Thirty Nights with a Dirty Boy: Part 3: A Heroes and Heartbreakers Serial (6 page)

The memories tugged at me, stronger and clearer than normal.

“She asked what was wrong, where I was. I panicked and hung up. But she came looking for me. I’d called on her husband’s phone and he’d said he had a meeting—with my parents.” I forced myself to breathe. “
I
was the meeting.”

I wasn’t going to explain the rest of that—not now. How did I explain to him, to anybody that a man my parents knew and played golf with had been invited over to participate in …
Stop,
I told myself.
Just stop. If you don’t, you’ll end up in another panic attack and you’ll never finish this
.

“They drugged me.” Moving to the window, I rested my hands on the carved wood of the windowsill. The air inside the house felt stifling, and I wanted to be outside, away from anything and everything.

The very city seemed to be pressing in on me now.

Maybe I would leave.

There was little that needed to be done with Nora’s Door that I couldn’t do via the phone or Skype.

I could leave here and travel, and maybe I could even have fun.

Sean moved behind me. I flinched when I heard him and made myself turn to face him. I had to get through this, then I’d be able to do anything I wanted … as long as it didn’t involve him, that is.

“My name wasn’t always Ella Cruise.” Reaching up to toy with my necklace, I met Sean’s eyes. “When I was eleven, Nora suggested we change it. She’d just won custody of me, and it was becoming obvious that people would continue to hunt me down, try to get pictures, try to get a story…”

There was nothing in his eyes now but confusion.

“My father’s name was Jonathon Lyle—he owned Lyle Pharmaceuticals.”

Sean shook his head, then he stopped. “Wait a bloody minute…”

I moved around him, cutting a wide berth. The box waited on the table. Next to it was a copy of a newspaper. I hadn’t thrown it out. It was only a few weeks old and Paul had tried to throw it out several times.

Finally, I’d told him I’d just buy more copies, so he’d he’d left it alone.

It featured a prominent article on a pharmaceutical company. Not Lyle, though.

Lyle Pharmaceuticals no longer existed. It had been bought out by a much larger company a few years ago. It had been the last joint venture Nora and I had done together, one that had netted me millions of dollars and had cut the reins that held me to that ugly past.

Or so I’d hoped.

Flipping the paper open, I found the article and turned it over to Sean.

He scowled down at it, but took it and started to read.

I knew exactly when he’d reached the interesting bits of it.

I had them memorized.

UMI Pharma, now a world leader in pharmaceuticals, still struggles to overcome some shadows. A number of their frontline products were developed by the once-powerful Lyle Pharmaceuticals. UMI bought out Lyle and absorbed the company’s line, as well as its shadows.

Lyle’s former CEO, Jonathon Lyle, would have been sixty-two today. He was killed less than a month into what would have been a life sentence for charges of child molestation and child pornography.

While no victim was ever named, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Lyle hasn’t been seen since some months before the trial. Nobody knows what happened to Eileen Ellis Lyle after the arrest of her parents.

The sound of the paper crumpling in Sean’s hand was terribly loud in the small room.

I met his eyes calmly.

“Is that…” He stopped and took a deep breath. “Was that you?”

Turning back to the window, I debated about my answer. “Jonathon and Evelyn Lyle were my parents, yes.”

“And why he went to jail … he…”

It was so hard for people to say the words. I understood it. It was hard for me even now, and it had been done
to
me.

“I don’t know what all he did to me, Sean.” Wrapping my arms around my midsection, I focused on the deep navy of the sky and what few stars I could see. “I don’t know what either of them did.”

“Either…?” The word came out in a rough growl.

“Yes. I told you there were no words for what was done to me.” Although it wasn’t cold, a shiver racked me. I had a feeling I’d be suffering this chill for a long time to come. I sensed him moving toward me, so I eased off to the side. I didn’t want his pity.

The box, so simple and plain, sat on the table waiting for me.

“It started out as an experiment, they claimed. They never meant for anything bad to happen. They each blamed the other, and then they blamed themselves, and then they blamed me and society and money.” I talked as I moved over to the box. I hadn’t ever looked inside. Nora told me what was in it, and then she’d said if I ever needed to fill in the gaps in my memory, I could start here.

But I hadn’t ever wanted to.

If Sean weren’t here …

It didn’t matter what the cause was. I was here, and I was going to finish it. As I touched the top of the box, I looked up at him. “I was told that I never slept well. I cried a lot at night, and then I started to sleepwalk. My parents claimed they were at their wits’ end. The pharmaceutical company had already been working on this medication for some time. It was nearing the testing stages, and my father had been involved every step of the way. It was meant to be a sedative, one with fewer side effects. It cleared the system quicker and wasn’t addictive.”

One thing that UMI had pushed for was to get their hands on that drug.

Nora and I had both refused.

It was still Lyle property. As it hadn’t ever made it past the first testing stage, thanks to my father, it was nothing more than an experimental drug, and an unproven one at that.

I wouldn’t allow it to be sold.

Ever.

“I have no idea when they started drugging me with it. I don’t know which memories are real and which ones aren’t. There were things I’m told we did that I have no memory of.” I shrugged as I slid my hands inside the box and lifted out a fat file folder. I placed it on my lap before pushing the box aside.

There were letters inside.

Most were from Nora. I recognized her handwriting from just a glance. I wondered what they were for.

Maybe I would read them. Maybe I wouldn’t.

For now …

I picked up the letter on top.

It was from Jonathon Lyle.

My stomach twisted almost savagely.

Nora told me she’d gone to visit him after he’d been incarcerated. He’d already been attacked twice.

She’d said he was battered and bruised and bloodied. She’d smiled as she told me.

I’d cried in my room, away from her.

Even now, part of me felt like I was supposed to love the man.

I went to open the letter. Fumbling with the seal, I swore. I ended up ripping the edge, and still, I couldn’t open it.

“Here.”

I tensed at the sound of Sean’s voice, low and raw.

He sat down in front of me, his weight braced on the table.

My skin prickled from his nearness.

I wanted …

I stopped the thought before it could form.

“What’s this?” he asked as he gently took the letter from my hand and opened it.

“I don’t know. Nora made them each write me a letter. She said I deserved … something.” I had wondered at the time, tried to figure out just how she’d made them do anything, but I’d figured it out. They’d lost everything, the stockholders of the company had seen to that, and they’d all but bankrupted themselves trying to find a way to fight the charges.

Nora had married into old money, though and there was a
lot
of it.

She’d used that money to fight for me and make sure I would have the means to do whatever I needed—to buy whatever illusory security I thought I might want later in life. And she’d used it to force things from my parents.

She’d told them she’d keep them … comfortable in prison and that she’d make arrangements for the company to survive under her guidance until I could take the reins, if they would just agree to sign guilty pleas. Nora hadn’t lied … exactly. Years later, she’d helped UMI with their rather hostile takeover, and she’d made sure money that would have been my parents’ went into an account for me.

Blood money. My mother hadn’t wanted to do anything, but my father realized he was either looking at a hellish prison sentence or one where he could maybe buy protection.

He’d underestimated the hatred men in prison had for those who preyed on children.

I still didn’t know all the details, nor did I care to. My mother wasn’t likely to tell me and my father couldn’t.

Looking at the letter Sean held, I could appreciate what Nora had done for me. She hadn’t just forced them to acknowledge what they’d done. She’d taken care of me, loved me, and secured my future.

She’d secured some sort of life for me even after she was gone, while stripping their power away.

But it wasn’t enough.

Sean seemed to agree. Dismayed, he stared at the letter and then at me. “What could they bloody say?”

“Nothing.” I shrugged. “But Nora was a big believer in closure.”

Sean’s long, elegant fingers tugged the letter out of the envelope, tightening on it a moment. I had the feeling he wanted to burn it. When he held it out to me, I slid him a look. “Read it,” I told him. “It doesn’t matter to me what it says.”

Sean’s fingers tightened around the letter.

The look in his eyes was awful, and I thought he might refuse.

But then, slowly, he looked down, and after a moment, he started to read.

The letter suffered the same fate as the newspaper.

So did the next one.

I didn’t bother to see what happened after that. I didn’t want to see what was inside, not really.

As he continued to read, I left the sitting room.

Chapter 6

I didn’t know what I was planning to do until I was already in my room, pulling out my suitcases. Not the small, overnight ones, but the oversized ones that would hold more than half my substantial wardrobe.

Alice came in while I was pulling clothes from my closet. To her credit, she didn’t ask a single question.

She just joined me and began to fold clothes along with me, taking the things that wouldn’t travel as well folded and setting them aside.

We worked in silence for a long time.

It seemed like hours, although it was probably just under one.

When I heard a noise at the door, I didn’t let myself stiffen up. I already knew who it was.

Looking at the tight features of the older woman standing next to me, I said, “Why don’t you go to bed? It’s getting late.”

She wanted to argue. I could see it.

She came to me and brushed my hair back gently. “Will you wake me before you leave?”

“You know I will.”

Sean said nothing when Alice left the room.

Even after we were alone, he didn’t speak. He came deeper into my room and prowled the large span of carpeted area. After a few minutes of that, he turned to look at me. “So this is what the queen’s bower looks like.”

It was a pathetic stab at his old humor, but I smiled anyway.

It was far easier to do it now than it had once been. Instead of brushing aside his comment, I looked at my room. It was airy and open. Elegant, too. But it was devoid of personality and warmth. Devoid of charm.

“I pity the queen who has a room like this,” I said quietly. The walls were pale silver. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized the room echoed the design of the Waldorf, the hotel where I’d met Sean our first night together. Silver and white. Everything was silver and white. I could stand against a wall, and, save for my hair, I’d blend right in.

“Why is that?”

“Because the room is cold. There’s no emotion here, no life.” Shrugging, I went back to packing. “I’d always thought a queen would have a more welcoming bower than this.”

“It’s the princess you’re thinking of.” His voice was rougher, closer. “She’s got time for all that. The queen, now … well, her life is all about being efficient and being in control. She doesn’t have time for soft things or romance.”

He stood behind me.

So close, I could feel his warmth.

I didn’t let myself turn around.

“What is it you’re doing, Ella?”

“I’d think it was self-explanatory, Sean. I’m packing.”

“Going on a business trip?”

I didn’t answer right away. I was too busy trying to understand the desperation I heard in his voice. It was a sharp edge. But maybe I just heard it because I wanted to. Because I needed to. My hands shook as I placed another shirt in the suitcase. “No. I’m going to … go.”

He said nothing for the longest time.

Nor did he move.

After I’d finished with that stack of clothes, I turned. He stood there, blocking me. I went to move forward, and that just put me within an inch of his body.

“Excuse me.” I would have done an actress proud. There was no emotion in my voice. Nothing.

“You’re going to go,” he said, his voice echoing the flat tones of mine. “Go
where?
For how long?”

“I don’t know. I’ll go wherever. I’ll do whatever. And I don’t know. Maybe
forever.
” I looked around the room, thought of the house. “I only stayed here because this was Nora’s house. She left it to me. She was sick, you know. She had cancer, and she wanted to die here. She’d … this was the home she lived in with him—her husband. I don’t know what all he’d planned to do, but he hated it here. It was the family home and sat empty until they married. He hardly ever came here. But Nora loved it and made it her home. Then she made it mine. She left it to me, and I was too afraid to leave. Then I was too stubborn not to try. I’m not so afraid now, and I’ve proven that I can leave … so I’m done.”

I went to cut around him.

I made it two steps before a powerful forearm came around my waist and hauled me back. “No. Not like … Ella, not like this. I’m sorry.”

The warmth of his chest against my back went racing through me. Places gone cold and hollow filled with heat again. But it was only temporary. I covered his hand with mine.

“I know you’re sorry.”