THIRTY-TWO
ZAIRN’S DECLARATION DIDN’T go down well and explained why Roman chose to move on. Someone mentioned an after party and he didn’t even bother inviting her. Good. She didn’t want to go.
Zairn and Roxie invited her back to theirs, but with Roman out, she couldn’t pass up the chance to have some alone time with Struan.
Oh, and Roxie’s question about finding her so fast? No one could answer that. It was kind of embarrassing she hadn’t asked it herself. With no friends in town, no connections, no one in LA knew her except her colleagues, and Renata hadn’t even known she was missing that night.
Back at the mansion, she went up to her bedroom to change out of her clothes and snagged a satin robe. If she and Struan were definitely alone in the house, she wouldn’t have bothered with it. Magnus could be around and she didn’t want to be caught creeping around the house naked late at night. Or at any time.
Dim light from under Struan’s bedroom door suggested he might still be awake. Whether he was or not, she still planned to visit. Pushing down the handle, she peeked around the door. Lying on the bed, back to her, he twisted to check who was intruding.
“Should I have knocked?”
“No, baby,” he said on a snicker. “Come here.”
In she went, closing the door with an extra push. Anything to slow unwelcome visitors. And, at that point, everyone was unwelcome.
“I was out at a premiere thing.”
“Yeah, I heard.”
Darting across the room, she leaped onto the bed and clambered over him, casting her robe aside so she was naked before wriggling under the covers and tucking herself in.
“You’re sleeping here tonight?”
Maybe she should’ve… “If that’s okay. I know it’s only been a couple of nights but…”
He caught her chin to match their eyes. “But…?”
“I’m not sure I could sleep in a cold bed without you.” Dumping herself on him was kind of rude. “Should I have asked permission?”
“No,” he said and propped his own head back on his fist. “No, Fawn, I just didn’t expect—”
“I can go,” she said, sitting up. “If you’d rather just—”
“No.” He put a hand on her waist to keep her still. “Stay where you are. Did Roman come back with you?”
She settled down again. “No, he went to party somewhere else. Zairn would only serve him club soda, so he wasn’t in the best of moods.”
“I saw they showed up. Was that a coincidence?” The curl of her lips and sly eyes answered for her. “Yeah, I didn’t think so. Good. I’m glad you had support. I’m always sorry when I can’t be with you.”
Oh, and there was regret. “If you saw them at the event, did you see the red carpet?”
“Yeah,” he said, his expression inscrutable.
“Does that mean you saw—”
“Yeah,” he said again, and shook his head on his knuckles. “Let’s not talk about that.”
Although she didn’t like barriers, she had to respect his boundaries. “I wish you hadn’t seen—”
“I do too. Other than that, did you enjoy yourself?”
If he wanted to move along that was more than fine by her. She’d happily relegate that kiss to some dusty, dirty corner of her memory and pile new shiny ones on top. Lots of Struan kisses would be excellent cover.
“Roxie asked me something. A question I couldn’t answer and Roman couldn’t either.”
“Okay, try me.”
“How did they find out who I was? ‘They’ being the national, potentially international, press. How did they ID me in the video so fast?” She kept going in spite of his frown. “No one in LA knew me, other than those I work with, and they didn’t even know I was missing during the power cut.”
“Renata? Maybe after the fact.”
“Why would someone think to ask Renata? Why would someone think to show her the picture?”
“If it was released online, maybe she saw it.”
“And immediately called the press? I can ask her,” she said, willing for that to be the answer. Though honesty wasn’t guaranteed. Her boss may not want to be fingered for squealing. “We were at that event until late, like wee hours late. I crashed as soon as I went home. I’d guess Renata did the same.”
“Some people get alerts to their phones.”
“Of every name ever? Why would she have Roman Lowe in her alerts?”
“I don’t know.”
“Roxie thought it was weird. The press arrived early. Like I said, we were at the event until late. The story didn’t hit while I was still awake, and then suddenly they were mobbing my street.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t there either.”
That only roused her smile again. “You would’ve been if you’d come home with me.”
“I would have if you’d asked instead of running off.”
“You were going to tell me. Right before they came in and interrupted us. You wanted to tell me something.”
His fingertips grazed her brow and coasted across her temple to comb into her hair. “Protecting Roman is second nature. It’s something I do automatically. That energy you felt? I felt it too, and it screwed with my head. I cover for Roman by rote. Never, ever, in all our history, has it ever occurred to me to reveal that I’m not him when I’m supposed to be playing him.”
“Our energy was different?”
“Sounds crazy, but being honest with you was important, I knew I should be honest with you. I had to be. Maybe it’s your aura, it begs a guy to lay it all out. I can’t be around you and not want to tell the truth. You demand sincerity, deserve it. I hate that I disappoint you.”
“You don’t disappoint me. I’m disappointing—”
“Yeah, I am. I’m disappointing myself too, because this is real. Us is real. For the first fucking time in my life, I have—at Roxie’s, when we’re alone, you just accept that I’ll put Roman first. Everyone keeps telling me I’m a pussy, or have a white knight complex, for holding my brother upright when it comes at the cost of me, my life. Yeah, there were times it frustrated me, but this time it’s more than that.”
“People care about you,” she said, wriggling closer. “No one wants to tell you what to do with your life.”
“Roman does, and maybe, if I thought it was mutual—that’s it. I thought all my life that it was mutual. We are siblings, twins, I believed we had this innate connection to want the best for each other, but it’s not true. He doesn’t want the best for me. He couldn’t care less. If I didn’t have the same face, if I wasn’t useful, he wouldn’t give a damn. He’d leave me in the dust. And what do I have, Bambi? Tell me what I have.”
“Things are—”
“I don’t mean things. Fuck things. I don’t need bricks and mortar or wheels on the road. When I turn around and look at what I’ve done with my life, it’s clear I’ve done nothing. Anything I’ve done worth anything is attributed to him. I’m my brother’s shadow, nonexistent to anyone but him.”
“Not to me. You’re everything to me.”
“If he wanted what was best for me, this would be tearing him apart as much as it is me. Want to know something?” She nodded. “He gets a kick out of it, a kick out of being with you, flaunting you, and not because you’re beautiful, though you are, but because you’re mine.”
She couldn’t disagree, but had to ask, “Where is this coming from? At Roxie’s, anytime I said anything, you stayed quiet. I assumed you accepted we had no future the same as I did, and didn’t want to say the words out loud for fear of hurting me. Tonight you feel different. This feels different. You’re energized.”
“Because I saw it tonight on that red carpet. I’ve done that with Sway so many times, so many times. Walking past the reporters is easy; if we did approach, or were penned in, Sway tended to take the lead. I never touched her, an arm around her waist, or our hands together, sure. Nothing over the line. I didn’t feel that way about her, and she was Roman’s, it didn’t enter my head.”
“The kiss,” she said, “because he kissed me.” The one he didn’t want to talk about, and this was why. It messed with his head. “It wasn’t a full-on kiss, and if I could have pushed him away—”
“I know, this isn’t on you,” he said, his fingers sinking deeper into her hair until they curled around the back of her neck, tipping her chin up. “I know what he did. And that was my breaking point. He didn’t kiss you because he wanted to or because you wanted him to. He didn’t even kiss you because he was cornered. No one asked him to do it. Why would they? It’s not necessary or traditional on a red carpet. In fact, it’s downright strange to do something like that.”
Which guaranteed more people would be talking about it.
“So why did he do it?” she asked. “He took me by surprise. I don’t know why he—”
“He did it to damage me. That’s the only reason there is. Whether I saw it live or later, it happened, and the press will talk about it. There will be pictures, there will be buzz online. I was always going to know it happened. He kissed you because you’re mine. You’re mine, and he knew you couldn’t stop him. I couldn’t stop him. He had all the power. He has all the power. That’s what the kiss was, his way of exerting superiority. It was predatory. Exactly the word you used. How many times do we hear that sexual assault is not about sex? It’s about power, and that’s what he gets off on.”
“What do you want to do?” she asked, laying a hand on his chest, enjoying how their lower bodies rocked together.
“I don’t know yet. It’s still… in my head.” Which was possibly why he hadn’t been ready to talk about it. “What I know for sure is I won’t let him do that to you again.”
“To us,” she said. “I had to endure it, but it was an assault on you too.”
And almost as intimate. Although he avoided the physical act, this was his twin, a man supposed to stand up for him, to take a bullet for him. Rather than treat her with care, as Struan did with Sway, Roman had taken advantage and abused that position of trust to gain a petty, resentful advantage. Forevermore that image would be out there in the world. The masses might not understand its significance; they always would. This wasn’t something easily forgotten or shrugged off.
Pushing up, she touched her lips to his and was so pleased when his responded. This changed how he felt about his brother, but from the way he scooped her beneath him and settled himself between her thighs, he proved it hadn’t changed them, hadn’t damaged them.
Whatever he decided to do, she’d be with him one hundred percent. She didn’t blame him for his confusion. This was a lifelong fraternal relationship he’d relied on, one that underscored his identity. Now he had to figure himself out all over again. That was okay. At his core, he was still him, and him was all she wanted.