Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
Hallie
I wake up Tuesday morning to loud knocking.
I deserve better than this.
Pulling my pillow over my head, I squeeze my eyes shut in the hope that whoever it is will leave.
The noise persists.
“Fine!” I call loudly into the small space. Fucking fine , I continue in my mind. “I’m coming!”
The knocking stops, and as I pull on my bathrobe, my gratefulness knows no bounds.
Making my way across the living space, I can very easily see who’s waiting for me through the large glass doors. The fact I can see a single thing through my ridiculously cried-out, crusty-ass eyes keeps me humble and in awe of the human body.
“Coffee?” Julian asks, holding out a baby pink cup in my direction after I open the door.
I narrow my eyes on him, but I nod, taking the caffeine.
Heading to the couch, I curl up in one corner, caring very little about my appearance or if Julian decides to follow me into the room. I remind myself that he’s likely here because he loves me, and I opened the door without yelling because I love him too. I don’t, however, love him enough to tell him I accepted the offer Marcus put on my gran’s house. Decisions made in anger and all.
“What’re you doing here?” I ask, attempting to get a read on just how much he knows.
He takes a seat a few cushions down, his own cup still nestled between his palms.
“Marcus called. Said he’d messed up big-time.”
“That’s true, but you didn’t have to come.”
A look of guilt flashes across his features. “I did.”
“Well. You didn’t have to knock.” I’m ungrateful in my heartache.
He slips me a quick grin. “Hallie, I know you well enough to know there wasn’t a single chance you’d be answering your phone.”
I ignore him, pulling a velvety-soft blue cushion onto my lap. “Shouldn’t you be at work?”
I’m positive that while it might be morning, it’s not nearly before school early. But Jules is dressed down in washed-out jeans and a dark gray T-shirt. This is not his Mr. Scott teaching attire.
He shrugs, taking a sip of his coffee. “I thought it was about time I took a sick day.”
“You’re playing hooky?” I demure, eyes wide, a single hand pressed against my chest. “For me?”
The man had never played hooky in his life, but Julian does nothing but roll his eyes, not rising to my bait.
“I thought you were a good enough reason to take the day off.”
I’m grateful for his generosity but hate that he thought it was needed. This whole week should be one of steady, rising excitement for him and Erica, and I wasn’t about to let my poor life choices get in the way of that.
Speaking of which. “I’m surprised Erica isn’t here with you.”
He smiles, a single dimple showing up on his right cheek. “It took a lot to get her to go to work. She loves you.”
“Well, I think you should let her play hooky today too. The two of you could sneak off and have a romantic time together. Go to the beach. Have a picnic. Build a pillow fort and binge-watch movies. You could watch all the Lord of the Rings films in one go.”
They all sound like excellent suggestions to my ears, and with the best friends occupied, I’d be free to lock the doors and lick my wounds. It’d give me the little bit of time I needed to be the Hallie they deserve this weekend for their wedding.
Their wedding in which I’m the maid of honor and Marcus is the best man. My heart, bruised and battered inside my chest, gives a pathetic thump at the thought. That’s if our stupidity and the breaking of Jules’s rules hadn’t lost us our titles.
Holy hell. Maybe I won’t be the maid of honor for much longer. Who could blame either of them for wanting us out of the way on their big day?
Julian clears his throat. “I came up with the truce for a reason, you know,” he says, reading my mind. Thankfully, the words are kind, even if the “I told you so” is implied.
“It wasn’t the worst idea,” I respond evenly, attempting to bury my feelings. “We needed something to keep us from committing grievous bodily harm.”
I pull my cushion a little more tightly into my chest.
“And now?”
Isn’t that just the question of the day?
My eyes ache. “We still probably need something to keep us from committing grievous bodily harm.”
I take a deep breath, and my lips quirk. It’d be funny if it weren’t so damn sad. I can’t think about my conversation with Marcus yesterday afternoon without my eyes burning with the threat of angry tears. I take a long drink of my coffee.
“I knew he’d been interested in your grandmother’s house.”
I cough, barely swallowing the hot liquid. Well, there goes my thinking I was keeping that news to myself.
I feel the heat of anger rise inside me at the thought of someone else I love lying to me. Of them keeping things from me. “What do you mean you knew ?”
Julian puts his cup on the coffee table, then turns toward me. “I mean, I knew he’d been to see the property to assess what work needed to be done on it. He’d looked into what types of developments the land had been approved for. But when I brought it up, he didn’t give me a straight answer about it. I told him you’d hate him if he bought it, and he replied saying you hated him already.”
My chest seizes at the image of my gran’s house simply not existing, newly built condos in its place. The thought of it being knocked down is painful. Just because I hadn’t thought I could live here, hadn’t believed I could call this place home, didn’t mean I no longer wanted the house to exist. I’d simply imagined some young couple or happy family purchasing it, that it’d be a fresh start and a new home for someone else.
“He wants to demolish it?” I ask, voice small. The betrayal I feel quadruples, taking up all the space inside me.
Julian shakes his head. “I don’t know, Hal. All I know is he was looking at the options, at the value.”
Something about this niggles at me. Marcus specializes in restorations, not new developments. Knowing the development permissions for the property seems almost pointless for the type of work he does. Unless it was the chance at a new venture for his business. It wouldn’t surprise me, but one single thing does.
Julian’s eyes are earnest on mine, and I look away, no longer trusting them. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Hal, I’m sorry, I’d hoped…” His sigh is long and drawn out. “I’d hoped it’d be different this time.”
I scoff. Didn’t we all.
“Do you want him to be at the wedding?” he asks now, completely serious. But for all that I’m ready to do Marcus physical harm, I don’t wish for animosity between him and his brother. Not again.
“Jules. He’s your brother, and he loves you, more than anything. He adores Erica. I might want to fling things at his face, but I wouldn’t take him from your day. If one of us needs to bow out, I’d rather it be me.”
Julian’s brows betray his surprise. “Why?”
I rub my aching eyes, unable to believe I’m about to defend Marcus. “Because it wasn’t just Marcus who broke your truce.” I suck in a breath. “We only technically broke a single rule, and it was one which couldn’t be broken without the other’s consent.” Julian grimaces, and I resist the temptation to roll my eyes at his immature reaction. “We were in this together.” Until we weren’t , I think bitterly. “But I’m the one who’s leaving, who can leave earlier if need be.”
“You’ll have to excuse me if I disagree.” He looks at me like I’ve lost my mind. Maybe I have.
“Jules, if you ask Marcus to no longer be the best man, I know you’ll regret it one day. He’s your brother.” My chest burns at the thought of leaving, the backs of my eyes gearing up to follow suit with another round of tears. The excitement of going back to Edinburgh and a home of my own no longer holds the appeal it once did.
“Why do you care, Hallie? After everything, after all the pain he’s caused you, why do you care?”
If the question had come from anyone else, I doubt I’d bother answering, but this is Julian. This is the friend who’s come through for me time and time again. The least he deserves is the truth—my truth.
“Because even though it’s highly unadvisable, I love him. And just because he doesn’t feel the same way about me, that I wish I didn’t feel that way about him, it doesn’t mean he should lose his relationship with you and Erica in the process.”
I discard my pillow, pulling my knees up to my chest and wrapping my arms around them. All the better to hold myself together. I hate that my fire and fury from yesterday have been smothered by my tears overnight. I have to remind myself that I can be sad now and angry again later.
There’s a small pause. “You love him?” Jules asks in gentle disbelief.
I press my forehead to my knees.
“Don’t make me say it again,” I mutter into my pajama pants before looking back up.
“How’d that happen?”
“A lot easier than I’d thought it would.”
But if I were being honest, it’d been the way Marcus went toe to toe with me, never backing down in our banter, my sharp edges not scaring him off. The way he touched me and how he went out of his way to help me, especially when I didn’t ask for it. The agony I felt when I remembered he’d had an ulterior motive for it all was absolute and all-consuming.
Jules considers me, and I can only imagine what type of hot mess I look like in his eyes. The pathetic creature defending his brother to him. Most likely, he’s remembering how we’d been here before and how he’d helped me when I’d cried for days on end. How, as only a teenager himself, he’d made sure I was looked after in my heartbreak and in my grief.
“Hallie, you might not want to hear it, you might not want to know it, but when you left, it did break my brother’s heart. The broken nose I gave him was nothing compared to what he did to himself.”
Last week, I might have given up a limb to hear this. Today, I don’t even care.
Well.
I hardly care.
“He’s the one who pushed me to leave, who’s making it so easy for me to leave now.”
“That doesn’t mean the same thing as him not wanting you to stay.” His words are vague, and boy, these brothers? They are the absolute worst.
My eyes narrow. “That doesn’t even make sense.”
“Sure it does.”
“Explain it to me.”
“Hal, I don’t read minds. I wouldn’t want to even if it was an option. But for all that Marcus is a pain in my ass, for all that he’s thrown himself into his work, leaving very little time for anything or anyone else, he’s not a bad person. All he’s ever done for any of us is provide. He’s worked hard, fixed and restored people’s homes, and helped build people’s dreams. He helped Mom retire. Didn’t like the idea of her working so hard anymore. And the charity he’s built for the young people of our community? The work he does is life-changing.”
My frustration is a living, breathing thing inside me, clawing its way out. “So he’s not the devil? Excellent. It’d have me studying your family tree a little more thoroughly if he was.”
I don’t care how many saintly deeds Marcus has lined up, not after he slept with me, lied to me, and betrayed me. Again.
“Hallie, I’ve seen the books you and Erica read. Don’t try and pretend you aren’t hot for Hades.” Julian’s attempt to diffuse my anger falls flat.
“Your sarcasm is not helping.”
“Oh, and yours was?” Ire drips from the words.
I think longingly of my darkened room, of the packing I need to do, of the smile I’m going to need to force onto my face over the next few days. I think for just a moment of the man who sleeps in a bed only yards from mine. I wonder if he slept as atrociously as I did last night.
I hope it was worse.
Everything in me is tired. “I sold him the house.”
Jules’s sigh is heavy, his smile small. “And yet you’ll always have a home here regardless.”
The house is silent as I close the door behind me, tucking the spare set of keys Erica had given me for Marcus’s place into the back pocket of my jeans. Kicking my shoes off, I don’t bother to turn any lights on as I make my way through the front hall, the late-afternoon light doing a good enough job. The bare floorboards don’t make a sound under my feet, and my heart flutters in my chest at the thought of being caught somewhere I really shouldn’t be.
Nothing I can do about it, though.
When Erica had asked me to pick up the outfits from the tailors last week, the thought of being in Marcus’s house hadn’t been an issue. So when she’d asked me earlier today if I wanted someone else to pick them up instead, it’d been sweet, but I’d said no. Not when the countdown was on, for the wedding and for me leaving. I wanted to be helpful in these last few days, and I didn’t want her worrying about me. And it wasn’t like Marcus would be home anyway.
Only dropping off the best man’s suit didn’t actually require me to go into his bedroom. I could’ve laid the suit out on the couch or the dining table, even.
I do neither of those things.
Instead, I’m walking down the short hallway toward the back of his house, pushing on a partially open door into what is no doubt Marcus’s bedroom. My curiosity, it seems, is to be a curse until the very end.
I’d had time to think about what Julian had said yesterday, about how Marcus pushing me to leave all those years ago was not the same thing as him not wanting me to stay. It’d made me think of what Marcus himself had said—how he’d thought I’d deserved better than to be hitched at such a young age. Closer to thirty than twenty now, I can see exactly how ridiculous it was. It just doesn’t make the old wound hurt any less. It doesn’t make the memory of my first heartbreak any less severe. It doesn’t lessen the betrayal or erase the feeling of being used. Because youth hadn’t meant my love was any less real.
Tiptoeing around the room, garment bag still in hand, I take in the thick gray rug beneath the king-sized bed, dark navy sheets, and matching comforter. I step a little closer to reach out and touch his bedding, and my gaze snags on a small, deep red velvet box on his bedside table.
I drop the garment bag on the bed with such carelessness that it starts to slide off. I grab it quickly, steadying it before it hits the floor, and then head for the bedside table.
The hair on my skin stands on end, a deep-seated nervousness caused by familiarity taking up residence in my stomach. Part of me knows that it’s most likely Erica’s wedding band for the weekend. Marcus is the best man, after all. It’s his job to have the ring.
But as I move closer, I see that that’s not the case at all.
I know this jewelry box. Had seen it on my gran’s dressing table numerous times growing up.
Picking it up, I can see the golden hinges are slightly tarnished, the velvet a little worn.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, heart pounding, blood rushing in my ears, I swallow thickly, then open the lid. The sight of what’s inside steals my breath: an emerald-cut ruby in a gold setting with three small marquise diamonds surrounding it on either side of the band.
The ring is beyond beautiful, more so than I remembered, the ruby deep and mesmerizing, the diamonds twinkling brightly even in the late-afternoon light.
The ring looks like new, recently polished.
I run a finger along the diamonds, not touching the ruby in case I leave a smudge on it.
And as much as I want to, I can’t bring myself to remove it from the box. I don’t dare to.
I’m so caught up in what I’m holding that I don’t notice I’m no longer the only one in the room. It’s a sixth sense that has the hairs rising on my skin, causing my eyes to lift.
Marcus leans against the doorframe of his room, his face partially in shadow.
Part of me remembers a normal reaction would’ve been to jump up; I’ve been caught unaware somewhere I shouldn’t be.
“How do you have this?” I ask, bypassing the part where I’m somewhere I haven’t been invited. I look from him back down to the small box in my palms.
Marcus doesn’t move from where he stands. “Your dad gave it to me after your gran passed away. She left it to me in her will.”
This is complete news to me. I’d had no idea the ring had been left to anyone.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because he was right. It wouldn’t have been right for me to give it to you, to have taken your future from you. It was an unpleasant reality check, but a reality check all the same. I was never quite sure how to give it to you after that.”
I look at Marcus, finally seeing the harm those words did to him, anger at my father rising again. “Not then. Well…you should’ve told me then. And now. Days ago. Years ago. Why didn’t you tell me you had this?”
He finally moves into the room, and it’s then I notice how tired he looks. There are dark smudges under his eyes I’ve never noticed before. Marcus isn’t a person who loses sleep over much, but apparently he’s been losing sleep over me. I’d wished for it after all.
His smile is a shadow of his true self. “Hallie, what your dad said to me shouldn’t have dictated my actions, but it did. And instead of talking to you, I acted like the immature ass he accused me of being. I chose to hurt you because I knew you wouldn’t have left me otherwise. Hurting you was the simplest way to cut the ties between us.” He pauses, but only briefly, a hand rubbing along his neck. “As for the money, your dad offered it to help broker a conversation between you. Even considering it was wrong. I knew it was a mistake as soon as he told me about it. But when you first showed up, you wanted nothing to do with me. What did it matter if I suggested a conversation between the two of you? But things between us shifted, and I wanted to tell you, to get you on board with the young people we’d be helping—the young people who were suddenly at risk if the money didn’t come through. But the closer we got, the more wrong it felt. I don’t need to blame your father for that. I can own my own mistakes.”
I already knew that about you . The thought shocks me.
After the hurt of the last few days, I hadn’t assumed I’d feel this way. But it’s true; I know he owns his mistakes. I just hadn’t thought he’d considered breaking my heart to be one of them.
I think about what he reminded me of just days ago, of what he needed reminding of now.
“Marcus, you were young too. We were still kids. And as for the last few weeks, I didn’t expect this either,” I say, gesturing between us.
He shrugs. “But I still knew better. Could’ve handled it better.”
He’s so unbelievably hard on himself, and I don’t know how I never noticed before. He’s his own toughest critic, and that’s saying something since both Julian and I, two of the people who care for him most, don’t exactly go easy on him.
I look down at the ring again, my head shaking in disbelief. “I can’t believe she left you this.”
Marcus is directly in front of me now but still keeping his distance. “Why do you think she left you a house?”
My heart gives a little pinch. I know why. “I guess she thought we’d figure it out.”
“I think she hoped we’d have the same type of love she and your grandfather had.”
I swallow tightly. I’d thought so too. In fact, I’d told her so, that I’d wanted what she’d had.
“Were you ever going to tell me?” I ask, unsure if I’m referring to the ring or the impact of my words.
“I’d planned to give it to you, more than once.”
There’s a small pause, and my eyes shoot to him. I’m speechless as he kneels in front of me, his eyes quicksilver, and I fall into them, my heart thudding in my chest.
“Really?” I whisper.
A small, self-conscious smile touches his lips, and he clears his throat. “I flew to Edinburgh to give it to you, but you were with someone else, and even if you weren’t together, you looked happy. Carefree. I didn’t want to be the one to interrupt that.”
He gives a small shrug. “I chickened out.”