Page 7 of How to Belong with a Billionaire

She shot me an alley-cat grin. “Fun, isn’t it?”

“That’s for me to know, and you to find out.”

“You little minx.”

We’d reached the financial district. Not my favourite bit of London, I had to admit. It was almost as if the centuries had been smoothed away with the buildings themselves, leaving nothing but glass, like blinded eyes, reflecting the steel-grey nothing of the sky. Or alternatively: It reminded me of Caspian, so all I was seeing was my own emptied-out heart.

George pulled over in the Barad-dûr–esque shadow of Hart & Associates. “So what’s it to be?”

“I…I don’t know.”

“Nobody’ll think less of you, either way.”

I peered up at Caspian’s place of business. His twenty-first-century fortress, coldly gleaming. “Imight.”

“There’s no shame in love or pain.”

“Well”—I pushed open the car door and scrambled onto the pavement—“I’m sick of both.”

And I marched in like I fucking owned the place.

The effect of which was slightly diminished by the fact nobody really noticed or cared, and I had to stand in the lobby like a lemon while George got her camera bag out of the boot.

But then we were in the lift, being whooshed up to Caspian’s floor in that tiny glass bead. And it was impossible not to remember the last time I’d done this. I’d been furious then, but so full of hope.

No hope today.

Just the determination to look Caspian in the eye, and feel whatever I felt, and know I’d keep living after.

George nudged her shoulder gently against mine. “If you need to run away screaming, just pull your ear or something, and I’ll cover for you.”

“I won’t need to.”

“What can I say?” She smirked at me. “I’m a fan of safe words.”

And so she managed to make me laugh as the doors opened, admitting us into the vestibule outside Caspian’s office.

It hadn’t changed. Which was to say, it was still as intimidating as hell. Glass and marble and blah blah blah. And Bellerose, at his desk, looking like a terribly severe angel.

“Hi.” I waved in acheck me out not being totally destroyedkind of way.

His head snapped up. And, wow, he was looking rough: dark circles under his eyes, cracked lips, acne rashes across the tops of his cheeks. “Arden. I—”

“We’re here fromMilieu. We’ve got an appointment.”

“Yes, I know. It’s just…” He scraped a lank lock of hair away from his brow. “Actually, it’s fine. Go right in.”

I should probably have been squirrelling my emotional energy away for, well, myself. But for all his chilly ways, Bellerose had been oddly kind to me.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

He frowned, reverting to his more typical mode of Impatient with Arden. “Of course I am.”

“Are…are you sure?”

For a moment, he stared at me, his expression almost pleading. But all he said was, “Mr. Hart’s in his office.”

And so I had no choice but to let it go.