Trusting Him: A Billionaire Beach Island Romance (Billionaires of Driftwood Island Book 5) Read online

  “Everything alright, son?”

  The meaning behind his tone was clear. He was telling me that I better not be harassing Ruby. I knew better than to argue with him. The locals all stuck together, and this guy clearly thought I was an outsider looking for trouble.

  “Everything’s fine. I was just leaving.”

  He nodded at me, but didn’t stop staring. He didn’t stop staring the whole time I walked slowly back inside. I sat on one of the plush chairs at the entrance for a long time, trying to figure out what to do and ignoring the stares from the librarian at the front desk.

  So many possibilities swirled in my mind, until finally I made a decision. I took a deep breath, rose from my chair, and went to look at the books that Ruby and the little girl had left behind.

  It was time to execute a plan to get Ruby back in my life—and to get to know the daughter I’d just discovered I had.

  Chapter Four

  * RUBY *

  I had never dreaded going in to work as much as I did the morning after seeing Ian in the library. I couldn’t believe that he’d shown up there with no warning. Why had he thought that would be okay?

  I supposed the why didn’t matter. He had shown up, and now he knew he had a daughter. One look at Chloe was enough to confirm that. She was the spitting image of her father.

  I had spent the entire night feeling guilty. I should have introduced him to her then and there. I shouldn’t have run away like a coward. I should have told him about her years ago.

  So many things I should have done, and instead I had driven away from the library as fast as I could. Not that it mattered. I knew I would have to face him eventually. He obviously knew how to track me down.

  It didn’t help that my good friend Kelsey had apparently seen him too. I’d received a text from her early yesterday evening, asking why there was a man at the library who looked suspiciously like Chloe.

  I hadn’t answered the text yet. I wasn’t sure what to say. Kelsey wasn’t going to be happy when she realized that I had known all along who Chloe’s father had been, but had never confided in her. I guess I’d been keeping a lot of secrets from everyone.

  But dealing with Kelsey was far from my biggest problem at the moment. Right now, I needed to deal with my boss. I needed to find a way to convince him that I was not the right person to clean the presidential suite, but I had no good excuse. I couldn’t exactly walk up and tell him that the guest in the suite was a former flame of mine and cleaning his suite was horribly awkward. My boss would yell at me for getting romantic with a guest, even though my romance with Ian had happened long before I’d worked here.

  In the end, I decided to try claiming that the work was too much. I knew this wouldn’t make my boss happy, but at least it might get me out of cleaning Ian’s suite. Then all the yelling would be worth it.

  I approached my boss’s office door, located at the back of a room with large, industrial washing machines. Sometimes I thought I couldn’t blame him for being irritated all the time. I’d be irritated too, if my office was constantly surrounding by noisy, rumbling washing machines. Swallowing hard, I raised my hand and knocked on the door.

  He yelled in a gruff voice for me to come in, so I opened the door and stepped into the office. I didn’t close the door behind me, and I hoped he wouldn’t tell me to. I would rather deal with having to speak loudly over the sound of the washing machines than be enclosed in a small office with my boss. His temper scared me.

  “What do you need, Ruby?” He looked up impatiently from a stack of papers spread out across his desk.

  I clenched my fists together and told myself to just spit it out. “I would like to request that you assign someone else to clean the presidential suite, if possible. I appreciate the confidence you’ve placed in me by offering the job to me, but I believe the assignment puts too much work on my plate. I’m already responsible for cleaning several other suites, and several other premium rooms. I don’t want my work to suffer and our guests to be unhappy because I’m too overloaded. I could recommend Larissa for the presidential suite. She—”

  “Are you out of your mind?” my boss interrupted, yelling at me. “You think you can just walk in here and pass off the assignments you don’t like?”

  “It’s not that I don’t like the assignment. It’s just that I want to make sure we’re giving all our clients our best service, and—”

  “You don’t decide what our best service is! I do. And I’m telling you that I want you to clean the presidential suite. I’m honestly quite disappointed that you would be so lazy as to try to get out of it. God knows you have your own issues, just like all of you fools that work for me. But laziness had never been something I worried about with you. I guess I was too optimistic.”

  “Sir, I—”

  “Don’t try to backtrack now. You’ve shown your true colors. But don’t worry: I’m going to show you just how much work you are capable of!”

  My boss had stood now, and was leaning over his desk so that his face was inches from my own. I told myself to stand my ground. I didn’t want to flinch and show any weakness, but it was hard not to. It was hard not to burst into tears when a man this mean was yelling directly at you. I bit my lower lip and chewed it so hard that I could taste blood. If I could just make it through this ordeal without crying. I didn’t want to lose my dignity.

  But my boss showed no signs of slowing down. He was yelling even louder now. “I’m going to make sure that you’re assigned even more work than you are now. And I expect you to finish in the same amount of time. I’m not paying you overtime, Ruby. You can toughen up and do your work in the time you have, or you can watch me fire you. Don’t think I won’t! Don’t think I can’t—”

  “What is the problem here?”

  The strong voice that interrupted sounded vaguely familiar, but it couldn’t possibly be who I thought it was. Could it? I turned around and saw to my horror that it was, indeed, Ian Hughes. I felt my cheeks burning with embarrassment, and I wondered how much of that exchange he had heard. I looked down at my feet quickly, unable to meet Ian’s eyes. This morning was definitely not going the way I’d hoped it would.

  My boss fell silent, and instantly stood tall, straightening out his posture.

  “Sir, I…I beg your pardon. Can I assist you with something? My apologies, but this is a staff area. Generally our guests don’t come down here. I wouldn’t want you to get hurt or something. I can call one of our bellboys to lead you back upstairs and help you with whatever you want. No request is too big or small.”

  My boss’s chest puffed out in pride, and I stared at him in disgust. How could he go from being so angry and demeaning one moment to being so sugary-sweet and kind the next? What a hypocrite.

  Ian, at least, didn’t seem fooled by this act. He went deathly silent for a few moments, staring down my boss, who quickly began to cower.

  “I don’t need help from a bellboy. I actually came down here specifically to see if I could find Ruby, and it appears that I’ve found her. So if you don’t mind, I’d like to borrow her for a few minutes.”

  “Of course. No problem, sir. Is everything in your room okay? Did you need more staff to help clean it? I could—”

  “Everything is perfect,” Ian said. “The room is spotless and in pristine condition. I’m quite satisfied with it, but I have to say I’m far from satisfied with what I’ve just seen right here.”

  I watched, somewhat shocked, as Ian leaned forward, grabbed my boss by the collar of his shirt, and pulled him up so his face was only inches away from Ian’s.

  “You listen here, mister. If I ever—ever—see you yelling at Ruby like that again, I will make sure you lose your job. And trust me: I can do that in a heartbeat. I’ve got enough money and connections that the resort owners and management wouldn’t dream of disagreeing with me if I told them that you weren’t a good fit for this position. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Y-y-yes sir.” My boss was literally trembling
, and I have to say that I enjoyed seeing that a little more than I should have.

  My enjoyment was short-lived, however. A moment later, Ian was looking at me, his piercing green eyes seeming to see right into my soul.

  “Walk with me, Ruby.”

  I gulped and nodded, scurrying after him as he turned to make his way back through the rows of washing machines. I didn’t dare protest, even though right now all I wanted to do was to fall into a hole in the ground and disappear permanently from this resort.

  I had a pretty good idea of what Ian wanted to talk to me about, and I knew it didn’t have anything to do with whether his suite was clean enough or not.

  Chapter Five

  * RUBY *

  Ian was silent for the entire long walk back to his suite. He didn’t say anything as we rushed through the lobby, and he remained quiet as we climbed into the elevator for the trip to the top floor of the hotel, where his suite was located. It was not until he had followed me into the suite and closed the door behind him that he turned to look at me and finally spoke.

  “Ruby.” It was the only word he said at first. His tone wasn’t angry. It was filled with some other emotion that I couldn’t quite place. Sadness? Regret? Maybe a bit of desire? He was hard to read right now, and I was freaking out more with every passing second. What was he going to do now that he knew about Chloe? Was he going to try to take her away from me? I would fight him with ever fiber of my being, and every last penny I had. But, admittedly, I didn’t have many pennies. I couldn’t afford a decent lawyer, but he could easily afford the best. He would win that fight.

  The panic rose in my chest no matter how much I tried to push it down. I took a few deep breaths and tried to at least act calm and normal, even if I felt anything but.

  “Ruby,” Ian said again, a little softer this time. He took a step toward me, and I resisted the urge to take a step back. No matter how sad or angry he might be, I had to face him. I owed him that much at least.

  Strangely, in the middle of that tense moment, I found myself noticing how good he still looked. The few years that had passed had only made him look better. His chiseled face was still just as gorgeous, but his eyes had more of a depth to them. He had grown and matured, and the effect was unbearably sexy.

  Not to mention his body was still as muscular and ripped as it had been during that first summer together. I felt my heart doing a flip-flop in my chest as I briefly let my eyes wander to his biceps, which were bulging beneath his t-shirt sleeves. His relaxed fit jeans gave less away about how his leg muscles looked, but I could still see that he was in excellent shape. I wasn’t sure how he had time to run a billion dollar company and still work out, but there was no denying that he did. He was still the most handsome man I’d ever met.

  I felt suddenly frumpy in my maid’s outfit. I hadn’t worn any makeup today, and my hair was pulled back into a frizzy mess of a ponytail. Not to mention I was sure I had dark circles under my eyes, since I’d barely slept last night. I’d been too busy worrying about Ian and what his sudden appearance meant for Chloe.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked. There still wasn’t anger in his voice, but I could tell there was a lot of frustration there.

  I forced myself to look up and meet his eyes. “I didn’t think you’d want the responsibility. We had a whirlwind summer romance, then you left and I never heard from you again. I figured you didn’t want any permanent ties to me.”

  Ian shook his head, then took a step toward me. He put his hands on my shoulder, and I tried to ignore the fire that I suddenly felt rushing through me. “I never stopped wanting you, but I didn’t pursue you because I thought you just considered it a summer romance. I realize now what a mistake that was. I should have stepped up and been a man, and come after the woman I couldn’t stop thinking about.”

  I chewed my lower lip forcefully, trying to keep myself from shaking at his words and his touch. For a moment, I allowed myself to imagine what life might have been like if he had come after me. He would have known about Chloe much earlier. Would he have run in the other direction, or would he have helped raise her? Would he have tried to take her from me? Or would we have been partners together in her life? Would things have been less difficult for me? I could have used the financial help.

  I would never know, I guess. All I knew was that now introducing Chloe to him was going to be much more complicated than it had been when she was a baby. How was Chloe going to feel about a man who was essentially a stranger suddenly appearing in her life?

  “I would have wanted to meet her,” Ian said, letting his hands slide down my shoulders to my arms, then taking a step backward so he was no longer touching me. I felt the loss of his touch right away. My body felt suddenly colder, and a strange sadness washed over me.

  But even though a big part of me was falling straight back into craving Ian’s touch, a bigger part of me was worried about my daughter.

  “I…I don’t know, Ian. I’m not sure she’s ready to suddenly find out her dad is here.”

  Ian’s eyes flashed with the first sign of anger, and I realized how ridiculous I must sound to him. Here he was, discovering that he had missed out on four years of his daughter’s life, and I was trying to stall their meeting even further.

  “And when will she be ready?” he asked. “Do you really think that delaying things any longer is going to make things better, not worse? I’m trying to be understanding here. I really am. I’m sure it wasn’t easy for you to be pregnant and alone and not know if I even cared about the baby. I wish with everything in me that you had told me, or that I had come after you. But you didn’t, and I didn’t, and here we are.”

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I know it might not seem like it, but I was just trying to do what was best for Chloe. Truly.”

  “Chloe,” Ian said slowly. “Chloe. What a beautiful name.”

  I realized with a fresh pang of guilt that he hadn’t even known his daughter’s name until that moment. “Chloe Elizabeth,” I said. “Her middle name is Elizabeth.”

  Ian’s eyes widened. “Really? Elizabeth was my mother’s name. She was my hero but she—”

  “Died when you were twenty-one. I know. You told me. That’s why I gave Chloe her middle name. I wanted her to have at least something from her dad.”

  Ian shook his head slowly. “I honestly don’t know what to say right now.”

  He moved backward a few more steps and sat down on the plush living room couch. Then he gestured for me to sit across from him in the armchair.

  I sat, feeling strange for sitting down in a room where I was usually working. I perched on the edge of the seat and waited for him to speak. I felt like anything I said right now was only going to make things worse.

  “Let me come over to your place tonight. I’ll order pizza, or whatever food kids are into these days, and I’ll have dinner with you guys. You don’t have to tell her tonight that I’m her father, but I at least want to start building a relationship with her. This child is mine, too, Ruby. I don’t want to be a deadbeat dad. I want to be there for her.”

  I chewed my lip even harder than before. “Okay. Fine.”

  I heard myself saying the words, and I knew they were the right words to say. But I still felt terrified, and couldn’t believe that I was actually agreeing to this. What choice did I have, though? Ian was right. He was her dad. If I tried to keep him away, he had every legal right to fight me on this, and that’s not what I wanted.

  What did I want? What I really wanted was to go back in time, and have Ian never leave the island in the first place. In my fantasy world, he would have stayed here and married me. He would have known about the pregnancy and gone through it with me. He would have been there during all the crazy uncertainty of the newborn days. He would have helped me pay for all the expenses that a child entails, and I never would have had to take this stupid job at the hotel, dealing with a boss who thought he could mistreat me just because he was in charge.

&nbs
p; But I couldn’t go back in time. I had made my decision not to tell Ian, and I had paid for it. Now, I had no choice but to see how Chloe reacted to Ian. And if Ian wanted to share custody and have Chloe with him in New York part of the year, I doubted I had any choice about that either. I hadn’t avoided any problems by not telling Ian about his daughter. I had only postponed things.

  I hadn’t avoided my feelings for Ian by not chasing after him, either. I had never truly stopped thinking about him. But now, with him right in front of me, it was clear that all the old chemistry was back. If it hadn’t been for the tiny little fact that we had a daughter together who had yet to meet him thanks to me, we would have already been out on a secluded beach together somewhere.

  I had blown that chance, too, though. I was always going to be Ruby, the girl who screwed up her life by having a kid with a guy she barely knew, and then not even telling him about it.

  I stood stiffly to leave. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters except Chloe. Not even my own happiness.

  “Do you have something to write with? I’ll give you my address.”

  Ian nodded and pointed to the polished desk on the other side of the suite. I walked over there and wrote my address and phone number down with trembling fingers. I wasn’t excited about having Ian at my house. The place would probably look like nothing more than a closet compared to the sorts of places he was used to staying. But I thought Chloe would be more comfortable meeting him in her own space, so I would make the sacrifice for her. Ian could come and laugh at where I lived and at how cheap all of my furniture was, and it wouldn’t matter as long as Chloe was okay.

  “I should go. I have a lot of work to do.” I turned toward the door and picked up my pace. I wanted to get away from Ian as quickly as I could. Technically, I still needed to clean his suite, but I would do that later. Hopefully he was going to head out soon to go to a beach or the resort’s spa. I’d try to find a time when he wasn’t actually here to take care of the suite. My boss clearly wasn’t going to reassign someone else to the job. In fact, now that Ian had humiliated him in front of me, my workload was probably going to double as punishment.