Accidental Tryst (Charleston #1)(33)

She glances around nervously and back to me.

I carefully set my delicate cup down before I throw it across the room or accidentally crush it.

"Now, Trystan, I . . . look, please." She reaches out a hand, but I stand and she's forced to pull it back. "Don't make a scene," she says quietly, nervously, eyes darting around the room.

Leaning down so to the passersby it might look as if I'm telling her a secret, I put my hands on the arm rests either side of her.

She leans back but has nowhere to go.

"I won't make a scene," I say quietly to the side of her head, "as long as you get something clear. All I wanted was a family. I was thirteen years old. I loved you. As cold as you were. I loved it here. I thought I'd come to paradise. Only, we were sent away again. And then I had to watch my own mother die a long slow death. Alone. For all her faults, she was your daughter, for Christ's sake," I hiss. "And you ignored her. Ignored me. It's a little too late for regrets, don't you think? The time to pretend you gave a shit about me would have been while I sat alone at seventeen in an NHS hospital as a stranger told me my mother had finally gone to God. If you think I'm hardened . . . difficult . . . heartless . . . ruthless, you haven't seen anything. You made me this way, Isabel Montgomery. And I'll do whatever I damned well please."

I pull back and stand.

Wet tracks mark Isabel's powdered cheeks. Her normally regal, statuesque features are crumpled and broken. I look away from her. The waiter takes that moment to arrive with my omelet. I grab a napkin from my place setting and hand it to her. My hands are shaking, belying my composed tone.

"I won't be eating after all," I tell the nonplussed server. I peel off some bills to cover the meal and then head to check out of the hotel.

I want to beat the shit out of something, but I have nowhere to go and nothing to hit. I don't care what Ravenel says about me sticking around, I need to go back to New York and get some distance from the clusterfuck my life turned into over the last three days.

I'm flying out of here tonight, no question.





17





Trystan





I've set myself up in Ravenel's conference room with financials printed and spread out all around me. The company accountants are set to arrive and give me a proper rundown, and Uncle Robert is keeping to himself at the end of the table with his own files.

Ravenel's assistant pokes her head in the door for about the eleventh time. "Is there anything I can get you, Mr. Montgomery?"

"We're fine. But, thank you." I speak for both of us in the room.

She pouts. I should be hitting that while I'm in town, it would certainly go some way toward easing the tension brewing the last few days. I stare after her. Why am I not? I definitely noticed how cute she was when I came in a few days ago, and she would be more than willing, that much is obvious. What was her name again? Daisy, I think.

"I wouldn't if I were you."

I look up to where Robert is sitting at the end of the table with his own files.

He nods his chin toward the door. "She's Maybank's niece. As in Mr. Ravenel's law partner."

"Thanks for the heads-up," I tell him then cast my attention back to the papers in front of me. "Where is Maybank anyway?"

"Hunting in Africa."

"Gross," I mutter.

"Tell me about it," Robert concurs, and I give him a surprised look. "Please," he adds. "It's not like culling the deer population. Killing endangered animals with a gun from a safe few hundred yards away is pure greed."

"Fact," I say, begrudging we have common ground.

He looks at me over the top of his file. "My mother hasn't made it in. I'm assuming the meeting did not go her way this morning?"

I blow out a breath. I still feel like shit. It felt both good and horrible to get all that off my chest. "I wouldn't say it went well, no. I don't know what "her way" was, but let's just say we didn't get that far."

"I'm sorry, you know?"

"About what?" I ask stiffly.

"About Savannah. My sister. She was a screw-up, I know. But so was I. We'd have to be, with cold parents like ours. I tried to reason with them. Hell, I even tried to contact Savannah myself, but she wouldn't respond. I—I'm sorry, Trystan. I would have been there, if I'd known."

I swallow over my tongue that feels too large in my mouth.

"Thank you," I manage, but it comes out hoarse. My heart is pounding in my throat, my head heating up. Burning.

"Fuck," I mutter and stand abruptly. "I need some air."

Stalking out of the room, through reception and down to the street, I feel like I can't get outside fast enough. Like I might suffocate. I think I was about to fucking cry in there. Except I don't damn well cry. Haven't in fourteen years.



* * *



Emmy is sobbing so hard I can barely understand her.

"Shh, calm down," I tell her. "Sweetheart, I can't hear what you're saying."

I'd answered without thinking, desperate for the distraction she brought from my own family drama, only to be greeted by almost incoherent hysteria.