Rule #32 The more they trust you, the worse it feels when you lie to them.
Matis
Ididn’t think this through. I’m sequestered in Amelia’s room in broad daylight, which means I can’t climb down from the window the way I came in. And her parents are home so I can’t walk out the front door either.
After she and I get out of the shower, I notice her mood has changed. She’s overthinking the news Daisy brought. I can practically read her mind. She thinks I should take the job in London, leaving her here without me.
My heart is telling me I would never do that.
My mind is telling me to at least consider it.
But to Amelia, she’s afraid that I’m sacrificing too much. If only she could understand…with her, nothing is a sacrifice.
After drying off, we return to her bedroom, where I find my phone vibrating with an incoming call. In nothing but my underwear, I pick it up and see Ronan’s name on the screen.
When I wince, she glances at it and her face falls.
“He’s going to ask you to meet with him today,” she mumbles quietly.
“It doesn’t matter,” I whisper.
“Yes, it does, Matis.”
Tossing my phone on the bed unanswered, I pull her into my arms. “If you don’t love me and never want to see me again, I’ll take the job. But that is the only condition under which I would say yes, understand me?”
My forehead presses against hers as her eyes close. “Matis. You don’t mean that. You’re just being romantic. But I know you…and you would love to have a new club.”
“Is that the case or not, mon trésor?”
She opens her big blue eyes and stares up at me innocently. “You’re not playing fair.”
“Is it?” I persist.
With a roll of her eyes, she falls deeper into my arms. “Of course it’s not. Promise me you’ll at least think about it.”
“Fine,” I mumble weakly. “I’ll think about it.”
When my phone buzzes again with an incoming text, I reach down to the bed and pick it up.
Ronan: Call me when you’ve got a minute. I have something to talk to you about today.
“You should call him back,” she says while pulling clothes out of her overstuffed closet.
“Then what? How am I going to get out of here?”
She giggles. “You should have thought of that before you climbed into my bedroom in the middle of the night.”
The corner of my mouth lifts in a smirk. “It was worth it.”
And it was…even though I think I pulled something in my back and my biceps are more sore than they’ve ever been in my life.
“Call him back and tell him you’re on your way over. I’ll distract him in the kitchen so you can sneak downstairs to the front door and knock like you just got here.”
She’s as cunning as she is adorable.
Pulling on my shirt and pants, I watch her comb her short blond hair, tousling her bangs over her forehead. “How will you distract him? And what about your mother?”
“I’ll show him my sketches,” she replies with a shrug. “He’s a sucker for anything I make. And my mom is glued to his side anyway, so I don’t think that’ll be a problem. I’ll just text you when the coast is clear.”
Watching her get ready, replaying the events of last night and how it felt to sink inside her for the first time, my heart pitter-patters wildly in my chest.
I’ll miss this, I think to myself. This phase of our relationship—sneaking around, being together despite the rules, indulging in all our firsts.
Amelia is it for me.
I don’t know when this happened or if I really tried to avoid it, but it happened nonetheless. She owns my heart.
Even if she moves on with her own life without me someday, Amelia is the last person I will ever love this way.
Fifteen minutes later, she slips downstairs with her sketchbook under her arm.
I’ve already texted Ronan to tell him that I’m in the area and on my way over.
As I wait in her room for the text to tell me it’s clear for me to go downstairs, I stand with my back against the door and a feeling of disgrace in my gut.
I’ve never judged men my age who pursued women Amelia’s age. Hell, I’ve done it in the past. But it’s not like that with us. I know that in my heart. I never acted on or desired anything with her before this month. It’s not her age that I love.
It’s her.
Her spirit. Her soul. Her brilliance.
These things ring with truth in my heart, but will others see it? Can I withstand the criticism others will project at us?
And what about my friendship with Ronan? This changes everything.
My phone buzzes and I look down to see a message from Amelia on the screen.
Amelia: Go.
There’s a sense of unsettled nerves in my bones as I quietly peel open the door to Amelia’s room and slip down the hallway toward the stairs. The house is quiet, but I hear their voices in the distance, in the direction of the kitchen.
Thankfully, they’re speaking loud enough to each other that they don’t hear the creak on the stairs as I make my way to the main level. When I reach the bottom floor, I spot movement to the right and see a member of the house staff passing through with a pile of folded laundry in her arms.
In a rush, I tiptoe to the front door just across the foyer. Before I can reach it, someone behind me speaks, nearly giving me a heart attack.
“Bonjour, Monsieur Moreau.”
I spin around and smile at the housekeeper. She’s grinning at me politely.
If I’ve learned anything in my life of breaking rules and getting away with far more than I should have, I know the trick is to act as if I belong here and nothing is out of the ordinary.
I shove my hands in my pockets and greet the woman. “Bonjour,” I say with a flirty smile. “Is Ronan around? He’s expecting me.”
Hopefully no one notices that the front door never opened or closed.
“Of course,” the woman says before scurrying to the kitchen.
A moment later, Ronan turns the corner and beams at me.
“You weren’t kidding. You were in the area,” he jokes before putting out a hand for me to shake.
Behind him, Daisy and Amelia enter the room to greet me. Amelia is biting her bottom lip wickedly. She brings her fingers up to her mouth to hide her smile.
“Hey, Matis,” Daisy says, beaming sweetly. “Hungry? We’re about to sit down for lunch.”
“Er…” I start, but Ronan claps a hand on my shoulder to answer for me.
“We have a little business to discuss first, sweetheart. We’ll join you as soon as we’re done.”
When he looks into my eyes, I shrink all the way down to the floor. Everything hits me like a train on the tracks.
I am the world’s worst friend. This man, my best friend, and his wife trusted me with their children. Their fucking children.
And now I’m lying to them.
The fact that they’re falling for it makes it feel even worse.
“Okay,” Daisy replies with a sweet, trusting smile. “You two don’t work too hard.”
With that, I let Ronan steer me toward his office. Once we’re alone inside, I do my best to remain casual. Do what I normally do.
So I slowly meander to the leather chair, dropping into it and crossing one leg over the other.
“What are you scheming?” I ask.
Ronan pours us each a drink before moving behind his desk, handing the expensive whiskey over to me.
“I don’t scheme.” He wears a coy grin as he takes a sip of his.
“Yes, you do, and it usually involves me.”
“I bought a club,” he states plainly.
Of course, I already know this. I was standing next to his naked daughter in the shower when his wife broke the news to her.
So I act surprised. Raising my brows, I tilt my head to the side and wait for him to continue.
“In London.”
“You want me to move to London,” I state.
“What I want isn’t the question. That’s not my place,” he says, leaning back in his chair. “But you are the first person I’m going to offer it to.”
“I thought we retired,” I joke, taking another sip.
“I retired.”
“So did I,” I respond flatly.
“Then tell me no.”
Ronan Kade is one of the most understanding and gracious people I have ever met. It’s almost infuriating how accommodating he can be. Never pushing or pressuring. Never hard or cruel or judgmental.
He’s not telling me to take the club. He won’t even point out what we both know is true—that I’m bored. That I miss working. That I wasn’t ready for retirement.
Instead, he’s going to offer me exactly what he knows I want, leaving me to make the decision on my own.
What an asshole.
He doesn’t know why this decision is so hard for me. He can never know why I can’t answer him so easily. That my heart is here. It has left my chest entirely, living and beating in another person that I simply could not survive without now.
And it gets worse as Ronan pulls the photos of the club up on his computer and shows me. The building is beautiful, the area of downtown lively, the layout perfect.
“Ronan…I appreciate it, but I can’t.”
There’s a flinch of disappointment in his eyes, and if I’m honest with myself, I feel the disappointment too. I don’t want to tell him no. But I can’t tell him yes.
My mind is a fog of indecision.
“Okay then. I’ll ask someone else.”
“I can’t leave my mother,” I say, although it’s only partly true.
“You don’t owe me an explanation, Matis.”
“I know I don’t, but you are my friend. And as my friend, you have to listen to me complain about how bored I am here now. How much I miss it. So now you also have to listen to me complain that until my mother leaves this world without me, I must take care of her.”
“You’re a good man for that, Matis. But you know…she would be taken care of.”
I walked into this. I opened the door for his argument, and now I have to deal with it.
“I know, and I appreciate it. I really do, Ronan.”
“Then think about it,” he says. Leaning forward until his elbows are on the surface, he looks into my eyes.
Suddenly, I imagine a world in which I could tell Ronan the real reason I can’t leave. Because the woman I love lives here.
Unless…
An idea enters my mind, embedding itself in my brain like a virus. And once an idea starts, there’s no way to stop it.
Amelia could come to London. There, we could be free. We could be together without hiding or judgment. There’d be no rush to come out as a couple.
I could have everything I want. It’s right in my grasp.
“I’ll think about it,” I say, my eyes growing unfocused as I stare at the wood grain on the desk.
“Good,” he says proudly. Then, after a moment of silence, he leans back again. “So what else is new with you? You’ve been quiet lately. I take it you…met someone?”
There’s a quizzical lift to his brow that makes my stomach turn. But really…why would I lie any more than I already have?
“Actually…yes,” I say, downing the rest of the liquor in my glass.
Without looking up, I see Ronan smile widely. “Amelia, I assume.”
My head snaps up. “What?”
“This was her doing, right? She’s persistent.” He laughs. “The minute she said she was going to help find you a date on that app, I knew she wouldn’t quit until she did.”
“She’s persistent all right,” I mumble, sinking back down into the chair.
“So, tell me about…her…or him?”
I clear my throat. Fuck.
“Her,” I say, my brows pinched together. “And…she’s incredible. She’s funny and beautiful and has the kindest heart I have ever met.”
The corner of his mouth tugs upward as he watches me from across the desk.
“I’ve waited years to watch you fall in love,” he says. “It’s about time. When do we get to meet her?”
Trying to clear my throat, I end up in a coughing fit mostly from the burn of the whiskey that seems to have gone down wrong.
Ronan chuckles on the other side of the desk. “Okay fine, I’ll slow down. You’re not ready for that. Message received.”
I laugh it off with him, but it’s clear to me that I can’t be totally natural around Ronan in this scenario. And not just because it’s Amelia I’m dating but because talking about relationships in general is new to me.
After that awkward encounter, I follow Ronan out of the office and to the dining room, where Amelia and Daisy are enjoying their lunch. I accept their offer to stay, sitting across from Amelia as a quiche is placed on the table in front of me.
She’s talking about her sketches and ideas for her fashion show, and I’m so enamored by her as she speaks that the realization doesn’t dawn until a few moments later.
If Amelia gets into her program, she won’t be able to leave Paris.
And getting into her program is exactly what she wants.
With a smile, I look down at her sketches as if it’s my first time seeing them. “You are so talented,” I say with a wink as she fights back her blush.
“You’re just saying that because you’re my biggest fan,” she replies.
“No, I’m your biggest fan because you are so talented.”
While she and I argue, her parents watch us with pleased expressions on their faces. They’re proud of themselves because they think they chose the perfect godfather for their daughter.
If only they knew the truth.