The Billionaire's Allure (The Silver Cross Club Book 5) by Bec Linder

Author:Bec Linder [Linder, Bec]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2015-01-14T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Max

Renzo looked like he wanted to beat me into a pulp, and I didn’t blame him. He had the decency to wait until Beth and the little boy—Renzo’s son? Nephew? Younger brother?—were out of sight in the back yard. Then he turned to me with such black rage in his eyes that I was convinced he was going to hit me, and I tensed my muscles in preparation for the blow.

“I’m not going to hit you,” he said. “But I really want to.”

“Why don’t you, then?” I asked. “I’ll take the hit. I won’t even fight back.”

“That won’t suffice to make amends,” he said. “And I’m trying to stay out of prison. So there won’t be any hitting.” He flexed his fists, clearly still fighting the urge to punch me in the face.

“Renzo, I’m sorry,” I said. “That’s all I can say. I was a stupid kid. I didn’t know anything about life.”

“No,” he said. “And you still don’t. I want you staying away from Bee.”

So that was it. He hadn’t emerged from the house to mend fences. He’d come out here to threaten me. “I’m not going to do that. Maybe you won’t forgive me, but she has.”

Renzo looked back over his shoulder. Beth and the boy were still out of sight, but he turned to me and said, “Let’s take a walk down the block.”

We walked in silence, side by side, until we reached what was evidently a safe distance from the house. Then Renzo stopped and rocked back on his heels, hands in his pockets. “I never gave her your letter.”

I had the feeling of going down a staircase in the dark and reaching the bottom without realizing it, or sitting down in a chair that was lower than expected: an abrupt, unexpected jolt, and the proverbial rug yanked out from beneath me.

If Beth had never read that letter…

“She doesn’t know,” Renzo said, answering my unspoken thoughts. “I never gave it to her.”

“Fuck,” I said, and turned away.

The thing I regretted most about my misbegotten adolescence—more than running away from home in the first place, more than terrifying my parents—was lying to Beth and Renzo about who I was. The letter had been my attempt to explain, and to absolve myself.

And Renzo never gave it to Beth. No wonder she hadn’t gotten in touch with me.

“Why did you do it?” I asked him.

“I read it,” he said. “I was suspicious. Your story didn’t add up. You were too smart about some things, and too clueless about others. So I read the letter. And when I learned that you had lied to us, I decided that Bee should never know. It would have broken her heart.”

“I thought she knew,” I said. Oh, Jesus. My stomach churned. This changed everything. I had, without meaning to, renewed my relationship with her under false pretenses. “I have to tell her.”

“Don’t,” Renzo said.

I stared at him. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t tell her. At least not yet. It isn’t the right time.” He rubbed one hand over his face.

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