Chapter 39
WREN
W hen the front door opens again, I fill with hope. He came back. But as I rush into the living room, completely naked, I realize that nope . Remy’s home.
I cover my junk, but not quick enough for him.
“I don’t want to know why Darcy ran out of here half-undressed and you’re like …” He waves a hand in the general vicinity of my body. “That.”
“Good, because I don’t want to talk about it.” I turn on my heel and march back to my room, angrier than ever.
And depressed as hell.
How can he tell me he loves me one minute and then break my heart in the next sentence? Was it supposed to make me feel better?
How can he not see he’s making the exact same mistake his father made all those years ago?
He chose to marry for obligation, and I don’t give a shit if he ended up actually falling for Darcy’s mother.
The way Mom talks about Warren, it’s as if they both always held a flame for each other.
They couldn’t be together, but they knew deep down they were each other’s soul mate.
How can Darcy just walk away from that?
How am I letting him?
I throw on some clothes and head into my kitchen to pour myself a stiff drink, but Remy, being the best cousin he is, is already there for me, whiskey in hand and holding it out in my direction.
I down it all in one go. “I thought you didn’t want to know. What’s with the talky juice?” I shake my empty glass, and he takes it back to fill it up again.
“I didn’t want to know, but now that you don’t want to tell me, I do. I’m complicated like that.”
I slump and look away as I say, “We didn’t stop.”
“Didn’t stop what?”
“Hooking up.”
“That much is obvious.”
“Thanks for the sympathy.”
“I don’t understand though. Did you not just have sex with your … what is he? The world thinks he’s your brother, but your dad married his mom, so does that make you official stepbrothers or what? Is that like a role-play kink that makes the sex extra hot?”
“It does not, and no we don’t. It’s a mindfuck enough to know that everyone else thinks we’re brothers. But that’s not the point. The point is that tonight was the last time. He said he can’t be with me, and he’s going to marry some other guy.”
Remy winces. “Ouch.”
“Right after he said he loves me.”
“Damn.” Remy hands me my second drink and then a third when I’m done. “Everything makes more sense now. The wallowing. Leaving MediaCorp. I knew you’d tell me eventually, and I haven’t wanted to push, but damn, that’s heavy.”
Yup.
“What are you going to do?”
Ha. “Is there a word for I don’t fucking know, but I’m two seconds away from blowing up his entire life?”
“What, like outing you two? Somehow, I don’t see that leading to marriage.”
“Pfft.” I sound really dignified, I know. “I’m not even sure if we could legally get married. We technically have the same dad.”
“You’re going to give up? That easily? That’s not the stubborn-headed Wren I grew up with, and if this is what he does to your spirit, then I don’t want you with him anyway.”
I appreciate my cousin, I really do, but he doesn’t get it. “You don’t understand what it’s like for him. He’s under so much pressure, believing he has to do it for the family. He’s not stringing me along out of assholeism. It’s obvious he’s in as much pain as I am, but what am I supposed to do?”
“Fight for him, maybe?” Remy sounds just like Mom.
“And when he rejects me and I have to watch him marry someone else? Watch him repeat the same mistakes our father did?”
“At least you’ll know you gave it all you have.
If he still makes the biggest mistake of his life after that, then you’ll be able to deal with it knowing there were no what-ifs.
That if you’d fought harder, you might’ve gotten the happily ever after you deserve.
” Remy shifts. “When I was talking to your mom … I got the feeling she’d do things differently if she could. But her chance is gone. Yours isn’t.”
The thought of having Darcy forever is something I’ve never wanted with anyone else, but it’s also terrifying. Because if I put myself out there and he still chooses the company over me, my self-worth is going to nose-dive, and it was never in a great place to begin with.
What’s even more scary is becoming like my mother. What she endured for years, watching Darcy grow up in the role I was supposed to have. Seeing Warren and his wife in the news.
I couldn’t do that.
I can’t live without Darcy.
“Just don’t give up on him yet,” Remy says.
Feeling buzzy from the whiskey, physically exhausted from the sex, and mentally drained from the heartache, I place my empty glass back on the kitchen counter and head to my room.
I fall face-first onto my pillow but have to turn my head to breathe eventually. My gaze catches on a tiny, white triangle that’s sticking out from under my nightstand lamp.
It’s where I stashed that stupid envelope Mom gave me when Warren died. The one I refused to open because I didn’t give a shit what it said. I’m not sure I care now, but I can’t keep pretending it doesn’t exist.
I’ve never wanted anything from my father, but as I pull the envelope out of its hiding place, I suddenly wish for all the fatherly wisdom and for him to give me a solution. Some perspective.
I rip down the side of the envelope and get the dreaded feeling that it’s just going to be another check or official papers or something impersonal.
What am I thinking? It’s from Warren Ritcherson. Of course it’s going to be impersonal.
I’m tempted to throw it right in the trash. I can’t be disappointed by what’s inside if I never see it.
The small opening mocks me.
Fuck it. It’s time.
I pull out the single sheet of paper, and again, I get the sinking feeling it’s a check, but when I open it, I hold my breath as I read over the handwritten words.
Wren,
I’ve started this letter a thousand times only to realize that no matter what I say, you won’t want to hear it. Out of all my children, you’re the most headstrong, and I wish I could say I hated it, but I don’t. Because I like to think you get it from me.
But from one headstrong man to another, I need you to know that regret is the hardest emotion to get over. It consumes you.
Do I regret everything in my life? No. I have four amazing children, all different in their own ways. They’re the brightness in my last days.
Even you, the child I’ve watched from afar.
I’m so proud of what you’ve accomplished on your own. You fight for what you believe in and what you want, and I admire you for that. Even if it’s at the detriment of my own wants.
I wanted a life with you, I wanted to be there for you while you were growing up, but I wasn’t willing to step out of line until it was too late.
You wanted nothing to do with me, and I can’t blame you. You know all this already.
If you’re still reading and haven’t set fire to this letter yet, I just want to say that you can refuse every single cent I leave for you in my estate for all I care, but if you take nothing else from me, please take this: I love you and your mother.
I always have. My only wish for you is a life full of love and no regrets.
I used my tenacity to keep hold of a wrong decision. I was too stubborn to admit I chose wrong.
Don’t be me. Learn from my mistakes.
Love, whether you like it or not, your father,
Warren.
This letter a few months ago would’ve sent me into a rage. How dare he emotionally manipulate me from the grave, I would’ve thought. But here, now, it’s as if he’s talking directly to me. Telling me what I need to do.
I can’t live my life the way my mother did. The way Warren did.
Mom, unable to date. Always waiting around for him to change his mind.
My father, unhappy in the choices he made but too afraid to take them back.
Remy’s right. My mother’s right. Hell, I don’t want to admit this, but even my father is right.
I can’t let Darcy walk away so easily. If he still chooses not to be with me, then that’s on him, and I can’t sit around waiting for him to change his mind, but I can try to stop him from making the mistake in the first place.
Buckle up, Darcy, because I’m not letting you go.
I’m going to fight for you.
For us.
* * *
There’s only one moment of hesitation after setting my plan in motion. That plan being the same chaotic mess my head is right now.
It comes when I get on the elevators at the office, not realizing Harvey would already be inside.
We ride up to the top floor in silence, and I may or may not fantasize about the moment Darcy tells him he doesn’t want to marry him.
Because if I’m going to do this, I have to be all in. I can’t show Darcy any doubts.
I haven’t worked out every detail of how we can make it work, but I have suggestions. Possible solutions. All of which he will probably hate, but if it gives us a chance …
I need to believe our problems have solutions, or what’s the point in even trying?
The elevator doors open, and Harvey gestures for me to go first.
Trying to win me over isn’t going to happen, buddy. This is one brother who’ll never approve of your charade.
He follows me all the way to my office, but when I open the door, the desk isn’t as empty as I left it. There’s … stuff.
Everywhere.
“Sorry,” Harvey says behind me, and I jump. “I was under the impression you weren’t coming back, and Fiona said I could set up here while my family and I continue to look for office space in the city.”
And Darcy didn’t stop it? He really is trying to replace me completely, isn’t he? No, not even replace me—erase me.
“No problem. I can take up shop in Darcy’s office.” I spin on my heel and dart across the hall.
Darcy glances up at me as I enter his office without even knocking. The color drains from his cheeks. “W-what are you doing here?”
I close his door, lock it, and then round his desk to hit the frosted glass button. The second the room is private, I park my ass next to his computer.
“Wren …”
“I decided something.”
“You’re coming back? You’re going to take the company from me? You want to make me even more miserable than I already am? What? What is it?”
I lean forward, mere inches away from him. His breath on my cheek, my lips near his ear, and I murmur, “I’m not letting you go.”
When I pull back, I can’t help smiling at his shocked face.
“I don’t care what we have to do to make us work. I’m not giving you up without a fight.”
Darcy averts his gaze. “We can’t.”
“Who says we can’t?”
“The law. Father’s will. My birth certificate.”
“My birth certificate doesn’t say shit. As far as the law knows, my dad is unknown.” I take his hand. “Those are all things that can be voided if we tell everyone the truth.”
For a split second, I swear he’s on board. His hand shakes, but he covers it by making a fist and tugging it from mine. His jaw is tight as he says, “You know why I can’t do that.”
“No. I know why you won’t do that. But what if there’s a way around all the business stuff?”
“There isn’t. I’ve looked. Trust me, I’ve tried.”
“No, you haven’t.”
The hope in his eyes only cements that I’m doing the right thing. “Do you have a plan?”
But here’s the part he’s going to hate. “I have … an idea, but we’d need to run it by Junior and Tobias first.”
Darcy shakes his head. “How can you think that’s even an option? Just because they’re not pretending you don’t exist anymore, they’re never going to let you have majority shares.”
“Have you actually had a conversation with Junior and Tobias about the company? About what they want?”
His mouth opens. Then closes.
“You’re so adamant that you know everything.
That you know what they want, what the shareholders will say, what will happen if news of us got out.
But how do you know that the news won’t blow over, and we could all live our own lives, by our own choices?
Just because Warren Ritcherson forced you into this job, that doesn’t mean he gets a say over your life. No one does.”
Darcy’s lips quirk. “Except you?”
I hold up my hands. “Hey, you tell me to leave, and I’m gone.
You marry Harvey, I’m done. But don’t expect me to wait around for you like my mother did for your father.
I’m fighting for a future here. Our future.
You can either join me or give up on being happy.
What’s it going to be?” My heart thrums wildly, and I break out into a cool sweat because this really could go either way.
It takes what seems like an eternity for him to think about it, with each second that ticks by making the last thread of hope fray even more.
“Don’t give up on me,” I plead. “Not yet. Not until we’ve exhausted every avenue. Every loophole.”
His gray eyes meet mine. “What was your idea?”
With two simple words, I hold the power to change our lives forever. “Marry me.”