Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 107639 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107639 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 538(@200wpm)___ 431(@250wpm)___ 359(@300wpm)
“Before San Cordova, who knew that you were Landry Davis the model, Everett Davencourt the viscount, co-founder of ETC, heir apparent to an earldom, weird freak-boy about lobsters, oddly nervous about giving speeches even though he wants to run for office, and a guy who grew up with noisy house-birds? Who knew all of those things together?”
“No one. I don’t exactly go around sharing the lobster thing.” He paused as if searching for the catch. “Why?”
I wanted to cry. I wanted to cradle him in my arms and murmur promises that this man-boy, this tall, gentle lover of fun and shenanigans, this soft-hearted son and devoted friend, would never be so fucking lonely again.
“You don’t have to hold it all in anymore,” I whispered as carefully as I could. “There’s one person who knows all of it now.”
A puff of air escaped his nose, warming my hairline. “Yeah. And that person has kept me at arm’s length for three fucking years. You make it sound so easy, Kenji. Know what’s not easy? Racing with an egg on a spoon on only two hours of sleep. Close your eyes.”
His large hand came up and covered my eyes for me, cutting off the dim light outlining the shadows of his face.
Instead of arguing, I let him dismiss my emotional plea, but I didn’t follow him into sleep. I lay there thinking back over ten years of knowing Landry Davis, the Right Honorable Everett Landry Davencourt, Viscount Hawling. He’d been a grieving, confused teenager who wanted to escape the heavy mantle of familial expectation and have a normal life. A normal life that led him straight into another blatantly abnormal experience of almost-accidentally helping found one of our generation’s most pivotal software systems, resulting in untold wealth he kept hidden from his family. A normal life that had tumbled him into the global spotlight for his good looks and charm, resulting in years of trying to keep his identity secret while under interrogation lights.
The man who spent years trying to be everything to everybody while pretending to flit around like a dilettante.
His story was unbelievable. And so incredibly isolating.
After a while, the door creaked open, and Turkey’s heavy body landed on the mattress next to my legs. She wobbled over the folds and lumps in the duvet until curling behind Landry’s knees.
I let out a breath. At least when he was here, he was loved and supported by his family. And when he was in the States, he was loved and supported by the Brotherhood.
My nose burned with emotion as my brain helpfully supplied the truth.
But not by you.
Landry was right when he said I’d kept him at arm’s length. I’d believed the lies. I’d tried to protect myself from him.
What would it have been like if I’d given him a chance? Would he have ever confessed the truth of his identity to me? How long would it have taken? And how would I have reacted?
The answer to the last one was clear. I vividly remembered the things I’d told Landry in the car leaving the city airport. My first reaction had been to leave. To pick up my toys and go home.
To flee, like any other animal when scared.
I’d been an idiot.
And if that realization wasn’t galling enough, I’d planted myself squarely in the center of a public farce where I had to pretend to be fake-married to the man just as I was finally realizing that he might, in fact, be the one for me.
It was like having everything you’d ever wanted dangled in front of you on a stick just out of reach. You could look but not touch. You could live adjacent to it but never claim it as your own.
My eyes stung from trying to see Landry’s face in the dark.
But as hard as I tried, I couldn’t make him out.
“Pretty sure consuming opiates before a public appearance is a bad idea,” Cora murmured without taking her eyes off her phone screen.
The Range Rover smoothed to another stop as we made our way through London traffic.
“Fine.” Landry shifted in the seat next to me and rubbed his hands up and down his thighs. “But we have time to stop at a pub for a quick pint. I just need to take the edge off.”
“I don’t understand,” I said, not for the first time. “You’ve done things like this before. You helped Zane cut the ribbon on the community center in Barlo and then said a few words to the crowd about his generosity. You and the guys did a meet and greet last September for Sterling Chase employees and partners.”
“Not the same,” he grumbled, glancing out the window.
“How is it not the same?”
His chest heaved. “I didn’t have to remember how to speak in exactly the way I’d been trained by political strategists while knowing people are fixated on my American accent. I didn’t have to worry about making a stupid joke, or finding a way to drop a casual child poverty fact into my speech without scaring the children in the audience, or referring to three different schools without showing preference for one over the other. Or, god forbid, touching a child.”