My Fair Billionaire(26)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

And why did it bug him so much to realize that? He wasn’t a kid anymore. He didn’t care what world she lived in or that he’d never be granted citizenship there. Truth be told, now that he was a monster success, he kind of reveled in his mean-streets background. Even as a teenager, he’d taken a perverse sort of pride in where he came from, because where he came from hadn’t destroyed his spirit the way it had so many others in the neighborhood. So why had it been such a sticking point with him in high school, the vast socioeconomic chasm between him and Ava? Why was it still a sticking point now, when that chasm had shrunk to a crack? Why did it bother him so much that his and Ava’s worlds would never meet? What difference did her presence in the scheme of things—or lack thereof—make anyway?

His cup was nearly to his mouth when an answer to that question exploded in his head. It bothered him, he suddenly knew, because the thing that had sparked his success, the thing that had made him escape his neighborhood and muscle his way into a top-tier college, the thing that had kept him from giving up the hundreds of times he wanted to give up, the thing that had made him seize the business world with both fists and driven him to make money, and then more money, and then more money still…the thing that had done all that was…

Hell. It wasn’t a thing at all. It was a person. It was Ava.

Down went the teacup, landing on the table with a thump that sent some of its contents spilling onto his hand. Peyton scarcely felt the burn. He looked at Ava, who was studying a plate of cakes and cookies, trying to decide which one she wanted. She was oblivious to both his spilled tea and tumultuous thoughts, but she had flipped back the veil from her face, leaving her features in clear profile.

She really hadn’t changed since high school. Not just her looks, but the rest of her, too. She was as beautiful now as she’d been then, as elegant, as refined. And, he couldn’t help thinking further, as off-limits. When all was said and done, the Ava of adulthood was no different from the Ava of adolescence. And neither was he. He was still—and would always be—the basest kind of interloper in her world.

As if to hammer home their differences, she finally decided on a frilly little pastry cup filled with berries and whipped cream and transferred it to her plate with a pair of dainty little silver tongs. Then she went for one of the prissy little flowered cakes. Then a couple of the lacy little cookies. All the fragile little things Peyton would have been afraid of touching because he would probably crush them. He was way better suited to a big, bloody hunk of beef beside a mountain of stiff mashed potatoes, with a sweaty longneck bottle of beer to wash it all down. The nectar of the working-class male.

When Ava finally looked up to see how he was faring, her brows knitted downward in confusion. He glanced at the plate of sandwiches sitting between them. Although they were heartier than the pastries, those, too, looked just as off-limits as everything else, so small and delicate and pretty were they. He tried to focus on them anyway, pretending to be indecisive about which one he wanted. But his thoughts were still wrapped up in his epiphany. God. Ava. It had been Ava all along.

He wasn’t trying to master the art of fine living because he wanted to take over another company and add another zero to his bottom line. Not really. Sure, taking over Montgomery and Sons was the impetus, but he wouldn’t be trying to do that if it weren’t for Ava. He wouldn’t have done anything over the past sixteen years if it weren’t for Ava. He’d still be in the old neighborhood, working in the garage with his old man. He’d be spending his days under the chassis of a car, then going home at night to an apartment a few blocks away to watch the Hawks, Bulls or Cubs while consuming a carryout value meal and popping open a cold one.

And, hell, he might have even been happy doing that. Provided he’d never met Ava.

But from the moment he’d laid eyes on her in high school, something had pushed him to rise above his lot in life. Not even pushed him. Driven him. Yeah, that was a better word. Because after Ava had walked into his life, nothing else had mattered. Nothing except bringing himself up to standards she might approve of. So that maybe, someday, she would approve of him. And so that maybe, someday, the two of them…

He didn’t allow himself to finish the thought. He was afraid of what else he might discover about himself. Bad enough he understood what had brought him this far. But he did understand now. Too well. What he didn’t understand was why. Why had Ava had that effect on him when nothing else had? Why would he have been satisfied with the blue-collar life for which he had always assumed he was destined until he met her? What was it about her that had taken up residence deep inside him? Why had she been the catalyst for him to escape the mean streets when the mean streets themselves hadn’t been enough to do that?

“Is something wrong?” she asked, pulling him out of his musings.

“No,” he answered quickly. “Just trying to decide what I want.”

Which was true, he realized. He just didn’t want anything that was on the plate of sandwiches.

“The petit fours here are delicious,” she told him.

He’d just bet they were. If he knew what the hell a petit four was.

“Though you’d probably prefer something a little more substantial.”

Oh, no doubt.

“Maybe one of the curried-egg sandwiches? They’re not the kind of thing you get every day.”

And naturally Peyton didn’t want the kind of thing he could get every day. Hell, that was the whole problem.

“Or if you want something sweeter…”

He definitely wanted something sweeter.

“…you might try one of the ginger cakes.”

Except not that.

Oh, man, this thing with Ava wasn’t turning out the way he’d planned at all. She was supposed to be schooling him in the basics of social climbing, not advanced soul-searching. And what man wanted to discover the workings of his inner psyche for the first time in a frickin’ tearoom?

“Aaahhh…” he began, stringing the word over several time zones in an effort to stall. Finally, he finished, “Yeah. Gimme one of those curried-egg sandwiches. They sound absolutely…” The word was out of his mouth before he could stop it, so overcome by his surroundings, and so weakened by his musings, had he become. “Scrumptious.”

Okay, that did it. With that terrible word, he could feel what little was left of his testosterone oozing out of every pore. A man could only take so much tea and remain, well, manly. And a man could only take so much self-discovery and remain sane. If Peyton didn’t get out of this place soon…if he didn’t get away from Ava soon…if he didn’t get someplace, anyplace, far away from here—far away from her—ASAP, someplace where he could look inside himself and figure out what the hell was going on in his brain…