“You’re kidding.”
“She’s not. She’s going to be on the first plane I can get her to.” Logan paused. “Actually, the first plane you can get her to.”
“You want me to escort her?”
“Yeah, you okay with that?”
“What about Hunter?”
Logan frowned, it wasn’t like Rocco not to help out. Just as Logan never failed to step up if Rocco ever asked. “He’s gone off somewhere. I think Chelsea told him something about that coffee-cart queen before she and Xander went to Mexico.”
“Oh. Right.”
Logan glanced at his phone for a second to make sure it was still working. Why had Rocco gone so quiet? “I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t desperate, Roc. It’s just...” he trailed off. He didn’t want to put his relationship with Min into words.
“Yeah I get it. It’s fine. I’ll meet you at your apartment. See you there soon.”
Logan stared at his phone again, but Rocco had rung off already.
He glanced up at his building. He needed to get Dani out of there. He needed to work things out with Min.
He felt like he was standing at the top of a mountain, about to make the run of his life, but he was unsure if the powder was as perfect as it appeared, or if it hid a crevasse—that if he started on the downhill, he might slip through a crack. And fall.
The day, so far, had sucked. Min had tried to talk to Dani—but the other woman had shut her down on the conversation front, hiding out in that bedroom. And truth?
Min wasn’t in the mood for trying to help someone else find her happy place. She was struggling with her own.
He loved... this?
For a few moments, she’d deluded herself that there might be something more to them. That along with the hot sex, there was laughter and connection and a liking.
But it was just the hot sex.
Sure, she’d never thought she’d have a man jonesing for her the way he did. Until last night, she’d thought she could revel in it for as long as it lasted. Because it wouldn’t last. After the heady days of lust, it died out eventually, right? Logan was such a sensual person he’d soon find another partner to stoke those flames to the roaring temperature he liked.
But she?
She’d hurt.
She hurt now.
Hadn’t she been the one to say right at the start that sex was different for her? That it meant more than it probably should, more than he’d ever intend. And even though she’d known—gone into it eyes wide open—that for him this was only about igniting that chemistry, she’d let it come to mean more.
Because it wasn’t the sex. It was him. The joker, the tease, the wild one... but also that loyal, gentle, protective side he kept hidden from most of the world.
He might have been seen naked by millions, but he bared his soul to almost no one. She’d seen the beauty of his soul.
And yeah, when Logan touched her, the rest of the world ceased to exist. She’d always thought that was a cliché, a fantasy that Hollywood movie moguls pedalled. But it really happened. When he kissed her, that was all that mattered. She was utterly engaged, being with him was all she wanted.
Which was insane. Because what he loved, was this. Just sex.
How horribly ironic—when she’d thought she could teach him some kind of lesson? In restraint? Take him down? How arrogantly naïve she’d been.
She stared at the computer screen, still on the main page of her social media manager. She’d barely managed a thing today. Deserved to lose all her clients.
Ugh. Pull it together.
She was going to have to save her business, and get her ass out of here as soon as possible. Resolutely she started typing.
Only then her phone rang. Min glanced at the screen, her throat doing its usual little spasm at the ring tone. Every single time it happened that way—even though for so long, she’d had it so controlled. But it was always in the back of her mind.
The caller was her mom. And she couldn’t ignore it. She’d only ring back. Better to get it over with.
“Araminta, it was good to see you at the weekend.” Her mom was practically purring. “You managed the occasion very well.”
Seriously? Her mom had no idea.
“Uh, thanks, it was n-n-nice to see you t-too,” she said.
“You’ll have seen these pictures? They turned out nicely too.”
“What p-p-pictures?” Min’s hands became clammy.
“Of the party. There’s a lovely spread in that Profile magazine.”
In the gossip mags? Online too? Min quickly searched.
“You’ll have to come and visit me soon,” her mom said.
“Mom, I can’t c-come for a while.” Min watched the screen load.
“Of course you can, we’ll need to start planning the wedding.”
The picture of them on that blue carpet appeared. She looked nervous, he looked as edible and as self-assured as ever. So not a match.
“For heaven’s sake mother, the engagement isn’t even r-real.” She couldn’t stand deluding her mom any longer. Her mom did that to herself too often as it was. “It’s a b-b-business arrangement lasting a few weeks to promote Logan’s public profile.”
“What?”
“It’s not real,” Min said slowly. “It’s a f-fake engagement.”
Because she’d screwed up his stupid social media feed. Because he’d been bored and didn’t want to go to his horror home alone. Because he’d seen her as a sexual challenge.
“But you’re engaged. You have that beautiful ring. You had that big party... there were all those people there...”
Yeah, there had been. Too bad.
“So you’re going to break it off?” Her mom’s anger mounted. “This is so humiliating, Araminta. How could you do this to me?”
“B-better to b-b-break it off than go through with something that’s never going to be right.”
It was never going to work.
“But—”
“But nothing.” Min lashed out, her current hurt coalescing with the pain of her teen years. “I’m n-n-not dragging any child of mine through the heartache of crappy divorce after crappy divorce. I’m not f-following your path, m-m-mom. Having to get used to new step-sisters and brothers... only for it all to end again a couple years later? Then start again? It’s never, ever happening.” Min drew in a shuddering breath. “I don’t want your life, mom. And I d-d-don’t want Logan that way.”
She wasn’t settling for second best. She’d rather be without altogether.
“You’re a fool,” her mother snapped. “An idealistic—”
“No, Mom. I’m realistic. Do you honestly think a man like Logan Hughes would stay f-faithful to m-m-me? Of course I’m not m-marrying him.”
And he damn well didn’t want her to anyway. She wasn’t the perfect kind of bride he’d need, she couldn’t maintain the appearances that seemed so damn vital in his family.
“But Min—”
But nothing. “S-s-s-orry, mom. We’ll talk some other—” She just rang off.
Not doing it anymore.
She stared at the picture she’d pulled up on the computer screen. The one taken of her and Logan after they’d landed at Summerhill. She was laughing up at him, he was smiling at her in that wicked way.
So much fun. So not forever.
She covered her eyes with her hands. The image burned her worse than the explicit scenes from his sex-tape had.
It burned her heart.
“Min?”
She looked up with a start.
Logan stood just inside the door. His eyes were the coldest, palest blue she’d ever seen them. “Are you okay?” he asked, his voice clipped.
She nodded, unable to speak that second. How long had he been home? She hadn’t heard him come in. He’d only just arrived, right?
“Good.” He glanced away from her. “I need to talk to Dani.”
“She’s b-been in her room most of the day,” Min said softly.
/> Logan’s frozen expression crumbled as irritation flashed. Without another word he spun on his heel and left the room. Min blinked at his speed. He was angry?
Min sat stiffly in her chair as he thudded the few paces down the hall to Dani’s room. She heard the harsh, repeated rap of his knuckles on the door.
“Dani?”
“Yeah?”
Min heard the door open.
“Dani?” Logan’s voice reverberated through the walls. “What are you playing at? You’re on some kind of holiday?”
Min clung to the armrests of the chair. She didn’t want to listen in, though it was impossible given both Logan and Dani were talking loudly.
Min turned cold, then hot, then cold again as pure discomfort trickled through her veins.
Okay, Dani was now shouting. Min didn’t blame her given the way Logan had gone in all guns blazing. He hadn’t given his sister a chance to talk.
Adrenalin fired through her system. She was still trying to calm down from her own fight, because she’d never lost it with her mom like that. And now seeing Logan again for the first time since his ‘love this’ comment last night? He’d looked hard—and not in a good way. Hard and remote and cool. Now hearing him tear into his sister?
It wasn’t the Logan she thought she knew.
“Modeling?” Logan’s voice went through the roof.
Then Min heard him laugh. It wasn’t a nice laugh.