The Alpha Dating Game(28)
“Is that your family crest?” Jessica asked. “The bear?”
She supposed rich people had family crests, like royalty did. Or families with long lineages and the money to trace them.
“Yes.” He sounded embarrassed. “I know it makes us sound pretentious but we have European roots.”
Atreides. Even the name sounded like royalty. But he was still Kyle Smith to her for the moment.
“Kyle,” she ventured, feeling nervous. She had been wondering how to broach the subject about his name. It’s OK, she wanted to say. You can come clean to me now. I know you’re rich, and I really don’t want you for your money.
“Yes?”
The gates swung open noiselessly. The Mustang drove through them.
“Is there anything you want to . . . tell me before we go in?” There. She had said it in a roundabout way, opening the door for him to confess. She hoped she wasn’t being too presumptuous.
Kyle did not say anything for a moment. For a while, she was afraid she had gone too far.
Then –
He sighed.
“OK,” he said. “I didn’t want to tell you this before . . . but tonight wasn’t my idea. I didn’t want you to meet my Dad, but he wanted to meet you.”
Not what she was hoping for, but at least he had opened up. This she sensed was the truth.
“Did you tell him about me?”
“Yes. I told him I was dating this wonderful girl.” He said it like he meant it and she didn’t get the sense he was just saying it because he wanted to please her. “And he insisted on meeting you.”
“Is that normal for him?”
He hesitated. Then: “No.” He turned to her. “Jessica,” he said desperately, “I – ”
He stopped.
Her pulse was in her throat. When he didn’t say anything further, she said, “What is it, Kyle? Is there something you need to tell me?”
He pulled in his breath.
“Oh, look,” he said, “we are here.”
She looked. The sight of the mansion took her breath away. But it wasn’t a ‘gawd, that’s beautiful’ sort of reaction. The house was more ‘in your face, horror style Gothic’ than anything.
“My great-great-grandfather built this place,” Kyle said softly. “I know. I don’t like it much myself.”
“Kyle, you were going to say something to me. What is it?”
He parked his Mustang in an empty slot. She could see money everywhere she looked because the parking lot was filled with luxury cars.
He pulled up the handbrake.
“Jessica?” He turned to her. In the diminishing light, she could see that his eyes were sincere and filled with pain. “I do have something to say. I . . . I’m very fond of you. And that surprises me too, because we haven’t known each other for that long.”
A choke welled up her throat.
“I just wanted you to know that, OK?” he said hurriedly.
“OK. I’m very fond of you too, Kyle.”
He smiled, somewhat relieved.
“Let’s go meet my Dad.”
DINNER
Jessica was suitably impressed by the Enclave, Kyle reckoned. Very few people weren’t. Then again, not many people were ever invited into this inner sanctum of the Atreides clan. Jericho Atreides preferred to conduct his business at the prestigious country club of which he had been a member of the board for over fifteen years.
The Enclave was home, a place where secrets abounded and family members sought sanctuary. Jessica or anyone who wasn’t an Atreides couldn’t see or sense it, but the property and its surrounding woods were guarded by defensive magick. You couldn’t just walk into the grounds and not be repelled by some strange unease and a compulsion to turn back.
Of course, when you were invited to the Enclave, it either meant that you were very special . . . or you weren’t expected to live long enough to divulge its secrets.
The guilt was eating him up like a termite gnawing at wood.
Jessica, run, now! he wanted to scream.
And yet, he mustn’t . . . shouldn’t care. She was human. The clan members weren’t supposed to care about humans. They didn’t intermarry. They didn’t see humans as anything but a convenient tool to further their economic and lustful means.
“It’s fabulous,” Jessica said in an awestruck tone.
His heart sank.
I love her.
How can you be in love with her? You barely know her!
Yes, the voice of his conscience was right. Human infatuation was always overwhelming to the young and uninitiated. The Elders did warn them of that. Just because you love being with her doesn’t mean you love her.
He forced a cheer in his voice that he did not feel. “It always reminds me of the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland.”