Last Name - Dr. Rebecca Sharp Page 0,55

want them to know how bad the debt was… what my father had done.”

I shuddered. “And what did he do?” I forged on. “I’ve seen your looks. I’ve seen the way you bite your tongue when people bring up your father and how you fight to change the topic.”

I turned to face him, closing the space that had grown between us when he came to a stop.

“What else did he do?”

His eyes narrowed on me, the slits darkening with the painful memory.

“He had an affair.” The words dropped like a silent bomb in the space between us. “But I’m guessing you already knew something to that effect because you are asking.”

Now, my strength faltered, my head dipping to look at the floor.

“An affair with an employee,” I murmured quietly, unsure if I was asking a question or making the accusation.

It took several minutes. Minutes where we went through the motions that now felt routine before bed. Minutes of silence that screamed with the truth.

His father slept with an employee.

And now, so had James.

Of course, it was different. James wasn’t cheating on… me.

Still my heart ached with the weight of the burden I realized he was carrying.

I sat cross-legged on top of the duvet facing the bathroom door, waiting for him to emerge. The air felt unstable.

Like I’d finally reached down and saw the bedrock of what made James himself. The same way he’d seen the darkest parts of me.

“Carrie…”

My head snapped up.

“I shouldn’t have asked,” I said with a small voice.

His shoulders dipped with a sigh as he climbed onto the bed in front of me. Placing his knuckles under my jaw, he brushed his thumb back and forth over my skin, staring at me for a long moment.

“You should,” he said. “And I should’ve told you.”

“They don’t know, do they?” I murmured.

His regret was smeared with hurt and anger. “No,” he clipped. “When I found out about the debts, I looked into how things had gotten too bad. Turned out, his business trips to look at new properties were mini-vacations with… his mistress.”

He tried to hide it, but that word sent a wave of disgust through him that was palpable.

“I’m sorry…” I repeated, though the words didn’t seem like enough.

“It changed everything for me,” he continued. “Finding out the crater of debt the business was in shook my whole world. But finding out this… seeing for the first time my father’s true character…”

“James…”

“It changed everything, but it wasn’t what broke me.” His gaze hardened. “What broke me was thinking about what it would do to my family. To my mom. To Lars.”

My heart ached.

“They were grieving, and the thought of telling them the truth… what would happen if they found out…”

“Does anyone else know?”

My jaw tightened. “Some of the upper-level managers and board members. I’m sure some staff. I’ve done everything to keep the truth contained. Even now…”

“You don’t think they deserve to know the truth?” I asked with a strained voice.

“Deserve?” he growled. “What they deserve is for it to not be the truth. But I can’t change that. The only thing I can do is shield them from it. What purpose would it serve to tell them now? What good would it do?”

I coughed to hide my small cry, swallowing down my emotional protest.

It would save us.

“It would take this burden off your shoulders,” I said unsteadily. “The burden of being the only one in your family who knows the truth. They already think you’ve done so much… sacrificed so much… to save them and the business—”

“No.” The word was a gavel. Verdict made. Judgment passed.

His hands cupped my cheeks, his gaze boring into mine. “I would do anything to protect my family,” he swore to me.

And it was the most bittersweet irony.

He swore to me with the deepest sincerity because he meant me, too. That he would do anything to protect me.

Instead, all he did was prove that having to choose between being with me and protecting them would destroy him.

“You are the most incredible man I’ve ever met,” I blurted out, my mind racing with all the things I’d have to do tomorrow.

But tonight?

I was keeping tonight for myself.

Our first night, I thought I’d never see him again. Tonight, I knew that would be the case.

“Carrie,” he growled, pulling me against him as we laid in bed.

I shuddered, sinking into his familiar warmth.

“We don’t have to talk about it right now,” he said after another minute. “But I need you to know something.”

“Yes?” I whispered,