Gavin is on my caller ID and that is not a call I want to take in front of Bella. I decline the call. “Let’s go. It’s late.”
“Don’t you need to get that?” she asks. “I can give you privacy.”
I walk to the door and open it. “Whoever it is can wait. The plane will not.”
She hesitates and then grabs her long, black trench coat from the hook by the door, slips it on, and walks outside. I follow Bella to the porch, pulling the door shut. When I turn, she is there waiting on me, close, and I all but end up colliding with her again. “Bella,” I chide softly.
“I have to lock up,” she explains, and we’re standing there again, unmoving, staring at each other. I’m going to kiss her, I think again.
And holy hell, my phone rings again, and I step around her and walk down the steps, removing my phone from my pocket to find my mother calling. I decline the call and pause to wait on Bella. She catches up with me. “All set?” I ask.
“Yes,” she confirms. “I’m ready. What time is our flight?”
“Seven,” I say, aware that it’s nearing five. “We should be fine.” I’m certain that we will, but we won’t have time to kill time at the airport, which is fine by me. The less time I spend with Bella, the better. Or worse. It just depends on how you look at it.
The driver greets us, and I hand off Bella’s smaller bag. Once he has it in hand, I open the rear door for her, and she slides inside. I join her, but she is on the other side of the car, far from my reach.
Once I’ve shut the door, my cellphone buzzes with a text from Gavin: We need to talk. Call me.
I reply with: I’m not alone. On my way to the airport
Good, he replies. I hope she’s pretty enough to live with. You need a fake fiancée right now. The clock is ticking on your inheritance. One you’re willing to marry for at least three months. Before you object, I’m already working on a prenup that will protect you. This is a little more than one year of your life. You have to do it. Call me when you can talk.
What about a legal challenge? Is my reply.
He has ammunition against you, Tyler. Your license and your reputation are the least of your worries. Withholding evidence is a crime. If that comes out, it will snowball. Your cases and your father’s would be overturned. Suck it up and pick a bride.
My involvement in criminal law was short-lived, but my father’s was not. In fact, we didn’t sell off the criminal law division until two years ago, and it was long past due. It no longer fit our business model. But the selloff is irrelevant when it comes to the liability that could be created. Gavin is right. This is a problem, and I’d happily just suck it up as he demanded, but what if my father planned to use this case against me anyway? He was evil. I have to find a real answer, and marriage isn’t that answer.
“Everything okay?”
At the sound of Bella’s voice, I realize that the SUV is moving. I rotate to face her and she’s already facing me, studying me, her blue eyes bright with worry. She could be the perfect fake fiancée. I’d come here today with that in mind. How could I not think of Bella for this role? She is gorgeous. She is intelligent. I enjoy her company. She wouldn’t try to screw me in the end of all of this. But as I sit here now, facing her, I think of her job, her brother, and years of knowing each other, and l realize this could change her life, and affect her reputation and her career. This could become emotionally messy, even if it would be physically satisfying. We wouldn’t save me from the grief I do not feel for my father or from a father with a plan to torment me right up until I inherit. All this match would do is create complications Bella doesn’t need and I can’t afford.
She is both the right and wrong woman for me. And yet, I speak as if she is the only woman for me, “That depends on you, Bella.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Tyler
Bella’s eyes flash with a mix of emotions I cannot read, but then she doesn’t force me to try, either. “Are you saying that if this film deal falls apart, I’ve irreparably damaged you and Hawk Legal?” she challenges. “Because that is unfair. I called you in—”
“No, Bella,” I state, clearly having opened a can of worms I do not want open at all, let alone with an audience created by our driver. It was a flippant response, an almost angry reply to her concern for me after my call. A response driven by my frustration over the fake fiancée requirement and the fact that the only woman I seem to be able to think about is her.
And that is more than a small problem.
“No, Bella?” she asks. “What does that mean?”
“I wasn’t talking about Dash’s deal.” I motion to the driver. “And is this a conversation you really want to have right here and now? Because I do not.”
“Then what did that mean?” she counters quickly, evidently unconcerned by being overheard.
“You asked if everything was okay. I said—”
“It depends on me. The only thing that I know of that depends on me is this deal we’re negotiating for Dash.”
“I could have been talking about the comfort of our travels,” I state rather dryly. “For instance, if you talk when I’m trying to sleep or scream with every bump on the plane.”
“But you weren’t saying either of those things or anything to that effect and we both know it,” she counters. “Just say what you want to say to me, Tyler. I’ve never known you to hold back.”
She has no idea how much I don’t want to hold back, how much I wouldn’t hold back if I ever had her alone, and willing, in the ways, I want her willing. But once again we have crossed a line that impacts our professional relationship and that is on me. I used her innocent question as a sounding board for too many things going on in my head. My need for a fake fiancée. My need to fuck her the hell out of my system. My concern is that will never be possible for many reasons.
And I’m agitated enough about the corner my father has shoved me into, that I don’t really give two fucks right now. “You are clearly not in the same headspace as me, Bella. I thought you were better at reading me than this.” I lean in closer to her. “If you were in the same headspace as me, I’m certain you’d understand the meaning. If you still do not, I’m willing to do whatever is necessary to help you understand. When we’re alone.”
The heat of anger in her stare is replaced by the heat of understanding. “You were talking about—”
“Yes,” I say because her eyes say it all. Her mind is in the bedroom, where mine hasn’t left since I touched her. “I was,” I add.
“Oh,” she says, her cheeks flushing a warm pink.
My lips curve. “Yes, oh.”
Her eyes meet mine. “I don’t know what to say to that.”
“Nothing. Not here. Not now.” The implication is that we will talk about it later and I do believe that’s what has to happen.
She scrapes her teeth on her bottom lip and turns away. I linger a moment, watching her, noting the slight tremble of her bottom lip that speaks of vulnerability and emotion. The best thing I could ever do with Bella is treat her like one of the other women in my life. To demand terms and a written agreement. I ask myself right now why I haven’t considered this option.