Page 64 of Sweetheart: Part One

But rich didn’t mean happy, and there was something lurking under the surface here. Something she wasn’t willing to tell us.

“Is Ebony better than what it was?”

She opened her mouth as if the answer was too easy, then shut it. Her eyes darted to the side as if she were going to run.

“Were you in danger?” I asked.

I wished she’d just tell me.

“No.” She swallowed. “No, nothing like that…”

“Help me understand.”

What was it? My mind was running in a million directions. She was trying to start over, but from what? Burden of family pressure? An ex?

“I’m just… never going to get an opportunity like this again.”

“You don’t know that—”

“Idoknow that,” she said sharply. Then she winced. “This… This was kind of it for me.” She smiled weakly. “I know that sounds pathetic…”

“It doesn’t.”

“I didn’t even expect it to go like this at all. But now… Well, you’re more than I expected.” She trailed off. “It’s worse, because…” She couldn’t finish that.

Because it was close.

Because if this had gone the way it did with every other Sweetheart, if we’d all said no, and Ebony had simply got bored of her, she could walk away knowing it never would have worked.

Instead, she was going to leave here knowing it hadn’t gone like it usually did. That maybe she’d been so close to claiming this and escaping whatever she was running from.

My heart sank.

“You told me you’d consider it,” she whispered.

“I did, Vex.” It was the truth. I’d considered it for every second that had gone by in the last few days.

She nodded, working so hard to hide how hurt she was.

She shouldn’t be.

She should be trembling in my arms, making me feel as terrible as she could possibly manage.

“Okay,” she said instead, with a weak smile. “Thank you.”

VEX

I needed to do something drastic, or I’d never get that signature.

Rook was out.

Love was out.

Drake was out.

Ebony was my only hope.

He had been different from the beginning, as if he existed in opposition to me. He was driven by his own instinct, and in that, there was solace. As wild and crazy as it sounded, I decided that if any of them were to make a mad choice, it would be him. So, with still no signatures on the contract, I waited until the evening for him to go to the gym.

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