Honestly, if it’s because she’s sick again, it will feel like less of a betrayal.

I turn away, hoping to shut it all out while I work through the facts. But tempers in the room rise, and soon I find I’m unable to zone out the conversation any longer.

“Do you hear her, Hudson?” my mother says behind me. “She threatened Celia. In front of everyone.” She isn’t helping.

“Mother, stay out of this.”

“Hudson, you have to get rid of her. She’s dangerous. Celia tells me she has a record. Why on earth would you let her into your life when you knew these things about her?”

I won’t hear this. “Shut up, Mother.”

I spin around and brush past Celia and Sophia, stopping in the center of the room to finally meet Alayna’s eyes. Though I’m torn and uncertain, there is one truth that does not waver—I am in love with Alayna Withers. I will do anything for her. She is my light, and I will fight like hell to keep her from my darkness. Whatever that takes.

I tell her this silently through my stare, and I feel her acknowledgment pass back to me. She knows. She has to know that I’m here for her.

I’m barely aware as my mother prattles on behind me. “It makes sense why she’d be obsessed with Celia. She knows you belong together, Hudson, and she’s jealous. Celia was pregnant with your baby. She can’t compete with that, no matter—”

“Aw, shut the fuck up, Sophia,” my father cuts her off. “It wasn’t even Hudson’s baby. It was mine, you ignorant bitch.”

And then all hell breaks loose. My rage, already bubbling just under the surface, ignites in a blaze. “Goddammit, Jack.”

“It’s my business to tell,” he says, “and I’m tired of this lingering lie.”

“It wasn’t a lie we told for you.” For as much as I’ve resented that I had to keep his secret, I guarded it wholly. There are too many people who will be hurt by this unveiling. My mother. Celia’s parents. Alayna, because I never told her. It was a secret best kept to the grave.

Now the room swarms with the aftermath of this. Sophia’s crushed. Celia’s embarrassed. Jack’s…relieved, it seems. I’m surprised to realize I don’t care as much as I once would have. Everything in my world is dimmed next to the spotlight of my precious Alayna.

In the bustle, she slips away. I rush to follow her, not making the elevator before the doors close. I take the other elevator down and find her in the lobby.

“Alayna,” I call after her. She waits for me, but when I reach her, I realize I don’t know what to say. So I settle on, “Why did you leave?”

“Isn’t it obvious? That was a madhouse, and I didn’t want to be there anymore.”

“Yes, that it was.” There are words sitting at the tip of my tongue. So many of them. Which do I choose?

“I, um…why didn’t you defend me up there?” she asks before I’ve decided how to respond. “Are you that mad about the David situation? It’s me that’s supposed to be mad at you, remember?”

Was it only this morning that I transferred David to my club in Atlantic City? It seems like a lifetime ago that I was worrying about her and him. I don’t regret my decision to move him from The Sky Launch—that club belongs to Alayna—but I admit that I was underhanded in my dealing with it.

Now that feels benign in comparison to the malignancy that I’m about to inflict upon our relationship. But if we have any chance of working past our issues, I have to be sure we’re both mentally able to handle the task.

“Wait—” She realizes it before I have to say it. “You believe her.”

My jaw twitches. I don’t know.

“Hudson?”

I put my hands on her upper arms. “I believe in you.” They’re the truest words I’ve ever spoken. “And whatever you need, I want to give it to you. If you need help—”

“Oh my god, I can’t believe this.” She backs away from me. “I can’t fucking believe this.”

I clench and unclench my fists as if it will somehow help me hold onto her. “Tell me that you didn’t do it. Tell me you didn’t call her. Tell me you didn’t see her.” If she tells me she didn’t—I’ll believe her.

But she doesn’t.

It’s confirmation that she’s lied to me. I can’t bear to think that she’s done it willfully. She has to be acting out of her illness. It’s the easiest thing to believe.

She shakes her head. “It’s not how it looks, Hudson. I didn’t stalk her or harass her or whatever she’s claiming. Are you on her side or mine?”

“I’m on your side. Always, your side.” How can she not know this by now? Everything I do, everything I say, it’s always for her.

“Then you believe me?” Her eyes are soft, pleading.

It’s not that simple.

I stick my hands in my pockets. If I don’t hide them away, I’ll pull her into me, and then I’m afraid I won’t ask her the hard questions. “Did you call her?”

“Yes! I said I did upstairs!” She pulls her phone from her bra and shoves it toward me. “Here, you want to see? Take it! You’ll see all the times I called her since that’s what you seem to be concerned with.”

I ignore her outstretched hand. “I don’t want proof. I want to help you.”

“I don’t fucking need any help!” She throws the phone across the lobby. It shatters when it lands.

She stares at it while I stare at her. She’s hurting. She feels like I’ve let her down.

But she let me down as well. I’m hurting too. I’m new to this pain, and I don’t know how to deal with it. Her constant betrayals are wounds that I know I can learn to ignore, but I’m not sure how or if they’ll ever completely heal.

She turns and runs. Out the front door.

I follow. “Alayna, come back here.” I catch her by her wrist. “I’ll cancel my trip. We’ll find the best treatment—”

“I’m not sick.” She yanks her arms from my grip. “Go to Japan, Hudson. I don’t want to see you.”

Jesus, Japan. I’m supposed to be leaving in a couple of hours. “I’m not going to Japan now.” I’ll cancel everything for her. There is nothing without her.

Still, she walks away. “Go to Japan,” she calls back to me. “I don’t want to see you for a while, if not ever. Got it? If you’re at the penthouse when I get home, I’ll find somewhere else to sleep, and I don’t mean for just one night.”

She keeps walking. I let her.

I watch after her for long minutes though. I chose wrong; I know that. I probably knew that as I was pushing treatment on her. She’s not sick. She didn’t do the things Celia accused her of. She was in her right mind when she went behind my back.

I have a new decision to make. I can either choose to let this pain weigh me down and ruin our relationship forever, or I can choose to make my own transgressions right.

The decision’s easy. I won’t lose Alayna. Before I can try to win her back, though, there is an obstacle that must be dealt with—Celia.

* * *

Crying and yelling meet me when I return to my apartment. Celia and my father are in a screaming match, my mother’s sobbing. Or pretending to sob. There’s no actual tears. Brian is studying the artwork on my walls, seemingly trying to be invisible.

I almost feel bad for the guy.

I don’t feel bad for anyone else. In fact, they need to leave. “Thank you everyone for the chaos in my living room. It’s time for all of you to go now.”

Brian heads first toward the elevator, as if he’d been simply waiting for permission before he bolted.

I stop him. “Not you. I’d like you to stay, if you don’t mind. Alayna has asked me not to be here when she returns, but I’d rather she isn’t alone.”

Brian’s mouth opens, his eyes darting. “I suppose that would be fine.”

“Where are you staying? The Waldorf?” I surprise him with my accurate guess, but he simply nods. “I’ll arrange to have your things moved over here. The guest room is down the hall. Make yourself at home.”

He nods and heads to where I’ve directed him, happy for the escape.

Celia’s tried to sneak past me while I was speaking to Brian, but I catch her before the elevator arrives. “And I didn’t mean you should leave. We have to talk.”

Her eyes are red and tired. “Hudson, I’m not in the mood.”

“Oh, let’s not talk about mood.” My delivery is even and cold. I’m actually surprised I have as much patience as I do for her. Inside, I’m boiling.

“Do you not realize what just happened here?” Her voice is low, but she’s seething. “My parents are going to fucking kill me. They were never supposed to find out about me and Jack.”

“It’s called karma, Celia. You reap what you sow. And today you sowed a lot of bad karma. Would you care to explain?”

“I’ve done all my talking. I have to be somewhere now, so pardon me.” She brushes past me into the waiting elevator.

She won’t get away this easy. I step in after her. “I’ll see you down.”

Celia rubs at her temples. She’s not happy about this, but she has little say.

“I’m coming too.” My mother sticks her hand in just as the doors begin to close.

I may actually snarl when I say, “Take the next elevator.”

But my mother isn’t fazed. She slips in despite my command. “I’m not staying another minute here with that man.”

That man is standing behind her, a surly expression on his face. “I’ll take the next elevator.”

I suppose expecting Jack and Sophia to travel down to the lobby together is a bit much at the moment. “Fine,” I concede. I wait for the doors to close before adding, “Though I’m surprised you don’t mind being with this woman.”

Celia throws me a glare.

My mother throws me a glare as well. “I know Jack. He’s the one who’s responsible. It wasn’t her fault.” She wraps an arm around Celia. “He took advantage of you, honey. I understand. He was the grown-up. You were the child.”

Unfuckingbelievable.

Celia leans into my mother’s embrace, putting on the full victim act. “Thank you, Sophia. That means more than you could know.” She even dabs at her eyes, which, as far as I can tell, are dry.

“Jesus Christ,” I mutter. They’re more alike than I’d ever realized.

My mother scolds me as she affectionately pats Celia’s arm. “I’m not happy with you either, Hudson. Covering for that cheating bastard—”

“I wasn’t—” I don’t finish the sentence. It’s not worth it. She’ll never understand. “Whatever. I’m not going through this with you, Mother. Work out your feelings about this on your own.”

“I don’t know why I expected sympathy.” Her terse tone is well-practiced. “I forgot who I was dealing with.”

I roll my eyes. “Like mother, like son.”

“That’s not how the saying goes.”

Celia straightens and pats Sophia with the consolation I’ve denied her. “This must be so hard for you, Sophia.”

As if she wasn’t the exact cause of all the hard.

My mother takes the inch and yanks it a mile. “It is. It’s devastating.” She continues as the elevator doors open in the lobby and we step out. “God, it feels like so much of the last ten years have been a lie. The baby. The baby wasn’t even mine at all.”

This time it seems tears might actually be forming in her eyes. Somewhere deep inside, there’s a piece of me that acknowledges this is a big loss for her. As unhealthy as it was to do so, she’d focused so much of her energy on her dead grandbaby. The child that would have continued her union with Jonathon Pierce. Today’s revelation had to shake her to the core.

But frankly, at the moment, I don’t give a fuck. “Save it for your shrink. I said I didn’t want to hear it.”

Meanwhile, Celia has tried to sneak away again. I trot after her, abandoning my mother. “Hey, hey, hey.” I grab her by the arm and escort her across the lobby and out the front doors. “We aren’t done. I’ll see you to your car.”

“I didn’t drive.”

“I’ll wait with you until your driver shows up.”

“I was planning on taking a cab.”

“We’ll cab together.” I don’t let her interject another excuse. “Celia, we’re having a conversation whether you want to or not. And we’re having it now, though you are welcome to choose our location.”

Her shoulders fall as she surrenders to defeat. “Cab, then.”

We hail a cab and slip in the back. I dive in the minute she’s finished giving her address to the driver. “This scam of yours, Celia—it’s not cute. It’s not even clever. It ends now.”

“I love how you immediately assume that anything I say is a scam. You can’t ever give me the benefit of the doubt?”

“I did give you the benefit of the doubt. I believed you when you stood there and told me you were happy for me. That you would give up this experiment with Alayna. Blatant lies is your trick now?”