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“I think he’s ready, Leo,” Damian added. “I understand your concern, but we can’t time the moment when the right woman comes along, and when she does, we can’t lose her because the timing isn’t quite right.”
Leo frowned. “It’s not as though I don’t like her. I do. I just don’t want to see you like that ever again. Christ! The last two years have been hell for you, Dylan. If I would have just known—”
“Don’t, little brother,” I said as I held up my hand. “I’ll tell you the same thing I told Damian…no one could have helped me. I had to figure out that I was worth saving myself. You and Damian both tried. Mum did, too. I wasn’t listening. Something inside me finally had to snap before I was willing to get help. I’m just grateful that we’re all here together right now. The past is over, and I want to move on with my life. If Kylie decides that she’s willing to take me on, I’d be happier than I’ve ever been in my entire life.”
“And if she doesn’t?” Leo asked with apprehension in his tone.
I shook my head. “Not an option. I’m in love with her. I’ll find a way to be with her, no matter what it takes. I’m not going to let geography get in my way. I’ll never believe that the two of us don’t fit. I just have to find a way to put the connection together.”
Leo shook his head. “Shit. No offense, but I’m glad I’m single. I have no desire to get that intense over a female.”
Damian chuckled. “Your turn will come, eventually.”
“Not if I can help it,” Leo grumbled. “And most women think I’m crazy because I spend most of my time in remote locations. Me meeting a woman who actually understands why I do what I do is incredibly unlikely.”
I frowned. “Maybe you should rein back your travel a little and relax. You’re never in the same place for very long. I don’t remember you even having a regular girlfriend. Have you? Did I miss it?”
“Two,” he shared. “And there was nothing to miss. They didn’t last long, so we never got to the meet-the-family stage. Neither one of them understood my obsession with saving species from the brink of extinction, or why, when I was a wealthy billionaire from an important family, I had passed on taking a role in Lancaster International. I guess in most women’s minds, being a businessman would make a lot more sense than what I do.”
“Damian and I have always understood,” I told him solemnly. “You’ve always had something else that drove you, Leo, a passion that was different from ours but just as important.”
Leo grinned. “But mine has never gotten me laid nearly as often as yours did,” he joked.
He’d probably be surprised to know that I hadn’t slept around quite as much as he thought. “Then maybe you should start spending a little more time in a location that at least has cell service.”
“I will be, for a while anyway,” he said. “I’m leaving for America after the wedding so I can finish getting my new facility set up there. The area isn’t exactly a metropolis, but hot running water and a cell tower will be close enough.”
“How’s it going over there?” Damian asked.
“So far, so good,” he said nonchalantly. “I have some issues to work out, but it’s making progress.”
“So, does that mean you’ll call more often?” Damian questioned.
“As long as I have service, I’ll call,” Leo said and then turned his eyes back in my direction. “I’m behind you, Dylan, and I hope everything goes smoothly with Kylie. If you need anything, I’ll only be a phone call away right now.”
I swallowed the regret that rose up in my throat.
I’d missed so much time with both of my brothers.
Nothing had really changed between all of us, but that time void still remained.
“I’ll be over to see your new sanctuary. Hopefully, Kylie will be with me.”
“Nicole and I would like to come, too,” Damian added. “We’ll bring Mum.”
Leo grinned. “Brilliant. I’ll see if I can find a place to live that isn’t too shockingly primitive.”
Damian and Leo started discussing something else, but my mind wandered.
No matter how much I’d tried to put my future with Kylie out of my mind, it always rocketed right back there.
I had no idea when she’d want to leave to go back to the States, and I couldn’t make her stay if she felt she had to go.
I’d leave and go with her in a heartbeat, but I’d already promised Damian that I’d stick around and work out of our headquarters here in London while he was away. I owed him that for dumping on him over the last two years. Hell, I owed him even more than that, even though that’s all he’d asked for.
When I’d told Leo that I wasn’t letting geography get in the way of my happiness, I’d meant it.
But what if it wasn’t just a geographical problem?
What if Kylie wasn’t ready for a commitment?
And if she wasn’t, could I really blame her?
I’d wracked my brain for every single argument she could make and had come up with a solution for every single problem she might bring up.
Except one…
I couldn’t make her love me and want to spend the rest of her life with me.
If she didn’t, and that wasn’t what she wanted, I was utterly and completely fucked.
