Fallen Rose by Amelia Wilde

Chapter Seventeen

Haley

My birthday arrives, and Leo wakes me up with a kiss. More than one, in fact. A trail of them down my neck and between my breasts and over my stomach.

And lower.

He keeps my legs spread with his body and licks three orgasms out of me. I can’t breathe by the time he looks at me from between my thighs, dark eyes glittering, hair a gorgeous mess. It’s work to catch my breath. “Is that all?”

He licks my clit again, a precise movement that sends a tremor through my legs and makes my head fall back on the pillow. “Greedy,” he scolds, and then he crawls between my legs and fills me up.

It’s a whirlwind day, with more people in and out of the house than I’ve seen. His front door keeps opening and closing. It gets louder every time, because Leo’s security team checks everyone who comes in. I’m forbidden from going into the dining room. I’m required to have lunch brought to me on a silver tray while I read.

In the afternoon he sends Mrs. Page to bring me to the guest suite, where two women in black uniforms wait to give me a makeover.

Daphne’s waiting too, her hand at the collar of her shirt. She can’t stop biting her lip. “Hi,” she says, her smile lighting up and disappearing again under the awkwardness. I haven’t seen her since she came into Leo’s room. I didn’t want to bother her. “Happy birthday.”

“Hey, Daphne. Are you here for a makeover too?”

“I can just go,” she says quickly. “It’s your birthday. You probably don’t want me in here, given—”

I grab her hand and tug her toward the door. “Listen. I don’t care that you walked in on us.”

“Oh my god.” She covers her face with both hands. “I’m so sorry. I should have knocked. Leo’s usually up late and I wasn’t thinking.”

“Are you okay, though?” This isn’t a conversation I expected to have in front of two stylists. But here we are.

Daphne blows out a breath and lets her hands fall to her sides. “It’s complicated.” A small smile. “I had no idea. And I probably have no right to be mad at him for not telling me, I just—I wish I’d known.”

“He didn’t tell me, either.”

“He didn’t?”

“No. I walked in on him. If he could have told you, Daph, I’m sure he’d have done it.”

She sighs. “It’s a lot. Living here is a lot.”

“I know. You don’t have to get ready with me, if you don’t want to. I wouldn’t blame you.”

Daphne rolls her eyes, and it’s so pretty it makes me laugh. “I want to come to your party. I want to get ready with you. That’s pretty simple, at least.”

“Is it? Because—” My cheeks heat. “Okay, so, I’ve never gotten ready for a party like this before. My sister always did my hair. Are there any rules I should know about? I don’t want to make a fool of myself.”

Leo’s sister presses her lips together in pure, kind sympathy and pats my shoulder. “No, there’s no rules. Just tell them what you want.”

They’ve brought a big mirror and chairs for us, and it turns out I don’t have to tell them what I want, because Leo already has. Daphne raises an eyebrow when the stylist tells me that he’s already given instructions. “He is such a control freak.”

I meet her eyes in the mirror. “I find it pretty hot.”

“Gross,” Daphne whispers, and then she dissolves into laughter.

It’s nice, getting your hair done by someone with skills. It doesn’t feel terrible to be touched. Leo’s taken that on as his own personal mission. The shower was only the beginning, and it’s working.

He’s so much more than I thought. So much more than everyone gives him credit for. He would be furious if anyone knew, and I get it. He uses his reputation as a tool to protect his family. To protect me. To protect himself. So I wish things were different, but not too different. It’s an impossible task, untangling him from his past. I don’t think everything happens for a reason. That pat bullshit people say when they can’t think of anything better. But at some point, it all added up into the man he’s become.

“What are you thinking about?” Daphne asks. “You’re so quiet.”

My eyes are closed so the stylist can put on eyeshadow. They wouldn’t be here if Leo hadn’t approved their presence, and this is his sister, so I feel relatively safe in my honesty. And I’m tired. Tired from having nightmares. Tired from worrying about what Caroline will do next. And from the good things, too. “I was thinking about Leo.”

“You are, like…so in love with him.”

There’s no denying it, and no point in denying it. Daphne wouldn’t even be the first person I’ve told. She wouldn’t be the first Morelli. “It’s true.”

“Are you happy?” I’m so glad, so glad, that my eyes are closed. That the sweep of the makeup brushes is keeping them that way. I hope Daphne’s not looking. “You sound like it’s complicated.”

I don’t have the words. Just like with Eva, everything I could say about Leo falls short of him. Disastrously short. And if I try to describe to Daphne how I love him, I’ll cry and ruin all my makeup. I’m not sure I could force those descriptions past the lump in my throat. How my heart aches every second I’m apart from him, and sometimes more when he’s in the room. How the only thing that settles the fear and uncertainty of this moment in my life is his hands on me. How the sound of his voice is the closest thing I’ll ever feel to an answered prayer.

“He was sick,” I say instead. “After he came home from the hospital. He had this awful fever.”

“I know,” she answers. “Eva told me. She wouldn’t let me come over.” Daphne clears her throat. “She said he wouldn’t want me to see him like that. Which isn’t fair. He’s my brother, too. He keeps me at arm’s length and then he turns around and makes me live here for safety.”

“My brother helped Caroline kidnap me.”

“Jesus.” Daphne’s quiet for a long time. “Leo said you went out to meet him. He didn’t say—”

“He didn’t say that Cash called me and asked me to come. Caroline’s man beat him up first and made him do it. That’s why I went outside in the first place.” I breathe slow and deep. I’m not going to screw up this makeup. This party. “I don’t know what point I’m trying to make. Just that brothers are complicated sometimes.”

“So things are not easy with your family.”

“No. I talked to Eva about this when Leo was sick, and she said I would have to choose between them and Leo. After everything that’s happened, I’m worried we’ll never have any peace. I’m worried she might be right.”

“She won’t be.” Daphne sounds confident about this, at least. “Not if Leo has anything to say about it. He always gets his way.” She knows it’s not true. I know it’s not true. But it’s a step onto lighter ground, which is where we’re supposed to be for a birthday makeover. “My collector has been texting me.”

“You can open your eyes,” says the stylist, and when I do, I find a completely neutral, friendly expression. I would bet anything that she’s deliberately not paying attention to our conversation. It’s probably part of her contract.

“Have you texted back?”

“No.” Daphne bites her lip. “I don’t know what to say. Leo would be pissed if I told him where I am, so I haven’t said anything.” She groans as her stylist applies a rosy shimmer to her cheeks. “He’s not a bad guy. Leo should settle down.”

“I don’t think that’s in his DNA. How long are you going to hide him, though? Do you have a secret name for him in your phone?”

“Collector,” says Daphne. “Obviously.”

I laugh harder. The stylist quirks her lips and waits for me to stop. “My sister had a boyfriend when she was in high school. She didn’t want my dad to know who it was, so she saved him in her phone as a smiley face emoji. It was funny because her face made that same expression every time he texted her.”

Daphne grins, her dark eyes lit up. “Did they run away together? Get married?”

“No, they didn’t make it past senior year. She married someone that was Constantine approved. An investment banker.” Jeremy Rand seems nice enough, in a severe kind of way. He manages the finances for most of the Constantines. Except for my father, of course, who doesn’t have enough money to manage. He has strict ideas about what Petra should wear and say and do. “I miss her, but I feel like I don’t know her very well anymore.”

“Yeah,” says Daphne. “Sometimes I feel like I don’t know anyone at all.”

“You know me. What you see is pretty much what you get.”

Her smile crinkles her eyes. “No way. You look like a Constantine—you are a Constantine—but you’re kind. And you look quiet and soft, but when you’re with Leo, he listens to you.”

Something about her voice makes me reassure her. “He listens to you, too.”

She makes a face. “No, he doesn’t. He just tells me what to do. You have a stalker, Daphne. Move in with us, Daphne. Don’t get murdered, Daphne.”

“Well, the last one seems like good advice,” I say, unable to hold back a laugh.

“I’m a grown woman, but he treats me like I’m a child.”

“He cares about you. That’s why he’s so protective.”

“Overprotective,” Daphne says. “I mean, the whole idea is offensive. Someone likes my paintings, so they must be a crazy stalker?”

“I’m sorry,” I say, not because I think Leo is wrong about this collector. More because I can see the hurt in Daphne’s eyes. It’s painful not to be taken seriously by your family.

“Whatever,” she says. “Enough about Leo.”

“Enough about him,” I agree. “He’s not interesting in the least. Besides, I want to hear more about this collector. There’s something in your voice when you talk about him.”

“He likes my paintings. That’s all.”

“Maybe,” I say, my tone noncommittal. “Maybe he only cares about your paintings, but what about you? Do you only care about him as a customer?”

Her cheeks turn pink. “I don’t know. How are you supposed to know?”

The jumble of feelings I have for Leo rises—the love and the hate, the frustration and the fear. He’s everything good and hopeful in a dark world, but he would hate to hear me say that. “I think if you don’t know how you feel about him, he’s already more than a customer.”