Her Billionaires_ Boxed Set(124)

All he wanted to do was to stare at her from afar. She looked so, so happy. Being apart from him and Dylan seemed to have done wonders for her, red cheeks and dimpled smile deeper and fuller. His own face stretched into a loopy grin, the first in far too long.

Beep! Shaken out of his moment of joy, he realized the light had turned green. With great reluctance he took the left turn, watching for as long as was safe, her face a beacon of hope.

Then gone.

That day at home three months ago, after leaving Josie’s apartment, after Laura had screamed—screamed— that they should buy the building if they wanted in had been the coldest, hardest day of his life, like watching his own death in slow motion, his heart torn out and thrown to the wolves. What had they done to her? How had he and Dylan taken such an open, gentle soul and turned her into a screaming banshee? What evil lurked in them that this could happen?

His run home had been fruitless, his need to escape Dylan at all costs greater than the desire to pound it out. All he could think of when he’d arrived home was a great red wall of anger within, and destruction made more sense than trying to be good. Everything he had worked for went to shit that day—everything —so shattering the glass in the room was like shattering his bond with Dylan.

It made sense through the pure hatred he felt for himself at hurting Laura so deeply.

Now? Not so much. For four months he’d lived apart from Dylan, his cabin a refuge that slowly had turned into a prison. An entire adulthood spent living with Dylan could not be undone so easily; in his rage, he’d missed that point. He felt as if he were missing a limb, the phantom remains of a leg or an arm feeling real and visceral, yet truly gone. Mike had banished himself from Dylan’s life, ignoring the text messages and voice mails that had been plentiful that first week, then tapered off in the second, finally ending with a plaintive, “When you’re ready, I’ll be here.”

Mike hadn’t been ready. Not yet.

Maybe not ever.

Seeing Laura like that, though—a gut punch. Flooding memories of her, of Dylan, of the three of them—and most of all, of the great promise they’d represented, of a lifetime together. Double gut punch. He maneuvered the car into a parking spot at the skyscraper where the tax adviser’s office resided and put his forehead on the steering wheel, taking time.

Breaths.

Awareness.

So full of life! Laura had never been so radiant with them. Perhaps she’d really moved on, finding a new person— persons?—to be happy with. The way the pink and white and green of her shirt had highlighted her hair, her eyes shining and bright, and how Josie had even seemed happier than her normal self all made Mike wonder if he and Dylan were just poison for poor Laura.

Maybe not telling her the truth, though vicious and unfair, had somehow been the right thing in the end. Beating the steering wheel with one fist, he let himself feel. Not react. Not withdraw.

Feel. Fuck fuck fuck. How had his life come to this? Alone in his enormous cabin, designed to be filled with friends and laughter, it was now inhabited by Mike the Monk. Mike the Idiot.

Mike the Lonely. And he was, for the first time in his adult life. Not alone—alone he understood. Alone he could handle, could even enjoy.

Lonely? Lonely was a form of self-abuse he couldn’t escape.

Not that he hadn’t tried. Running ninety miles a week, though, didn’t get him any further from his messed-up self. How had he turned into such an animal that last day at the apartment? What was buried deep within and unleashed at that moment, so all-powerful he’d gone into a near fugue state and been so violent? It had scared him. Badly.

Maybe he should stay away from Laura. Even Dylan.

Perhaps being lonely was his new normal. What he deserved. Because whatever was going on in Laura’s life, from the looks of her countenance in the window glimpse, she was swelling with glee and enjoying life.

Without him.

Screech. A BMW took a corner too close in the cement-floor garage, tires filling the cavern with too much sound. The clock told him he was late for the meeting with the tax attorney. Climbing out of the car and grabbing his briefcase, he smiled at the memory of her. Once his, once Dylan’s, once theirs, she had morphed into just Laura.

Which was, all along, what she’d really needed.

Tears choked his throat. He ground a fist into his thigh, willing the unexpected rush of very unprofessional emotion away. Tax attorneys weren’t therapists. He was here to talk numbers. As he cantered to the elevators, though, one number rang mournfully in his head, buzzing.

Three.



“You see that? Mr. Money strikes again.” Dylan flinched but didn’t say anything. The guys working the night shift were all crowded around the television, the same local morning news show that had featured his doom...er, his billionaire status three months ago.