Fragile (Shattered Book 2) Read online

  “Liz, I have found a helper,” I said, opening the door to her office. She was holding Olivia in her arms and the girl was smiling. I swear, she was the most beautiful kid, I had ever seen.

  “Stanley! What a pleasant surprise.”

  He came to kiss Liz on the cheek.

  “He’s free for the rest of the day, and he offered to help, so I asked him to stay with Liv while you and I check on the show seating.”

  “Really? Thank you so much, Stanley. We desperately needed another pair of hands here.” She gave the baby to my brother and he carefully wrapped his arms around the girl.

  “Well, hello, Princess! Wanna play a game?”

  Olivia giggled in response and clapped her small hands.

  “See? I told you, you two will be just fine here. Call us if anything.”

  “What if she…”

  “You are a doctor, Stan. You should know what to do with kids. Didn’t your college teachers tell you all about kids?”

  Stan grimaced. “They probably would have, if I had been going to become a kindergarten teacher. Unfortunately, all I know about kids is how they come into the world.”

  I wished him luck and pulled Liz by the hand. She waved at her daughter and the two of us left.

  “He will never offer his help again,” Liz said, as we walked down the hall.

  “Relax. Stan raised me, and he never once said he hated me. And compared to me, Olivia is an angel. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about.”

  Five hours went by way too fast. But despite my worries, everything was ready for the show just in time for its beginning.

  “Where’s your dress?” Liz asked, signing for another delivery. I had never seen so many flowers in the studio. Her clients adored her, and everyone thought it was their duty to congratulate her on her new collection.

  “It’s in my office,” I replied.

  “Go get changed. I’ll stay here to greet the guests. And when Kameron arrives, I’ll tell him to help Stan with Olivia.”

  “Okay.” I went through my to-do list again and nodded approvingly. Even if I had to spend the show wearing nothing but my underwear, I didn’t care. My work always came first.

  I gave Liz the guest list and went to my office. I was going to wear one of the dresses from my friend’s new collection. It was scarlet and strapless and went to my knees; a corset followed by a full-circle skirt scattered with small shining crystals.

  I put the dress on and looked at my reflection in the floor-length mirror.

  Something about the way I looked scared me. My dress, shoes, my makeup and hair – everything was perfect and looked exactly the way I wanted it to look tonight. But the fear in my eyes didn’t go well with all of the above.

  I swallowed and put my hand on my belly, where the silk of the dress covered a scar that once changed my life forever. Six years ago today, I lost something very important, the something that I doubted I would ever be able to find again… I lost myself. And even with time, the fear I felt that terrible night still lived inside me. A memory I never wanted to recall flashed behind my eyes; my palms started to sweat, my breathing increased. Quickly, I shook my head, and took a deep breath. I couldn’t let stupid memories bring me down, not tonight.

  Someone knocked at the door.

  “Just a minute!” I shouted back. I looked at my reflection again, took another deep breath and went to open the door.

  Just to see the least expected person standing behind it…

  “Liam? What are you doing here?”

  He didn’t respond. His dark-blue eyes, so familiar yet so strange, took their time to study me, from head to toe. Inch by inch, my body started to tingle, as if responding to his invisible touches.

  A few silent moments later, his eyes found mine again, he cleared his throat and said, “Liz asked me to call you. Looks like someone can’t find their seat.”

  “Damn it.” I brushed past him, trying to ignore the wild beating of my stupid heart. The stubborn thing just wouldn’t give me a break, and when it came to my brother’s old friend, it turned into a traitor and never listened to what my mind tried to make it believe in. True they say – a heart has a mind of its own.

  Liam had always had that effect on me. First as my high school crush, then as the last person in the world I wanted to feel anything for. The thoughts of him never left my mind, neither when I was sixteen, nor when I turned twenty-four.

  I hadn’t seen him for months. Even though karma thought that seeing him on a permanent basis in my house as Stan’s guest was not enough, Liz and Kameron decided he and I would make perfect godparents for Olivia. It looked like they did their best to put Liam and me in one room, when he and I couldn’t wait to leave it and never see each other again. And there was a very good reason to feel that way…

  “Liz, what happened?” I asked, as I stopped next to her. “I made sure everyone got a seat.” I took the guest list from her hands to read it all over again.

  “Relax.” She smiled, taking it back. “Everything is ok. I just wanted you and Liam to greet each other. The poor thing is crazy about you.”

  “Are you out of your mind? He and I can hardly stand the idea of breathing the same air and walking the same planet. Though I wouldn’t deny the presence of craziness in our relationship. Every time I see him, he drives me nuts!”

  Liz laughed. “I wish you could look at yourself from a different view. For years, you two have been fighting like cats and dogs. Isn’t that a good enough reason to believe that you are crazy about each other?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Liam and I, together – never gonna happen!”

  “Never say never. Besides, you never told me why you hate him so much.”

  “I don’t hate him. It’s just that he has no idea how to shut his dirty mouth whenever he sees me. Seriously, why me? Do I have a sticker on my forehead saying, ‘Dying to spar with Liam!’?

  “He just can’t find the right words to tell you that he actually likes you.” She winked at me.

  I rolled my eyes. “He has more than enough girls in his life to ‘like’. They undress for him every hour or so. Remember what he’s doing for a living? No doubt, becoming a plastic surgeon was just an excuse to touch boobs on a regular basis.” I knew it was not true. But my tongue just didn’t move to say something good about him.

  “If I didn’t know better, I would say you are jealous.”

  “Me? Jealous? Come freaking on, Liz. You know what I think about men, and this is not going to change.”

  “Being a strong feminist doesn’t change the fact that you are an attractive young woman and men want you, whether they have the balls to admit it or not.”

  “So? I told you I don’t need a man to make me happy. All I need is a few drops of sperm to do magic to my body and get me pregnant. The rest is my worry.”

  “What if your dream baby’s father wants to be a part of your life as well?”

  “Never! He can be a part of my baby’s life, but my life is off limits.”

  “And what if you…”

  “If I need sex, I will find a man to have it with. And Liam is not an option. So please stop throwing him my way. And if I need my boobs to get bigger, I will go to a different plastic surgeon. There’s no way in hell I’m gonna let him anywhere close to my girls. Period.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  6 years ago

  There had to be a logical explanation for nature’s decision to make certain men ungodly beautiful and as jerky as shit. And to my great disappointment, Liam just had to be one of them. But what was even more disappointing – I liked it. No, scratch that – I LOVED IT.

  I hated myself for being so weak around him, but I couldn’t help it: my heart raced in my chest and did a double jump whenever he pronounced my name; my legs turned into Jell-O. I have had a secret crush on him since the very first time he said ‘Hi’ to me, years ago. Back then, I was just a girl with two pink ribbons in my hair and one of my front teeth missing, but I still thought h
e was just like one of those princes from my favorite fairy tales that mom read me every night. His chestnut hair was a slight mess, and combined with his dark-blue eyes and the most charming smile I had ever seen, he won my heart at first sight. I used to write his name in my diary and surround it with pink hearts, wishing one day he would send me a Valentine’s card, saying how much he liked me.

  Yeah, well, that was before I realized he was far from being a prince charming. When a few years later I saw him kissing one of Springs cheerleaders, I swore I would never look in his direction again. Just to keep staring at him every time he and Stanley crossed the threshold of our house… So much for my sworn-off-Liam rule, damn it.

  Growing up didn’t change a thing. My heart still refused to listen to my reasoning. And my childhood crush just had to become even more handsome. I bet now he had even less free time than three years ago, when Stan asked him to stay with me because my right hand was broken and I couldn’t do anything on my own, and since our parents were on vacation, there was no one else to help me. But, instead of helping me, Liam brought a bowl of popcorn and a few cans of Coke, probably thinking it would be enough to keep me alive for the next couple of hours or so, and then disappeared saying he had very little time and a very long list of things to do. Turned out, he had a very long list of girlfriends to catch up on in one night. That’s why next time we met the first thing I said was, “Hope your tool’s doing well? After so many things you guys had to do the other night...”

  It was the second time in my life that I swore I would never look in Liam’s direction again. Just to bump into his Naked Glorious God-help-me Highness after almost a year of not seeing him. Fucking great…

  I sat on my bed and sighed. I was hopeless. And he was an ass. Perfect match, right?

  ***

  Present Day

  “Congratulations, ladies! You did a great job.” Kameron smiled at his wife and then at me.

  The fashion show was over and judging by the happy faces of our guests, Liz was going to have another busy couple of months ahead.

  “I would never be able to do it all without my wonderful assistant,” she said to me.

  “You are welcome, darling. You know how much I love what we do.”

  Stanley spoke, “Has anyone seen Liam? He wanted to tell us something, but then the show began; he said he would talk to us later.”

  “Do you know what it was that he wanted to tell us?” Kameron asked.

  “Nope. But judging by his expression, it was something important.”

  I looked around the room, as curious as ever. “There he is,” I said, spotting Liam in the company of one of our models. Well, of course, where else could he be if not flirting with another pair of over pumped lips?

  I used to think that I was over him, that I didn’t care how many girls he dated at the same time, that I didn’t feel anything for him. But for some sick reason, I could still feel the tiny bunches of jealousy forming within and then eating me alive, even though I had never had a reason to be jealous about the guy who never belonged to me.

  Kameron waved for Liam to come over, but I just couldn’t stand the idea of being so close to him again, or talk to him. The unexpected meeting at the threshold of my office was more than enough for one night. For months, I’d been trying to avoid him. And I did a damn good job with it. Even when someone started talking about him, I pretended I wasn’t listening. I dived into my work and at some point, I realized that my disease named ‘Crush on Liam’ was not as unbearable as it used to be anymore. And then, he just had to come knocking at my door and ruin everything.

  As always, I couldn’t stop staring at him. His eyes… God, I never seemed to be able to look away once they trapped me in the prison of their spellbinding, dark-blue depth.

  Why him, for crying out loud?

  I never knew how to answer that question. There were many guys who asked me out, sent flowers and tons of compliments my way, but none of them was him. Not even close. Something must have been terribly wrong with me if I still harbored a soft spot for the man whose imperfections outweighed the little good I could find in him. The more of an ass he was, the deeper I fell for him.

  Un-freaking-believable…

  “I need to do something urgent,” I whispered to Liz. “See you later.”

  And before she would protest, I slipped through the crowd and rushed to hide in the safety of my cozy office. I have been working so much these days; it turned into my second home. Sometimes I stayed in the studio so long, I would crash on the couch, too tired to drive back home. Thank God, Liz never caught me sleeping at work, or she would fire me just to make me take a break.

  Work was my cure. It helped me forget the shit that my life was full of. It wasn’t just about Liam and his attractiveness that made my knees tremble, there was more to it. But I didn’t want to let it bring me down. I had been down once, and it was no fun; I never wanted to feel like that again. Even though recently I felt like I was losing myself even faster than six years ago.

  It started the day my brother called me and told me about our father’s health problems. He needed an operation and we both knew that after it, his life would never be the same again. Our lives changed too. Delia, the nurse, stayed with him for the biggest part of the day, and on the weekends, Stan, mom and I took shifts looking after him. Considering how little he could do on his own, seeing him like that made my heart bleed.

  The night before his operation, I couldn’t fall asleep. I got dressed in a pair of jeans and an old hoodie, grabbed my car keys and went to the only place where I always found much-needed peace – the lake house. When Stan and I were kids, our parents often took us there on the weekends. But that night, I was not the only visitor of the place. Liam was there too… I didn’t know Stan had given him a spare key. I was kind of curious to know what he needed it for. Something was telling me that it was not just about another sexy rendezvous.

  Liam met me on the terrace. Needless to say, we were more than surprised to see each other there.

  “I didn’t know you were going to come here tonight,” Liam said, shifting uncomfortably from one foot to another.

  “I could say the same about you. What are you doing here?” My eyes traveled to the glass of whiskey he was holding in one hand. Wearing jeans and a black shirt, he looked a lot younger than in those tailored suits he wore for work. But something about him felt off.

  “I needed to run away…” He said. “Hope you don’t mind if I stay here for the night?”

  I was too stressed to mind.

  “I don’t,” I said. We walked into the house and I closed the door behind me.

  I had never seen Liam so sad. His always bright and smiling eyes were full of something I couldn’t understand.

  “What happened to you?” I went to the coffee table where a bottle of amber liquid was sitting and poured some into a spare glass.

  “Long week. And you?”

  “I’m scared…” I said. There was no point in lying. I knew dad needed an operation, but no one could guarantee its successful ending.

  Liam nodded and took a sip of his drink. “Stan told me about your dad. I’m so sorry…”

  I leaned against the back of the couch and sighed. Silence filled the room. The only sound to break it was the burning fireplace. I gave Liam one more look, came over to the fire, and sat down on the carpet, with my face welcoming the warmth coming from the flames.

  “If you want, I will leave you alone,” Liam said.

  “No,” I protested with my eyes still focused on the gold and scarlet spurts of flame. I was kind of surprised to hear my next word. “Stay.” Despite my sucky mood and my, let’s say ‘eventful’ past with Liam, I was glad to see him tonight.

  I didn’t turn to see if he stayed, but a few moments later, he came to where I was sitting and sat down next to me.

  I swallowed the contents of my glass in one gulp and grimaced as the burning liquid ran down my throat and landed at the bottom of my empty stoma
ch. I hated whiskey. But right now, I welcomed the bitterness and the heat it sent through my veins. All I wanted was to forget everything my mind was filled with.

  Liam stayed quiet. So I spoke first, “Remember Stan’s fourteenth birthday?”

  He laughed under his breath. “Hard to forget. You pushed me into the lake, into mid-April, freezing-my-balls lake, and I drenched to the bone. I had been fevering for three days after that. Thank God, I didn’t get pneumonia. What did I do to deserve that, by the way?”

  “You called me Piglet, because I was wearing a pink shirt that reminded you of Piglet from Winnie the Pooh.”

  “Oh, right! The shirt… It was very funny. But I honestly didn’t mean to offend you.”

  “Liar. You knew I would get pissed and you pushed the bottom.”

  “I’m sorry. I really am…”

  I turned to look at him, ready to see another scoff on his face, but there was none. He actually looked so miserable.

  I frowned. “You sure you’re okay? I mean, you look somehow different tonight. As if you were not you.”

  He thought for a moment. “It’s probably because you have never tried to see the real me.”

  I smirked. “It’s probably because the only you I remember seeing is an asshole who has been trying to psyche me out for as long as I can remember knowing him.”

  A ghost of a smile touched his lips. His glorious, perfectly sculptured, full lips that I had been imagining kissing for years. I would still give away a lot to kiss them. Damn it…

  We stared at each other. I could hear the clock ticking on the wall, as if counting down seconds to the moment I would let my defense go. The tension between us got thicker with every beat of my heart. I could almost feel the weight of it on my shoulders. His gaze was as heavy as thundercloud; the darkness of his eyes did weird things to my body and mind. He knew what I was thinking as well as I knew what he was thinking… Because our thoughts were the same.