36. Regrets

THIRTY-SIX

#1 That fukking video

"Nathan."

Lillian Hunt's imperious Southern voice echoed again around the planetarium's cavernous space. We both scrambled to right our clothes, Nathan tucking me behind him as he zipped up his pants.

We glanced at each other, but quickly broke into identical smiles.

"It's no use," I murmured as I reached up to fix my hair, which had mostly fallen out of its careful arrangement. At least I'd managed to cover my breasts again. "We're a friggin' mess."

Nathan looked as bad as me, his curls a riot atop his head, and my lipstick visible around his mouth, even in the dark.

He grinned back at me. And had never looked more handsome as he quickly tugged me back to him to steal one last kiss.

Apparently, first impressions were out the door. I couldn't have cared less.

"Get your filthy hands off my son!" Lillian shouted again as she made her way down to the bottom of the room, followed by, I realized, both of Nathan's brothers, as well as his father.

"Excuse me?" I snapped back before I could hold my tongue. I didn't put up with my fourth-grade teacher calling me stupid, and I wasn't going to take this lady's shit either, even if she was my boyfriend's mother.

"Mom, calm down," Nathan said, despite the fact that absolutely no woman ever obeyed those two words. "Joni's my girlfriend. What we were doing isn't exactly out of the ordinary, even if the location is."

Behind Lillian, Spencer snorted. "The Museum of Natural History." He looked up at the stars still circling the ceiling. "Pro move, bro. Didn't think you had it in you."

"None of us did." Carrick appeared beside him, his massive arms crossed over his chest, having removed his jacket at some point during the evening. "Did you really think you wouldn't be missed, you jackass? Dad's giving the keynote in ten minutes. Everyone sat down for dinner but you two."

"We just needed a minute," Nathan said as he hurried to right his clothes.

"Only a minute?" Spencer said. "Nate, I think we need to have a talk about endurance."

He held his hand up for a high-five to Carrick, who ignored him. But when he caught my eye, Nathan's youngest brother winked at me. Under normal circumstances, I might have laughed back. I had a feeling that if things were different, Spencer Hunt and I might have gotten along.

Right now, however, I was stuck on another point. The little speech Nathan's father was about to give. What Xavier had told me it would include. And the fact that his mother was so angry he was missing it.

Nathan had stood up for me too many times to count.

Now it was my turn.

"Maybe it's for the best that we miss the speech," I said.

The entire family whirled.

Lillian's expression flared. "And why, exactly, would you say something like that, you little trollop?

"Don't talk to her like that." Nathan's voice sliced through the air, causing his mother to reel as if she'd actually been cut.

"Nathan might not know what you were planning, but I do," I put in. "My brother-in-law told me all about it. You might know him—Xavier Parker, the Duke of Kendal. Yeah, he clued me in. Said all people could talk about before we arrived was your little plan to hang Nathan out to dry in front of thousands of people, including his colleagues."

Nathan's head whipped right back to his mother. "What is she talking about?"

She didn't confirm it, but Lillian's guilt played all over her refined features. Along with burning hatred, pointed directly at me.

"How dare you," she gritted. "How dare you interfere in a family affair! First, you wedge into my son's life—a little gold-digging nobody completely undeserving of everything he has to offer. You sashay around in public dressed like a common whore, and then you act like one to a society function? You think you have a right to object to our family's plans?"

Her harsh words cut like knives, but I wasn't done. More than I hated how she was characterizing me, I hated how she was talking about Nathan. Like at his age, he was nothing but a prize. A ward. Something to manage just because he wasn't exactly like her.

The same way people had talked about me my entire life.

"I have the right because, unlike you, I actually care about him," I snapped. "And when you love someone, you're honest with them. You care more about their well-being than your own selfish needs."

Over Lillian's shoulder, Carrick's eyes narrowed. But I was too fired up to notice.

"Did you even tell him you were going to name him the next CEO of your company?" I rattled on. "Or were you planning to threaten a teenage girl's life to force him into that, too?"

Spencer's mouth dropped. "She knows about Isla?"

Lillian covered her mouth. "Oh, Nathan, you didn't."

"She knows everything." Nathan glanced at me and squeezed my hand, his deep brown eyes unexpectedly warm. "She knows me better than anyone."

Carrick looked between us, his shrewd gaze seeing something in the situation I couldn't put my finger on. "Do you know her, though?"

A chill fell over my entire body. I couldn't have said why. Carrick's eyes were cruel, but knowing as he pulled out his phone. My spine froze. No, he couldn't. There was no way he would know…

Then he punched something into the phone, and a moment later, everyone else's buzzed.

"What the fuck?" Spencer murmured as he opened the message. His eyes met mine with something I should have expected. A little bit of pity, yes. But mostly disgust.

"What is it?" Lillian demanded as she scrambled for her phone. "What did he send?" When she swiped to her messages at last, her vitriol landed on me like a flaming arrow to the heart. "Lord in heaven."

"Jesus," Spencer said as his eyes grew wide, unable to tear himself from the screen. "Nathan…you sure know how to pick 'em."

"Stop," I mewed, then turned to Nathan. "Please. Don't."

But he was already watching. And this close, I could see the reflection of the images on his glasses. Could hear the echoes of the familiar sounds.

The sickening slap of flesh on flesh.

The gleeful chuckle of the stranger on top of me.

The haughty comments from Shawn, standing behind the camera.

"You like that, baby?" I could hear him asking. "You like it when he treats you like the slut you are?"

And me. Moaning. Lost in a haze of whatever drug he had fed me that night. Barely conscious of where I was, what I was doing, or who I was doing it with.

Begging to be released. Begging for him to finish. Begging for it all to be over so I could stow it away and forget it had ever happened.

I'd done all right at that.

Until now.

"Joni…" Nathan's voice sounded lost. "Turn it off," he ordered his family. "Turn it all off. Delete it, and never look at that garbage again. Do you understand me?"

None of them obeyed.

I wished I were anywhere but here. Anyone but myself.

"It's not…I didn't…" My head was a howling mess; I didn't know what to say. There were too many things swirling, including the story of how the scene on everyone's phones had happened, which was simultaneously too simple to believe and too complicated to explain.

"H-how?" I finally managed to get out as I turned to Carrick. "W-where did you get that?"

Carrick, at least, shoved his phone back in his pocket and smirked. "You didn't think I'd forget about your little friends at the game, did you? Or did you actually think I wouldn't do due diligence on my brother's supposed new flame?" He flipped his phone into his jacket, and I was grateful to see that Nathan's family had all finally stopped watching the horrible scene. "Your boy Vamos sang like a canary with a little cash. Especially after Nathan beat the shit out of him."

Beside me, Nathan growled. He actually growled at the mention of Shawn's last name.

"You didn't…you don't want to inherit the company at all, did you?" I asked. "You were waiting to sabotage us from the beginning, weren't you? So Nathan would have to come home after all."

"Well, I was hoping you'd fuck it up all by yourself, sweetheart, but you surprised me," Carrick said with a smirk. "Color me shocked that when my big brother finally fell in love, it was with someone like you. Even more when it actually seemed like it might work out."

I'd never wanted to punch someone so badly in my life.

"Lucky for me, you left a trail of dirty laundry a mile wide," he continued. "Why would I want that god-awful spotlight when I've already got the perfect place in the shadows?"

He made me sick. The whole situation did.

"Regardless of my motives," Carrick went on, "the ends justify the means. It's time for Nathan to come home. His judgment is obviously impaired if he's jumping into another relationship with someone like this. It's Isla all over again, and we don't want to get saddled with another situation like that."

"No," Lillian said almost gleefully. "We do not."

I turned back to Nathan. "Please. Don't let them do this. It was so long ago, and I didn't know…you have to believe me."

For a second, I thought maybe he would. I thought that maybe, just maybe, Nathan would demonstrate the same unconditional tolerance, compassion, and fairness I'd seen from the very beginning. That it wouldn't matter what stupid mistakes I'd made in the past because what we had in the present, what we might have in the future, would matter so much more.

But Nathan wouldn't meet my eye. He wouldn't look at anyone. He swallowed again and again, like he was trying to remember how to do it in the first place. His eyes were glazed, shocked, and his hands were once again opening and closing by his sides. He looked like he was drowning.

Like I'd drowned him.

"Nothing to tell me?" Nathan said in a voice shredded by resentment and regret. "Nothing between us?"

I hiccupped as tears started streaming down my face. "I…I tried…" I shook my head. "Please understand. I just…I just couldn't."

"I would have helped you." Those big brown eyes dragged up to meet mine, pools of anger and sadness. "I wouldn't have cared. If you'd just been honest with me. If you'd told me first."

"I didn't," I sobbed. "I didn't mean it. I didn't want to hurt you."

Two fingers slipped under my chin, drawing my eyes up to meet his one more time.

"The only thing that could ever hurt me was a lie." Then he dropped my chin and turned toward his family. "Let's go."

I watched as the four of them filed out of the planetarium, leaving me there, floundering under a sky full of stars that seemed to be laughing as they slowly winked out. I buried my face in my hands and cried until I didn't have anything else to give.

Then I picked myself off the ground and somehow made it out of there, keeping my head down as I passed guests on my way back to the exit.

Leave. I needed to leave. Where I'd go…well, I'd think about that once I was outside.

"Joni?"

I turned at the sound of a familiar voice and found Xavier Parker's tall form striding down the hall.

"Where are you going?" he asked, and his eyes flashed as he took in my condition. "What happened?"

"Nothing." I couldn't stop from crying all over again. "I need to leave."

"What is it?" Xavier asked as he took my arm. He glanced back toward the gala. "What can I do? Where can I take you?"

The blare of the loudspeaker sounded, and vaguely, I heard the sound of a deep man's voice. "I'd like to take this opportunity to announce my retirement from Huntwell Corporation, but that the company will continue in the hands of my capable son, Nathaniel…"

"Marie," I whimpered into my hands. "I just want my sister. I want Marie."

Xavier nodded, though he looked somewhat confused as he punched a message into his phone. "Done. Come with me."