“I didn’t bring it with me because I don’t have an international calling plan.” Her voice was hollow, but she couldn’t put any life into it. Not when she was so scared. “And I knew he had your number.”
These past few years, her job had been to figure out every single thing that could possibly go wrong for Jeremy, and then do whatever she needed to do to make sure it didn’t happen. But ever since she’d connected with Will, she’d taken her eye off the ball more and more. And now, for this trip, when she should have run through all the possibilities, all the things that could go wrong, she’d done the exact opposite. She’d let Will handle the details for her brother so that she could have fun in her sexy fantasyland.
“I’ve got a couple of pictures I can send,” he said to his caller, “but we were working on a car, and he’s not looking straight at the camera.” He paused. “Yeah. Sure. As soon as I hang up.”
They’d taken off half an hour ago, after Will had awakened the flight crew in the middle of the night and obtained clearance to fly within the hour. He had everyone back in San Francisco looking for Jeremy—his staff, the police, the detective.
But he couldn’t change the fact that they had to sit on this plane for almost ten hours. While Jeremy was out there. Alone.
What if something terrible had happened to him?
What if she never saw her brother again?
“Anything to report?” Will had his phone to his ear again as he signaled the steward, pointing at the coffee service on the sideboard and miming that the man should pour a cup for Harper. Even now, Will was taking care of her, taking care of everything.
“Call the minute you hear anything, find anything.”
She wanted to blame him. For making her come to London. For taking Jeremy out of the grocery store and into that job up in the city. She wanted to scream at him, shout that it was all his fault. If he’d never come into their lives, if he hadn’t seduced Jeremy with his cars and his friendship, if he hadn’t touched her, everything would have been fine. Had she been able to make the blame stick, she’d have done it in a heartbeat. She needed someone else to condemn so badly that she felt bile push up from her stomach.
But she couldn’t blame Will. She’d understood who and what he was right from the beginning. A man who knew what he wanted and hacked through whatever obstacles stood in his way.
This was her fault.
Hers alone.
She’d forgotten the one thing she knew to be true in her life—Jeremy had to come first. Her mother had drilled that into her long ago, after Jeremy had come out of the coma and they’d known he’d never be the same.
“Jeremy’s going to need all the help you can give, Harper. He needs you. And if anything ever happens to us, you’re going to have to take care of him.”Harper had always done everything in her power to take care of her brother. Until now. Until she’d allowed herself to be wild and free.
To fall head over heels in love.
She was Jeremy’s guardian. She was all he had. But she’d let the rush of speed, and Will’s charm, blind her to her responsibilities.
Will didn’t know how Jeremy sometimes reverted to a frightened little boy. Will didn’t understand how utterly trusting her brother was. He would believe anything a stranger told him. Will had wanted to give him more freedom, more challenges. But she was the one who knew Jeremy’s limits. And she’d let it all happen.
She’d seduced herself with the attention, with the nights in Will’s arms, and she’d started wanting more than she should have. Started thinking she could actually have more.
The steward set their coffee down, with cream and sugar for her, black for Will. She looked at the milky coffee without picking it up, realizing that she’d forgotten the two china cups back in Will’s London penthouse. And she was glad, because they would always remind her that while she’d been off having wild sex in foreign lands, something bad had happened to her brother.
Will laid his phone on the table between them and turned the handle of his cup to pick it up, thanking the steward. When they were alone again, he said, “We’ve got a long flight. Why don’t you get some sleep in the cabin? I’ll stay by the phone.”
“I can’t sleep.” Her voice sounded dull and totally without emotion.
“There are some over-the-counter pills in the bathroom cabinet.” His eyes were weary, his brow lined with worry, his features sharp. “You haven’t slept much since we left San Francisco.”
She hadn’t. Because she’d been too busy making love with Will.
But she’d finally remembered her brother was her true duty. And she would never, ever let anything happen to Jeremy again. Because when they found him—God, please let me find him, I’ll do anything you want—things were going back to the way they had been before they’d ever met Will Franconi.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Harper’s silence made Will’s gut churn. He needed to know what she was thinking, what she was feeling. She meant everything to him—she and Jeremy both did—and he would give up literally every penny he had just to have her brother safe and sound again.
And to know that he hadn’t lost her love.
Right now, he was praying for at least one out of two to come true, since he couldn’t imagine Harper ever saying she loved him again. Not after he’d done the exact thing she’d been so frightened of...