The nurse appeared at my elbow. “Miss, you need to leave. You’re upsetting my patient.” The breathy girlishness was gone from her voice.
But the statement only served to further enrage the Pardini patriarch. “I’m allowed to be upset!”
“For the record,” I bellowed over his voice, pushing the nurse aside. “I don’t care whether you put Luke in your will or not. I think it would be good for him if he cut you out of his life. At least, he would never have to deal with you anymore.”
“Miss—”
I ripped my elbow out of her hands. “I’m leaving.” I stumbled out of the room in a fog of rage, hardly knowing where I was going. Luke was nowhere to be seen. I was upset with myself and my heart was racing with all of the things he said—all of the things I said. I should have kept my mouth shut. I didn’t know what effect my words would have on Luke’s father. What if he took everything I said to heart, and cut him off like I suggested? You’re an idiot. You’re a moron. Luke paid you to do a job and you blew it!
I stopped midway down the hall. It had been a quarter of an hour and there was no sign of Luke. Maybe he left. Ahead, I saw a sign for a restaurant and bar and followed it.
I found Luke perched on a barstool. It was eleven in the morning, so most of the place was empty. The bar was deserted. He stared down the tiny shot glass, a small row of empty glasses beside it. I edged up to him as he stared morosely downwards, not even acknowledging my presence, playing with the glass with his long fingers.
“Three shots at eleven A.M.? Must be some sort of record,” I said lightly.
Luke shrugged and I placed my hand over his to stifle his movements.
“Didn’t expect to see you here.”
I blinked. “Why?”
“You heard my father. I won’t be able to pay you anymore.”
“Luke, I don’t care about the money.”
He gave me a sidelong grin that looked uncannily like his father’s. “Right.”
“I mean it.” My heart was beating in my ears as I stole myself to tell him. Luke’s father hadn’t been what I had pictured. Luke had painted a dark portrait of an evil, masochistic man, but all I had seen was man full of pain, bewildered by his son’s coldness. He was horribly misguided, but evil? I didn’t think so. Still, on the whole, Luke would probably be better off without his dad in his life.
“I wish I had your dad,” I confessed.
“Your foster parents must have been pretty terrible if you prefer him.” He looked at me and flinched. “Sorry.”
“No one ever gave a damn about me. If I died, no one would really notice. No one except Natalie. I don’t know what being loved feels like.”
“Neither do I, really.”
“Your mother loved you,” I said sharply. “And as mean as he is, your father still cares about you.”
He laughed as he sipped the dregs of his drink. “How would you know?”
“We had a—a talk.”
“‘Bout what?”
I took his hand and set it in my lap, nervously squeezing his palm. “Well, I yelled at him and he told me things about you—about your mom. Maybe if you knew them, it might change your feelings about him.”
Luke slipped his hand out of my grasp, shaking his head.
“No, listen. He said that he paid for psychiatrists and therapists and everything under the moon for your mom and he hid her depression from you. To protect you. He even sent you away to protect you from her in-laws, who were demanding more money and suing him. He didn’t want you to see all that.”
Luke, who had been shaking his head harder the more I talked, slammed his fist into the bar table so that the glasses fell on their sides. “No! Everything he says is a lie.”
“Luke, in all fairness, why would he lie about that? He could probably furnish proof if you asked for it.”
He turned to me, anger thickening his features. “Then why not tell me about all this? Why did he make me think it was my fault she died?”
“He probably didn’t know that you felt that way. I know it’s screwed up, but like I said, he thought he was doing the best thing for you. He told me he wanted you to become normal—not consumed with greed like your cousins and uncle. And you know what, it worked.” Even though I told his father otherwise, I believed it now. Growing up away from all that money and influence—wasn’t that a good thing? “I think you should go back there and talk to him about all of this.”
He slammed a few notes on the bar table. “I don’t care about it. It’s too late for me to hear all of this. All I want from him is what I deserve—my inheritance.”
“I told your dad something,” I blurted.
Luke’s wavering, drunken eyes were fixed on me. “Told him what?”
My eyes slid over his slightly wet ones. “That I’m in love with you.”
He blinked and almost fell out of his stool. Then he chuckled and the sound cut through me like a knife. “Did he buy it?”
Hollowness resonated inside me. Even if I told him I meant it, he would never believe me. “Luke, I meant it about the money. I don’t want you to pay me anymore. If I could, I would give it all back to you.”
His eyebrows were in danger of disappearing in his hair. “Why?” he said in a voice that was completely sober.
My heart seemed to jump out of my chest. Just say it. A strong voice I had never heard before echoed inside my head; it filled me with courage. Go after what you want. “Because being with you has been the best time of my life and I don’t want to be paid for it. I want it to be real.”
I was already turning away. I didn’t want to see him looking sorry for me; it would destroy me. His feverish hand closed over my wrist and dragged me back against my will, making me face his intense gaze.
He looked stunned. His deep blue eyes were wide and his mouth trembled. “I—I don’t—”
I didn’t want to hear it. I leaned into him and his arm wrapped around my waist. My lips silenced his and I tasted the alcohol swirling in his mouth and the smell of his hair that was uniquely his, clouding around me like perfume. I remembered hotly the night we had sex and how his smell lingered all over my body. I deepened the kiss, knowing that this couldn’t last and that I might as well enjoy it. I pulled back and he was looking at me, breathless, as though he had never seen me before.
“I know you don’t feel the same. I just had to tell you.”