Page 7 of From West, With Regret (NYC Billionaires #2)

FIVE

LONDON

I collapse in the middle of the floor, landing on my back with my hands over my stomach. The ceiling fan blades spin in a hypnotizing rhythm as I struggle to catch my breath.

Selene falls in a heap beside me, scooting closer until her arm is pressed against mine.

My entire body aches. My calves pulsate and my thighs burn. Not to mention my skin is covered in a thick layer of sweat, making the ends of my ponytail cling to my bare shoulder.

“I could have sworn you said spin class would help me clear my mind, but I’m beginning to think you may have invited me just to torture me.” I roll my head against the hardwood, facing my sister, and crack a small smile.

Selene turns to look at me, giggling, and the sun catches her gorgeous eyes, sparkling with a happiness I don’t see on her enough.

“You’re my sister, London. I didn’t bring you to torture you.

I genuinely thought it would help clear your mind.

It always does for me.” She brushes her unruly blonde hair from her forehead and looks back up at the ceiling.

A few stray pieces of her bangs stick to her forehead.

Her face is makeup free, and her hair is in its natural state—a sight rarely seen when it comes to my sister.

“I guess after what happened at the funeral, I needed it.” I sigh.

It’s been one week since I walked away from my husband for the last time, but all I can think about is his brother West. I haven’t been able to stop this unshakeable feeling I had that entire morning like I’ve met him before.

My lower stomach fluttered when he’d marked my arm with his name and phone number.

I rest my hand on my stomach and think about the faded ink now.

The intensity in the agonizing seconds as he scribbled on my skin a mere ghost of a memory now.

Thankfully, I wrote his number down on one of Selene’s notepads before it completely disappeared.

Fuck, what is wrong with me?

He’s my dead husband’s brother, and I only talked to him for a grand total of thirty minutes.

“I still can’t believe what happened.” Selene rolls onto her side, facing me fully as she rests her head in her hand after propping herself up on her elbow.

“What?”

“With Heath,” she says in a hushed tone. “The way his helicopter suddenly went down like that. Did they even find out what happened?”

I close my eyes. I honestly haven’t put much thought into the circumstances surrounding Heath’s death. “Something about a mechanical failure.”

“I feel sorry for the pilot in the helicopter with him. Must have been a shock to their family as well.”

“Yeah,” I agree, rolling back to face the ceiling. “I never met him, but I know him and Heath were fairly close.”

A knot twists in my chest, remembering the last thing Heath said to me before he walked out the door, on his way up to the roof, where his helicopter was waiting for him.

I was on all fours, watching the blood spill from the palm of my hand as I tried to clean up the broken pieces of the ceramic dinner plate he’d smashed against the wall seconds earlier, narrowly missing my head.

“I wish I could have gone to the funeral with you.” She confesses, her voice cracking. “At least you wouldn’t have had to face Heath’s family on your own.”

“I know.” I frown. “Glenna was insistent on it only being immediate family. Well, her definition of immediate family anyway.”

Damn. The Hall family is confusing to say the least.

“Yeah.” Selene allows her voice to drift off, accepting my explanation with reluctant acceptance.

I shift my gaze to the windows lining the front of my sister’s small studio apartment.

It’s a modest home not far from Manhattan.

The paint is peeling, and the toilet in her closet-sized bathroom doesn’t flush properly half the time, but I know this place is just a steppingstone for Selene.

It isn’t her forever home but a means to an end when it comes to her dream.

“How’s the book coming?” I ask, forcing the memory of my marriage out of my head.

“It’s going,” she says flatly.

“Doesn’t sound like it from the tone of your voice. Usually, you’re giddy when talking about it.”

She frowns and stares off in to the distance. “I don’t know. I want to pitch it to a traditional publisher, but it’s not as straightforward as it used to be.”

“So, publish it yourself. I heard the indie route is the way to go these days. You get full control and everything, right?”

“Yeah,” she sighs, still not meeting my eye.

“But you need money to make money… if I want to do it the correct way, an yway. Hiring everyone to design and edit the book isn’t bad—I can save up for that—but diving into ads and marketing is what’s terrifying.

I would have to take on a lot of that myself or hire someone.

It’s not impossible, but it is a leap of faith for someone who is barely scraping by. ”

I roll to my side and reach for her hand.

Half of my life may be a mystery, but I’m so thankful for Selene.

She’s been the one constant I can depend on, and I know if it wasn’t for her, I can think of a million different scenarios that could have been worse.

In all the darkness, she’s my bit of light, and she has been ever since we lost our parents a few years ago in a situation neither of us have truly ever gotten over.

Though I know Selene was affected the most, and it's taken years of therapy to get to where she is now.

“You have endless possibilities,” I gush. “I know that whatever you decide, you’ll make it happen.”

“Thanks.” She gives me a tight-lipped smile. “I love working for Charleigh at her flower shop, but I know it’s not what I want to be doing forever. At least I know I have that as a stream of income for now.”

“I love that she’s kept you on her team.”

“Yeah.” She chuckles. “If I didn’t already know I wanted to go into writing or publishing, I’d probably work there forever. She’s the best boss and friend.”

“Everyone’s dream.” I smile back, squeezing her hand.

We lie together in silence, which allows my mind to wander back to the faded numbers stained on my inner arm. My eyelids grow heavy despite what I know I need to do today. I lift myself up onto my elbow and search the tiny living room. “What time is it?”

Selene twists and grabs her phone from the floor behind her before she rolls back to face me and taps her screen. “It’s nine.”

“Okay.” I lay back down, my arm burning. How is my arm burning when we just spent the past hour in the spin class from hell? “My train leaves at two, so I still have time for a shower and to finish packing up before we see Grandma.”

“You don’t honestly still plan on staying in Boston, do you?” Selene asks. “There’s nothing left there for you.”

Her brutal honestly is like a small knife to the heart. She’s right.

I don’t have anyone or anything in Boston.

Our grandmother has been in a nursing home on Long Island for the past ten years, and contrary to the occasional visit I’ve managed here and there, Selene has made it her mission to visit as much as possible.

Perhaps it’s her way of making up for the ugliness we’ve endured in our lives.

Being close to our grandmother reminds Selene of the past.

A past she remembers.

“Why are you going back?” she presses. “Aside from the fact your clothes and a few other things are back in that apartment you shared.”

“I don’t know. It’s what I should do, right?”

“Why, because you were married to Heath?” she asks, stunned. “You weren’t happy in your marriage.”

I haven’t told Selene the whole truth about my marriage to Heath. West knows more than she does, but that’s only because I knew it would only give Selene more reasons to convince me to leave Heath. Skeptical from the start, she never liked him, and I couldn’t blame her.

“I know.” The truth is a hard pill to swallow.

“We’ve only been sisters half our lives, but sometimes it feels like it’s been our whole lives. Call it what you want, intuition or whatever, but my gut always made me question his motives.”

“What do you mean? ”

“There were plenty of instances, but one of them was when you told me all about his stock trading.” Her green eyes find mine again.

“I can’t say I know too much about Wall Street and stocks.

Honestly, I think I’d rather eat cardboard than attempt to figure out how all that works.

But the way he would brag about being able to manipulate the market with this stomach-turning money-hungry look in his eye.

Like what he was doing was borderline illegal and he got off on it.

” She shivers. “Rubbed me the wrong way.”

I process Selene’s thoughts—the same thoughts I would have whenever Heath would come home late after what he would call ‘a night out with the guys’, even though I knew it wasn’t as simple as that. He always counted on me not asking questions.

Selene is right to have had an unsettling feeling about Heath’s stock trading. I’ve felt the same way. Especially when he started giving out stock advice to a number of his associates, as though he were an expert or something.

“Back to your situation.” Selene cuts through my thoughts. “You may have your life in Boston, but you don’t have me. Or Julianna and Charleigh. We’d be here for you… just in case you weren’t aware.”

“I am and I know the three of you would be there for me.” I twist my mouth in thought, and stare up at the spinning blades as I feather my finger over the faded ink on my arm.

If I decide to leave Boston, I already have a job opportunity.

West wanted to hire me based on nothing more than the drawing I sketched on a napkin.

I still haven’t wrapped my head around it, wondering why.

Why me? Why is he so trusting of me to create pieces for his bars? How many pieces, and for how many bars?