Tyce guided Sage to a chair and stepped away from the table, deliberately walking over to the far side of the room and leaning his shoulder into the wall, crossing his feet at the ankle. It was an insolent pose, a deliberate maneuver to keep the Ballantyne men off-balance. Tyce had deliberately dressed down for this meeting; he wore faded, paint-splattered jeans over flat-heeled boots and a clean black button-down shirt over a black T-shirt, cuffs rolled back. Linc and Beck were dressed in designer suits; Jaeger was a little less formal in suit pants and a pale cream sweater.
Sage, well, Sage looked stunning in the clashing colors of pink and red, most of her hair in a messy knot on top of her head, tendrils framing her face and falling down the back of her neck. She was innately stylish, yet people assumed it took her hours to look so perfectly put-together, but he’d seen Sage on the move; she could shove her hair up in thirty seconds, could dress in another minute. Sage wasn’t one for spending hours in front of a mirror.
Tyce looked at her face and frowned at the blue stripes under her eyes, at the pallor in her skin. She looked like she’d dropped weight and it was weight she could ill afford. She kept sucking her bottom lip between her teeth, darting anxious looks at his face. Tyce, deliberately, kept his expression blank, his face a mask. She could’ve avoided this meeting, he reminded himself; she could’ve taken one of his many calls; they could’ve done this differently. But, after trying to reach her for two weeks, her refusal to see him or talk to him limited his options so he contacted Linc and convinced him that a meeting would be beneficial to all parties.
Tyce watched as Linc stepped forward and placed both his hands on Sage’s shoulders, his gentle squeeze conveying his support. Jaeger and Beck flanked Sage on either side, arms folded and jaws tense. Her brothers were very protective of their sister and he hoped that this conversation wouldn’t turn physical but who the hell knew? When you were dealing with family and money and business, anything could happen.
“Since you asked for this meeting, Latimore, would you like to get the party started?” Linc asked, his voice as cold as a subzero fridge.
Tyce nodded, straightened and walked to the table, pulling out a chair at the head, another deliberate gesture. It was a silent screw you to their pecking order, telling Linc and his brothers that he wasn’t going to neatly slot into their order of command.
Tyce rested his forearms on the table. He turned his head to look at Sage and wished that they were alone, that he could kiss her luscious mouth, trace the fine line of her jaw, kiss his way down her long neck to her shoulders. Peel her clothes from her body...
Tyce sighed. He was imagining Sage naked because, yeah, that was helpful. He ran his hand across his face and caught Sage’s eye.
“This could’ve gone differently, Sage. If you had taken my calls, answered my emails, had a goddamn conversation with me, I wouldn’t have had to do it like this.”
Ignoring her frown, Tyce reached across the table and pulled his folder toward him. He flipped open the cover and withdrew a sheaf of papers and tossed them in Linc’s general direction. “Share certificates showing that Lach-Ty owns around fifteen percent of Ballantyne’s.”
Four backs straightened, four jaws tensed. Linc picked up the share certificates, examined them and carefully placed them facedown on the table. “Would you care to explain,” he asked in a dangerous-as-hell voice, “why you own fifteen percent of our company?”
Sure, that was why he was here, after all. “Technically, I don’t own the shares. I just paid for them.”
Linc gripped the table, his hands and knuckles white. “Then who does own the shares and why the hell did you pay for them?”
“My sister owns those shares because I thought it was right that she owned a percentage of the company her father left to you.” Tyce hesitated and thought that he might as well get it all out there so that they could move forward from a basis of truth. “I thought that, since your sister is carrying my baby, it was time to lay my cards on the table.”
And that, Tyce thought, his eyes moving from one shocked Ballantyne to another, was how you dropped a bombshell.
Shock, horror, surprise, anger...all the emotions he expected were in their faces, coating their questions, their shouted demands for more information. Tyce ignored them and kept his gaze focused on Sage, who stared at him with hellfire in her eyes.
She half stood, slapped her palms on the table and leaned toward him. “How dare you tell them without my permission?”
Tyce held her gaze and lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “Because if I left it up to you, then you’d be ready to go into labor and you’d still be hemming and hawing about how to tell them, what to tell and whether you should.”
“You had no right—”
Tyce pointed at her stomach. “That’s my child in there too and, might I remind you, if you’d agreed to meet with me instead of ignoring me, then we could’ve resolved this and more.”
“More? What are you talking about?” Sage demanded, her voice vibrating with fear and concern.
Linc placed a hand on Sage’s shoulder and urged her back into the chair. “He’s talking about the shares and alluding to Connor having a daughter.”
“What? Connor never had any children,” Sage emphatically stated. “That’s crazy!”
“You’re pregnant?” Jaeger yelled.
“Everyone shut up!” Linc ordered and looked at Sage. “Let’s finish with Latimore first. Then he can get out of our hair and we can talk about your baby,” Linc added in his CEO-everyone-must-listen-to-me voice. Yeah, well, Tyce didn’t have to.
“Your optimism is amusing, Linc,” Tyce drawled. “It’s my baby too and, sorry to disappoint you, but I’m going to be around for a hell of a long time.”
“No, you’re not,” Sage stated.
“Oh, honey, I so am. But we’ll discuss that later,” Tyce said, his voice quiet but holding no trace of doubt.
“Why would you think that your sister is Connor’s daughter?” Linc asked, his jaw rock tight with annoyance.
“I don’t think she is Connor’s daughter, I know she is,” Tyce replied. Tyce saw that they were going to argue and lifted his hand. “Look, let me start at the beginning and I’ll talk you through it.”
Where to start? As he said, at the beginning. Well, at Lachlyn’s beginning, not his. They didn’t need to know about his childhood, about those dark and dismal years before, and after, Lachlyn came along. As quickly and concisely as he could, Tyce recounted the facts. His mom had worked as a night cleaner at Ballantyne International, in this very building—something he had no reason to feel ashamed of; it was honest work and if the Ballantynes were too snobby to understand that, to hell with them—and, because Connor worked long hours, they struck up a friendship. His mom and stepdad separated, she and Connor started an affair and she became pregnant.
“My mom knew that she had no future with Connor so she went back to my stepfather hoping that he’d raise Lachlyn as his.”
His stepdad, originally from Jamaica, took one look at Lachlyn, a blond-haired, blue-eyed baby, and lost his temper. Tyce took his disappearance that same day as a firm no on the raising-and-supporting-Lachlyn question. Those months following his stepfather’s disappearance had been, by far, the worst of his life. His mom sunk into what he now knew to be postpartum depression, made a hundred times worse by her normal, run-of-the-mill depression. Looking after the baby had been a struggle for her. She hadn’t had any energy left over for a confused eight-year-old boy.
“Did your mother ever tell Connor that he had a daughter?” Beck asked, his voice laced with skepticism.
“No,” Tyce snapped back, frustrated. “Since Lachlyn’s birth certificate states that my stepdad is her father, she didn’t have a legal leg to stand on. She assumed that Connor would dismiss her claims.”
“Which is exactly what we are going to do,” Linc told him, his blue eyes hard.
Linc reacted exactly as he expected him to so Tyce wasn’t particularly surprised. “You can, but it won’t make any difference to my plans.”
Tyce ran his hand around his neck, hoping to rub away the headache at the base of his skull. He darted a look at Sage and saw that her face was even whiter than before and her big, endlessly blue eyes were dark with pain and confusion. She looked like he’d punched her in the gut. The fight immediately went out of Tyce and he moved his hand across the table to cover hers. He desperately wanted to scoop her up, soothe away her pain, assure her that everything would be okay.
But Tyce, more than most, knew that life had a nebulous concept of fairness and had a shoddy record at doling out good luck.
Sage snatched her hand out from under his, as if he were contagious with some flesh-eating disease. She folded her arms against her chest and glared at him. He couldn’t help his smile.
“You should know that your prissy, ‘I’m a princess and you’re a peasant’ look turns me on.”
His comment also had the added bonus of pissing her brothers off. Score.
Sage lifted her hand, her lips thinning. “This is business so let’s keep it to that, okay? You and I have nothing to say to each other.”
Oh, they so did. “We have a great deal to say to one another and we will,” Tyce promised her, lowering his voice.
“In your dreams, hotshot,” Sage retorted, fire in her eyes.
Tyce reached across the table and pushed a curl out of her eyes with the tip of his finger. “You can fight this, kick and claw and scratch, but you and me, and that kid, we’re going to come to an understanding, Sage. I’m not crazy about this arrangement, neither are you, but we’re going to have to deal. I’m not going anywhere. Start getting used to the idea.”
Because he so badly wanted to frame her face with his hands, to lower his mouth to cover hers—God, it had been so long since he’d held her, tasted her, feasted on her—Tyce stood up and jammed his hands into the pockets of his jeans. Feeling wiped, he blew out a breath before locking eyes with Linc again. It was time to get this done.
“I’ve purchased enough shares to earn a seat on the Ballantyne board. I’m going to take that seat, I will oppose every decision and I will vote against every motion you make unless you actively try to establish whether Lachlyn is Connor’s child or not. Do not underestimate how much trouble I can cause. I’ll undermine your position and I’ll actively campaign to have you removed as CEO.”
Linc’s face paled at the threat. But because he was a deal maker and a strategist, Linc then asked the question he was expecting. “So if Lachlyn is Connor’s daughter, how much do you want?”
These rich people, they always thought it came down to money. “I don’t want any of your money,” Tyce replied, enjoying the surprised shock on their faces. “If the DNA results come back saying that Lachlyn is not Connor’s daughter, then I will sell the shares.”
“What’s the catch?” Beck demanded.
“If Lachlyn is Connor’s daughter, then I’d like you to give her a chance...to get to know you, to become part of your family. She missed out on that, having a family.”
So had he but that didn’t matter. Lachlyn was the one who’d spent her childhood and teenage years in a dismal house permeated with the sadness of a perpetually depressed mother and a too tense, uncommunicative brother. She deserved the chance of being part of a close, happy family. And nobody, apparently, did family better than the Ballantynes.
Tyce held the back of a chair, his hands white against the black leather. He didn’t drop his eyes from Linc’s face, didn’t break the contact. Linc, confusion all over his face, frowned. “I don’t understand any of this. You spent tens of millions buying those shares but all you want is for us to give your sister a chance to get to know us?”
Tyce nodded. “You’ll be happy to hear that she’s a lot nicer than I am.”
Linc’s mouth twitched in what Tyce suspected might hint at amusement. He leaned back in his chair and folded his big arms across his chest. “This is batcrap insane, Latimore.”
“Probably,” Tyce admitted, darting a look at the still-fuming Sage. Oh, that reminded him. Hardening his expression, he looked from Linc’s face to Jaeger’s and then to Beckett’s. “I have one more demand...”
Beck groaned and Jaeger swore. Linc just waited, his eyes narrowed.
“My last demand is that you leave us, Sage and me, alone. Having a baby, becoming new parents, is something new to both of us and we don’t need her three angry, protective brothers muddying the waters.”
God, he was tired of this conversation, so tired of it all. All he wanted to do was to climb into bed with Sage and wrap himself around her. He would even forego sex just to hold her and sleep.
Sage held up a hand and stopped what he was sure was going to be a hot response from Jaeger. Hot seemed to be Jaeger’s default setting.
“You three don’t need to fight my personal battles,” Sage said, her voice clear and determined. “Tyce and I will deal with our personal situation, ourselves. Not—” Sage sent him a look that was designed to shrivel his balls “—that we have much to discuss.”
“Are you sure, shrimp?” Jaeger asked her, doubt in his voice.
“Very.” Sage nodded. “I can handle him.”
“If he lays a finger on you, we will rip him from limb to limb and bury him so deep that no one will ever find his body,” Beck added, his voice so flat and so bland that Tyce had no choice but to believe him.
“Tyce is an ass but he’s not violent,” Sage told them.
So nice to know how she really felt about him.
“Still...” Beck’s eyes connected with his and Tyce nodded, acknowledging Beck’s threat. Hurt her and he’d die. Got it.
“One tear, Latimore, and all bets are off,” Linc said, rising to his feet. “We’ll need a week or two, and your sister’s DNA, to ascertain whether she is Connor’s daughter and, if she is, we’ll meet again, with your sister, to determine a path forward.”
It was, Tyce realized, as much of a deal as he was going to get today and it was, honestly, better than he hoped. Lachlyn would finally have, if the Ballantynes cooperated, a shot at having the large, crazy, loving family she’d always said she wanted.
“Two weeks and then we’ll reevaluate?” Tyce held out his hand and wondered if Linc would shake it. “Deal?”
Linc’s warm hand gripped his and their gazes clashed and held. “Deal.”
Linc dropped his hand, sidestepped him and opened the door to the conference room. “I’ll contact you to set up the time and place for the DNA swabs.” Linc walked out of the conference room and punched a code into the pad next to the elevator opposite the conference room. The doors slid open. Right, it was official; Linc was kicking him out.
Tyce ignored Linc’s impatient expression and walked past Jaeger to drop to his haunches in front of Sage, resting his forearm across his knee. He waited until Sage lifted defiant eyes to meet his. “After you’ve spoken to your brothers, go home and sleep. I’m going to drop in this evening and—we’ll talk then.”
“I won’t be there.”
Tyce resisted the impulse to roll his eyes. “We need to talk, Sage. We can do it this afternoon or tomorrow morning but we are going to talk.”
Sage muttered a curse under her breath and Tyce swallowed his smile at her hissed profanity. “Okay, this evening. Around five.”
Tyce nodded, stood up and bent down again to drop a kiss on her head. Not wanting to see her reaction, her disgust, he spun around and headed out the door and into the lift. After punching the button for the ground floor, he looked at Sage and electricity, as it always did, hummed between them. He wanted to run back into the room, scoop her up and run away with her, to hell with Lachlyn and Sage’s brothers. To hell with his art and her status as one of the wealthiest women in the world.
To hell with it all.
Unfortunately, Tyce thought as the elevator’s doors closed, running away solved nothing.
* * *
The meeting had run longer than they thought and Beck and Jaeger left a few minutes after Tyce, both of them assuring her that they were in her corner, that they would help in any way they could.
“Up to and including beating the crap out of Latimore,” Jaeger told her as a parting shot.
When she and Linc were alone Sage walked to the small window, laying her hand on the cool glass. Droplets of icy rain ran down the pane and the low, gray clouds outside threatened snow. Late winter in New York City, she thought; she felt cold inside and out.
“You okay, shrimp?” Linc asked her. Sage turned, put her back to the wall and looked at her brother, his chair pushed back and his long legs stretched out.
“Mentally or physically?” Sage asked.
“Either. Both,” Linc answered her.
Sage lifted one shoulder and shrugged, biting her bottom lip. Linc’s eyes were on her face and she knew that her brother was hoping for an answer. Unlike Jaeger and Beck, Linc didn’t nag and as a result, she found herself talking to him more often than anyone else.
Still, it was easier to stick to the facts. “I’m about twelve, thirteen weeks pregnant. I’m not seeing Tyce, it just happened.”
Linc’s expression was sober. “Do you want to keep this child?”
Now there was a question she could answer without hesitation. “With every breath I take.”
Linc relaxed and his lightened. “Okay then. If you want to keep the baby, then we’ll all pitch in to help you... You know that, right?” Linc stated.
Sage nodded. “I do. So does, apparently, Tyce.” She tapped her index finger against her thigh. “I’m really surprised that he wants to be involved. I thought he’d take my offer to run.”
Linc scowled. “A hell of a lot surprised me today and that was only one thing of many.” Linc flipped through the folder Tyce had left and pulled out a letter-sized photograph of his sister, Lachlyn. He placed it on the table so that they could both look at the photo. “I can’t deny that she looks like Connor, she has his eyes.”
“And his nose,” Sage added. Apart from their hair color, she and Lachlyn could almost be sisters.
Linc folded his arms. “He made quite a few threats today. Do you think he’d act on them?”
Sage knew he would. Tyce never said anything he didn’t mean and she told her brother so. “The media is fascinated by him and, because he’s so reclusive, when he speaks the world will sit up and listen.”
“Crap.”
“If his sister is Connor’s daughter... God,” Sage said, her voice trembling. She couldn’t say more, hoping that her brother would know what she was trying to say without her having to verbalize her thoughts.
“If she’s his daughter she’s entitled to some part of his wealth? Is that what you are trying to say?” Linc asked her, pain in his eyes.
Sage nodded. “Isn’t she? We’re not his biological children, Linc. Yes, he adopted us but we’re not his blood,” Sage muttered. “If he knew about her, he would’ve scooped her up and pulled her into the family, his family.”
“He wouldn’t have tossed us aside,” Linc stated, his voice full of conviction. “Connor had an enormous capacity for love.”
“But he wouldn’t have ignored her either.”
Linc nodded, his face grave. “You’re right. She would’ve been pulled into this family. And five people would’ve inherited his wealth and not four.”
Sage traced the curve of Lachlyn’s cheek with her finger.
Tyce’s sister would’ve been hers, as well. The mind just boggled at the thought.
Linc rested his arms on the table, his brows lowered. “It’s important that we take this one step at a time, that we don’t get carried away. We need to do the DNA testing.”
She had a sister; Connor had a child; there was a missing Ballantyne out there. Sage felt the world tilting and she leaned her back against the wall and closed her eyes. She couldn’t do this; it was all too much. The pregnancy, Tyce, Lachlyn... Too much change.
And let’s not forget the little detail of Tyce deliberately targeting her to gather information on her family. Their meet-cute at that art gallery had been anything but fortuitous. He’d intentionally set out to meet her with the goal of getting her to spill company information. And strangely, that hurt the most and made her doubt everything that had happened between them. Were they really that sexually compatible or had he been just pretending? Was he as attracted to her as she was to him? Had it all been one horrible, well-thought-out, excellent act on his part?
God, just the thought that the six weeks they’d spent together three years ago might be one-sided made her feel like someone was ripping out her internal organs without any pain relief.
Had he laughed at her, was he still laughing? Did he think she was a gullible idiot? That she was easily manipulated? God, she had to know.
Right now.
Sage lunged for her phone and pulled up his number, punching the green button. Tyce answered just after the first ring.
“Yeah?”
“Where are you?”
“In the alley behind the store—I went out the back exit,” Tyce replied. “Why?”
“Wait there,” Sage ordered, her skin prickling with embarrassment. She disconnected the call and picked up her coat, draping it over her arm. She could cope with a baby, with being on her own, but she didn’t know how she would handle the truth that she was simply a means to an end for Tyce.
And a very easy lay.
God, she’d never felt more off-balance in her life. She looked at her favorite brother. “I’m going to go. I’ll talk to you later.”
Linc placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Shall we all have dinner at The Den tonight and you can break the news to the rest of the family? That way you can answer all the questions that I don’t have the answers to.”
Sage nodded. “Sounds good.”
Linc pulled her into his arms and rubbed the top of his chin across her head. When he spoke, his voice was rough with emotion. “Our baby is having a baby. How is that possible? How did it happen?”
Her eyes burning from unshed tears, Sage knew that in order to stop her tears from falling, she needed to diffuse the emotion swirling between them. “Well, Latimore and I met and then we stripped each other naked—”
Linc took a hasty step back and slapped his hands over his ears. “Shut up, shrimp. God, now I need brain bleach to get that picture out of my head.”
* * *
Sage was a bundle of dread and anxiety.
She wanted to run away and hide, to do her ostrich impression—head in the sand—but at the same time she needed to know, she needed to have her worst fears confirmed.
Because when they were, she could, finally and without a smidgeon of doubt, bury those lingering doubts around whether walking away from Tyce three years ago was the right thing to do.
She’d know and she could be free of the what-ifs that occasionally plagued her. What if she was braver? What if she took a chance?
When he told her that it was all one-sided, then she could finally step away from him, physically and mentally.
At the door leading to the alley Sage punched the master code into the access panel and heard the click. She gave the heavy door a hard push and stumbled down the two steps that led into the narrow space behind the building.
“Easy there,” Tyce said, grabbing her arms and keeping her from doing a face-plant.
Sage slapped his hands away and tossed him a scathing look. “Did you deliberately set out to meet me three years ago?”
Tyce frowned and his expression turned inscrutable. “Initially, yes.”
“And after that?” Sage demanded, hearing the shrill note in her voice. “Did you keep sleeping with me to get information about the business and my family?”
“You didn’t give any,” Tyce pointed out.
“That’s not the point! Did you use me for information?” Sage shouted, slapping her hands against his chest. “Did you keep sleeping with me because it was a means to an end? Were you into me, at all?”
Sage felt her ribs squeezing her heart and lungs and thought that her skin felt a size too small. She reminded herself to breathe, telling herself that she could deal with hearing that Tyce wasn’t that into her, because it would give her the impetus she needed to stop thinking about him, dreaming about him, being tempted by him.
“Is that what you think?” Tyce asked, gripping her wrists and holding her hands against his broad chest. And, just like that, heat flowed into her and her fingers tingled with the need to touch and to explore. She could feel the slow, hard thump of her heart against her tight ribs and her nipples tightened, desperate for attention.
Tyce was touching her and that was all that was important...
“Are you seriously asking me whether I was pretending to be attracted to you?”
Tyce’s harsh question reminded her that they were standing in an alley in the rain-tinged wind. Oh, and that she was as mad as hell with him.
“Are you insane?” Tyce demanded, his face saturated with frustration. He abruptly dropped her hands and slapped a hand on the top of her butt, jerking her into him. Sage released a surprised gasp when her stomach connected with the long, hard length of him. Holy cupcakes, he felt so good...
Tyce grabbed her elbows and lifted her off the ground, easily carrying her until her back touched the rough concrete wall. Holding both her wrists in one hand, he lifted her hands above her head, her breasts pushed into his chest. His deep, dark eyes met hers as he brushed her hair off her cheek. Sage held her breath as he slowly, so slowly dropped his head and his lips finally—God, he felt so good—covered hers.
His lips danced over hers, a soft, slow exploration, his tongue gentle as it wound around hers. She expected fire; she expected heat; she expected the maelstrom of want and need that always swirled between them but she didn’t expect tenderness or reassurance. She didn’t want to feel either. She wanted to be able to walk away from him, not be tempted to step closer... God, how could he make her feel like this?
Sage wrenched her mouth out from under his and glared up at him with what she hoped were stormy, accusing and not dreamy eyes.
“Did you kiss me to avoid the question?” she demanded, begging her heart to stop its relentless attempt to leave her chest. She dropped her eyes and, feeling the length of him still pressed against her, tried to pull her hands from his grip.
Tyce held her chin and forced her to look at him again. “I admit that I set out to meet you but this—” he hesitated “—crazy buzz between us had nothing to do with Lach-Ty, with the Ballantyne shares. It was, is, all you.” He pushed his hard erection into her stomach and closed his eyes. “And me. You walk into the room and I immediately start thinking about how soon I can get you naked.”
Dammit. His voice was deep and slow and lifted every hair on her neck. It made her want to feast on him, to gulp him up.
So much for finding some distance.
Tyce abruptly dropped her hands and stepped away from her, pushing his free hands into his hair. “It’s cold and—” he nodded to the camera above their head “—not the most private place for either kissing or conversation. We’ll talk more tonight.”
Sage nodded, her head hurting with an overload of information and emotion.
Two thoughts ran through her head like toddlers on a sugar high: I want him bad and it’s so bad that I want him.