Page 115 of The Fiancée Farce
Gemma let loose another growl.“Brooks.”
Anger was easier to process than the dozen other less comfortable emotions vying for their turn in the spotlight. Gemma wasgoodat being angry; it was like slipping into a well-worn pair of jeans that hugged her hips just right, the denim soft and broken in, a comfortable kind of armor.
He held his hands up once more. “Bad joke.”
Understatement of the century.
“What? Did you blow through your pool ofPlayboymodels and decide it was time to spice things up, shift gears to ex-sisters-in-law?”
Of all the reactions she might have expected, Brooks flinching wasn’t one of them. “Do you really think so low of me?”
He sounded crushed, completely at odds with his usualdon’t give a damnattitude. Invasion of the body snatchers, indeed.
She uncrossed her arms, dropping them to her sides. “She’s mymom, Brooks.”
There was nothing Gemma wouldn’t do to protect her.
His Adam’s apple bobbed on a hard swallow. “I was seventeen when I met Lena.”
Hello, non sequitur. “Okay?” Gemma frowned. “I mean, yeah, that would make sense. Mom had me when she was—”
“No.” Brooks shook his head. “I—Christ.” He undid the topmost button of his shirt and reached for his champagne, downing what remained in the glass in one swallow. “It was March. A Tuesday. I know because I had stayed late after school forLes Misrehearsals.” Brooks smiled. “I was playing Marius, of course.”
Gemma rolled her eyes.
“I came here, to the club, for a drink. Nothing out of the ordinary. I sat myself down at my usual spot, and a pretty waitress I hadn’t seen before came to take my order. I ordered a G and T, and she asked for my ID.” He smiled again. “No one here had ever bothered to ask for my ID before.I’m Brooks van Dalen, I told her. She said,that’s nice, but I still need to see your ID.” He chuckled. “She couldn’t have given less of a damn who I was, and I was smitten.”
Gemma pressed the heel of her hand to her chest, feeling suddenly at a loss for words.
“I came every single day after school. We talked. And got to know each other. She was my friend. And my infatuation grew until, before I knew it, I was head over heels in love with the beautiful girl behind the bar who took absolutely none of my bullshit.”
“What happened?” And how was she only now hearing this for the first time?
Brooks stared at her with a devastated frown. “What Victor wants, Victor gets.”
She pressed the heel of her hand harder against her chest, trying to massage away the ache behind her breastbone. “Tell me.”
He looked distraught but did as she asked. “I came to the club for lunch one weekend with my father and oldest brother and, asluck would have it, my friend was working. Shortly after, I was offered a summer internship at a law firm in London. I was given no choice but to accept it and leave immediately. I wrote to her, but I was young and stupid and far too trusting—I later learned the missive was never received.” The shattered look in his eyes was at odds with his smile when he met her gaze across the table. “When I returned, your mother was several weeks pregnant with you and under the presumption that I had merely . . . left. And your father,ever the white knight, had woven a web of lies in my absence. The rest is, as they say, history.”
Damn her father and this whole destructive family.
She’d be damned if she let history repeat itself. If she let the Van Dalens hurt someone else she cared about.
She’d made Tansy a promise, a promise to protect her, and it was a promise she intended to keep for as long as she lived.
“There are a great many things in life I regret,” Brooks continued. “But none more than letting my brother and my father dictate my choices. Choices with repercussions that affected not only my life, but Lena’s, too.”
Movement over Brooks’s shoulder caught her eye: her mother approaching him from behind. Gemma held her tongue, heart pounding behind her palm.
“I have no ulterior motives, Gemma,” he promised, holding out his arms, laying himself bare. “No nefarious intentions, I swear. I would merely like the opportunity to right a wrong and maybe, just maybe, see if I could have a second chance with my first love.” The color in his cheeks deepened. “Quite frankly, my only love.”
A wide, watery smile broke out across her mother’s face, and if Brooks’s story hadn’t cracked her open, that alone would’ve done it.
Gemma took a deep breath, air whistling between her lips,shoulders rolling back, standing straighter. “I swear, if you hurt her, I will sink your yacht to the bottom of Lake Union with you strapped to the deck. Got it?”
Brooks held a hand up to his chest. “I will give you the rope myself.”
“Good.” She gave a sharp nod. “And I want zero details.” She met her mother’s eye. “Fromeitherof you.”
