Loving Leo (The Romanovsky Brothers Book 3) (22 page)

He took the back of Val’s head and kept him close, whispering in his ear. “Fuck if I know why, but Zoey loves the shit in your boxers, Val.  She’s not going anywhere.   She’s not.  So stop treating her and that baby like they have an expiration date.”

Val shoved himself out of Leo’s hold, teeth bared.  “You don’t know anything about it.”

Leo watched him move back, eyes narrowing.  “Listen, Val.  Hear me.  I’m not going to stand by quietly and watch you hurt her.  So whatever it is that’s broken in you, whatever it is that’s been broken in you for a
long time,
you need to figure it the fuck out.  Because if you hurt Zoey, you’re answering to me, and you’re answering to Rome, Gar, and Pop.  By the time you’ve made it to Pop, you won’t have a single limb still attached, and he’ll be forced to start in on your teeth.  I suggest you figure your shit out before it comes to that.”

Val moved to the wall, clenching his fists.

Leo waited for him to send one flying into the plaster.   “You have no idea how lucky you are,” he said to Val’s back.  “You have a fiance who worships you.  She’s pregnant with a child that will worship you.  You have two parents who worship you.  You’re about to be a billionaire, so the
world
worships you.”  Leo cringed.  “This never-ending pity party you’ve been throwing yourself for years is about to get really old, V.  You have nothing, nothing…”

When Val turned back to him, something new was in his gaze.  Shock?  Disbelief?

Leo didn’t know he was shaking until he pointed his finger and saw it moving.  “You have absolutely
nothing
to be this miserable about.”

“You don’t know a damn thing, Leo.  You have no idea.”

“No idea?” Leo’s voice rose.   “I have no idea what it feels like to have a twin brother who both my parents love more?  Who my siblings love more? I have no idea what it feels like to constantly be an outsider looking in, in my own family?  I have no idea that Pop would be fine if you’d been the only one of us born?  That he sees me as a fucking failure?   I have no idea what it’s like to constantly be in your fucking shadow?”

Val’s mouth dropped, and this time, the shock and disbelief were gone.  All that remained was sorrow. “Leo.”  He cringed.

“They’ve always loved you more.” Leo nodded.  “And you
will
never
have any idea what that feels like.”

Val was frozen in place, his wide eyes filling as they searched Leo’s across the room.

Then, he laughed.

“Wow. Just… Wow, you have no idea—” Val voice broke as his laughter rose.  “How wrong you are.”

Leo was surprised to hear the very words that Ashley had said to him on the yacht coming out of Val’s mouth.

“Leo, you have no idea.” Val looked up at him from under his eyelids.  “What I wouldn’t give to be as kind and open…” He paused.  “As fun
and free as you are.  What I wouldn’t give to have every person who meets me fall in love with me, on sight.  What I wouldn’t give to escape this heinous thing…” Val made a claw at his gut.  “This
heinous
thing inside me. To have Ma and Pop trust me enough to set me free in a real way, the way they’ve always trusted you.  Pop can’t release me, because he knows I’m constantly on the verge of falling apart.  Ma coddles me, because she
knows I’m weak.
 
They don’t do the same to you because they know how strong you are.”  His shaky smile grew wider.  “The only reason I am where I am today is because I’ve never stopped fighting to be like
you,
Leo, but there isn’t enough money in the world to buy the gifts that you were blessed with. 
You
have no idea…”

When his voice broke, Leo zoomed across the room and pulled Val into a fierce hug once more.

“I’m sorry,” he breathed.  “Val, I’m sorry.  I shouldn’t have… I was wrong to say all that shit.”

“I can’t put my kid’s crib together because I’m not strong enough, all right?”

“You will be,” Leo whispered.  This time, Val didn’t try to pull out of his arms.  “Because I’m always going to be right here to remind you just who you are.”  He shook him.  “You’re Val fucking Romanovsky.  Smartest son of a bitch I ever met.  About to be a billionaire before thirty.  A man who gives to his family without question or hesitation.  You might think you’re filled with heinous things, but I know what’s real. And I’ll always be right here, right on your ass, reminding you.”

Only when they heard the click of the front door did they pull back.  They wiped their eyes and avoided each other’s gazes, in the embarrassed way only two men who’d become more emotional than they’d planned could.

Sniffling, they turned to the door just as Zoey stepped inside with several shopping bags hanging from her arms.

“Hey baby,” she called, voice somewhat solemn, focused on twisting her keys out of the lock.  “I picked up some fun things for the baby…” She looked up and froze in the doorway when she caught sight of Val and Leo, looking flushed.  “Uh oh.  Were you two having a… twin moment? I know better than to get tangled up in that madness.”  She motioned to the hallway.  “I’ll come back.”

Val and Leo shared a look before they both stepped away from each other, giving Zoey a clear view of the crib, and the rest of the assembled baby items scattered across the living and dining area.

Leo grinned.  Even though he’d complained the whole way, it was worth it to see Zoey’s mouth drop, and her eyes fill.

“What in the world?”  she gasped, eyes searching the room as she stepped in, pushing the door closed.  “Oh my god.” 

Leo hurried over and took the shopping bags from her hands. 

She looked up at him, eyes wet with emotion.

Leo set the bags on the dining table, and Val made room as Zoey waddled over to the crib, reaching for it with clawed hands.  She took the white bar under her shaking fingers, turning to Leo with big blubbery eyes.

He motioned to Val.  “Val finished putting it all together.  While you were out.”

Val’s chest swelled.  He lifted his eyes to Leo over her shoulder.

Zoey turned to Val and launched her body at him, curling her arms around his neck.  Every inch of suffering washed clear from Val’s eyes.  His body relaxed, and his eyes fluttered closed as he tucked his head into her shoulder, disappearing into her essence.

“Val.”  She sniffled.  “I was so worried.  I was so worried that you were having second thoughts… about me.  About the baby.”

“Never, Zo.”  Val tightened his hold around her, meeting Leo’s eyes over her shoulder.

Leo pointed to the door.  “I’m gonna head out.”

Zoey pulled away from Val and turned to him.  “Now?”

Leo ran his hand down the back of his head.  “Yeah.  I gotta go fix something.”

“With Ashley?”

Leo moved to the door with a blush, placing his hand on the handle.

“Just be honest with her, Leo,” Zoey said.  “Be honest about every dirty, nasty, embarrassing, ugly thing about yourself.  Every secret inside you.  Give it to her.  Just give it all to her, and she’ll have no choice but to love you, because all those things are the best things about you.  Truly.”

Before Leo could stop himself, he crossed the room and took Zoey in a hug.

She smiled at him when he pulled back.

“Thanks, sis.”

Zoey pushed him.  “Go get your girl, damn it.  What are you still doing here?”

Leo bounced away on his back foot, pointing at her.  “You’re the best.”

“You are.” Zoey smiled, turning to Val with a laugh when Leo zoomed out the door.

The stairs of the water tower rattled to life, and Jessica pressed her head back, gazing up at the cloudy night sky. She tried to take a deep breath, knowing it was him, but couldn’t.  When his head appeared at the top of the ladder, and their eyes met, she knew she was still furious, even though she had no right to be.

He cleared the ladder and stepped onto the tower, keeping his distance.  His white button-down was untucked from his black slacks, blowing in the breeze.  He must’ve come straight from work.  He pushed his hands in his pockets, holding her eyes.

“I’m not ready to see you right now,” she said.

A silence passed, leaving just the whooshing of the wind and the honks resonating from the Brooklyn Bridge to keep them company.

He shook his head.  “I can’t eat, can’t sleep. I’m an R. Kelly song in the flesh, Ash.  And not even one of the classic R. Kelly songs.  I’m the track that got tossed during development.  The track that never saw the light of day because it was so utterly broken, it was beyond help.”

Jessica had to turn her head away from him.  She’d be damned if he saw the smile threatening her lips.

He spoke to the back of her head.  “Haven’t gotten a damn thing done at work.  I can’t function, at all, knowing that I hurt you.”

“You’re wrong, Leo.  You don’t sound like an R. Kelly song.”  She turned back to him.  “You sound worse.  Like a Lionel Richie song.”   And she wasn’t buying it.

He stood a little taller once he had her eyes.  “I got into it with Val the other night.”

Her lips parted.

He raised his eyebrows.  “I told him… everything.  About how angry I’ve been all these years.  How resentful.  How I’ve felt stuck in his shadow.  Not worthy.”  He laughed.  “Imagine my surprise when he had a few shots to fire right back at me.”

Jessica couldn’t help it, she stood.  She took a step toward him.  She clutched the railing and held his eyes across the tower, the breeze blowing her hair across her face.

Leo held hers, too.  “He said that he’s spent his whole life trying to be like me.”  He laughed.  “Me.  This whole time…”

Jessica took another step, seeing the truth in his eyes.

“This whole time I’ve been so busy resenting him that I completely missed how much pain he’s in.  That he’s fighting his own war.  A fight I would’ve never known about if I hadn’t met you.  I would have never opened up to him the way I did, if I hadn’t done it with you first.  So… Even if you hate me for the rest of your life, even if you can never find it in yourself to forgive me… I wanted you to know that.  I wanted you to know the part you played in making my life a little better.  Easing the madness inside me.  Opening my eyes to my brother’s pain, reminding me that he’s just as fragile as I am.  Maybe more.”  Leo shrugged.  “I’ll do anything to protect Val, but I wouldn’t have even
known
he needed protecting if you hadn’t inspired me to be honest with him.”  He breathed out.  “So I guess I’m not just here to say I’m sorry… but to say thank you.”

Jessica couldn’t believe it.  This son of a bitch had done it.  He’d sucked every inch of anger right out of her, and now all she wanted to do was cross that tower and cuddle his head to her chest.

With what felt like the world between them, they each took hesitant steps forward, taking their time to close the gap.

“Three weeks ago, I leaned in to kiss you for the first time,” he said.  “And you reared away from me—”

She froze in mid-step.  “Best decision ever.”

He didn’t miss a beat.  “Before that, it had been a long time since a woman had turned me down.  I didn’t even know how deeply invested I was in their acceptance until you refused to give me yours.  When you didn’t kiss me that night, you changed me.  I didn’t have the foresight to see how deep.  I just needed to win.  So I made it my mission to get you to say yes.  I made it my mission to get you into bed.  To conquer you.  To prove I was worthy.”

The wind kicked up her hair, and they were close enough now that the ends tickled his shirt.  She barely heard her own whispered voice. “I hope you’re getting close to redeeming yourself soon.”

They both stopped, searching each other’s eyes.

“Ashley, I was owned by my ego.  Driven by my insecurities.  That feeling of never being good enough.  Smart enough.  
Val
enough.”

She had to force her eyes away.  The wire strapped to her chest was itching again.

“I didn’t want to face that feeling, so I surrounded myself with women who I thought were building me up.  I truly believed they were.  Until I met you.  Now I know the lies I told myself everyday, the reason I had them around, was because I didn’t want to face what was really going on with me.  My relationship with my family.  With women.  With myself.  I didn’t want to believe that I hated Val’s successes, because they always diminished my own.  I thought it made me a terrible person, and I did anything to stifle it.”

She breathed in.

“Then I met you…” He smiled.  “And, yes, you became the next woman to check off a list.  There for the sole purpose of justifying the lies I needed to tell myself.  I couldn’t wait to lay you down, because it would validate me all over again.  But the more time I spent with you, the less I wanted that.  I just wanted… you.  Not just your body, but your heart, your mind, your
smile.” 
He pressed a hand to his heart.  “Jesus, that smile.”

She was unable to fight the very phenomena he was praising, looking away when it tugged her lips.

He took in the sight.  “I wanted to know
you
. And I wanted you to…
want
to know me.”

She licked her lips, peeking at him from the corner of her eye.

“I know you have no reason to believe me, but the day you showed up at my door, I’d just got done telling those girls all about you.  Telling them why the party was over.  Why the madness had to end.  They’re not just gone from my apartment.  Here?” He pointed to his heart.  “They’re gone. Here?”  He pressed two fingers to his temple.  “They were never there.  Not the way you are. I wanted them gone before you came to my door, Ash, I swear to God.”

Jessica fell against the railing next to her.

He closed in.  “Do you believe me?”

She told the truth.  “No.”

“Ash, I don’t want to be that guy anymore.  I want to be the guy who’s worthy of you.  Whose apartment you can show up to unannounced whenever you feel like it.  I want to be the guy that you trusted enough to leave the city alone with for two days.  The guy who you smile at with that smile.”  His own lips parted into a grin.  “Not that conniving Wednesday Addam’s smile, but that real one… the one that takes a hook to my heart and shreds it to a thousand pieces.”

“Leo, the truth is…” Jessica shook her head.  “I was wrong to rip your head off about those girls at your place.  I reacted like a crazy person.  I reacted like you were mine, when we haven’t even talked about whether or not you’re mine, or whether or not I’m yours.”  She looked down.  “You’re not my boyfriend.  You never were.  I had no right to dictate—”

“I’m giving you the right.  You can dictate all day.  I’m yours.”

Her mouth fell open.

He reached into his back pocket and produced a ticket, holding it up.  “The gala is next week, and… I’d love it… if I could arrive with my girlfriend on my arm.”

Jessica’s mouth fell open.  “Your girlfriend?”

“I’m yours, if you’ll have me.”  His breathing picked up. “Have me, Ashley.  Please have me.”

***

Of course she’d taken the ticket.  Of course she’d forgiven him.  Not because he’d given her the “girlfriend” title.  Not even because she’d wanted it.

No.  She’d forgiven Leo, because she still needed him.  Chet had said it best. He was her job, her mark.  A pawn to be used for information and then discarded by any means necessary.

Her eyes rose to the mirror’s reflection, and she told herself she wasn’t a bad person.  She wasn’t wrong for doing her job.

So why couldn’t she make herself believe it?  Was it because, for the first time in their relationship, her lies were the only lies that remained?  All of Leo’s “ugliest parts” had been exposed and beat to the ground.  A part of her had almost wished his apartment hadn’t been empty when she’d followed him through the door that night, that he
still
had a harem of naked women loitering around.

At least then, she wouldn’t be the only terrible person.  The only fraud.  The only liar.  At least then, her lies wouldn’t stand alone.

Her ugliest parts still rang true.  So much so that she found herself cringing at her reflection in his master bathroom as she pushed her hand under the hem of her dress.  The sound of the tape ripping away from her skin bounced off the walls as she pulled the wire out, dropping it on the counter.  She stared down at the black cord, scratching her nails against the granite countertop before snatching it up and shoving it into her purse.

He’d laid himself bare that evening on the tower, and her body had exploded with warmth, passion, a blinding need that sent stars flying behind her eyes and straight to her throbbing center.  She’d tried to remind herself that he was her mark, an irredeemable dog, even as she pushed her tongue past his eager lips.  She’d trusted the words in her head until he’d zeroed in on her and kissed her with intent, pressing his desire to her stomach as he yanked her body to his.  It had taken everything she had to pull away, fearful he would feel the wire. She’d agreed to let him take her home.

Because he’s your mark.  A tunnel to Val.  A means to an end.  And you still need him. Even if it means fucking him tonight.

She stared at her reflection, swallowing.  After several deep, ineffective breaths, she swiped a pack of wet wipes from her purse and cleaned herself up.  A wisp of extra perfume cooled her wrists before she tossed it into her bag and pulled the bathroom door open.

Leo faced the door on the edge of his king mattress, adorned in black bedding, leaning forward on his knees with his hands clasped.  He stood when she emerged, a shy smile spreading his lips.

“Hey,” she whispered from the doorway.

“Oh hey, Wednesday.”

Breaking eye contact with a grin, she fingered the bathroom wall before flicking off the light switch.

He held her eyes as the light diminished, leaving only the dim lamp from the hallway spilling into the dark room. Licking his lips, his fingers visibly shook as he watched her from across the room.  He took the bottom of his t-shirt in his hand, hesitated just enough to give a hint of his heaving abs, and then inhaled deeply before tugging it over his head.

Jessica’s eyes followed the fabric.  He released it, and it fell to a heap at his bare feet.

Her eyes moved up his long legs, his tight stomach, the art on his arms, which rippled with more urgency with every quiet second that passed.  He didn’t close the space between them.

She dropped her purse to the floor, meeting his hooded eyes with a desire-filled gaze of her own, running her hands down the front of her body, feeling her own abdomen rising and falling.

She was no longer in denial.  Since high school she’d wanted a piece of this man. To find out why there was a never-ending line of girls thirsty to get to his dick.  If she was going to destroy him and his family, she concluded, she might as well have a little fun while she was at it.

After he came, and then passed out, she’d plant enough hidden cameras in his apartment to put JFK Airport to shame.

Her body ached for that moment.  Not for the moment she bugged his apartment, but the moment before the remnants of his pleasure lulled him to sleep, the moment when he slammed in deep, driving for a comfort only she had to give, filling her with his desire, his hardness spreading channels of her body that belonged only to him, even if she’d convinced herself they didn’t.

She looked down at her dress and faltered.  Nudity was inevitable.  If she was going to have sex with him, she’d have to get naked, and getting naked was always the hardest part.  Peeling the clothes off.  Baring herself to a man.  Letting him see her stretch marks, her jiggly parts, all the imperfect little passageways she’d mastered hiding under strategically executed outfits, and an endless supply of Spanx
.

Her heart felt like it had relocated to her throat when she bent down and took the hem of her dress in her hands.

Leo’s eyebrows pulled, darkened orbs lingering on the dip in her neckline before falling to the hem of her dress.  His desire to see it off was so plain in his eyes, it was as if he’d already made love to her ten times in his mind.

Jessica stood tall, bringing the hem of her dress with her as she did.

He watched with rapture as the dress rose past her full hips, red panties, heaving abdomen, red bra, and finally over her head, making her hair tumble down into her heavy eyes.  The dress lingered in her hand in much the same way his shirt had lingered in his, and she tossed it away with a deep breath.

Unable to stop herself, her hands crossed over her body and covered her hips, where the white marks were most prominent.  Marks that signified all the weight she’d lost, all the hard work she’d done, had somehow been deemed something to be ashamed of.   Somewhere deep inside her, she knew they should be a badge of honor, not contrition.  Still, she wanted to hide—to hide away Beer Belly Borgia
,
even if it had been a beer belly he’d secretly longed for.