EXPOSE (The Billionaire's Rules, Book 6) (4 page)

But Cullen started talking again.
 
“I performed a very similar surgery some
time ago, and…” he seemed to struggle to find the words.
 
“It…did not have a good outcome.”

Ivy licked her lips, searching for the right
response.
 
“Does that mean you can’t
try again with a different patient?”

“You don’t understand,” he said, finally
turning his head and meeting her gaze.
 
His eyes were terribly haunted, like empty orbs.
 
“I killed her.”

A chill went deep through Ivy’s soul at
his confession.
 
“Cullen—“

“I made the simplest mistake and she
died.”
 
He grimaced, swallowing, and
then looked up at the ceiling once more.
 
“My stupidity cost her everything.
 
I lost her—I lost someone who mattered very much to me.”

“Everyone makes mistakes,” Ivy said.

He just shook his head again.
 
He didn’t bother to try and hide the
pain that was etched on his face.
 
“It’s over,” he said softly.
 
“I’ll never perform surgery again.
 
And that,” he said, finally regaining control of his emotions, “is why I
can’t have that woman standing in front of my house all day long.
 
She needs to let it go, and find someone
else to do that operation on her sister.”

Ivy sighed, wishing she could say
something to help, something to give him comfort.

But he was lost in his own private hell
and there was no way in.
 
It was
amazing enough that he’d told her this much about his life.

She was overwhelmed to hear him discuss
this subject in such a personal way.
 

That email Xavier Montrose had sent her
had indicated that people at the hospital thought Cullen had done something
intentionally wrong.
 
They’d thrown
around the word
murderer
when
describing him.

But Cullen was admitting to something
very different than murder.
 
He was
confessing to a screw up, to having perhaps made a very big mistake—a mistake
that obviously still tormented him.

So maybe he had screwed up and perhaps a
woman had died because of it.
 
Didn’t that happen sometimes?
 
Wasn’t the unfortunate truth that surgeons were human beings, fallible
as anyone else, and sometimes their mistakes cost people’s lives?

They lay in silence for a long while, and
then Cullen turned onto his side and watched her for a moment.
 
“I’m a very difficult man,” he said,
after a time.

She smiled.
 
“You’re not what you think you are.”

“I’m not?” he asked, curious.

“Nobody is.”

He looked momentarily surprised.
 
“Why is it that you continue to say the
most unexpected things?” he asked, a hint of a smile appearing on his
face.
 
“You really do astound me,
Ivy.”
 
He reached out and stroked
her cheek with his fingers.

Ivy closed her eyes, relishing the
feeling of his hand on her cheek, and his unexpected softness and
vulnerability.

He’s
a good man.
 
I don’t care what
anybody says about him.
 
I believe
in Cullen Sharpe.

But then something occurred to her, and
her smile faded.

“What’s wrong?” Cullen said.

“Nothing,” she lied, as she realized that
her secret was becoming an unbearable weight on her soul.
 

If
you really think he’s a good man, than how can you justify hiding the fact that
the FBI is investigating him?
 
And that they’re trying to force you to help them?

Ivy sat up and then slid off the bed,
grabbed her panties and sweats off the floor and pulled them on.

“Ivy,” Cullen called to her.

She looked back at him, her stomach feeling
sour and nervous.
 
“Yeah?”

“Tell me what’s on your mind.”

“There’s…there’s nothing to tell.”

“You’re disappointed about what I told
you?” he asked.
 
“About the woman
who died during surgery?”

She hated to think that he would believe
such a thing.
 
“No, of course not,”
Ivy said, brushing her hair back and trying to gather her thoughts.
 

The guilt was becoming almost unbearable
now.
 
He’d revealed himself and she
was letting him down.

“Something happened,” Cullen said.
 
“Between when I told you and now.
 
Your whole demeanor—“

“Please, stop analyzing me,” she nearly
shouted.

Cullen looked taken aback.
 
“I only want to ensure you’re okay,” he
said stiffly.

And then she hung her head and started to
break down.
 
“I’m not cut out for
all of this,” she said, as the tears started in earnest.

“Cut out for what?”

Ivy looked up at him.
 
“Oh, God, Cullen.”
 
She felt sick.
 
She put a hand to her mouth and a wave
of nausea rolled through her,
then
seemed to pass.

He slid forward on the bed.
 
“You can be honest with me.”

“You’re going to hate me for it, but I
swear—I swear it wasn’t my fault.”

He breathed heavily through his
nostrils.
 
“Just say it, whatever it
is, and then we can deal with it.”

“The FBI is investigating you,” she blurted
out, the words coming so quickly she could hardly believe they’d been spoken
aloud.

Cullen didn’t react.
 
His eyes were blank.
 
“I have no clue what you’re talking
about,” he said.
 
He sounded truly
shocked.

Ivy sat back down on the edge of the
bed.
 
“Remember how you saw me
talking to Lucas on the bench outside the office?” she asked.

He nodded.
 
“Yes.”
 
He scratched his chin, his eyebrows
lowering.
 
“You’re saying he has
something to do with this?”

“He works for the FBI, Cullen.
 
He’s a federal agent.”

Cullen began laughing.
 
“This is a joke?”

“No,” she told him, shaking her head.

His smile faded.
 
“Ivy, if you’re playing some kind of
game…I really don’t get it.”

“It’s not a game.
 
I’ve been keeping it to myself because
he threatened me.
 
He said they
could send me to jail for telling you.
 
Obstruction of justice or something.”

Cullen’s smile was totally gone now and
his eyes were hard as diamonds.
 
“You’re fucking serious,” he said, his voice a whisper.

“I don’t know what they think you’ve
done,” she began, but Cullen had risen from the bed and paced over to the
window.
 
He threw the curtain aside
and peered out.
 
“They’re following
me?
 
Conducting surveillance?
 
What else?”
 
He spun around and looked at her with
suspicion.
 
“Tell me what you told
them about me.”

“I couldn’t tell him anything,” she said,
desperate to make that paranoid look on his face go away.
 
“Cullen, you’ve never told me
anything.
 
So I didn’t give them any
information.”

He shook his head.
 
“How can I trust you?” he asked.
 
“You’ve been lying to me.”

“I was terrified.
 
The U.S. government considers you an
enemy.
 
That’s what he told me.”

Cullen came towards her, pointing at
her.
 
“I need to know absolutely
everything that happened, Ivy.
 
Every word that was spoken between you two.”
 
He glowered, as if the fury was building,
but then his shoulders sagged.

It was as if what she’d told him had
broken something in his spirit.
 
“I
need to know everything.
 
Everything,” he said softly.

“Okay,” Ivy replied, her arms folded
across her chest.
 

He looked at her with wary eyes.
 
“You understand, if what you’re saying
is true, this could cost me my company, my work, my livelihood, my
freedom.
 
That’s what you’ve just
told me.”

She nodded, biting her lower lip.
 
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before.”

He sighed.
 
“You’re telling me now.
 
So go on.”

She started with Lucas coming to her
cubicle, leaving out the part about the email from Xavier Montrose.
 
After all, that was small potatoes
compared to the issues with the FBI.
 
And if she told him about Xavier’s email and that she’d kept that
occurrence secret as well, then Cullen would surely never trust her again.

So she simply told him that Lucas had
approached her in the office and told her he needed to meet with her in private.
 

And then Ivy continued on, telling the
story as accurately as she could remember it, and Cullen listened without
speaking.

When Ivy told him about the texts that
had been sent to her phone before she passed out, Cullen nodded.

“Of course,” he said, almost
smirking.
 
“That’s the real reason
you fainted.”

“I’m sorry I lied,” she said.

When she was done telling her story,
Cullen went back to the window and looked out of it.
 
“And Lucas never told you the exact
reason they’re investigating me,” he said.

“No,” she told him.
 
“He just said that it’s serious, that
they consider you a potential enemy of the U.S. government and that I need to
start helping them get information about you.
 
Lucas was very clear that if I told you about
the investigation or refused to help him, I’d be punished.”

Cullen shook his head.
 
“I wish I could tell you what I believe
is happening,” he said.
 
“But
unfortunately, anything I tell you from here on out could be used against me
someday.”

Ivy realized that this was the death
knell of their relationship.

Now that Cullen Sharpe understood the government
intended to use her testimony in some way, anything he might tell
her—anything she might accidentally even see—would eventually be
turned against him.

“I just want you to know,” she said,
“that I truly believe you’re a good man.”

“Why do you think that?” he said, looking
at her over his shoulder.

“Because,” she said, “I care about
you.
 
And I see kindness in you,
even if you don’t think it’s there.”

He shook his head.
 
“You don’t even know me, Ivy.”

“Are you sure about that?” she asked.

He didn’t answer for a long time.
 
“The best thing for you is to get as far
away from me as possible,” he said.

Ivy stood in the middle of the room.
 
“Cullen, please don’t do this,” she
begged.
 

He came slowly to her and put his arms
around her, drawing her close.
 
His
cheek grazed hers, and his lips were on her ear.

“I care about you also,” he
whispered.
 
“I care too much to let
you be destroyed by my problems.
 
I’ll never let anyone harm you—even if it means protecting you
from myself.”

“But what if I don’t want to go
away?
 
What if I’d rather stay with
you now and deal with the consequences later?”

He stroked her hair.
 
“We’ll never be able to trust one
another after today.
 
There will
always be questions, fears of being turned on, turned in, used against each other.”

Cullen let go of her after kissing her
cheek.
 

She cried a little, wiping her eyes.
 
“I feel like we were only just getting
started, and now you’re ending it.”

“We’ll spend the day and night together,”
he told her.
 
“One last night, and
we make it count.
 
We save it in our
hearts forever.”

She nodded, knowing she could never
resist another moment with him.

Knowing that she would live with Cullen
Sharpe inside of her forever.