Page 38 of Filthy Rich

“But, don’t be—please don’t feel embarrassed with me. I don’t mind, I just want to know why.”

“Whenever I talk about my problems to someone, my voice will crack and I’ll start crying. Even wonderful moments choke me up, like when Nan and Herman told me they were getting married, or just now when you said you wanted to give me a good-morning kiss.”

“Me asking to kiss you good morning was a wonderful moment?”

“Yes, it was, Caleb. For me it was, because it teaches me that you want me here.” She sighed heavily against my bare chest, and I could feel the heat of her breath move over my skin. It started things up down south again. All she had to do was speak and I wanted her again. Didn’t she realize that yet? “Rehearsing what I want to say to people doesn't really help, either, because I end up sobbing and thus can't get the words out of my mouth, or control that feeling at the back of my throat,” she added with another heavy sigh.

Jesus.Not what I was expecting her to say. Again, I reminded myself that Brooke was someone I barely knew. My feelings for her remained unchanged, but as she revealed more about herself, I understood there were many layers of complexity in her life. Complexities she struggled to work around so she could function as a person. We all had them. Same, but different complexities, pushing in at odd moments, making us dance to their tune. The bastard fuckers.

“Well, let me say this then: having you here to say good morning to, after the night we just shared together, is a wonderful moment for me.” It was more than wonderful actually, but I didn’t want to scare her with how I really felt.Insanely fantasticwas closer to the mark. I tugged on her chin with a finger because I needed to see her eyes and I needed her to see mine. “If I cry too will that help you feel better?”

My teasing worked because she laughed and her eyes smiled—and my world tilted a little bit more. I got my good-morningkiss, which was spectacular all on its own, but there was more to look forward to. So much more.

I was going to sit down with her and eat the delicious breakfast she’d cooked for me.

And then I was going to carry her back to bed andmake loveto her again, and reassure her just how much I wanted her here with me.

After that, I was going to carry her into the shower and make her come against my lips one last time before we both got ready for work.

Then I would have the pleasure of dropping her off and kissing her good-bye before she walked inside her building. I would watch her as she went in and know I was seeing my girl. Mine.

Brooke Casterley was mine now.

Sixteen

CALEB

James R. Blakeny & Associates, PC was the only firm I’d consider with something like this—since it was me with the request and James doing the investigating—because I didn’t trust anybody else when it came to my private business more than I trusted my best friend.

We met at boarding school when we were ten. Both of us dumped at a private institution where rich mothers and fathers sent their sons when only the most exclusive prep school would do. I remember standing in line for the phone we all had to share, so I could call my parents and beg them to let me come home.

When it was my turn, I made the call and got my mother on the line. I wanted to talk to my dad but she told me he couldn’t come to the phone right then. I let her know how much I hated living at school, and how badly I missed my brothers and my baby sisters. I begged and pleaded to be allowed to go to a day school and live at home, but she just told me to stop crying and that I was embarrassing her. I often wondered if I’d been able to catch my dad on the phone that day, things might have turned out differently. Dad was reasonable. Mom was not. She let me know in no uncertain terms that I was staying put, andwouldn’t be coming back home until Isaac showed up at the end of November to bring me there for Thanksgiving. Then she told me it was for my own good and hung up on me.

Some of other boys witnessed me crying and taunted me. They called me a baby and pushed me around before I ran off and hid behind one of the school buildings and cried some more. When I lifted my head up later, I discovered I wasn’t alone. The boy who was right below me alphabetically in the class was sitting a few feet away. James Blakeny. I asked him why he was there. He told me he’d called his parents the day before for the very same reason as me. James had gotten his father on the line. The same cold, hard message was delivered to him, only it came from his dad instead of his mom. We bonded that day and found out that boarding school didn’t suck so badly when you had a friend to share it with.

That was twenty-one years ago, and boarding school had been exchanged for Harvard eight years later. Then it was grad school—Harvard Law for James and Harvard Business for me. Now our companies took the place that school had filled when we were kids. Not much was different between us today than it’d been back then, I thought as I walked through the doors of his law firm.

“He’s free now if you want to go on in, Caleb.” His legal secretary had known me since I was a kid, from back when she’d worked for Judge Blakeny, James’s father.

“Thank you, Mrs. Kennedy.” I gave her a wink.

“Aren’t you ever going to call me Marguerite?” she teased back.

“No, ma’am. It wouldn’t be courteous for me to address you as anything other than ‘Mrs. Kennedy’ on account of my oath. A scout is always courteous.”

“Still with the Boy Scout thing, Caleb, after all these years?” This was our little game.

“That’s right, Mrs. Kennedy. I try to always remember to conduct myself like the Eagle Scout I am.”

James looked at me weirdly when I entered his office and sat in the buttery-soft leather chair reserved for clients. Right now I was a client.

“What has this girl done to you, my friend?” he said, after a minute of staring.

“How much time do you have?” I answered.

“That good, huh?” He didn’t look convinced.

I removed a piece of lint from my pant leg before replying. “The wordgoodis insufficient and lacking in details to help you understand what she hasdoneto me.”

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