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The reason he’s doing all this isn’t to get his hands on a prize he can’t buy, it’s out of a sense of family and belonging, and to him it’s a piece of the love his father probably never expressed.
He’s doing this because he’s human. He might be the hottest thing I’ve seen, and a bordering on perfect specimen of a man. He’s definitely richer than I can imagine. But he’s willing to do anything for that family connection.
And me? I’m in this for money on the surface, but that money’s to save my brother from perhaps trusting someone else carelessly, but Danny didn’t deserve to be where he is, languishing on the bottom. Not with debts he can’t pay, debts that aren’t his, and not with a big fat black ball with his name on it, courtesy of his ex partner.
I go to tell Hudson the truth.
“You know what?”
His mouth lifts a little. “It depends if I’m going to like what you say.”
“It’s all going to be okay. I’ll fix this for you. Not that anything needs fixing. I mean, I’ll make sure we make this happen, but—”
A bright ringing sound rushes through the house. Does he have some sort of lie detector that I don’t know about?
“Hang on,” he says and leaves the room, sliding his hand against my arm as he goes.
The door. Of course it’s the door. I squeeze my eyes shut. I’ve made everything that little bit worse, haven’t I? If I explain about Danny and how we only have each other, ever since our grandparents died, Hudson will be fine. Right?
He comes back in with a manilla envelope.
“The wicked never rest.” I point at the flat package that looks to have documents in it. “Work.”
He tosses it down on the desk near the window. “The New York gift and curse, anything delivered by courier any time.” Then he frowns. “I’m an ass, Scarlett. I know you’re doing this for me, but my mother mentioned a career plan?”
“I panicked. I mean, I’m into studying and developing artificial intelligence, but I’m not even on the bottom rung.”
College was great and then our grandparents died and Danny had his career mapped so I decided to help with that while I sorted my own things out and weeks led to months and…well…here I am.
“I’d like to hear about it.”
I wave a hand at him. “It’s boring.”
“You know, I don’t think there’s anything boring about you, Scarlett. Or anything you do.”
My heart twists and I have to tell him the truth. Find a way to make it sweeter than it is, bring it down to what it is, a small lie. A girl who helped him, that’s all.
But I do need to say something because he told me he trusts me and wants to see me after all this and…oh, crap, I want that, too.
“Hudson?”
“Yeah?” He smiles at me. And it’s the loveliest, most open thing I’ve seen. The trust almost knocks me over.
And it hits me.
My white lie that spawned all these others, that lie is now not really white and not really small. That’s simply me being desperate. He’s not going to be understanding if I tell him. He’ll put a stop to it. Better to get through this now.
If I keep all that to myself, and keep it contained, maybe buy some extra duct tape for the soul, I can push through and save all this for him. And once that is done, I’ll take my chances and come clean.
If he never wants to see me, so be it, but I don’t want it to be a situation where he just walks away from his own wants and needs.
I can’t let him down.
Telling him the truth will do just that.
Instead, I do the one thing I know I can think of. Slowly, I walk up to him and smile. It’s easy to do. The man is gorgeous and hot and sparks ignite when we touch. I stop in front of him and slide my hands up the front of his waistcoat and I toy with the top button.
“I was thinking,” I say, popping that button free as his hands come up to my waist and he pulls my shirt free. “That we didn’t get to explore the possibilities of this room.”
