Just To Be With You (The Sullivans #12)

“She was.”

“It’s amazing how beautiful and talented she is, isn’t it?”

“Mom,” Serena said, finally speaking up, “we should go.” She didn’t even look at him, obviously too embarrassed to do anything but say a soft thank-you to Tatiana for doing the read-through with her.

Tatiana threw her arms around the model and said something to her that neither Ian nor Serena’s mother could hear, and when Serena pulled back, she was smiling again.

Genevieve held out her hand to Ian. “It was positively lovely to meet you, Ian. I do hope we’ll be seeing you again, and soon.”

Ian had learned early on from his own mother that if he didn’t have anything nice to say, it was better to keep his mouth shut. “Take care, Genevieve, of both yourself and your daughter.” He would have walked over to say a personal good-bye to Serena, but it was far too likely that her mother would see it as a sign of interest, rather than politeness. He remained in the living room while Tatiana walked the two women out.

* * *

Closing the door behind her a few minutes later, Tatiana slumped against it. “Poor thing, I don’t know how she deals as well as she does with everything. Tell me, what did you think?”

“You’re amazing at what you do.”

She smiled, a big smile that told him how much his compliment meant to her. “Thank you. But Serena’s the one up for the role, not me. What did you think of her?”

“She was good. Not polished. Not particularly confident, either. But there was something about what she did that was compelling. Very compelling.”

“Raw emotion. She’s brimming over with it. It’s less that she’s trying to act the part, more that she is the part. Which is precisely what I’m hoping will happen for me with my new role, that I’ll understand it well enough to become the freakin’ character soon. Unfortunately, thus far it’s—”

She cut herself off with a frustrated little growl as she walked into the living room to pick up the coffee mugs. “I never offered you anything to drink. Want a cup?” When he shook his head, she put them in the sink, then turned back to say, “Thank God neither my mom nor Valentina were stage-mother types. To be fair, though, I can see that it would be hard for Genevieve to have a daughter that beautiful without worrying about people taking advantage of her. I suppose you’d want to do anything you could to protect her.”

“Protecting her?” He thought about the way Serena’s mother had practically offered her daughter up to him, simply because he was rich and came from a powerful family. “I’m not sure that’s what she was doing.”

“No,” Tatiana said with a sigh. “I’m afraid you might be right. She looked at you like you were a particularly delicious piece of candy that she would have been happy for either her or her daughter to enjoy. When I asked you to stay to give your opinion, I didn’t think about how uncomfortable that would be for you.”

“It wasn’t a problem.”

“You should have heard her before you got here, going on and on about how gorgeous all you Sullivans are. I’m thinking I should check the picture she was looking at and make sure there isn’t any drool I need to wipe off.” Tatiana picked up a framed photo from her mantel and studied it carefully before putting it back. “Looks clean and dry, thankfully.”

He didn’t recall seeing this picture from Marcus and Nicola’s wedding, one where everyone was relaxed rather than posing wedding-style for the shot. “Did you get this from the photographer?”

“No, I took it.” She smiled at it, then at him. “I really shouldn’t be so hard on Genevieve. All of you Sullivans really are quite pretty.”

As he looked at the beautiful woman standing before him, Ian finally accepted that she didn’t have a clue just how alluring, how tempting she was herself. On the day they’d met in the vineyard, he’d been so certain it was all an act on her part, that there must be something she was trying to gain by acting so, well, normal...despite all the evidence to the contrary.

Now he knew it wasn’t an act. Because though Tatiana was a world-class actress, she was one of the few women that he’d never seen put on an act in real life. Instead, amazingly, she let herself be real, be honest, be vulnerable. He could now see why Valentina and Smith were so protective of her.

Ian found that he wanted to do whatever he could to protect her, too.

Especially from a man like himself.

“It must have been difficult for your father when you decided to become an actress.”

“I was pretty young when he passed away. I’d only just started to do a few commercials, so he never had to deal with me falling for bad boys.”

“It wouldn’t matter how young you were, he would still have worried, would still have wanted to protect you.”

“I would have liked that, to know that he was there to take care of me if I needed him.” Her words were soft, filled with longing for the father she’d lost far too early. “I always think of him, even now, when something really great happens. I want to run to him to tell him everything, want to feel him lift me up one more time and spin me around in circles until we’re both dizzy. Valentina says that she’s always felt him watching over us, but I didn’t get as many years with him as she did, and sometimes he’s so fuzzy in my head...”

Ian didn’t think before moving to close the distance between them. Tatiana’s grief at losing a parent was so much bigger than what he’d gone through with his divorce, and yet, she didn’t try to hold it in or to keep it caged inside.