Three Wishes(41)
Author: Kristen Ashley

Terrified and confused at this sudden change, she looked to the right and to the left, anywhere for escape, anywhere but at Nate.

And to her shock, his hands caught her face, resting one on either side, gently trying to force her to look into his impossibly dark eyes.

“I didn’t know,” he whispered and the absolute ache dripping from his first words said to her since she found out he was alive cut through her thin shield of numbness like a razor.

She attempted to pull her face free but his hands tightened.

“Lily, I didn’t know,” he repeated, and she caught his eyes and they were glittering dark with something that she couldn’t read, something hideously painful and she had to get away from it. Was desperate to get away from it. She needed to flee.

She tried to look over his shoulder but he was too tall, too close. Things were happening in the room, there was urgent talk, maybe even a tussle. But all she could see was Nate.

“Look at me,” he demanded.

She frantically shook her head against his hands.

“Lily, look at me.”

At his soft, gentle words, she couldn’t stop herself, she looked at him. She looked into his impossibly handsome face.

And then, for the first time since she knew he was alive, she spoke to him. She said the words she’d been saying in her head for days.

“You told me you’d never let me go,” she whispered but it was an accusation.

His eyes closed and the pain in them swept over his entire face and settled there like it would never, ever leave.

Then he shocked her again. He dropped his forehead to hers and kept his hands on her.

Something out of her control made her continue.

“You told me,” she said in a shaky voice, “you’d always take care of me.”

He opened his eyes and stared into hers. He was so close that if she moved the lower half of her face forward, less than an inch, she would have been kissing him.

“You didn’t take care of me,” she murmured, stating the obvious.

“Mr. McAllister, step away from my client,” Alistair demanded from somewhere close.

Nate didn’t move, not a single muscle.

“Mr. McAllister!” Alistair snapped.

“Let him be!” Victor shouted fiercely and then, “Let them be,” he said this last in a voice that, Lily noted dazedly, was utterly broken.

Alistair was not to be denied. “Mr. McAllister!”

Nate ignored him, his eyes drilling into hers.

She couldn’t bear it a second longer, she couldn’t shift moods this easily. Something was happening but she had no idea what it was. She had so little fight left in her and she had to concentrate. She wasn’t strong enough, in that moment with Nate’s hands on her, his warm body pressed against hers just like she’d been wishing for years, his forehead resting on hers. She simply couldn’t bear it.

“Nate,” Lily said softly, beseechingly, “let me go.”

He ignored her too, for a moment.

Then, just as abruptly as he pursued her, he did as he was asked and let her go.

And just as swiftly, he walked back to his chair, righted it to the table and sat down.

After a moment of stunned silence where everyone seemed immobile, the entire assemblage did the same though not nearly as quickly.

Nate watched Lily as she slowly, shakily walked back across the room and resumed the seat Alistair was holding for her.

“Are you quite all right?” Alistair asked once he’d also sat down and was leaning into her, peering at her, his own face beyond angry and she was glad there were no paperweights in the room or there would have been hell to pay.

She nodded, undone by the whole scene and wanting nothing more than to leave. To go back home, to Tash and Fazire, and recoup, recharge and fight some other day.

Worse still, her head was beginning to ache and she felt more than slightly queasy and she had the terrible feeling that a migraine was coming over her.

“Let’s just get this over with,” she begged, her voice so small it was tiny.

She had no idea her voice betrayed to the two men in the room she knew a very short time many years ago, one she had come to care about deeply, one she had adored more than life, that she was now just a mere shadow of the former Lily Jacobs.

At her words Alistair fully lost his temper and his head jerked around toward the others.

“Right. Then. I suppose after that scene I don’t have to go into detail about the financial situation all that left Ms. Jacobs in. There was not a great deal of wealth in her family, Lily had attended Oxford on a scholarship and had been working in pubs and shops since her arrival in England. Due to the pregnancy, she was unable to work, had a mortgage that went unpaid for months and was nearly thrown out of her home. She was not entitled to National Health Service so the birth and subsequent hospitalisation were all private and cost a fortune. She was forced, even though she didn’t wish it, to sell her family home in Indiana but death duties and a bad exchange rate meant that money was practically gone before it got to the country. She –”

Nate’s solicitor interrupted Alistair wearily, sensing they’d lost the upper hand they’d been so certain of when they’d entered the room. “Just tell us what you want.”

Alistair didn’t hesitate. “We want five hundred thousand pounds for back child maintenance for the last seven years. We want two thousand pounds a month starting now. Mr. McAllister can see his daughter one weekend a month, two weeks during summer holidays and alternating school holidays. Ms. Jacobs wants Natasha every Christmas. The first meeting of Mr. McAllister and Natasha will be supervised by either Maxine Grant or Lily’s long-time family friend, Fazire.”

Alistair was on a roll, he was asking for more than they agreed. If Lily wasn’t already wound up by all that had happened, she would have spun like a top at what he was currently demanding.

But he was interrupted.

“Give it to her.” This was Nate’s deep voice cutting in and Lily’s head jerked to him.

He was staring at her. Staring at her so intensely she felt his eyes like they were a physical touch on her skin.

“I’m sorry?” Alistair asked, nonplussed at being disturbed in his postulation.

“Give it to her. Have the money transferred to her account by the end of the day.” As he said this, Nate’s head moved to look at his solicitor and it was clear it was an order.

“But, Mr. McAllister –” his solicitor threw in.

“The five hundred thousand?” Alistair was, Lily saw, thrilled.