The Bond (Unbroken Raine Falling 4)

Finally, this man who’d been such a mystery to her might let her solve him. It didn’t matter that she knew his favorite brand of underwear or could make all his favorite foods without looking at a recipe. She didn’t know the name of his childhood pet, what he’d been like as a teenager, or why he never spoke to or about his parents.

Hammer ate every bite she’d made for him. Raine could only manage to get down half. Her stomach was in knots when she pushed her plate aside.

“Tell me. Everything.”

With a sideways glance at her food, he frowned. “Will you promise to try your dinner again before bed? I’m worried about you.”

She’d promise him a quickie on the moon if he’d just tell her already. “I will. Just…”

“Get on with it.” He nodded and rubbed his palms together as if trying to decide where to start. “My parents were extremely wealthy. My grandfather was a physicist who worked with this brilliant guy named Noyce.” He studied her face. “Not ringing a bell? Patent 2,981,877? The world’s first silicone-based integrated circuit. My grandfather saw the potential and invested in the company that sold them, Intel. He also invested in the Texas Instruments version, too. Why not hedge your bets? He grew a few hundred thousand dollars into—”

“Millions.” She’d guessed he came from money but… “Wow.”

“Hundreds of millions,” he corrected. “The money began rolling in when my dad was a teenager, and he came to adulthood spoiled and entitled, a lot like I did. His dad had money, so why work? My grandfather died a couple of years before I was born, and my father inherited half his fortune. Apparently, I have an aunt somewhere I’ve never met who got the other half.”

Raine shook her head. “I had no idea…”

“The only other person on the planet who does is Liam.” Hammer tapped his fork on the table and gave her a tight smile. “And he only knows because I got drunk enough one night early in our friendship to tell him.”

“So your dad inherited a lot of money. When do we get to you?”

“After he married a woman almost exactly like him, and they partied their way across nearly every continent, spending millions and millions. But somewhere through the haze of booze, drugs, and travel, she got pregnant. They were self-absorbed, and I cramped their style. So I was basically raised by staff while my parents circled the globe.”

“You grew up lonely.” She reached for him.

He set his jaw as if he didn’t want to acknowledge that, but he squeezed her hand, and Raine knew she was right. Her heart ached for him.

“I felt trapped in our house on Park Avenue. I couldn’t go anywhere without having to be carted around by our chauffer or jockeying with a billion people for the same inch of sidewalk.”

“I’ve only seen pictures of New York. It looks frenetic.”

“I like it better now that I’m an adult. But it will never be home for me again.”

Too many bad memories. She understood that. Same reason she’d never step foot into the Kendall house ever again.

“When I was thirteen, they sent me away to Phillips Exeter Academy. I thought I was escaping my hellhole of a house. Prep school was supposed to equip me for Harvard but…god, I hated that fucking place. It made me feel even more like I had no control over my own life.”

So he’d chosen an adulthood and a kink that allowed him not only to control most everything but to be master of all he surveyed. “I understand.”

“Not yet. I’m just scratching the surface.” He blew out a breath as if trying to decide where and how to continue. “Growing up bored and resenting my parents’ freedoms while I was stuck in school, I had this stupid, rebellious dream of being a rock star. I was going to be the next Kurt Cobain.” He laughed. “I knew every note on every Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Nine Inch Nails CD. I guilted my folks into buying me an electric guitar and amp one Christmas. They gave me a Fender Stratocaster—not because they believed in me, just to shut me up. I played the fuck out of that thing, full blast, whenever they were home.”

Raine frowned. “Did they cuss you out? Ground you?”

Hammer shook his head. “They just soundproofed my room, shut the door, and left for Rio. It was time for Carnival, after all.”

The bitter edge to his words made her angry on his behalf. What kind of parents took so little interest in their own son? She didn’t ask if he and his dad ever played ball or if his mother baked him cookies. Clearly not. He’d grown up solitary, used to swallowing down his emotions.

That was only just beginning to change.