I was only twenty feet from the door I’d come through when I felt a hand on my arm. Hopeful, I spun around, only to find Tristan, whose grip on me was getting stronger.
“Excuse me,” I said firmly. “I just need to find the restroom.”
“Aw, don’t be like that, sweetheart,” he said, and he started pulling me next to him, almost dragging me to the end of the hall into an empty room. I started to struggle, but I’d learned too many times that it was all too easy to end up being an embarrassment to Dylan. The last thing I wanted to do was make a scene with someone who worked for his father. Even if he was a dick.
The room was some kind of anteroom, like a staging area, with a couple of chairs and a desk and then a door to yet another room. But he stopped and moved me towards a wall. Suddenly I was very, very nervous.
“Tristan, what do you want?” I tried to keep my tone normal, but I was cold suddenly, and nervous. Nothing about this felt right.
He just laughed, and a disgusting bit of drunken spit collected at the corner of his mouth. Fuck, this was bad. I turned to leave—I just needed to get out of there. But before I could get very far, Tristan had grabbed my hand and pulled me back.
“Tristan. Stop. I—” But my words turned into a series of incomprehensible nos.
“Come on, baby,” he began, and he leaned into me, pinning me against the wall with his hips. I could feel his hardness against me, and I wanted to vomit. I tried to wriggle free, but he pinned both my wrists in one of his hands and moved them above my head. His hands were clammy and too strong. His breath smelled of gin, and his face was too close, too warm. I felt disgusting. Trapped. I started to cry against all my wishes—the wet tears dropping into the bare deep V of my dress, reminding me of how exposed I was. I couldn’t handle this. He had to get away from me. I couldn’t do this. Even though I was essentially pinned against the wall, I put all the force I could summon into ramming my knee firmly into his crotch.
“Motherfucker!” I shouted.
He grunted in pain and swore loudly, more spit landing on my chest, but somehow he managed to keep my hands pinned to the wall.
“You bitch!” he screamed as he regained composure. “But that’s how you like it, isn’t it? A little rough?” He drove my legs wider, pinning them with his thighs, restricting my movement even more, and I lost my balance in my shoes. I couldn’t get the leverage to try to hit him again.
“Fuck you, asshole!” I screamed, trying to keep the whimper in my voice at bay.
“Aww, sweetheart. You know you want this. You must be fantastic in the sack—why else would Dylan Hale want a gold-digging whore like you? This cunt must be pretty special.” His knee was pushing the fabric of my dress between my legs. And that word, a word that Dylan made sound so sexy, felt scary coming from Tristan’s mouth.
I could feel my own trembles against his chest as he pressed into me, and then his hand moved inside the front of my dress, and he roughly, sloppily grabbed my breast.
“Get off me!” I screamed, although I could hear how rough my voice was and doubted it carried.
“What? So Dylan’s the only one who’s allowed to tie you up and screw you, you kinky bitch? He’s the only one allowed to rough you up and tuck little toys inside your pussy? Why else would a man like him tote around a nothing little whore like you?”
All of a sudden he was fiercely pulled away from me, and I sank against the wall, wrapping my arms around myself, the tears starting to come in earnest.
“Because I love her, you prick! Get the fuck off of her!” It was Dylan, and I looked up just in time to see his fist connect with Tristan’s face. Suddenly Will was in the room, closing the door behind him and crouching next to me, asking if I was okay and gently rubbing my shoulder, holding me against him. I was so overwhelmed, the sensations were assaulting me, and I was trying to adjust to the scene in front of me. Will looked down and pulled my dress back into place.
Tristan was holding his nose, which was bleeding, and Dylan had him jammed up against the wall, one hand pushing into his chest, the other grabbing his chin. Dylan looked ready to spit on him. I’d never in my life seen fury unleashed, not really. This is what that looked like. It was terrifying, but there was also safety in knowing that fury was on my side.
“You?” he demanded. “Fucking you?” All of a sudden I realized what Dylan was responding to. Oh my god. The emails. They had to be from him. How else would Tristan know that Dylan had tied me up during sex?
Tristan started to laugh. “Took you long enough to figure it out, golden boy, didn’t it?”
“You fucker! How?” Dylan wasn’t screaming, but his voice had dropped two octaves, and I’d never heard a sound so threatening.
“A first in computer engineering paid off,” he said, and he was actually laughing in his sense of victory. “And you and your team of imbeciles went down every false path I laid out for you.” He was so pleased with himself. He was maniacal.
“Why, you pathetic piece of shit? Fucking why?” The veins in Dylan’s neck were throbbing, his eyes could kill, and somehow he’d lost his tuxedo jacket in all of this. I’d never once, not ever, seen Dylan out of control. Not even in bed with me. Dylan was putting all his weight into Tristan, his hand now gripping his throat, and Tristan was getting redder and redder.
Tristan laughed hoarsely. “Why do you think, you precious asshole? You’re a goddamn undeserving playboy. I’m the one who saved Hale Shipping from financial oblivion. I’m the one who’s there for your father every day. I’m the one who’s actually helped him run Humboldt for the past decade. Where have you been, my lord? Gallivanting around town with chambermaids? Star fuckers? Whoring yourself out with whatever pussy was available? And now bringing here some slut who has no right to be anywhere near the Abingdon name? Your father was right—you’re shameless. It was time someone took you down a peg or two, don’t you think?”
Dylan was seething. I half expected to see white foam come from his lips he was so angry.
Tristan had a bizarre look of triumph on his face as he continued. “I may have no right to Humboldt, which is a fucking mistake of birth. But I goddamn well have a right to Hale Shipping. I should be the one to run that place. Do you know how long I’ve been kissing your father’s ass? How much I’ve put up with? How far I’ve gone to prove that Hale Shipping would be better off in my hands? And still the old man insists it’s yours. How does it feel, Hale? Standing by while someone fucks with what’s yours?
“And you made it easy, didn’t you? You offered her up on a silver platter, fawning like an idiot, showing the world just how in love you were with that stunt at the Savoy. Pathetic. Your security guard made things fun, added some challenge, but I never thought you’d make it so easy to get to you, Hale. So easy, I almost thought you wanted me to watch. You two put on quite a show—”
Dylan shoved his hand into Tristan’s chest in fury, jamming him against the wall. “Why? Why did you do it?”
Tristan laughed again. “Apart from the joy of watching you flail about? Of sending you on that little wild-goose chase? Easy. Now that I’ve had my fun—and compiled enough evidence—the press can have your little video, those pictures. Do you honestly think the board will put the company in the hands of a depraved, ruined dilettante? And who would be the best choice for your replacement? How about the man who’s been at your father’s side for the last decade while his real son was off not giving a shite? The best part? Where Hale Shipping goes, so does Humboldt. It will all be mine. Maybe not the title, but the rest of it, and I’ve fucking earned it, unlike you and your piece of ass over here.”
Dylan reared back his hand punched Tristan in the face once again, and Tristan wilted, his face in his hands, knees buckled from the pain. “Like hell you will. The first one was for Lydia, you asshole. That one was for my family. You’re done.” Dylan’s words were like ice—fury incarnate. “Now,” he said, turning to Will, “get this pathetic fuck out of here.”
Will looked down at me and whispered, “You okay, Lydia?” I nodded, and he got up and dragged Tristan by the arm to the entrance of the small room. I couldn’t imagine what kind of repercussions there would be for having a fistfight in Buckingham Palace.
“Baby,” Dylan uttered under his breath and came rushing over to me, pulling me up and firmly against his chest, wrapping his arms clear around me. He kissed the top of my head and let his lips be planted there. He held my face in his hands and stroked my tear-stained cheeks. “Christ, Lydia, are you okay?”
But before I could answer, Will returned with the beat-up Tristan. When Dylan looked at him as if to ask What the fuck? Will explained that the palace had asked that we wait until the coast was clear and transportation had been arranged before removing Tristan, who was hunched over, nursing his face, and mumbling about Geoffrey and Hale Shipping.
“I’m okay,” I said into Dylan’s chest, but he pulled away to inspect me, to take a look for himself. I looked down and saw what he saw—the bodice of my dress wrinkled and askew, and I could only imagine what my face looked like. Mascara was probably streaming down my face.
“Oh, damsel, look what I’ve let happen to you,” he whispered, pulling me closer, holding me against him for a long minute. I felt his head above me turn. “Will, mate—the press.”
“I’ve taken care of it, Dylan—no one saw you come in here. Caroline will let you stay until the press are gone.”
“Dylan, the video—” I said, still shaking. The only thing that could make all of this worse was if Tristan managed to follow through on his threat about sending the video to the press.
“Take the fucker’s phone, Will,” he said, and I could hear the movements behind me, hopefully indicating that Will was removing Tristan’s ability to forward the video to anyone. “I won’t let that happen, baby. We’ll get anything else he has before he has a chance to do any more damage,” he finished while pulling me just a little closer.
We stayed there for a moment until both of us were calm, or until I was, anyway. When my breathing had evened, when my eyes were dry. The entire time his arms were wrapped tightly around me. The warmth was returning to my skin, to my core. It was as though Dylan thought that by holding me tightly enough to him he could undo what had just happened. And I let him. I let his smell, his muscular frame, and the soothing chant of his words bring me back to him. I couldn’t even tell you what he said—there were you’re okays on top of I love yous and babys and damsels, but it was the mere sound of his voice that did the job of relaxing me.
When I finally pulled away slightly, my hair fell around my shoulders—Dylan must have removed the pins from the bun without me even realizing it—and he gently used his thumbs to sweep the dampness from my cheeks.
“I’m sorry, damsel.” He continued to hold my face in his hands. “I’m so sorry.” Dylan’s voice sounded resigned and sad, apologetic in a way that made no sense.
“I’m so glad you’re here, that you were here, that you came.” But he was shaking his head even before I had finished speaking. We were now alone—Will must have dragged the disheveled Tristan from the room. And the space was dark—the moonlight and lights from the courtyard were the only sources of brightness in the room, but they allowed me to see Dylan’s expression perfectly. An expression not of calmness but of furious defeat, enraged powerlessness, had crept over him.
I was just beginning to process everything that had happened, everything that had been said. Tristan Bailey.
Dylan’s eyes left mine and his arms dropped away. I stood up from where we’d sat on the floor against the wall, so I could see him better, so I could get a grip on the uneasy feeling seeping between us, so I could start to ask the questions I needed to ask. He rose as well and leaned away from me, against the wall behind him.
“Hey,” I said, trying to get his attention, tilting my head, trying to will his eyes to meet mine.
“Baby,” he said, shaking his head. I gave him a minute, hoping I’d be able to discern what was running through his mind, that the softness would return. But instead his face got harder. He somehow got further away.
“Fuuuck!” he finally said, so sternly I nearly jumped, his hands running through his hair, his foot banging against the wall behind him.
“Dylan?” I asked, reaching my hand out, but he didn’t take it. I could practically see the onslaught of thoughts running at lightning speed through his mind. None of them were good. What was going on?
“Lydia,” he said, and he sounded so…sad. Angry and sad, and I knew now, with certainty, that there was something else going on. This wasn’t only about what had just happened with Tristan. This was about something bigger. Whatever had been bugging him in the car was bubbling up. “Bloody hell,” he started again, bitter frustration and resignation tinging his words. “How could I have let this happen?”
“Dylan.” I’d said his name sternly, almost shouted it—I needed him to snap out of it, to stop talking to himself, to stop working himself into an angry frenzy and start talking to me. “What is going on? This obviously isn’t all about Tristan Bailey and the emails. You thought it was the Bresnovs, but it was Tristan. That leaves some details to figure out, but at least we know.”
“That’s the problem, though, isn’t it? I was wrong. I couldn’t protect you from him.”
“But you did. You came in here. You ripped him off of me,” I protested, marching towards him. Now I was frustrated. He was focusing on all the wrong things. He had protected me—why couldn’t he see that? “Dylan, what else is going on? Talk to me.” My voice was a mix of annoyance and, increasingly, desperation. I felt like he was pulling me down some spiral, to some inaccessible place.
He stroked my cheek once with his hand but then pulled back, pulled away from me. Like he didn’t believe me. Like it wouldn’t matter what I said.
“It never should have happened, Lydia. And none of this would have happened to you if you hadn’t been in a public relationship with me. You would have been safe.” He moved to a wingback chair and sank into it.
“Fucking stop it with the ‘safe’ business! Just tell me what the fuck is going on, Dylan! Why did Tristan think he could get his hands on Humboldt? What was this all about?” I was boiling over, and I had a right to be. He was descending into some dark place, shutting me out, and I needed him to stay at the surface long enough to tell me what he was going through but also to see me, to see us.
Finally, with his head in his hands, his elbows on his knees, staring at the floor, he spoke. “Lydia…” He trailed off, trying to find words.
“What?” I asked, suddenly more concerned than angry. This wasn’t the Dylan I knew.
“When I went to Humboldt this afternoon, my father told me…” He paused, taking a deep breath. “Remember that deal I told you about? The one that went south?”
I nodded and thought back to that night he came back from Russia, so certain he’d figured it out.
Dylan nodded. “It wasn’t just a bad deal. There’s more. As I told you, two years ago I realized something was going on with Hale Shipping. I did some investigating and learned that my father had run the company so poorly since my grandfather’s retirement that the place was on the verge of bankruptcy. But the year-end reports looked fine—it didn’t add up. I confronted him about it.”
He was staring at the ceiling and then the floor—anywhere but at me.
“He confessed that he’d gone to the Bresnovs for help, for money, and hid it from the board. As you know, the Bresnovs helped my grandfather start the company, and my father thought they’d help him keep it quiet, that a secret deal with them would buy him the time to turn the company around, and no one would ever know. He accepted a large sum from them to get the company back on track, but he was naïve about who he was getting in bed with.”
He sighed and once again rubbed his forehead with his fingers.
“They essentially blackmailed him.” He shook his head as he said it, almost as though he’d just made it real by saying it aloud.
“What? How?” I asked, completely blindsided by this.
Dylan sighed and took a moment. “They agreed to bail out the company on two conditions. First, he would allow them to use Hale Shipping to launder money for some of their less-legal operations.”
“God, Dylan,” I started, and I tried to approach him, but he held his hand up. He wasn’t done, and he wasn’t going to let me get close.
“Tristan was involved. He knew about the deal, helped my father hide it. I couldn’t let that go, obviously. So I intervened. I dealt with the Bresnovs, and my father swore he’d build the company back up .”
“How did you deal with them?” I was still standing a few feet from him, my arms wrapped around myself, just trying to take all of this in.
“I did my own research and discovered the Bresnovs are minor players in a much bigger operation. They have connections to some of the worst criminal organizations coming out of Moscow—human traffickers, drugs, the works. So I approached British intelligence for help. I figured they’d take care of the bastards. But it turned out that the Bresnovs were already on their radar. They’d been keeping tabs on them, hoping the family would crack open their investigation into much higher-ups, bigger criminals. They weren’t willing to take in the Bresnovs before they’d caught the bigger fish. In the end I struck a deal—MI6 provided me with information that helped me stave off the Bresnovs, at least for a while. They also agreed to protect the Hale name and give my father and the company immunity. In return I agreed to work with them, to use our connection with the Bresnovs to further their investigation.”
“Holy shit.” This shit was crazy.
He looked up at me for the first time in several minutes, remembering. “Lydia, that’s who I was meeting with that night I was going to Amsterdam—a member of MI6.”
“A government official.”
“I didn’t lie.”
“I know. I trusted you.”
Dylan nodded at this somberly.
“So you’re still working with them?”
“The Bresnovs?”
I nodded.
“We made them investors on the official record, much to their chagrin, so it’s much harder for them to use us to do anything illegal. And my father’s supposedly been trying to bring the company back into good form legally. But they knock on my door every so often, reminding me or my father in subtle and not-so-subtle ways that they are just biding their time, waiting to get what they feel they’re due.”
“God,” I said, not really knowing what else to say. “So until they’re apprehended for other things, you’re just holding them off.”
“Precisely. Only tonight I learned there’s more. My father didn’t tell me everything two years ago, but he did this afternoon. I couldn’t understand why he wouldn’t just sell the company—if he sold, he’d still be rich, and since the Bresnovs are investors on public record, they’d get a cut. It would be out of our hands. And it’s not as though he’s ever actually cared about the business itself. Yet he was so bloody stubborn about keeping it in the family. I couldn’t figure it out. Now I know why.”
“Why?”
Dylan sighed and closed his eyes with resignation. “The Bresnovs’ second condition was that my father make Humboldt Park an asset of HS.”
“So Hale Shipping owns Humboldt Park?”
He nodded.
“Why would they do that?”
“Because they knew we wouldn’t sell if it meant losing the estate. And if we can’t sell, we have to keep helping them. They’ve been biding their time, but they’re ready to cash in on my father’s end of the bargain. They want him to get back to helping them launder money, and now they want a cut of HS profits too.”
I was just trying absorb this. It seemed so far-fetched. So crazy. But everything now made sense. As long as the company stayed in the family, so did Humboldt Park. It had not been just anger or spite in Geoffrey’s voice that day when he talked to Dylan. It had been desperation.
“So that’s why your dad’s wanted you so involved lately? He wants you to take over?” Dylan nodded in affirmation.
“In his mind he’s been grooming me, trying to get me on board.”
“But, Dylan, your father’s only in his sixties. You don’t have to take over now. We have time to figure this out. To get you out of it. You said you’re working with British intelligence. We can figure this out together, Dylan.”
We were both quiet for a moment. I was standing, as I had been for several minutes, in the center of the room, my arms wrapped around my torso, the gown I was wearing suddenly feeling heavy and yet not enough. I wished we were home, in private. There were so many questions, so many details. But I could see, even before he spoke, that another thing was happening here.
“Lydia, I’m not dragging you through this,” he said, so decided. “Not when I can’t be trusted to keep you safe. I was sure that it was the Bresnovs trying to put pressure on me…Fuck, Lydia. I was so distracted by that possibility, I didn’t even see Tristan coming. I can’t keep up. I should have had more security on you. I should have distributed my team better. I should have kept a closer eye on HS…All I wanted was to protect you from this.” He threw his hands up, indicating that the whole world was a danger to me. “I can handle giving up architecture. I can handle taking this on. But I wouldn’t be able to handle losing you. If anything happened to you—”
I felt my blood cooling. It was like I could feel him removing himself from my heart, pulling us apart, convincing himself that he had to pull away. All I wanted to say was But I love you, because shouldn’t that be enough? Shouldn’t that say it all? But I couldn’t seem to get the words out.
“I never wanted to burden you with my life, my family, a father who would bribe his son’s girlfriend to leave him, the need for a bodyguard, the presence of the criminals trying to take my family down, for fuck’s sake. I’ve seen before what this does to people.” Grace. He was talking about Grace. But we were different. We had to be.
“And then tonight. Tristan…The worst part is that in my gut, I knew it. I knew we should have stayed a secret. I should have just enjoyed you as long as I could and then let you go. Or I should have just controlled myself from the beginning. I was being selfish. I—”
No. He couldn’t do this.
“Stop!” I said, finally finding my words.
“Lydia. Even you must see that everything I feared has come to fruition. You think I haven’t felt your anxiety over the past few months? Your doubts, your fears about my stress and what I wasn’t sharing with you? About what I was sharing? About the media, the photos? You think I couldn’t feel how, even slowly, the mess that is my life was breaking us down?”
“But you weren’t being open with me! And you’re not giving us a chance. If you’d just—”
“No, Lydia. I can’t do it all. It’s time to face reality—duty has come calling, and tonight has made one thing perfectly clear: You’re not safe in a relationship with me. I can’t give you what you deserve. The truth is that you were always going to be out of my reach. I just couldn’t help myself. I needed you. You’re the fucking love of my life, and all I’ve learned is that I was a fool for ever thinking that mattered.”
A tear glided down my cheek. No wracking sobs, just quiet defeat. It turned out it wasn’t me who was flailing. It wasn’t me who was screwing this up. I was fighting. I was clawing at the walls, digging my fingers in, determined to hold on to this, because I knew it was worth it. But he wasn’t clawing at the walls. He didn’t know we were worth it. He couldn’t. He was giving up. I couldn’t be strong enough for both of us. This wasn’t my life I was trying to reckon with. It was his, and only he could save it.
I took a deep breath, this time calming myself down. I had a choice, and really there was only one thing to do. I took a deep breath and began talking, the words like ice as they rolled off my lips, because I knew where they were taking me. “Dylan, I could keep fighting you. Fighting for you. For us. I could stay here in this room in Buckingham Palace and try to convince you that we’ll always be stronger together than alone. I could try to force you to see that. Because you’re wrong. I know you’re wrong. I look at you and I see something you don’t—I see a future you deserve. One where you’re not alone. One where you’re the incredible architect, the good man you are, and the Duke of Abingdon. I have faith in you—you can figure this out.” He was looking at me and his head was shaking, almost imperceptibly, but there it was. “The only problem is, of course, it doesn’t work if I’m the only one who believes that. Believes in this.” I gestured to the space between us. Then I closed my eyes, and another tear fell. I knew I was about to let the best thing in my life die in Buckingham Palace. “So okay,” I said, crying steadily but hunting for my resolve.
He looked up, slightly shocked that I was giving in. “You deserve more than this. Than me.”
Deserving more than him was an impossibility. It wasn’t about deserving a person. It was about deserving what we had, and I knew in my gut I’d never find what we had with anyone else. Although I guess in one way he was right—I did deserve someone who could see me through the muck, who would fight for me. So I tamped down every screaming retort, every begging plea for him to open his eyes and see what he was throwing away, and I nodded. “You deserve more too.”
Dylan looked up at me, standing before him. I was wearing the most gorgeous couture gown I’d probably ever wear. I’d been styled by a team of experts. I had started that evening looking more beautiful than I’d ever look again, and I was ending it with the feeling that for the second time that year I was losing the most important man in my life.
Dylan rose from his seat and started to approach me, but I couldn’t let him touch me. If he touched me, I’d lose all composure, all ability to do what he needed me to do.
So before he could get to me, I turned and walked away.