The Owner of His Heart

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE





NATHAN had been looking for Matsuda for the last twenty minutes, but so far between guests stopping him to thank him for hosting the ball and fellow businessmen stopping him to inquire after the Japan deal, he hadn’t managed to actually connect with the man he hoped to be partnering with soon. So imagine his surprise when he found Matsuda at the edge of the party, talking in Japanese to his brother, who was now sporting a black eye, courtesy of the punch he’d delivered earlier.

Nathan rubbed his own jaw, which was beginning to swell from Andrew’s own hit before interrupting their conversation without preamble, “What’s going on here?”

“Ah, Mr. Sinclair,” Matsuda said, switching to English. “I was just congratulating the other Mr. Sinclair. Our company has decided to accept your offer of partnership for a Japan site.”

This was excellent news, what Nathan had been working toward all summer. But despite this, he turned to his brother and demanded, “Where’s Layla?”

Andrew squinted. “I’d thought she would have found you by now. She jumped out of the car when we got here and went looking for you. She mentioned a contract.”

“What?” Nathan said, even more confused now. But then it occurred to him: “Oh, she’s trying to find me to thank me for letting her out of the contract. Kate must have already told her.”

“What contract are we talking about?” Matsuda asked. “Is this Layla another business associate?”

“No,” Nathan answered.

Andrew took him by the arm. “May we have a minute. There are some things I need to discuss with Nathan. Afterwards, we’ll come back and toast our new partnership.”

Matsuda bowed. “Of course.”

Nathan barely had time to complete his bow before Andrew was tugging him away back toward the entrance foyer. “Okay, tell me about this contract,” he said as soon as they were out of earshot.

Nathan told him about both contracts, figuring he deserved to know the truth about what had gone down that summer. “But I guess, I’m a better man than either you or Layla thought, because I’m done trying to control her with contracts. If you two want to be together again, I’m not going to get in your way.”

Andrew shook his head with dawning realization. “You actually love her, don’t you?”

“Obviously, I love her,” Nathan answered. “And I want her to be happy, even if it’s with you.”

Andrew studied him, as if we were re-evaluating everything he thought he knew about his twin. In the end he heaved a sigh and said, “Okay, fine, I’ll be your best man.”

“What are you talking about?” Nathan asked.

“Layla was right about us needing to act like brothers again. We were actually doing okay before this summer, and we need to get back to that. So I’ll be your best man at your wedding and somehow I’ll forgive you for stealing Layla.”

“I didn’t steal her,” Nathan said. “And what do you mean you’ll be the best man at our wedding? What exactly happened between you and Layla?”

Andrew gave him a wry smile. “She chose you. I stated my best case for why she should be with me, and she chose you anyway. Again.”

Nathan went still. “What do you mean by ‘again.’”

Andrew studied his tuxedo lapel, unwilling to meet Nathan’s eyes. “I mean that kiss you saw ten years ago. It wasn’t Layla and me kissing. It was me kissing Layla, trying to convince her not to dump me, in order to be with you.”

Nathan’s fists clenched. “You let me believe all this time that she’d chosen you?”

Andrew raised his hands. “Don’t cause a scene,” he warned. “I already have to explain to everyone why I have a black eye. And if you hit me again, my offer to be your best man comes off the table.”

“You let me leave her in that hospital all alone, believing she didn’t want me?” Nathan continued. “Do you have any idea how much I loved her, love her now?”

“Obviously I didn’t, or I would have told you,” Andrew answered. “And I can’t believe you’re trying to make me feel guilty for not helping you to steal my girlfriend.”


“I didn’t steal her. I loved her more than you did, and she loved me back. She chose me.” Nathan said. Saying the words aloud filled him with a new wonder. He had spent all this time being bitter, but she had chosen him both then and now.

“Funny, that’s kind of what she said.”

Before Nathan could press him for further details, Kate came rushing toward them. “I saw Layla coming in, and I got everything reset up for the proposal.” Kate frowned, looking over both shoulders. “But where is she?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out,” Nathan said.

“She must still be talking to Mrs. Sinclair—I mean Diana,” Kate said, correcting herself with a glance toward Andrew. “I saw them go into the library together after Layla arrived. Diana looked upset and I think Layla was trying to comfort her.”

They all exchanged knowing smiles. “Mystery solved,” Nathan said. He cut his eyes toward his brother. “I’m going to have delay my proposal because my future wife is too busy comforting your future ex-wife.”

Andrew shrugged. “Well, you know Layla. Maybe even better than I do at this point.”

Nathan’s phone vibrated in his tux pocket. After pulling it out, he checked the caller ID and saw it was Spencer Greeley. Maybe he had a break in the case.

“Excuse me,” he said to Kate and Andrew. He walked away without waiting for their answer. At that point nothing was a bigger priority than keeping Layla safe. “Do you have something?” Nathan asked.

“I’m not sure,” Sterling answered. “But I wanted to call you just in case. I finished going through the names on the sign-in sheet at Ms. Matthews’ physical therapy center and one jumped out at me. Did you know your sister-in-law went into Layla’s center a couple of times for physical therapy? Apparently, she’d sprained her wrist playing tennis.”

Nathan’s mind began putting two and two together, even before the detective had come to his conclusion. “Diana was there the day Layla was first threatened?”

“Yeah, she was. Might just be a coincidence, but I’m going to hack her credit card records to see if she’s bought any cans of spray paint lately.”

But something was already telling Nathan what those records would reveal. Diana had lied. She had pretended to not even know who Layla was when she’d stopped by the mansion looking for Andrew. But Nathan was now certain Diana knew exactly who she was and had been threatening her accordingly ever since seeing her at the physical therapy center. He dropped the phone and started pushing through the crowd toward the library.

***



Inside the library, Layla tried to calm the screaming panic inside her mind and talk to Diana. “Diana, I know you think you saw something significant out there, but let me assure you, there is nothing between Andrew and me. I’m in love with Nathan.”

“It doesn’t matter who you’re in love with,” Diana said, coming around the desk. “He’s in love with you. And if I can’t have him, you can’t.”

“I don’t want him. Seriously, I’m in love with Nathan.”

Diana lips trembled into a bitter smile. “That’s what you said ten years ago when you found me in Andrew’s room.”

Layla blinked, trying to process this new piece of information, even as a previously blocked memory unfolded in front of her mind’s eye. “You were there,” she whispered, remembering. “I came to deliver that note, and I found you in his room going through his things. I didn’t know who you were, but I knew you didn’t belong there.”

“I was only trying to gather some information. I wanted to know who this girl was he’d been dating, and see if there was any way I could snatch him back from you.” Diana said. “So I snuck in past the servants and I went into Andrew’s room.”

Layla shook her head. “Snatch him back from me? He broke up with you before he ever met me.”

“I don’t believe you,” Diana said.

She had said the same words that night long ago, Layla now remembered, with that same crazed look in her eyes. Then she’d grabbed a Swiss Army knife off of Andrew’s desk and came running toward her.

Layla’s flight instinct had taken over at the sight of the knife bearing down on her and she’d run, only managing to get out one scream before she missed the step and went tumbling face forward down the stairs.

“It was you I was running from,” she realized out loud.

“Yes, it was me, and I wish you had died. Then you wouldn’t have come back to town to ruin my marriage,” Diana said with venom in her voice. “Am I supposed to believe your return to Pittsburgh at the same time Andrew disappeared was just a coincidence?”

“Yes, that’s exactly what you’re supposed to believe,” Layla said. “Because that’s exactly what happened. I’m not in love with Andrew. In fact, when I came up to his room, I was just there to deliver an apology, because I had already broken up with him.”

“I don’t believe you! I don’t believe you! I don’t believe!” Diana screamed like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum. “All you do is lie. You pretend to be this innocent girl, but you stole Andrew from me twice.” She cocked the gun.

And Layla began to feel real despair. This woman was going to kill her, for real this time, and before she had a chance to tell Nathan how she really felt and why she had chosen to go to the party with Andrew as opposed to him.

She had always had a thing about breaking promises and now she couldn’t escape the irony. She had broken her promise, just once, and now she would be paying for that broken promise with her life.

Tears of frustration sprang to her eyes. “Okay, if you’re going shoot me, no matter what, let me just say this. I love Nathan Sinclair. My heart belongs to him and it always will. If this ends badly for me, please let him know I said that.”

Then Layla surprised her by running toward her and grabbing hold of the gun’s barrel.

***



It felt to Nathan like the crowd grew thicker as he got closer to the library door, as if they were purposefully trying to keep him from Layla, his heart, his soul, the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

His father had always kept a revolver in a locked drawer in his desk. After inheriting the house, Andrew had not only kept the gun, but had also made a big deal of leaving it in the drawer, claiming that’s what their father would have wanted.

Nathan knew Diana knew it was in there, and he felt sick with fear for Layla. He shoved people aside left and right, and cursed himself for never telling her how he truly felt, for never saying those three words during their two months together: I love you. He had been such a fool. He could only hope he wasn’t too late.

Finally, he reached the library door and was just about to turn the knob, when a gunshot rang out on the other side of it.