“Should I draw it for you?” he asked.
She looked at him. Danny was instructed to help her with anything she wanted, but that wasn’t something she needed help with.
“I think I’ve got it.” She smiled. “Will you let me know when Tyler or Lee are home?”
“Yes. Dinner is at six.”
She rolled her eyes. She thought maybe since they were out for the night she could eat on her own schedule.
“Ok.” She climbed the stairs, feeling the exhaustion hit her.
Her phone buzzed. She saw Niall’s name appear on the screen this time.
“What is it?” she asked quickly.
“Are we meeting tonight?”
“What? I said I would call you when I had something for you.”
“I’m not patient.”
She reached the top of the stairs and rushed to her room. The last thing she needed was Danny to hear her conversation.
“You’re going to have to be. I don’t have the kind of money you think I do. You gambled me into this situation, Niall. It’s not like you sent me with a dowry.”
“What the fuck is a dowry?”
She hung her head. “It doesn’t matter. It just means, I need some time.”
“You have until the morning. Or I go to the press.”
“Morning? There aren’t piles of cash lying around the house, Niall. I don’t know what you think happens with rich people and money. It’s in accounts, not stuffed in a mattress.”
He blew into the phone. “I don’t care how you get it. Just get it.”
Before she could protest again the line was silent. Brooke looked at the phone. He had hung up on her.
“Shit,” she whispered, sinking on the bed.
Last night she had moved into her new suite of rooms, adjoining both Lee and Tyler’s rooms. She flattened her hand on the pillow where Lee slept and rolled to Tyler’s side. She could still smell them on the pillows. They were her everything.
They would be humiliated if they discovered what she had done. They wouldn’t be able to forgive her. They would never look at her the same way.
Her eyes burned. The tears stung. She loved how they touched her. How they kissed her. How they worshipped her body. The idea that she could lose it because of her past, was suffocating. She fell to the bed as the sobs filled her lungs.
She couldn’t lose them. Not now. Not ever.
Thirty-Nine
Brooke
She awoke to Tyler nuzzled to her breast. Lee was pressed against her back. She opened her eyes. Tyler smiled.
“Good morning, sweetheart.”
“When did you two get home? I never heard you come in.”
They were naked. She felt the warmth of their skin under the covers.