Chapter 7
“No?” Quin asked as he laughed, a bit unsure. “Charlotte, you just said no.”
Braydon tried not to laugh out loud as he heard the answer and watched his stepbrother fumble.
“What… What I meant was that I’m not sure right at this moment.” Charlotte tried to cover. “I just… This came out of nowhere, and I don’t think I can give you a definite answer right at this second with everyone watching.”
As she struggled to find words, Braydon sipped his brandy and found his mother in the crowd. She looked pissed, her face pinched as she glared at Charlotte. This was not how her perfect day for her perfect son was supposed to go. Braydon loved it when her plans didn’t turn out and watched the rest of the drama unfold.
“Okay… Okay, well… Why don’t I give you some time to think about it? Is a week okay?” Quin asked, trying to keep it light.
“Yes, that would be most helpful, thank you.” Charlotte glanced around, her face bright red from embarrassment, and gingerly pushed through the crowd and disappeared inside the house.
Immediately, the muttering began. Braydon hurried to his brother before their mom reached him. “Well, dear brother, I’m assuming that did not go according to plan?”
“No, not exactly. I thought… I thought she would say yes.”
Braydon had to admit he’d been shocked to see the woman from last night standing in front of his brother. The fact that she hadn’t said yes made him feel good—maybe even great. When they’d locked eyes, he’d fought the urge to go to her and break up the conversation but had forced himself to stay put.
“Because you’re such good friends?”
“Well, yes. It made sense. That, and her father.”
Braydon stilled. “What about her father? I thought you said our mother had the idea for the arranged marriage. Her parents were in on it, too?”
“A long time ago, it was set up as a possibility that we would wind up together. Benefits for both families,” Quin said as he tucked the small, velvet box back in his suit jacket pocket. “I know she knows that. I guess I just don’t understand.”
Braydon patted his brother on the shoulder, confused about what was going on inside his head. Charlotte—his Charlotte from last night—was betrothed to Quin? How the hell had that even happened?
“I guess I should go and speak with Mother.”
“That might be a good idea before she strangles Charlotte for embarrassing her.” Braydon watched Quin wonder off, then hurried in the opposite direction towards the house. Charlotte was probably hiding somewhere. He wanted to find her.
It was her eyes—that’s what it was. The way they’d zeroed in on him when Quin was trying to plead his case. The way he saw her lips twitch in a smile. He saw her start to move toward him before she mentally stopped herself and focused on Quin. Braydon had seen it all, and instead of feeling elated that someone had indirectly put his mother in her place, he was thrilled that Charlotte clearly wanted him. He wound through the house, asking the servants if they’d seen a woman. They pointed him in the same direction—the library.
He hurried towards the library, grabbing a bottle of champagne and two glasses as he passed the kitchen. Charlotte was probably in need of a drink, if nothing else. Braydon reached the large oak doors and knocked.
“I’ll be out in a minute,” a voice called. “Please, just one minute!”
Braydon wasn’t going to give her a minute. He barged in and smiled wide when he saw the look of surprise on her face. It dissolved into a smile, which slowly turned into a look of sheer panic.
“Charlotte. Fancy seeing you here,” he said as he closed the doors behind him.
“What are you doing here?” she hissed.
“Wanted to see how you were holding up after, you know, crushing poor Quin’s heart.”
Charlotte stared at him confused. “You know Quin?”
“Yes, hence the reason I was invited to his engagement party.”
“His what?” she yelled. “Wait, everyone else knew what this was?”
Braydon nodded as he poured two glasses of champagne and offered her one. She didn’t take it at first until he told her about the invitation. Then she took it, chugged the whole thing, and held her empty glass out for a refill.
“What was he thinking, doing this to me?” Charlotte muttered as she paced the library.
Braydon took a seat and watched her closely. He couldn’t ignore the way she looked in that dress. It fit her like a glove. He pictured himself peeling it off, bit by bit… Then quickly stopped the fantasy. What was wrong with him? One-night stands were just that. One-night stands. So why was he here with her now? Why the hell did he care?
“Apparently you two are destined to be wed,” he said dramatically. “Or something weird and medieval like that. Nice to know you were already promised to someone.”
She turned and narrowed her eyes at the bitter sound of his voice. “I’m sorry. It would have been nice if I’d known that as well! They always just threw the idea around. Nothing was ever concrete. I don’t know what made him think, after all these years, I’d consider marrying him.”
Braydon shrugged. “You can blame our dear, sweet mother for that one.”
Charlotte lost the mouthful of champagne she had in her mouth. “Your mother? You’re his brother?!”
“Stepbrother, and I’d rather not get into my family relations right now.”
“I don’t think I can handle this,” she whispered and promptly sat down on the couch. “I slept with Quin’s brother… The night before he proposed to me. What kind of woman am I?”
“One of adventure and mystery,” Braydon teased as he held up his glass to her in a toast.
But she shook her head. “No, I don’t do things like this. Ever! What is happening to me?”
“You’re acting like a normal person with desires,” he said and, unable to control himself any longer, got to his feet and moved to the couch. He plopped down next to her as she continued to sip her champagne. “Charlie, you’re going to get drunk.”
“So? Is that a bad thing? And stop calling me Charlie,” she said as she turned to face him. They stared at each other, long and hard, and Braydon knew she was reliving last night. Every last delicious detail. “I…uh, I should probably… get back out there.”
He reached out gently and took her glass. “What’s your hurry?”
“I…I don’t know exactly.”
“You know all they’re going to do is bother you with nonstop questions,” he said quietly, tucking a stray curl behind her ear. “And make you feel even worse than you already do.”
“Yes, but still,” she said, trying to form words as his fingers trailed down her neck. “It’s the proper thing to do.”
“Proper?”
“Yes…the proper thing,” she breathed. Braydon leaned in and kissed her.
Braydon wasn’t sure what made him do it, but those grey eyes of hers drew him in. The kiss was slow and simple at first, but the second she started to kiss him back, they both lost it. He pulled her closer to him until she was up on his lap. Her dress hiked up as she straddled him, pressing her body against his as his hands reached around her. He was half tempted to just do it, right there in his mother’s precious library. But some bit of sanity told him that was asking for trouble.
And this isn’t? No strings, no second dates. So what the hell are we doing?
Charlotte groaned against his lips as his hands made their way up her thighs, one sliding up under her dress. He was close, so close to feeling what he’d felt last night, when suddenly she backed off of him, nearly falling off the couch as she struggled to get to her feet.
“What the hell am I doing? I can’t be acting like this.”
Braydon stood, trying to readjust so his erection wasn’t so obvious. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m sorry. I have to go,” she said as she straightened her dress and rushed out the door before Braydon could say anything else. He sat back down on the couch, grabbed the bottle of champagne, and drank straight from it.
That woman… What was it about her? He’d never been like this with anyone else. Hell, he and Natalie never felt close after their bouts in his office. There was no real connection there, but one night with Charlotte, and he felt… What? Empty? Lonely for the first time when she wasn’t near him?
“Gotta stop this,” he muttered to himself. “No time for a relationship. No room for one, either.”
He sat there for a long time until the doors opened and Quin walked in. He didn’t say anything. Didn’t have to. Braydon handed him the champagne bottle and watched his goody-goody brother start chugging away.
“You talked to Mom?”
“What gave you that idea?” Quin muttered. “Braydon, I never ask you for anything, but tonight, please take me somewhere and get me trashed.”
Braydon grinned as he patted his brother on the shoulder. “That I can do for you, my dear brother. Consider it done.”
***
Charlotte didn’t even care if she left the party with her mother anymore. She needed to get out of the house and away from the brothers who were currently driving her insane. One wanted to marry her and the other… She just couldn’t get him out of her head. His touch was fire, and she craved it, wanted it, and in the library, she’d been so close to letting him take her again…
“There you are,” a voice snapped behind her. Charlotte whirled around to find Meredith and her mother bearing down on her. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“What do you mean?”
“Telling my son no! Are you out of your mind? Do you know how long we have planned for this to happen, and you just waltz in here and ruin everything! You horrible girl,” Meredith seethed.
“Really, Charlotte,” her mother added. “All you had to do was say yes. Why didn’t you?”
Charlotte shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t think about Quin like that.”
“What’s there to think about? He’s an attractive and rich young man.”
Charlotte nodded at Meredith. “Yes, but don’t you want him to have love in his life? Not just a marriage of convenience?”
“You listen to me right now,” Meredith snapped. “You are supposed to marry Quin. That was the arrangement made between your father and me years ago. I expect you to uphold your family name and his by keeping your end of the deal. You may take whatever time you need to think, but know that by the end of it, you will accept a ring from my son.”
Charlotte felt her face grow red in anger as she stepped closer to Meredith. “Or you’ll do what? This isn’t the dark ages, Meredith. You can’t force a person to marry!”
Meredith stared at her long and hard, then turned to Victoria. “Perhaps you and your mother should have a talk about that. I will see you tomorrow evening, Victoria? At the ladies’ club?” She didn’t wait for an answer but hurried back to entertain her guests, leaving Charlotte staring at her mother as if she’d lost her mind.
“We will talk about this at home. I have already called the driver,” Victoria murmured and headed for the front door. “You have embarrassed me, and you have embarrassed your father. I hope you know that. This whole weekend has been atrocious!”
“I don’t know what you expect me to do about it.”
“You could have said yes! Quin has been you best friend for ages. What’s wrong with marrying your best friend?”
Charlotte shook her head. “I don’t want to lose my best friend. And why couldn’t you have just talked to me about this? You let me embarrass myself and Quin in front of everyone we know!”
“No, you did that to yourself, my dear girl.”
She wanted nothing more than to argue with her mother, but she didn’t. They stood in silence until the car pulled around, but even then, Charlotte kept her anger to herself. Her mother continued to lecture her on being old enough to understand the consequences of her actions, but Charlotte had stopped listening. Her thoughts returned to those few moments in the library with a man she hardly knew. A man who was nothing like his dull brother, who lived the most boring life she had ever known.
And now, she would probably never see him again. Her heart sank at the thought as she stared out the window, longing for the courage to do what she wanted instead of always being dictated to by a mother who had mood swings ranging from one end of the spectrum to the other.
“Did you hear me?” Victoria said as they pulled up their long driveway.
“Yes, you expect me to be downstairs in an hour to discuss today,” Charlotte muttered.
“Speak clearly when you talk to me.”
Charlotte didn’t say a word. As the car stopped, she hurried out before the driver could open the door, rushed inside, upstairs, and closed and locked her bedroom door. She felt like a teenager all over again, wanting to hide from the world. If only it were that easy to escape. To just disappear from this life she’d created for herself. Yesterday morning, everything had gone according to plan, then her mother had—she thought—given her permission to break out of the norm and find herself, only to be dragged kicking and screaming back to her old life.
The worry she had for her mother started to grow the longer she lay there. Was she getting sick? Charlotte knew there had been some bouts of depression when her father died, but her mother had gotten through them. Were they coming back?
Maybe she’d wait it out and see what happened. The last thing she wanted to do was call the family doctor and have him come for a visit. But she didn’t want to lose her mother to whatever might be going on inside her head. What would her father do? Charlotte didn’t have to think too long and hard on that one. She loved her father, always had, but he was just like the others. If something was wrong in the family, it was a secret. Don’t let anyone else see the illnesses.
Her father had hidden Victoria’s random mental moments, as Charlotte called them. Moments when her mother just wasn’t herself. No one outside the house knew. That was the way they lived.
“Charlotte.” A knock sounded at her bedroom door. “Your mother is waiting for you in her study.”
“Thank you, Milly; tell her I’ll be right down.” Had it already been an hour? Charlotte glanced at her clock and groaned. Great. Now she was going to spend the rest of the evening listening to lecture after lecture about what she had done wrong this weekend. She was suddenly no longer the perfectly proper young woman in a very refined box, and she didn’t know why. The leprechaun, she was sure, was part of the reason, and there was no way in hell she was going to tell her mother about him.
She took a few extra minutes to change into a pair of jeans and a sweater. She went downstairs, ready to face whatever her mother threw at her.
Her mother’s study was different than her father’s. The walls were painted a light shade of lilac, the desk and all chairs were white, and the accents were shades of purple and blue. So different from what Charlotte was used to while working in her father’s old study.
“Have a seat,” her mom said when she entered. Charlotte sat in one of the winged chairs in front of the desk and waited. “Listen, I know we haven’t had a chance to sit down and talk in a while. There are some things I need to explain to you.”
“Like how you tell me to do one thing, then throw a fit when I follow through?”
“I did not tell you to go to a strip club and a bar with your friends, then stay out all night,” her mother quipped. She didn’t sound angry, just tired. She took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I just want you to find a way to be on your own.”
“Mom, can you just tell me what’s going on?”
“I’ve been lying to you. We’re in trouble.”
Charlotte waited for her to explain, but she didn’t. Her mother sat in the chair, eyes closed, looking as if she wanted nothing more than to cry. “Mom, what are you talking about?”
“Before your father died, he had his lawyers make certain investments with his money—our money—in order to make sure we were taken care of. Well, some of those decisions have fallen through, and in the next few months, we will be broke.”
“What?”
Her mother sighed as she leaned back in her chair. “We will start letting the staff go as of tomorrow. After that, we’ll see what assets we can quietly sell.”
“You’re serious. When did you find out?”
“A year ago. I’ve been trying to find a way out of it, but we’re tapped. It’s going to start coming out of the money left to both of us.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? I could have done something.”
“Yes, you could have—like saying yes to Quin’s marriage proposal.”
“No, you can’t put that on me,” Charlotte snapped. “You could’ve told me a year ago, and I could’ve gotten a job or done something. Why didn’t we just move, sell the house?”
“We are not leaving our home,” her mother argued.
“I don’t know why not. It’s just a house, Mom.”
Victoria leapt to her feet and paced the study. “It is not just a house. This is the home I shared with your father. I can’t give it up, not yet. You will marry Quin, or we will lose everything. Where do you hope to get money for the orphanages, Charlotte? We will have nothing.”
Charlotte hadn’t even thought about that. She felt tears prick her eyes and wanted to hold her mother, but at the look on her face, Charlotte was almost scared. “I just… I need time, all right? Please, just give me that.”
For a long time, there was silence between them. Her mother started whispering to herself, so quietly Charlotte couldn’t hear her. She moved to stand near her mother and caught what she was repeating over and over. “Miss him, miss him so much.” Charlotte put her arm around her mother, pulling her close.
Charlotte wasn’t even sure her mom knew she was there.