Page 2

TWO

LANDRY

I raced down the street with my heart already pounding and my head spinning and ran for two solid hours until my legs shook and my stomach cramped. By the time I reached my building, the taste of Kenji’s kiss was already stronger in my memory than on my tongue.

Damn him. Damn him to fucking hell for not giving me a chance.

Our argument at Christmas played through my head for the millionth time. I’d tried to make my case—to convince Kenji to take a chance at turning our physical relationship into something more, something with actual, confessed feelings—but he’d soundly rejected me.

“You’re incapable of a serious relationship, Landry,” he’d said. “And you don’t know who you are or what you want. Why would I want to be with someone like that?”

It had cut deep, mostly because he was right in some ways… just not for the reasons he thought.

Exhausted and heartsore, annoyed at both Kenji and myself, I took the elevator up to the penthouse, trying to think up a way to keep myself distracted for the next four weeks so I didn’t accidentally find myself jogging in the neighborhood of San Cordova, pretending to need a bathroom just so Kenji might invite me in.

When the elevator door opened and I noticed a suitcase in my entry hall, I realized my distraction had arrived, but it was not the pleasant sort I’d been hoping for.

Fucking fuck. I leaned forward and braced my hands on my knees, concentrating on taking a deep breath and letting it out. Jesus Christ. Just what I do not need right now.

“I can hear you out there cursing silently, Everett,” Nan’s voice called from the kitchen. “Might as well face the music.”

Nancy Bayliss was my father’s majordomo. The woman who’d been half housekeeper, half auntie to me growing up and the person most likely to call me on my bullshit.

Second only to Kenji, of course.

“How did you get in here?” I asked, coming around the corner and seeing her making herself at home with my kettle and the tea things. “And you know I prefer Landry .”

Nan’s hair was pulled back in its usual twist, but a few silver-brown strands were loose around her face. Her clothes were a bit wrinkled, which wasn’t usual for her—it was clear she’d just flown in—and her smile looked tired.

“What makes you think I don’t have a key? I manage all of the family properties for you and your father.”

I moved over to the cabinet to get a glass and fill it with cold water from the fridge. “This isn’t a Davencourt property. It’s my personal one, and we both know it.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine, then. I sweet-talked your doorman. It turns out he has a beloved Cornish Rex. I grew up with Cornish Rexes. That was all it took. Oh, and I gave him a tin of Walker’s Shortbread from the airport Duty Free.”

I snorted. Bruce was a sucker for shortbread, so I’d asked Nan to send me some homemade shortbread from the cook at the family’s Scotland estate to go along with Bruce’s holiday bonus last year. Nan never forgot a detail, nor did she refrain from using one to her advantage when needed.

“This isn’t a good time, Nan.”

She picked up two full mugs and tilted her head toward the sofas in the living area. “Have a cuppa with me. We need to talk.”

I was filthy. Covered in sweat and probably still reeking of sex. But something in her tone alerted me to the fact this was serious. I followed her to the sofa and sat down.

Nan took a careful sip of her tea before glancing at me. “Your father’s health is deteriorating.”

“His health or his memory?” I asked. “Because you have a hard time saying the words. Dementia. Alzheimer’s.” The words weren’t hard for me to say. Accepting what they meant for him and for me, however…

Her lips firmed. “He’s no longer able to do his job, Landry. I’ve been trying to tell you for a while now, but you’ve continued to ask for more time. Well, I’m afraid that’s no longer an option. If you leave it much longer, your father might reveal your identity by accident. We need to get him out of the public eye and into a quiet retirement on the estate. And you need to take your place as the future Earl of Davencourt.”

Nan’s words were a calm statement of fact, yet they made my heart ricochet around my chest.

“Dad can simply take leave.” I felt like I was reciting lines from a script, replaying a conversation we’d had several times. “Our publicists can tell everyone he’s dealing with health issues. Cora’s already handling the family charitable foundation, and I’m managing the estates remotely. The only part of it I’m not doing is the glad-handing bullshit?—”

She lifted a sculpted eyebrow. “And a little thing known as the House of Lords.”

I made a sound of disgust. Inheriting the earldom after my father passed was one thing; serving in Parliament was another. Besides, things were different now. A seat in the Lords wasn’t passed down from father to son anymore. A replacement was carefully selected from a list of hereditary peers in a by-election. And as I had no interest in politics, I would be a terrible choice.

However, fifteen generations of Davencourts before me had been willing to take their place in the House of Lords, and I couldn’t—wouldn’t—be the first to throw off legacy. It was unthinkable. Instead, I would put myself forward when the time came and expect a polite, but quick, rejection.

Nan seemed to think otherwise. “You are a hereditary peer. The Right Honorable Everett Landry Davencourt, Viscount Hawling,” she said, as if I’d ever been able to forget. “Your father has served in the Lords for forty years. He’s spoken to Teddy about you taking his place, and the prime minister would like to meet with you to discuss it.” She tilted her head and studied me. “There’s only so long a young peer can be off ‘finding himself.’ Your gap year has become a gap decade, I’m afraid. You’re needed back in England.”

The press of lifelong family expectations was a familiar weight on my shoulders. “This is why he let me hide,” I reminded her a bit desperately. “He didn’t want me to feel this pressure.”

Even if I wasn’t selected for Parliament, I would be expected to re-enter high society, be the face of the Davencourt earldom, which involved rubbing elbows with other peers, influencing politics to benefit the family’s holdings and purpose, marrying within my station, and playing pretty peer at charity events. It all seemed so staid and boring. The opposite of who I was and the life I wanted.

Nan nodded. “Who do you think arranged everything? Your father. And I’m happy it worked. Considering you chose the most high-profile career possible, it’s frankly a miracle you’ve managed to keep your title under wraps this long.”

Nan was right, but then again, I hadn’t exactly planned on becoming a fashion model. And I sure as hell hadn’t planned on becoming a world-famous one.

Fortunately, the long-haired blond with perfect skin and chiseled abs on the cover of fashion spreads was unrecognizable from the scrawny teen with military-short mousy-brown hair, spots, and a belly a bit rounded from pints at the pub with his mates. I’d left school before going into sixth form and had spent two years studying for my A-levels with private tutors while watching my mother’s final struggles with lung disease. I’d been the late-in-life miracle child, which meant I’d had to watch my parents suffer from age complaints and illnesses way too soon. My father had witnessed the toll my mother’s decline and death had taken on me, which was why he’d agreed to my desire to run away from my life and start over somewhere new—somewhere people didn’t know I was the long-awaited “Davencourt heir,” potentially on the cusp of becoming one of the largest landholders in the United Kingdom outside of the royal family.

I’d meant to sneak away just long enough to have a normal college experience in America. My father had insisted on an Ivy League education, but otherwise, he’d gone along with my request for a temporary name change, a glow-up, and a fresh start.

But the expectation had always been there, a giant noble anvil hanging over my head, stamped with the family crest and crusted with hundreds of years of expectations.

“I’m not ready,” I whispered to Nan now. Even I could hear the emotion in my voice. I cleared my throat. “Not yet. I need more time.”

“That’s what you said last time we discussed this.” Nan set her tea down and scooted closer before squeezing my arm. “Is this about a man?”

I clenched my back teeth together. “That makes me sound pathetic and childish.”

She laughed. “It’s not pathetic and childish to want to find love, darling. It’s very normal.”

I huffed. “Nothing normal about this situation, I promise you. I’m not sure love is in the cards with this one. At least… at least not on his side.”

I, of course, already loved Kenji more than was healthy. My side wasn’t the problem. But Kenji had already decided I wasn’t a good bet for a relationship… and that was before he learned that I’d been hiding the truth about my name and title, the work I spent half my time doing, and my family responsibilities.

Nan reached for her tea again and sat back, kicking off her shoes and tucking one leg underneath the other. Despite being in her mid-fifties, Nan remained trim and fit. Managing the upkeep of the Davencourt estate was no small position, and Nancy Bayliss had held the job for decades.

She studied me as she sipped her tea, and I tried not to squirm. She’d known me since I was nothing but skinned-kneed and gap-toothed. If there was a secret to be had, Nan would suss it out.

“Unrequited love? How very Shakespearean.”

I sighed.

She gave me an empathetic smile. “So tell me about him, this man of yours. Is this simply a crush, or are you two actually seeing each other?”

I stalled for time with another sip of tea. Now that I was cooling off from the run, my sweat-damp clothes were turning cold and unpleasant. The gray January day outside the wall of windows in my apartment didn’t do much to warm me. “Neither, really. I mean… both?”

Nan let out a soft laugh. “Well, that’s clear as mud.”

I took another sip and glanced at her out of the corner of my eye. “It’s Kenji.”

She opened her mouth, then closed it again. “Kenji, as in… your executive assistant?”

“You make it sound inappropriate,” I snapped.

Nan lifted that damned eyebrow of hers but didn’t say anything.

I gritted my teeth. “It wasn’t like we planned it.” My heart thumped a little faster as I remembered that night. “He was angry. I was… also angry. Anyway, it just happened.”

“You mean sex,” she said. “You slept with him.”

My face heated. Nan matter-of-factly discussing my sex life was somehow worse than if it had been my own mother. I nodded.

“Recently?”

Very recently. As in, just a few hours ago. I coughed and took another sip of tea. “Three years ago, the first time,” I mumbled. “It’s been off and on since.”

She nodded slowly. “And you have feelings for him, but you say he doesn’t necessarily return those feelings.”

I inhaled sharply through my nose. “He acts like he doesn’t,” I admitted. “Hell, he acts like he hates me. But then sometimes…”

I thought back to the nights Kenji had allowed himself to fall asleep with me—the times he’d curled against me, searched for my hand, and tucked his face into my shoulder, trusting me implicitly when he was too exhausted to remember all the reasons he didn’t want to trust me.

I let out a breath. “I just want him to give us a chance. Give me a chance. Let me prove to him that I…”

Nan patted my arm. “Have real feelings for him?”

“He doesn’t know. About my family.” I darted a glance at her. The look of empathy on her face bordered a little too close to pity. “And I can’t tell him. Not now. Not after all this time. He’ll think I’m even less responsible than I am.”

Her smile dropped. “You’re the most responsible man I know, Landry. You have two full-time jobs and manage to live a double life without anyone outside the family being any the wiser.”

“Yes, well. Lying but doing it well probably isn’t a point in my favor.” I winked.

Trying to lighten the mood was pretty much my default setting, but it was harder than usual in that moment. I needed to leave off this unpleasant topic so I could search for my equilibrium. Kenji’s departure was still too raw, and I was nearly shivering from cold in my running kit.

I stood. “I need to shower and change before I run us both out of here with my stench. Give me a few?”

I didn’t wait for her response, simply disappeared down the hallway to my bedroom. The firm press of her stare followed me all the way.

As I made my way into the bathroom and turned on the water jets, I wondered at her making such a long trip. Things must be serious with my father, even though he’d seemed okay in December when I’d visited last. I’d stopped in London on my way back from a job in Paris and spent a week listening to my father tell me stories from his travels to Africa in the 1980s to visit his late brother, stories I’d heard a thousand times before and could recite word for word. When he wasn’t regaling me with the same old shit, he became sentimental about how he’d met my mother or about Davencourt Park, the country estate where our ancestors had lived for hundreds of years, though he hadn’t lived there full-time in ages.

I hated those visits. Every time I walked into Hawling House in London, I felt invisible chains tightening around my chest. Grief at the slow loss of my father was one part of it. The clock ticking on my freedom was another. And though I’d always known there was an expiry date on my life as Landry Davis, I wasn’t ready to give it— me —up.

I stood under the pounding hot water and let it wash away the dirt and morose feelings. I had no business feeling sorry for myself because one of my many sources of untold wealth was demanding my attention.

What right did I have to throw a pity party? None whatsoever.

I replayed moments from my night with Kenji. The clench of his stomach muscles as I ran my tongue around his nipple. The sound of his breath catching when I murmured the word beautiful into his skin. The scent of his shampoo as I wound a long strand of his hair around my finger and tugged.

I groaned into steamy air. The man was sex on two legs. He was putty in my hands when we were naked together, but he was so fucking stubborn outside of the bedroom.

He was regimented and strict. Exacting and professional. Scarily— sexily —competent. The only time Kenji seemed to allow himself any pleasure was during sex or his damned meditation sessions. And knowing I was the man who got to glimpse the softness behind that hard shell, who got to light the fuse that made his tightly leashed control explode in a white-hot shimmer, felt like a privilege far more precious than anything else Everett Davencourt or Landry Davis could possess.

All these thoughts of Kenji made my dick hard as usual. I stroked myself off to memories of being inside the hot clench of his body. By the time I dried off and pulled on clean clothes, I was shaking from hunger and exhaustion.

When I returned to the living area, I saw takeout bags from Katz’s deli. My mouth watered immediately. “I can’t eat that. I have a shoot in the morning.” It came out whinier than I’d intended, but my disappointment was real. Katz’s pastrami was world-famous. Nan couldn’t help but order it as soon as she landed every time she came to New York.

“I wasn’t sure, so I also ordered you an avocado quinoa salad with hard-boiled eggs.” She gestured to the dining table by the window. “Have a seat, and I’ll get you a… well, I guess you don’t want too much water, do you?”

I let out a breath. “No. They want abs.”

We sat down and started eating. After a few minutes, she couldn’t hold back her strong opinion. “When are you going to stop torturing yourself with this ridiculous diet?”

There was no point in arguing with her because she was right. For the past year, I’d begun hating my modeling career. I’d taken fewer and fewer jobs, only keeping enough of them to be able to still call myself a professional model without feeling like a fraud. I didn’t need the money. Not only had I been born into obscene wealth, but I’d tripped into a second fortune when a group of university friends and I had invented a software program that had sold for billions. And then there’d been my modeling career.

I had more money than sense.

But I also had more money than purpose. If I didn’t want to be the earl yet, and I didn’t want to be a supermodel, and I didn’t want to help run the tech incubator company my friends and I owned, then what was I? Who was I?

“…you don’t know who you are or what you want. Why would I want to be with someone like that?”

Kenji was right.

“I don’t know how to stop,” I admitted before filling my mouth with enough salad to keep from saying more.

“You tell them you’re done. Hell, you tell them you have to go home and take over the family business. They’ll understand, especially when they learn who you really are.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“Not easy, maybe, but simple. Your father needs you, Landry. And it wasn’t like you were going to hide from your responsibilities forever.”

“I have a couple of weeks free after tomorrow’s shoot,” I offered. “I was going to use that time to deal with estate business remotely, but I can do it in London and check on Dad.”

She studied me. “And while you’re there, we can make a plan for you to meet with the prime minister to talk about serving in the Lords.”

“Not yet.” I held up a hand. “Please, Nan. This is not my agreement to make anything official. It’s my agreement to come check on Dad and help out, okay?”

I expected her to argue further or at least call me out for being in denial, so her sigh of relief surprised me. “I’m just happy you can come. I’m sure once you see the state of things, you’ll feel ready to finally take your place where you belong. Back home with us.”

I tucked into my salad despite the nerves churning up my stomach.

Maybe Nan was right. I wanted to retire from modeling anyway, things with Kenji seemed to be in a perpetual stalemate, and managing the estate already took a lot of my time and attention. Would it really be so bad to claim the role of heir publicly?

It didn’t take long for me to learn that the answer to that question was an unequivocal yes .