Beautiful Secret (Beautiful Bastard #4) (34 page)

It was several long seconds before she spoke. “Darling?” Without looking up, I could hear her swallowing, hear her finding breath. “Tell me she hasn’t hurt you.”

“Quite the contrary. I believe I’ve hurt
her
.”

“Oh, Niall.”

I leaned my head back, staring at the ceiling. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for that to come out so baldly.”

“It loosens something in me to know you’ve moved on, even if it’s emotional to hear it.” She paused to take a deep breath. “I can hear it in your voice, see it in your eyes. This tightness and urgency. I could never have drawn this sort of reaction out of you. I was terrible to you at times, I know that. But you weathered it all with such calm stoicism. Do you imagine how that feels to know, truly, that it would be impossible to evoke a passionate response from you?”

I looked back to this woman I’d mistreated, been mistreated by. “I’m sorry, Portia.”

She gave a wan little smile. “Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault.”

“Are you good, though?” I asked quietly.

“In general I am,” she said. “It’s been up and down. For the first few months after the divorce I was a bit on the wild side. Spending money frivolously, seeing men left and right.”

Nothing
. I felt nothing when she said this.

“Recently I was seeing someone more seriously.” She toyed with the small charm on her napkin ring. “I suppose that’s what had me panicking these past few days. It’s hard to be with someone different, the fear of repeating past mistakes. We were together so long, Niall, that it felt wrong in a way to go off with someone else, like I was betraying you.”

I looked up at her. I’d personally never felt the sense of betrayal, but I understood what she’d said about it being hard to be with someone new. To be afraid. To figure out their rhythms and needs. To worry constantly about failure.

“He’s someone I knew from before.” She hesitated. “From work.”

Something clicked in my thoughts. “Stephen?” I guessed.

Portia sounded guilty when she admitted, “That’s him. Stephen.”

I caught the way he would watch her. It struck me only then how apathetic I’d been at the work functions, business dinners, and in the office when I’d stop by to drop off lunch or something she’d forgotten at home. Stephen couldn’t help but glance at Portia every few seconds, at least when I was near.

If someone regarded Ruby the way Stephen had looked at Portia, I would turn homicidal.

My thoughts tripped, blood running hot:
Tony
looked at her that way.

“Nothing happened before,” she said. “I promise, Niall.”

“I believe you. And I’m not surprised, Porsh. I saw the way he looked at you.”

She laughed. “Yes. Like that one girl at your office, when I dropped off the papers to sign. She had hearts in her eyes, watching you.”

I felt something inside me squeeze tightly.
Christ
. Even Portia had seen it.

“Ruby?” I asked, and saying her name sent a heated spike through my chest.

“She’s tall, beautiful. American?”

I needed a drink. Nodding, I lifted my wineglass to my lips and said, “That’s her.”

Portia’s eyes widened in comprehension. “She’s the one you’ve been with?” She paused. “The one you love?”

Again, I nodded, not even a hint of doubt lingering.

“She’s wanted you for ages and you were finally together?” Portia sounded like a schoolgirl. And it was a testament to our distance that she’d invited me here to discuss taking her back and had so easily let the idea fall away. “Niall, it’s so romantic.”

“Like you and Stephen?”

“Well, I’m not sure if we’re a thing anymore, but it is what it is.” She leaned forward, tilting her head as she asked, “Tell me what happened?”

And like this, with my head in my hands and pulse thudding anxiously in my throat, I confessed the entire affair to Portia.

I told her about New York, Tony’s not being able to come and Ruby coming in his place. I told her about Ruby’s feelings for months before I was aware, her beauty, her humor, and how she put me at ease so immediately. I told her about my fears, my longing, my hesitation. And, although I likely didn’t need to, I told her how I knew she needed more from me—more communication, more intimacy—and I sincerely tried to do it right.

“And then I came here for dinner,” I admitted. “I couldn’t tell her it was nothing without feeling like I was lying—because I did intend to hear you out, Portia—but I didn’t want her to think that I was coming back to you, either. She looked
shattered
.” I groaned, remembering her vacant expression, the way she’d absently wandered from the room and out of the building entirely. “I’ve made a terrible mess of this.”

“Niall,” she said, voice soothing. “You know you’ve got to fix it.”

I nodded, feeling sick. I didn’t know if it was that easy. I’d messed up, enormously.

She paused. “I love you, you know?”

Her voice held a rare poignancy. She’d said this only a handful of times during our marriage and here, the words spilled out so much more readily.

Smiling up at her, I said, “Love you, too, Porsh.”

And then, the familiar command returned: “Fix it.”

I jogged down the steps to the street, already dialing Ruby’s number.

It rang, and rang.

I’d never heard her voice mail recording before, and hearing her voice while my heart was clutched with an uneasy panic only made me feel more urgent.

“Hi, this is Ruby! Leave me a message and I’ll probably just text you back because I’m terrible about calling but if
you’re calling this number you probably already know that about me and I’m already forgiven.”
Beep
.

“Ruby,” I began, “it’s me, Niall. I’ve . . .” I trailed off, pulling at my hair. “I’ve just left Portia’s. Ruby, I don’t know why I went there. I shouldn’t have gone. Please, just call me. I want to see you tonight. This was all absurd. I
need
to see you.”

But hour after hour, she didn’t call, and she didn’t text.

Admittedly I arrived at work early the next morning but I was still surprised that Ruby wasn’t yet at her desk.

Her friend Pippa was there, though, and when I approached—knowing full well Pippa was aware of our relationship—she blinked away from me in a scowl.

“Pippa?”

She looked up at me again, eyes level and assessing. “Yeah?”

“Have you heard from Ruby or know when she’s expected in?”

Her expression shifted from annoyed to baffled. “ ‘Expected in’?”

“In to work,” I clarified, a bit unnecessarily I felt.

“Are you daft?”

I stuttered out a few syllables, finally settling on “I don’t believe so?”

She looked at me silently for a couple of beats. “You really don’t know, do you?” she asked, standing up to face
me. “Ruby was
sacked
, you dolt.”

I blinked. “I’m sorry. Sacked?”

“Sacked.”

“She was sacked?”

Pippa laughed humorlessly, and shook her head. “She was made to choose between her internship and a relationship with you. She meant to tell you yesterday afternoon that she was done here, but I think you had
other
plans?”

Oh.

Oh.

Bloody . . . fucking . . . hell
.

Panic tore through me, causing my heart to squeeze tightly before it exploded into a rapid swing.

“She . . .” I gasped, looking around as if she might actually be there. As if this might be some sort of game.

Tony made her choose between her job and me.

She chose me.

And as far as she was concerned, I chose Portia.

“I’m
fucked
,” I whispered to myself.

Pippa snorted. “Too right.”

I stormed into Tony’s office, eyes on fire. “You have got to be bloody kidding me.”

He startled, standing abruptly. “Niall.”

An intern I hadn’t even noticed stood up from the chair across from him, smoothing her skirt and excusing herself with a quiet, “Pardon.”

We both watched her leave; her beauty and youth
triggered another explosion in my chest. I barely waited for her to close the office door before I turned to him, voice low with fury, “Give me a reason I shouldn’t slam your head into that desk right now.”

Tony held up his hands. “It’s my group policy, Niall. Per the rules I set forth verbally when Ruby started
in my group
, I can’t allow fraternization.”

“Since when?” I nodded to the door. “Was this rule set forth before or after you hired that one there?” I took a step closer. “Was this before or after you suggested I pull Ruby? Was this before or after you admired her tits, her legs?”

He blinked, swallowing nervously. “I’m not sure what conversation you’re referring to, but if you’ve been able to find it in writing, I’m happy to discuss it with you.”

I laughed dryly. “So you’ve been to HR, then.”

Tony closed his eyes, repeating, “Per the rules I set forth verbally when Ruby started in my group, I can’t allow fraternization.”

Seething, I told him, “You are a bloody joke. I hope Ruby sues your pockets inside out.”

If someone had told me only a month ago that I would meet a woman from the office, fall in love, and lose her all before spring truly arrived in London, I would consider the prospect ludicrous.

Ruby didn’t return to the office that morning, not even to clean out her desk. Her absence was a blaring void: no hint
of her silly laugh, no flash of her playful green eyes. Even the interns’ office seemed subdued when I walked past. So as late as half past nine—after my blowup with Tony, and as my blood pressure seemed unwilling to return to normal—I could barely focus on a single task in front of me.

Will you not call me back?
I asked her via text message.
I’ve made a mess of this. I’m desperate to speak to you.

Productivity at work remained impossible after I hit
SEND
. I glanced to my mobile nearly every ten seconds, turning the volume up on the ringer as high as it would go. Normally one to leave the device in my desk drawer when I went to meetings, I carried it with me, leaving it just at my elbow on the table. Short of showing up unannounced at her doorstep, it was my only connection to her.

Just after lunch, I heard my text alert, and startled like a madman, toppling a cup of pens on my desk. Hope bloomed, immediate and heavy, making it nearly impossible to breathe. It took no time at all to read it; my heart felt neatly punctured. Her message said, simply,
Job hunting
.

Typing furiously, I asked her,
Darling, please call. Why didn’t you tell me what happened with Tony?

An hour passed. Two, three, five. She didn’t reply.

I interpreted it as the dismissal I knew she’d intended and turned off my phone to avoid the temptation to plead with her in an unending string of messages. Unable to work, I paced the hall like a lunatic, ignoring Tony’s furtive, guilty glances in my direction and Richard’s lingering, uncertain ones.

Almost as soon as I set foot in the door of my flat, I moved to the office, dialing her number. It rang once—my heart was lodged in my windpipe—and again, and finally a third time before she answered.

“Hi,” she said, her voice small and thin.

Nearly choking on my breath, I managed, “Ruby, dove.”

I could immediately picture her wince when she replied, “Please, don’t call me that.”

I sucked in a breath, pain radiating through my chest. “Of course, I’m sorry.”

She didn’t say anything in response.

“I wish you’d told me about your conversation with Tony,” I told her, absently folding a small piece of paper on my desk. “Darling, I had no idea it had gone that way.”

“I was going to tell you away from the office. I didn’t want to cry there.” She sniffed, cleared her throat, and then fell silent again. Her chatty disposition was notably absent, and the loss of it ached as if a branch of my lungs had been dissected away, leaving me slightly breathless. Indeed, other than the occasional sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line, she was oddly silent; a part of me wondered if she was crying.

“All right, Ruby?” I asked quietly.

“I’m fine,” she murmured, “just going through some application forms.”

“Ah.” So my options were to talk to her while she was distracted, or lose this one connection I had to the woman
I loved.

I told her about the fruitless dinner with Portia, and how in the end there wasn’t anything to discuss. I knew it as soon as I walked into the old flat. “I’m sure it felt awful for you.” I pressed my palm to my forehead, murmuring, “I can’t talk through all of this on the phone. I have so much to say.”
I love you. I’ve been a fool
. “Ruby, please just come to dinner.”

“I can’t,” she said, simply.

So, to keep her on the line, I spoke to her until I ran out of subjects, feeling bumbling and lost for the first time with her. I described my day of distraction, the walk home, the bland dinner I planned to prepare. I told her about my conversation with Max earlier in the day, that Sara was expecting a second baby already. I kept talking until I ran out of the normal subjects and babbled on about nothing: stocks, the new construction down on Euston Road, my relief at the lessening rain.

I wanted her to blame me, to rail. I wanted her to tell me all the ways in which I’d disappointed her. Her silence was terrifying because it was so unlike her. I would rather have a million angry words than a single moment of her reserve.

Her opinion and esteem were already fundamental for me, even after only a month. The simple truth was that I’d never felt both so
known
with her, and so wandering even a day without. She was unlike
anyone
.

But eventually, under the weight of her continued silence, I let her go, begging her to call me when she felt ready.

Two more days passed without word
from her, and I was unable to get out of the house, craved nothing to eat, and imagined nothing could be better than sleeping for hours on end. I knew I was facing the type of blood-draining sadness I’d previously—or, rather, blissfully ignorantly—only imagined could be avoided by stoicism itself.