Chapter 40
KENT
Iwoke up in Sylvie’s suite again, and for a moment I let myself enjoy the peaceful quiet of the morning. Her apartment was cozy in a way that my Manhattan penthouse had never been. There were no sirens in the distance. No airplanes or honking horns.
But I did hear what sounded like a rooster in the distance. I hadn’t seen any chickens on the property but maybe a neighboring farm. It sounded pretty far away. I didn’t think I had actually ever heard a rooster. Not in real life anyway.
I lay there taking it all in.
I should be freaking out and jumping out of bed. Usually, I hated the morning after stuff. I hated the bullshit promises to call or suggestions we do it again sometime. The idea of being in bed with a woman while not fucking was like choosing to lay on a bed of hot coals.
Usually.
But not with her.
I didn’t move a muscle. I didn’t want to wake her up.
Because I knew what the day held in store.
I would probably never get the chance to be with her again. She would throw me out of her bed and her life. I would never get to hold her naked body against mine.
I’d never had a girlfriend. Not a real one, anyway. There had been women, plenty of them, but nothing that lasted longer than a few weeks. Nothing that involved waking up next to someone and actually wanting to stay.
The longest relationship I’d ever had was probably three months with some socialite whose name I couldn’t even remember now.
She’d wanted more than I was willing to give, and I’d cut things off the second she started talking about meeting my family or spending holidays together.
The idea of that kind of intimacy had always made my skin crawl.
But lying here with Sylvie curled against my chest, her breathing soft and even, I was starting to understand what I had been missing.
This wasn’t the desperate hunger of last night or the thrill of conquest I was used to.
This was something else entirely. Peaceful, comfortable, right in a way that scared the hell out of me.
What would it be like to have this every morning? To wake up next to someone who actually knew me, who I didn’t have to perform for or impress? To have that familiarity where you could be completely yourself, flaws and all?
I’d watched my married brothers and always pitied them.
All that compromise and the expectations and all that work just to keep someone else happy.
It had seemed like a prison to me. But now, with Sylvie’s warm body pressed against mine and her hair tickling my chest, I wondered if maybe I’d been the one who was trapped.
Trapped in a cycle of meaningless encounters that left me feeling emptier each time.
She stirred slightly, making a soft sound in her sleep, and my arms instinctively tightened around her. The gesture was so natural and protective that it caught me off guard. When had I ever felt protective of anyone besides myself?
But that was what she did to me. Made me want things I never wanted before. Made me imagine a different kind of life, one where I came home to someone who was genuinely happy to see me. Someone who laughed at my jokes and called me on my bullshit and made me want to be better than I actually was.
The fantasy was so vivid I could almost taste it.
Weekend mornings like this one, lazy and warm.
Coming home to her. Learning her routines, her preferences and all her moods—even the bad ones.
Having someone who was mine in a way that had nothing to do with power or control and everything to do with choice.
For the first time in my life, I understood why people talked about love like it was worth sacrificing for.
And that was when the full weight of what I was about to do hit me like a freight train.
Soon, Harold would call his daughter with questions about the contract.
Questions I couldn’t answer without revealing everything.
By tonight, Sylvie would know exactly who I was and what I’d come here to do.
She’d know that every word out of my mouth had been a carefully constructed lie designed to manipulate her family into giving up everything they’d worked for.
“You’re awake,” Sylvie murmured.
I looked down and found her watching me. “I am.”
She pulled away, yawned and stretched. “You should have woke me up.” She practically jumped out of bed. “I have to get a move on.”
She walked to her dresser and started pulling out clothes.
“What’s the rush?” I asked.
“This weekend is an event weekend at the lodge,” she said as she walked to the bathroom. “We have a neighbor coming over with his wagons and Clydesdale horses to do winter rides through the tree farm for guests. Kids absolutely love it, but it’s a ton of setup work.”
I sat up, intrigued despite myself. “That actually sounds pretty cool. Need help?”
She poked her head out of the bathroom, her face lighting up. “Really? That would be amazing. I could definitely use the extra hands, especially since I’m supposed to meet Dad for lunch to discuss your family’s offer.”
My chest tightened painfully at her words. So that was the deadline. That’s when this would all come crashing down, because Harold would have explained exactly what the Bancroft acquisition meant, and Sylvie would finally understand that I’d been lying to her from the beginning.
She’d see how much my family planned to take. She’d realize that “investment” meant total destruction.
And she would hate me for it.
I climbed out of bed and strolled into the bathroom.
She looked at me and laughed. “What are you doing?”
“Taking a shower.”
“With me?”
“Conserving water,” I said with a wink. “You’re making it sound like we’re in a hurry. I don’t have time to go to the lodge and shower.”
“That’s a terrible lie.”
“But it’s working, right?”
She reached into the very small shower and turned on the water.
The shower was barely big enough for one person, let alone two, but somehow we made it work.
Steam filled the tiny space as hot water cascaded over us.
I found myself mesmerized by the way droplets clung to Sylvie’s skin before sliding down her curves.
“This is cozy,” I murmured, my hands finding her waist as she reached for the shampoo.
“That’s one word for it.” She laughed, accidentally elbowing me as she tried to turn around. “I think you’re too tall for my shower.”
She wasn’t wrong. I had to duck slightly to avoid hitting my head on the showerhead, and every movement required careful coordination to avoid knocking into each other.
I helped wash her hair. Her eyes closed as I worked the shampoo through the auburn waves. I was turned on, but not in a way that demanded I take her against the wall. I was enthralled with her. Every little detail about her.
She was beautiful, yes, but it was more than that.
There was something genuine about her that I’d never encountered before.
No artifice, no carefully constructed image designed to impress or manipulate.
Just Sylvie, completely herself, trusting me enough to be vulnerable in a way that made me want to open up as well.
“Your turn,” she said.
Even something as simple as sharing shower products felt loaded with meaning. Domestic in a way that should have terrified me but instead felt oddly comforting.
We finally emerged from the shower, skin flushed and clean. I wrapped a towel around my waist while she put on her bra and panties. The morning routine felt natural, like we’d been doing this for years instead of days.
“I should get dressed,” I said, reluctant to leave but knowing I needed to maintain some semblance of normalcy. “Don’t want anyone seeing me do the walk of shame in yesterday’s clothes.”
“It’s not a walk of shame if I invited you,” she said with a grin that made my heart skip.
I kissed her once more, soft and lingering, before forcing myself to step away. “I’ll meet you outside in twenty minutes?”
“The horse setup is happening near the main barn. You can’t miss it.”
I slipped out of her apartment and made my way back toward the main lodge, hyperaware of every sound in the hallway. The last thing I needed was to run into Harold or one of Sylvie’s relatives while clearly wearing the same clothes from dinner last night.
I managed to avoid seeing anyone. I pulled on fresh clothes and rushed back out just in time to see a trailer full of massive Clydesdale horses pulling up.
“Kent, this is Bill Anderson,” Sylvie said, introducing me to a weathered man in his sixties who looked like he’d been working with horses his entire life. “Bill, this is Kent. He’s offered to help us set up.”
Bill gave me an assessing look that suggested he wasn’t entirely convinced a city boy would be much use, but he nodded. “Always appreciate an extra pair of hands. You know anything about horses?”
“Not much,” I admitted. “I know which end the food goes in.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “Well, you’re about to learn a lot more today. Come on.”
He opened the back of the trailer, and fuck me sideways, the horses were huge. Again, I had seen them in pictures and even in a few parades, but never had I been up close and personal with the beasts. The animals were magnificent, huge draft horses with feathered feet and gentle eyes.
“Let’s get this done,” Sylvie said.
What followed was several hours of surprisingly enjoyable physical labor.
We loaded the wagons with hay bales and thick fleece blankets for the guests to bundle up in.
We prepared thermoses of hot chocolate and arranged them in insulated containers.
Bill showed me how to attach jingle bells to the horses’ reins, so they’d make that classic sleigh-ride sound as they moved.
I was a tall man. A big man. But the horses intimidated the hell out of me.
Sylvie was in her element, directing the setup while also being incredibly patient when I had questions about how things worked. We attached battery-powered Christmas lights to the wagons, transforming them into something magical that would glow beautifully against the snow-covered trees.
All the while I was enjoying working beside her, watching her laugh at something Bill said or seeing her face light up when she stepped back to admire our handiwork, I knew I should tell her the truth.
Every moment I stayed silent was another moment I was lying to her, another layer of betrayal that would make everything worse when it finally came out.
I could tell her right now. Pull her aside, explain what the contract actually meant. I should give her a chance to hear it from me before her father broke the news. It was the decent thing to do, the only honorable option available.
But I didn’t. I kept working, kept pretending and stole the last few hours with her before everything inevitably fell apart.
“This looks great,” Sylvie said, surveying the decorated wagons with satisfaction. “The guests are going to love this. Thanks for helping, Kent. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
The gratitude in her voice made me feel like the worst kind of fraud.
“I should probably head up to the lodge,” she said, checking the time on her phone. “Dad’s expecting me for lunch. Wish me luck?”
She looked so hopeful, so excited about presenting what she thought was her family’s salvation. The trust in her eyes was almost physically painful to witness.
I watched her start to walk away, heading toward the lodge steps where her father was probably waiting to destroy all those hopes. My mind was screaming at me to stop her, to tell her everything before she walked into that meeting unprepared.
Right before she reached the steps, something in me snapped.
“Sylvie!” I called out.
She turned back, smiling that bright smile that I knew I was about to wipe off her face forever.
“Yeah?”
This was it. The moment where I could either do the right thing or let her walk into an ambush. The choice was mine. I knew that whatever I decided in the next few seconds would define who I really was.
Not a Bancroft trying to prove himself to his father. Not a trust fund playboy trying to avoid consequences. Just Kent, looking at the woman he’d fallen for and trying to decide if he had the courage to be honest.