Page 10 of In the Heir (Westerly Billionaire 1)
And the truth.
Spencer isn’t in love with Alisha.
What the hell is he doing?
On the way out of the building, Brett took out his phone. Someone had to know if Alisha was okay. Brett told himself it wasn’t his business, but that didn’t stop him from calling Rachelle.
Chapter Five
Although Alisha hadn’t come to a single conclusion about what she wanted to do, she did feel more relaxed. The lake house, or lake shack as she sometimes jokingly referred to it, always had that effect on her. She didn’t have memories of the place. Her mother hadn’t taken her there, perhaps because it had been her sanctuary, too, but her grandmother had said her mother had spent summers there when she was a child. Alisha liked to think that when she visited, she was connecting with a time when her mother had been happy. The sun was beginning to set across the water, and if she wasn’t going to spend the night, Alisha knew she should leave soon, but she was too comfortable to move. Lying in the grass, propped up on her elbows, she had finally silenced the panic within her and was simply letting herself be in the moment.
“I thought you might be here,” a deep male voice said behind her.
What the hell? Alisha screamed and jumped to her feet. What is Brett doing here? “You scared me.”
His eyebrows rose and fell, then one side of his mouth curled in irony. “That wasn’t my intention. Rachelle said you weren’t feeling well, and when you didn’t answer your phone . . .”
Since when do you talk to Rachelle? And why would you be calling me? Alisha swallowed that question and lowered the hand that had naturally risen defensively. “How did you find me? No one knows about this place.” He held her gaze without answering and an idea came to her. “Do you have some kind of creepy file on me?”
The other side of his mouth twitched as if he were fighting a smile. “Creepy, no. Detailed, yes.”
Too much adrenaline was rushing through Alisha for her to appreciate his humor. “That is wrong on so many levels. Did your file say that I come here to be alone?”
“It’s not that detailed.” He looked her over, either not getting her hint for him to leave or dismissing it. “You look like you’re feeling better.”
Alisha’s face warmed as did the rest of her beneath his sustained attention. She clasped her hands in front of her and hoped her response to him wasn’t obvious. “I am. Thank you.” She swallowed hard as he gazed at her, and her heart began to beat fast. This time not from fear. “If you’re here to offer to pay me off again, I’m still not interested.” She watched for a reaction to her words, but his expression betrayed none of his thoughts. “I’m also not sorry about what I said to your grandmother, if you’re expecting an apology.”
“My grandmother needed to hear what you had to say, and I thought you handled her well. She respects you—that’s the first step toward her liking you.”
Alisha looked away, not wanting him to see how confused she was by his praise. “I’ll take your word for that. She didn’t look happy with me on Sunday.”
“No one likes to hear the truth, but it’s better than a lie.”
“I guess,” Alisha said, not sure where the conversation was going but positive it would be better if she ended it rather than found out. “Now that you’ve seen I’m fine, I’m sure you have somewhere you need to be.”
He looked her over again. Although he was a man who played his cards close to his chest, Alisha would have sworn he was genuinely concerned about her. “Rachelle thought you might call in sick to work tomorrow.”
“I’m not sick.”
“She told me you’d already gone to bed for the evening because you weren’t feeling well.”
With a sigh, Alisha ran a hand across her brow. “I lied, okay? I needed a little time alone, and if I tried to tell her that, she would have thought I was upset.”
“Are you?”
Alisha turned away from him and looked out over the water. “What could I have to be upset about? I’m getting married in less than a week.”
He came to stand beside her. Alisha glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. With his jacket pushed back and his hands in his trouser pockets, he looked every bit like the confident, successful man he was. “If you have any doubts, you should postpone it.”
Folding her arms across her chest, Alisha turned her attention back to the peaceful view of the lake. “I really don’t want to discuss this with you.”
“Marriage is—”
“Why are you here? What is it that you want me to say?” Spinning on him, Alisha dropped her hands to her hips.
His intense blue eyes sought and held hers. “The truth.”
Alisha’s chest heaved as she began to feel cornered. “What truth?”
He turned fully toward her. “I don’t believe you’re in love with my brother.”
The peaceful lake setting faded into the background as Alisha’s senses filled with Brett and how he made her feel. I don’t believe you’re in love with my brother. She knew she couldn’t admit to that and should feel horrified that he could see through her so easily. Yet it was his presence she was most affected by, not his closeness to the truth. His nearness sent tingles of unexplainable pleasure through her. It was impossible to look up at his mouth and not wonder how it would feel on hers. Alisha’s lips parted and her breath turned shallow. She couldn’t move. Didn’t want to move. Nothing she’d felt for any of the men she’d been with had prepared her for how easily Brett erased her coherent thoughts and replaced them with wicked images.
His mouth hovered above hers, the warmth of his breath teasing her. She felt herself swaying closer to him. “Well?”
I need to push him away, tell him he’s wrong.
God help me, I don’t want to.
“Brett—” She stopped only because she didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t tell him how she felt. She couldn’t lift up on her toes and taste his lips, even if she was shaking from the need to. His eyes burned with a wild hunger. Anything they started wouldn’t end with one kiss.
Sorry, Spencer. I know I promised to marry you to help you, but I accidentally slept with your brother. My bad.
Alisha took a step back, raised a flat hand up between them. “You need to go.”
He held her eyes a moment longer, then nodded. “Are you staying here tonight?”
“No,” Alisha said in a thick voice. “I’m going home.”
“It’s late. I’ll follow you in my car,” he said.
“You don’t have to.” There was an unyielding look in his expression that she recognized. “But you will.”
His sexy lips curled ever so slightly. “Just to your driveway. I’ll sleep better if I know you made it home safely.”
Do you really care about me? Do I want you to? Alisha nodded, then gathered her purse and phone. Sleep? Not going to happen.
I plan to lie awake questioning my moral compass, then indulge in a fantasy or two about us engaging in carnal acts, and finally round off the night by listing all the reasons why giving in to how you make me feel would be the wrong choice.
Wrong for Spencer.
Wrong for my relationship with the people I love like family.
I should have gone with my first reaction and said no to marrying Spencer.
I can’t add another layer to that mistake.
After sliding into her car, Alisha started the engine and watched Brett get into his vehicle. She let herself imagine for a moment what could have been had they met under different circumstances. Would they have come together for one night or become lovers? Could someone like her have ever fit into his life and vice versa? She tried to imagine him chaperoning a field trip and smiled. Tough as he looked on the outside, she had a feeling her students would walk all over him. She sensed a gentleness in him. Strength, but kindness. It was a combination she wished her father had possessed.
Brett pulled far enough back onto the road so that she could pull out in front of him. Alisha did, then drove off, kno
wing he would follow.
She glanced back often during the drive, and he was there, watching out for her. For as long as Alisha could remember, she’d taken care of others: her mother, her friends—Spencer. She kept her pain hidden even from Rachelle, because her friend had also had her own share. Although Rachelle had been raised by a loving mother and a loving stepfather, she’d known her biological father only through court-ordered visits. As soon as she was of age, Rachelle had stopped seeing her father.
Alisha had never asked her why. Talking about Dereck Westerly would have opened the door to a conversation about her own father, and she’d never told anyone about her father’s rage. She’d been too afraid she would be taken from her mother if anyone found out. She’d needed to stay and keep her mother safe the best she could.
