Caught in the Billionaire’s Embrace(24)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

Marcus strode to the window, lifted one curtain for a scant moment, then let it drop. “I guess we could turn on the TV to see what the weather guys are saying about how much longer this will last.”

“I suppose we could.”

But neither of them did. They only looked at each other expectantly, almost as if they were daring the other to do it. Della knew why she didn’t. She wondered if Marcus’s reason mirrored her own.

Finally, he folded himself into the other chair, setting his cup on the table beside hers. He crossed his legs with deceptive casualness, propped an elbow on the chair arm to rest his chin in his hand and, looking her right in the eye, asked, “Who’s Geoffrey?”

Della felt as if someone punched her right in the stomach. Obviously he’d heard more of the phone conversation than he’d let on. She wondered how much. She wondered even harder about how she was supposed to explain her relationship with Geoffrey to Marcus. It wasn’t as though she could be vague about something like that.

She reminded herself she didn’t have to tell Marcus anything. Not the truth, not a fabrication, nothing. She could say it was none of his business, repeat their agreement not to disclose any personal details about each other—which he’d already breached a number of times, one of which had been at her own encouragement—and change the subject.

But she was surprised to discover there was a part of herself that wanted to tell him about Geoffrey. And not just Geoffrey, but about everything that had led to her meeting him. She wanted to tell Marcus everything about the mess that had started on New Year’s Day to herald the beginning of the worst year of her life, about the months of fear and uncertainty that had followed, right up until her encounter with him at Palumbo’s. She wanted to tell him about how she hadn’t felt safe or contented for eleven months. About how lonely she’d been. About how hopeless and scared she’d felt.

At least until her encounter with him at Palumbo’s. It was only now that Della realized she hadn’t experienced any of those feelings since meeting Marcus. For the first time in eleven months—maybe for the first time in her life—she’d been free of anxiety and pleasantly at ease. She’d spent the past twelve hours ensconced in a perfect bubble of completeness, where nothing intruded that could cause her harm or pain. All because of a man whose last name she didn’t even know.

But she couldn’t tell him any of that, either.

She couldn’t say a word. She’d taken a virtual vow of silence about what had happened in New York, and she’d been told that if she revealed anything to anyone, it could compromise everything. And then the last eleven months of living in hiding and being so relentlessly alone would have been for nothing.

Two weeks, she reminded herself. That was how long Geoffrey had told her she had to wait. Only two more weeks. In sixteen days, everything would be revealed, everything would come to light, and Della would be free of all of them. Of Geoffrey, of Egan Collingwood, of her boss Mr. Nathanson and everyone else at Whitworth and Stone. And even if that freedom meant losing everything she had now and starting all over somewhere else, even if it meant becoming an entirely new person, at least she would be done with all of it. She would be safe. She would be free. She would be done. She just had to hold on for two more weeks.

She opened her mouth to tell Marcus that Geoffrey was none of his business and then change the subject, but instead she hedged, “Well. So much for forgetting about the episode in the stairwell. And you promised.”

“I’ve made a lot of promises since meeting you,” he reminded her. “And I haven’t kept many of them. You should probably know that about me. I’m great at making promises. Terrible at keeping them.”

She nodded. “Good to know.”

“Doesn’t make me a terrible person,” he told her. “It just makes me more human.”

It also made him an excellent reminder, Della thought. His assertion that he couldn’t keep promises illustrated more clearly why she couldn’t tell him anything more about herself. She might very well become the topic of his next cocktail party anecdote or an inadvertently shared story with a colleague who had some connection to the very life she was trying to escape. Not because he was a bad person, as he had said. But because he was human. And humanity was something Della had learned not to trust.

“So who is he, Della?”

She hesitated, trying to remind herself again of all the reasons why she couldn’t tell Marcus the truth—or anything else. Then, very softly, she heard herself say, “Geoffrey is a man who…who kind of…” She sighed again. “He kind of takes care of me.”

Marcus said nothing for a moment, then nodded slowly. His expression cleared some, and he looked as if he completely understood. That was impossible, because there was still a lot of it that even Della didn’t understand.

“You’re his mistress, you mean,” Marcus said in a remarkably matter-of-fact way. “It’s all right, Della. I’m a big boy. You can spell it out for me.”

It took a moment for what he was saying to sink in. And not only because the word mistress was so old-fashioned, either. Marcus thought she and Geoffrey had a sexual relationship. That he was a wealthy benefactor who was giving her money and gifts in exchange for sexual favors. That she, Della Hannan, the only girl in her neighborhood who had been determined to claw her way out of the slum not using sex as the means to get there, was now making her way in the world by renting herself out sexually to the highest bidder.

She should have been insulted. Instead, she wanted to laugh. Because compared to the reality of her situation, his assumption, as tawdry as it sounded, was just so…so… So adorably innocent.

Wow. If she were Geoffrey’s mistress, that would make her life a million times easier. But number one, the guy was married. Number two, he was old enough to be her father. Number three, he looked like a sixty-something version of Dwight Schrute. And number four, there was no way he could afford a mistress when he had two kids in college and a daughter getting married in six months. After all, federal marshals weren’t exactly the highest paid people on the government payroll.

Marcus must have mistaken her lack of response as being offended instead of off guard, because he hastily continued, “Look, Della, it doesn’t matter to me. I’m the last person who should, or would, judge the way another person lives their life. I don’t consider your situation to be appalling or bad or cheap or dirty or embarrassing or—” He seemed to realize how badly he was belaboring his objections—and he’d barely made a dent if he was going to be all alphabetical about it—something that made them sound even less convincing than they already did. He gave his head a single shake, as if he were trying to clear it. “Besides, it’s not like I haven’t, ah, kept a woman myself in the past.”