One Night to Risk It All

CHAPTER SEVEN


HE WAS SO TIRED he wanted to lie down and not get up for three days. But he didn’t want to lie down alone. He wanted to lie down next to Rachel. To pull her curvy body against his and just hold her while he slept.

That was probably the jet lag talking, but oh, well.

It was morning on the island, late night in New York. What he had to do was drink an espresso and suck it up. He was young—there were plenty of people his age who partied every night and went to work the next morning.

For some reason, though, half the time he felt old.

Maybe it was the strain of being a respectable businessman when he knew that it just wasn’t programmed into him genetically. He would have been better off selling his body for cash or selling other people to turn a profit.

He shut down that line of thinking and walked into the house.

He could hear singing. Coming from the kitchen. It was off-key, and it was horrible. Warbling about wanting to make someone feel wanted.

He followed the noise like a bread crumb trail, and at the end of it was a blonde with her hair piled high on her head in a messy bun, dancing around the room in short pajama shorts with an empty mug in her hand.

“Good morning,” he said. “Is the coffee made?”

She stopped then flailed, her arms flung wide. “Ack!”

“Sorry to interrupt.”

“You scared me. I didn’t know when you’d be back.”

“I texted you.” That was how he’d kept in touch with her over the past week. The occasional text just to make sure she was okay. Sometimes she’d even responded without an insult.

“I hadn’t checked my phone yet.”

“I’m so disappointed you weren’t waiting for contact from me with bated breath.”

“Sorry.” She went over to the coffeemaker and set about filling the empty mug.

“Thank you,” he said.

“It’s for me.”

He shot her his deadliest look and went to the cabinet and picked out his own mug, then poured himself a cup. “I don’t think you appreciate how much I need the caffeine.”

“I’m supposed to limit it, but I can’t seem to shake the need for an early morning cup. But the doctor said that was okay.”

“Doctor?”

“Yes. I managed to secure myself a covert doctor visit while you were gone.”

He leaned against the counter. “And?”

“Knocked up, as we thought.”

“And?”

“It’s early. No point doing an ultrasound or anything like that.”

“But everything is fine. And you can drink a coffee.”

She curled her fingers like talons around her mug, her eyes glittering evilly. “I can drink a coffee.”

“Okay. Don’t cut me or anything.”

“Hiss.”

“You just said hiss.”

“Hissing at you would be overdramatic. It was like a pre-hiss. A warning.”

He looked at her, in her pajamas, her feet bare, toenails bright pink, her hair piled high on her head, and laughed. She was the most absurd little thing he’d ever encountered.

“What?” she asked.

“You’re so weird.”

“I am?”

“Yes.”

“Why are you shocked by it?”

He shrugged. “The press makes you look like some...staid and stable ribbon-cutter.”

“Ribbon-cutter?”

“Like you go to openings and stand there and cut the ribbon.”

“Hmph. That’s your bad for believing the media’s representation of me! They only see a small bit of who I am, and they report on a piece of that. They don’t know me or what I do at home.”

“Is that their fault or yours?”

“What does that mean?”

“You’re very guarded, Rachel, and while I have to say you don’t seem to be around me, in general, I think you are. Does anyone know you?”

Rachel paused with her coffee mug halfway to her lips. She was unhappy because seeing Alex walk into the kitchen had sent her heart way up into her throat, even worse than it had done when he’d sent her text messages during the time he’d been away.

“Alana probably a little.”

“Alana?”

“My friend. The one I was in Corfu with. The one who encouraged me to go and talk to you. She was my maid of honor along with Leah, actually. Well, she would have been had I gone through with the wedding.”

“And she knows you?”

She winced. “Mostly.” Alana had been there for the wild past. They’d passed a liquor bottle back and forth between them in her Mercedes. They’d cleaned up their act together. But Alana didn’t know that Rachel felt like she was suffocating beneath her skin.

She shopped with Alana, she talked shallow crap with Alana. She and Leah had warm chats where Rachel felt obligated to seem stable and to give advice. She and her father had a similar relationship. She always felt like she needed to seem happy, so that he wouldn’t worry that something was wrong again. That she might be sliding back into her old ways.

Then there was Ajax...and with him she had to be...well, calm and fine and...and...things. With Ajax she was the woman she pretended to be for the media. Poised and steady. She could never do anything that might point in the direction of her very covered up, fairly sordid teenage years. She could never flail or cuss.

She did both of those things around Alex. With alarming frequency. And she wasn’t sure why. Maybe because he’d seen her naked. Or maybe because she’d been naked since she met him. Metaphorically.

“I’ve just never... Everyone has their expectations. And what they need from me. You, on the other hand, well, I don’t need to be a certain way around you because I don’t even like you, and also we’re stuck together, so what you think about me or want from me doesn’t really matter.”

His eyes went blank. “I don’t really know what it’s like to have someone have expectations of you.”

“Oh. Well, it’s not bad. I don’t really mind it or anything. It’s just that...it means that I make sure I behave a certain way in certain company is all. And yeah, I don’t go around saying weird things in public or around people who wouldn’t get it. So I’m...restrained in certain settings and...”

“Fake,” he said.

“What?”

“You’re fake. And that’s okay, I am, too. I mean, I know how to be. Witness how we met. And how do you think I survive a week of meetings like this? I don’t go in telling them where I’m from. I make sure to temper my language. I’ve learned how to dress in a way that reflects who I am now, and what I do now, not in a way that reflects who I was. Or where I’m from.”


“I’m not fake.”

“Don’t look so upset.”

She realized she was frowning with great ferocity. She didn’t bother to stop. “How can I not be upset when you’re telling me that I’m fake?”

“Because it’s a life skill. Chameleons do it. It’s how they survive. It’s how we survive. You don’t want to walk around showing the wrong colors, so to speak. You have to learn how to blend in.”

“Deep, man.”

“It’s the truth is all. And you do it, so you obviously, instinctively, know the benefits of it, whether you like it or not.”

“It’s...being appropriate in your surroundings. It’s not fake.”

“Is it authentic?”

“Does it... What does that mean?”

“I’m not judging you, Rachel, I’m observing.”

Her phone started buzzing against the hard marble tile and she grabbed it, looking at the screen with no small amount of dread. Because she hadn’t talked to Ajax at all since his wedding with Leah and she hadn’t talked to Leah on the phone. Or her father. And she didn’t know if she could handle any of them.

Fortunately the caller ID showed that it was Alana. Alana, who she was prepared to deal with at least. They’d talked a little bit during the week, and while she hadn’t broken the pregnancy news, her friend had guessed that Alex was the reason for the wedding no-show and had been nothing but supportive.

“I have to take this. In an authentic manner.” She hit the green button on the screen. “Hi. What?”

Alana was talking so fast that Rachel could hardly decode what she was saying. “A huge order. Like...huge, and I can’t fulfill it if I can’t buy the materials—I’m only getting half paid up front. And you’re not even going to believe this! A pipe burst in the shop upstairs and flooded me completely. I have ruined inventory, things that I can’t just replace and my insurance thinks her insurance is responsible and vice versa and it’s just absolute madness!”

“What can I do?”

“There’s the obvious but I hesitate to ask.”

“Well, since I’m part owner in the business, it makes sense that I help, especially since— What is this huge order?”

“It’s costume stuff, which I don’t love to do, but I’d get a film credit. It’s for a really big French film and—”

“Say no more. I’m coming over. We’ll get it all worked out.”

“You don’t have to come if you’re still deep in issues with your mystery man.”

Rachel looked up at Alex. “Let me worry about that.” She hung up. “I have to go to Cannes.”

“What?”

“My friend Alana has a boutique there. Technically, I have a boutique there. I own most of it. But I’m a silent business partner, as it were.”

“How is it I didn’t know that?”

“No one knows that,” she said. “Not even Ajax. And yes, I felt a little guilty about it, but I believe in her skills as a designer and I wanted to support her. So I set her up with a boutique. And we’ve been turning a decent profit the past few years. She’s having a crisis now, though—burst pipe upstairs—and we have damaged clothes. So I need to go and see what all happened, and try to help her get everything put back together.”

“That’s easy,” he said. “Throw money at it.”

“What? Like just pay someone to go and fix it all?”

“Why not?”

“I have a budget. What? I do. I have a trust, yes, but I have to live off of it. And I just stopped living in the apartment my father paid for. And I’ve just burned some bridges, so all things considered, I should throw a mop at it, not money. It needs to get done quickly because she has a chance to pick up a major client, but not if she’s underwater. So to speak.”

“I could pay for it. You know, if you were my wife I would feel obligated to pay for it.”

“Oh, no! I’m not your wife, though. I’m not even your fiancée. You know what? It feels really good not to be someone’s fiancée. It really does.”

“I’m happy for you.”

“You don’t sound it. So anyway, as I’m assuming I’m not a prisoner, I need to get a plane off this island and get myself to Cannes.”

“Are you coming back?”

She bit her lip. “I don’t know. I might stay with Alana for a while. This, you and me, is probably going to end in shared custody.”

He frowned. “That’s not how I want it to end.”

“How do you see this ending?”

“With our family together. You with your child, me with both of you. You in my bed.”

She choked on her coffee, coughing and sputtering, bracing herself on the counter until she could suck in a breath that wasn’t blocked by liquid. “What?” she finally managed to rasp.

“What did you think I meant when I proposed marriage?”

“Something not so...intimate.”

“And why not? We’re good together, agape.”

“Whatever. You only slept with me because you were being revenge-y. And you were wanting to steal Ajax’s woman and his business and whatever. It had nothing to do with me.”

A muscle in his jaw ticked. “I suppose. But things have changed. You’re the mother of my child and all things considered...”

“I will never be a convenience. Not for any man. Not ever again. You talked about being fake. Fine, maybe I’ve been fake. I didn’t even know it, though. That’s the thing. I didn’t know...how far from love what I felt for Ajax was, and I’ll never put myself in that position just to make other people comfortable. I’m done making other people comfortable. I’m going to make me and my baby comfortable. Beginning and end of story.”

“Well, then, I suppose I should drink more coffee and pack.”

“Why?”

“Because, apparently, we’re going to Cannes.”

“We?”

“I’m not done with you, Rachel. Not by a long shot. And hey, this time, I’ll pay for the hotel room. Since you paid for the last one.”

Her ears burned. “Did you not just hear what I said?” She really needed him to not be suggesting they pick up where they left off in Corfu, because she was genuinely afraid that she would be too weak to tell him no. That she would say “yes, yes, take me!” and lie down on the nearest flat surface so he could have his wicked way with her, and that would accomplish nothing.

It would be fun, though...

Maybe. But she wasn’t going to have any more of that kind of fun with him. She had, in some strange way, been set free by all these crazy turns of events, and she was going to make the most of that freedom. Not head toward another loveless engagement.

“I heard you. I’ll get us a penthouse suite with separate bedrooms. It will be very luxurious and private and it will not interfere with your budget.”

“Well...thanks. But why?”

“Because I am not going to give up on you, agape mou. On us.”

“Because you love me so much?” she asked, her heart hammering, her palms sweaty. She’d asked it to put him off. To mock him. Instead, she found herself standing there shaking, a part of her praying his answer would be yes.

“Not at all. Love isn’t in the cards for a man like me, Rachel. I wouldn’t even know where to begin. But a family... I thought I would like to try.”


She swallowed hard. “But I need more than that, Alex. I need more than just you trying. I’m not going to be your happy family experiment, it’s not fair.”

“You don’t have a happy family, experimental or otherwise at the moment, so why not?”

She tried to ignore the punch to the gut his words delivered. But it was impossible. Because she’d lived the past eleven years holding her family together. Being what they needed. And now it was gone.

It was gone and she didn’t know what to do without it.

It was like realizing that pieces of her armor had been stripped away. Threatening to expose her. Vulnerable. So soft and easily hurt.

She crossed her arms beneath her breasts, as if that might hold what was left of her armor close to her skin. As if it might protect her.

Suddenly she was very aware of the baby inside of her, and that, in spite of the fact she had a human in her, she’d never felt so alone or frightened in all of her life. As if everything, inside and out, had turned completely alien.

She would take pictures of herself being intimate with her former almost-lover hitting the news any day over the feeling that had grabbed her by the throat just now.

“I...I need to go,” she said. “Send the plane. I’ll pack.”

“No. Lucy will pack for you. You rest here and I will see to all the arrangements.” For Alex, he seemed almost contrite.

“You don’t have to come.”

“You don’t want me to?” he asked.

“No.”

“You can’t always get what you want, agape.”