It was nice to know that my awkwardness was so amusing for him.
“All right. You go shower.” He kissed the corner of my mouth and stepped back. “Throw me a towel, then I’ll go order us some food so you can write your next stunning character reference for me.”
I tugged my skirt down over my ass and upper thighs with one hand and grasped the door handle with the other. “You’re...not leaving?”
The condom snapped when he rolled it off, punctuating the speed with which his eyes found mine. Light lines appeared on his forehead as his brows drew together. “No. Why would I leave?”
I opened my mouth to answer and then shook my head.
Brett pulled up his clothing and came back in front of me, buttoning his jeans. “You thought I’d leave?”
I didn’t answer him.
Something flared in his eyes as he cupped my chin. “Not you, okay?”
“Okay.” My voice was quiet, but something inside me...niggled.
It felt a bit like regret.
And it didn’t dim when he kissed me again.
“I can’t do this.”
William barely glanced up at me from whatever he was working on. “Do what, dear?”
I always hated being called ‘dear.’ “This...this thing.” I waved my arms around. “With Brett. I can’t do it anymore. I have enough for one more article that I promise will make him look like the good guy I know he is, but I just can’t do this.”
He swept his pen across the bottom of the page and, with a sigh, set down the pen and pushed his work to the side. He pinched the arm of his glasses and pulled them down from his face. “Lani,” he said quietly, finally looking up at me with eyes several shades darker than his son’s. “Of course you can.”
“Of course I can?” I blinked at him. “No, trust me, I can’t. This is not going the way we agreed when I took that damn check. It was supposed to be minimal contact with Brett and the rest through you, Mae, and Camille. This is not working the way I thought it would. It’s Brett all the time and I...” I paused and looked away to take a deep breath. “I can’t...do...that.”
William studied me for a moment, his face expressionless. The only indication that he was thinking came from the way he scratched his forefinger slowly beneath his chin. “Sit down.”
I didn’t move.
“Please, sit down.” He motioned to the chair opposite his desk.
This time, I did as he asked and nestled myself into the comfortable chair with my hands on my lap.
“There was a reason I asked you to do this for me. And no, it wasn’t because Camille suggested you. She and Brett like to think it was, but when he agreed to this, I was already thinking of you.” He put the glasses on top of his closed laptop off to the side of his desk.
“Why?” I ran my hand through my hair. “Why me, of all people?”
He looked me dead in the eye and said, “Because with you, he’s a different person.”
“You could have fooled me.”
He chuckled quietly and reached for his packet of cigarettes. He tapped one out of the packet, put it between his lips, and lit it. “I’m assuming, then, that there is one glaring point nobody has mentioned to you about his behavior.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“Lani...The day you left was the day these problems started.”
I took a deep breath. “What?”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
BRETT
“What?” Lani’s breathy tone caught my attention as I turned the hall toward Dad’s office.
What was she doing here?
I stopped a foot away from the door and turned my face toward the open doorway.
Dad sighed heavily. “When you left, he changed. Almost immediately.”
Fuck.
“I don’t understand,” Lani said in a small voice. “Why would he change just because I wasn’t here?”
There was silence for a moment. “That’s a conversation that’s best left to the two of you.”
“Feel free to stop speaking in code at any time.”
Dad laughed. “No code, I promise. Besides, if you’d like to know what I’m talking about, he’s standing right outside the door.”
“Shit,” I muttered.
“Hi, son.”
“Hey...” I shuffled toward the doorway. “I was just passing by your office and...”
“Decided you’d stop and listen to our conversation.” Lani turned and speared me with her gaze. “Hear anything good?”
“Well, everything I heard involved discussing when you left, so I guess that depends whether or not you’re gonna tell me why you did.”
She took a visibly deep breath before her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Okay,” she said softly, looking down. “Okay.”
“Okay?” I stilled. “Just like that, you’re gonna tell me?”
She swung her gaze back to me. “Only if you tell me what your dad means.”
“Okay.” I shrugged. “Let’s go chat on the beach.”
Lani looked at my dad for a moment before she pushed herself to stand up. “Better get this over with,” she whispered. I think it was meant to be to herself, but she never was very good at being quiet.
I led her out of the office and through the kitchen to the back door. It was still early so the humidity wasn’t terrible, but it was the only place we’d be able to get privacy to have this conversation. And what a fucking conversation it would be.
Oh, yeah, hey, I never told you, but the reason I lost it when you left was because I was fucking in love with you.
Jesus. This was fucked up.
I turned and took Lani’s hand to help her down the last few uneven steps to the beach.
“Thank you,” she said softly, peering up at me through her lashes.
I don’t know if it’s because of what happened between us yesterday, but it’s so fucking awkward. Not to mention that every time she pursed her full lips, I just wanted to kiss her.
“So. Where do we start?” she asked, sitting down on the sand and removing her shoes.
“At the beginning. With why you left.” I dropped down next to her and rubbed my nose.
“Imagine that.” She ran her hands through her hair and, with her hands clasped behind her neck, looked out to the water. “I kinda hoped we wouldn’t ever have to have this conversation.”
“Even after yesterday?”
Bright red flushed up her cheeks, even if she did turn her head in an attempt to hide it. “Yes.”
“You wanted to leave again without having it.”
“Well...yeah. That was my plan.”
I shrugged one shoulder. “Now you can’t. Tell me why you left.”
Lani let her hands fall away from her neck and she turned her face toward me. “Remember a few days ago when I said I’d had my heart broken?”
My mouth was dry. “Yeah?”
“You were the one who broke it,” she whispered.
Something I couldn’t discern slammed into me, hitting me hard in the gut. Guilt? Shock? A mixture of both?
I broke her heart? How could I have possibly done that?
“I don’t understand,” I replied slowly.
She looked away and rested her cheek in her hand. “Right after graduation, you were talking with Stevie Lewis. It was so loud I don’t think you knew anyone could hear you, much less me.”