Page 25 of Up for Heir (Westerly Billionaire 2)
“No touching,” he repeated slowly. “Because you don’t like it when I touch you?”
She could have lied, but that was something they’d never done with each other. “Because I like it too much.”
He sucked in a breath audibly. “You’re not making this easy, Hailey.”
“I’m trying to be honest.”
“Your honesty makes it pretty damn hard to remember why we’re trying to be friends.”
Hailey watched the waves crash against the shore and disappear. Being with Spencer had been like that. Beautiful. Simple. Gone as soon as it hit resistance. A night or two in his arms wasn’t worth reliving losing him or risking the progress Skye had made. “I need more than what we had, Spencer.”
“What does ‘more’ mean?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Then how do we move forward?”
Hailey wrapped her arms around herself. Wasn’t this how I lost him the first time? Because I didn’t know what I wanted? Because by the time I figured it out I couldn’t articulate it? “I need something I can trust. Something solid.”
Spencer was old enough to have heard something similar from a variety of women. It wasn’t unusual for them to want more than he offered because normally he offered nothing beyond sex. He’d never had a problem issuing an ultimatum: take me as I am or take a hike.
He couldn’t imagine saying that to Hailey. In fact, when she looked at him with those big eyes of hers, he regretted being the kind of man who’d ever said it. Unlike the man he’d been for too long, she wasn’t in it for the thrill of the game. She was honest, even with her desire, and it touched him as deeply now as it had when they had been young virgins learning each other’s bodies together. With them it might not always have been good, but it had always been real.
Another man might have said exactly what she wanted to hear and not meant it, but that was another thing he could never do to her. “You need pie.”
She smiled at his reference, and he tried to ignore the way the waves seemed to caress her breasts each time they washed over them. “I guess I do. What about you?”
Not an easy question. I do love cake. What man doesn’t? At work. In bed. I’ve never been one to turn down a good piece of cake.
But has it made me happy?
Her smile wavered the longer he took to respond. He didn’t want to rush and say more than he meant. “I’ve never tried it.”
“Never?”
He frowned. “We’re still talking on a deeper level, right? Because I’m getting confused and a little hungry with all the pastry talk.”
“Hungry? Are you serious?” He liked how his joke returned a smile to her face.
He shrugged. He wasn’t in a place where he could give her the answers she was looking for, so it was better to lighten the mood. “I’m not that complicated. Feed me—”
She raised a hand toward him and said, “Stop right there.” But she was still smiling.
His grin widened. “I see you’ve become wise to the ways of men.”
“You, anyway,” she said lightly.
“I like to make you laugh. It’s my second favorite thing to do to you.”
Her chest and cheeks turned an adorable pink. “Rule two: easy on the innuendos.”
He rounded his eyes and touched his chest, feigning surprise. “Me? Have you heard yourself?”
“I have. Sorry.” She laughed and the sound sent his heart beating wildly in his chest.
She was relaxing with him, so he kept the banter up. “It’s understandable.” He flexed an arm for her. “What woman could be around all this and not have those thoughts?”
“Wow, that’s a healthy-sized ego you have there,” she said and splashed him.
He almost joked about what he had in an even larger size, but that would have broken rule number two. He could have pulled her to him and kissed her soundly, if not for rule one. Why did I agree to these rules?
Oh, yeah, because it’s Hailey.
And she matters.
In the end, Spencer’s body succumbed to the chill of the water and he felt safe in suggesting, “Want to get out and go for a walk down the beach?”
“I’ve always loved that.”
He frowned as they made their way back to shore. “I don’t remember us ever going to the beach together.”
“Unless you count Mangiarelli’s, campus, or your garage, we didn’t actually go anywhere.”
Shit. We didn’t. “Why did you date me?” he asked, turning to face her once they were both clear of the water.
She touched his arm gently. “I didn’t care where we were. I just enjoyed being with you.”
She was breaking rule one, but he wasn’t about to say it. “It was the same for me. I don’t remember ever having a bad time with you.”
Her hand fell away. “We didn’t have to work on it at all. Do you think that’s why it didn’t last?”
He didn’t know, so he took a step to start off their walk. She matched her pace to his. “Maybe, or maybe we were just too young to know what the hell we were doing.”
She nodded. “It’s funny. Back then I thought I had all the answers, now I second-guess so much of what I do.”
“You’ve been through a lot.”
“So have you, but you didn’t let it stop you. You took your dreams from back then and made them a reality. That has to be amazing.”
She is amazing. How she makes me feel is amazing, too. “Sometimes. Other times I wonder why it doesn’t matter as much as I thought it would. Part of me needed to prove to myself that I could do anything Brett could do. I proved it. My company will soon be as successful as his. I did it on my own, without the family’s money. So in a way I beat Brett, but it doesn’t feel how I thought it would. When he comes to see me, he looks disappointed. I don’t know why he even comes around. It’s not like either of us enjoys his visits.”
They walked along the shore together for several minutes, then Hailey said, “Maybe he’s not disappointed in you. Maybe he’s disappointed in himself.”
“Brett? That’s unlikely.”
“It’s easy to write someone off and walk away. That’s what we did to each other. I didn’t ask what was important to you. I didn’t think about what you might be going through. I focused on my experiences only. It stopped me from really knowing you. How well do you actually know Brett?”
Spencer paused and looked out over the water. He could have told her he’d been just as self-centered the first time around, but she knew it. He couldn’t go back and fix the past, but he could try to make more of the present. Hailey was pushing him to face issues he’d spent a lifetime denying he cared about. Honesty was long overdue.
“I don’t. Not on any level that matters.”
“Then my next question is—do you want to?”
He found that he wanted to share how he felt with Hailey. Was it because they’d once come to each other, naked and unsure, and guided each other along? Did a bond like that endure? “He came to my office this week, and when I saw the way my little sister . . . Do you remember Nicolette?”
“I do.”
“Anyway, she didn’t sugarcoat what she thought of him and kept giving him these little digs.”
“And you felt bad for him.”
“Yeah, I did. Which is surprising because, all my life, he’s been cutting me down, telling me what I was doing wrong. Nothing I did was good enough.”
“Just like your grandmother.”
“Exactly like my grandmother.” He paused and looked down at her. “Did I tell you about her?”
“No,” she said hastily. “It’s just a guess. You said she’s coldhearted.”
They started walking again. “She is. They’re very similar. Put the man I thought was my real father in the same room with them and you’d have a trifecta of judgment.”
They’d reached a part of the beach that was deserted and rocky. Hailey stopped, picked up a stone, and threw it in the water. “That’s so sad.”
Great, how did I get her to sleep with me? I depressed her until she gave in out of pity. He pushed his feelings back into the box he kept them in. “Really, what is family except a huge time-suck, anyway?”
She spun on him then with unexpected anger in her eyes. “Do you honestly feel that way?”
He rocked back onto his heels in the face of her challenge. This was a new side of her. The easygoing girl he’d once fallen for now had an edge. He had a feeling that if he said yes it would bring a swift end to their time together.
The bullshit I tell myself isn’t enough for her.
“No, I don’t, but telling myself that makes the shitshow of my family bearable.”
An awkward silence followed.
She sat on a large rock and pulled her legs up protectively in front of her. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to react like that. I’m not judging you, but it’s hard for me to hear you talk that way. You have a big family. They make you angry. They drive you nuts, but you could work it out if you wanted to. You have the luxury of being with any of them if you choose. I can never have even a bad day with Ryan again.”
