Page 32 of The Duke's Contract

“It’s my mother,” Bre whispered over to Matthew, unsure of what to do. Because he remained on the phone, Matthew was unable to give Bre a verbal answer. Instead, he, taking the call and shooed her away.

“Mom? Is everything okay?” Bre asked on the off chance that her mother called due to some sort of emergency.

“Are you okay?” Bre’s mother screeched over the phone. Deb Reynolds was not one for hysterics. She’d faced a lot of hardship in her life and kept her family together through it all. Bre and her mother never understood one another, and Bre never formed a bond quite as tight as her sister had, but at the end of the day, they loved one another. “Your fiancé is all of the news here with some supposed Lady. The news is saying the two of you are finished? Breanne, what in the devil is going on?”

At her mother’s voice, Bre began to tear up, and all of the pain and betrayal she’d stomped down in the last two hours as she went into crisis mode flooded to the surface. “Oh, Mama!” she cried out as she crumbled. “Everything is a mess,” she admitted.

As Bre fell apart, she told her mother everything. She explained how she’d been conscripted to help Henry find a wife, how he trapped her into his web, about their fake engagement, and finally about how small and insignificant she felt against his formidable mother. She purged and purged, allowing every dirty secret to come forward, including the fact that despite everything her heart ached for Henry, and this very public betrayal felt crippling. For once, Bre’s mothing listened. She gave her daughter the emotional support she craved with her silence, allowing her space to air her grievances until Bre felt like there was nothing more to offer.

“Breanne, now I know you don’t think much of my opinion,” her mother said. Bre tried to interrupt, “Don’t interrupt me. Even as a baby, you always did what you wanted, but honey, I think you need to come home. I know you care for this Henry, but his life does not sound like it fits for you.” Bre sobbed as her mother’s words, sunk into her soul. Even her own mother knew Henry’s world wasn’t where she belonged.

“I didn’t just call you to check up. Your father and I have been concerned ever since you told us about this engagement. Honey, I love you, and I want all the happiness for you, but I don’t think you’ll find it playing second fiddle in someone’s life. I did my research on this Henry, and neither your father and I were impressed by what we say.”

“So, you think I should break it off?” Bre asked speaking voice to the question that haunted her all day. Could she forgive Henry for all of this? Could she go back to a man who she knew she didn’t have a future with?

“You need to come home Bre,” her mother told her matter-of-factly. “You need to come back where you belong.”

Bre didn’t know what to say, but she did know there lay truth in her mother’s words. “Your father and I booked you a plane ticket. I emailed you the information. Use it if you need it.”

The gesture tugged at Bre’s heart. Her parents did not have money for a last-minute plane ticket, but somehow they’d scrounged it up for her, their little black sheep, and Bre considered what that might mean.

Chapter Twenty-Three

“What do you mean she’s left?” Henry asked Bre’s flat-mate Emily. “I checked her work, and her boss told me she’d gone home for the day.” Henry felt frantic. He’d come home shortly after dropping Sienna to her car, showered, and caught up on a few hours of sleep, only to wake up to find a fucking apocalypse taking place.

“She’s gone home. To the States,” Emily told him again, speaking slowly as though the speed of her speech somehow contributed to his lack of understanding.

Frustrated, Henry gripped his hair enraged at her response. “Tell me where she is,” he demanded. “If she’d headed home, she’d have phoned me prior.” Henry believed that. He believed that no matter the circumstances or her anger, Bre would not flew across the Atlantic to escape him. She couldn’t even afford a last minute plane ticket.

“Not sure what you aren’t hearing?” the surely Emily said in response, clearly not intimidated. “She left, and maybe she tried to phone you while you were sleeping off last nights bender,” she snapped at him.

Before he contemplate his actions, Henry felt his hand colliding with the wall. The plaster crumbling around his fist as pain radiated up his arm. “Fuck!” he yelled as he pulled a chunk of drywall out along with his bloody hand. He gave Emily credit for the fact that she barely flinched at his display of explosive anger. Bre mentioned once that her flat-mate tended bar, so he assumed she’d seen her fair share of angry men.

“You’ll be paying for that,” she said before slamming the door directly in his face. Henry refused to believe her words. He grabbed his phone dialing Bre’s number once more. This made call number thirty.

“Hello?” a voice said on the other end. The sound startled Henry who expected the sound of the voicemail.

“Breanne?” he yelled into the phone. “Where the fuck are you? I’ve just left your place, and your flat-mate has informed me that you have left the country.” Henry’s desperation ticked up

“I know, she just texted me saying you punched a hole in our hallway.” ‘She’s still thinking of the apartment as hers, that’s a good sign,’ Henry thought to himself desperately grasping on whatever he could.

“Tell me where you are,” he commanded, listening carefully for any clues on her end. “We can discuss the pictures and the tabloids. I swear there’s an explanation.”

Bre released an audible sigh that Henry felt in his bones. He knew he needed to see her. “Tell me where you are,” he repeated once more.

“I’m waiting to board a plane,” she told him her words heightening his sense of urgency. Henry sprinted away from her door and towards his car as he begged her to wait. “You won’t make it,” she told him. “My plane boards in ten minutes. I’m only calling you, so you’ll stop harassing Emily.”

Her words stopped Henry cold, “Why are you doing this?” he asked.

Bre laughed sardonically at his question. “Give me a chance to explain. Don’t get on the plane. I’ll come to London, and if after we speak you want to fly off I’ll buy you the bloody ticket myself,” he begged. He never asked for anything in his life, but he knew if she got on that plane, she’d be lost to him forever.

The silence stretched on for what felt like years, and Henry prayed to whatever gods listened that Bre would leave the airport and meet him. “I left the ring in the box in your room,” she said softly her words shattering his hope.

“Bre..” He begged. “Those photos are not what you think they are,” he started hoping to explain in whatever way he could.

“Stop,” she demanded. Henry didn’t listen, “I got pissed with Nathaniel, and he invited Sienna and her mated to our table,” he tried to get everything out hoping against hope that Bre would see the truth in his words.

“Stop,” she said once more her voice hardening as he spoke more. Henry would never call Bre weak, but the laborious nature of her tone took him aback. “Those pictures and Sienna, they are just the straw that broke this charade,” she said. “We had fun, but let’s be honest, I don’t belong in your world, and I don’t want to spend my life giving things up for someone who doesn’t plan to commit.”

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