“How generous of you to forgive them both. When did you decide your spy games were officially over? Last week? Tonight? A few moments ago?”
“The night of the break-in,” she said quietly. “I realized there was much more between us, and I didn’t want to sacrifice it for some strange sense of justified satisfaction. I wanted to get to know who you were, separate from your mother. And I did. Dalton, there were never any lies between us in bed, or with my emotions. I planned to tell you.”
His jaw clenched, and he spoke from between gritted teeth. “You planned to tell me, huh? I lay beside you and told you everything about my mother and the accident. Stuff I never shared with anyone else, because I fucking trusted you. Why didn’t you tell me that night, Raven?”
“I tried! I swear to God, I began talking, and then when I finished, I looked at you and you’d fallen asleep! So I promised myself I’d tell you the next morning, but you had to run out before we had a chance to talk.”
“Convenient. At least you’ve gotten the answers you need, Raven. Is that your real name? Or is it Bella?”
“My father called me Bella, but I go by Raven.”
“Good to know.” His words were like jagged paper cuts against her bare skin. She tried not to jerk back from his cold mockery. “It’s kind of funny that I played completely into your hands, isn’t it? I pursued you. I originally asked for the job to restore your bar. I stayed late at closing and showed up at the gym. It really was my fault, you know. I had no idea this whole time you had another agenda.” He began walking back and forth, tapping his finger to his mouth. “It makes sense now. The biting anger and sarcasm beneath your words. The way you looked at me sometimes with hatred. Studied my brothers and asked questions about my family. Convinced me to share secrets after sex. It was all for information gathering.”
“No, it wasn’t,” she interrupted. “I wanted to know more about you and your family—for me. Because I was beginning to truly care about you, separate from our past. Don’t you see we can move forward from this? We can even heal some of the rift between our families, and all these years of bitterness.”
“Because you don’t blame my mother anymore?”
“Yes. I don’t know if we’ll ever know what truly happened, but I don’t believe she was using my father.”
“I’m glad you don’t blame her anymore, Raven.” He spun around and faced her. His next words came like slow, deliberate bullets, and tore through her. “But I do blame your father. My father thought he was a coldhearted, manipulative bastard who wanted my mother’s money and saw an easy way to get it. And I do, too.” His blue eyes blazed like fire, but it wasn’t the warm kind that wrapped you in heat. No, this was the type that destroyed and broke, leaving nothing in its wake but devastation. “I think he was a liar, and I think you’re just like him. You only care about yourself, and you’re willing to hurt anyone else along the way to get what you want.”
“You can’t believe that.” She forced back the tears, strengthening her voice. “You’re angry and feel betrayed, and I understand. But I’ve never lied about my feelings for you. I know you feel the same way about me. You told me tonight.”
“I was wrong. It was just fucking, after all. I look at you now and feel . . . nothing.”
She shook her head. “Don’t say that. Don’t walk away from us.”
“There was never an us, Raven, or Bella, or whoever you are. There was just pretty lies, and great sex, and a mystery that’s now solved. Now I want you to get out of my house.”
“Dalton—”
“Now.”
He turned and walked out to the balcony, leaving her behind. Slowly, she rose from the bed and dressed, her movements numb. Heart shattering, she pushed through the raw pain and paused with her hand on the doorknob.
He needed time. With time, he’d calm down, they’d talk more, and they could fix this. He was in shock and needed some space to realize it was real between them.
Clutching that mantra to her heart, she left the room.
Chapter twenty-four
The week passed in a fog.
He worked on the deck at the Sullivans’. He steered clear of the office and made sure to give constant excuses for why he wasn’t at dinner or around Morgan and Cal’s building site. He stayed away from My Place and ignored Raven’s daily phone calls, refusing to listen to her voice mails. He buried himself early in his room with a bottle of Cal’s whiskey and drank himself into a stupor. Then repeated the next day.
This was what he had feared. This was why he’d locked himself up so tight no woman before had been able to break him open. All those years he couldn’t return a woman’s affections, until now.
Maybe he was being punished. How many women had longed for him to return their feelings? Dozens? He’d wrapped himself in a bubble, and no one had ever busted in. Worse, he’d never felt like he was missing out on anything until Raven came into his life and made him . . . want.
Lies. All lies. From the moment they’d met till the last moment in his bed, when he said the words. Stupid. He’d been so stupid to think it could last, or be different. Sickness twisted inside him at the thought of her father haunting him even years later. The man had destroyed his family and killed his mother. If it weren’t for him, she would’ve been safe at home that night. And Raven knew all along while she manipulated his emotions and made him fall for her. He couldn’t stand the humiliation, and constantly analyzed each moment between them, picking apart the stories he’d shared with her and wondering if she’d been taking notes for the sole purpose of proving his mother was at fault.
He grew more and more haunted.
After a long, brutal day spent working until his body ached, his brothers finally confronted him, blocking his entry from the front porch. Tristan held a glass of wine, and Cal thrust a bottle of Raging Bitch in his hands. Normally, he’d sit back and let them help him sort through the mess, but it was still too raw. Telling his brothers would drag up the painful past. Hadn’t they been through enough?
He tried to force a smile. “Thanks, dudes, but I gotta go up. Have some stuff to do.”
“Sit, Dalton. We’re worried about you.”
“I can’t—”
“Do you want me to bring Morgan out here for the inquisition, or do you want it to be just us? Because I know it’s bad. Half of my whiskey stash is gone, and that shit has to be specially ordered.”
Dalton smothered a curse and sat.
“Good choice,” Tristan said, taking his place in the rocker to the right. “Now, I’m not a touchy-feely ‘Kumbaya’-type guy, but lately you’ve been beyond miserable. Even scarier, you don’t eat anymore. I haven’t even seen Hershey wrappers around. What’s going on?”
Cal remained silent. Dalton took a sip of beer. His breath strangled in his chest, and in that moment, he knew he needed his brothers.
“Raven’s father was Matthew Hawthorne. The man who ran away with Mom.”
Tristan jerked so hard, red wine sloshed over the rim of his glass and onto his pressed slacks. He didn’t even notice. “You’re fucking with me.”
Dalton shook his head, rubbing his gritty eyes. “Wish I was. I just found out last week. The night she stayed for dinner.”
Cal finally spoke up. “What did she say?”
Bitterness leaked through his words. “She was full of excuses. Said she’s been haunted for years about her father and the way we talked about him back then. Said she realized who we were the first night in the bar, but she didn’t say anything until she decided to use me to gain information.”
“Wait. She what?” Tristan asked in shock. “You mean Raven was dating you to get information on Mom? What the hell!”
“What was her plan?” Cal asked quietly. “To confront us? Confront you? What did she expect to find?”
“She said at first she thought Mom was the one who manipulated her father, but now she thinks they were in love. She planned to confront us when she learned Mom was some type of seductress—such a bunch of crap. But then she decided she’d been wrong, and she doesn’t believe Mom was at fault. I guess I told her shit along the way that she was filing in her head. I can’t believe I didn’t see this coming, or make any type of connection. Her father called her Bella—that’s how she was listed in his obituary—so that probably threw me off. And to be honest, we were so shell-shocked we never really cared about who Matthew was leaving behind.”