Just To Be With You

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

It was a good thing, Tatiana thought the following afternoon, that filming had begun today. Even better that the director had wanted to start with the scene where Rose left Aiden. They hadn’t needed much extra makeup to create the shadows under her eyes or the powder to make her skin look pale.

And when they were done with their first day on set, both the director and her co-star had told her that they’d never seen her be better. Having just channeled all of her pain and the brittleness she was feeling into her character, she was struck by the irony that just when she’d managed to keep her career from going off the rails, her personal life had completely crashed and burned.

After leaving the set, she headed out on foot through town for home. And it was true, Seattle really did feel like home already.

She was starting to know the city fairly well after the past couple of weeks, but not so well that she wasn’t surprised when her route took her right past the restaurant where she and Ian had eaten on the first day she’d shadowed him. Her chest clenched as she stood outside and remembered how naïve she’d been, how easy she’d thought falling in love—and being loved back—would be.

All the previous night without Ian, she’d longed for him, had been so tempted to go knock on his door and beg him to forget everything she’d said about not trying. But Ian, she knew, had always protected everyone else.

Now, she needed to protect him from giving up everything he loved for her.

“Tatiana!”

She was surprised to see Mia stepping out onto the sidewalk. Looking up, she saw that the restaurant where she and Ian and his professor had eaten was just a couple of doors down from Sullivan Realty, Mia’s office.

“I was just going to call you about Friday night and here you are walking past.”

Oh God, Tatiana had forgotten all about the party at Mia and Ford’s house to celebrate her and Smith’s Oscar nominations. When Tatiana had first suggested it, the family celebration had seemed like a great way to make sure Ian wouldn’t be able to avoid her. But now, after she’d made him promise on the plane to keep his distance…

She sighed. Hadn’t she known there would be family parties? In fact, it was one of the reasons he’d been so hesitant to start anything with her in the first place, because of how awkward—and horrible—it would be to constantly see each other if things didn’t work out.

Somehow, she told herself, she’d have to figure out a way to deal with seeing him at Mia’s house tomorrow night.

Mia had been all smiles when she came out of her office, but her grin quickly fell away when Tatiana lifted her sunglasses and she got close enough to see Tatiana’s face.

“You know what,” Mia said, “let’s go into my office so that we don’t cause any more pandemonium out here on the sidewalk than Ford already did this morning when he decided to go out and pick up coffees for us.” Mia put an arm around Tatiana to direct her inside. “I know falling in love with a rock star is every woman’s fantasy, but let me tell you, the reality can be a little nuts sometimes. One woman actually stripped off her underwear in the middle of the sidewalk to give to him.” Mia made a face. “Can we say yuck?”

“Serious yuck.”

“People probably do weird stuff like that to you all the time, don’t they?”

“Not that weird, thankfully,” Tatiana said with a laugh. One that sounded so rusty she realized she hadn’t laughed since she’d been in Ian’s arms on the island and they’d been dancing around Legos on the floor of their perfect little barn room.

As soon as they stepped into Mia’s office, Ian’s sister closed the door and then the blinds to make the glass-walled space private. “What’s wrong?”

Yesterday, though Valentina had clearly been extremely worried about her, Tatiana’s sister had accepted that she wasn’t yet ready to say more. Since then, of course, Valentina had sent a half-dozen text messages checking in, and they were meeting in a little while at her place so that she could finally tell her sister everything.

But now that she was sitting with Ian’s sister, who loved him as much as she did, Tatiana knew she wouldn’t be able to keep it all from spilling out another second. And if she was going to tell it, she figured she might as well start from the beginning.

“When we were at your parents’ house for dinner and I was helping your mom in the kitchen, I told her I had fallen for Ian.”

“Wow.” Mia’s eyes were wide with surprise. “I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that my mom loved hearing that.”

“I think she did,” Tatiana said with a small smile. “She gave me a big hug...and then told me to stay determined and not to give up on him.”

Emotion swamped Mia’s face. “We all love him so much.”

“I know you do. How could you not when I fell in love with him the first time I met him in Napa at Marcus and Nicola’s wedding? Partly,” she admitted, “because he’s gorgeous, but mostly because of how much he obviously loves you and wanted to make sure you were safe and happy.”

“Love at first sight,” Mia said with a sigh. “That’s so romantic. Only you don’t look happy, and I’m guessing that if I went to see my brother right now, he wouldn’t look happy, either.”

Knowing her voice would break on any words she tried to say, Tatiana simply shook her head.

“I was so sure things would turn out differently with you,” Mia said. “Hoping, praying that he’d finally open up with you, even though he’s isolated himself more and more from all of us over the years.”

“Me too,” Tatiana confessed in a hollow voice. “I kept thinking that if I didn’t back down or give up or go away, if I was just there for him, if I could just smash through all of his boundaries, he’d let me in. And when we were on the island, for a while...”

“Island?”

Realizing no one but her sister and Smith knew about their aborted trip to Alaska, she explained, “We were headed to Alaska for one of his meetings, but when that bad storm hit, we had to land way on the north end of Vancouver Island. While we were grounded there for three days without cell phones or Internet connections, I got to see another side of your brother when he actually let down his walls for a little while.” Tatiana didn’t realize she’d put one hand over her heart until it was already there. “Far enough that he started talking about wanting to try with me. He even said he’d give up the big deal he’s been working on for the past two years so that we could have more time together.”

Mia looked shocked. “He’s been obsessed with investing in that company.”

“He should be. I met the founder and the guy’s a genius. And that’s just the problem. If I let Ian give that up for me because he thinks there’s some sort of rule about how much time and focus you can give to someone you love versus your company—”

“He’d be miserable.”

Tatiana nodded.

“But if he didn’t walk away from it all,” Mia said, “if he still worked crazy hours, would that ever be enough for you?”

“After spending the past week and a half with him, and seeing how well he juggles it all—better than anyone I’ve ever seen—I know it would be. I don’t want him to change. I don’t need him to change. He’s perfect just the way he is. But—”

“He doesn’t see that, does he?”

“No, he doesn’t. And if we were together, he would live in constant fear of hurting me, and feel guilty every time he thought he was letting me down.”

“Ugh.”

Tatiana nodded. “Double ugh.”

Mia reached into her desk drawer and pulled out a box of Brooke’s chocolates. “This definitely calls for my emergency stash.” Once both of them had popped truffles into their mouths, Mia asked, “So, are you going to be okay with seeing him on Friday night?”

Tatiana figured there was no point in lying. “It’s going to be really hard to see your brother.” She sighed before admitting, “But—and I know this probably doesn’t make any sense—it would be worse not to see him.”

Mia’s lips had moved up into a little smile as she held out the box of chocolates. “Want another?”

Tatiana shook her head. “No, thanks. And I’d better get going or else I’m going to be late to meet up with Valentina. She’s already worried enough about me.”

Mia gave her a warm hug. “See you tomorrow night. And if you need to talk again before then, you know you can call or come by the house anytime, don’t you?”

“I do.”

“I wish my brother knew it.”

“He does, Mia.”

“Then why has he been shutting me out for so many years?”

“I don’t know. But maybe,” Tatiana said with a small smile that she knew wouldn’t make any sense to anyone but Ian, “it’s finally time for you to ask him.”

It had taken years of work, of focus, of dedication for Ian and his executive team to close the eAirBox deal. They’d celebrated last night, all of them, including Flynn and his team. But, for the very first time ever, Ian’s professional triumph wasn’t enough to make up for his personal loss.

There wasn’t a moment when he had stopped thinking of her during the past twenty-four hours. Hell, during the past several months since the wedding, if he was being honest with himself. Again and again he replayed every one of her beautiful smiles, the sweet sound of her laughter, the softness of her mouth on his, the bliss of feeling her skin heat and dampen as she came apart in his arms...and the honest emotion that he’d seen in her eyes every time she looked at him.

He’d gone around and around in his head trying to figure out a way that they could make things work, what he could do to convince her to give him another chance, but every time he was stopped by Tatiana’s voice in his head: It’s exactly what you did with your ex-wife. You tried to make a relationship work around your job and what she wanted from you. But it didn’t work. And I love you too much to let you make those mistakes again.

Ian was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t realize his sister had walked into his office until she threw her arms around him and said, “I love you, big brother. You were gone so long that I didn’t get to tell you nearly enough. Now that you’re finally back home, I’ve got lots of lost time to make up for.” After a long while, she finally drew back to sit on the edge of his desk. “But before we get to the heavier stuff, I need to remind you about the party at our house tomorrow night. You’re in charge of the bubbly, so you’d better not be late or we won’t be able to toast Smith and Tatiana.”

Damn it, he’d forgotten about Mia and Ford’s party on Friday night. How could he go when he’d promised Tatiana that he’d—

Wait a minute, Ian thought, as he rewound back to the exact promise he’d made: not to answer her calls, or let her shadow him at work anymore, or take her away for a business trip on his plane. But he’d never made even the slightest promise about staying away from her at a Sullivan family event.

Thank God.

“Have you seen her?”

His sister nodded, looking far more serious than usual. “She just dropped by my office, actually, on the way back from her set.”

“How is she?”

He was surprised by his sister’s faint smile. “Head over heels in love with you. And I just found out that she talked to Mom about her feelings for you, too.”

“She did?”

Mia’s smile grew even bigger. “She did.”

“Wait a minute,” he said, his brain feeling even more muddled now than it had since he’d watched Tatiana walk away from him the previous afternoon. “If you just saw her, and you obviously know what happened, and she’s talked to Mom, then why aren’t both of you yelling at me for screwing everything up?”

“Seems to me,” she said softly as she studied his face, “that you’re doing a good enough job of that yourself.”

But he knew his sister, knew there was plenty she wanted to say to him, and that there had been for a long time. “I didn’t hold back with you when you were getting together with Ford in Napa. You promised me that it would go both ways.”

She looked like she could hardly believe what he was saying. “Wow. I can’t believe you actually just asked me to butt into your private life when you’ve held back so much from all of us for so long. Not just since your divorce, but before that. Before you met and married Chelsea, even. I actually think it happened once you left college and started working to support us all. Tatiana was the one who suggested I come here to ask you why.”

“Of course she was,” he said, easily able to see Tatiana encouraging his sister to push past the walls he’d put up around himself. “I’m sorry, Mia. I’m sorry I shut you out.”

“No, it wasn’t your fault, Ian. At least, not all your fault. Because we let you do it. We let you pull away. And now I can see just how wrong we were—one of us should have gotten in your face a long time ago and just stayed there until you had no choice but to lower your walls.” She put a hand over his. “Tatiana did exactly that, didn’t she—what we were all afraid to do? She stood up to you and every time you pushed her away, she didn’t give up on you. Instead, she came back again and again.”

His chest clenched tight as he told his sister, “She did.”

“She’s braver than every last one of us.”

“She is brave. And brilliant. And beautiful.” He ran his hands over his face and admitted, “It’s only been one day, but I already miss her so damned much, Mia.”

“I know things with you two are a big mess right now,” his sister said as she squeezed his hands, “but I still have to tell you how completely amazing it is to know that you’re as head over heels in love with her as she is with you.”

Easily able to see every one of his sister’s hopes and dreams for him on her face, Ian had to tell her, “If I were the right man for her, if I could give her everything she needs, if I could do it all—I would.”

“When we were kids,” his sister said softly, “you proved again and again that you could do, could achieve, could have anything you set your mind to. I know you’re convinced that you can’t possibly find a way to balance work and a relationship, because you never could before now. But I think there’s a simple reason for that: You never wanted a relationship with a woman enough to give it your all.” She paused for a moment to let her words sink in, before adding, “You’ve never truly loved a woman before Tatiana, have you? Not the way you love her—with everything you are.”

“How sweet. A little family reunion. And how perfect that you’re having it in your office, Ian, since I know how much you hate to leave it.”

Mia spun around. “Chelsea.” His sister sounded like she’d tasted something rotten. “It’s been too long, and yet, I have to admit I wish it had been longer.”

Ian didn’t normally feel like laughing when his ex was in the room, but he was surprised to find himself swallowing a laugh after Mia’s retort.

“Thanks for coming by, Mia,” he said. “And for the update.”

Knowing this was his way of kicking her out, Mia asked in a low-pitched tone, “Are you sure I can’t stay and throw things at her?”

His laughter bubbled all the way up and out this time. “Thanks, but I can handle her on my own.”

With obvious reluctance, Mia slid off his desk. But instead of leaving him to deal with Chelsea alone, she headed straight toward his ex. “Why are you here?”

Chelsea raised an eyebrow. “That’s none of your business.”

“Oh yes, it is.” Mia advanced toward Chelsea in such a way that his ex-wife actually took a step back. “Mess with my brother and you’re messing with all of us.” Mia’s gaze swept down, then back up Chelsea’s body. “You know, that color makes you look much less pale than usual. You should thank your stylist for helping you out.” Turning back to Ian, Mia smiled and blew him a kiss. “See you Friday, big brother.”

Ian couldn’t fault his sister for wanting to protect him. Not when he’d spent his whole life doing the same for her. As soon as the door closed behind her, he stood up to greet his ex-wife. “I’m glad you’re here, Chelsea.”

“You are?”

He nodded. “I was going to call you today.”

“You were?”

“I’m assuming you read about the eAirBox deal?”

She pulled the front page of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer out of her purse as confirmation. “Remember how my phone kept running out of space for taking pictures and I said, they need to make more space on these things? Well, that’s just what this company does, which means I can make a case that I gave you the idea.” He was pretty sure she wasn’t joking, not even when she said, “You made a mistake by not holding on to me, Ian. I was your lucky charm.”

His ex was certainly creative, he had to give her that. And once upon a time, he’d found her beautiful, too. But now he saw just how false every part of her was, from her colored contact lenses to her artificially plumped-up lips and breasts to her fake tan.

And yet, none of that changed the fact that he had hurt her.

“You’re right,” he finally said, “I did make a mistake with you. Lots of mistakes. I screwed up in our marriage and I just kept screwing up afterward, too.”

This time, she wasn’t able to hide her surprise. “I can’t believe you’re saying these things.”

“I’ve been beating myself up for years over our marriage, over not being there enough for you. I’m truly sorry that I wasn’t, Chelsea. You didn’t deserve to be ignored. Nobody does.”

“Well—” For the first time, it looked as if his ex didn’t know what to say. “Thank you for the apology. Even if it’s long overdue.”

It was long overdue, he realized. This whole conversation was, in large part because after the divorce he’d shut himself away from everyone by moving to London. Were it not for Tatiana being brave enough to confront him—and to keep on doing it, even when he’d repeatedly tried to push her away—he wouldn’t be having any of these long-overdue conversations today.

From the first, he’d been struck by the way Tatiana always wanted to understand why people did what they did. But even more amazing was the fact that she wasn’t afraid to go deeper than other people usually did. She wasn’t afraid to push harder, or farther, either.

Now, it was time to channel her fearlessness to get some answers from his ex-wife.

“Can I ask you a question, Chelsea?”

His ex-wife was frowning now, at least as much as she could with a dermatologically frozen forehead. “I guess so.”

“Why did you marry me?”

Her frown deepened until there were actual lines on her face. “Is this a trick question?”

“No, I promise you it isn’t.”

“You weren’t like any other man I’d dated. You were more confident. More focused. More determined. It was exciting to be with you, especially since you were traveling for business so much that when I was with you, it never felt like we’d settled into a boring pattern like other couples.”

“But eventually didn’t you want that? Didn’t you want to settle down? Didn’t you want our life together to have more of a pattern?”

“No, I didn’t. I just wanted you to turn your focus to me. I wanted to be more important than your company, your deals. I thought that once we got married, you’d change.”

And it was true, he suddenly realized. All Chelsea had really ever wanted while they were together was for him to change who he was. Whereas, again and again, Tatiana had said the exact opposite, that she loved him just the way he was.

He hadn’t been planning to give his ex any more checks, but since he had a feeling she hadn’t been saving much of what he’d given her over the past several years, he decided it would be his last act of penance. At the same time, however, it wouldn’t be fair just to hand it to her and let her think there were more checks coming in the future.

“I’m not giving this check to you because of my new deal. In fact, I never wrote any of these checks because I actually thought I owed you anything for any of my deals, or because I was afraid of your lawyers. I did it because I felt guilty that I didn’t treat you the way a good husband should have. But now I think it’s finally time for both of us to move on, past the mistakes we made with each other.”

Chelsea stared at him for a long moment, before awareness lit her gaze. “This is because of Tatiana Landon, isn’t it? I saw the way you looked at her. You’re in love with her, aren’t you? That’s why you want me out of the way. You’re hoping I’ll accept your apology so that you can go to her and tell her you’re not a big, fat jerk.”

He could see the calculations already going on behind her eyes, was nearly certain that she would try to dig up something about him and Tatiana so that she could leak it to the press, and he was glad for it. Happy that it helped dissolve the final remnants of his guilt.

Misplaced guilt that he’d let drive Tatiana out of his life.

“You’re right again,” he said as he moved to the door and held it open for their final good-bye. “I am in love with Tatiana, and I hope that one day, you’ll find what you’re looking for, too.”