Page 66 of Finding Lord Landry

Kenji’s legs ate up the distance to the back of the house, where I could hear Nan and my father talking.

“Trust me,” I called after him. “You do not want to do that.”

He waved a dismissive hand over his shoulder. I took a step in his direction before stopping myself. What I really needed right now was distance from him.

Kenji’s hand in mine, his calm words praising me, and the feathery touch of his lips under my ears had lured me down a dark path.

A false path.

We weren’t actually in a relationship. Despite my wishes, despite years of hoping, and despite the farce enacted for the media, Kenji didn’t want to be with me.

Breath struggled to move through my chest at the reminder.

What I needed was something to keep my mind off my fake husband. What I needed was to prepare myself for this absurd bid for Parliament. Even though my chances of getting selected were close to zero, I knew Teddy Baines wouldn’t have asked me to put myself up for it if he didn’t have a plan.

I turned on my heel and entered the code for the elevator. While I waited for it to come up from downstairs, I shot a text to Teddy’s assistant.

Please find me a few minutes in Teddy’s schedule.

His team would have already seen the cheeky implication I gave to reporters before brunch and know exactly what I wanted to talk about.

Once I was ensconced in the Range Rover—with Simon at the wheel in case the area around Whitehall was too congested to park—my phone buzzed with a call from Zane.

The sight of his familiar face on my screen made me realize how much I missed the Brotherhood.

“Hey, you,” I said, accepting the call. “How are things with the new label?”

“Fuck you,” he said, emotion clogging his throat. “Fuck you sofuckingmuch.”

My chest constricted as I realized that in all of my plans, in all of the strategy meetings and discussions over how to reveal my hidden identity to the public, I’d never made the four most important phone calls.

“Zane,” I breathed. “Wait.”

I could hear his tears and his bodyguard boyfriend’s angry grumbles in the background. “You stood there in front of cameras acting like it was no big deal. Like the fact that you and Kenji are… are…”

“We’re not!” I said quickly, cutting him off, trying to limit what Simon heard since he’d only worked for the family for six months. “We’re not. You need to let me explain, but I can’t right now. I’m on the way to an important meeting and?—”

“Oh,” he scoffed with a bitter laugh. “Oh, sure. Well, if it’simportant, I guess you’d better go.”

“Call Kenji,” I begged. “Please. Please call Kenji right now and ask him to explain.”

“Kenji’s not mybrother,” he barked, voice full of betrayal. “Kenji’s not the guy I thought understood me. The one who supposedly grew up poor like I did, who knew what it was like to wonder where his next meal was coming from.”

Shame washed over me, leaving me hollow and light-headed. “Zane.”

I heard Ryan in the background. “Hang up. He’s not fucking worth it. C’mere, sweetheart.”

Tears welled in my eyes as I looked up at the ceiling of the Rover in hopes they wouldn’t spill out and get caught on someone’s camera.

“He’s right, Z,” I said, pretending to smile in case anyone was watching. “Listen to the man.”

I ended the call.

FIFTEEN

KENJI

The minute I walked into the kitchen, I was bombarded by the one-two punch of Nan and Cora demanding to know every detail of every moment we were in the public eye.

---