CHAPTER TWENTY
‘AND THE SOLUTION you’ve come up with is marriage?’
Lily Newman’s steps faltered at the words. Not because she was at an engagement party—her best friend Caitlyn’s—where marriage was supposed to be celebrated, but because of the anger that stiffened every word she’d overheard.
There was something familiar about the voice, though not because she knew the person speaking. It was just something in the tone... But that was ridiculous, so she focused on the fact that since she didn’t recognise the voice entirely she couldn’t be overhearing either of the individuals she was celebrating that evening.
She looked around to check whether she might be caught eavesdropping. Not that she wanted to be doing that. She had come upstairs to have some time alone. Yes, maybe it did have something to do with seeing her ex-fiancé Kyle arrive with the woman he’d cheated on Lily with. Okay, maybe it had everything to do with that.
Because she hadn’t wanted to face it, she’d escaped the lavish party Caitlyn’s wealthy fiancé Nathan was hosting at his newly purchased home, thinking she might as well explore considering the time she would spend there once her friend was married. But her exploration had ended fairly quickly when she’d heard those angry words from the room she was now standing outside.
‘Mr Brookes, we think—’
Brookes was Nathan’s surname, she thought, and realised why the man’s voice had sounded so familiar. He was one of Nathan’s family. Perhaps the brother Caitlyn had told her Nathan had a tenuous relationship with. The one she’d never met and knew not to bring up in front of Nathan after Caitlyn had told her not to. She knew she should give him his privacy, and was about to leave when the man spoke again.
‘It doesn’t really sound like you were thinking at all, Jade.’
The voice hadn’t risen in volume, but Lily felt a chill go through her.
Poor Jade.
‘We...we actually did put a lot of thought into this, Mr Brookes.’ A male voice took over from Jade, though his words were no more confident.
‘Then take me through your thought process.’
Careful, Lily thought.
She looked around again, saw that she was still alone, and leaned against the wall.
‘We did the research.’ Jade was speaking again. ‘The file we mailed you has all the results from various avenues—test groups, opinion polls, social media. Yes, you’re a successful businessman now, but you’ve done that largely outside of the public eye. People still remember you as the man who lost the Shadows Rugby Club their chance to compete internationally. They remember you as the man who would do anything to win a game, but took it too far in the end.’
There was a pause, and then Jade continued hesitantly. ‘And then all the attention was on your suspension, and the partying you did during the year after your last game for the Shadows...’
‘You’re not telling me anything new.’ The words were flat. ‘I hired you because I knew that it would be difficult to...restore my image. But I’m doubting my decision now, since you’re telling me marriage is the only way I can do that.’
‘It’s not the only way,’ the other man Lily had yet to identify said quickly. ‘But it’s the fastest way. And considering that the buy-out is time-sensitive...’ He trailed off.
There was silence for a while, and Lily pushed away from the wall. Guilt spread through her when she realised she shouldn’t be listening to a private conversation. Sure, she wanted to know more about Nathan’s mysterious brother—if that was who he was—but it was purely out of curiosity. There really wasn’t a reason for her to listen to Nathan’s family’s business.
She turned away, forcing herself to act like the confident woman she was trying to be and face Kyle, but she paused when she heard the voices in the room again.
‘I shouldn’t have asked you to come to my brother’s engagement party.’
So he was Nathan’s brother.
‘We can discuss this tomorrow, after the TV interview.’
Her thoughts froze when she realised the man was now walking towards the door, and her legs moved just in time to avoid being caught. She hurried down the passage and turned the corner that led to the stairs...
And then stilled when she saw the man she was trying to avoid walking up them.
Kyle.
His date—the other descriptions in her mind weren’t quite as polite—was giggling as he whispered something into her ear. Lily had never bothered to learn the woman’s name—why would she need to know the name of the woman she’d caught naked in her fiancé’s arms?—but she did remember the red hair and petite frame.
It made her pull at the dress Caitlyn had begged her to wear a few days ago. It was too tight, Lily thought desperately. She wished with all her might that it wasn’t in a shocking red colour that did nothing to hide the curves Lily had plenty of—too many, in fact.
Her pretend confidence was already dwindling, she realised. And although there was a part of her that told her it was to be expected when she was about to face the man who had broken her down throughout their relationship—who had cheated on her—she had expected more of herself.
It also did her no good to notice how much smaller than Lily Kyle’s date was. She watched the man she had once thought she loved slide a hand around the woman’s tiny waist, pulling her close enough that there was no space between them. They were sneaking away to fool around, she realised, nausea fierce in her belly. How many times had she thwarted Kyle’s attempts to do just that with her when they were at parties? He hadn’t only found a woman smaller than her, Lily thought. She was also the risk-taker Kyle had always wanted and Lily would never be.
In the split second before Kyle saw her Lily decided to take a risk. She wanted Kyle to think that she had been making out with someone upstairs. That the thing she had refused to do with him—the thing he had found someone else for—she was now doing with someone other than him.
She would probably think that it was a terrible decision later, but as she fluffed her coiled curls and rubbed her lips together to smudge her lipstick she only hoped one thing—that Nathan’s brother had a sense of humour.
‘Lily?’
Kyle’s voice immediately sent her skin crawling and her heart galloping. She couldn’t believe that she’d once found that voice attractive. Now she heard the slime curl around every word.
She lifted her eyebrows. ‘Kyle? I didn’t see you there. How are you?’
The of-course-you-saw-me glint in Kyle’s eyes set her teeth on edge and had a small part of herself recoiling.
‘I’m well. How are you? I heard you managed to get that bookstore up and running eventually.’
‘It’s doing really well, actually. My initial investment was quite substantial, as you know.’
Kyle’s eyes hardened, and satisfaction pumped through her. But then it gave way to the usual feelings of disgust at the thought of how their relationship had ended. At how she’d compromised her integrity, her dignity.
She ignored the fact that her self-confidence was deteriorating with every moment she spent in his presence.
‘You’ve never met Michelle before, have you? At least not officially.’