She pursed her lips. “I didn’t know you had siblings.”
“We’re all scattered. Doing our own things.” He’d scarcely spoken to either of them since the trial.
“Let me guess. You’re the oldest?”
“Guilty as charged.”
“You were probably super bossy, too.”
That made him grin. “There I plead the fifth.”
“Uh-huh.” She leaned in closer to inspect a corner of the painting, and he half thought she’d decided to drop it. But then she turned to him, arms crossed over her chest. “You never volunteer anything, do you?”
He frowned. “Excuse me?”
“Every time it’s your turn to talk about yourself, you answer questions. Barely. But you never offer anything.”
Her accusation took him off guard.
He’d volunteered plenty, their first couple of days. He’d shown her that painting and told her about his childhood visits to the Louvre. About his father’s ring.
He’d volunteered things he’d never volunteered before.
And besides. “This all started with me asking you to tell me more about what we were looking at.”
It had started with a question he hadn’t even cared about until it had come out of his mouth.
“But it evolved into us talking about your family. Or at least me trying to.”
She wasn’t wrong, but nothing about it seemed fair. “So you can be evasive and I can’t?”
“I wasn’t being evasive. I was just trying to figure out what you wanted.”
“To get to know you.” He spat it. “Is that such a crime?” He heard what he’d said—heard the hypocrisy in it about a second after it was out in the air. He tried to backtrack, spinning wildly. “That’s not the same thing at all. Stories about dead artists versus my whole . . .” Clusterfuck of a family. He was practically pleading now. “It’s not the same.”
“If you can’t tell me anything about who you are, then what are we even—” She cut herself off, eyes shuttering. He’d never seen her so pissed off before, and a ball of dread formed in his stomach when she waved a hand at him and turned, heading toward a sculpture on the other side of the room.
It left him alone, standing there beside a fucking Eugène Boudin, watching her walk away from him. An instinct surged up, telling him fine. If she wanted to be like that, what did he care? It was only a matter of time until she walked away in any case. If not now, in the middle of a museum, it would be in a matter of days, disappearing behind airport security, never to be heard from again.
But . . . but . . .
Fuck.
Forgetting the people surrounding them, he jogged across the gallery. Came up behind her and took her shoulders in his hands, spinning her around until they were face to face. She gazed at him expectantly, like everything that would happen after this point revolved around what he said now.
Maybe he should cut his losses and go. There were a hundred other women just like her, tourists on their own in a beautiful city, waiting to be shown a good time.
Only none of them were her. None of them would see through all his lines or make him work so hard for it. None would come to him so innocent and yet so fiery. She was the one he wanted to give up his empty days to walk around museums with, and take to quirky restaurants, and kiss and touch. The one he wanted to spread out naked on his bed.
“My name is Rylan Bellamy,” he said, and it was the truth.
But like everything he’d told her this week, it was only a partial truth, and the part he didn’t say burned. He’d been going by his middle name since college—had settled on changing it the day his father sent in his acceptance letter for him. As if choosing his name were any kind of substitute for choosing his fate. He hadn’t offered the rest of it to anyone in years.
But now it rose up in his throat, that monstrosity he’d been saddled with at birth. That weight that had been placed on his shoulders, that had determined his path for his entire life.
Theodore Rylan Bellamy III.
Somehow, withholding it from her felt like a lie.
He darted his gaze up to her face, searching for any sign she’d caught him in it. But her mouth was a flat line, her eyes impassive and impatient. She was still waiting. He needed to give her more.
Right. She’d been asking him about his family.
He took a deep breath. “I’m the oldest of three children. My sister, Lexie, is three years younger than me. She’s finishing business school, and she’s going to take over the goddamn world someday.” She really was. Lexie, the spitfire. If she’d only been a son . . . Instead, his father had gotten him. Him and . . . “My brother, Evan, is the youngest. He’s a junior in college, and no one knows what he’s going to do with his life, but he—” He cut himself off at the pang in his chest. Because Evan was the real disappointment of the family, and yet . . . “He’s like you. And my mother. He loves art, and beautiful things.”
And that’s why Rylan had always fought so hard to protect him. To keep him from being stuffed into the same airless box that Rylan had.
He’d made sure his brother had a choice.
Kate’s mouth had dropped open, like she hadn’t been expecting any of that. It hadn’t hurt to give it to her, though. All at once he wanted to take back the myriad half truths he’d told her and start anew.
But the idea of it had him reeling, suspended on a tightrope and ready to fall. She’d walk away for real if he did.
That didn’t just hurt. It ached, and in ways he wasn’t prepared for it to.
Something inside of him lurched, reversing wildly to pull him from the precipice. All the lessons he’d had drummed into him about holding his cards close to his chest, not showing people the tools they could use to ruin you—they crowded in around him. Keeping him safe.
He let her go, drawing his hands to his sides to hook them in his belt. He took a single step back. Squaring his jaw and lifting his chin, he said, “And that’s more than I’ve volunteered to anyone. In years.”
Hell, when was the last time he’d given away his last name?
There was danger in all of this, but he stood there beneath the weight of her scrutiny. She’d effectively asked him to let her get to know him. If what he’d offered hadn’t been enough, that wasn’t his fault. Not now.
After what felt like an hour, she closed her mouth, and her posture softened. She reached out a hand, crossing the space he’d put between them, and the air seemed to shiver as the distance shattered and fell.
Her hand on his was cool and small and soft, but it was a relief. The one she placed against his heart even more so.
Gazing up at him, she smiled, real and tentative. “Thank you.”
His throat refused to work, so all he could do was nod.
“Come on,” she said after a moment. She nodded her head toward the hall. “I don’t have a lot I can tell you about Eugène Boudin. But I hear they have an incredible collection of Cézannes?”
It terrified him, just how good that invitation sounded. Twisting his wrist, he moved to intertwine their fingers, swallowing past the tightness in his lungs. “Lead the way.”
The strangest mixture of excitement and nerves bubbled up behind Kate’s ribs. Rylan’s palm was warm against hers, and he followed her so willingly.
She’d challenged him. Called him out for the evasiveness that had been making her feel more and more disposable with every aborted conversation. And he’d chased her down and told her things. Not much, but enough.
And now he wanted to listen to her talk about art.
She was falling into something entirely too deep with this man, giving him more and more of her trust, despite the way her head screamed at her not to. But as they wound their way through the galleries, dodging other patrons and nodding at security guards as they passed them by, she gave in to it. She felt incredible and in control and alive. Consequences were things she could worry about later.