Chapter Twelve

Shane

Fiona looked fucking beautiful in her sleep. Especially since she was still naked and almost on top of me. Our legs twined together, and one slender arm draped over my stomach.

I woke up lazily, not wanting to move so much as a muscle. I lay there, watching her sleep for a long time. I didn’t want to wake her.

Watching her wake eventually was even better than watching her sleep, though. She was so fucking cute, blinking open those huge eyes that still reminded me of the ocean. She looked confused for just a second.

Her cheeks became pink when she saw me watching her. “Hey, how long have you been awake?”

“A while,” I answered, wrapping an arm around her and drawing her closer still. Now that she was awake, it was only a matter of time before I would never hold her like this again. I didn’t intend on wasting a second.

“Sorry,” she muttered. “You should have woken me. Do you have anything that you have to get done today?”

“Yup, I have to spend some more time with this insanely sexy girl I know.” I smirked, dragging my fingers over an exposed nipple.

Fiona shuddered, then drew the sheets up to cover herself. “If you mean me, I think the correct words are insanely sleep-deprived girl. You’re an animal, Perkins.”

I was actually kind of proud of that. “You loved it.”

She laughed, wrapping the sheet around her. To my great disappointment, she rose and headed for the bathroom. “Careful, Shane, your cockiness is showing.”

“I think you mean my cock. It’s not my fault you took the sheet. If you come back to bed, I’ll cover it. And you.”

Her tinkling laugh sounded from the bathroom. “If I come back to bed, neither of us are getting anything done today.”

It was true, but there was also nothing that I had to do that was more pressing than her. The sounds of her brushing her teeth and cranking the shower made me realize that she wasn’t changing her mind.

I dressed quickly, then scavenged for a spare toothbrush. I found one in her cabinet and tried to ignore the fact that she was naked just a few feet away from me, though I couldn’t see anything, since the shower was all fogged up.

She padded into her kitchen minutes later, drying her hair with a towel. She wore another sundress that I would’ve ripped off her at a moment’s notice, if she so much as hinted that it was what she wanted.

Sadly, she didn’t. Instead, she flipped the switch on her coffee machine and readied two cups.

“It feels kind of weird asking you this after everything we did last night but do you take any sugar?” she asked, fixing me with her piercing gaze. With an almost imperceptible shake of her head, she turned her attention back to the mugs as she waited for my answer.

What was that all about?

“One sugar, please,” I told her, then moved to her fridge to grab some milk.

I lifted it in her direction and she nodded. “Yes, please.”

“I can think of way more interesting situations to get you to say that.” I laughed.

She smiled but wagged a finger at me. “Nope, I need my caffeine fix before we even think about it. You kept me up half the night.”

“Okay, what do you want to do until then?” I thought that the night before had been a one-time thing but I didn’t want it to be.

For once, I was the one who wanted a repeat performance. And another one after that. Fiona had taken a wrecking ball to my obvious misconception that having her once would get her out of my system.

“Talk, I guess?” She gestured to her sofa and placed my steaming mug of coffee on a coaster on her coffee table.

“Fine, what do you want to talk about?” I would tell her anything, except that I’d lied to her. I didn’t think that would go over well after the night we’d shared. If ever, for that matter. Fuck.

“You know so much about my life, tell me about yours.” She insisted on prying at the one subject that was tender around her.

Still, I could give her what she wanted without too many specifics.

“Like, my day-to-day?” I asked, buying some time to gather my thoughts.

“Day-to-day, childhood. Whatever you feel like telling me. I feel like I know so little about you.” She sat down and folded her legs underneath her, curiosity burning in her eyes.

“Okay, right now, my day-to-day involves fishing with a particularly stubborn—”

She chucked a throw pillow at me, giggling.

“Your real life, silly.”

“Ah. Okay, but just so you know, being in Mystic is very real to me.” I took a deep breath. “In Houston, I work my butt off and hadn’t so much as thought about fishing for years.”

“Why not?” she questioned but it wasn’t in the judgmental tone that her father had taken the night before.

“Too busy. Running a business the size of my family’s takes everything you’ve got.” Not to mention that I had to concentrate on turning our reputation around.

“Yeah? Why do it then?” Her chin jutted out.

“It’s my legacy,” I answered simply.

Her brow furrowed. “That’s what you want people to remember you for?”

I was a bit confused about her hostile tone but explained as best I could. “Of course. I love the business. It’s been in my family for generations.”

“You’re proud of it?” she asked incredulously.

“Yeah, I’m helping to build something that will last for generations and will ensure that my children have a secure upbringing.”

“You have children?” Her eyes widened.

I laughed. “Not yet. Maybe one day. Maybe not. My family will always be well taken care of, either way. And I get to make a difference in the world.”

“Yeah,” she breathed. “What kind of difference, though?”

“A positive one,” I insisted.

Her answering laugh was wry and disbelieving for some reason. “How do you figure that?”

“We’re in the...” I trailed off. We were getting dangerously close to my lie. “Energy business. I’m investing in more sustainable solutions than oil.”

There. That was a safe answer. No way anyone would think that an oilfield tycoon would have an interest in that.

“More sustainable than oil?” A thoughtful expression crossed her delicate features. “My dad was interested in that before he… Before everything happened. It made me live a greener life.”

She was right. I’d noticed solar panels on her roof before and a water tank in her tiny backyard through the window in her kitchen that morning.

“Yeah, more sustainable than oil,” I confirmed, though I didn’t want to say much more than that.

Fiona changed the topic abruptly. “My father made me more aware of the environment, made me want to live green and support earth-saving initiatives. What is yours like?”

Fuck, she wasn’t a tree hugger or anything, but she did seem passionate about it. What would she say if she ever found out who I really was? The troubles of our fathers aside, it was bound to be a fuck-up.

“My father is driven, even in his retirement. He won’t let go of what he wants. He’s ruthless like that.” Thunderclouds drifted into Fiona’s eyes. I overcorrected. “But he wasn’t a bad father. He gave me the best of everything. Always.”

“The best, huh?”

“Always. I remember when I was eight, he came home one day and told me that the deal he closed that day was buying us a new yacht.” I was lost in my memories. I hadn’t understood why we needed a new yacht. I also didn’t mention that the same yacht had been moored in Mystic for years before my dad got rid of it because it wasn’t large enough for him anymore.

“You got a new yacht when you were eight?” Lightning crackled in the thunderclouds in her eyes. “So, the yacht that you already had wasn’t good enough?”

For the second time in as many days, I had no fucking idea what was going on. It was disconcerting, since I exercised control in all things and had for as long as I could remember.

I treaded carefully. “I don’t know. I mean, I was eight. He made a business deal that paid off and thought that the family should be rewarded with a sailing vacation.”

She laughed humorlessly. “Of course, a sailing vacation. What was the deal?”

It was one of the fucked-up ones that had probably led to her dad losing his contract with Perkins Enterprises, so I wasn’t touching that with a ten-foot pole. “I don’t know exactly. Like I said, I was eight years old.”

“Yeah,” she muttered. “You were. Do you remember what the rest of that year was like for you?”

“When I was eight?” I searched my memory as my mind raced, trying to put together why she would ask. “It was fine. We moved into the house that I would grow up in. My mom and I went to Disneyland in Paris, I think.”

She stared at me wordlessly, the expression on her face one of gut-wrenching pain. That was when it hit me.

When I’d been eight, she would’ve been six. It was the year that her dad had lost everything. It was probably the worst year of her life, and there I was, throwing Disneyland in her face.

I was such a fucking asshole. “Fiona, I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize until just now—”

“I think you should leave, Shane. I thought that I could do this, but I just can’t.” She stood and gestured toward the door, storms still raging in her eyes.

I reached up to take her face in my hands. She had to understand. I had to make her understand. She swatted my hands away and stepped out of reach.

“Please, baby.”

“Don’t call me that. Don’t ever call me that ever again.”

I could understand that she would be hurt about the stark comparison between our lives that year but I didn’t get the pure, unbridled anger in her voice.

I threw my hands up in surrender. “Fine, I’ll leave, if that’s you want. I am sorry, Fiona, but I don’t understand what just happened.”

“You have everything else in life. You don’t need an explanation from me.” She practically pushed me through the door, only so that she could slam it in my face.

What. In. The. Actual. Fuck. What just happened?