She shook her head at him. ‘I’ve known men like you and … you have too many secrets, Leo. I couldn’t be with someone I couldn’t trust.’
Leo felt the skin on his face pull tight. ‘Are you saying I’m dishonest?’
‘I’m saying I don’t know who you are. You give nothing away and …’
‘Somebody hurt you?’
Lexi huffed out a breath and shrugged her shoulders but the movement was stilted. ‘My father led a double life and when my mother found out it nearly killed her.’ She tugged at the necklace nestled between her breasts agitatedly and then dropped it when she saw him looking. ‘I don’t know why I just told you that.’
‘Because you want to sleep with me but you’re torn.’
She shook her head. Oh, to be so confident. ‘I’ve never met anyone like you but … like I said, you have secrets and they scare me.’
‘Believe me, moya milaya, it would scare you more to know them.’
She shivered and wrapped her arms around her waist and Leo cursed himself for saying what he had. Then he cursed her for being the person she was. She was too genuine and almost innocent in her view of the world. She made his conscience spike and he knew that pursuing her after this would be selfish and he’d promised himself he’d never be selfish again after Sasha’s death.
He heard a discreet cough behind him. ‘Someone had better be dead, Danny,’ he growled, not looking at his EA.
‘You might wish that were the case in a minute.’
Leo turned at the serious note in Danny’s voice. ‘What is it?’
‘You said to inform you immediately if we got word from Amanda.’
Leo’s eyes narrowed. ‘You found her, then.’
‘Not exactly. I’ve been checking your emails all day and this came in.’ He handed him a piece of paper and Leo took it, a sense of dread forming a knot in his belly.
He scanned the email and started sweating like a man trapped in a steel cage with a dozen hungry lions for company. ‘Married?’ He shook his head. ‘She can’t do this.’
Danny didn’t say anything and Leo knew that his worst nightmare had come true. Amanda was demanding that he take full custody of Ty. She had remarried and Ty didn’t fit into their lifestyle.
He felt the fist in his belly rise to his heart and emotion and pain clawed at him as memories of the past hurtled into his consciousness.
Air became choked in his lungs and Leo felt the panic he had experienced at the childcare centre when he’d first seen Ty take hold.
He needed space.
Time to think. Without looking at either occupant on the deck, he crumpled the piece of paper into his fist and stalked off.
CHAPTER NINE
LEXI wandered down the long walkways and spiral staircases until she came to her and Ty’s suite of rooms. She checked on Ty and smoothed his hair off his forehead as she watched him sleeping
peacefully. He looked so much like Leo and her mind automatically wondered where he had gone. What he was doing.
He had said ‘married’ in such a tortured voice Lexi could only surmise that Amanda had remarried and the news had clearly devastated him. Her heart clenched in reaction and her skin grew hot. Her earlier assumption that he still harboured strong feelings for Amanda Weston was clearly correct.
She straightened Ty’s sheets and let herself out of his room and crossed to her own. She knew Carolina was asleep in the other room with the monitor on and that she would not be needed any more tonight.
She kicked off her heels and wandered out onto her private terrace. The air held a faint chill now that a soft breeze had picked up and she rubbed her bare arms. She turned back inside and poured herself a glass of water and sat down at the small writing desk, running her fingers over the edge of her laptop before jumping up again. She was too wired to sleep and too restless to work.
Again her mind drifted to Leo and she wondered if he would want someone to be there for him when he was feeling terrible. Instinctively, she knew that he wouldn’t but sometimes people didn’t know what they needed until they had it. She knew he wasn’t a talker but maybe he’d never had anyone offer a listening ear before. She might question his morals and his life choices, but he was a human being in pain and everyone needed someone at a time like this.
Not questioning her motives too closely, Lexi donned her heels and decided that the only way to put her mind at rest was to find him, make sure he was okay and then return to her room.
Pleased with her plan, she took the elevator up to his level and tapped lightly on his door. After a minute she knocked harder and then, still hearing nothing, turned the door knob and opened the door.