a sharp breath.
Last night, I was sitting in the kitchen, alone with my thoughts—minding my own business—when my father and Briar wandered in without so much as glancing toward the breakfast nook where I sat in the dark.
What began as idle chitchat and general pleasantries morphed into a full-on heart-to-heart where Briar described all the things that made her fall in love with my brother.
Only she wasn’t describing Burke.
She was describing me.
“Why are you here?” I ask her.
She tucks a wispy strand of hair behind one ear, studying me from the other side of the room through a fringe of dark lashes.
“The house is dark . . . I just wanted a little bit of light so I could read, so—”
“No.” I cut her off. “I mean, why are you really here? What do you want? Is it money? Is that why you’re marrying my brother? Because you’re sure as hell not in love with him.”
A bolt of lightning tears through the dark sky behind her.
She fixes her attention on the carpet, her full lips pressed together.
“You going to answer me or . . . ?” I let my words taper, though my feet are firmly planted. I’m not leaving until I get a response.
