One Night to Risk It All (16 page)

The elevator stopped. Fifth floor, of all the stupid things.

Then it stopped again.

And again.

Finally he was at the lobby, and by the time he was out on the street, he was sprinting. He was going to get Rachel. And he would beg if he had to.

But he had to take a chance.

Otherwise, all of his houses, his island, every cent of his money, wouldn’t matter. Gaining all the world didn’t matter if he lost the one thing he truly needed.

* * *

“Where is your dang ice cream, Leah Kouros?” Rachel muttered, rummaging through the freezer. “Why does your stupid candy company not make ice cream?” Unfortunately, her sister was down at Leah’s Lollies today and was not in the apartment to hear Rachel cursing her name over her lack of frozen treats.

The front door opened and Rachel straightened. Maybe her angry mutterings had summoned Leah.

“I’m in here! How is it you have all this sugar and no ice cream? Answer me that.”

“I don’t know.”

She turned around and dropped the spoon she was holding. It clattered on the tile floor, the sound ringing through the silence.

“Alex,” she breathed. She felt like she was going to fall over. Felt like she’d been sucker punched. She hadn’t seen him in nearly a month.

She put her hand on her stomach. Five months in and she was definitely looking her condition these days. “What are you doing here?”

His eyes dropped to where her hand was resting, a strange expression on his face. “Your body has changed.”

“I’m pregnant,” she said, “that happens. Especially since things are going well.”

“They are?”

“Yes.”

He let out a long breath. “I am relieved to hear it. Beyond relieved.”

“I didn’t think you cared.”

“I’m a liar,” he said, his words rough. “I care...Rachel, I mourn the changes in your body that I’ve missed. That it happened without me here. I should have been with you all this time. I should have been here. I should have...I should have been your husband.”

“It was your choice not to be,” she said, bending to pick up the spoon. “You were the one who walked back down the aisle and left me to explain why there wasn’t going to be a wedding.” She slammed the spoon onto the counter. “You made that decision. And then you told me it was your plan from the beginning. To use me. Because I was just a pawn to you. A pawn like I’ve been to everyone else. Except this was worse because with you I was honest. I told you how I felt, Alex. I showed you who I was and you took that and you abused it.”

“I lied to you,” he said.

“You what?”

“I lied to you because... Rachel, I got up there and I looked out in the crowd and I saw Ajax sitting there. And I knew...I hated him so much because of who I thought he was, but for some reason being up there and seeing him, my brother, made me see myself clearly for the first time. I hated what I saw. A man who used you. A man who contrived to trap you with him, even when he knew he had no hope of ever being all the things you deserved. A man who would hold you to him using any means, even your love against you. I saw myself in that moment. I saw that I was a man whose own mother couldn’t love him and that she was right not to. I—” He took a deep, shaking breath. “I couldn’t allow you to go through with it. Because everything that happened between us was so manipulated by me. Including your feelings. You say you love me...but that’s because you’re having my baby. Because you spent a few idyllic months on a private island with me.”

She was sure that the room was spinning.

“Alex,” she said, her voice trembling. “Are you telling me that you were acting the whole time we were on your island?”

“No,” he said, “but it was so engineered, all of it. You felt trapped. I made you decide to come with me so quickly I...”

“Do you trust that I’m a smart woman, Alex?”

“Yes.”

“Great. No hesitation even. So do you trust me to know my own heart?”

“Why? I sure as hell didn’t know mine.”

She frowned. “Poor man. Well, I know mine. I loved you. So much. And when you pushed me away...when you told me you never even wanted to see our child? I wanted to hit you with something heavy and blunt.”

“That seems fair.”

“I gave you my love, you...you jerk. I gave you everything. I would have—”

He pulled her into his arms and kissed her, deep, desperate. And she didn’t push him away. Didn’t fight him. Because she was too hungry for him. Angry, yes, she was angry. But she’d never stopped wanting him. She’d never stopped loving him.

He pushed her back up against the fridge, his hands on her waist as he kissed her. She wrapped her arms around his neck, tears streaming down her cheeks as she poured all of her hurt, all of her weeks of anguish into the kiss.

“Okay,” she said, gasping for air, “we have to talk and not just have sex. The sex is fine between us.
We,
on the other hand, have problems.”

“True,” he said, breathing heavy.

“So why are you here?”

“Because I have spent the past month drunk and miserable. Because every time I think about never seeing our baby I want to die. And every time I think about never seeing you again...Rachel, I start praying for death to come quickly.”

“Why?” she asked, her throat tight.

“Because I love you. With every broken, miserable piece of myself. And I realized this weeks ago but I kept thinking it wasn’t fair to ask you to spend the rest of your life with a man like me. But...but I have to be selfish now and ask that you do. That you spend your life with me because if you don’t then I’m not sure what my life means at all.”

“Alex, why do you think you aren’t worthy of me?” she asked. “I am... I’m not perfect. And I’ve fought to get to the place where I could say that and just be okay with it. I’m not perfect. I’ve made mistakes. And I’ll make more mistakes. I don’t want a perfect man because I could never live up to those standards.”

“I would give you a better man,” he said.

“With all due respect,” she said, “you’re a jackass.”

“Why?”

“Because I know what I need. I know who I am. I don’t need better. There isn’t better for me. For me, there’s you. That’s it. Alex, the moment I saw you I fell in love with you. Is that crazy? I would have thought it was crazy until five months ago when I saw you standing there, on a yacht. And you made me want things I never knew I needed.”

He pulled her to him, crushed her against him, taking a sharp breath. “Me, too. Rachel, that was the moment for me, too. When you were standing there looking at me, so awkward and obviously attracted.”

“Hey.”

“It’s true. You were. But it’s okay, because that was the moment. When I knew that I needed you. I didn’t know then that I needed you forever. I thought an hour. A night. I didn’t know how much it would change me. But it did. And then you kept changing me these last few months. Even when you weren’t there. Even when all that was left of you was how much I missed you.”

“Why did it take you so long?” she asked. “Why did it take this long for you to know you loved me?”

“It was the one thing I’d never had before. I loved my mother, Rachel, but I didn’t know what it was like to have her love me back. Not really. I didn’t understand love as a living thing. As something that could give. She took. I gave. And in the end I was left devastated because...she ended herself rather than be with me, Rachel.”

“Alex...it wasn’t you. She had so many problems, honey, but they weren’t you.”

“I know,” he said. “I do now.”

“I’m glad. I’m so glad.”

“Ajax helped me with that. He...he made me see. I hated him for what he had, without trying to find out why he’d been able to get it. Love. And when he told me that...it all made sense. Love is different than I thought. The love I feel for you has demanded that I change, that I give, that I sacrifice. And it makes me burn. Makes me want. Makes me hurt. Makes me so happy I... It’s happiness like I never thought I could have. I had no idea what to call it, no idea what to do with it. It’s love. And it’s the most terrifying, wonderful thing I’ve ever felt before. And if you feel the same for me, if you want to do this—for the rest of our lives, knowing who I am, where I’ve been—then I can only be grateful. I can only try and become the man I think you deserve.”

“Just be the man you are, Alex. That’s the beginning and end of all I want from you. Because it’s the freedom you gave to me. And it might seem like a small thing but...Alex, don’t you see that you set me free? I feel like I was trapped in someone else’s body, desperately trying to live up to an ideal I didn’t even want to be and afraid I was failing miserably at it. You are... You are amazing. What you’ve given me is amazing. There is no better man to me than the man who simply wants me. As I am.”

“I am that man,” he said, kissing her cheek. “That I promise you. I want all that you are. All that you will be. We’ll both keep changing, but we’ll change together. Whatever life has in store for us, I think we can meet the challenge head on, as long as we’re together.”

“I think so, too.”

“So, when are we getting married?”

“Not for at least six months,” she said.

“What?”

“I need time to plan it. I love you and this is for life. And you love me. This is a real wedding. Also, I
don’t
dig the pregnant bride look, I’ve decided.”

“You’re going to make me wait, Rachel?”

She smiled, her heart swelling. “For some things, Alex. Not for others.”

* * *

A long time later they lay in her bed, limbs tangled, breathing hard. She was tracing his biceps with her fingertips, a smile on his lips. Yes, she loved this man, more than anything. Their start had been rocky at best, but they had forever ahead of them.

“You know, if we can make it through all of this, I think we can make it through anything,” she said.

“I agree.”

“Just as long as we’re honest, from now on.”

“In the interest of honesty then,” he said, “may I say, I think your breasts have gotten larger. I like it.”

“Wow. Romantic.”

“Maybe not. But honest.”

“Appreciated.”

Suddenly, she flashed back to that evening they’d eaten pizza in a fancy hotel in Cannes. When he’d talked about happy endings. “You got your happy ending,” she whispered.

He kissed her on the cheek and she could have sworn he left a teardrop behind. “It’s not over yet.”

“No,” she said, snuggling closer. “It’s not. And thank God for that.”

“Yes. I get a whole lifetime with you. With ups and downs, with every emotion. But it will be with you.”

She kissed his forearm and held his arms more tightly to her. “That’s much better than any old happy ending.”

He sighed, and she could hear the smile in his voice. “I agree,
agape.
I agree.”

EPILOGUE

“I
T
WAS
A
BEAUTIFUL
WEDDING
,”
Leah said.

“And it
happened,
” Ajax added.

“You’re sensitive as a blunt instrument,” Leah said, beaming at her husband.

Ajax shrugged and turned to face Alex, who was standing there in a tux, his tie undone, his two-month-old son wrapped in a blanket and nestled in his arms. “Am I insensitive, little brother?”

Alex shrugged and looked down at his son. Liam didn’t care that his parents had just gotten married. He was at peace, as he always was, everything in his world right. Alex’s heart swelled with love, with pride. That his son had so much family to love him. That his life would be so much more beautiful than his or Ajax’s had ever been.

That he would never know the harsh criticism of a mother the way that Rachel had. Never feel like he had to rebel or close up completely, rather than being who he wanted. That he would never wonder if he was loved at all. They told him every day.

“Yes, but it’s part of your charm.”

“Don’t encourage him, Alex,” Leah said.

Rachel returned then, on her father’s arm. They had just finished their dance and Rachel was beaming. Her figure was still fuller than it had been before giving birth, her cheeks round. He loved it.

“How nice,” Joseph Holt said, “to have all my children, and my grandson together in one place.”

Alex’s heart tightened as he looked around at his family. “Yes, it is,” he said.

“Do you mind if I steal my grandson for a moment?” Joseph asked. “I’ll trade you your bride for him.”

“A deal.”

He handed Liam to the older man, then took Rachel’s hand, leading her out to the lit dance floor. “This wedding was much more you, wasn’t it?” he asked, looking around at the simple décor. At the bright colors. It exuded joy. Just like his wife.

“Yes,” she said. “But then, with you, I am much more me.”

He kissed her nose. “I’m glad. I’m certainly a better me. It’s amazing what can happen inside you when you start to understand love. When you replace anger with it.”

“I’m glad you did, Alex, because you have so much love to give.”

“I’ve never been as happy as I am today,” he said, his wife in his arms, his son nearby.

“Then we have a new goal,” she said.

“What is that?”

“To find even greater happiness, every day. As long as we live.”

“With you, Rachel, that won’t be hard at all.”

* * * * *

Keep reading for an excerpt from SECRETS OF A RUTHLESS TYCOON by Cathy Williams.

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