Chapter 8
Harry
Imake it exactly three steps toward the car before I stop.
What the hell am I doing?
The driver motions me toward the car, but I take a step back, my thoughts assaulting me in a whirlwind. I can’t do this to her. I can’t treat her like this, like everyone else seems to.
George abandoned her at the altar. Her father treats her like a commodity to be transferred, and based on the way her mother was looking at her at the reception, she can’t be much better.
And now I’m adding to that list, shipping her off to be alone in Manhattan so I can pretend this situation is manageable, so I can pretend I don’t want to strip her dress off her body and remind her that she’s far more than whatever she thinks of her body.
I take another step back, and my breath leaves my lungs.
She stands there in the middle of the lobby, her palms pressing into her eyes like she’s trying to ground herself, and I move before I can think better of it.
I push back through the revolving door, my steps too quick, my carefully curated facade left behind.
I don’t second-guess — my hand wraps around the back of her head, my other around the small of her waist, and I pull her in, pressing her against my chest as I scan the lobby for somewhere somewhat secluded.
“Breathe,” I murmur, feeling her still against me.
My walls are too far down.
There. By where she’d sat with her sister this morning, behind the fountain, behind the plants.
I move her before she can protest, lifting her up just enough to warn her that I’m walking. She doesn’t fight it. Eyes trail us, a mixture of previous guests and people checking in for the day, but I do my best to shield her from sight.
The second their line of sight is broken, I lower her back down, take her face in my hands, and gently pry her off my jacket. Her eyes are wide, but unfocused, staring either at something on my shirt or right through me.
“Hey,” I say softly, my thumbs rubbing gently back and forth across her cheeks. “Can you take a deep breath for me?”
Her lashes flutter, her chest rising slowly but jaggedly. The release is just as shaky.
“Atta girl. Another one.”
Her jaw steels beneath my grasp, but she does it, a little more steady this time.
I study her face, angling her head back just a bit more, forcing her eyes to lock on mine. “What do you want, Elena?” I ask, keeping my voice low, just for her. “Not what I’ve offered you. Not what your father expects. What do you actually want?”
Her lips part, but no words come out. She blinks at me like I’m asking her to solve quantum physics or explain the meaning of life.
“The penthouse in Manhattan,” I clarify. “Is that what you want, or are you just agreeing because it’s what I suggested?”
“I—” She stops, her brows knitting, her throat bobbing on a swallow. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Yes, you do.” My fingers graze the top of her forehead, sweeping a stray wave back behind her ear. “I’m asking you what you want. Not Elena, the conscientious daughter. Not Elena, the reluctant bride. You.”
Her chin lifts, and there’s a flash of defiance in her panicked gaze, the same flash I’d seen in the private room at the church when she’d reminded me that she didn’t have a choice.
But it disappears just as quickly as it came, that easy mask slipping back into place no matter how much it clearly affects her. “It doesn’t matter what I want.”
“It matters to me.”
The words hang between us, more honest than I intended them to be. Her gaze breaks, blinking faster, looking anywhere but me.
When she finally responds, it’s so quiet I almost miss it.
“I don’t want to go to Manhattan,” she breathes, her jaw quivering. “I don’t want to be alone.”
The admission hits me square in the chest. Of course she doesn’t want to be alone — she’s just been abandoned by everyone who should have been protecting her, passed around like a business asset, married off to a man she barely knows.
The last thing she needs is more isolation.
“Okay,” I murmur. “Where do you want to be?”
Her gaze locks back on me, and the vulnerability there nearly breaks me. “With you.”
Two words. That’s all it takes to completely derail every thought in my head.
I shift one hand to the back of her neck and drag my other through my hair, not caring if it messes it up, trying to think past the way she’s looking at me and the memory of how she felt in my arms last night.
This is dangerous territory. The smart thing would be to put distance between us, to maintain boundaries until we can figure out what will happen when George inevitably comes crawling back.
But the defeated slump of her shoulders, the glassiness of her eyes, and the way her jaw is flexed like it costs her too much to say what she wants, tell a different story.
She’s spent her entire life being told what to do, where to go, who to marry — I’m sure of that.
Everyone’s treated her like she’s disposable.
I don’t want to be another man who abandons her.
“All right,” I sigh, the decision solidifying in my mind as I speak. “We’ll move your things to Highcourt Hall instead. You can stay in the guest house, if you’re okay with that.?”
She nods and wipes her eyes with the side of her thumb.
“Okay. Your sister can visit whenever she wants, stay as long as she likes. The estate’s big enough.”
I can see the relief flood her. Her lower lip trembles, her hand stops shaking as badly, and all of it confirms exactly what I’d suspected — that she’s been bracing herself for rejection and disappointment. She’s been expecting it.
“Elena,” I say, tapping the underside of her chin with my knuckle to get her to look at me again. “You don’t have to bite your tongue with me. You don’t have to agree to things you don’t want just to keep the peace. This isn’t your parents’ house, understand?”
Her throat bobs. “Old habits.”
“Then break them.” The command comes out a little rougher than I wanted it to. “You’re not a child anymore, and you’re not an object. If you don’t want something, tell me. If you need something, ask for it. Your opinion matters.”
“Does it?” Her voice breaks. Christ.
“Yes,” I sigh, my thumb tracing the hairline at the nape of her neck. “It matters to me.”
She nods, though I’m not sure if it’s to me or herself. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me for treating you like a human being.”
The lobby fades around us as she looks up at me, her eyes wide, her mouth parted like she either wants me to kiss her again or wants to say something. Close enough that I can take what I want, close enough to make me forget every reason why I shouldn’t.
She’s strikingly easy to fall into. And that’s exactly why I take a very deliberate step back, letting my hand fall from her, breaking the spell before I do something stupid and put us further down a pathway we won’t be able to undo when my son inevitably crawls out from wherever he’s hiding.
Something shifts in her expression the moment cool air comes between us.
“George will come to his senses eventually,” I say, my voice far rougher than intended. “And when he does, he’ll honor his commitment to you.”
Her breath falters. “But—”
“This is temporary, Elena.” The words taste bitter on my tongue, but I know I need to say them, for both of us. “The plan hasn’t changed. George will come back, we’ll get an annulment, and you’ll marry him instead.”
“You just said that my opinion matters to you.”
The words hit me like a blow. “It does.”
Her jaw works. “And yet I’m still expected to marry him.”
Fuck.
I don’t know what to do with that. Pivot. “I have work to focus on. We’re opening a new hotel in Switzerland, and I know you’ve got the events planning for White Distillery, so we can both work from home, from Highcourt. You won’t be alone—”
“You’re changing the subject,” she says.
I clench my teeth. “Yes.”
She nods, turning her head from me.
“If you need to travel for events,” I continue, trying to keep myself on course, “I can arrange that. Whatever you need to maintain your career, I can handle that from home.”
“Yes, sir.”
I can’t stop the genuine, physical recoil my body reacts with. The formality of it alone is off-putting, but the immediate thought of her saying it to her own father time and time again hits me square in the chest. “Don’t—don’t call me that.”
Her mouth purses into a thin line, but she nods. I can’t even tell if it was an intentional dig or if it just slipped out.
“Last thing,” I say carefully, and her gaze snaps back to mine. I hate the words before they even leave my lips. “What we did last night won’t happen again.”
The look that flashes across her features screams that she very much hates that, too. But it’s gone before it can fully settle. “Fantastic,” she deadpans.
“This isn’t a real marriage,” I insist. “We both know that. Until George comes back, we should have… boundaries, if you’re going to live with me.”
A single brow raises. “Boundaries?”
I blink at her. “Do you genuinely think it would be appropriate for either of us to have sex when you’re meant to be married to my son?”
“I didn’t say—”
“No, but you were thinking it.” I glance over my shoulder, half to give myself a break from staring at someone I want this badly, and half to check if anyone is listening. “And that’s okay. I was, too. But it’s not happening. That’s my rule, if you’re staying with me.”
“Christ,” she mutters. “Fine.”
“So glad you agree,” I say dryly, taking another step back. “Now, are you riding with me, or are you staying here for a while?”
“My bags aren’t packed—”
“I can have that handled.”
She shakes her head. “I want to stay for the night. Sarah’s still here until tomorrow.”
I nod. “Okay. Good, that’s good, that gives me time to sort out the guest house.”
She watches me, her breathing even now, her hair a bit of a mess from where my hands had held on.
“I do have to go,” I say carefully. “But I’ll send a car for you tomorrow. Call me if you need anything.”
She nods.
I take a step back, and then another, hating myself less this time — but the temptation to stay still gnaws at me.
I won’t touch her again, even with her in my house. I have to tell myself that I won’t.
I have to believe I won’t.