The Pull of Destiny (41 page)

Is this normal father/
son behaviour?

Judging from Luke’s stony
expression- no. Why did they hate each other so much that this uncomfortable
scene had to happen? What had happened between them to create such animosity?

Mr. Astor turned to me
again, his eyes asking me a question. “You know, Miss Sawyer, I tend to wonder
why you accepted Luke’s date offer. I’m sure you know about his track record?”

I opened my mouth to retort
but Mr. Astor talked over me. In retrospect, that was probably a good thing,
because I wasn’t feeling particularly disposed to him at the moment.

“You’ve probably ruined
your reputation just by going out with this screw-up son of mine,” he
continued, nodding in a severely pissed off Luke’s direction. “No
self-respecting guy would touch you once you’ve been tainted by Luke Astor the
Third. I mean, look at Joanna Winthrop! They dated for a few years and now the
only guy who’ll have her is that money loving scumbag she’s dancing with.”

I looked up at Mr. Astor
in surprise. He didn’t strike me as the type of guy who’d even remember the
names of his son’s ex-girlfriends, but here he was, proving that he not only
knew who Joanna was, he was also all up in her business.

Luke also looked up at his
dad, his face teeming with emotion. “Are you serious right now?”

Ignoring Luke, Mr. Astor
turned to me again. “After Luke’s third DUI, I told him to straighten out or
I’d send him to one of the strictest English boarding schools on the planet.
Can you imagine, he crashed one of my cars into a McDonalds while he was on a
bender with a bunch of his dumbass friends?”

I vaguely recalled hearing
something about that incident, but by the time the story had gone through our school
grapevine, the general consensus had been that Luke and his boys crashed the
car into an oil tanker outside a fancy restaurant and they managed to escape
right before the car went up in flames, incinerating the fancy restaurant and
everyone in it.

I knew Robyn was lying
about that!

I didn’t say anything in
response to that, because, well, what
could
you say?

Luke groaned loudly. “Oh,
my God, dad, just stop already! You’ve already ruined the entire night for us.”

“Me, ruin your night?” Mr.
Astor looked genuinely surprised as he pointed to himself. “I’m just regaling
your beautiful date with stories, since you’re obviously too tongue-tied to
talk to her yourself.”
Now he thinks he’s doing us a favour. Come on!
“Of course, he isn’t always this tongue tied around girls,” Mr. Astor went on,
turning to me again. “In fact, the amount of times I’ve found him in the hot
tub with a pretty young thing - let’s just say he gets his libido from me.” He
winked lewdly as my eyes widened. “I always was scared that little Faith would
walk in on him and his various floozies, but so far so good. Ever since the
doctor diagnosed his aneurysm, he’s been keeping a low profile, thank God. Or
maybe he’s been holding his sexscapades in his room, where nobody can see.”

“I’ve been helping him
with his bucket list,” I interrupted hastily, feeling like I had to say
something
to detract Luke’s dad from the embarrassingly painful dissection of his son’s
sex life. In the back of my mind, all I could think was
‘I sat on his bed!
Did he hold his sexscapades there too?’

Luke glanced up from his
study of his hands, a positively grateful look on his face at my intervention
tactics. He mouthed, “Thank you,” at me as his dad did a double take at the
sound of my voice. What did he think he’d been talking to all this time, a
tree?

“What’s that? A bucket
list? Why the hell would he have a bucket list? You that sure you gonna croak,
kiddo? You want me to cancel Dr. Khan and let you handle this by yourself?”

I almost growled at Mr.
Astor’s callousness. Didn’t Luke’s wellbeing mean a damn thing to him?

“People don’t only have
bucket lists just because they’re going to die,” I said in chilly tones. “Luke
wants to do the things he always wanted to do before he has his operation. It
has nothing to do with death and everything to do with being organised.”

“But Luke isn’t organised,
sweet thing,” Mr. Astor said, swigging down his wine like it was water. “He
does everything half assed then drops it when he’s bored. You wait and see.
He’s not gonna finish his stupid list.”

“Yes, I will,” Luke said,
his voice flat and emotionless.

“Oh, wait, I’m sorry, you
must have already finished your list!” Mr. Astor laughed sarcastically.
I’m
really starting to hate that laugh. And the man. And his overpowering cologne.
“I
mean, what could possibly be on it apart from ‘get wasted’, ‘get high’,
‘vandalise historic landmarks’, ‘get suspended multiple times’ and ‘get
arrested’? Honestly, the only thing you could still do is get yourself into a
car accident and go the same way as that friend of yours.”

My mouth dropped open in
shock. Mr. Astor was talking about Shane! And in such a blatantly disrespectful
way too! Hadn’t he ever heard about not speaking ill of the dead? And he was
Luke’s best friend, too!

Giving his dad a look of
utmost fury, Luke pushed his chair back and stood up, kneading his forehead
with one hand. “That’s low,” he said, his voice cracking with anger. “Shane was
my friend! His parents are here- you’re heartless!”

With that parting shot,
Luke turned and stomped out of the ballroom, his back rigid with anger.

Grinning like everything
was all good, Mr. Astor turned to me. “He’s probably gone to bawl his eyes
out,” he said dismissively. “Can I tempt you with some wine?”

This had to be a dream.
Either that or I was being punked.
Please let this be an episode of Punk’d.
Because no family could possibly be this dysfunctional, could it? I thought I
had it bad with Nate. This was an entirely different story.

I stood up, grabbing my
purse. “Excuse me, sir. I have to go check on my date,” I said, my voice
sounding frosty to my ears. I didn’t care much. The last thing I felt like
doing was being nice to the egotistical man. No wonder Luke put up such a tough
guy front. With a dad like that, he had to.

Before Mr. Astor could say
anything else to me (
can I tempt you with some wine? Puh-leeze!)
I
scurried off in the direction Luke had gone, my heels clattering on the floor.

I found Luke leaning
against the wall opposite the entrance, his head in his hands. Uncertainly, I
approached, twisting my purse nervously in my hands.
Is he crying?

Apparently hearing me get
closer, Luke raised his head and gave me a smile that didn’t quite reach his
eyes. I was relieved to see that he wasn’t crying.

“I’m sorry I ran out like
that,” he said apologetically as I edged closer to him. “I just couldn’t take
it - talking about Shane like that - talking about me like that...” His voice
trailed off and he stared morosely at his hands. “I just had to walk away
before I did something stupid.”

“It’s okay, Luke,” I
assured him, patting his shoulder.

He rested the back of his
head against the wall, closing his eyes. “My head hurts,” he mumbled. “I
thought the- aneurysm was gonna implode, I was so pissed.”

“He shouldn’t have been
baiting you,” I said, my voice rising indignantly. “He knows you’re sick, he
knows what could- potentially- happen when you get mad-.”

“And he doesn’t care. All
he cares about is work, money and - Faith.” Luke scowled reflectively.
“Sometimes, he probably wishes she was his only child. I know I suck, I’m a
waste of resources.” He gave a humourless laugh. “But- he’s stuck with me.”

He sounded so sad, and
looked so dejected that it was all I could do to keep myself from crying. I put
an arm around his shoulder, wishing there was some way I could make him see
that I didn’t think he was a waste of anything.

“Why does he – dislike you
so much?” I asked delicately, looking at his pensive profile.

He sighed. “It’s a long
story.”

“Oh. Right.”

In other words, none of
your business.
I nodded,
deciding to leave it alone.
But you told him about Nate and Rhea when he
asked and if that wasn’t a long story, I must be loco!

What I was thinking must
have showed up one my face because Luke hurriedly added, “I’ll tell you all
about it one day, but not now. I don’t wanna deal with it right now.”

Fair enough.

“Okay,” I whispered as
Luke wrapped his arm around my waist.

Ruefully, he said, “This
date’s been a bust. I’ll make it up to you, I swear.”

“I’ll hold you to it.”

“I’m really-.”

“Luke,” I said wearily,
running a hand through my hair. I knew what he was going to say. I didn’t want
to hear it again. “If you say you’re sorry again, I’m gonna cry. I don’t think
you want that. It’ll make that day in Baskin Robbins seem positively tame.”

“Okay, I won’t say the s
word,” Luke said softly, coming closer to me. “Can I just say how pretty you
look tonight?”

I looked up at Luke
through my eyelashes. “Well, I wouldn’t mind hearing
that.
”

Dayum, he was totally
flirting with me.

“And throughout our dance,
all I could focus on was your hair.” He put his hands on my shoulders in a
repeat of that day at Shazia’s place, burying his face into my hair.
Isn’t
that somewhat unsanitary?
I mean, I did wash it tonight, but still! “God,
it smells so good! What shampoo you use?”

“Herbal Essences,” I said,
gulping rapidly as he raised his head from my hair and dropped a kiss on the
top of my head.

“It smells delicious.
Like, if hair was edible, you’d be bald by now.”

That’s a slightly scary
idea. Thank God hair isn’t edible- no one would want to see a bald Celsi
running around.

“I’m glad that’s not the
case,” I said as Luke randomly hugged me to him, pressing his cheek against
mine.

“I suck at dates, don’t
I?”

Shrugging as best as I
could, I said, “Well, you sucked at this one.”

Chuckling, he brushed his
lips against my cheek. “Next time it’ll be better,” he assured me, tucking a
strand of my no doubt mussed up hair behind my ear.

Hold up. Did he just say
next time?

“What makes you think
there’s gonna be a next time?” I asked coquettishly.

Smiling roguishly at me,
Luke said, “I never date and run. Promise.”

I smiled back as he bent
his head down again, presumably to kiss my other cheek. But-

Let me just clarify one
thing. It wasn’t dark in that corner we were standing in. I didn’t move my head
suddenly at the last moment (I’m not that reckless). So when Luke’s warm, soft
lips grazed against mine, I was pretty much as flabbergasted as you are.

CHAPTER 17

give them
something to talk about.

Celsi’s Point of View

I should have seen it
coming. The kiss, I mean. Isn’t there supposed to be some sort of sign that
lets you know that a guy is going to plant a big wet one on you?
Or in my
unique case, a frisson inducing gentle one?

You’d think that with all
the romance books I practically devour that I would know all of the tell-tale
‘prelude to a kiss’ signs off by heart! Increased eye contact. Rapid breathing.
Subtle licking of lips.

Luke Astor must have
missed the memo because I didn’t even have a second to realise that a kiss was
his intention. If he’d just tried to hug me again, I would have been prepared,
or at least not surprised, but a kiss... I was lost.

I felt as though time had
suddenly stopped as his dark hair suddenly brushed against my forehead like a
silky curtain, tickling my eyelashes. His amazingly soft, slightly parted lips
moved oh so slowly and gently against mine, feather light, as our breath
intermingled. For a second I was frozen, too shocked to move, too shocked to
know what to do. But I knew one thing for sure- if neither of us put a stop to
this right now, I was gonna
have
to kiss him back.

There are some things I
can resist. Luke Astor’s lips on mine- not one of those things.

Mustering up all my
willpower (and then some) as my paralysis broke and delayed reaction finally
kicked in, I backed away from Luke, slamming my back into the wall as I stared
at him, my mouth wide with shock. Unfortunately, immediately after doing so, I
regretted pulling away. The kiss had actually felt rather nice, if I hadn’t stopped
to remember where we were, and what might happen if Luke and I got caught red
handed by Joanna, Wendy, or (God forbid) Luke’s father.