Chapter 32 Tate
TATE
The wind whips around us as we cut across the water of the Hudson like a hot knife on butter. Sullivan commands the sleek speedboat like he was born to do it.
“I can’t believe you never mentioned you have a boat. Do you have any others? Slower ones?”
Sullivan glances at me, his lips quirking as I grip onto my seat with white knuckles. He pulls on a lever and reduces the speed. The city skyline begins to form back into shapes instead of just a blur.
“My father prefers the slower ones… yachts,” he replies, his eyes pinching a fraction. “I don’t have time to float and take in the scenery.”
“I’ve noticed. The only time you sit still is when you’re playing the piano.”
I curl my hand around his bicep when he doesn’t say anything and lean my head against his arm.
“This is lovely. I’ve had a great evening. Thank you.”
“It’s not over yet,” he says, kissing my hair.
“A new outfit that I feel incredible in, and dinner in a private dining room at a restaurant I know has a six-month long waiting list. What else do I need?”
“You’ll see,” he replies, steering the boat over the moonlit water.
I run my hand over the diamond choker. The weight of it has pressed against my skin all evening. But it’s not been unpleasant. In fact, the choker has served as a wonderful reminder of how Sullivan must trust me in order to allow me to borrow such an exquisite piece.
He flicks his eyes in my direction. “I’ve insured it for you. I’ll get a safe installed at your place. But until then you can keep it in one of mine when you aren’t wearing it.”
“What? I thought you’d borrowed it from the store?”
A small curl of his lips is the only sign that he heard what I said.
His profile is dark and determined as he keeps his eyes fixed ahead on wherever he’s taking us. His suit is as black as his hair today. The cut as sharp as his jaw.
He’s devastatingly handsome. And only growing more so the longer I look at him. The more I get to know him, and who he really is beneath his CEO persona.
“Sullivan?” I press. “I can’t keep it. I—”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s… it’s expensive. They’re diamonds,” I splutter.
“Would you have preferred rubies?” His head snaps in my direction, a serious, questioning expression on it.
I scoff. “Oh my God, you actually want me to keep it, don’t you?”
His eyes drop to my neck and his gaze heats like the sight of the diamonds sitting there pleases him.
“I insist on you keeping it.”
“I don’t own anything like this.” I stroke the jewels, the cool, smooth surface of the piece moving against my fingers as I swallow. “When will I ever wear it? When I’m making coffees?”
“If you want to.”
I snort at the ridiculousness of the idea. “Sullivan…”
“Tate,” he counters, dropping the boat into neutral so we slow down to a gentle bob. “You can wear it whenever you like. But if it makes you uncomfortable, then save it for when I take you out on dates.”
“Dates?” I bite my lower lip. “You mean I get more of this?”
“You get more of this.” He sucks his bottom lip, his gaze sliding down my body. “As long as I get all of you.”
“Do I get all of you too? All the secret parts no one else does?” I ask playfully.
His brows pinch and he focuses on the choker, reaching out to run his thumb over my skin above it.
“You could just wear it naked if you like. I could fuck you in every piece Beaufort Diamonds has ever made,” he murmurs.
His eyes flare with desire and I shake off the feeling that he deflected my question on purpose as he pulls me into a passionate kiss that has my stomach filling with butterflies.
“I could kiss you forever,” he whispers against my lips, tracing my cheek with the back of his hand. “But then you’d miss what I brought you here to see.”
He sits back, spreading his arm around me over the back of the seat cushion. He delicately circles my bare shoulder with gentle, skilled fingers.
“Watch. And listen.”
I look over the water at a floating platform we’ve drifted closer to. A lone piano is set up on it.
A man dressed all in black wearing a balaclava sits at it.
“That’s not…?”
Sullivan smiles at me as my throat goes dry. He pulls me into his side and kisses my temple.
“It is,” he whispers.
The first notes of Nuvole Bianche by Einaudi ring out over the water like a haunted introduction.
My stomach drops as the crowd lining the harbor comes into focus. Hundreds of cell phone lights illuminate the gathering like fireflies as they film him.
The Masked Maestro.
Here in the flesh. Playing as well as he always has. Exactly how he’s always sounded when I’ve raced to one of his concerts to lose myself inside his music.
Sullivan strokes my skin, but I no longer feel it. I’m numb.
“I thought it was you,” I say, my voice a strained whisper.
“I told you it wasn’t,” Sullivan says calmly, like the realization isn’t crushing something inside me.
“I heard him play a song that wasn’t like the others. It was…”
I grow tenser in his hold. I sound ridiculous. A woman with stupid dreams about feeling a man’s soul through his music. Feeling his passion. His pain.
Feeling him.
“It was what?” Sullivan asks, relaxing into the seat, enjoying the music.
“It doesn’t matter,” I breathe, forcing down the illogical swell of disappointment in my gut.
I thought it was him.
I wanted it to be him.
I swore it was him because the way I feel around him has become so intense so…
I love him.
But as stupid as I know it is, a tiny part of me fell in love that day at Grand Central Station.
And the rest of me fell for Sullivan.
I wanted it to be him.
Forty-eight hours of replaying our date in my head and I’ve finally come to terms with it.
I spent so many months wondering who The Masked Maestro could be. It was part of the magic, that element of mystery. But now I know for certain that it isn’t Sullivan, I no longer care who The Masked Maestro really is.
His music is still beautiful. But the magic is gone.
He isn’t the man I’ve fallen in love with.
The song that touched my soul in Grand Central Station was just a fleeting moment where I imagined feeling something.
Maybe I’m a fool, for wishing it was Sullivan.
The way he plays, the emotion that flows through his fingertips onto the keys; I thought it had to be him.
Because the only time I’ve felt such a spark of light inside me except when he plays, is that one time in the station.
I was sure he was lying when he said he didn’t know how to play Unstoppable. But he wasn’t, because it isn’t him. Time to move on and appreciate what’s right in front of me.
“Everything okay?”
I turn at Sullivan’s deep, concerned tone and am met with a brilliant blue gaze that blazes with an intensity that thrums through my body like an electric charge.
“Fine.” I smile at him, resting against the cool leather car seat and looking at Molly beside me. She’s stroking her baby doll’s eyelashes. She’s so much like Sullivan. She even pulls her brows together in the same look of concentration. So adorable.
Sullivan had to stay in the office for a meeting with Jones and a few others, so I watched Molly. She was telling me about her auntie’s dog who she sneaks into her bed with her when they look after him.
Sullivan’s meeting ran over and we all got takeout and ate together in the conference room. It was strange seeing him relax at work, chatting with everyone as we ate.
Everything felt so natural.
Me, him, Molly.
I glance at him, and his eyes lift from his phone like he senses me. The way they sparkle has my stomach erupting into butterflies. It’s a look that says he suspects what I’m thinking. But he can’t. Because that would mean he’s aware of how hopelessly in love with him I am.
And if he knows but isn’t saying anything back, then…
“Tate?” he murmurs.
“I’m fine,” I repeat, like saying it out loud makes it true.
His eyes narrow like he’s about to ask me something, but the song playing from the car’s radio grabs my attention.
“Cliff? Can you please turn it up?”
I shoot forward, hanging off the edge of my seat, straining to hear.
It’s the same words, the same melody, but it’s completely… wrong.
Bile rushes up my windpipe.
Sullivan straightens in his seat. “That’s your—”
“My song,” I choke, turning to him in horror.
Ice slithers up my spine as the unknown female artist continues to sing my words like they’re hers. Like they’re her hopes and dreams. Her work.
Not mine.
“You didn’t know about this?” Sullivan states, studying me as I blink rapidly, the back of my neck on fire.
“I think I’m going to…” I swallow.
“Cliff, pull over,” Sullivan commands calmly.
The moment the car rolls to a gentle stop, Sullivan flings his door open and strides around to my side. He opens my door just in time as I fold at the waist and throw up violently in the gutter.
“It’s all right,” he says, gathering my hair from my face as my heaves turn dry.
“Tate?” Molly pipes up.
“I’m okay. Just got a little sick,” I say, giving her a weak smile, not wanting to worry her.
“I’m good now,” I tell Sullivan.
He passes me a bottle of water that Cliff’s got from the trunk. I take a sip and hand it back to him. He watches me like a hawk, a dark determination in his gaze. My head’s still spinning as he passes the water to me again.
I wave it away. “I’m fine. We need to get back. It’s almost Molly’s bedtime.”
“Drink,” he instructs, his voice a steady calm, a direct contrast to the thudding in my temples.
I take the bottle and glug some more down until the concerned look on his face eases a fraction.
“Who else has heard you play that song?”
The deep frown lines between his brows are matched with a dangerous undercurrent in his tone.
I shake my head. “No one, I…” I swallow down the threat of more vomit. “My ex, Brandon. He works at a record label. He’s not high up or anything, but he keeps telling me he can get my song in front of the producers.”
“He keeps telling you?” Sullivan questions, more than a hint of suspicion in his tone.
I wince at how stupid I’ve been. How I didn’t see this coming.
“It’s why I changed my number. He kept calling after we broke up.”
Sullivan’s nostrils flare.
“Last name?”
A muscle in his cheek clenches when I don’t immediately answer, and his eyes bore into mine.
I swallow. “Rutter… Brandon Rutter. He works at Liberty Records.”
He nods once.
I know the look on his face. Laser-focused eyes. Jaw set like stone. It’s how he looks when he’s about to go into battle in the boardroom.
“Sullivan—”
“Are you okay for us to keep driving?” he asks.
I nod weakly.
“Good.” He reaches into his breast pocket and hands me a monogrammed handkerchief before closing my door softly.
He climbs back into the car and as we pull out into the city traffic, Molly’s lower lip trembles.
“Hey, I’m okay,” I reassure her.
She rubs her eyes, a mix of tiredness and confusion swimming in them.
“I am. All good now, see?” I smile at her.
But I’m not convincing enough.
As the final notes of what used to be my song play out, her little face screws up and she tilts her head back against her car seat.
And cries.