Chapter 25
Kane
“Morning,” Brielle mutters, joining me in the bathroom.
When I came back to the room last night and found her asleep, I went down to my office and worked for a while, giving her some space.
I don’t know what happened last night, but it feels like all the progress we’d made was wiped out.
“Morning,” I say back, sticking my toothbrush in my mouth.
I’m not shocked to see her in here with me since she joins me every morning to shower and get ready for the day, but I am surprised she’s doing it after the way she pushed me away last night.
Maybe she was just tired?
She grabs the toothpaste, applies some onto the brush, and when she drops the tube, my eye catches her engagement ring in the soap dish.
She took it off.
“You’re not wearing the engagement ring?” I ask.
She glances down at it and flinches. It’s so quick that if I wasn’t watching her, I wouldn’t have caught it—but I was, and I did.
“I’m sure a lot of women would love the ring,” she blurts out, not looking at me.
“But it’s just not for me. I always imagined when I was proposed to, it would be because the man I was with loved me, and the ring would symbolize that love.
” She shrugs. “This ring is huge, and like I said before, it just looks like it’s trying to make a point.
” Her eyes finally meet mine. “And I don’t like the point it’s trying to make. ”
The point it’s trying to make.
The forced marriage.
I open my mouth to tell her that my feelings have changed, that I’m falling in love with her, but I stop myself, worried that I’ll scare her away. I tried to tell her through my vows yesterday, and then she shut me out. Maybe she’s not ready to hear it yet.
“What are you up to today?” I ask instead, like a fucking coward. “I was thinking we could—”
“I have plans,” she says, cutting me off. “Have a good day.”
And just like that, I’ve been dismissed.
“If you love her, just tell her.”
“It’s not that easy,” I say to my mom over the phone. “I tried to tell her with my vows, and I think I spooked her.”
“So, talk to her,” Mom insists. “I’ve never been married, but one of the most important things in a relationship is having open communication.”
Fuck, she’s right. I need to talk to her.
We hang up, and since Brielle just left, I get in my car to follow her. She always goes to the coffee shop, so I’m not surprised to find her there. Only, before I can get out to join her, she’s walking out with her coffee in hand and heading to her car like she’s in a rush.
She’s also not dressed in her usual workout gear.
She takes off down the street, and since I’m a nosy bastard, I follow her. She flies through the streets in her cherry-red Porsche, not stopping until she arrives at … the Humane Society?
She gets out, drinks the last of her coffee, tosses it in the trash, and then walks inside. Since she clearly didn’t want me to know what she was doing, I drive away, letting her do her thing.
I have nothing else going on, so I head to the office to get some work done. When there’s nothing else to do, I go to the country club to get lunch, where I find Lorenzo sitting at the bar with a whiskey in his hand.
“A little early to be drinking?” I say lightly, sliding onto the seat next to him.
“Getting drunk is the only way to survive living with that bitch.” He swallows the rest of his drink in one go and gestures for the bartender to bring him another.
I order a drink as well as a chicken Cobb salad and then glance at Lorenzo. “You okay?”
We don’t know each other, but anyone can see how defeated the guy is.
“Leo is barely three months old, and I don’t know how I’m going to spend the next several years with this woman. She’s driving me fucking nuts.”
“I’m assuming Leo is your son?”
“Yeah.” The bartender sets our drinks down, and he takes a sip of his. “Leonardo Sparks. She didn’t even give him my last name, yet she’s acting like she’s in love with me. Says she wants to be a family. She’s up to something. She has to be. She always is.”
“Well, while you figure it out, at least you have your son under your roof, and once you find out the game she’s playing, you can plan your next move. Have you told Dominick and Matteo yet?”
Lorenzo shakes his head. “Not yet. They’ll want to remove her from the situation, and maybe it makes me soft, but I don’t really want to kill the mother of my child, even if she’s a conniving bitch.”
He sighs. “I’ve always tried to do the right thing.
Be a good guy. My dad taught me to be respectful to women.
Even though my mom wasn’t his first choice as a partner, he was always good to her.
But I swear to God, if I find out this bitch is fucking with me, I’m going to make her regret showing up on my doorstep. ”
“Nah.” I shake my head as the bartender places my salad in front of me. “You won’t make her regret showing up because, without her doing so, you wouldn’t have known you had a son. You’ll make her regret not handing him over to you and walking away.”
I glance at Lorenzo, and he nods in agreement.
“Let me find out she’s fucking with me, and I’ll make sure she regrets ever coming to Harbor Point to begin with.”
After lunch, I go home, and the house is quiet. After getting a workout in and swimming a few laps in the pool, I heat up dinner, but Brielle says she’s busy, so I save her some and eat alone, wondering if this is how our marriage is going to be.
And this continues every day for the next week. When she’s home, she pretends I don’t exist. She refuses to eat the leftovers I save her, and when she leaves, she doesn’t say where she’s going, and she no longer hangs out at the coffee shop so I can’t corner her there.
The following Sunday, since I have nothing else going on, I follow her to the coffee shop, hoping to put an end to this bullshit.
I get she’s upset that I forced her to marry me, but we both know she still wants me.
She might glare daggers at me to my face, but when she thinks I’m not looking, I see the lust and longing in her eyes.
Like last Sunday, when I pull up, she’s already got her coffee in hand, heading back to her car.
And like last Sunday, when I follow her, we end up at the Humane Society.
But instead of driving away, I park and follow her inside, only to be stopped by her standing in the doorway with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Daniil said you were following me. Why?”
Shit, I forgot about her guard. At least that means he’s doing his job.
“Why are you here?” I ask, ignoring her question.
“Brielle!” an elderly woman says, coming around the desk. “I missed you last week.”
“How was your trip to visit your kids?” Brielle asks, giving the woman a hug.
“Cold!” The woman laughs. “But it was a good visit. I was surprised to see that you volunteered the day after your wedding. No honeymoon?”
Brielle smiles sheepishly at the woman, and I curse myself for not considering she might’ve wanted to go on a honeymoon. She barely wanted anything to do with the wedding, so I figured a honeymoon was out of the question.
Jesus, my mom was right. We really do need to talk.
And then the woman’s words hit me.
“You volunteer here?”
Brielle glances at me and nods.
“Is this your husband?” the woman asks, extending her hand. “I’m Jude, the manager here. Brielle has been volunteering here for a long time now. And her donations have saved so many animals.”
“I’m Kane.”
“It’s wonderful to meet you. Brielle, why don’t you show him around? I know a certain someone will be excited to see you.”
The woman winks, and Brielle forces a smile.
I get a visitor badge, and Brielle takes me into the back, where all the animals are, saying hello to several of them along the way.
“I love animals, especially cats,” she says after a few minutes. “I found one once when I was little.” She opens the door to a decent-sized room, and the cats lift their heads to acknowledge us. “I snuck him into our house and named him Pebbles because I loved Fruity Pebbles.”
She laughs softly and kneels in front of a cat toy. A brown and black striped cat pokes its head out and starts to meow, climbing into her lap like they’ve been friends for years.
“I used my money to get him a litter box and food, and since I was only thirteen at the time, I carried it all back myself. My dad had said no pets, and when he found out that I had one hiding in my room, he threw it out, and it got hit by a car and died.”
She snuggles her face into the crook of the cat’s neck, and it purrs loudly.
“I always said that when I finally got out from under Andrey’s thumb, I would have a house full of cats.” She laughs, and it’s the first real laugh I’ve heard from her since we got married.
“But I moved in with Dominick, and since Peyton is allergic to cats, I started volunteering here.” She smiles down at the cat.
“I get to give them all the love they deserve. Don’t I?
” she says to the cat she’s still holding.
“This is Molly. She was found on the streets, and she had gotten into a fight of some sort, so her ear had to be stitched. When we called the owner, they said they didn’t have time for a pet and we could keep her.
She’s a bit older at three years old, so she hasn’t been adopted yet.
Everyone wants the cute kittens, not the older, damaged cats. ” She rubs the tip of her ear lovingly.
She introduces me to several of the cats, but it’s clear Molly is her favorite, and once I head out, leaving her to volunteer, I know what I need to do.
Just like the cat, Brielle wants to be loved. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do—I’m going to love the hell out of her.