Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
THE DINNER WAS exquisite, no other word for it.
Being seated opposite Bastian, she didn’t have to talk to him throughout the meal. Which worked because she still hadn’t processed. Each time she sipped her wine, her eye caught on his scowl. He wasn’t happy, but she wasn’t sure she was either.
The meal stretched on for hours. Felt that way anyway.
Only after the coffee and brandies were handed out were they allowed to leave the table.
People were directed into another room to enjoy their refreshments.
After consuming a seven-course meal, she didn’t have space for another mouthful, even a liquid one.
The food and service were provided by the professional elite.
The crème-de-la-crème. If she hadn’t discovered his secret before, she would like to think she’d have figured it out from that clue alone.
Was she sure? No. It had been staring her in the face since the night they’d met, and she’d missed it.
Putting any money on her comprehending the obvious would be a bad bet.
None of the guests made a move to leave the house; the party was far from over. Guests were filtered back into the parquet-floored hall they’d started in. Harper left her wine on the table and went with the herd waiting their turns to stroll through the bottleneck.
“Come here.”
She heard Bastian before she saw him. Her hand was snatched, and she was tugged away from the other dinner party guests. More than a few noted her and Bastian’s escape to the opposite corner.
Through a door, up some stairs to a corridor, and into a room, much homelier than the dining room.
It didn’t quite fit with the impression of the rest of the house.
The thick, purple rug on the floor was lush, but modern.
An open fireplace dominated one wall. On another was a huge television with deep, wide couches aimed its way.
“What happened?” Bastian asked, snapping her focus from the decor.
“Nothing happened,” she said, admiring the dark gray fabric across his shoulders when he turned his back. Except something had happened, hadn’t it? “I’m an idiot. I suppose that happened. But it’s nothing new.”
“You’re not an idiot,” he said, taking off his jacket and tossing it to the back of one of the couches.
“I didn’t see it,” she said. “I suppose I saw what I wanted to see. Or rather didn’t see what I didn’t want to see.”
“What are you talking about?”
He could be exasperated, he could be angry, but both of them had to face the truth.
“I know who you are.” Now, she now knew, hadn’t before. Idiot. “If you deny it, Huddle Hunt will call you a liar.”
“Sweet—”
“No,” she said, stepping out of his reach. The conflict in his expression tore between anger and contrition. Her own thoughts produced a question as they fell into line. “What the hell do you need me for, Bastian? Do you know who you are?”
“I know who I am. My identity doesn’t take away all life’s worries.”
“You’re not worried,” she said. “Coming to my sister’s engagement party was a game for you, nothing more. Why in the hell did you come to the hospital?”
“I was concerned.”
Fingernails digging into her palms, she wanted to scream. “About what? One of your associates could’ve got an update. I’m sure you can pay the hospital for information like that over the phone.”
Anger brought his scowl back full-force. “You learn this one piece of information and re-write my whole character around it?”
“I shouldn’t have had to learn it from someone else. I thought we were in this, whatever this is, together.”
“We are.”
That was an insult. “You lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“You weren’t upfront.”
“This whole thing was a con from day one.”
“To everyone else, not to us.” Least that was what she’d believed. “I didn’t know you were conning me the whole time. I’ve been nothing except honest, but you… What is it? Charity? Is that what I am to you?”
“No.”
“You didn’t need me,” she said. “A man like you doesn’t—you don’t need charity.”
“You’re not charity. I haven’t changed. This doesn’t change anything.”
He hadn’t even asked what she learned or what was going on. He knew without explanation, proving he wasn’t ignorant to the issue, or how she’d react to it.
Adrenaline fizzed in her veins, but at least her breathing was evening out a little.
Still, it was like her whole existence was in shock.
“This started at Adara’s engagement party,” she whispered, taking herself back to the beginning.
“It started outside the gym.”
Everything he said churned up confusion again.
“At the hotel? Your hotel. Why didn’t you tell me it was your hotel?”
“What does that matter? Building ownership was, is, completely irrelevant.”
It had to be deliberate, causing this frustrated infuriation, he had to be doing it on purpose.
“Not to me,” she said, moving closer. “And that doesn’t answer the question. Why didn’t you tell me?”
“When?” he asked. “When was I supposed to tell you?”
Talk about a copout.
“Don’t give me that, like you had no time to bring it up. We’ve danced alone; we’ve spent the night in the same bed. We’ve talked. All we ever do is talk when we’re together. Why didn’t you tell me?”
He didn’t have to shout to convey his aggravation.
“I didn’t want this,” he said, gesturing between them.
“Every single time a woman I care about… if I think they…” He took a deep breath and turned his eyes to the ceiling.
“Men, women, employees, friends, society, whatever.” He did his half-shrug.
“When people know, they… it changes things. I cease to be whoever they thought I was, and I become… a lie.”
The depth of his sincerity elicited sympathy, but that didn’t change anything.
“We were lying,” she said, admitting that they’d both been at fault. “We were never who we said we were.”
“We were to each other,” he said. “We knew what was going on. There was no lie between us.”
Though tension still crackled in the air, resignation settled over them.
“Bastian,” she said and reached to take his hand.
He moved it before she could make contact. “Forget it,” he said, straightening in a fashion she didn’t recognize of him. He looked at his watch, grabbed his jacket, and started for the door. “It’s not important. I’ll have a car take you home.”
She didn’t want to leave. She wanted to forget the animosity and kick off her shoes. She wanted to dive onto one of those couches and pull Bastian down with her. Not this starched, detached Bastian, but her Bastian, the Bastian she knew.
When he opened the door and gestured for her to exit, she couldn’t refuse.
He led her back the way they’d come, through the dining room that was now being cleaned by various members of household staff.
He didn’t take her through the hall, thank goodness.
It would be filled with people curious about the woman being unceremoniously ejected.
Bastian left the building with her, ran down the outer stairs and leaned in to talk to one of the valets who then disappeared.
Now what? They waited. The party was still going on.
No doubt he’d rather be there than in the cool evening air with her.
There was no need for him to stand there, chaperoning her, unless he wanted to be really sure she was gone.
Ouch. This moment, together in silence, punctuated the end of their association.
Another chapter closed. How come the chapters of her life always ended with awkward humiliation?
“I can get a taxi,” she said.
“As you’ve discovered, I could have a chopper come pick you up and take you home if there was somewhere to land at your place,” he said, draping his jacket over her shoulders before retrieving his phone from the inside pocket. “The driver is on salary anyway, it’s only right he earns it.”
The same car that drove her to this fate pulled up in front of them.
Bastian opened the door for her. “It was nice knowing you, Harper Scott.”
The smile he aimed for didn’t reach his eyes.
Lifting her hand to his face, she traced where his dimple should be. A dimple she’d never see again.
“Bastian,” she whispered but couldn’t say anything else.
There was nothing to say.
This was it. Over.