Page 9 of Virgin's Stolen Nights with the Boss

‘Look at all these, Elias. Do you really want to leave?’ his father said, gesturing to the awards that littered the table.

Elias gritted his jaw. The conversation he’d had with his father, and later his mother, about possibly leaving the company had been a private one.

‘Leave?’ Seraphina perked up at this snippet of information.

‘Those damn polo ponies!’ William huffed.

‘Vincent’s team is doing really well.’ Seraphina squeezed her husband’s arm. ‘I think they’ll take the cup.’

She smiled over at Elias, but it only made the bile churn in his stomach.

‘It might be your team against Vincent’s in the final...’

‘Elias?’ his mother prompted. ‘Seraphina’s talking to you.’

‘I think I’m about to be called to speak,’ Elias said, grateful for the usher who came over and told him he was indeed needed to make his way to the stage. ‘Excuse me.’

The audience were undoubtedly expecting the usual polished performance. It was five years now since Joel had died, and Elias had delivered a variation of the same speech every time.

Elias thanked the sponsors and the donors and all the people who had made the award possible. Then he spoke briefly about the selection process and the quality of candidates who had competed to win the scholarship.

He looked to his father, who sat holding his mother’s hand. She’d been a much sought-after interior designer before Joel died, and had overseen the impressive refurbishment of Elias’s Malibu ranch.

It was the last project she’d undertaken, though, and she had since refused his repeated requests for her help with the restoration of the grooms’ lodge. Instead, she had devoted herself to this scholarship, in a bid to keep the perfect memory of her son alive.

With the formalities out of the way, Elias looked out at the now rather bored audience and knew his father was right. Public interest in the scholarship was waning, and he couldn’t bear to see his mother’s heart broken all over again.

He knew he could do more.Shoulddo more...

‘After Joel died,’ Elias said, in his deep, measured voice, ‘it was as if my world stopped turning...’

He moved his tongue over dry lips, unable to tell anyone, let alone an audience of people he cared nothing for, that he’d been lost.

‘I moved out of LA in an attempt to get my bearings. And I guess I’ve never quite made it back...’

He glanced at the audience and it was clear that his attempt to describe, even obliquely, how he’d felt was not going down well. This was his chance to do what his father had suggested.

‘People often ask how I dealt with my grief. Joel and I were not only best friends...we worked together, socialised together, played sport together... Well, we did until he fell in love with my mother’s new assistant...’

He forced out a smile to indicate that he’d just delivered a good-natured little joke, and glanced towards his family’s table, at his late brother’s seemingly sweet widow, who was clutching his mother’s other hand...

‘A few months before Joel died we celebrated his marriage.’ He could not bring himself to say Seraphina’s name, he realised. ‘He was the happiest I’ve ever—’

Elias swallowed audibly. He attempted to continue, to give the audience what his father claimed they clamoured for, but his mouth was dry...so dry. He was so burdened with the weight of the truth, so weighed down by the secret only he and one other person knew, that suddenly he did not think he could keep the lid on that box of emotions for one second longer.

Because Joel hadnotbeen happy...

And now, as he stood in front of the podium, attempting to articulate the depth of his loss, all Elias could feel was the same abhorrence and disgust he had felt two weeks before his brother had died.

The sheer disbelief when Seraphina had attempted to kiss him.

Pushing her off, Elias had said two words that no gentleman should ever say to a lady.

Oh, but she was no lady.

‘It’s you, Elias,’ Seraphina had sobbed,stillreaching for him,stilltrying to kiss him. ‘It’s always been you... Joel doesn’t have to know.’

‘Youdisgustme.’

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