Chapter 36
MONTE CARLO, MONACO
Every note echoed in symphony with the anger of the heavens booming overhead. Every note engulfed Miles in an unbreakable bubble, but even confined in his safe space, he was aware that the world was nothing but a dangerous place, filled with people who could still harm him.
He closed his eyes, listening to the loud crack of a thunderbolt that must have illuminated the calamitous sky as it released its sizzling energy. His fingers fled atop the keys like they belonged there, the music consuming him to his very bones.
Words ricocheted against every corner of his mind, more powerful than anything he’d ever heard.
I love you.
I love you.
I love you, Huxley.
The realisation crashed over him, forceful like the downpour, almost sweeping him off his feet any time he’d let those three little words be ingrained into his soul.
He’d never been loved before.
Appreciated. Admired. Worshipped, yes. But not loved to his fullest. Indy loved him fiercely. Not the racing driver. Not the World Champion. Not the famous athlete. Just him.
His chest heaved when the song ended, and he opened his eyes to look at his trembling fingers hovering over the piano’s keys.
Glancing up, he caught Indy’s enthralling silhouette as she leaned against the doorway, her entire attention settled on him. A string of light pouring from the sky had cascaded upon her—she wore moonlight like a tiara, the stars like a halo.
“That was beautiful,” she murmured, smiling softly.
How could he miss her when she was mere metres away? Regret clung to his chest as he realised he’d pushed her away, that he had probably hurt her by needing some space.
He cleared his throat. “Thank you. I composed it myself.”
She straightened herself, admiration etched on her features. “This is impressive. What did you name it?”
He tilted his head, keeping his eyes on her. “Blue. I named it after you. I wrote it for you.”
“When?” she whispered, her hands trembling, her eyes misting over. Fuck if that distance separating them didn’t destroy his already fragile heart.
“After our first kiss,” he admitted. If she only knew how many songs he’d written about and for her. How his head had been in a constant frenzy, endlessly thinking about her. How his heart had been calling out a name, foreign to him then but clear and logical now. And how a beautiful song had been ingrained inside his mind, spelling out the letters of love for him to write down on a sheet of music. It had always been Indy—the owner of his soul, his heart, his world.
“That was years ago.”
“Exactly,” he responded with equal softness. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you. Not for one second.”
Indy nodded, crossing her arms over the oversized jumper she was wearing. He could glimpse a pair of silk shorts beneath it, exposing the legs he thought of at least once a day.
“Did I wake you up?” It was past midnight, after all.
She shook her head. “Couldn’t sleep.”
“Daisy,” he rasped. “Come here.”
Indy didn’t waste a beat to rush towards him. Sitting down besides him on the piano stool, she sighed with relief as she dropped her head on his shoulder. Miles wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close, now feeling complete and content—like a puzzle finally finding its missing piece. The pull he felt towards her was innate and strong and impossible to resist, like he was a moth to a flame; an ember needing its fuel to spring to life.
“I’m sorry.” He kissed her temple multiple times. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
Her fingers tightened around the front of his shirt, bunching the fabric. “I’m the one who needs to apologise.”
“No. I shouldn’t have pushed you away. I do understand why you waited to tell me.”
Teary eyes looked up at him, and the fact that she felt guilty, too, made his chest hurt. Like shards bursting through the thick walls preserving his heart.
“Can you tell me how it happened? Tell me everything,” he demanded softly, rubbing the spot between her shoulder blades with his thumb.
Her fingers ghosted over the keys, and when she started playing Au Clair de la Lune, he chuckled.
“That’s all I can do,” she said before letting her hands fall down on her lap. “Sorry. I’m deflecting. I just don’t get why you’re not angry at me.”
“I was angry earlier. And I’m sorry for walking away.”
“No, your reaction is totally valid.”
He loved talking to Indy because no matter what he felt, she never invalidated his feelings, which was something he wasn’t used to before becoming friends with her.
“Talk to me,” he desperately said. He just needed to know what had happened. Why the demons of his past were trying to crawl back to the surface.
He pivoted to straddle the stool, both legs dangling on either side. Indy followed his lead, but he pulled her closer, draping her legs over his thighs until she locked her feet behind his back.
“Better.” He pushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “I need to see those pretty eyes when you talk to me.”
“Even when they’re puffy and filled with tears?”
“Even then.”
Indy took a deep breath, tucking her hands in the sleeves of her jumper. His jumper, he finally realised. He almost told her she looked exceptional in his clothes, but now was not the time.
“So,” she started, “it happened on Thursday morning when I was walking to the track with the girls and Rosie. A woman came up to me, and I thought she was maybe a fan who wanted a photo. Turns out that one, she didn’t like me and did not want a photo, and two, she just wanted to talk to someone who’s close to you. She said she was your mother when I tried to leave.”
Miles didn’t understand why this woman would try to come back into his life after almost twenty years of absence. Didn’t want her to be back.
“I said it was a bold statement to make,” Indy continued. “That she needed to carefully choose her words. That she had no right to come back into your life and ask to see you during one of the biggest weekends of the season. I told her not to come close to you unless you chose to speak with her. I told her to leave you alone unless you decided to meet up, if and when you were ready. I’m sorry if I overstepped. I was really blinded by rage in the moment, and all I wanted was to keep you safe.”
Cupping her cheeks, he stared into those eyes he loved so much. “Indy, I know this isn’t the right thing to say right now, but goddamn it, you are so sexy when you’re angry. When you’re protective of me.” She chuckled, shaking her head. “In all seriousness, I don’t think you overstepped at all. What did she do after that?”
“She looked lost. Maybe high, if I’m being honest with you. She threw me the dirtiest glare and walked away. I asked security at the entrance of the paddock to keep an eye out and warn me if she was lurking around, but luckily no one saw her. She hasn’t shown up on any other day, either. It was such a weird encounter.”
“High…” Miles scoffed. “Of course she wouldn’t have changed.”
“But do you think it was really her?”
His hands found her smooth thighs. He didn’t even want to ask about her appearance because that would perhaps confirm the doubt. “I don’t know. I’ve had women come up to me trying to tell me I had knocked them up. Tried to get money from me for child support.”
Her eyes widened. “What? When?”
“A couple of years ago. But don’t worry. I didn’t get anyone pregnant, and the only woman I’ve been with in the past three years is you.”
“I still can’t believe it,” she quietly said, astonished.
He brushed her lower lip with his thumb. “You ruined me for anyone else.”
She blushed then blinked, like she remembered what this whole conversation was initially about. “Would you want to have a conversation with…”
“Erica,” he filled in. This woman’s name left a bitter taste on the tip of his tongue. The thought of ever seeing her, speaking to her, made his stomach churn. He had vomited earlier when he’d gone to hide in his room. For a moment, he felt stuck in his ten-year-old body, panicking and suffering from anxiety because of the words his mother was telling him.
“Right. Do you want to talk to Erica?”
“No,” he said without hesitation. “I’ve already spoken about it with Dad a few years ago, and neither of us would want to reconnect with her. She’s hurt us so much. The pain she put us through is not normal. And I still stand by what I said those years ago; I don’t want to see her ever again.”
“I support your decision. But I have to be honest with you, she tried to ask me for money. She said that she’d never show up again if I paid her.”
He frowned. “How much?”
“Fifty grand.”
“Fifty—what the fuck? You didn’t?—”
“I told her to get lost. And not come near me, you, our friends, or else my lawyer would contact her. I was not joking. No one messes with my man.”
My man.
Christ, this woman was utterly magnifying. She embodied sunshine, joy, positivity. But it turned out she could turn those golden rays into flames to burn her entourage if her loved ones were so much as threatened. Indigo Bailey was an empowering, loyal, fierce woman. And she was his.
“There’s a high possibility that she wasn’t Erica,” he steadily pointed out. “People are crazy. They’d do anything for money. And it’s no secret that my mother hasn’t been around in a while, so… People know I’m loaded.”
“You’re annoyingly humble, too.”
Regardless, even if this woman was actually his mother, he didn’t feel the desire to speak to her, let alone see her.
“You’ve never told the media about her, right?”
He shook his head. “No, they only know she’s not part of my life. It’s none of their business, anyway. Besides you, there’s only Kai and Ava who know the whole story.”
Her cold fingers slipped through his. “Thank you for telling me.”
“You deserve to know everything about me. To see every piece of me.” The tip of his nose brushed against hers as a shaky breath left his mouth. “Indy, you’re it for me. I feel safe with you, and that’s all I need. I know I’m broken in a way, but I’m not asking you to fix me.”
With a job that required him to travel all year long, it wasn’t easy to settle in a place he could call home. Sure, this flat was beautiful, provided him the safety he needed, but it wasn’t until Indy had claimed that room at the end of the hall that this flat became a home. Until she’d sprinkled flowers all around, tossed a shoe by the sofa and a lipstick on the kitchen counter. Until she gave him a purpose to come back to Monaco during off-days and feel content to be here.
His home was wherever Indy was.
His home was Indy.
“You’re not broken. Even if you think you are, I’m going to tell you this: we all are in one way or another. No one’s perfect. No one lives a life without being harmed or going through some tough times. That’s what life is about—crossing obstacles, battling the climb, reaching the mountain’s peak. And through those broken pieces you seem so sure of carrying around, I saw your light. And it’s beautiful. It’s inspiring. If there’s one person who deserves to be successful and happy after all the shit they went through, it’s you.”
“Indy,” he murmured, a thick lump in his throat. “You—fuck, woman. You cannot say those things to me and—” Not expect me to fall even harder for you. No one believed in him the way Indy did. He blinked the burning feeling in his eyes away.
Miles’ mind was racing. To ground himself, he gently grabbed her face, dusting the smattering of freckles over her cheeks with his thumbs. Softly, his lips fell upon hers, and time stopped. He exhaled shakily, pressing a firm kiss to her mouth before letting his forehead fall onto hers.
But when thunder boomed again, loud and powerful, he startled.
Indy’s soft hands stroked the hair at his nape. He closed his eyes, leaning into her touch, lingering in the moment, and listened to the soft patter of rain crashing onto the windows. Bizarrely, he found a deep serenity within him. Perhaps it was because Indy was here. She was his solace. His calm.
“You don’t like thunderstorms, do you?” she asked in a whisper. “Because of your mother?”
Smart woman.
He nodded, opening his eyes to find her attention on him—looking at him like he was a work of art. “The first time she raised her voice at me, there was a thunderstorm. It might sound silly, but for so many years, hearing thunder just reminded me of my mother’s angry words. Her cruelty. How she said I was ruining her life. So, whenever there was a thunderstorm, I would go over to Ava’s. We’d play board games, watch movies. I felt safe at her place. One morning, after I accidentally fell asleep on her sofa, Zoya—Ava’s mum—walked me back to my flat. She wanted to speak to my mother, but all my mother did was look down at me, then at Zoya, and told her she could’ve kept me forever. Then she left for whatever she had planned that day without so much as saying a word to me.”
“What?” Indy’s eyes were veiled with unconcealed sorrow. “That isn’t okay.”
“I now realise it. I just didn’t get it then. It was around that time that my nightmares began. They were really bad when I was younger. Now I get them once in a while. They can be bad, like that one time you found me in the middle of the night. But I’m doing okay. I don’t let them affect me any longer. Now I know that it was just a dream. That reality is right here, where I am with the people I love. Who love me back.”
Indy kissed his forehead. “I’m so proud of you. And your sister? Maya? How did she cope?”
He sighed, gazing at the ceiling. “She was a moody adolescent who acted like an entitled brat. That was how she coped. Mum was her entire world, the way Dad is mine, you know? So when our mum left, Maya was wrecked. She also went to therapy, longer than I did. She was depressed. Grieving. Angry all the time. And then she got into uni, but she hated her classes. So Dad suggested she went travelling. She travelled with us whilst I was competing in F3. Then she met that guy. Felix. Coolest guy I know working in photography. They fell in love. She was happy, and she just…came back to life. She is happy now, and it’s what matters the most to me. She’s married. Trying to have kids. I tried protecting her my whole life. Tried to provide her with as much comfort as I could even though it wasn’t my job. I don’t hear much from her nowadays, but simply knowing that she’s okay makes me feel at peace.”
She swallowed, a tear rushing down her cheek. “You are such a good man. And you are so loved.”
“And I’m going to be okay,” he said softly. Mostly to himself.
She hugged him tightly. “You are. I’m going to be there for you. Always cheering you on. Always encouraging you. Always giving you a shoulder to cry on and a hand to hold onto at the end of the day. You’re not getting rid of me.”
Miles chuckled in the crook of her neck. “That’s cool with me. I wasn’t planning on letting you go, anyway. I’m always going to be there for you, too, Indy. Always.”
“I know.”
“Thank you, baby. You have no idea how good it feels to talk about it. How good you make me feel.”
Miles was so lucky to be living in the same universe as Indigo Bailey. To be the one she’d given her golden heart to. He would take great care of it—protect it like his most prized possession.
“Let’s do something fun?” he suggested. “I need to clear my mind.”
Her gaze slipped to the floor-to-ceiling window. “I have an idea.”
The rain poured down on him, his hair sticking to his forehead. He could barely see, but he felt the cold water crashing onto his skin, could hear Indy’s soft laughter as she squeezed his fingers, could feel the erratic pulse of his heart as they stepped onto the empty shore only lit by street lamps.
“Your idea was to get soaked under the pouring rain?” he asked, baffled. “In the middle of the night?”
“Not quite.”
Thunder still rumbled in the night sky, this time more gently. Indy turned to him, her wide eyes full of joy and her cheeks rosy. “It’s okay,” she assured softly. “You’re safe. Nothing’s going to hurt you.”
He’d always been one to take care of others, but maybe, just maybe, it was okay to let himself be taken care of.
He swallowed. Braced himself to face his fears. “I know.”
When she started running towards the sea where the waves were colliding with each other, and kicked her shoes off, Miles knew what this fearless woman had in mind.
“Indy…” he warned, yet ran after her.
Her socks followed suit, then her pair of shorts fell onto the sand. He watched her with a broad grin, this wild girl having the power of making his life colourful and beautiful.
He glanced at the buildings lined up behind his shoulder, noticing that not a single light was turned on in those flats. Good. This moment was theirs.The universe belonged to them.
“Ever gone skinny dipping, Golden Boy?”
There wasn’t a single predictable thing about Indy, and that was exactly why he was so drawn to her. So consumed by her fire. Whilst he was cool and collected, she was vibrant and electric. Indy brought out the best in him, and that was exactly why he knew they’d always been meant to be.
He shook his head in disbelief, pushing the wet strands of hair away from his forehead. “Shit, Indy, I can’t even find the words to describe your level of craziness right now.”
Her jumper hit the sand, leaving her in a pair of flimsy lavender panties with a matching lacy bralette. She shrugged, a hearty laugh escaping her mouth. “Kam once said I was unhinged. Tito agreed.”
Indigo was the portrait of everything that was beautiful and mesmerising in this world—a coalescence of colours, flashes of gold mixed with tangerine and pink, feeling akin to a magnificent canvas that, to some people would look like a mere painting, but to him felt like a work of art only he could read and comprehend.
Indigo was wild, and lively, and full of life.
She was everything.
“You’re just perfectly yourself,” he said.
Miles pulled his t-shirt off and decided it was finally time to be alive.
Rushing past her, he smacked her ass, causing her to giggle and follow him into the water. They yelped at the cold waves touching their skin, but he still welcomed the sensation. He caught Indy by the waist, then tackled her into the water until they were both soaked to the bones.
“Bastard,” she laughed as they recuperated their breath.
He grinned, standing up and pulling Indy with him. He made her twirl, right there under the pouring rain as they stood in the ocean—losing themselves in their own world.
Brushing his nose against her wet one, he let his smile widen. “You love me,” he said in a murmur, his heart thundering.
Her gaze softened, her arms winding around his neck. “I do.” When her hand grazed his chest, like she was just controlling the drum of his organ, she smiled, and he melted into her touch.“I meant it when I said it earlier. I love you so much, Huxley. I wanted to wait before telling you. Wanted you to realise that you love me too and needed you to say it before I could. But I realised that what you need is to know that you’re not alone. That you’re loved. That I love you—every part of you.”
He swallowed the lump of emotion, cradling her face with his trembling hands. “Thank you.” With a soft kiss to her lips, he smiled, a rush of adrenaline racing down his spine. He’d never felt like this before—complete. “You’re everything to me. My whole world. Thank you for being patient.”
Because of living in a fast-paced universe, he wasn’t used to having someone wait on him and welcome him with open arms the way Indy had.
“I’m always going to wait for you.”
Miles cradled her to his chest, closing his eyes at the sensation of their heartbeats falling in perfect synchronisation. Miles was going to meet her at the finish line, intent on giving her the world, the galaxy, the universe beyond its infinity.