LUKE: Complete Series (10 page)

“Yeah, well, I was smart when it came to computers, but pretty stupid when it came to a lot of other stuff. I showed up at my parents’ door thinking that all would be forgiven once they saw how well I was doing. I didn’t even get a glimpse of my mother or sister before my dad slammed the door in my face. He said he didn’t want my money and he didn’t want anything to do with me.”

“Why? Why would he do that?”

“That’s the big fucking question that I still don’t have an answer for. I think he might have thought I was coming back to prove that he was wrong for throwing me out, but I wasn’t. I really just wanted to help them. I do help them out, but it’s all wired to an account under my sister’s name and she handles the money.”

Nia set our drinks on the round knee-high table in front of us. “You all set for now?”

“We’re fine. Thank you, Nia,” he replied, as he handed her a hundred dollar bill.

I took a long sip of my rum and diet, trying to slurp up as much courage as I could before it was my turn to spill my guts. I expected him to prod me to start talking, but he waited patiently until I finished my drink. I took a deep breath as I could already feel the tears stinging the backs of my eyes. I blinked a few times and began.

“The summer between my sophomore and junior year at Cornell, Ryan came to visit me for a few weeks.” I paused as I remembered the taxi door opening and throwing my arms around him as he stepped out. “I was so happy to have him there that I never even questioned why he traveled three thousand miles to visit me for three weeks when he could be partying with his buddies during their summer break. It wasn’t until the last couple of days of his visit that I noticed something was wrong. He looked… troubled.”

I picked up my glass and tried to take a sip before I remembered that I had already drunk the whole thing.

“Here.” Luke passed me his glass of bourbon and I took a hard swig and handed it back to him.

“He told me he was thinking of dropping out of the University of Washington. I was in shock. He and his buddies had talked about going there since they were in junior high. He went to a billion sporting events there in high school. He lived and breathed U-Dub.”

I smiled as my mind drew back to the time Ryan got drunk and almost had a purple W tattooed on his ass.

“But that wasn’t it,” I continued. “After he told me he wanted to drop out, he dropped an even bigger bomb. He wanted to join the Marines.”

I stuffed my hands between my thighs as they began to shake. Luke rubbed my back as I took a few breaths and tried to swallow the long-buried emotions that now threatened to choke me.

“I was in awe of him. Here he was, one year into an engineering degree at one of the best universities in the country and he was willing to drop all of that to do something that felt right to him. I admired his courage. So I did what I thought was the right thing to do and I told him to go for it. I… I encouraged him to enlist.”

I buried my face in my hands as the tears began to blur my vision.

“Hey, you don’t have to talk about it anymore.” Luke’s voice was soothing as he rubbed my shoulders. “I’m sorry I made you talk about it.”

I wiped my tears before I sat up and looked him in the eye. “I need to talk about this.”

“Are you sure?”

I nodded and he handed me his glass of bourbon again. I downed the rest in one swig and continued. “The worst part was….” I took another deep breath. “The worst part was right before it happened…. I hadn’t seen him that happy in years. When he came out of the mental health office he looked fucking ecstatic. I didn’t find out until later that he had actually requested the psychological evaluation. It was his only cry for help and it went unheard. I thought when he walked out of that office with a smile on his face it was because he wanted to serve another tour. How stupid is that?”

Luke grabbed my hand and looked me in the eye. “It’s not stupid. It’s what anyone would have thought.”

“Yeah, well, I should have known something was up ‘cause then he asked me to bring the car around while he stood in front of the hospital and smoked a cigarette. He only smoked when he was drunk.”

My entire body trembled as a loud voice inside my head told me to stop before it was too late, but I couldn’t stop. The chains were breaking on these memories and everything was rushing to the surface, crisp and clear and unbearably real.

“As soon as I walked away to get my car, he made his way to the back of the hospital and climbed a fire escape to the roof. I was the first one to find him because I was the first to notice he wasn’t in front of the hospital where he was supposed to be. When I found… when I found him he was still alive. He fell ten stories and survived long enough to tell me he was sorry.”

I wiped at the tears on my face, trying to catch them before they fell, but they were coming too fast. Luke peeled off his coat and held it in front of my face. Something about him offering his thousand-dollar coat for me to use as a hanky made me smile—until he spoke.

“Brina, I have a confession to make.” He tucked the coat behind him and took my hand in his. “It’s something that’s been eating away at me for a while and I’ve wanted to tell you ever since you walked into my office last week. I was hoping you’d bring it up somehow, but it looks like I’m the one who’s going to have to do it.”

My heart pounded wildly against my chest. This was it. He was finally going to confront me about working for NeoSys—right after I poured my heart out to him. I took a deep breath that rattled in my chest as I prepared for his words.

“I paid the excess costs on your brother’s funeral.”

I blinked a few times as I gathered myself. “What?”

“I’ve been doing it anonymously for the families of fallen servicemen in Seattle for a while. Janice used to take care of all the details. I didn’t know when I sent the donation to your family that they would use it to hold the services before you got back from San Francisco. If I had known you would miss the funeral, I would have put some kind of contingency on the donation or something. I didn’t know they would go ahead without you. I’m so sorry.”

I heaved a deep sigh of relief. “That was you?” I looked straight into his eyes through the hazy darkness. “Do you know how much you helped my family?”

“You’re not mad?”

I threw my arms around his neck just as Nia arrived to take our drink order again. He laughed as I threw my leg over his and squeezed him as tight as I could.

“Thank you so much.”

“More of the same,” Luke called out to Nia, as I loosened my grip on him.

“Thank you,” I repeated, as I sat back. He reached across and brushed a lock of hair away from my mouth. “I felt like crap when I came back and realized I’d missed the service, but my mom said that the floral arrangement you sent with the donation made her happier than anything the whole day. Red was my brother’s favorite color and she thought the donation and the red flowers were some kind of sign from God that someone was looking out for him. That he had made it into heaven. I know it sounds crazy, but you don’t understand what you did for my mother.” He hung his head a little and I tilted his chin up. “Hey, you and I are linked.”

He smiled as he brushed his finger along my bottom lip.

I grabbed his hand to get him to focus. “Luke, I have something I want to tell you, too.”

4

Nia came back with our drinks and I quickly snatched mine off the table. More liquid courage was what I needed to end the lies right here. I took two long sips before I slammed the empty glass down.

Jill’s words rang inside my dizzy head.
“The real question is can you survive
another
broken heart?”

Then it hit me. This whole time I had been thinking about how all this would affect me. But if I told Luke the truth, there was no guarantee I wouldn’t break
his
heart.

“What do you want to tell me?” he asked, as he squeezed my knee.

I leaned over and kissed the scruff on his jaw. “You’re amazing.”

He reached behind my head, twisted his fingers in my hair, and pulled my face toward him. “We’ll see about that.”

As his lips touched mine, my phone vibrated in my purse, which was lodged between us. He began to pull away and I grabbed his collar.

“Where are you going?”

“Aren’t you going to check that? It might be your parents.”

“I’m twenty-three years old. I think I’ve earned one night completely free of parental contact.” He cocked an eyebrow and I rolled my eyes as I let go of his shirt. “Fine.”

I dug my phone out of my purse, being careful to hold the screen in a position where he couldn’t read it, and quickly turned the screen off as soon as I saw I had four text messages from Milo. I stuffed the phone back into my purse and tucked my purse behind me.

“Not my parents,” I declared.

“Are you ready to see the suite?”

“I thought this was supposed to be a day trip. I didn’t bring a change of clothes.”

“Then I guess we’ll have to buy you something to change into.”

“No,” I replied quickly. “No, no, no. This isn’t
Pretty Woman
. I don’t want you to buy me a wardrobe and leave me curled up on the bed wearing a diamond necklace and feeling like a prostitute.”

“Who said anything about buying you a wardrobe? I was thinking something more along the lines of jeans and a T-shirt.”

“You’re such a jerk.”

He smiled as he kissed my forehead. “Come on, Julia.”

He wasn’t kidding. He literally bought me a pair of jeans and a T-shirt at the True Religion shop and that was it. There was no way he would let me wear the dress I was wearing to work tomorrow morning.

“T-shirt Nazi,” I whispered, as we entered the lobby at the
Four Seasons.

“First I’m a jerk and now I’m a Nazi again. You’d better watch the name-calling. It’s still my birthday. You’re at my mercy tonight.”

The smile on my face vanished instantly when we reached the elevator lobby.

“Do you want to climb forty stories?” he said, as he took one look at my face. “I’ll do it, if necessary.”

I shook my head. “No. Don’t be ridiculous.” I pressed the call button to prove my point.

The doors slid open and I hesitated for a moment as he stepped inside. He held his hand out and I latched on with both hands as I followed him in. As soon as the doors closed, he slid his cardkey into the slot and pulled me into his arms.

“Are you okay?”

I wrapped my arms around his waist and buried my face in his chest as I tried to remember to breathe slowly. “I will be.”

“Good, ‘cause I have a surprise for you in the suite.” The elevator slowed to a stop and the doors slid open. I stepped into the corridor and Luke grabbed my hand. “This way.”

He led me toward the room on our right and I realized, once I saw the room number, that we were on the fortieth floor. He slid his cardkey into the door and turned to me when it flashed green.

“Close your eyes.”

I closed my eyes and heard the soft click of the door opening. He led me inside and I couldn’t help but smile as nervous excitement built up inside me.

“Sit down, but keep your eyes closed.”

I sat down on what felt like a sofa. I tapped my foot and tried not to peek as I waited for him. Soon, I heard his footsteps getting closer.

“Can I open my eyes now?”

“Yes.”

He sat on a dark-mahogany coffee table across from me in a living room the size of my entire apartment, but it wasn’t the size of the suite that surprised me.

“I know you said you didn’t want jewelry, but I got this for you a few days ago before your
Pretty Woman
comment. If you don’t want it, I’ll understand.”

The box in his hands displayed a diamond circlet necklace. It had to set him back at least $100,000.

“Why?” I whispered.

He laughed. “Not quite the response I expected, but I guess… because when I’m with you I feel… present, like I’m making memories that I will look back on fondly when I’m old and gray.”

I swallowed the guilt and looked him in the eye. “I can’t accept this.”

“Why?”

I stared at the necklace for a moment before I answered. “Because I… I don’t wear jewelry.”

He glanced at my diamond stud earrings before he replied. “I’ll send it back.”

The look of disappointment on his face made my heart ache. “Wait.” I placed my hand on his knee before he could stand. “I’ve just never gotten a gift like this. I don’t even know what…. Oh, just put it on me.”

He smiled hesitantly as he removed the necklace from the box and fastened it around my neck. It felt heavier than I thought it would.

“Thank you, but it’s
your
birthday. I feel really terrible that you gave me such an extravagant gift on your birthday and I don’t have anything for you.”

He looked me in the eye without a trace of a smile. “All I want from you tonight is your consent to ravage you.”

I stood up and pulled my dress over my head. “I’m all yours, Mr. Maxwell.”

He pulled the waistband on my panties and smiled as he peeked inside. “Don’t ever call me Mr. Maxwell again.”

5

Thursday and Friday in the office were spent mostly ignoring Milo’s voicemails and texts and taking calls from the receptionist whenever a new birthday package for Luke arrived downstairs. Most of the gifts were from people who were sending their best wishes and regrets that they couldn’t make it to the birthday bash on Saturday. One package the size of a shoebox caught my eye. The return address had no name and a San Francisco address.

It was my job to open all of Luke’s packages, but something told me this was something he should open himself. I knocked on his office door and it swung open immediately.

“You have another package,” I said, carrying the heavy cardboard box toward him.

“What is it? Another set of golf balls.”

“I didn’t open it. It’s from San Francisco.”

He looked up from his tablet and eyed the box. “Just set it on the desk. I’ll open it later.”