Chapter 30
Maeve
On our way back from a morning coffee run—double Americano for him, caramel macchiato for me—Kellin receives a text. I don’t know what the message says, but the air shifts.
He tenses, those lines around his mouth pronounced and firm.
That text ushered us into the calm before the storm.
We walk back up the drive to Chateau Marmont and hand over our valet ticket in exchange for the Beemer.
A minute later, Kellin tips the guy, and I accept the keys and hop in the driver’s seat. If I plan to wait on this looming thunderstorm, despite the painfully sunny skies, I need a distraction. And it doesn’t get much better than driving.
Eyes on the road, Maeve.
In my peripheral vision, I spy the tightness in Kellin’s shoulders as he responds to the text.
Do I ask?
Do I dare?
His knee bounces. I catch it bobbing up and down from the corner of my eye, his foot tapping the floorboard like he’s already ingested a full pot of coffee.
“How about some classics?” While I’m mostly talking to myself, I still hold my hand on the knob to the sound system and wait for a response.
He grunts out an affirmative while his fingers tap away on his screen.
I click the stereo. The Four Seasons, it is. If this doesn’t turn his frown upside down, cheer him right the hell up and all that jazz, nothing will.
Vivaldi’s violins float through the interior in a matter of seconds. The calming, melodic notes both energize me and soothe my nerves.
Until I sense Kellin’s eyes on me.
I glance at him. “What?”
“When you said the classics, I thought you meant Skynyrd, The Stones, The Eagles. You know, classics from the last century.”
I groan. “Dude. The Four Seasons is basically the ‘Free Bird’ of classic-al music. Broaden. Your. Horizons.”
No one puts down my taste in music.
I don’t worry about falling for this guy. That I love how he takes care of me and screws me like his life depends on it. The fact that a simple smolder from him drenches my panties doesn’t alarm me. Nor does the urge to wallow in his sheets to cover myself in his scent.
My biggest fear is that he’ll leave, and I’ll never see him again.
Even so, I refuse to let him intimidate me into changing who I am. Not even a minor alteration, like my taste in music.
I grew up around men scarier than the Irish Adonis sitting shotgun.
Pull your head out of your ass and get over your pissy little mood. That’s what I want to say.
He gave me a taste of what togetherness could mean, filling an undefinable void in my heart.
Though I’m loathe to scare him away, he should learn that I’m not afraid of being alone.
I crank the volume up.
Oh, look at that.
Kellin puts his phone down and rests his hand on my leg. Though perfunctory, the touch at least acknowledges his shift in mood since receiving that string of texts.
I can cut him some slack.
When his phone rings, he silences it.
“Everything okay?”
A nod.
I try again. “You know you can answer that.”
“I’ll just call them once we get to the hotel. Boring business stuff.”
I doubt boring business could trigger his current grim disposition, but whatever. Nothing I can do if he refuses to talk.
Kellin stares out his window. Rolls it halfway down, then halfway up, then back down a quarter. Fidgets with his phone again.
Ugh, this is awkward.
I attempt a smile I do not feel. “Big day?”
“Who’s staying in the penthouse?”
I blink at the abrupt change of subject, glancing from the road to him and back again. “Um…what?”
Where the hell did that come from?
“I’ve just seen you head up there a few times this week and wondered if it’s more than business. Like, if a friend’s staying there or…something.”
My fingers tighten on the wheel. Is he asking if I’m holing up a lover in the penthouse?
Yes, between working eighty hours a week and rolling in the hay with you, I have another guy on call up there. Two, in fact. And I keep a third in Chef’s walk-in freezer. On literal ice for those sexy times emergencies.
I open my mouth to unleash a blistering reply but pause.
Wait.
Does he know about my family?
He’s seen Brody around the Cypress. But does that mean he’s aware of the mobster book club?
Is this my chance to confess who I am and where I’m from?
Is this a test?
I conjure a script in my head.
Yes, Kellin, I’m spending an exorbitant amount of time in the penthouse because my father, the head of the Port Kings, the West Coast faction of that mob, likes to abuse his power over me and my place of business.
So, if we get married and have six babies, they will all be bad seeds, or half-bad seeds, or maybe a quarter now that I’m doing the math.
But this does mean there’s a chance they could grow up to be royal assholes.
Like giant royal assholes with murder in their veins.
So…you still in?
I side-eye him, deciding to forgo the six-baby comment in lieu of a saner response. “That’s confidential information, Mr. Jameson. You know hotel policy.”
He doesn’t push, but if I thought a storm hovered on the horizon before we climbed into the car, the forecast now calls for golf ball-sized hail.
The cold shoulder he’s throwing off could power a blizzard.
I can’t even enjoy the violins during the second movement, Winter, and that’s my favorite part.
Jerk.
Ten agonizing minutes later, we enter the parking garage of the hotel.
Kellin pecks me on the cheek and scoots out of the car before the key is even out of the ignition. “I’ve got to make some calls. Catch up later?”
My “yes” is swallowed by the slamming of his door.
All right then.
Without a backward glance, he darts into the emergency stairwell rather than the elevator.
I gape at the closed fire door and rub the growing ache in my chest, the fingers of my other hand clenched around the keys.
This. This is why I’ve avoided love for so long.
That emotion only leads to pain.
Love is just a sugar-coated lie. A razor in a candy apple.
Resting my forehead on the steering wheel, I rewind the events of the morning.
Hot sex, a little more aggressive than usual, but still six out of five stars.
A text, and a few more, a phone call, and then that weird question about the penthouse.
My spine stiffens as realization dawns.
Well, shit. He knows about the Port Kings.
At the very least, he knows the Gallaghers have criminal ties. That’s the only logical explanation for his sudden, weird shift in behavior. One of his Zenith buddies probably tried to sound the alarm all morning.
My gut twists. Damn. That was my chance to admit everything. To save myself in the hopes that he’ll still want to invest. But why would he?
Why would anyone?
And yet, if he knows and doesn’t run, then maybe it’s a trust thing. Maybe Kellin is testing me because he’s falling for me too.
Maybe if I confess, the investment will fall through, but the two of us won’t. Is that why he’s still here? For me?
For us?
I should head straight to his hotel room and come clean.
My hand flies to the door handle, and I leap out of the car and into the elevator in a flash.
Sweat beads along the small of my back. Nerves tingle the tips of my fingers.
This is not a typical Maeve move. I’m the one who runs away from intimacy, not toward it.
But it’s the right thing to do. We can’t build a relationship on lies. I witnessed that as a kid. I watched the lies and fear destroy my mother one drink at a time. Then one pill at a time.
The elevator dings when I reach Kellin’s floor, and the alert wakes me from a trance.
I still. My heart pounds in my ears, louder than the piped-in music.
How the hell does Kellin know about all my visits to the penthouse?
He was never with me when I received the royal summons.
That’s when the real storm hits, and a tsunami of nausea overtakes me. I bend over, hands on my knees.
Kellin’s been watching me. Following me.
But why?
For information? About what?
Me? The Cypress?
My guests?
My father?
Is he some kind of private investigator? A cop? The FBI?
Surely he didn’t have ulterior motives this entire time.
…Right?
The elevator doors slide shut. I’ve never felt so small in this quiet space, like I’ve all but vanished as I press the button for the sixth floor.
My heart insists no. No way would Kellin play me like this.
Too bad my mind’s screaming at me to wake the hell up.