The Man to Be Reckoned With(26)

But when she entered the hall, shook hands with friends, he was nowhere to be seen.

And so she waited. Through Robert and Jackie exchanging vows, through their friends toasting them.

She stumbled through her own speech, her eyes still locked on the entrance.

And she waited.

She kissed Jackie’s cheek, danced with Robert and only then it dawned on her that her waiting was useless.

Nathan had never planned on attending the wedding.

* * *

Riya was fuming when Jackie found her in the quiet corridor that seemed to absorb her anger and the sounds she made.

“Riya.” Wary hesitation danced in Jackie’s eyes. “I’m so sorry, but this is for the best. Let him go, Riya. It’s got nothing to do with you.”

Shocked at how perceptive Jackie was being, Riya stared at her. “Please, Jackie. Not today. Just enjoy your day.”

“I’m learning, Riya. I’ve never provided you with security, but I do think of you, worry about you. After all this, you deserve happiness, you deserve someone who’ll love you and take care of you for a long time. And Nathan is the last man on earth for you.”

Riya didn’t like the look in Jackie’s eyes. And yet, for the first time in her life, she had a feeling that her mother was speaking the absolute truth. “What do you mean?”

“He doesn’t deserve you. Isn’t that enough?”

“Just please tell me what you mean.”

“He has the same heart condition that Anna had.”

Gasping, Riya grabbed the wall behind her. A violent shiver took hold of her, and her teeth chattered in her mouth.

She felt as if someone had pushed her off a cliff and the earth was rising to meet her without a warning, without a safety net.

Anna had been barely into her forties when she died.

No. No. No. It couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be borne.

Nathan was a force of life.

“I don’t have a heart. At least, not a working one.”

All the signs had been there right in front of her. That night in his suite, he had almost fainted. Did it happen often? That strap he had worn on his wrist sometimes instead of his watch, it had to be a heart rate monitor.

So many times she had called him heartless, had thrown his mother’s name in his face, wondered at how easily he cut everyone out of his life... She shot to her feet and swayed, still feeling dizzy. “I need to see him.”

“Riya? What’s wrong? You look unwell.”

She lifted her gaze to Robert’s and swallowed. Tried to rally up her good humor, her strength. Because she had always been strong, hadn’t she? They all left, they all deceived her; what else did she have but her strength?

But Nathan hadn’t deceived her, hadn’t lied to her. In fact, had told her that he would always leave.

“Nathan. Do you know where he is?”

“He went back to the estate. He’s leaving in a few hours.”

Shock traversed through her, a sudden cold in her chest. “He was here. Today? When? Why didn’t he—”

“Yes. But he left just as you and Jackie arrived. Said he couldn’t stay any longer. He’s leaving tonight.”

Let him go, Riya, the part of her that she had painfully trained into place screeched at her. Let him walk out of your life. End it all before you sink.

“Oh.” It was a miracle Riya managed that, because inside it felt as if someone had pulled the ground from under her. “He didn’t even say goodbye, Robert. I... He promised me he would be here tonight.” She tried to breathe past the fear and spiraling hurt. “I don’t understand any of this. How could I not realize? How could he not tell me? I...”

Wrapping his arms tightly around her, Robert hugged her. And enveloped in the love she had always craved, the lack of which had made her erect a shell around herself, Riya found herself unraveling. One question kept relentlessly pounding against her head.

Why did she care so much?

He had made it clear that they didn’t mean anything to each other. Not even friends. Having faced abandonment and rejection all her life, she’d always worn retreat as her armor. She wanted to do that tonight too. But he had left her nowhere to hide.

“I’m sorry it came to this, Riya. But you have to know it has nothing to do with you.”

Riya laughed because that was what everyone kept saying. “No?” she said, her voice echoing in the quiet of the carpeted foyer. She was so tired of fighting this, of telling herself that she was strong. “It seems everyone finds it so easy to walk away from me, so easy not to feel even affection for me. So easy to reject me. I hate him for doing this, hate myself for feeling like this. I have to be the stupidest woman in the world—”

Shaking his head, his heart in his eyes, Robert sighed. “It’s the way he survives, Riya. He would despise himself if he became like Anna.”

“I don’t care what his reason is. I deserved at least goodbye.”

“No, Riya. Wait.”

Uncaring of the anxiety in his face, Riya tugged at her arm. Every inch of her was shaking with urgency, the rest of her body scrambling to catch up with her heart. “Let me go, Robert. If he leaves before I can get there, I’ll never see him again.”

Her throat closed up at the very prospect. “Never again.” He’d pretty much promised her that. He’d cut Sonia out like that. And to never see him. “I have to talk to him—”

“Don’t make this harder on him.”

“What about how I feel?” She screamed the words, wondering how to stem the hurt. She’d been prepared to say goodbye tonight, but knowing what she did now... “I never saw my father again. If Nathan leaves before I see him, if something happens to him, I couldn’t bear it, Robert.”

It hurt as if someone were ripping out her heart from her chest. Had she and the time they had spent together meant nothing? Hadn’t she mattered even a little to him? Shards of hurt and pain splintered through her.

Trembling, she patted her palms down her midriff in a rhythm.

“I’m so sorry, Riya. He had no right to do this to you. I’m sorry I didn’t protect you—”

The sob that she had battling rose through Riya and she threw herself into her mom’s arms. “He doesn’t care, Jackie. He was perfectly willing to walk away...without a word. I wish it didn’t hurt so much.” She clenched her eyes closed. She couldn’t give in to tears now. “This goodbye is just for me. Just for me.”

Standing in that softly lit corridor, looking at Robert, who had the exact same eyes as his son, Riya calmed herself down. Her world was changing, slipping from her hands, forever shifting. But even for the fear rattling through her, she couldn’t stop.

Only one more night, she reassured herself. Just one more night and she would never think about him again.

* * *

“You promised me a dance.”

Hearing the soft whisper of her voice, Nathan turned around from the balcony. He hadn’t been sure if she would seek him out. With a steely focus, he’d not speculated on whether he wanted her to find him.

Leaning against the wall, he let his gaze rove over her. She looked ethereal tonight, like some beautiful, otherworldly creature come to earth with the express purpose of tormenting him. The beige silk dipped and flared around her lithe body, her hair falling like a silk curtain on one shoulder.

Like a shadow, he had watched her step out of the limo. Hadn’t been able to help himself from greedily drinking in her beauty. Had exercised every ounce of will when he saw her gaze wander through the hall, looking for him.

It had taken everything he had in him not to drag her away from the appreciative male gazes and there had been too many of those for his liking. But she wasn’t his to protect or even to look at. After so rudely rejecting her small advance for a friendship, after witnessing the hurt flash in those beautiful eyes, he’d known he’d better keep his distance from her.

Not hurting Riya had somehow become the most important thing to him.

“If I remember right, you said you didn’t want to dance with me,” he said, willing himself to smile. His fingers gripped the railing so tight that the pattern would imprint on his palm. “Leave Travelogue and go away, forever. Those were your words.”

Something shimmered in her gaze, but for the life of him, he couldn’t tell what.

Stepping inside, she closed the door behind her. “I changed my mind. I’ve decided a lot of things have to change in my life.”

“Like what?”

With a shrug, she looked away from him and he saw her chest rise and fall, her spine straighten as though she was bracing herself. For what?

He needed to get her out of here. Before he lost the tenuous thread of his control. Before he forgot how it had felt to have her look at him as if he was her hero, as if there was nothing he couldn’t conquer. As if he would always be there for her.

She smiled then. There was fear in that smile, a bravery in it. There was something in her eyes that pulled at him, pierced through him. As if she was fighting to stand, as if she was fighting to keep herself together. And, as it had been from the beginning with her, every atavistic, male instinct in him rose to the fore.

Was she afraid? Of what?

He reached her, lifted her chin, looked into her eyes. “Riya, what is it?”

She shook her head, clasped his wrist, brought his hand closer so that his palm was wrapped around her cheek. Pressed her mouth to the center of his palm. “I’m quitting Travelogue.”