My Billionaire Stepbrother (Lexi's Sexy Billionaire Romance #1) (21 page)

“Oh,” Samantha says, “this is so much better than breakfast.”
 

Parker scrambles into view behind her. He’s wearing a suit with the fly open, and I realize that since we met again, I haven’t seen him out of formalwear — other than that time in the limo of course. Those
two
times in the limo. The day, it now seems with a resurgence of anger, that I joined the notches on the infamous Parker Altman’s bedpost.
 

“Angela!” he shouts.
 

I spin on my heel. The elevator doesn’t open into Parker’s apartment. For security reasons, it’s accessible down a short private hallway ending in another locked door. I’m traversing that hallway now in reverse. The elevator should still be waiting; it’s dedicated for this floor. The lobby attendant had to, after getting Sam’s buzz, unlock the elevator and let me in.
 

Parker will reach me before I get there.
 

“Angela!” he shouts, now running.
 

I can’t believe I was such a gullible little girl. Such a naive, gutter-trash conquest. I look back to see his frantic face running toward me, his shirt untucked, his neck maddeningly kissed with bright-red lipstick. Samantha is visible at the far end, still posing in the doorway like a minx.
 

I had all the evidence in front of me. Samantha had laid it all out. It didn’t matter that she was only telling me things I mostly knew. In fact, it was
worse
that she was telling me what I already knew. If she’d given me new information, I could blame Parker for hiding his true nature. But now it was clear that
I
was to blame.
 

I let my heart get the most of me. No, no, wait; tell the truth … I let my
vagina
get the most of me. How the hell had I made the leap between “Parker wants me” and “Parker loves me”? Nowhere in our past or present had that been said or implied.
That
had been my heart. My foolish, stupid, naive heart made the leap from lust to affection then sold it upstream to my brain, which was desperate to believe it. Because it’s one thing to do what I did for love but another to do it for lust. The first made me almost noble: defying others for love. The second made me a disloyal, abandoning, sellout slut.
 

Parker runs to the door then holds it open.
 

“Angela! I made a mistake.” Huffing, catching his breath. “You were right about me. You were exactly right and — ”

I’ve heard enough.
 

I shove him hard with both hands, right in the chest, with all my strength. I hate myself for it, but I’ve already started to cry. Parker is a brick wall, and I’m slight, but still he staggers back, his face an awful mix of guilty and sad. As it should be.

“I know I was right,” I tell him.
 

The doors close.
 

I sink to the floor then journey to the street, sobbing.

ANGELA

I
T
TAKES
THREE
WEEKS
OF
the normal grind before I feel myself again. Three weeks of dealing with Mom’s crap and Bill’s errands. Three weeks of waiting tables at TGI Friday’s, trying not to hate people who leave shoddy tips. Three weeks of running my path over and over, trying not to stare out at the damning Los Angeles skyline.
 

But little by little, I find I’m able to look in the mirror again. I try to forgive myself, and mostly succeed. Mom and Bill are less forgiving. In their minds, I had Parker on the hook and let him slip away. I’d almost healed the gash and pulled this family from the ghetto for good (and, I suspect Bill thinks, moving on up to a
dee-luxe
apartment in the sky), but then I’d blown it.
 

Great job, Angela. Great job failing to provide for this family.
 

They say this to me and give me disappointed looks while I vacuum, while I pay the bills, while I drop off Mom’s pain meds and mow our tiny lawn.
 

But I have to at least forgive myself, seeing as nobody else will forgive me. I was weak. I was compromised from below the belt. Parker, intentionally or not (I prefer to think intentionally), reached into our shared past and found a lever he could use to exploit me and get into my pants. I got my itch scratched too, I suppose, and hence am largely to blame. For believing him and surrendering myself. I’m also to blame for breaking a taboo that held us apart our entire adult lives, but somehow that feels like no big deal. Mom and Bill got married, so what. I can’t let their actions define me.
 

I’m thinking this while doing the dishes my mother claims she can’t do because of her imagined disability.
 

I work. I come home. I run. I work. The cycle repeats.
 

I can’t hate Parker in the way I used to even after the worst of the pain abates. He betrayed me, sure. And he used me, maybe. But he’s just so broken. If anything, I feel sorry for him. I feel sorry for Parker with his penthouse and his helicopter and his jet and his limousines. I feel sorry for his drink and his drugs and his meaningless sex. I feel sorry for the hell he must live in daily. He’s a man with everything, and nothing.
 

I’m feeling superior for my willingness to turn the other cheek — to forgive and pity those who’ve wronged me rather than simply despising them — as I get out of my car, pleased that Mom and Bill are away, leaving me a few hours with myself. I park on the street because some asshole has blocked our driveway with a busted-up Ford adorned in fancy rims and tinted windows — the poor man’s vision of luxury. It’s hard to see things like that anymore, now that I’ve known opulence firsthand.
 

I open the mailbox. There’s a red envelope inside.
 

I look down, curious. I turn it over. There’s no return address, but my name is on the front. It’s lumpier than it should be and something rattles inside.
 

I open the envelope, and the strange thing falls out. A key. Inside the card — a birthday greeting without any signature — there’s an address. Whose, I don’t know.
 

“Just accept it,” says a voice.
 

I look over and see Parker getting out of the busted Ford. He must have borrowed it for this dramatic reveal, sure I’d run at the sight of his billionairemobile.
 

He doesn’t come closer. He’s twisting something nervously in his hands: probably the keys to that piece of shit.
 

“Please don’t fight me on this, Angela,” he says. “Just accept it. There are no strings attached in any way. In fact, I
request
you don’t even call me. I’m here because I want to be sure you take it, but you’ll never see me again unless you want to.”

I look down at the card.
 

“What is it?” I ask, more surprised than angry.
 

“It’s a key to your apartment.”
 

I look at my house.

“Not
theirs
, Ang.
Yours
. They stay here. It’s a condition of accepting it. I’ve already arranged to buy the house from your landlord, but you can’t tell Maria or Dad it’s been sold, and especially to whom. I want you to have the utility bills sent to my accountant.”
 

I look down at the key. Shockingly, I’m not angry, too tired for rage.
 

“No,” I say.
 

“No?”
 

“I won’t let you pay my rent.”
 

Parker walks closer. Despite my imagined stoicism, my heart beats faster.
 

He’s shaking his head. “I’m not going to pay your rent, Angela. I’m going to pay
theirs
— or, really, just buy the house. You are in charge of your rent for as long as you want to be. Just so you know, you’ll be paying my office because I bought that place, too. But we’ll charge you just under market.”
 

I don’t know how to react. It’s not every day your billionaire stepbrother buys you an apartment, announces you’re moving into it, then declares himself your landlord.
 

I look up, questions in my eyes.
 

“Because you don’t want charity,” he says, answering the question I’ve not yet asked. Again, he nods toward the house. “But I won’t let you keep
giving
charity either.”
 

I look down at the key.
 

“I can’t accept this.”
 

“
You’re
not accepting anything. I’m giving to
them
. I just don’t want them to know.”
 

“Why not?”
 

“Because it’s really for you, Angela.”
 

There’s a beat of silence between us. I understand what he’s doing, but as much as I want to stomp my foot and refuse, there’s no way. I’ll still pay about what I’m paying now, I imagine, but it’ll be in my own place. How I’ll explain this benefaction to Mom and Bill, I don’t know, but they’re used to handouts. It won’t be hard.

“Why are you doing this?”
 

His eyes are sad, regretful. “I have to do something. I don’t want to be tied to my dad or your mom anymore. At all. But it’s not fair for you to be holding the bag. This is my solution. I’ll pay,
and
you’ll pay, but you’ll at least have your own place. You’re off the hook, and I get an unburdened conscience without Dad on my back.”
 

I turn the key in my fingers. “Where is it?”
 

“About six blocks away.”
 

“Not downtown?”
 

“You wouldn’t accept a place downtown. You wouldn’t take a place you can’t afford with your own money, and you wouldn’t let me subsidize your rent. It’s a step up from here, it’s clean, it’s safe, and you’ll pay the same as your neighbors.”
 

I don’t know what to say. I can’t quite say thank you because it’s not really for me. And yet it absolutely is. Parker said so.

“Thanks, I guess,” I say anyway.
 

“So you’ll take it.”
 

I nod.
 

“Thank you.”

“You shouldn’t thank me,” I say.

“I was sure you’d refuse. I thought you’d see it as accepting a handout. But it’s not. Everyone wins.”
 

“Everyone?”
 

He smiles sadly. “I want to apologize, but that I’m
sure
you won’t accept.”
 

I say nothing.
 

“But I want you to be happy. Just that is enough. You’re an amazing person, Ang, you don’t deserve to be saddled with all the garbage from your past.” He looks toward the house again, and his eyes narrow. “Or garbage from mine.”
 

I want to touch his hand but don’t dare. I felt strong a moment ago; now I’m fragile like glass. This man betrayed me. This man is an inconsiderate monster. He thinks only of himself. I’m thinking this while I run my fingers along the key to my new apartment, imagining the freedom he’s allowed me to have.
 

With nothing more to say, he gives a little frown/smile, nods, and starts to walk away.
 

“Parker,” I call.
 

He turns again.
 

“You’re not that guy,” I tell him.
 

I walk toward him. Maybe I’m being foolish. Maybe I’m being naive. Maybe I’m thinking like a stupid little girl looking to be taken advantage of, but I find the strength to take his hand anyway.
 

“You’ve changed a little,” I go on, “but not into what you’re afraid you’ve become.”
 

“Thanks,” he says, touched.
 

“I just thought you should know that.”
 

He nods. “It’s because of you.”
 

I blink. I meet his eyes.
 

His hand in mine, he says, “I don’t know if you’re right and I haven’t become that person. But I was before I met you again. Your selflessness ruins me.” He smiles a little. “It’s hard to be as jaded and angry when you’re around.”
 

I say nothing because in the way I counterbalance his ego, he counters my self-sacrifice.
 

“I found that out the hard way,” he says.
 

“How?”
 

“After you left, I broke up with Samantha.”
 

“You did?”
 

He nods. “And I realized I was only with her for one reason.”
 

“What’s that?

“I don’t like the way I see myself. Sam was bad for me, no doubt, but at least she admired me and what I represented. At least she wanted me. At least she saw me as powerful and strong. And when she was gone, I only had my own eyes. I didn’t like what I saw in the mirror. Who I too easily become, left to my own devices.”