Only a Millionaire (The Sinclairs #6.5)(6)

Evan shrugged. “Maybe. But it’s all I’ve ever known. Liam can’t think there’s anything wrong with being rich. He’s pretty well off himself.”

I nodded. “I know. I did his taxes.”

“So why can’t you just tell him now?”

I’d asked myself that same question several times. Sure, Liam would probably feel better knowing I wasn’t in love with another guy, because he was aware I’d been attracted to him at one time. “He’ll know I lied,” I replied sadly.

“It’s only a lie because you never said anything to the contrary.”

“No, Evan. I lied. When he asked questions, I lied my ass off.”

He took another sip of his coffee before he said, “He came to me asking questions. I’m assuming it was probably around the time that he thought you had a man in your life. He threatened to fire you if I didn’t tell him why you were here.”

I looked at him sharply. “He did? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because he wasn’t going to fire you, even if I denied him any information, which I did.”

“What if he had?”

“Then I would have found you another position. But I knew it wouldn’t come to that. Liam has an inherent sense of decency. He wasn’t going to boot you after you’d done a good job for him,” Evan said smugly.

“What did he want to know?” I still couldn’t believe that Liam had gone to Evan seeking the truth.

“Everything,” he answered. “But those weren’t my questions to answer. I figured you’d tell him what you wanted to tell him.”

“There are so many times I’ve wanted to tell him,” I admitted. “But I promised you and Noah that I wouldn’t say anything.”

“There’s nothing stopping you from doing it now. You’re going back home. Your hiding days are over.”

“I think it would be much too late for that,” I shared. “He hasn’t mentioned his attraction since, and he’s gone back to treating me like a teenager.”

“And how do you feel?”

“Bad,” I said unhappily. “I can’t really win either way. Either he’ll despise me for being attracted to him while I was with somebody else, or he’ll hate me for lying to him. It’s a lose-lose situation for me. But it doesn’t matter. I’m going home, and I don’t have to see him again after that.”

My chest ached from saying the words I didn’t really want to say.

I’d never see Liam again.

Evan leaned back in his chair. “In business, things are never a lose-lose situation,” he considered. “It’s just a lack of being able to see the positives.”

I gulped down the rest of my coffee before I told him, “This isn’t business, and there are no positives, Evan. The time to tell the truth passed me by, and it isn’t going to help me now. Liam and I are in a strictly professional relationship. He got over his attraction, I’m sure.”

“Did you get over it?” he probed mercilessly.

God, I could see why Evan was so successful in business. I was nearly squirming because Evan acted like he had me under a microscope after he’d dissected me. And he was supposed to be on my side. I’d sure as hell hate to be his enemy.

“Yes,” I lied. But then I remembered that I hated lying and retracted: “No.”

He smirked. “It can hardly be both.”

Exasperated, I told him, “Okay, yes. I’m attracted to him. It never went away. But I know better than to want pointless things. I’ll be fine once I get home and get back to a normal life. Liam was nothing more than a fantasy. Maybe I was bored. Maybe I was missing my family and friends. Whatever the cause of these crazy emotions, it won’t apply once I’m back on the West Coast.”

“And if it doesn’t eventually go away?”

I gave him an irritated look. “Then I’m completely and utterly screwed,” I finally blurted out, exhausted from Evan’s relentless questioning. I was starting to feel like a star witness being grilled by the defense team during a murder trial.

Evan’s manner was casual, but his expression was intense.

“It doesn’t have to be like this, Brooke. You could tell him everything. There’s no shame in what you did. If you lied, you did it because you had to. I think Liam will understand.”

“I don’t think he will.” Evan had no idea what my tense relationship had been like with Liam. “Please. I just want to go home.”

“It’s your call,” he stated. “But I can tell you from experience that there are always positives in real life, too. It’s not just in business. Unfortunately, sometimes you have to look pretty damn hard to find them.”

We fell into another conversation, and I was relieved that we didn’t have to talk about Liam anymore. It was way too painful to wonder what might have been had I just been an employee and not a pretender.

But I knew that the lies prevented me from ever knowing what would have happened between me and Liam if everything was different.

Don’t think about it. Just get through the next two weeks.

Things weren’t going to ever be different, and there was no point in thinking about what could have been.

I had to deal with reality.