Page 46 of The Runaway Bride and the Billionaire

“Hi dear.”

“It’s been a while.” My pointed tone did not go unnoticed.

He sighed. “Yes, I know and I’m sorry about that. It’s just been difficult to adjust to… ”To a world where I don’t do your bidding. I mentally finished off the rest of his sentence but out loud I asked, “How have you been?”

“Very well. How have you been? I hear you have a job now. What’s that like for you? It must have been difficult,” he said,

“At the beginning, yes. But now, I’ve adjusted just fine. I love my job.”

“Oh really?”

I cocked a brow even though he couldn’t see me. “Yes, really.”

“I’m proud of you then.”

I wasn’t expecting him to say that so it took a while for me to answer. “You are?”

My father sighed again. “You’ve done far better than I expected you to. That is enough reason to be proud. You see the truth is that I didn’t expect you to last more than two months in New York. That was why I made you stay with Matteo. I didn’t want you to waste money on renting and setting up an apartment when I was certain you would be back in less than three months. I never even considered that you might get a job. Like I said, you’ve done far better than I expected and I’m proud of you.”

I wasn’t surprised by the fact that my father expected me to give up. He and my mother didn’t believe I was capable ofhandling things on my own. I suppose I couldn’t blame them for their lack of faith in me. I hadn’t done much to inspire their faith.

Still, they’d never given me the opportunity. My life had never truly been in my own hands. Not until now. I felt proud of myself for proving my parents wrong. In a way, I’d also proved myself wrong. My expectations for myself were not as low as my father’s, but I had to admit that I didn’t expect to survive this long. I didn’t think I was capable of getting a job and fending for myself. I had as many doubts as my parents did.

It was a goal but it wasn’t one I truly believed I could achieve. Thankfully I proved everybody wrong, especially myself. Pride warmed my chest, and I smiled as I stared at the faint reflection of myself in the penthouse windows.

I turned to look at the living room and I realized a lot of this wouldn’t have been possible if my father hadn’t forced me to live with Matteo. I was comfortable in this house and that allowed me to search for a job from a place of desire rather than desperation.

If I were on my own, I would have likely taken the assistant job that I’d been offered at first. Being here allowed me to wait for something better.

Surprisingly, I had my father to thank for that. And so I did. “Thank you for making me stay with Matteo.”

“Well, I certainly didn’t expect that,” he responded with a laugh. “I suppose he’s treating you well.”

“Yes, he is.””He better be. The deal I offered him was worth millions of dollars.”

I furrowed my brows. Matteo didn’t tell me anything about a deal with my father. Certainly not one that relates to me. “What deal?”

“It was the only way he would agree to let you stay in his house for four months. As part of our agreement, he would house youand I would give him a multi-million-dollar deal. Don’t bother thinking about that, Amelia. It’s business and in business… ”

My father’s voice trailed off until all I could hear was a loud ringing noise. I couldn’t tell if it was coming from outside or from inside my head. The pitch of the noise increased with every breath I took. I looked around but my vision was blurred. Not by tears but by memories.

I remembered asking Matteo why I was here. I asked him why he’d agreed to let me stay here when he could have easily told my father no.

I don’t know, he’d said.

But evidently, that was a lie. He welcomed me into his home because my father offered him money. And he didn’t even have the decency to tell me the truth.

The ringing stopped and I could finally hear my dad again. He was still talking about business. He relished any opportunity to lecture me. “I have to go now, Dad,” I said, effectively cutting him off. “Thanks for calling.”

I ended the call before he got a chance to reply. My mind was too fixated on Matteo to consider being more courteous.

He was in the kitchen right now, preparing the meal for us to eat. We’d spent so much time together and through it all he never once considered telling me the truth. After all his talk about building trust. Little did I know that he’d been lying this whole time.

I felt a mix of anger and sadness. I hated him for lying to me. If he had only told me the truth from the beginning, then I wouldn’t feel as stupid as I did now. But I had to wonder if I would have liked to hear the truth. Would I have liked to know that he only welcomed me into his home because he got money out of it?

Probably not. But Matteo should have given me the chance to decide how I felt about it. He should have told me the truth.

I walked down the hallway and towards the kitchen, my footsteps sounded unusually loud against the tiled floor. Or maybe that was just the noise in my head?

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