Page 32 of Worth Every Moment (Hawkston Billionaires #4)

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“ T he account is empty.” The voice of my banker booms from my desk phone, which I’ve put on speaker.

I’m too agitated to sit down, so I’m pacing my office.

Normally, this large, airy room with its vast glass windows and epic views over London's skyline, is a place of refuge for me.

A sanctuary of sorts. I know what the fuck to do when I'm behind my desk, and this small corner of the world is mine to control.

“What the fuck?” I run my hands through my freshly washed hair. It’s a mess, but thank God it doesn’t have any of that awful product left in it.

“It’s all gone, sir.”

“Where? Where the fuck has it gone? Whoever took my wallet can’t have spent 28 million quid in the supermarket.”

“The card hasn’t been used.”

That uneasy prickle works its way up my spine. “What do you mean?”

“Whoever took your card, can’t use it. Didn’t use it. It was cancelled before they had a chance to use it.”

“You’re telling me everything’s gone, but it has nothing to do with the fact that someone nicked my shit at a photo shoot earlier today?”

“Yes, sir. That’s what I’m saying.” His voice trembles and he clears his throat. The poor prick sounds nervous. “When did you last check your balance?”

There’s a hint of accusation in his voice that I can’t ignore.

“Are you implying I lost 28 million quid? I just didn’t notice?

” A lead weight sinks through my gut, tugging me down into the darkness of shame.

That could have happened. I don’t look at my accounts that often.

I have so many that I mostly trust that whatever I left in them is still going to be there when I come back I have people monitoring my money.

Our family’s financial advisors. My father’s—

Fuck .

A numbness works its way up my legs. I need to fucking sit down. “Is there any trace of it?”

“Excuse me?”

I lean against the desk, both palms flat on it, head hanging down between my shoulders. I lift one hand and tug on my tie, yanking it loose. “The money. Surely it leaves a trace. A path. A fucking exit route from my account.”

“No, sir. None of that. This is… inexplicable. It appears to have…”

“To have what?” I snap.

“Vanished, sir.”

I cover my face with my hands, press my fingertips into my eye sockets, and let out a rumbling groan.

“Sir? Is everything— ”

I fucking knew it. I hang up before he can say anything else. My heart hammers. This is seriously fucked, and I know exactly who’s to blame. And I know I will never, ever , see that money again.

A knock on the door followed by my brother’s voice calling my name has me rushing to compose myself.

If he finds me like this, he’s going to think I’m fucking messy.

Useless . Especially after I didn’t show up to work this morning, which is a first. Actually, a second, given I skipped work to spend the afternoon with Erica. She’s leading me astray...

“Yeah. Come in,” I say as I sit behind my desk, trying to steady my breathing. It’s only money. It’s okay.

It’s not only money. It’s Dad’s first move on the fucking chessboard.

Nico enters, striding right up to me and dropping a brand new iPhone in its box on my desk.

He stares at me for a second, and I wonder what he knows.

“How was Dad when you had lunch?” he asks, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

If he’s asking about Dad, then he’s not going to lay into me about playing truant earlier.

“He’s okay. Same old prick, really. Seems to be recovering well.”

A not-insignificant part of me wants to tell Nico everything. That Dad is gonna fuck me over. Drain my accounts if I don’t do what he wants. That I have to marry some young woman I hardly know right when Erica has finally agreed to date me.

Fake date me.

Whatever. It’s close enough. I don’t want to ruin it by having to get married to someone else.

But I can’t tell him. The idea of sharing this with Nico, letting them see that, yet again, Dad is playing me in a way he’d never do to him or Matt…

using me for his own gain… the shame of it is too much.

I can’t tell anyone. This is between me and Dad, and I will fucking sort it out myself if it kills me.

Nico nods, sliding his hands into his pockets, but still eyeing me with suspicion. “What were you doing in east London earlier? At the Wakefield studio?”

I rest my elbow on the desk and drop my forehead to my hand. I could lie to him. Or I could tell him the truth. “Who told you?”

“Your PA told me after you called and asked her to cancel all your cards.”

I heave a sigh. “I really need to talk to her about keeping my shit confidential.” Nico’s harsh gaze doesn’t leave my face, and I know he’s waiting for more of an explanation, so I offer it up. “I was doing Erica a favour. She had a fight with her mum last week and she’s been upset. So—”

“So you got half naked and let her paint you?” He says it with such disdain—as if I must be a class-A moron to have participated in such frivolity—that I want to punch him.

He flashes his phone at me, and sure enough, there’s the picture of me and Erica.

I know Erica said it wasn’t porn, but it’s definitely sensual.

Suggestive. Fuck it, she looks like a goddess climaxing on my lap.

Maybe Nico has a point.

“This is not a good look for business,” he says. “And she’s named you. ‘ My boyfriend, Seb Hawkston, agreed to pose with me. Isn’t he gorgeous? I couldn’t think of anyone better to launch my new fragrance—Infinity—with than him ’.”

A noise in the doorway draws both our attention, and I glance up to find Matt standing there, phone in hand. My stomach drops.

“When did you get tattoos?” he asks.

Resting my elbow on my desk, I drop my forehead into my hand. “Do you have nothing better to do than stalk me on social media?”

“The receptionists are all out there gossiping about it,” Matt says, gesturing with his thumb over his shoulder. He approaches my desk, looming over me before dropping into a chair opposite. “What’s the deal with Lefroy?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’ve never had a proper girlfriend and suddenly you’re dating your best friend?”

I bristle. “You had a wife and now you’re engaged to your nanny. What’s the actual question?”

Matt grunts and shifts in the chair. “I’m just saying, you’re the guy who never takes a woman to his house. One night stands in the hotel. Keep it casual, make it meaningless. It’s practically a mantra you live by.”

I hold in the groan that wants to spill from my mouth.

My past behaviour has done me no favours here.

I wish I could wipe it all away, especially if it means my brothers would take this relationship between me and Erica seriously.

I’m truly a lost cause if the first relationship I need them to take seriously isn’t even real.

“And she’s never shown an interest in you before either. You know… romantically,” Matt continues. “It makes me wonder what changed.”

Nico paces to the window, hands in his pockets. “What he means is, why now? Why would Erica Lefroy decide you’re good enough now?”

We’re all quiet a touch too long. Every muscle in my body strains with tension. “I really don’t like what you’re implying,” I say, finally.

“I’m not implying anything,” Nico says. “I’m just interpreting Matt’s inability to ask a direct question.”

“Fuck’s sake,” Matt mutters, staring at me. “Don’t be an idiot about this. I get why you’d do it. You’ve worshipped that woman forever—”

“Have not—”

“Stop,” Nico cuts in. “Matt’s about to use multiple words in a row. Don’t disturb him. It might never happen again.”

A smile threatens to break across my face even though I’m already pissed off at the direction this conversation is taking.

Matt scowls in Nico’s direction, then focuses back on me. “Are you really dating her?”

There is no fucking way I am telling them this is fake. No way . “Yes.”

Matt weighs this up. “It seems to have come out of nowhere. She’s never spent time with you in public and suddenly you’re the guy in the perfume campaign? I mean… no disrespect, but what the actual fuck?”

“We’ve spent loads of time together,” I counter, but it sounds weak, even to my ear.

Matt lets out a sigh that softens his shoulders. “You’ve spent time together at home, on the sofa. Watching movies. But not out in public.”

“We’ve been at plenty of parties together.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t arrive or leave together, did you?”

A chill rolls over my skin. I’ve always known how Erica liked to do things, micromanaging our friendship to suit herself.

And I was really, truly, okay with it. I’d give her anything she wanted and do whatever she wanted.

If it weren’t for the way Matt is questioning me on it, I wouldn’t give it a second thought.

“She’s Erica. She likes to do things on her terms.”

“Exactly,” Matt quips. “Why do you think she always asked Nico when she needed a public date? Why didn’t she ask you?”

I mentally run over the past events she attended with Nico before he was officially with Kate.

Charity galas, fashion show after parties.

The whole fucking lot. He was always the one on her arm, not me.

In the past, I chalked it up to Nico being boring and responsible, and Erica assuming I wouldn’t enjoy the events.

But now, with Matt staring at me like he feels sorry for me, I realise I’ve been deep in denial, and a truth that has hovered at the edges of my consciousness is suddenly flashing before me in fucking Technicolor.

Erica chose Nico because she didn’t want me .

Her words from the gallery batter through my mind on repeat like an endless round of gunfire.

You’re a joke .

Manwhore .

A wave of pain crashes through me, bringing with it the thought that, even if I do everything for her, there’s still a possibility that she’ll never think I’m good enough. Not for anything real , at any rate.