The Alpha King Call Boy
Chapter 81

Fiona

I heard Alexander's key turning in the door and flipped the magazine I'd been reading upside down, so it wouldn't be the first thing he saw when he walked in the room.

It was an old issue of a finance magazine I'd picked up months ago, before I started working at Crescent Ventures. The one in which they'd interviewed Conrad about his success there as CEO and owner of the company. There was a picture of Conrad on the cover, and if Alexander walked in and saw me reading the interview, he'd know right away what was on my mind.

And I wanted to handle this carefully. I had more questions for Alexander about the secrecy and lies he'd referred to earlier as "mistakes." But the tenuous peace we'd reached in the afternoon had been a relief, and I didn't want to just drop a grenade into it. The bedroom door swung open and in came Alexander, carrying a single long-stemmed white rose. It was very pretty, a huge flower in full bloom.

He put his hand to his chest when he saw me, his jaw dropping a little. "Wow," he breathed. "You look amazing."

"Thank you." I let my mouth smile only a little. I did enjoy his reaction and the intensity in his honey-gold eyes as he looked me up and down. But it was better he didn't know how much his desire flattered me.

Alexander spun the stem of the rose in his fingers idly, smiling, with his eyes glued to me as I crossed the room. When I reached him he offered me the flower rather formally, holding it in front of him and performing a small bow.

I took it, bringing it up to my nose and taking a little sip of air to sample its perfume.

"Better?" he asked.

I raised my eyebrows.

"I took it you didn't love the red ones I sent to your office."

I pursed my lips, feeling a tad embarrassed in hindsight about how I'd reacted to that "special delivery." It had just irritated me severely, felt like such a superficial attempt at apology. And yes, it was also over the top and in the way, very much not my style. "The big arrangement was too much, wasn't it?" he asked, like he'd read my thought. "I should have known better. I started thinking today that maybe you'd appreciate something a little more subtle."

"It's nice," I said, toying with the soft, clean white petals. They felt like satin. "I do appreciate it."

I put my nose back to the center of the bloom. The smell was actually quite lovely, light and mildly sweet.

When I looked back up, I saw Alexander was watching me sniff the flower. Then his eyes went to my hair, then to my neck. Then to my eyes. A flicker of embarrassment passed over his face, and I understood immediately what he was thinking.

He wanted to smell my neck the way I was smelling the rose. But he didn't know if he was welcome to just swoop me up and hold me like that anymore.

"Ready for dinner?" I asked, trying to break us out of the awkward moment.

"Yeah. Of course," he said, collecting his composure. "You?"

I nodded. He opened the door and held it for me.

We were partway to the dining room when he finally did dare to attempt physical contact. He opted for something less intimate, offering me his arm while we walked. I threaded my forearm through his elbow agreeably.

My energy began to surge way up the second that we touched.

I waited until we were seated before I brought up the touchy subject.

Alexander started piling food onto my plate and saying something about my diet. I stopped listening, really, when I realized that he was just prattling nervously. I found an opening when he finally returned his attention to his own meal, taking a bite of food and finally quieting down.

"I need to ask you something," I said.

Alexander put his flatware down on the table and turned to look at me as he chewed.

"Earlier you said it was a mistake to keep it a secret from me that you own the company. I just want to know more about that. I want to know why you felt you needed to hide that from me."

Alexander gulped down the food in his mouth and said, "Oh." Then he took a long drink of water, wiped his lips with a napkin, shifted his weight in his chair and finally continued, "Well. It's complicated."

I wished I could release the irritated growl that wanted to rumble out of my throat. But an emotional reaction wouldn't be helpful in this moment. I choked it down.

"I have time," I said calmly. I was very careful not to tinge the words with any trace of sarcasm, very much wanting to keep the conversation productive and non-adversarial.

Alexander stared straight ahead of him into space. He was thinking carefully about what to say. Weighing what percentage of the truth he was going to tell me, probably.

"I'll start at the beginning," he said. "My mother and Conrad started Crescent Ventures together, but she was the one who put all the capital in. Then when she passed, she left everything that was hers to me. The ownership share."

"I never wanted anyone to know the company was mine," he continued, "because it would have put it in jeopardy. My father remarried very quickly and my stepmother had me in her sights immediately. Scarlet would have gone after the company if she knew it belonged to me now, and I couldn't let her do that. I couldn't let her destroy my mother's legacy. Conrad and I made a deal to keep my role in the company a secret. It was a calculated business strategy. Scarlet doesn't have it out for my uncle the way she does for me."

"I understand your story," I said slowly, thinking it over. "But I asked you why you kept this secret from me in particular. Keep your secrets from the world, fine. But I am your fiancée. I am carrying your child. I sleep beside you every night, and I work for you. You see how it is different, right? How it matters? Why you should have told me?"

Alexander swallowed hard, then said, "I didn't want to burden you with my secret."

I shook my head. I had let go of a lot of my anger earlier, but apparently it hadn't gone very far. My chest began to tighten with frustration.

He folded his hands together and set them on the table. "You're upset."

"How I feel is not really the point," I responded sharply. "It's a matter of trust."

His mouth fell down at the edges, and he nodded.

"All those nights I came back from work," I continued, "I sat in bed with you and told you about my day. You asked me about my job all the time and I thought nothing of it. I thought that you were interested in my life, I guess. But then I found out you were my boss, and it just felt so... creepy. Like you'd been interviewing me without my knowledge. Taking advantage of my openness and vulnerability to get good intel on my projects, and-"

"No. No, no." Alexander interrupted me. His eyes went wide. "Fiona, no. That's not what I was doing at all. I ask about your day because I care."

"About?"

"About you," he said loudly, as if it were obvious.

"And about the project too, right?"

"Fiona." Alexander pulled a heavy hand down the whole length of his face. He shifted in his chair, turned his body square to me, rested his elbows on his knees and threaded his fingers together, making his hands into a prayer position. "It wasn't like that. I swear to you." I stared him down and arched an eyebrow, silently asking, Then what was it like?

He bowed his head, looking down at his hands. Opened his mouth, hesitated, closed it. Then did that again.

"Alexander." I sighed. It was time to wrap this up. "Please listen. I just wish that I could trust the man I share a bed with. And I don't feel like I can do that."

Finally he looked up at me again. His eyes were wide and pleading.

"What can I do," he asked, "to prove to you that you can?"

"Don't lie to me. Don't keep things from me. At least not things that involve me, things that affect me."

"I can do that," he said. He opened his big hands and held them out before him in a gesture of supplication. "I will do that from now on, I promise. I am so sorry for all of this, Fiona, and I wish that I could take it all back. Please believe me."