Page 66 of The Billionaire's Angel

My knees folded abruptly as if pulled by a string, and I sat back on the step, swamped with guilt and grief. Beside me, Aiden sucked in a breath and let itout.

“You had your headphones on,” he said, quietly. “They were in the library. You couldn't have heardanything.”

“I should've known,” I said. “I washere. I was upstairs. They died, and I didn't savethem.”

“It wasn't your fault, Gage,” Aiden said, his voice a low rasp. “Is that why you didn't come home? Because you thought I blamed you? How could you think I would blameyou?”

“Whywouldn'tyou blame me?” I asked. “I blame myself. If I’d heard something, if I'd gone downstairs, if I hadn't been sulking in my roomlike—”

“Like a teenager? Which is what you were. A teenager. Not super Gage special forces soldier. You were eighteen and unarmed. If you'd been downstairs, you probably would have died with them. Did you ever think about that?” Aidenasked.

“Maybe,” Iconceded.

I had thought about it, but that logic had never felt like absolution. Maybe Aiden was right, and I would've been killed along with my aunt and uncle. But maybe if I'd been there things would've changed. We didn't know what had happened to them, only that they'd been shot in the library in a crime almost identical to the one that had taken my parents lives so many yearsbefore.

In both cases, the deaths were written off as murder/suicides and dismissed, but we knew someone had killed them. We just didn't know why. Without answers, I couldn't stop wondering how I might have changedthings.

“I'm sorry I've been an ass since you've been home,” Aiden said. “I want you to come back to the company. I do. I just—” he stopped and swallowed hard. “I understand why you left, Gage. It was hard here without you, but I understood. You found them. You walked in the library in this house, and you found them dead. I get why you needed to get away. I thought you would come home after a few years, but I figured you just needed more time. And then they told us you were missing and probably deadand—”

Aiden's voice choked off. I tried to speak and found my throat was lockedshut.

We sat there in silence, fighting to get our emotions under control. Finally, Aiden reached out and punched me in the shoulder. Pain exploded, far out of proportion to his strike. I must've landed on it wrong when we'd hit the floor in the dining room. Shit, we were immature assholes, even in ourthirties.

“I should've come home a long time ago,” I said when I thought I could speak again. Fighting off the tightness in my throat, I said, “I should've known you wouldn't blame me. I just… I couldn't stop dreaming about them. I stilldo.”

“Gage,” Aiden said, “it's been twelve years. You can't let it take over your life likethis.”

“I know,” I interrupted, “I know. It's not just that, it's the last six months, and everything I did, everything I saw the years before that. It's a lot of shit all rolled up in my head so I can't sleep, and I'm on edge all thetime—”

“Yeah, no shit,” Aiden said, and I laughed. “You were always Mr. Cool, and now you're jumping me at awedding?”

“Yeah,” I said. It wasn't funny, not really, but I laughed anyway. “Cooper set me up with someone to talk to. My first appointment is nextweek.”

I shook my head and looked out over the back lawn into the moonlit trees behind the house. On the other side of those trees, through the dark woods, was my parents’ house, sitting empty and abandoned. I shook my headagain.

“I can't tell you how many times I've sat like this with guys dealing with the same shit and told them all the right things. There's no shame in it. It helps to talk to someone. Don't just bottle it up and ignore it. Then it's me, and I'd rather go without sleep than admit I can't handle it on myown.”

“You always were a stubbornfuck.”

“You going to let me come back towork?”

“Whenever you want,” Aiden said with a hint of a smile. It might've been a grin if his mouth hadn’t been as torn up asmine.

“I've been studying up with Charlie,” Iadmitted.

“I know,” Aiden said, surprising me. “She tore me a new one, told me what a royal asshole I was, and how hard you’ve been working. The stuff on the jump drive came from me, not Charlie. Once you get through that, you're probably ready to start easing your wayin.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Isaid.

We sat there in the dark for a few minutes before Aiden said, “So what's up with you andSophie?”

“I'm in love with her,” I said, liking the way the words sounded when I spoke them out loud. Trying it again, I said a little louder, “I'm in love withher.”

“I hope she's in love with you,” Aiden said, slowly rising to his feet, moving as carefully as an old man with achy joints. I'm pretty sure I looked exactly the same as I stood up beside him. “She was pissed as hell when she stormed out of the diningroom.”

Sophie was still pissed as hell when I knocked on the door of her room. She swung it open from beneath my rapping knuckles and glared up at me, her usually sweet face twisted into a scowl, her green eyes fiery withanger.

“What do youwant?”