Bring Down the Stars (Beautiful Hearts Duet #1)(83)

He laughed as he went to the immense desk in the center of the room. “Not quite. Something better, I hope.”

He pulled out an envelope from a drawer, then brought it to me and pressed it into my hand.

“What is this?”

“Open it.”

The envelope wasn’t sealed. I peeked inside to see a check made out to me. My heart took off and my gaze jumped up to his.

“Thirty-five thousand dollars? What …?”

And then I knew. The envelope trembled in my shaking hands.

“Weston told you, didn’t he? About the farm?”

He nodded. “It’s from both of us, in that sense. Because we both…care about you, Autumn.”

I shook my head, tears welling. “I never told him how much we needed.”

“Is it enough?”

“It’s almost exactly right.” I pressed the envelope to his chest. “I can’t take this.”

Connor caught my hand and held it, so the envelope wouldn’t fall. “Yes, you can. Your family needs it.”

“It’s too much. You have this much?”

Connor bit his cheek. “My father helped.”

I sagged. “God, Connor. You told him? You told your parents?” I turned away, my face burning. The envelope fell to the lush, carpeted floor.

His arms came around me from behind to turn me to face him. “Hey. It’s nothing to them—”

“It’s everything to me!” I cried, tearing out of his grip. “But I can’t say no, can I? I have to help my family. I’d be a fool to let my pride stop me, but my parents… They have pride too. And if they knew how I got this…”

I sank down in an overstuffed leather settee with wide brass buttons. Connor retrieved the check from the floor and knelt in front of me.

“We’re leaving tomorrow morning,” he said. “For God-knows how long. Wes told me about your family’s situation, and he didn’t—we didn’t want to leave you alone to cope with it. Not when I can help you.”

“This was his idea,” I said.

Connor shook his head. “He told me you needed it. I made it happen.”

“No, I can’t. It’s too much. My parents would wonder where I got it and I could never tell them. Never. God, my mother would never speak to me again.”

“Why not? For helping them? That’s all this is, babe. It’s help.”

“It’s too much.”

He pressed the envelope into my hand, and curled my fingers around it. I lifted my tear-stained face.

“What’s happening between us, Connor? I’m so confused. I feel like you’re two different people. You write me these beautiful letters but when I see you, those words aren’t there.”

And then I froze. A heavy lead weight dropped into my stomach. Followed by another. Two pieces clicking together. My throat went dry and a million thoughts—a thousand words—suddenly swarmed my brain like white-winged moths. I looked at Connor and my mind tried to conjure him sitting at a table, pen to paper, writing and writing and writing. My name at the top of the page.

I couldn’t do it. Connor wasn’t there.

But Weston…

Weston Turner materialized at the empty desk in my mind’s eye, and it was effortless to picture him there, bent over a notebook, his pen scribbling…

No. Stop. Impossible.

Yet the implications swamped me. A deluge of nauseating suspicion.

“What is it?” Connor asked, his tone wary, his hands stiffening on mine.

I held his gaze hard, searching, thoughts racing through my mind.

It can’t be. That’s a fucked up thing to do to someone. Catfishing? Like that show? Despicable. Weston would never manipulate me like that. And Connor would never do that and then sleep with me. Never toy with my heart. Why would he?

“You wouldn’t… lie to me, would you?” I asked, my voice hardly a whisper. “You wouldn’t tell me things that aren’t true? Not sentiments like those in the letters?”

I slept with you for a poem.

Connor shook his head from side to side, his lips pressed into a thin line.

“They’re all true, Autumn,” he said. “Every word in those letters is true.”

I nodded slowly. Connor’s words were his own. They had to be. Plenty of them came out of his mouth. I’d heard them myself. The phone call in Nebraska was a perfect example.

I sucked in a steadying breath. “I just don’t know what’s happening. Everything feels so tangled up.”

Connor blew out his cheeks. “I know. And I don’t know what to do about it.”

Mrs. Drake walked into the office then. “Oh, I beg your pardon, I hope I’m not interrupting.” Discreetly, she kept her eyes on her son while I wiped the tears from my cheeks. “The guests were starting to ask after you, dear. And Reginald has arrived.”

“Be right there, Mom,” Connor said.

“Need anything?” she asked him, but I could feel it was directed to me.

“We’re good.”

She went out and closed the door quietly.

“The famous Reginald,” I said.

His eyes were still on the door. “These are my last hours with my friends and family. And you.”