25. BEN
25
BEN
I walked to Sofia and stood next to her, looking out over the ocean.
“This is incredible,” she breathed.
“It is,” I said. “It’s weird, this is the same ocean we have at home. It’s all connected. But it feels so different out there. It makes me wonder what it would be like in the rest of the world.”
“Don’t you travel a lot?” Sofia asked. “You know, marketing planes and all…”
I shook my head. “I sell planes. I don’t fly them. Daniel does that. And Chris and Alex usually go to Monaco for the yacht shows but I don’t always join them. I usually just stay home.”
Sofia nodded, and I saw a lot on her mind, a lot she wanted to say but didn’t. I wanted to ask, but I was interrupted by Luke’s cellphone ringing.
“Damn it, don’t we get a break?” he groaned.
“Who is it?” Amy asked.
“Mom,” he grumbled. “I’m putting her on speakerphone.” He answered before Amy could protest and dragged her into the conversation. She rolled her eyes but they both put on a smile to sound like they wanted to talk to their mother.
“They don’t seem to get along with their family,” Sofia said softly.
“They don’t,” I said. Since I’d met them in college, Amy and Luke had dreaded family events, never facing their mother alone, always being shields for each other. “I can’t imagine how it must be. I guess I’m lucky in that sense—my parents are great and I can always talk to them. I never feel anything negative when I see their names on my caller ID.”
“You’re very close to your family,” Sofia said, not for the first time. “You’re lucky that you ended up where you did, with people who care that much about you.”
“I am,” I admitted. I knew what it felt like to have parents who didn’t give a shit, who didn’t want me, who would do whatever they could to get rid of me. Sure, they’d used the excuse of not having enough money, but I wouldn’t ever let myself believe that it was about money. Nothing is about money, not when it comes to life and love and the rest of the shit that really matters. “I don’t think others who get adopted have it that easy.”
I’d heard of foster parents who took in as many kids as they could for the money the state paid for each of them. I’d heard of kids getting taken away again after being placed because it didn’t work. I’d heard of kids growing up in orphanages their whole life and only struck out on their own when they were legal, when they could afford to do it, and never had a family at all.
In all those cases, I was lucky.
“My parents have everything they need in the others,” I said. “Alex and Chris handle the yachts pretty well, and Daniel… he’s the interesting one. I’m just around .”
Sofia was as shocked at my words as I was. I’d always felt it but never said it out loud.
Not even to Amy and Luke.
“If you’re suggesting that you’re not needed, then you’re making a mistake,” Sofia said.
“Why? I can’t see how they need me. I was adopted last, too. The charity case.”
Again, my words shocked me.
Sofia’s face changed to sympathy, and she put her hand on my arm. “Ben, you’re not a charity case. You carry as much weight as the others, and you’re as valuable to the company, and I’m sure to your family. You can’t for one second convince me otherwise.”
I swallowed hard. I had no idea where that had come from or why I’d said it, but I was suddenly emotional.
“It’s complicated,” I murmured.
“I understand,” Sofia said. “It always is, isn’t it?”
I nodded.
She removed her hand from my arm and I missed her warmth immediately. I stepped closer to her, wrapping my arm around her shoulder and lowered my head, our lips almost touching. She tilted her head up, but before our lips met, she froze against me before she pulled back and slipped out from underneath my arm.
“We shouldn’t do this,” she said.
I frowned. “What?”
“This,” she said. “Us.”
I shook my head, confused. “What do you mean, ‘we shouldn’t’?”
“Look, Ben… we succeeded. Richie is happy about the project, and he’s going to invest the money. Harborview and everything Blackwood Inc. has planned here is going to happen, and you’re going to oversee it, and that’s amazing. We don’t have to pretend anymore. We don’t have to keep playing this game.”
Her gray eyes were serious, the color of slate, as she looked up at me with an expressionless mask that I knew all too well.
It was the mask I usually wore.
And I hated it. I hated not being able to see what she was feeling underneath it all. I was a hypocrite for thinking that, I knew. I used that mask on everyone to protect myself, but now that I was on the receiving end, I hated it.
Especially on her.
“The trip isn’t over yet,” I started. We didn’t have to stop doing this, not as long as we were here. When we were here together, the rest of the world fell away and it was so easy not to think about reality, about my life and her life and what all of this would mean once we were back home again…
“That shouldn’t be the determining factor,” she said tightly. “None of this should have happened in the first place, you know that.”
I looked over my shoulder at where Luke and Amy were staring at each other, rolling their eyes in tandem, or mouthing things as their mother yelled over the phone at them. They were going to be busy for a while, hopefully.
“I know this shouldn’t have happened,” I said, turning back to Sofia, who had crossed her arms tightly over her chest, shoulders hunched a little against the wind that seemed to pick up around us. It tugged at her brown hair, blowing strands around her face, making her look like a goddess. “I was an idiot, an asshole, selfish and willing to do anything to get what I wanted when I told Richard that we’re married.”
Sofia blinked at me when I was painfully honest about what I’d done.
“I should never have lied to him, but my ego was too big and admitting failure to my brothers hadn’t been an option, so I did what I needed without taking you into account. And I’m sorry for that.”
Sofia’s brows knitted together.
“But I’m not sorry about what’s happened between us. I’m not sorry about sleeping with you, kissing you, holding you… I’m not sorry about sleeping next to you and waking up next to you again.”
“Ben…”
I took a deep breath. I was on a roll, my tongue going without my brain’s input, and I’d squashed the little voice in my mind that screamed at me that I was being too open. I needed her to understand what all of this was about, and there was no other way for her to understand unless I told her.
“Sofia, I pretended we were married for the sake of the project, but what I’ve started to feel for you isn’t a game. It’s not pretend. This has all become real to me and…” I hesitated. Sofia’s eyes were locked on mine, her lips parted, and holy fuck, she was beautiful. Not just on the outside—where she was already a goddess—but on the inside, too. She was such a wonderful person. “Sofia, I’m falling for you.”
There, it was out there. I’d said the words I’d been so terrified to speak.
“Oh, my God, Ben,” Sofia said, and her mask cracked so that I saw an array of emotions on her face. I just couldn’t figure them out.
“Sorry about that,” Amy said, coming toward us. “That was ridiculous. We actually hung up on her.”
I glared at Amy, who stopped short in her rant. “Am I interrupting something?”
“Yeah,” I said at the same time as Sofia shook her head and said, “No.”
I frowned at her, but she turned away so that I couldn’t see her face.
“Sofia,” I started, but Luke came to me just as frustrated as Amy was.
“Can you get rid of your parents?” he asked. “Is there some kind of legal emancipation for adults?”
I was suddenly pissed off. “You just don’t answer their fucking calls, Luke,” I snapped.
He looked surprised, and then his face twisted in anger.
“Jesus, who pissed in your coffee?”
I looked at Sofia, who took a few steps away from me.
“No one,” I grumbled, and I marched in the opposite direction.
I had no idea where the hell I was going, but I just wanted to go somewhere . I couldn’t just stand there like a fool after I’d told Sofia I was in love with her and she hadn’t said anything back. I never opened up like this. I never let anyone know how I really felt.
Hell, I never felt anything for anyone the way I felt for her.
Luke and Amy were like siblings to me, and I always loved having them around, but today, they were as fucking irritating to have with me as other people felt about their siblings because I just wanted to be alone with Sofia and find out what had changed between us.
Because something had changed. One moment, she’d been sweet with me, and we’d been perfect together.
And now, she was distant with me, closed off. Somehow, I’d lost her even though she was right there, and I didn’t know why.
Had Amy said something to her? Had she said something to Amy?
I wanted to know but fucked if I was going to turn around and walk back there with my tail between my legs when I’d just had a tantrum like a child. No, my ego was still perfectly intact, thank you very much. I’d told Sofia it had been because of my ego that I’d told Richard we were together, but now that I’d told her how I felt about her and I hadn’t gotten an answer, that ego was bruised.
And for a man like me, who acted like I had nothing to lose, I had a hell of a lot to lose, and a part of me felt like I’d just lost it.