STORM: A Standalone Romance (18 page)

The billionaire's handsome head lolled, and for a moment Cara feared he was about to faint. She ducked under his arm, quickly, just in case he needed the extra support, and all but hauled him out the hallway's back exit. A gust of cool London air hit them; Cara felt it through every inch of her too-thin dress, but Simon seemed unaffected by it. She helped him sit on the fire escape, and he dropped his head into his hands.

              "It's fine, Cara. I've just had too much to drink. I've been… overserved." He wouldn't raise his chin to look at her, and his tousled auburn hair fell across his eyes so that she couldn't get a good look at him. Cara bit the inside of her cheek. She had been at a party, once, where a girl she was acquainted with had been slipped Rophonyl. Cara had driven her home after noticing more than just the usual symptoms of being overserved.

              "Let me see your eyes, Simon."

              She didn't know if it would be the same for him—he seemed basically coherent outside of his strange behavior, and didn't look on the verge of unconsciousness. Simon reacted sluggishly to her request and moved his hands away from his eyes. Even in the light posted outside the door of the fire escape, she could see that his normally blue eyes were almost entirely black.

              "Dilated pupils," Cara said aloud. Her mind was racing. "Simon, is this similar to how you felt on the night of the accident?"

              "Yes," he confirmed. He then dropped his head back into his hands with a strange, unhappy sob. His moods were shifting faster than Cara could keep up with him, but he seemed aware of how out of control he was. "Oh God, Cara. I haven't changed a bit. I'm still the same person. I'm still—"

              "No, you're not," Cara said emphatically. "You're not the same person, because you never
were
this person. Someone is trying to set you up. Someone is trying to ruin you, Simon, and he's doing such a good job at it that he even has you fooled."

              "He?" Simon repeated airily. "Who?"

              Cara hadn't noticed her own use of the male pronoun until he pointed it out to her, and he was right to be confused. Why had she said that? It's not as if she had a culprit in mind…

              Or did she?

              "Simon, I'm going to call security," she said carefully. "I want you to stay out here, and I'm going to send them to meet with you. They might run a few tests."

              "What kind of tests?" Simon sounded horrified at the prospect, and she tried not to smile at his uncharacteristically childish tone of voice. It was endearing, but it was all wrong. He was reacting to everything she said on a very raw level, and she needed to be supportive of him.

              "I'm sure they'll check your eyes like I did, Simon, and ask questions. I'll speak with them before."

              "Don't go." Simon grasped her wrist as she made to stand. "Please, Cara. I'm sorry that I tried to have sex with you in the hallway."

              "You, er… you succeeded." Cara blushed, and took advantage of his moment of speculation to gently pry his fingers from her hand. "And you don't have to mention that part, by the way, to security. Just tell them what you're feeling, and that your girlfriend thinks you're drugged. I'll try and be back before they get to you, but I really have to see to something first.
Don't
move."

              "I love my girlfriend," Simon sighed as she kissed the top of his head and let herself back into the hotel. She didn't want to leave him there, not at all, but she wouldn't be gone for long.

              This would only take minutes.

              "Gerald!" She had the good luck of running into the butler on her way down the staircase. The elderly man paused, looking nonplussed by their encounter.

              "Miss Langford," he greeted her. "Where is Mr. Banning?"

              "Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that." She was gazing at him very hard now. He was dressed in his usual proper attire, but she noticed there was a slight bulge in his breast pocket. "What is that you have there? Ibuprofen? Oh, good thinking, Gerald. Simon is going to have a real doozy of a hangover tomorrow morning." And before he could stop her, Cara reached between them and plucked the pill bottle from his pocket.

              She had rarely seen any expression at all pass across Gerald's face, but now she was treated to a glimpse of borderline animal panic that flitted across his expression. "No, Miss Langford, I'm afraid that's my heart medication. I'm going to need that back—"

              "Funny, it certainly looks like a prescription bottle, but I'm afraid I can't read the label. What language is that?" Cara held the bottle out in front of herself, and Gerald made a swipe for it. The butler was out of luck—her reflexes were much quicker, as evidenced by her theft of the bottle in the first place. She raised it out of reach and brought it close to her nose. "Oh, you know what, actually? I forgot that there's a database for this sort of thing online! All I have to do is Google the color and shape of these pills, and their name will pop up! You wouldn't believe how easy it is, Gerald."

              "What do you want?" the butler hissed. Cara was reminded of the change she had seen overcome Melinda that day in her bedroom when the other woman had realized she couldn't be swayed. "And what are you implying?"

              "Wrong sequence of questions, Gerald." Cara backed from him a step for good measure and tucked the bottle down the front of her dress. She watched as the butler's eyes darted wildly about, but they both knew he wouldn't reach for it in plain view of any party guest who might just happen by. He thought he still had a chance of retaining his job, even though Cara knew otherwise. And she was about to prove why. "I know you've been drugging your employer. Not every day, maybe not even every
month,
maybe only two times total; but that's still twice too often." Cara crossed her arms protectively over the pocket she had improvised between her breasts. "You drugged him tonight, and you drugged him the night of the Pembrook accident. I'm half-suspicious that you drugged him that day in Connecticut when he nearly drove himself off the road and drowned."

              "You can't prove anything!" Gerald's vicious tone seemed to imply that he thought otherwise. "And anyway, why would I do something like that? Mr. Banning is my employer!"

              "You resent him," Cara said. "How long have you been working for his family? What have they ever done for you in honor of your service? I bet you aren't even in the will, are you? Or if you were, what Simon's parents gave you when they died wasn't enough. You had to go after their heir. You were planning on wearing him down slowly, weren't you? Making him think he was losing his mind, forcing him into solitude and driving him into the arms of the alcoholism he thought he already had." She was working herself up now, and when Gerald didn't deny any of her claims, it only made her angrier. "Were you hoping for him to leave his money to you? Or maybe you were just trying to have a bit of malicious fun at his expense. Me personally, I think you were shooting for both. You never anticipated the Stetson accident, but you worked that to your advantage too, didn't you? You were in touch with Stetson Pembrook's family;
you
were the one who advised them to go after Simon. And they probably agreed to give you a cut of what they were awarded for having their best interests at heart."

              "You Americans and your crime TV shows," Gerald spat almost nonsensically. "You think justbecause you've seen it done on the telly that you can suss out the facts. Well, you're wrong. And I'll make sure Simon realizes once and for all what a lying little bitch you are."

              Cara wasn't finished yet. "You poisoned Melinda," she said. "You poisoned Melinda and made it look like a suicide. She was threatening to cut the strings on your little marionette show. I bet she wasn't even aware of what you really are, was she? You two could have been like two peas in a pod, but you got greedy. Poisoning Melinda was the perfect incentive for Simon to leave the U.S. and come back to England, where you had a better chance of convincing him to meet with the Pembrooks and possibly settle out of court.
You
were the one who alerted the paparazzi, and
you
are the one who has been behind every terrible thing that has happened to him in the past year."

              By the time she had concluded her tirade, Cara found that she was too disgusted to sign off with a better ending. She started back up the stairs, intending to return to Simon before security and the police arrived. Gerald grabbed her wrist, his gnarled old fingers digging into her with surprising strength for a man with a so-called "heart condition".

              "Where are you going?" he growled.

              "I think the better question is where are
you
going?" Cara yanked her hand free from him. "I'd lawyer up if I were you. And stay away with Simon."

              She left him standing there, gazing at the ground, and she didn't look back.

#

Even though his butler was now in custody, Simon fired Gerald officially the next day. He said he wanted at least that satisfaction.

              "And now I have to hire new employees," he muttered over breakfast. He had hardly touched his plate, and he was holding an ice pack to his aching forehead. Apparently whatever Gerald had dosed him with the night previous left lingering effects similar to those of a hangover. Cara, who had made breakfast for him in the absence of a cook, tried not to take his lack of appetite too personally.

              "You definitely need a better screening process," she agreed. She sat across from him at the table with her laptop open, typing her story and frequently checking her e-mail for updates from the police. Since she had been the one to solve the case, she was being permitted unheard of access to the developments as they unfolded. With Simon's permission, she was going to turn his story in as her final project.

              "Cara." Simon drew the ice pack away from his forehead. "Will you do something for me?"

              "Sure." She didn't look up from her laptop.

              "Will you kiss me before the Pembrooks get here?For good luck."

              She glanced up in surprise at his request, and was met with a pair of earnest blue eyes. Cara closed her laptop and rose with a smile. "They were going to drop their lawsuit against you, you know," she said as she sat down in his lap and laced her arms around his neck. "Even before they found out about Gerald's involvement in the accident. They like you. I can tell."

              "I only care about one person who likes me at the moment," Simon said, and their lips met in an easy, loving kiss that sent currents racing all up and down Cara. This kiss felt deeper than any they had shared to come before it, and she knew that a shadow had been banished forever from their relationship. Like Simon, she was looking forward to the sun.

Cara jogged her leg impatiently, and her seatmate shot her an annoyed look. They were sitting in folding chairs out under the hot sun on the Trinity College football field—and by
they,
she was referring to herself and the hundreds of others who made up her graduating class. She felt hot and itchy beneath her flowing robe and cap, and she could tell others were feeling the same. They were just better at hiding it.

              She cast another glance over her shoulder. She could see her extended family occupying almost a whole section of the bleachers. When they noticed her looking, her older brothers waved broadly and embarrassingly. She was several yards away from them, but she could still see their shit-eating grins.

She was the last of her family to graduate, and she was doing it with top honors and the highest GPA out of any of them. Cara was proud of her achievements, but she still felt like something was missing. Or rather, someone.

She noticed a lone figure standing off to the side, in the shadow of the bleachers. The man had his hands in the pockets of his trousers, and he was casually leaning up against the structure. Cara squinted. The man was tall, and wearing what was undoubtedly an expensive suit, although he wore it more comfortably than anyone else she saw dressed similarly around him. The man didn't wave when he saw her looking at him, but he shifted to acknowledge that he felt her eyes. Cara turned forward again quickly, her face red beneath the square brim of her stupid hat.

She hadn't expected him to come. She had told him the date, and even sent an official invitation to his mansion downstate, but the last time she had heard from Simon Banning he was flying out to the U.K. for the remainder of the month. Unless he lied to her, in which case he had probably done so just so he could elicit this exact reaction from her. Cara crossed her arms and glowered, her slumped posture and the position of her arms only making the quick beating of her pulse that much more apparent in the back of her ribcage.

Simon Banning was here. Simon Banning had driven up to Trinity College to watch her graduation ceremony. She was feeling the exact opposite of mad at him at the moment.

Cara grinned helplessly, and hoped that the shadow from her cap would hide how obviously pleased she was.

Soon it was her row's turn, and she rose and walked to the podium with the rest of her group. When they called her name, she mounted the steps and accepted her diploma, shaking hands and smiling for a quick picture. As soon as she made her way back down the aisle and toward the bleachers, she was caught up in a whirlwind of activity. The Langford clan passed her back and forth between them as they hugged and congratulated her; she lost her hat at some point during the proceedings, only for it to pop back up on her oldest brother's head. Good, let
him
look like the ridiculous one. It certainly came naturally enough.

But she couldn't stop smiling, and hugging, and laughing. Once the ceremony was over and her family had finally calmed down enough to start discussing where to eat, Cara excused herself without a word. She made her way around the far side of the bleachers to join the man in the suit.

While she hoped the sweaters and bad haircuts of the future weren't entirely gone, Cara couldn't deny that the way Simon presented himself these days was enough to make her heart stutter. He looked healthier and stronger than she had ever seen him; he looked
right.
He filled his suit perfectly, and the way he styled his hair was effortless. He was clean shaven today, and Cara couldn't help but think the special occasion was her. She sidled up beside him and felt nothing but gratitude toward her brother for stealing her hat.

"Congratulations, Cara."

She had expected something different from him—a quip about her outfit, maybe, or even a toast to her student loans. But the sincerity of his greeting, coupled with a sense that he might actually be in awe of her, had her walking straight into his arms.

They hugged for a long moment, until Simon pulled back a little to look at her. "Your family looks lovely from afar. Have you told them about me yet?" he inquired with a raised eyebrow. Cara smiled mysteriously.

"I may have mentioned I met someone," she allowed. "Although I told them I thought you would be out of the country for my graduation. They still don't know you're English. I'm saving that surprise for when they meet you themselves."

"Cheeky girl," he said. "My business concluded early in London."

"You never even left, did you? You just lied about it so that I would be even more surprised when you showed up," Cara said.

Simon shrugged helplessly. "I wanted to see the expression on your face. Can I meet them?"

Her heart thudded in her chest. "You want to meet my family?" She glanced over her shoulder, but it was impossible to distinguish them from the crowd of other people's families. "Right now?"

"If it isn't too much trouble," Simon said. Cara turned back to him and tried not to let her amusement show on her face.
Trouble
was all she had been in since meeting Simon Banning.

She didn't give him an answer. Instead, she offered him her hand. Simon slipped his own hand out of the front pocket of his sleek black pants and interlaced his fingers with hers. Cara flirted her head in the direction she wanted to go.

"Come on," she said.

#

He arranged to have him all to himself later, of course. After charming her parents and managing to avoid pissing off any of her brothers, who were looking for any excuse at all to knock the head of the new guy dating their sister, Simon convinced them to let him spirit her off for the evening. He had nowhere fancy in mind—just a boring old understaffed mansion out in the New England countryside. They had left the Lanford clan to mull that one over.

              "You didn't tell them about my English heritage, and you didn't tell them about my money?" Simon was incredulous on the long car ride back to his estate. He was sitting behind the wheel at Cara's insistence. She was determined that he overcome his fear of driving, and the back roads of Connecticut were an excellent place to practice. He listed over into the wrong lane a few times, but considering he had done most of his driving in European countries up to this point, a few mistakes were to be expected. "What else didn't you tell them?"

              "Well, they don't know about the murder quite yet," Cara admitted. "They'll know once my piece is published. I figured reading about it would be preferable to me trying to explain it to them all at once."

              "If I hadn't lived through it with you, I wouldn't have believed it myself." Simon reached across the car to take her by the hand. So long as he stayed on the road, Cara decided she would allow it. "How did the interview go?"

              Cara shrugged. "They offered me the job."

              Simon squeezed her hand happily, and she grinned despite herself. She had been in an hour-long Skype interview with one of the top publications in the U.K. just before her graduation ceremony. Considering she was the journalist who had brought Simon Banning back into the public eye and solved his case in one fell swoop, she was in high demand. There were still some logistics to work out—like the fact that her office was literally an ocean away—but the job was almost all telecommuting. And with what they were offering to pay her, Cara wasn't feeling too worried about the future of her student loans.

              As soon as they got to the mansion, they relived their first day together. Mimosas and skinny dipping in the pool, followed by sex; conversation in the living room, followed by foreplay that led directly
to
sex. By the time they reached Simon's bedroom, Cara could hardly see straight.

              She came hard for the third time that evening and fell back onto the lush bed with a gasp of satisfaction. Simon rolled off of her and gazed up at the canopy as he ran a hand through his disheveled auburn hair.

              "Jesus, I don't think I've shagged that much in… well, since ever."

              "Please don't bring Jesus into this," Cara mumbled sleepily. "I don't want to risk drawing anyone's attention to the sins we're committing."

              "Feeling this good shouldn't be allowed, to be sure," Simon agreed. He glanced down at his receding erection and sighed. "You've had your way with me, Miss Langford, and now I'm spent. I think I'll be satisfied for a very long time."

              "I hope not." Cara rolled over onto her shoulder to look at him. "We still have to visit the cave tomorrow."

              Simon groaned again, and Cara grinned like a fox looking forward to a tasty meal in the henhouse. "My savior is going to be the death of me," he said as he rolled away to fish something off of the bedside table. Cara wasn't paying attention to his grousing. Despite the exhaustion of her body, her mind was awhirl with all of the possibilities the future might hold.

              "Hey Simon, can I get that exclusive after all?" she teased as the man turned back to her. "You know, the one you thought I was after? I bet the awful gossip rags in your country would
love
to know every detail of our torrid affair."

              "Funny that you should mention an exclusive," Simon said, and that was when Cara noticed the small black clamshell box in his hands. She sat up immediately, and nearly hit the back of the headboard with her skull. She cast wide eyes at Simon, her heart pounding in her chest. He fixed her with bright blue eyes, and for a moment, she suspected that they had both forgotten how to breathe. Then, he eased the box open, and a shaft of moonlight from the window sparked off Cara's exclusive.

Definitely
the happiest day of her life.

~ END of STORM ~

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