Alpha Billionaire Obsession (4 page)

The next morning when Anna woke up,
she was confused to see that Brian wasn’t lying next to her. She
wasn’t sure where he would have gone without her, but she got up
anyway and put on her swimsuit in preparation for one last day at
the pool.

Just as she was finishing getting
ready, Brian came back into the room holding his phone, visibly
upset. “What’s up? Who were you talking to?” Anna asked. She didn’t
like seeing Brian distressed.

“Oh, nobody. Work stuff,” he said
quickly.

For some reason Anna wasn’t quite
convinced; it seemed like something was wrong. “What work stuff?”
she asked, “I work with you, remember?” she laughed and nudged him
to try to lighten the mood.

Brian didn’t smile. If anything, he
looked a little more annoyed. “It’s nothing, don’t worry about it,”
he insisted.

“Fine,” agreed Anna, and they went out
to the pool. But honestly, it bugged her a little bit more and more
throughout the day. Brian continued to seem distracted and slightly
upset, and Anna wasn’t sure why he wouldn’t explain it to
her.

When Brian excused himself to go to
the bathroom, Anna eyed his phone, which was sitting on their
poolside table. She knew it would be crazy to snoop, but she really
wanted to know who had called earlier. And besides, he had gone
through her phone to get Macy’s number, she justified. They weren’t
hiding anything from each other, so it would be okay to just take a
quick look, she assured herself.

She picked up the phone and first
opened his texts. Much to her dismay, the most recent text had come
this morning, and it was from Melissa, Brian’s ex-girlfriend. Now
Anna couldn’t stop herself from opening it. It read, “Where are
you? You were supposed to pick up Joey ten minutes ago.”

Joey?! Anna’s mind raced. Who was
Joey? Why was Brian supposed to pick him up? Her jaw dropped as it
occurred to her: Joey must be Brian and Melissa’s son. How could
Brian not tell me that he has a SON? Anna was so shocked that she
couldn’t quite wrap her mind around it. She opened up his calls. He
had called Melissa right after getting the text this morning. That
explained where he had been when she woke up. Anna scrolled to
older texts from Melissa. They were all about Joey, including “I’m
picking up Joey this weekend,” and “Where are you with Joey?” and
“Claire told me that you were late bringing Joey to his lessons
yesterday.”

Anna just couldn’t believe it. She
quickly turned off Brian’s phone and put it back on the table as
she saw him walking towards her. He hadn’t seen her looking at it,
luckily. Anna wasn’t sure whether to bring up Joey right away, or
to wait and see if Brian would tell her on his own. Of course,
she’d rather have him tell her on his own terms, but it just seemed
crazy that he’d already told her he loved her, but hadn’t shared
this huge part of his life with her. Still, she decided not to say
anything yet.

They hung out at the pool for a while,
but then it was time to pack up and fly back home. Both of their
moods had shifted. Before, they’d been gleeful and affectionate,
but now both Anna and Brian were quiet and somber. When Brian
dropped her off at home, Anna put on a smile and thanked him for
the weekend, but as soon as she got in her house, she collapsed on
her bed. A tear rolled down her cheek. She just felt so confused.
She’d thought that she knew Brian so well, but it turned out she
didn’t know him at all.

At work the next day, Anna started in
her new position as a project manager. It was a lot of work, which
Anna was thankful for, since it took her mind off of the situation
with Brian. He sent her a few texts throughout the day, checking in
on her and sending a few pictures from the weekend. He seemed happy
and back to normal. Anna responded as she normally would, but she
still felt weird and uneasy. Knowing that Brian had hid something
so big from her had completely changed her opinion on him, and she
wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

She made an excuse not to go out with
him that night, and for the next few nights after. She said that
she was tired, and then that she was spending some time with her
parents, and then with Macy. Really she just didn’t feel like
spending time with Brian. She needed some space to think and
reevaluate her feelings for him.

By Friday, Brian must have figured out
that something wasn’t right, because as Anna left the office that
afternoon, she noticed him sitting in his car in the parking lot,
waiting for her. “Anna,” he called out to her, and she walked over
reluctantly.

“What’s the matter, Anna? If I didn’t
know any better, I would think that you were avoiding me.” He said
it playfully, but Anna noticed a certain sadness in his eyes. She
decided that she was being immature, that she needed to be upfront
with Brian and tell him what she’d seen and what she
knew.

“I just haven’t been feeling too
well,” she said, which was the truth. “But I feel a little better
now. Want to go get coffee or something?” Brian agreed, and Anna
hopped in his car.

They pulled into a coffee shop a few
blocks from the office, ordered their drinks, and sat facing each
other in a booth in the corner. Anna felt her face growing hot
despite the air conditioner, and reminded herself to breathe and
stay calm.

“So, are you going to tell me what’s
up?” asked Brian, still looking forlorn.

Anna took a deep breath. “I have a
confession,” she began nervously. She knew she was wrong to snoop
through his phone, and was not looking forward to admitting it.
“Sunday morning in Catalina, you looked so distressed, and you
wouldn’t tell me why. When we were at the pool and you got up, I
looked through your phone.”

“You looked through my phone?” Brian
looked upset. “You don’t trust me?”

“Well I thought I did, and I knew it
was crazy to look and I’m sorry, but I just had a feeling that
something was wrong.” She took another deep breath. “And it was. I
can’t believe you’ve been keeping something so big— the biggest
part of your life— a secret from me.” All of her emotions from the
past week came rushing to the surface, and Anna had to hold back
tears. “Why would you hide something from me if you love me? Did
you think I wouldn’t love you if I knew? Because I of course I
still would, I’m just upset you lied!”

For the first time, Brian looked
completely confused. “Anna, what are you talking about? I’m not
hiding anything from you.”

“Come on!” Anna said, a little too
loudly. “What about Joey? Your son with Melissa? Why didn’t you
tell me that you have a son?”

Brian covered his face with his hand
and at first, Anna thought he was crying. She felt bad for a
moment, but then, bursts of laughter emerged from behind Brian’s
hand and she realized he wasn’t crying at all; he was laughing as
if he’d heard the funniest joke ever.

This made Anna angry. “How is this a
joke to you? How is this funny at all?”

“I… I can’t believe… you think Joey
is… my SON!” Brian said, gasping for air between bursts of
hysterical laughter. “Now I can see why you were so thrown off.
Wow.” He was finally composing himself. “Anna, Joey isn’t my son.
He’s not anyone’s son. Well, I guess he’s someone’s son, but not a
human’s son. He’s a DOG!” Brian was still chuckling.

Anna’s mouth hung wide open. She
couldn’t believe it. “But Melissa said things about picking him up,
and about taking him to lessons…” She tried to comprehend the
situation, but this was so unexpected that she still couldn’t quite
grasp it.

“Yeah, dog training lessons.” Brian
explained that he and Melissa had gotten Joey together while they
were dating, and although Melissa had him most of the time now,
Brian still would pick him up every once in a while to play with
him or take him to dog training. “I’d completely forgotten last
weekend that Melissa was busy on Sunday and had wanted me to watch
Joey for the day. I felt really bad when she texted, and then when
I called her, she was really angry and gave me a lot of grief for
it. That’s why I was in a bad mood, but I just didn’t want to bring
up Melissa on your birthday weekend. Anyway, she got one of her
friends to watch Joey and it wasn’t a big deal.”

Now it was Anna’s turn to put her head
in her hands. “I feel so stupid!” she said, completely embarrassed.
Now Brian probably thought she was a crazy person and wouldn’t want
to be with her anymore. She couldn’t believe that she’d just jumped
to conclusions like that. She should have trusted Brian.

“Don’t feel stupid,” said Brian, back
to being serious now. “The way Melissa talks about Joey, it’s as if
he’s her son, so I could see why someone would think that just from
her texts.” Brian sighed, “But I have to admit, I’m disappointed
that you don’t trust me. I thought you knew what kind of person I
was, and that I’d never hide something like that from you, or from
anyone.”

“I know, and I said I’m sorry,” said
Anna, “I guess things just seemed so perfect and it’s never been
that way for me. So when I saw that, I thought, here it is,
something needs to go wrong and this must be it.”

“I never gave you any reason to
distrust me and I’ve been nothing but upfront with you, Anna,”
Brian sighed again, and he suddenly seemed very tired. “I think we
both just need some space. We’ve been moving really fast. I’ve
liked the intensity of our relationship, but now I’m just not sure
that we’re both ready for it.”

Anna knew that Brian was talking about
her, not both of them, not being ready for the relationship. She
felt terrible, almost as if she was going to be sick to her
stomach. She told Brian she was just going to walk back to her car
at the office, and drive herself home.

“I’ll give you a ride,” he said,
softening a bit.

“No,” said Anna, “I want to walk. I
need some fresh air.” She walked slowly back to the office, moping
along in the summer heat. She couldn’t believe it—she and Brian had
something so amazing, and she’d gone and ruined it. Even though
Brian hadn’t broken up with her, she felt like that’s where it was
heading. How often did “breaks” end up just being breaks? The
sinking feeling in her stomach told her that it was over, and it
was all her fault. Why hadn’t she just trusted Brian like she
should have?

When she got home, Anna went straight
to her room and broke down in tears. She heard a knock on her door,
and her mom came in, concerned about her. Through her tears, she
explained to her mom everything that had happened, and how stupid
she felt.

“Oh, honey,” her mom said, wrapping
her arms around Anna’s quivering shoulders. “It’s not over. You
just have to think hard about whether you are ready for this
relationship, and if you are, then show Brian.”

“How am I supposed to show him that
I’m ready? I know I am, I just don’t know how he’s going to believe
me after I messed up like this,” sniffled Anna.

“Just be yourself. You’re still the
confident, intelligent woman he fell in love with. He’ll see
that.”

And so Anna got through the next few
weeks, keeping herself busy with the things she enjoyed. She gave
her everything at work, she spent time with her family and friends,
she exercised, she read, she wrote. She and Brian didn’t talk to
each other, but sometimes they’d be on group calls together at
work, so she knew that he was seeing her progress. He was seeing
that she was strong and that she wasn’t going to let herself break
down. She was feeling good about herself again.

One Friday afternoon, Macy texted her,
asking if she’d like to go see some live music at one of their
favorite local restaurants. Anna replied that that sounded great,
and after work she went home and changed into one of her favorite
dresses and got ready to go out. She had no musical talent herself,
but she was always so impressed with musicians, and their bravery
in performing in front of a crowd of people. She met Macy at the
restaurant, and they sat at the bar, enjoying the singer/songwriter
and the acoustic guitar player who accompanied her.

They played a few songs, and after the
third or fourth, the singer paused and said, “That song was about
love. Sometimes love makes us act a little crazy, but you just have
to listen to your heart, and you can’t go wrong. There’s someone
here tonight who told me he’d like to say something about love, so
I’d like to invite my new friend Brian up to the
microphone.”

Anna couldn’t believe her eyes as
Brian, HER Brian, appeared seemingly out of nowhere and walked on
up to the microphone. She looked at Macy, who had a huge smile on
her face. “You knew?” Anna was dumbfounded.

Macy nodded. “Shh, listen to what he
has to say,” she urged Anna.

“Love really has made me a little
crazy,” he began. Some people near the front chuckled. “I had
something special with the most amazing woman, and then one little
thing upset me and I wanted to take a break.” Now he shook his
head. “It’s crazy that one little roadblock threw me off and made
me question our relationship.” He looked directly at Anna and said,
“Anna, I don’t blame you for jumping to conclusions. Trusting
someone new can be really hard, especially when things haven’t
worked out in the past.”

Anna felt tears well up in her eyes,
but she forced a little smile since people had turned to look at
her.