Chapter 6 Ryder
Ryder
“I have responsibilities like keeping you from losing your daddy’s fortune,” Charlie says to me in the dark nightclub on Davie Street. Her eyes grow into slitted moonstones, cut like diamonds. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“After I walk you home,” I say. I won’t have a beautiful woman walking the streets at night alone, especially not her. It doesn’t mean I have ill intentions. I follow her to the club’s door, even though she seems determined to leave me in the dust.
We’re on Davie Street when we turn left on Burrard in silence.
The cooling Vancouver air simmers between us.
We arrive at one of the five-star hotels in a glass tower downtown when I say, “I’m not sure I’ve told you how sorry I am about what happened between us.
And for what you lost. I’ve never stopped thinking about it. ” Or you.
“You haven’t?” She looks at me deeply before shaking her head. “It’s fine. Forget it.”
“What if I can’t forget it?”
She looks down. Her skin is glistening from the evening out as I fight the desire to pull her into my arms. I brush a strand of hair behind her ear and lean in closer.
It’s like nothing she’s said to me has sunk in, or I’ve lost my inhibitions from all the beers at the bar. Maybe they’re just hitting me.
“I missed out,” I say.
My face drifts closer to hers. Our lips draw together, and our gazes lock in something fierce and knowing. Is it my imagination, or is she not pulling away? Her haunting eyes fill with desire, full lips part, and temptation fills me.
A high-pitched ring breaks the moment as I zone into her. Her phone is ringing. I take a moment to realize what it is. Her face jerks from mine, and her hand digs into her purse. She pulls out her phone and stares at it with a deep worry crease between her brows.
“I need to take this.” She rushes down the street, away from me and the hotel.
I watch her pace the sidewalk, clutching the phone to her ear.
I can briefly make out her conversation.
“Is he okay? Do you need me to come home and take care of it? I’ll go to the airport now.
Okay, okay. Are you sure you have it under control?
” I catch bits of her tense phone conversation.
She hangs up and walks back to me with a tight jaw and pinched brow. She’s obviously stressed.
“Another difficult client?” I ask with concern.
“It’s not his fault. He inherited the difficult gene.
He’s pretty good, considering.” She shakes her head, making her way to the hotel doors, and I can just imagine the drama she puts up with.
She shouldn’t have to put up with anything.
Not when I have every means to take care of her.
What am I thinking? Other than I’d like to see Charlie smile the way she did when we were in the club and she was dancing.
I want to whisk her away on my sailboat and make up for every pain she’s ever felt and loss she’s experienced.
She carries too much weight on her shoulders.
She did back then when she was so worried about her dad. And she does now. I can see it.
“Do you like your job?” I ask her as a concierge holds open the hotel door for us. We walk through the upscale lobby with Victorian décor and round the corner to the elevator.
“What kind of question is that? Who likes their job? You don’t like yours and have the best job in the company.”
“I never said I don’t like it.”
“Well, you were pretty hasty to flush it down the toilet.”
“That wasn’t my intention.” Or maybe it was.
“And no, I don’t love my job,” but I still wasn’t sure why I did what I did or any of the reckless stunts I’ve pulled over the years.
Or my whole life. I mean, why? Maybe I wanted attention because my dad was a workaholic, my mom had depression, and I’ve felt invisible my whole miserable life.
“What job would you like, then? Environmentalist? I know a few of those,” she says it bitterly.
“Maybe.” I think before blurting what comes to mind first. “Though, honestly, the best job is the parents who get to raise their kids. They have the best jobs, don’t you think?
” What am I saying? Maybe I’m lit because I can’t believe I just said that to her, and she looks at me like I’m speaking another language.
My confession was shocking, even to myself.
She taps her toe in front of the elevator. “I have to go back to LA early. Something came up. But you can handle the press release yourself, okay?”
“No…”
“What?” She flashes me a worried look as the elevator doors open.
“No, I can’t handle the press release myself.” Somehow, I’ve found my way into the elevator with her, and she hasn’t sent me home yet.
“Of course you can, Ryder. You are a bigger boy than you think.” The elevator cart goes up before it stops, and she exits it.
I follow her down the hall and watch her unlock the door to her hotel room.
She’s about to shut the door in my face, and I can’t let her.
I’m realizing that if I don’t do something now, if I don’t say something now, I may never see her again and never get the chance.
Is there a way to tell someone that every stupid thing you’ve done to them was only out of love?
I press my hand to the top of the door. “Fine, I’ll take care of it myself if you let me in and tell me how I can make you stop hating me so much.”
“Your words, not mine.”
“You know, a day doesn’t go by that I don’t regret what my father did.”
“You’re not your father,” she says, and I’m not sure I believe her. It’s like she’s rehearsed the words as self-preservation. The tension in her jaw and the fierceness in her nod picks up. “Even if you ghosted me and were cruel to me after what your father did.”
She’s right. I tried to discourage unworthy dudes from hitting on her.
They could have caused her pain. Though, I took it too far.
The sheer pain in her eyes scarred my brain that night.
Regret fills me as I drag a hand through my hair, following her inside.
She hasn’t exactly closed the door in my face, but I have some explaining to do.
“Sorry, I didn’t want those jerks anywhere near you.
And you clearly didn’t want to hear from me since you ignored every text I sent you when I returned from France. ”
“I ignored every text you sent me because you only called me after you came back, and my family had lost everything. It was too late. My family was suffering and penniless, and you were too busy hanging out on nude beaches and fucking debutantes in France to care.”
Not true. I didn’t call you because I felt guilty as sin. But nothing I say will heal the past.
“You called me a child in front of your friends, but you are the… reckless one, Ryder,” she says, and that’s it.
Instead of telling her how wrong she is, I take her in my arms and lead her to the wall. “You think I’m reckless?” I say as her pupils grow wider. “You know what I think you are?” I growl.
“What?” Her bottom lip quivers, and her eyes spark defiantly.
“I think you’re mine. You might have rebelled against me. You might have gone to LA to become hot shit, but underneath that tough act, your heart, your soul, belong to me… always did, Charlie Gibbons.”
Her jaw drops. My lips draw into the curve of her neck, inhaling her sweet scent.
My hand slides down her hip and to the hem of her skirt.
I slowly lift the black material and drag my hand up her inner thigh.
Her breath rasps against my ear in uneven pants as my teeth drag along her skin to taste, my fingertips tracing the damp lace covering her pussy.
My voice rumbles. “You’re still soaked for me. ”
I’m about to drag the wet lace to the side when her hands land against my chest.
“So…” she says, breathless.
“So,” I growl, my finger teasing the vee between her legs as her hips react.
“Tell me why, after all these years, you’re still so wet for me?
” I move the lace to the side as her gray eyes darken with desire.
“Why do you still look at me like a schoolgirl crushing?” My lips lower to hers.
I can feel her breath on them when I press a finger deep into her folds, and she moans.
“Do not.” Those soft pink lips part. Her hands on my pecks soften as she wilts in my arms.
“Eyes don’t lie, and the lust in yours could take down walls. Don’t worry, sweetheart, I know how you feel.” I brush back her hair as the finger of my other hand plunges inside her. “Some things never change. First loves don’t die that easily.” My mouth slants to hers to claim.
“You think I was in love with you?” When her voice cracks, her lashes lower, and a tear rolls down her cheek. Charlie doesn’t seem like someone who cries anymore. Even though she was once the most openhearted woman I’ve met.
I pause, my nose grazing hers. A salty tear lands in my mouth when our lips brush. “I think we were meant for each other until I messed up. Always have been a shit.” I slip my finger out of her and cradle her head in my palms to gaze into her moonstone eyes.
“At least you’re right about one thing.” She peers up at me.
“If it weren’t for that, we would have been unstoppable.
The reason I didn’t call from France wasn’t because you didn’t consume me.
Romeo’s crush pales to mine, but I knew my father failed you.
The guilt was killing me. I was so angry with him.
Your parents were good people, and you deserved better than us ruthless Alexanders who claim to have morals.
” My hand caresses her cheek, and my thumb swipes at the moisture that drains from her eyes, leaving them glassy and transparent.
Her bottom lip quivers, her lashes glistening. “I don’t know why I’m emotional. It’s been a tough time since I left Vancouver, and I just had a very upsetting call.” She swipes at her eyes as though her tears should embarrass her when all I want to do is kiss them into eternity.