Captivating You (How to Marry a Billionaire #2)

Episode 54

EPISODE 54

KEEPER OF SECRETS

River

Twenty Years Earlier...

Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!

I’m in the kitchen at home when I hear pounding on the door. I walk the few steps and open it. Brett stands there.

“Are you nuts? It’s after ten. My parents and uncle are in bed.”

“Sorry. You want to check on them?”

“Hell, no. Just stop the pounding. What do you want?”

“You got any beer?”

“In the fridge.”

“I could use one. How about you?”

“You okay?” I ask.

“Yeah. Just meet me outside on the stoop. Bring some beer.”

I nab a few of Uncle Bobby’s beers out of the fridge. Uncle Bobby is Ma’s brother, and he’s been living with us and working the ranch since my father’s accident. He’s not thrilled when I snag his beers, but he usually looks the other way.

I pop a tab and take a long drink. I don’t like the taste of beer. Never have. But Brett’s right. Tonight seems like a beer night if there ever was one. I take several out on the porch where Brett is waiting.

He polishes one off quickly, grabs another, and pulls the tab. Ernie perks up his ears at the click and the hiss as some beer bubbles over.

I scratch his soft head. “Good boy, Ern.” I look out at the ranch and then upward to the night sky. Montana is called Big Sky Country for a reason. The stars are bright tonight, and the moon is a crescent sliver. A firefly whizzes past in a blink of light, and crickets chirp in the distance while the cattle rustle in the fields, occasionally lowing. I inhale deeply, letting the scents of the night—hay, wildflowers, and the earthy smell of the horses and cattle—soothe me. They’re familiar scents. Comforting scents.

Old Man Larson doesn’t keep cattle. Only goats, and they’re inside his barn at night. I’ve never seen a wildflower growing at his place. His poison personality must keep them at bay.

I let out a huff at my thought.

“What?” Brett asks.

“Nothing.”

Nothing I want to tell him , anyway. Brett’s my best friend, but he’s hardly the poetic type. He won’t understand me thinking that flowers can’t grow on Larson’s land. Seb would get it. He’s artistic, always making up tunes. Or Alex, always talking about the stories he wants to write someday. Pirates and adventurers, he says.

Me? I love the ranch, and I guess I get a little whimsical sometimes. I don’t ever want to leave this place. It’s in my blood. In my soul.

Brett’s the brains of the bunch of us, always messing with some computer program or another. He’s nearly put the local nerd out of business because he knows computers better than anyone in this little town. His attention to detail is uncanny, which is why I know his plan will work. He thinks of everything that could possibly go wrong, and he figures out a way to take care of it.

Brett takes a drink, slurping the beer off the top of the can. “You think we’re ready?” he asks after he swallows.

Did Brett truly just ask me that? This was all his idea. “You’ve planned out every detail,” I say. “You always do. How can we not be ready?”

He nods. “I worry about Jake.”

“Jake? Why?”

“He was so quick to agree. Not that I mind, but it’s not like him.”

“Yeah. I know.” I pet Ernie again and then throw one of his old tennis balls.

He bounds after it into the darkness.

Jake swore me to secrecy about Marnie and her pregnancy, and also about his mom losing her job. And there’s a bunch of other shit going down that he wouldn’t—or couldn’t—tell me. I want to unburden myself to Brett about it, but I can’t. My word is gold. My dad taught me that when I was little, before his accident.

Now my father doesn’t know me anymore. The accident took away a lot more than his ability to walk. All he does now is sit in his wheelchair and watch TV. More often he just stares into space. I stopped trying to get his attention years ago.

Ma, Uncle Bobby, and I take care of our small ranching operation. But I remember the good times. The times when I had a dad—a really awesome dad who taught me what it was to be a man.

That dad would be really disappointed in me if he knew what I was about to do.

I’m glad he doesn’t know. No one will ever know because Brett’s plan is foolproof...and I need my share of Larson’s riches.

So does Jake.

“What’s up with him, anyway?” Brett spits on the ground.

“Jake?” I shake my head. “Hell if I know.”

“It’s Marnie,” Brett says. “That’s got to be it.”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” Ernie returns and I throw the ball again.

“You think he’s getting serious with her?” Brett asks.

“Why the fuck would I know that?”

“You know everything, Riv,” Brett says. “You’re the keeper of our secrets.”

I turn to him, but he looks straight ahead, as if he’s trying to see something that’s not there.

“What the hell do you mean by that?”

“You know damned well what I mean. Everyone goes to you with their shit. Hell, I do too.”

“Brett, you never have any shit. The sun shines on you every day of your life.”

He stands, drains his second beer, and then he turns and looks down at me. “You’re fucked in the head. The sun shines on a pig’s ass more than it ever shines on me.”

I roll my eyes and grab the soggy tennis ball out of Ernie’s mouth. “You’re so full of it.”

Brett scoffs. “You think I like living in this hellhole town? You think I like?—”

I stand and meet his gaze. “I don’t think you like your lot in life any more than the rest of us, but for God’s sake, Brett. You’re the brains of this group. You’re the one who gets straight As without even trying. You’re big and muscled without ever lifting a finger for it. Hell, Coach has been trying to get you to come out for football since freshman year. Most guys would love a chance to be on the team.”

“Football doesn’t make you a big shot.”

“It’s not about being a big shot, for Christ’s sake. Seb and I love it. It’s about being a part of a team. About learning to push yourself to your limits and then push some more. It’s about learning to rely on your teammates, and it’s about?—”

“Getting all the tits and ass you want, Riv. I know you and Seb like that part of it.”

He’s not wrong, but Brett gets plenty of it without a football uniform. “I was going to say it’s about mental toughness. About quick thinking and adaptability. You’d be an asset to the team for sure.”

“I’ve got way bigger things to think about than football,” he says. “You know you’re like a brother to me, Riv. Quit with the recruiting talk. You’re just changing the subject. Tell me what’s going on with Jake.”

I draw in a breath. I want to tell Brett, and I trust him. He and I are closer to each other than we are to the others, despite the fact that we’re different as night and day.

“I don’t know, Brett.”

He shakes his head. “I hate it when you lie to me, Riv.”

That’s another thing Brett can do. He can see right through me.

“Fine. I can’t. Happy now? I fucking can’t tell you.”

“That’s better than lying, anyway.” He continues to stare at nothing in particular as the night breeze drifts over us.

“You told me you weren’t going to pry,” I remind him.

“I didn’t plan to, but this is big, Riv. And if Jake’s mind isn’t on what we’re doing, something could go wrong.”

My blood freezes. Something could go wrong ? This doesn’t sound like Brett. He plans for every contingency. It’s almost supernatural how he’s able to see so many scenarios at once.

Brett still stares out onto the open land, the stars shining down. Ernie rubs at his legs, pimping for a pet, but Brett ignores him, which is off.

He turns to me then, and his blue eyes sear into mine. “You’re the keeper of our secrets, and I’m going to tell you a big one.”

“About what might go wrong tomorrow?”

He shakes his head, walks a few steps forward, and then turns to face me again. “Keep this secret, and remember when and where you heard it. One day I’m going to be so rich, this thing we’re about to do will be a distant memory. Something like a dream within a dream. One day, I won’t have to think about other people’s money, because I’m going to have so much of my own that I’ll never be able to spend it all in five lifetimes. And Riv, I don’t care what I have to do to get it.”

Present Day...

Keeper of the secrets.

Those words Misty used to describe me. They hit me hard...and now I remember why.

Brett used the same words all those years ago.

And we all ended up richer than we ever imagined, though Alex doesn’t write about pirates. He writes commercial thrillers.

But Brett was wrong about one thing. It never became a distant memory, a dream within a dream.

It became a nightmare that haunts us all to this day.

Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!

The banging on the door and the movement of Emily’s naked body off my chest brings me back to reality.

“Give it a bloody rest, will you? I’m coming!” Emily scoots off the bed, throws her silk robe around her shoulders, and leaves me in the bedroom alone.