Between Commitment and Betrayal (Hardy Billionaire Brothers, #1)(22)

I glared at all of them. “You realize I could fire you all.”

“Sure. But we’re the best,” one of them stated. “And you know that. These are his last wishes.”

Was he tearing up? Jesus Christ.

“Fuck,” I swore angrily and glanced at my brothers. “Guys?”

“Your call. Everly’s call. We’ll be behind you the whole way,” Dimitri said, loyal as always.

“Now or never, Declan,” Mrs. Johnson pushed.

“Fine.”

“Fine?” Everly screeched. “Are you insane?”

“You want the damn yoga studio or not? We can always back out at three months.” She had to understand we lost everything if we didn’t.

She took two deep breaths and folded those clean, unmanicured fingers together. Then she pulled at the assortment of necklaces from under the collar of her dress and held them tight. So tight I knew her nails were cutting into her skin as she mumbled, “I’m gonna regret this.”

“Me too,” I grumbled. I met the stares of my brothers. “Don’t tell a fucking soul until I say.”

“One moment, then.” Mrs. Johnson got up and opened the door, and in walked a tall man with gray hair in a black suit. “Meet our ordained minister. I’ll be the witness, and we’ll get you two married off.”

The whirlwind began.

We repeated vows. We made promises that were completely empty. We made commitments we weren’t sure we could keep.

Then, the lawyers put papers in front of us. They explained our prenup would keep our finances and assets completely separate in the case of divorce. We signed. They explained the conditions of the will. We signed.

They pointed to our marriage license.

We signed on the dotted fucking lines.





10




EVERLY





“WELCOME HOME,” he said, and, like an ominous sign, lightning cracked in the sky and it started to rain. The clouds couldn’t hold the water a second longer, just like I couldn’t hold in the emotion and tension from the day.

His house was even bigger than Carl and Melinda’s, albeit in the same gated community. The appeal of that had been made very clear when the security guard closed the iron gates on the paparazzi that had followed us from the will reading.

I’d never known fame that intense. Sure, I’d had cameras on me once before, but they were for a news article, not glossy magazines and paparazzi. The flashes almost swallowed me up along with the crowd in that moment.

Declan didn’t exactly care about me, he’d demonstrated that more than once over the past few months, but he must have had a heart somewhere in that broad chest because his hand found the small of my back as he pulled me close and rushed me to his Bugatti Veyron.

I knew the car because I’d been so shocked at seeing it the first time. I’d seen a Lamborghini and other expensive cars, but nothing like that. It was always parked in the owner’s spot, and I had a weak moment of looking one day.

Its price was astronomical yet surprised me less now that I was staring at his house.

He drove us down a winding street where I saw the brick pillars with yet another bigger, black gate that stood taller than the last one we passed. Declan pressed a button on the steering wheel and the two fences swung slowly outward as we approached.

Gray brick weaved up and then fanned out toward a massive garage of dark wooden doors and an over-the-top staircase to the entrance.

I stared at the trees rustling in the wind, so high over our heads. Those trees told me that this land had been here far longer than any of us. Yet, his home had sleek lines, straight angles, and had a clean look like his fitness center.

As the water droplets pelted the windshield, I muttered, “Looks like a modern-day castle.”

He glanced over at me. “It’s actually your castle now, if you want to call it that, but it’s really just a house.”

“Declan, just because we signed a contract for a year doesn’t mean it’s my house in any—”

He cut me off by shaking his head. “What’s mine will be yours, Everly. You can’t tiptoe around me 24-7. Carl wouldn’t have wanted that, and I don’t either.”

Hearing his name even now when Declan and I hadn’t discussed him really since that night at the sauna made the guilt bubble up. “I probably should have reached out to him more.”

“You take the blame a lot for a woman who was only a child when your parents divorced.”

I dragged one finger down the window, following a line of a water drop on the other side of the glass. “I remember the anger I had that my father wouldn’t come home. I remember consciously making a choice in my teenage years to not visit after so many years of him not visiting a single time and forbidding me to come for the holidays. I forced an estrangement too. That’s on me. I was being selfish and emotional.”

He sighed. “Carl was selfish and emotional—he was the adult. You can’t take full responsibility. He could have pushed, insisted like a father should have.”

I nodded and, as I glanced at Declan, saw the charm everyone else did right then. He was meeting me on my level, smiling at me softly so as not to push me while in a vulnerable moment. Declan Hardy was dangerous this way, sitting in the quiet pitter-patter of the rain in his expensive sports car.