Fearless In Love (The Maverick Billionaires, Book 3) (27 page)

She hadn’t given up—but she needed to be a heck of a lot stronger for the next round. And she knew nothing would get her there faster than being with Matt and Noah.

During the next work week, she followed the usual routine, taking Noah to school, playing with him, teaching him, loving him as if he were her own little boy. They swam in the heated pool and worked on riding his bike. He was almost ready, and she couldn’t wait to find the perfect moment to surprise Matt.

And then there were the nights—the long, delicious hours in Matt’s bed, waking to his touch in the morning, his lips on her skin, his fingers tracing her curves.

Somewhere along the way, she’d stopped praying he would say he loved her. It would happen when he finally believed he didn’t have to be Mr. Perfect in Absolutely Everything. For now, she simply treasured their moments together.

Well, except the early mornings, when she had to sneak out of Matt’s room… She felt like his dirty little secret every time she took her short walk of shame. He would hate to hear her call it that, but in the early rays of light as she made her way back to her room, it seemed the sun through the windows illuminated a truth she didn’t want to see.

* * *

The following Sunday, Charlie and Sebastian showed up from out of the blue in a big white pickup. Noah ran down the front steps and straight into Sebastian’s arms. Matt’s friend swung him round and round until the little boy was laughing and squealing with delight. Seeing Noah’s closeness to the other Mavericks made Ari’s eyes mist.

“We’ve got a surprise for you,” Charlie said, bending down to give Noah a hug after Sebastian finally set him on his feet. She was outfitted in steel-toed boots, overalls, and a flannel shirt.

“What? What?” Noah jumped up, down, and around.

Matt looked on indulgently. With Noah’s hand in hers, Charlie led him to the back of the truck and let down the tailgate. Then she picked him up, setting him in the truck bed to see.

Matt stepped forward, his hands out, as if he were afraid Noah might fall, but Charlie kept her hands steady on him.

Noah uttered a soft, reverent, “Wow.” Then he tipped his head down to Charlie. “What are they?”

“That one is a Stegosaurus.” She pointed to a spiny metal dinosaur with big plates behind its head. It was small enough for Noah to rest his hand on its back, the metal spines rounded so he wouldn’t cut his fingers. “And that’s a Brontosaurus.” With its long neck, Noah would have to reach up to touch its head. “The flying one is a Pterodactyl. Uncle Sebastian brought a chain to hang it from the big oak out by your playground.”

Noah turned to throw his arms around her neck. “Thank you, Aunt Charlie.”

She beamed, and Sebastian slipped his hand beneath the fall of her hair. The gesture was loving, congratulatory, and possessive all at the same time.

It was the way Ari wanted Matt to touch her in front of everyone. As though she was
his—
and he was proud of it.

“After the costume you wore at the Halloween party, I’ll have to make a mini T-Rex too.” Charlie smiled, the sun lighting her face as she looked up at Noah. Then she scooped the boy from the truck bed and set him on the pavement.

“Charlie, thank you.” Matt put his hand over his heart, as if thanking her from the bottom of it. “Making these must have taken so much time out of your schedule.”

She shrugged beneath Sebastian’s loving touch. “Whenever I needed a break from my other projects, the dinosaurs were a perfect filler.” She beamed up at Sebastian. “A wise man once told me I have to take time out for things that I feel a passion for.”

“Sage advice,” Matt agreed.

“And since Charlie’s also finished her monster T-Rex, we’re having an unveiling at the barbecue this afternoon.”

Sebastian’s look encompassed Ari as well, and she felt the glow of being automatically included. Matt had done the same that morning when he’d assumed she’d join them at the barbecue Charlie and Sebastian were throwing. As though she was family.

As though she was
his.

“Wouldn’t miss it.” Matt took a step closer to her, and her heart raced even though he hadn’t touched her.

“All right, let’s get these guys unloaded.” Sebastian climbed into the truck bed.

Ari marveled with Noah while they set up the dinosaurs in the back garden. It was a perfect ending to a perfect week. A nearly perfect one, anyway. If only she could wait patiently for Matt to see clearly for himself that he loved her.

But she couldn’t deny that every loving glance between Sebastian and Charlie filled her with a deeper longing—and more impatience—to share the very same emotions with Matt.

* * *

With his son’s hand in his on the driveway as they waved good-bye to Charlie and Sebastian—and Ari only a touch away—for the first time in his life, Matt actually felt happy. Real happiness. It was more than the joy he always felt at being with Noah. For once, he felt content. Being with Ari was completely different from his time with Irene—not frantic and rushed, but sweet and miraculous.

These past weeks he’d been continually asking himself about love. Not just
was this love?
But could
he
love anyone right? Could he be there
always
, without mistakes?

In the end, it wasn’t their incredible lovemaking that made him see the truth. It was how endlessly patient Ari was with his son—and how patient she’d been with him, never pressuring him to say
I love you
. And though Matt wasn’t certain he’d do everything perfectly, he finally believed Ari wouldn’t give up on him even if he took a few small missteps.

At long last, he could see things clearly rather than through a haze of fear.

He loved Ari.

Loved her in a way he hadn’t known he was capable of after he’d lost his faith in the people who were supposed to care for him as a child.

Tonight. He’d tell her how he felt tonight after the barbecue, when she lay warm and soft in his arms.

The only thing marring his happiness was his total failure to give Ari her heart’s desire. It killed him that he hadn’t found her brother yet. But he would, damn it. He needed to make Ari as happy as she’d made him.

“Have I mentioned recently how happy you make me? How happy you make us?”

She beamed at him. “You make me deliriously happy too.” She bit her lip before adding, “Noah and I have a special surprise for you.” She held out her hand for Noah. He took it and skipped with her to the garage, where Ari punched in the code to open the door. “Stay right there,” she called out to Matt as they disappeared inside.

Matt turned up his face to the sun, reveling in its warmth the way he reveled in the heat of Ari’s smile.

“You can look now!” Ari’s voice was accompanied by Noah’s laughter.

Matt opened his eyes…and his heart choked his throat as he took in the near paralyzing sight of Noah hurtling toward the big slope of the driveway on his bike.

A two-wheeled bike that no longer had its training wheels.

“Remember to stay away from the hill, Noah,” Ari called.

But Noah was too excited to listen, and the bike gained speed. Too much speed.

Matt’s blood was like the roar of engines through his veins. Noah wore a helmet, but what if he barreled right out into the road?

“Noah!” Matt yelled, hit squarely by a vision of himself as a child, only a few years older than Noah, careening down a hill that was far steeper than he’d thought. “Stop!”

The gate was open to the street beyond it, and Noah was heading straight for it. Memories of agony and deep shame shrieked in Matt’s head as he started to run. His gaze shot to the road for signs of a car, but no way could he get to his son in time. Even as he ran, he felt the remembered pain of all those years ago, heard the awful crack of his arm breaking, his father’s voice calling him an idiot, a weenie, a good-for-nothing sissy.

“Noah!” His son’s name screeched through the sunshine. A car, the road, the hill.
Jesus, God, please no.

Just when he thought everything was lost, Ari was there, barring Noah’s way, her fists on the handlebars. “Now, Noah, you know the rules. You need to stay up top,” she said, chiding him softly. As if nothing cataclysmic or life-threatening had happened.

As if Matt hadn’t just lost years off his life.

“Did you see that, Matt?” Somewhere through his haze of fear and fury, he vaguely noticed that Ari and Noah beamed at him with excitement shining in their eyes. “Noah can ride without training wheels. We’ve been practicing so he could surprise you.” She didn’t seem at all frightened by what had almost happened. “He did great, don’t you think?”

It was hardly even a question. She simply expected Matt to agree, to congratulate Noah on his new skill—and to congratulate her for helping his son.

But Matt still couldn’t see straight. Not when the only thing in his vision was what might have been.

Noah crushed beneath a car.

Noah with broken limbs.

Noah with brain damage like Jeremy.

And not when all he heard were the things his father had shouted at him on that day long ago, as his arm screamed in pain and tears streaked his cheeks. Insults and abuse that were seared into Matt’s soul as deeply as his mother’s refusal to step in and help had been.

“What the hell did you think you were doing?” His voice was so deadly cold, so brutally sharp, that Ari stopped short, her smile instantly disintegrating.

“In my classes I learned it’s normal for a child Noah’s age to begin riding without training wheels. Plus, I did some research on the Internet. And Jorge can do it,” she added so softly that he had to read her lips over the rush in his ears.

“I don’t give a damn about Jorge or your freaking classes or what the hell the Internet says.”

He cursed, a four-letter word he’d never said in front of his son. But he threw it at her like a punch—then watched as Ari reeled from the blow.

“He isn’t ready to lose his training wheels.” Each word was a bullet. “Anything could have happened. Did you see how close he got to the road?”

“But I was there to hold on to him. To make sure he was safe.” She paused, swallowing hard before adding, “I’ll always be there for him.”

“How the hell do you know you’ll always be there?” he raged, his voice startling birds off their branches. She could never know what Noah might do in a split second. She could never protect him from everything, which was what Matt had vowed to do the moment his son was born.

Anguish tore her face, and she opened her mouth, closed it, then finally said, “I take care of him like he’s my own child. You know that.”

“He’s
not
your child.” Matt couldn’t stop himself from shouting. “
I’ll
say when he’s ready to take off his training wheels or his water wings.
Not
you.”

A cloud passed over the sun, over her face, over Noah. The silence that fell at the end of Matt’s tirade was so sharp it sliced them all to ribbons.

“You’re right,” Ari finally said. “He’s not my child. I’m just the nanny.” Each word from her lips sounded more hollow. More bleak. She leaned down to Noah. “It’s time to get off the bike, sweetheart.” Once Noah had, she gave him a kiss on the cheek, then, leaving them both, she headed back up to the hill to the garage.

* * *

Ari didn’t cry as she brought the training wheels back from the garage along with a screwdriver. The horror of it all had dried up her tear ducts.

“I’m sorry. I made a mistake. You should put them back on.”

“Daddy?” Noah whimpered.

But Matt didn’t move to comfort his son, he simply screwed the wheels back into place, anchoring the bike.

How the hell do you know you’ll always be there?

Ten words. But they were more than enough to put her in her place.

He’s not your child.

God, how could she ever have forgotten? Just because she wanted Noah and Matt to be hers didn’t mean they were. All the longing in the world didn’t mean she’d ever truly belong with them. One night at a party with the Mavericks didn’t mean she was part of the family.

“But Daddy, I was real good.” Noah turned from his father to Ari. “Right, Ari?”

She couldn’t answer him. Her vocal cords were swollen too tight. All she could do was nod.

Matt ratcheted down the last screw. “I saw how well you did, but I still want the training wheels on.”

“It’s not fair!” Noah scrunched up his face and ran from both of them, tears streaming down his cheeks. “You’re not nice, Daddy!”

“I’m so sorry,” she said again, barely able to manage more than a whisper. Then she ran too, leaving Matt alone on the driveway.

As she climbed the stairs to her room, her knees seemed to creak like an old woman’s, while her dreams crashed and burned, every single hope she’d ever had completely crushed. She’d been living in La-La Land. Rosie and Chi had warned her, but she hadn’t wanted to hear them. Maybe Chi was right, maybe Matt had only searched for her brother out of guilt for sleeping with her that first time.

Oh God.
Her legs wobbled, and she thought she might actually fall. She should have listened to her best friends, but she’d wanted to listen only to her heart, so she had deliberately forgotten her cardinal rule about remembering the difference between fantasy and reality.

How many times would she have to learn the lesson that she was temporary—disposable at the first sign of trouble? Just like with all her foster families. Even with her own mother, Ari hadn’t been important enough to her to get clean.

In her room, she stuffed her laptop into her backpack and her belongings into her bag. She’d become so good at leaving over the years that she could pack up in less than five minutes. She supposed the reason she hadn’t brought more things to Matt’s home had been the deep-down belief that the dream wouldn’t last. The fairy tale wouldn’t actually come true.

Not for her.

She’d wanted to surprise Matt, and it
had
felt like the right time for Noah to learn. But in retrospect, there was no denying that she’d been wrong in not asking permission. Matt was Noah’s father. He had the right to make the decisions, not her. And now, on top of it all, she’d turned him into the bad guy, just as Irene had done when she’d left for Paris without her son.