Loving the Secret Billionaire (Love at Last #1)(23)

I shook my head and kissed him back to cover up the big, ugly cry trying to claw itself out. It was raw and emotional, this thing he’d set off inside me and I had no idea what to do with it. I wanted to answer, to give him back those words, but I was suddenly scared.





9





Zach



* * *



“That was the wrong thing to say, wasn’t it?” I asked on my way back from the bathroom, the question an echo from the other night.

“It wasn’t. Not at all.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You’ve got more courage than me. I guess that’s what it is.”

“I have more courage than you? The guy who never leaves his house is more courageous than the schoolteacher running for city council?”

“You’re blind, Zach.”

Great. Now she’s using the blind card as an excuse for the way I live my life. I love her for it, but I can’t let her do it.

“You saying you’ve never seen a blind person out in the world?”

“I have, but—”

“I was blinded in a car accident, okay? A trick of fate that took my parents and left me without one of my senses. I’ve adapted. But look at me. I can’t even make myself leave my house. You’re the one who’s brave, Veronica. You’re willing to get out there and fight, while I do everything from here. Hiding.”

“I don’t feel brave.” She wrapped an arm around my chest and gave me some of her warmth.

“Why’d you run? I mean you explained who you’re fighting for, but what was the last straw? Or was it a gradual thing?”

“It was gradual, I guess. And then sudden.”

“Oh, that clears it up.”

I loved the light smack she gave my arm before kissing it.

“It was the library,” she finally said. “Library and lunch, in the same day.”

“What do you mean?”

“They proposed to cut funding for both the school library and the city branch, downtown.”

“I had no idea.” If I’d known, I might’ve done something. Or maybe not. I was always connected, but my world was way outside of this place. It was starting to sound like I should have been paying attention to things closer to home.

“Well, you wouldn’t. It doesn’t exactly make headlines with all the crap happening around us nowadays. But these little things matter, you know? There are folks who wouldn’t read a book if not for the library. It’s a place to learn, to congregate. It’s shelter and warmth for some. I grew up hoarding library books. We couldn’t afford to buy books, but I read.”

“What about the lunches?”

“The policy in our school system has always been to let kids accrue debt as the year goes on. We’d never turn away a kid who couldn’t afford to pay. And it’s a buck freaking fifty, you know?” An ache started up in my chest at the emotion in her voice. “If a family can’t afford to send their babies to school with that much cash—even when they’re already on a reduced lunch program—how can they possibly get them clothes or books, for heaven’s sake? So, our fiscally conservative school board has voted to make those kids pay, starting next year. Can you picture the embarrassment? You’re ten years old and you get to the register and Nana Schwartz has to shake her head no, that you can’t have that crappy slice of pizza and carton of milk? Every kid will see you’re one of the poor ones? And what if it’s the only food you’re getting all day?”

I was stroking her, not interrupting or making any noise, just giving her what comfort I could.

“Look, Zach. I don’t… I can’t love a man I just met, okay?”

I nodded, about to tell her it was fine, I’d wait, but she went on, leaving me blinking. What did she just say? Did that even just happen?

“Those babies, when I’ve got them in my class. They’re four or five and they’re hungry to learn. Playing is learning, you know, and they’re smart. They want to read, they want to count. They want it all so badly. But if they’re malnourished, if they haven’t eaten a veggie in two weeks? If they don’t have a single book in their house? If their parents can’t read enough to decipher their field trip permission slips—much less pay for that field trip? Well…”

“I’ll bet you pay for them to go, don’t you?”

She cry-laughed and nodded against me and I rolled into her, wrapped both arms around her and held her. I wanted to do more, give her more. I wanted to fix everything.

And I would, dammit. I’d do whatever it took. Give her whatever she needed.

“You’re amazing. You know that, right?” I asked her.

When she started to shake her head, I held her tighter, and rested my chin on the top of her head with a sigh. “You are some kind of magic, Veronica Cruz, waltzing into my life like this. I know it’s cheesy to say, but I feel like the luckiest man in the world right now.”

I soaked in the happy sound she made and listened to her breathing.

When she fell sleep, I peeled her warm, lush body from mine, slipped into my jeans, and padded my way quietly down to the basement, where I sat at my terminal and started typing.

It was time to ramp things up.