Addicted (The Addicted Series, #1)(102)

Yuki sat silently for a moment, then set her hands on the desk. "Julian, it comes down to one question, and one question only. Do you truly love Krystal?"

The first tears spilled down my face and I nodded. "More than life itself."

"Then you need to tell her. Tell her the truth."

I looked up at the ceiling of her office, and felt my heart tighten in my chest. "If I do that, she'll hate me. Yuki, I originally planned on f*cking her just to get to my father. That's not the sort of foundation a loving relationship is built on."

Yuki nodded, but shrugged. "There have been stranger ones. You could be like me and Lizette."

Lizette was Yuki's wife, the two lesbians having gotten married in Massachusetts as soon as it was legal. "I've never met her, Yuki. You've never let me meet her, probably for good reason. The most I've ever seen is photos of her."

"Well did you know that Lizette and I met at a conversion therapy seminar?"

"A what?"

"Conversion therapy. It's the idea that through counseling and other psychiatric therapies, homosexuality can be treated, and we can become straight."

I sat there, shocked. Yuki, the entire time she'd worked for my father, had always been up front about her lesbianism, and never had seemed the type to be ashamed of it. It wasn't like she was some militant feminazi in your face lesbian, but rather that it was just a matter of fact of life about her, like her black hair or her left handedness. To think that this confident, intelligent woman had been so tormented about her sexual identity as to go to such a sham seminar was shocking. "Okay, I've heard of that, just in a different name. Isn't it all, well, bullshit?"

"It is, but when you've put up with ostracism and outright bigotry all your life, even bullshit can have a ray of hope," Yuki replied. "Either way, we met there, and both of us were desperate. Lizette had been abused in past relationships, and as for me, well, growing up in Japan which is so male dominated and conservative in general, I was at the end of my rope. My father had said he would disown me if I didn't find a husband and pronto, and my mother . . . well, my mother was just in total denial. Any picture she saw of me with a girlfriend was just friends, like many young Japanese have."

"Wow, I never knew. No offense Yuki, but you always have seemed to be pretty strong-willed."

"You were a very angry teenage boy at that time, Julian, I'm surprised you noticed anything. But in any case, there I was at the seminar, and as soon as I saw Lizette, I was smitten. I'd seen her glance at me a few times, and I knew regardless of what else was said, I was done. I was beyond hope. So that night, I climbed up to the roof of the center they were doing the seminar, and I planned to jump off the roof."

"Holy shit," I said, shocked. "What happened?"

"I found Lizette up there. When I approached, she turned and looked at me with those amber eyes of hers and she talked me out of it, and from then on, we've been inseparable.

"Jesus. I never knew."

It was hard to take in, the thought that Yuki the strong, wise, perfect house manager had once been a suicidal wreck. "So you and Lizette have lived happily ever after?"

"Hell no!" Yuki replied with a laugh. "We've had our share of ups and downs, Julian. We're a couple, and no couple outside of the fairy tales has a perfect relationship. I personally think that Cinderella probably gave Prince Charming a good smack upside his head more than once after their wedding. But we're still together because we're honest with each other. So tell Krystal. If your love is as strong as you say it is, then she'll stand by you. It may piss her off, it pisses me off to know what you did, but she'll forgive you in time."

I nodded, and stood up. "Thanks, Yuki. How is it you're not working as some sort of quarter million dollar a year executive or something?"

"Because working in this house and for your father is better than an extra fifty percent to my paycheck," Yuki replied. "Don't think I haven't gotten offers. But some things Julian, some things are more important than money. Now get out of here and find Krystal before Gina gets here. She's supposed to arrive before lunch."

I started, shocked. "Wait, before lunch? Krystal said after lunch."

Yuki shook her head. "Before. She's flying in from Detroit, remember? And last time she flew charter instead of renting a car. She could have already landed."

"Shit. Yuki, do me a favor. If Gina shows up, try to delay her from finding Krystal. At least until I tell her the truth."

"Go on. I'll do what I can."

I ran out of Yuki's office, looking desperately for Krystal. The one disadvantage of having a manor is that everything is so damn BIG. Eight bedrooms, three wings, three dining rooms, acres of land, and the list goes on and on. Hell, someone could disappear if they wanted and never leave the main manor building.

I ran as hard as I could through the house, calling Krystal's name, but nobody answered. Desperate, I looked out the back windows of the main dining room, and saw Krystal sitting under a tree in the manicured portion of the garden, reading a book from the library. I tore through the hallways for the door to the outside, sprinting out and calling her name. "Krystal!"

"Julian?" she said, looking up and putting her finger in the book, closing it. "What's wrong?"