Compromising Kessen (17 page)

“I blame myself entirely,” Nick said, putting a hand across his heart. “In high school, she played all sports, and I mean all. She even managed to be on leadership and do cheerleading. Her first real date was with the point guard from our basketball team. All the girls loved him, including Kessen, but she was afraid he would kiss her. So that’s when I stepped in and took one for the team.”

Duncan gave Nick a little shoulder rub as if to say, “Atta boy.”

Christian rolled his eyes. “And she paid you?”

“Well, not with money.”

Something akin to murder flashed across Christian’s features before Nick continued.

“I had a huge crush on Sammy, but she only thought of me as a friend. Kessen helped her see me differently. It took a Michael Jackson impersonation and a quick makeout session, but I’m happy to say she’s been mine ever since.

“Fast forward to college, we all attended Ivy Leagues, and Kessen decided she wanted to go into business. She graduated early, earned her master’s, and in her free time dedicated as much volunteer time as possible at the local hospice where her mother was staying. She also read to her mother every single Vandenbrook romance novel on the market. I can still remember them having Vandenbrook Saturdays, as they called them at the hospice center. Her father never knew; he always considered Kessen to be extremely logical.”

Christian suddenly had a great deal more respect for the stupid romance novels, which had helped Kessen’s mother through that hard end to her life.

The mood seemed to change to something sad, so Christian asked, “What’s her most embarrassing moment?”

Kessen opened her mouth to speak, but Nick put his hand up. “I’ll take this one. It happened like this—Kessen had a crush on this boy.”

Kessen looked away in fear; Christian was ecstatic to hear the rest of the story. “Please continue,” he urged.

“This boy … well, let’s call him Tom. That okay with you, Kessen?”

A whimper was heard from her direction on the couch. Christian tried to keep his face straight.

“So Kessen found Tom attractive. The problem with Tom was, Tom didn’t know Kessen existed. So Kessen, in a flash of pure brilliance, decided she would find out his likes and dislikes and then pretend to like them too. She followed him home for three weeks straight, taking notes on where he hung out and what he did. Finally after the third week, a cop showed up and arrested her. Turns out, Tom had seen her stalking him the whole time and thought she was some sort of psycho out to get him. He did have a rather inflated view of himself, so it was totally logical to him a girl would stalk and kill him. Anyway, imagine his surprise when it turned out to be Kessen. He ended up not pressing charges, but he did obtain a restraining order against her, because he feared for his life.”

“I switched schools,” Kessen admitted.

Christian laughed. “How old were you?”

“I was only fourteen!” she said defensively. “And I was still going through that awkward phase!”

“Still?” Duncan said patronizingly.

She stuck her tongue out at him. “As much fun as it’s been to go down memory lane, I believe it’s time to turn the tables. Duncan, if you would be so kind.”

He saluted. “Right away, my lady.”

Duncan cleared his throat. “Our story now takes us across the Atlantic to the tiny country of England. Our boy Christian was born in London. Nick, if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Of course.” Nick held open the map and pointed to London, England.

“Thank you, Nick.”

“Of course.”

Duncan cleared his throat again. “He had a relatively normal childhood. That is, if normal includes having a nanny most of your life, and your mother and father sending baby pictures of you to the newspaper and local television stations, and women begging to betroth themselves to you at the ripe age of eight.”

Christian winced. He had forgotten about all the betrothal offers. How embarrassing.

Kessen blanched. “They still do that?”

“The Brits and their blue bloods,” Nick said wistfully, obviously making fun of Kessen’s interest.

Duncan pointed at Christian. “We grew up together. I immediately wanted to be friends with Christian, mainly because he had more toys, and his parents let him throw mud.”

Christian laughed.

“He also had an attractive older sister, at whom I would stare at for hours on end when he wasn’t watching.”

“Watch it,” Christian growled.

Duncan grinned. “So, it came to pass that around the age of fourteen, we discovered novels had been written about the Vandenbrook family. Upon further research in the local library, we also discovered Christian could easily use this to his advantage. And so began his days of dating, during which he wined and dined women all over London. Well, as best he could at that tender impressionable age. He soon tired of his own sleaziness and went off to college.”

Christian closed his eyes. Leave it to Duncan to mention all the affairs he’d had. Though one couldn’t count them as affairs, if the person wasn’t married. Besides, it wasn’t as if he was sleeping around. He merely dated a lot, which he felt the need to interject to the whole group.

All expressions looked doubtful. He felt like growling.

“Our dear Christian wasn’t interested in his father’s inheritance; he wanted to make something of himself, so he decided to break off from the family and actually get a job—something, if you’ve read any of the Vandenbrook books, you’ll notice never happened. His father was appalled; his mother nearly had a stroke, but Christian was extremely successful and happy. In hopes of finally bringing Christian back into the family’s honor, his father set about to engage his eldest son to one of the most notable families in London. The girl was beautiful but stupid, causing Christian to feel the need to work late into the night so he wouldn’t have to see her. Eventually they broke it off.”

Christian laughed. “Yes, we did, thanks to you; I still owe you one, by the way.”

Duncan smiled smugly to himself. “You’re not the only one who can seduce, my friend.” Then he winked at Kessen.

“Do that again, and I’m ripping your eye out of its socket.”

Duncan backed away from him and whispered to Kessen, “Quite violent when he gets territorial, don’t you think?”

She laughed and reached over to squeeze Christian’s hand. He felt like never washing it again. When she tried to pull her hand back, he held it tightly. Her look said, “Are you really being that immature right now?” But he merely smiled and kept holding tight. He wasn’t letting her go.

She eventually gave up and relaxed her pull. Christian brought his attention back to Duncan.

“In a nutshell, our future duke’s favorite food is spaghetti. Boring, I know. His favorite color is black, because according to him, it always looks dashing. He likes novels and is guilty of reading all of the Vandenbrook series, and adores scary movies. I think he has all his teeth, and at this point believes one day tea will take over the world.”

Kessen looked stunned.

“My turn, my turn!” Nick shouted. “Our friend Kessen loves bread, bread of any kind; she likes baked bread, burnt bread, hard bread.”

“We get it, she likes bread,” Duncan interrupted.

“Fine,” Nick said. “She adores any sort of fuzzy animal but will deny it to her grave, talks way too much about nothing all that interesting, also loves Italian food—although her knowledge of it extends to SpaghettiOs and macaroni and cheese.”

“Pity,” Duncan said.

Nick nodded. “She can speak three languages, has her master’s degree, but tends to play dumb, because it was what people expected of her. She is obsessed beyond reason with the Wall Street Journal, and her dream would be to star in the Broadway musical Cats.”

“That’s a lie!” Kessen yelled, lunging for Nick’s throat. Christian pulled her back just in time.

“Okay, fine. I lied about the whole Cats thing, but it would be funny to see her in a cat suit. Plus, she fights dirty.”

“Agreed,” Christian said dryly.

Kessen laughed. “I only fight dirty because I have to. Nick gave me no choice growing up, and Christian’s too cocky for his own good. Duncan, sorry, but you’re guilty by association.”

“Hey, that’s not fair!” Duncan put his hands on his hips. “You know, after learning more about you, it’s easy to see why Christian adores you.” He threw a challenging glance towards Christian. Christian felt his fists clench.

“I’ve been told I’m the better kisser between us. How about we give it a go? Just in case. I don’t want you to think you have no options.”

Christian jumped out of his seat, barreling towards Duncan. Lucky for Duncan he was able to hide behind a now panicking Nick. “You know,” Duncan said from behind Nick. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him react that way before.”

“Most peculiar,” Nick pointed out calmly.

“Agreed.”

“Well, time for bed!” Nick clasped his hands together, while Christian was still breathing heavily in front of him “Kessen, if you’ll just follow me upstairs, I’ll make sure your room is locked so nobody sneaks in during the night.”

Christian rolled his eyes. “As if I have no self-control.”

All three of them looked at him doubtfully.

“Oh, for the love of—”

“Language!” Duncan shouted, sounding exactly as Kessen had earlier that day.

Chapter Twenty

Kessen brushed a quick kiss on Christian’s cheek. “Thanks for the date.”

On pure instinct he crushed her to his chest and kissed her firmly on the lips, as if marking his territory in front of Duncan, even though he knew Duncan valued his pretty face too much to try anything.

“Until tomorrow,” he whispered huskily.

Kessen looked dazed as Nick tried to push her up the stairs.

“Shoot, Christian, you didn’t have to kiss her senseless. She probably doesn’t even know where her room is,” Nick grumbled as he led her away.

“You know I would never take advantage of her, right?” Duncan asked casually.

Christian fell silent for a moment. “Yes, I know I can trust you.”

“But, if for any reason you back out of this, you should know I’m sweeping in for the kill. She’s too much of a catch to let go. And if you let her go, my friend, you are a complete fool.”

Duncan slapped his back and ran up the stairs, leaving Christian alone in his thoughts. If he was being honest with himself, that was the last place he wanted to be. Where he really wanted to be was in Kessen’s room, leaving marks of his kisses all over her body.

He shuddered at the thought. The wisest course of action would be to take a cold shower, especially since he had six lonely nights ahead of him.

****

Kessen did, in fact, feel dazed as Nick graciously led her into her large bedroom at the end of the hallway. She collapsed onto her bed with a smile bigger than Texas plastered across her face.

“So, you love him, then?” Nick asked it in such a way, it was almost as if they were discussing the weather.

She sat up. “What would make you say that?”

Nick chuckled. “Oh, Kessen, where to begin? The kissing, the teasing, the flirting—it’s like I’m back in middle school with you all over again.”

“Except you don’t have to fight off the boys anymore, Nick.”

“Don’t I, though?” His expression turned serious as he walked across the room with his hands in his hair. “I’ve never been good at letting you grow up.”

“Are you going to turn all serious and sentimental on me?”

He flashed a wicked grin. “Never. But you’re like a sister to me. Heck, you are my sister; as much as I tease you two, I really do want you to be happy. Even if it does mean that by protecting you from yourself, I am in fact taking my life into my own hands.”

“What do you mean?”

Nick’s gaze fell onto a sharp letter opener in the corner of the room. Oh, she mouthed, then looked down at her hands and laughed.

Nick laughed. “Remember the chocolate chip cookie incident?”

Her stomach coiled just thinking about it. “How could I forget?”

Nick sat down next to her and sighed. “Your mom said you couldn’t have any more cookies, so you took it upon yourself to prove her wrong and eat the entire bag.”

“I threw up for hours.”

“I held your hair.”

“You’re a good friend.”

He snorted. “Yeah, I know. Not many friends would do that for each other.”

Nick grabbed her hand and sighed. Honestly, it was freaking Kessen out a bit. It was rare she saw the façade of “everything’s funny and nothing is serious” Nick fall. It wasn’t that he was faking it; he just did an excellent job of shielding his emotions. It was his one fault, or so Sammy said.

“I’m not letting you marry him if he doesn’t love you back,” he said almost in a whisper. Kessen felt her hand tense underneath his grasp. “It wouldn’t be fair; I would never forgive myself if I didn’t stop you from being stuck in a loveless marriage. You deserve so much more.”

“Then why did you come?” she asked.

“I came to offer my support … and to see for myself what was truly happening over here. Honestly, I could have supported a marriage based on mutual understanding, almost as if it were a business deal. I could handle that. But a marriage where one of you is head over heels and the other doesn’t even care? I couldn’t agree to letting you do that.”

Kessen nodded in understanding. A business transaction was one thing; a heart being involved was quite another. “If you worry about Christian falling in love with me, you’re going to age prematurely, and I know how you feel about wrinkles.” She nudged him in the side.

His gaze penetrated to the depths of her soul. “What makes you think I’m more worried about you than Christian? I told you the chocolate chip cookie story for a reason. You tend to get greedy when you want something; it’s what makes you a good businesswoman. It can also get you into trouble. Don’t make this a competition. If you do, only one of you can come out a winner. And that, my dear, will put an end to your nuptials for sure.”

“What exactly are you saying?” she asked, still confused.

He took an agonizingly long breath. “Kessen, I’ve never met a man more perfect for you in my entire life. If you screw this up, you’re an idiot.”