Page 112 of One Time in Paris
Callum gave him an odd look, then nodded. “You going to run with it?”
“Thinking about it. I’m parched.”
Callum rounded the island and froze, gaze snagging on the edge of the boots poking out from beneath the barstools. He glanced around, then his eyes focused on the knickers.
Fuck. Me.
“You have company?”
Aiden’s mouth went dry. “Not right now.”
Callum’s gaze flicked to the boots. “Huh. She leave in a hurry?”
That eyebrow lift. That smirk. He knows—or he thinks he does.
“I had someone over before New York. I didn’t even know those were still there. Got in late last night and went straight to bed.”
If I rot in hell, it will be in whichever circle holds the liars of the world.
The words tasted like acid. Aiden had told lies before—he’d grown up in a house where evasion was an art form—but not to someone who mattered like this.
Not tohim.
He kept his face still, but inside, something cracked. Because this wasn’t just a lie. This was betrayal. Of Callum. Maybe Callum had been Quinn’s friend first, but since Aiden had moved back to London? This friendship that had carried him through every bad moment. They’d become closer than Aiden had ever imagined, despite already being like an honorary brother in his family, and Callum had always believed in him—until now.
No wonder his family had no faith in him. Maybe all this time the only person he’d been deceiving about any goodness he possessed washimself.Had he always been so selfish? So willing to be so cold and detached to get what he wanted?
He used to think he was different from his father—used to pride himself on it. But now he was hiding the woman he loved in a bedroom while lying to his oldest friend with a straight face.
What would Isla say if she saw him now?
No. He didn’t want to know. Because maybe, deep down, he was exactly the man they all believed him to be.
The moment held, and Callum’s eyes continued to focus on Isla’s shoes as though he was lost in his own thoughts. Then he gave Aiden a tight smile. “For a moment, I figured that you had taken back up with Lola again in New York and flown back with her.”
Aiden went over toward the knickers, then gathered them from the floor.
Right.Because Callum wouldn’t assume his own sister had taken that place in Aiden’s life.
Of course, Lola would be a major obstacle to convincing Callum that he loved Isla. Callum had been there through that entire debacle. No way he’d easily accept that in the span of a few months, Aiden had not only moved on so wholly but also fallen completely and utterly in love with someone else.
Aiden barely believed it himself.
But it was also true. He loved that woman.
Hatedthat he had her hidden away in his bedroom, though.
“No, it’s safe to say Lola will not be returning to my life,” Aiden said, at last.
Callum set his hands on the island, then nodded. “Good. She was terrible for you. Though I have to warn you, my father invited her to the damn party tonight. He got a little carried away talking to her and her father at the Masters. I nearly wrung his neck for it on your behalf.”
Guilt had a way of making everything so much worse. Every comment Callum uttered, however innocuous, ripped through him like battery acid clawing its way through his gut.
When he didn’t answer, Callum frowned. “You sure you’re all right? You look pale.”
No, I’m not all right.
Every fiber of his body was screaming at him to just tell Callum already. Because that was what he’d promised Liddy he’d do. That was what heshoulddo. That was what needed to happen. This thing had become such an awful, toxic secret burdening him down, threatening to tear his world to shreds. And he didn’t want it to be. God, he wanted to shout from the rooftops how much he loved Isla.
