2. Miles
2
MILES
H er open-mouthed, shocked expression was priceless. The only thing keeping me from laughing out loud was the memory of how long it had taken to get here, and that meant much more than the penthouse of the man whose name I’d heard for as long as I could remember.
“I’m sorry, Pumpkin.” The man in question squeezed his daughter, whose icy hand I decided to release. “I know this comes as a shock.”
Mom was right when she’d described him as a two-faced, arrogant asshole. How could he stand in front of me and pretend the surprise he’d pantomimed at my mother’s grave was sincere? Did he truly believe she’d never explained—in detail—what went down between them?
Rather than wait for him to approach with his condolences, I went to him after the short graveside service drew to a close and cut to the chase. “I’m Miles Young. You must be my stepfather.”
There was deep gratification in watching him react. The ticking of his jaw. The flared nostrils. He struggled to keep himself in check, for sure, but no man could be confronted by a past he tried to forget without reacting. “Your stepfather? How is that possible?” he asked, looking me over like he was searching for a resemblance to my mother.
So that was his choice. Pretending he never knew I existed. At that point, it was his word versus Mom’s, and she could no longer tell her side of the story. No doubt he thought he was in the clear—the audacity of the greedy prick.
Raising my coat collar to shelter from an icy wind, I forced a chuckle for his sake. “You mean you had no idea I existed? I suppose it’s understandable. From what I heard, I spent my earliest days in my grandmother’s care while Mom worked.”
“But she never…” His brow creased, dark eyes still darting over my face. “Why didn’t I know about you?”
Still a liar after all these years. Some things never changed. “I couldn’t tell you,” I offered with a shrug. “The only person who could is no longer with us.”
“How do you know who I am?” he asked. The slightest touch of suspicion leaked into the question, not that I was surprised. A naturally dishonest, cold-hearted prick would assume everyone operated as he did.
“There were five mourners at the grave,” I reminded him. “Three of whom paid their respects as colleagues of mine. And you happen to look a lot like Magnus Miller, a man whose name I naturally googled once I learned he was my mother’s husband back when I was a baby.” Why he’d shown his face was a mystery. He’d abandoned her thirty years prior. Why care now? Maybe he wanted to confirm she was truly gone after seeing the obituary I’d sent to The New York Times.
Ex-wife of Manhattan Billionaire Dies in London.
Send donations in lieu of flowers.
I’d placed the ball in his court, and he’d decided to take a shot by flying out.
I hadn’t expected him to play dumb, which meant a lot of ad-libbing on my part. He seemed to buy the explanation easily, some of the doubt draining from his penetrative stare. “You look a lot like her,” he observed. “Let me take you to lunch. It seems we have a lot to catch up on.”
That was all it took for my asshole stepfather to trust me—that and learning about the very profitable and still-growing Young Industries, of course. Once he knew I wasn’t after his precious money, he let his guard down. “I still can’t believe she’d keep you a secret,” he murmured over a glass of scotch after hours spent catching up, as he put it.
He hadn’t told me anything I didn’t already know about him or his fucking family, though I did my best to feign interest and surprise when it applied.
Digging deep into my reserves of self-control, I suggested, “She may have been afraid of scaring you off. A single mother with a baby in diapers? How many young, wealthy men look to tie themselves down that way?”
“I would have liked to have a son.” Staring into his glass, he murmured, “Knowing you were around might have changed a few things.”
Naturally, he would say that. Anyone could make themselves a martyr with more than thirty years of silence. How convenient for him that Mom was no longer alive to throw his lies in his face. I would have to do it for her.
Aria stared at me, muscles twitching in her face while she attempted to process what had been dropped on her all at once. “My stepbrother.” It was not a question but rather an attempt at clarity. She didn’t want it to be true—that much was obvious when she had all but run from the coffee shop earlier. Perhaps I had overplayed my hand and frightened her too badly.
This was no empty-headed princess, no matter how spoiled and pampered she might have been. Still, when faced with the choice of approaching her or her twin, it seemed there was no contest. Valentina was sharper and more savvy. I’d observed her from afar and witnessed how she dispensed assholes at the clubs she promoted and events she planned. She would most likely have told me to get fucked if I approached her in public, charm or no charm.
The first encounter with Aria at the spin studio had sealed the deal. She’d noticed me, noticed the way I studied her, but didn’t say a word. Same with the times she’d seen me throughout her normal routine. Her natural response had involved distrust and a touch of fear which kept her mouth shut. Instinct told me she would fit into my plan perfectly.
“I was as surprised as you are,” I told her with a chuckle and a shrug. “There I was, thinking I was an only child all my life.”
Magnus’s affable grin told me my lies were believable. “Please, have a seat,” he urged, gesturing toward the chair I’d left while directing his daughter toward the one beside it. He practically had to push down on her shoulders to make her sit, then ran a hand over her red-tinted locks. Obviously, a dye job. Nobody was born with burgundy hair.
“I don’t understand.” She looked up at her father with confusion and disbelief flashing across her face. A rather stunning face—delicate, symmetrical features, pouty lips, bright blue eyes that narrowed when they looked my way. “How do I have a stepbrother I never knew about?”
“It’s a long story.” Magnus wandered across the room with its stuffed bookshelves and leather furniture. It was nearly as large as the first apartment Mom and I had shared. “You know I was married before I met your mother.”
“Yeah. I remember you mentioning that.” She couldn’t help but glance my way, likely in memory of how we’d left things earlier.
Had she come here determined to get to the bottom of things and ask about my mom? It was clear I had gotten under her skin, no matter how she attempted to pretend otherwise.
Magnus turned with a glass of water in his hand and gave it to Aria, then patted her cheek and rounded the desk. He seemed like a very affectionate father. I wouldn’t have guessed he had it in him.
A slight shift in her seat had me side-glancing in her direction. It was the girl with the glass of water who proved impossible to ignore. The glass trembled in her hands until she noticed me looking, then steadied as if by magic.
Sighing, Magnus took a seat. “Leila and I were divorced before I met your mother, Aria. She moved to England, cutting ties with everyone here. It wasn’t until recently that I was aware of Miles’s existence. For some reason, his mother chose to keep him a secret for the short time we were married.”
I bit my tongue while his jaw tightened as if the memory angered him. As if he genuinely cared. “Now that I know,” he concluded, “I hope we can get to know each other and, ideally, bring Miles into the family.”
He had a way with words and glossing over several important points in the story. Like the fact that his dearest Evelyn clawed her way into their marriage, or even worse, that he knew about my existence when they were married but discarded me like last night’s trash. It wouldn’t do to reveal the way my stomach churned at his explanation. Somehow, I managed to maintain a neutral expression while observing Aria’s reaction from the corner of my eye.
Immediately, her smooth brow furrowed as if she were troubled. Until then, she’d only looked like she’d swallowed something sour. “So he was born before your marriage. That would make him… thirty?”
“Nearly thirty-one,” I murmured. She was doing the math, convincing herself there was no chance of us being related by blood. “From what I understand, I lived with my grandmother prior to the move overseas.”
Magnus tipped his head to the side. I caught the resemblance between them when he frowned as she did. “Is there a problem with that?”
“No.” Her troubled expression belied the statement. “I’m only wondering why we’re hearing about him after all this time.” Funny how she talked about me like I wasn’t in the room. Typical wealthy brat.
“I’m getting to that. Unfortunately,” Magnus continued, his voice going lower. “Miles’s mother passed away several months ago.”
Aria looked my way, her frown deepening. “I’m sorry for your loss,” she murmured. The sort of thing people said to one another without thinking after that sort of announcement. She didn’t mean it. If there was one thing life had forced upon me, it was a strong instinct when it came to people—seeing through their motivations and hearing what existed beneath their words. She was easy to read.
At that moment, she resented my existence from the crown of her head to the tips of her toes.
“When I flew out for the funeral, I met Miles.” Magnus looked strangely proud when he turned my way as if he had anything to do with my life and education, or any of it. Men like him tended to take credit for what they played no part in—one of my mother’s many lessons I had taken to heart. It had always been a better idea to heed her advice than ignore it. There weren’t many things she’d detested worse than being ignored.
Aria groaned. “I thought you were out there to visit Uncle Charlie,” she told him in a tone heavy with judgment. “You could have come out with the truth.”
“It was my personal business,” he said sharply, enough to make her shrink back a bit.
Finishing for him, I concluded, “And he generously invited me out to meet all of you. I doubt he intended for the visit to happen so soon, though. It happens I’d already planned the expansion of my company and had targeted New York as the natural starting point for breaching the states, so it seemed natural to stop in and say hello.”
She couldn’t have cared less. I wondered if she heard me at all over what raged in her head.
“I can’t remember a more pleasant surprise. It’s a shame your sister couldn’t be here so I could introduce you both at the same time,” Magnus pointed out to Aria.
It didn’t seem she was listening. At the very least, she didn’t react. It was obvious to me she was troubled. Magnus either didn’t notice or pretended not to. I had no doubt of his skill at turning a blind eye to that which he didn’t want to acknowledge. I was proof of that, wasn’t I? We may not have been blood, but his influence had marked every aspect of my life.
All along, this man and his wife and daughters had lived in a palace. Every advantage and luxury had been theirs for the taking, while my mother and I had barely scratched out an existence.
“What is it you do, Aria?” I asked, feigning ignorance while smiling like the sight of her didn’t make me sick, as if this were the first time we’d set eyes on each other. Her silence on that point intrigued me. She believed in keeping things to herself and wasn’t the sort of girl who ran to Daddy over every little thing. She struck me as being stoic—ironically, something I might have respected in anyone else. This pampered princess? It would be a cold day in hell when I respected her.
She struggled to find the words. “I… uh… I work at my mother’s non-profit.”
“Of course, that’s right. I did a little research after meeting your father.” Grinning at Magnus, I amended, “My Stepfather. ”
The gamble paid off. She couldn’t disguise the way she flinched at the use of the term. I hadn’t expected this to be so much fun, digging at her. “A very impressive history, that non-profit,” I continued. “What was the latest estimate of women and families who benefited from their involvement? It’s well into the thousands by now, isn’t it?”
“Tens of thousands,” Magnus assured me with obvious pride. The prick had the nerve to puff out his chest as if he had anything to do with it. From what I’d learned, Evelyn was the brains in the relationship, taking her past trauma and turning it into something worthwhile. On the other hand, Magnus happened to luck out, thanks to his family’s tech business. Not everyone had to work their way to the top like I did.
“Miles owns a highly successful tech company,” Magnus explained. He was almost bragging by the sound of it. Why? He never gave a damn about me until the moment we’d locked eyes from opposite sides of my mother’s grave. He’d feigned ignorance, pretending he’d never heard of me until then. It seemed he was maintaining the charade now. Did he think I’d never had a conversation with Mom about him?
“He met a rich man’s sister and decided he could do better than a model with a kid.” Her voice echoed in my head like a favorite song long since memorized. “She was some ugly duckling with a limp. But she had money, and if there’s one thing the rich love, it’s other rich people. The greedy bastard left us with nothing. He humiliated me. I had no choice but to leave New York with you after that.”
Only the memory of everything she’d sacrificed for us was enough to keep me from vaulting over the desk and driving my fist into the smug bastard’s face until it was unrecognizable, sitting here surrounded by luxury while his ex-wife lived in poverty for decades before I was able to provide for her. All because she was an up-and-coming model and not an heiress.
Like spoiled little Aria, who considered working at her mother’s foundation a job and clearly bristled when I looked her way. “I’m looking forward to us getting to know each other better,” I told her, fighting back a grin when her mouth tightened in obvious disagreement. Poor baby. Was this the only time she had ever come up against adversity?
She didn’t trust me, and she was right not to. The girl had instincts almost as sharp as my own if she took a look at me and saw trouble. She had no idea how much trouble I could be.
Taking in her tight body took my thoughts down another, but no less dangerous, path. Had this uptight little brat ever been properly fucked? She deserved it with a body like that, with tits so perky they practically demanded to be worshiped. I’d admired her peach of an ass during our spin classes, watching her from behind. I imagined working her into a sweat, this time with me between her legs rather than a bike.
“If you want to know Aria better, you should hang around here a bit,” Magnus offered, snapping me out of my untimely fantasy. “She’s staying with us while her apartment is being renovated. I can’t lie. It’s nice to have her with us again.”
“Dad…” She shook her head, giving him the smile a much-beloved child gives their parent when they feel exasperated.
I could barely keep a hold of myself. My brain was on fire, my body humming once the seed of an idea took root and began to grow, almost exploding in a series of branches that flowered all at once. Could I pull it off? There was only one way to find out. “Don’t take that for granted,” I urged her while almost trembling in anticipation. I had to be careful. “It must be nice having somewhere comforting to turn to when you’re left without a home.”
Would he bite the bait I dangled in front of him? So far, he had practically fallen over himself to be the generous, benevolent benefactor—the loving stepfather.
The man was entirely too easy to predict. “Where are you staying now that you’ve crossed the pond?” he asked, folding his hands on top of the desk while wearing a studious look as if he was in the middle of expanding his already voluminous investment portfolio.
Somehow I managed to refrain from rolling my eyes at his unimaginative turn of phrase. “Oh, I’m crashing at The Plaza at the moment. Still looking for something long-term.”
Come on, come on, ask me . I could feel it in the air like an electrical charge before a lightning strike.
“Nonsense!” he boomed, shaking his head. “There’s more than enough room here. Why don’t you stay with us until you find a permanent place for yourself?”
Got him.
“Dad,” Aria muttered. When she caught me looking, she did a poor job of rearranging her expression into something that didn’t look quite as murderous. “I’m sure Miles can stay literally anywhere he wants to stay. I mean, if he’s half as successful as you’re making him out to be. Don’t insult him.”
I made a point of glancing her way before I spoke, intent on giving him the impression I was refusing with her shitty attitude in mind. “Really, you’re too generous,” I insisted. “You have already been so kind. I couldn’t impose.”
“It’s not an imposition if I’m asking point-blank for you to stay.” I opened my mouth, prepared to offer another half-hearted and completely empty protest, but he was hearing none of it. “My mind is made up. I expect you to get your things together back at The Plaza. I’ll have someone over there to transport everything as soon as you’re ready.”
“Well…” I glanced at Aria again, underlining my concern over her feelings before shrugging. “To tell you the truth, I would like the opportunity to get to know all of you better. Mom was the only family I had, so finding all of you has been a gift.”
“I’m sure the same goes for us.” I caught the way his gaze landed and lingered on his daughter, who had now settled for glaring murderously at her father with him either pretending not to notice or, more likely, being completely oblivious. And he was supposed to be some sharp-witted billionaire? He couldn’t even see what was taking place in front of him.
If anything, it was my duty to set him straight. I would open his eyes and force him to see how his thoughtless, selfish choices had rippled out through the decades and were now coming home to roost.
“It shouldn’t take me very long,” I offered as I stood, followed by Magnus. “I only brought enough for two weeks or so, intending to send for the rest once I found a permanent home.”
“Take all the time you need.” He rounded the desk before placing a hand on my shoulder. No doubt it was supposed to be a comforting, friendly gesture. What a shame it turned my stomach.
“Dad, can I talk to you for a minute?” Aria had missed the memo regarding how to behave politely, choosing instead to scowl at me, tugging her father’s sleeve.
It was unfortunate his phone rang when it did. He scowled, turning back to the desk. “I have to take this. I’ve been waiting for this call all day. Don’t worry,” he told her, giving her an absent pat on the cheek. “I’ll find you later, and we can talk. If you’ll excuse me.”
I knew what that meant, and so did she. With a soft grunt, she turned and marched from the room, the heels of her ankle boots striking the hardwood hard enough that I snickered to myself. Spoiled little bitch. She didn’t know what to do with herself now that Daddy hadn’t stopped the world at her request.
We were no more than a half-dozen strides into the hall when she whirled on me. The composed mask she had been wearing in her father’s office fell away. This was the real Aria, all flashing eyes and flushed cheeks, her perfect teeth bared in a snarl before she jabbed a finger against my chest. Goddamn, she was hot, so hot I looked forward to working her up this way for weeks to come.
“Listen…” she snarled, “… you might have him fooled, but not me.”
“Excuse me?” I asked, all innocent, as I looked down at her finger. It would have been too easy to yank her close and make her think twice about poking the lion unless she knew she could handle the roar. “What is this all about?”
“Drop the act,” she warned. “All your life, you didn’t know him or any of us, and now you want to be part of the family? I’m sure you didn’t mind finding out your mother’s ex-husband is a billionaire. I’m sure that had nothing to do with it.”
A billionaire who left his ex with nothing. Who abandoned her when something more interesting came along and conveniently ignored the fact of a child being involved. “Not everyone is as mercenary as you clearly are, Aria,” I murmured, pride swelling in my chest when her face went pink, and she fell back a step. “As for money, I have all I’ll ever need.”
“Sure, keep playing innocent. It seems to be working so fucking well.” She cast a doleful eye toward her father’s closed door. “You are not going to take advantage of his kindness. I won’t let you.”
“Really, Aria, you’re going to have to explain what you mean. I don’t have the first idea.”
Her cheeks went from pink to deep red. “You know damn well what I mean.” Touching a hand to her chest, she whimpered out, “Oh, poor me, a rich tech guy with nowhere to stay. I don’t have a family. Let me invade yours. ”
“Is that what you’re worried about? Are you afraid Daddy doesn’t have enough time for you now that he’s found the son he always wanted?” That might have been a mistake, but it came tumbling out before I could help it. It was unusual for me to take such a risk, but then her imperious attitude left me craving the satisfaction of watching her wither under my perceptive gaze. “Maybe you should be worried. He might want a son with business sense to manage his investments while you go to spin class and have your hair done. He may even add me to his will. That would put a crimp in your plans, I’d bet.”
Her head snapped back like she’d been struck. “Fuck you,” she whispered, trembling. “That is a foul thing to say. You’re a foul person.”
“I’ve been called worse things by people I’ve respected and who had a legitimate reason to sling slurs around.” I sighed, tired of where this conversation was going. “Your name-calling doesn’t matter to me, especially when I’ve done nothing to deserve it.”
“I am not going to let you do whatever it is you have in mind,” she warned, trailing me through the sprawling penthouse, her footsteps ringing out like gunshots.
The artwork on the walls would have put me through university twice over with thousands to spare, but they probably took it for granted.
“Is this the way to the door?” I asked over my shoulder, ignoring her.
“Yes,” she growled out. “And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll walk through it and not come back.”
“But Aria, I’ve been invited, remember?” It was almost impossible not to openly laugh at the impotent fury that twisted her features when I stopped at the door and turned to face her. “Look at it this way. We’ll get to know each other better. Your father seems very keen on all of us being a family.”
“You will never be part of my family,” she warned.
“Is that a threat? I can’t quite tell.” Chuckling, I opened the door and headed for the elevator. “We can work it all out when I come back. And I will, ” I assured her.
“It’s your funeral.” She slammed the door between us, and it was a relief to let out the laugh I’d been holding back, even as my dick twitched at the challenge she presented. I would surely remember her heaving tits later, alone, jerking off to the memory of sizzling heat that seemed to spring to life out of nowhere when we were face-to-face.
It wouldn’t be a hardship to take advantage of our chemistry and the fact she was so very easy on the eyes.
Magnus had no idea who he’d welcomed into his home. The man who would tear his perfect family to pieces.
I could hardly wait to get started.