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  Ryan was shaking his head, but she could see the doubt starting to creep in and she knew she was about to win. If only she could be happy about it. If only she could forget that Silver March had betrayed her.

  “You’re more an idiot than I gave you credit for if you really think I’d gone and fallen for him. You know what kind of girl I am. You really think I’d lose my head over a guy?” She forced out a laugh. “When I left your school, assholes, the one thing I learned was that it would be a lot easier for me to have a guy in my corner. A guy can just take care of all of the hassles and allow me to focus on basketball. Silver March meets all my requirements. I’ve got him wrapped around my little finger and he does everything I ask him.”

  Behind her, someone said quietly, “That’s true.”

  Lace froze.

  A moment later, Silver was standing right next to her.

  How long had he been there? Had he heard everything? She wanted to look at him and search his face for answers, but she couldn’t. She was afraid she’d find something else, something that would destroy the little control she had left.

  “She’s right when she says I’m hers to command and I’d do everything she asks. And I’m doing it because I love her.”

  Lace’s head jerked up, her gaze clashing with his.

  “And you love me, too, don’t you, Lace Wyndham?” She could see now that he had heard everything and that she had hurt him. She could see that he was furious with her, but more than that, she could see his need to hear her say the words.

  If only she could make herself believe that she really was seeing all those things.

  Because once, she had thought she was a good judge of people. Once, she had trusted a guy, thinking he was good, but that person had ended up ruining her.

  How could she be sure Silver March wasn’t like that guy? Because if she thought about it, wasn’t Silver March too irritatingly perfect – wasn’t he too perfect to be true?

  The silence yawned between them.

  Silver’s face was harsh with tension, his voice just as taut as he said, “Say the words.”

  She could only look at him, torn.

  “She’s not going to say it, man,” Ryan jeered. “Didn’t you hear her? She just said you were her fuck buddy. She’s a fucking slut who’d—”

  In a blink of an eye, Silver stalked past her and threw a punch at Ryan.

  “March, no!”

  But it was too late, the entire Northwest squad jumping into the fray.

  “STOP IT!” She automatically ran towards them, intent on getting Silver to safety. Was he for real? It was eleven versus one! How did he think he’d survive that kind of fight?

  But she had only managed to take several steps before she was being held back, and when she looked up, she recognized the man holding her as one of Silver’s own security team. Her head whipped back to the others, and she saw the rest of Silver’s men breaking the fight apart.

  Silver was on the ground, one knee propped up and holding his nose.

  “March!” The man behind her let Lace go, and she ran towards Silver, dropping to her knees as she sought to check him for injuries. But before she could hold his face, Silver had captured her wrist, and his burning gaze did the same to her eyes, preventing her from looking away.

  “Look at me. Really look at me, dammit. I’m the fucking guy who dropped everything at work and flew back to your side when you asked me to. Doesn’t that prove to you I love you? That you can trust me?”

  She could only look at him, unable to say a thing. Her lips parted, but no words came out, fear holding everything back.

  “I know I can let this go. I even know I know you better than you know yourself, but dammit, Wyndham. You can’t just keep fucking taking and taking—”

  His words singed her because she knew everything he said was true.

  “I’m at my limit.” His voice was flat as he made the confession. “I want – no, I need to hear you say the words.” He was practically begging, and she hated herself for it. Someone like Silver March shouldn’t be made to do this.

  But still, she could only look at him, tears running down her cheeks—

  “Don’t you fucking cry,” he rasped.

  “I’m trying not to!”

  Letting go of her wrist, Silver raked a hand through his hair in patent frustration. “That guy…that jerk you were talking to, he made me doubt myself, okay? I know it’s childish, but it’s why I need you to say the words.”

  When she still didn’t say anything, he started to shake her. “Do you really not trust me? Love me?” He inhaled deeply. “That girl…that girl he was talking about at the park? I went out for a jog and I bumped into her. She’s Sabrina Wyle. We call her ‘Bree’. She’s a childhood friend, and more importantly, she’s going out with Dylan Charbonneau, the rocker. She’s nothing to me. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  She did. She really did, and that was why it hurt so much. She understood that he was doing the one thing he probably hated doing. He was explaining to her when he didn’t have to. He was acting like he had to prove his innocence even when he didn’t.

  He was giving her every reason to trust him. To love him. To believe in him.

  But she was so damn scared.

  “Take my hand now.” His voice was stiff, his face white. “You can’t say the words yet. I get it. Just take my hand and I’ll understand.”

  Her head dipped.

  And now, he was giving her an excuse when she didn’t deserve one.

  It just made things so painfully clear.

  She couldn’t take his hand.

  She didn’t deserve him.

  “Wyndham, dammit. Just take my damn hand.”

  She didn’t. Wouldn’t. Because this, what he just did, it made things really, really clear. She loved him, and because she loved him, she couldn’t take his hand. Someone like her didn’t deserve someone like Silver March.

  And then she felt it—

  Silver trying to place her hand in his—

  Silver always making a way to make things right between them even when she was the one who was wrong—

  Lace yanked her hand away.

  A look of devastating shock darkened his gaze. She couldn’t understand what it meant, could only stare at his stiff back as he slowly came to his feet and started walking away.

  Why, she wondered painfully, did he look at her like that? Couldn’t he see she was, for once, doing the giving? Couldn’t he see that she was giving him up because she loved him so much?

  So why—

  And then it hit her.

  Oh God.

  She had made him believe Ryan was right and that she had been the one stringing him all along. That all the time he was in love with her, she had never loved him back.

  “No!” The word burst out of her, and she hurriedly scrambled to her feet. “March, March, March!” She ran as she shouted his name, and she didn’t care how everyone was turning to look at her as she ran past them.

  She caught sight of Silver stepping into his sports car.

  “Silver, wait!”

  But he didn’t turn back, didn’t even act like he had heard her.

  He simply drove away, leaving her just like she had asked him to for so many times.

  First Teardrop

  Fancy corporate events never used to scare her. But then, in the past, she hadn’t felt like she had anything to prove. She had always been surrounded by people who loved her, too, but now she was all alone. In all fairness, she had insisted it be so, but the knowledge was cold comfort as she felt people’s eyes on her.

  She was quite possibly the only teenager in the room. This was, after all, an invitation-only ball sponsored by March Enterprises for its valued partners. Her only relationship with the company was with its Vice President, and it had nothing to do with business.

  One week.

  Lace had survived exactly one week of pretending she could move on and forget Silver March. Dammit, she was so stup
id. He was Silver March. He was the type of guy girls would remember forever, even if they weren’t in love with him.

  When she had suddenly broken down in the middle of practice, bursting into tears, Lace had known then, and she didn’t need her team captain growling at her to run after her man if that was what she really wanted.

  “We don’t need a coward for a coach. Coach.”

  Asshole. The memory had her scowling. Ivan hadn’t needed to call her a coward to make his point. Her subconscious already knew she had been one, from the first instance she had refused to say the words that Silver wanted to hear, words that had been locked inside her heart probably since the first time they had met.

  She saw him before he saw her, and it broke her to see him so dazzling. It just wasn’t because he was surrounded by women and she was jealous about it. That was a given, but it was more than that. Seeing him in his milieu, it was only now that Lace was starting to realize just how much he had changed for her…and how much she had lost when she pushed him away.

  There was nothing like the intense, gentle man she knew in the Silver March standing in front of her. This Silver March was still charming, but coldly so. He smiled as easily as always, but there was also an air of aloofness about him, preventing everyone from getting too close.

  As she came closer, she started to hear him speak, and even how he talked, even what he was saying – it was all different. If he had been like this the first time they had met, she would never have the guts to even imagine he would be pleased to have a kiss as a reward.

  His head suddenly lifted, his gaze unerringly finding hers.

  He didn’t say a word, simply stared at her, long enough to have the all of the women around him glaring her way.

  The old Silver March would have taken the first move, would have left all the women behind him to take Lace in his arms so she would know he only wanted her.

  But that was then.

  This was now.

  They were not the same, and they didn’t feel the same about each other either.

  Somehow, she found the courage to move. Her eyes on him, she started forward, each baby step feeling like it was a giant leap for herself because it made her embrace the fact that she was a girl.

  This, Lace realized, was another thing that she had Silver to thank for. For so many years, she had unconsciously done her best to bury all signs that she was a girl, thinking that if people saw she had breasts, they’d also think she wasn’t good enough to be a coach.

  But when Silver looked at her…

  When Silver talked to her…

  He made her believe in herself.

  He made her realize that being a girl didn’t make her weaker, the same way being a guy didn’t make one stronger. It was a really simple lesson, but it had taken Silver to open her eyes to it.

  Silver.

  She took another step, then another and another. The closer she got to him, the more she felt drawn, his presence reeling her in.

  Lace absently noted that Silver had suddenly paled. His eyes had also widened, and he was starting to speak—

  “Watch out!”

  Oh.

  But it was too late.

  A trolley suddenly came out of nowhere, weighed down by huge silver-wrapped gift boxes. She tried to stop herself from walking, but her stilettos made her lose her balance, and —

  Smack.

  Lace clutched her nose as she started to fall back.

  This time, though, Silver was a second too late at catching her.

  However, other men weren’t, and she felt like one of those fangirls who liked throwing themselves at the crowd, the way so many pairs of hands had reached out to steady her. By the smitten looks on their faces, Lace had to grudgingly admit that Alexio had done her proud again with her party look. Maybe he really was gay, she mused absently. It would just suck if it turned out that a straight hot guy like her forward was better at makeup than her.

  “Excuse me.”

  It was Silver’s voice, but at its iciest. A second later, all the men were dropping away like flies swatted out of the picture as she was transferred to Silver’s arms. Still pinching the bridge of her nose, Lace took one look at his hard face and couldn’t help but grin. “Jealous?”

  He grinned back, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Want me to drop you?”

  She hastily got rid of her grin, and she could feel her body trembling with heightened awareness as Silver slowly helped her to her feet.

  He cupped her elbow as he led her away. “You’re okay?”

  She touched her nose. “It’s not bleeding anymore.”

  “Good.”

  They didn’t talk after that, and he felt so chillingly cold she couldn’t make herself speak first. Lace was hoping he would take them somewhere private but instead, he took her back to his little harem.

  Oh.

  She was to compete with them then?

  Lace squared her shoulders. This was just like basketball, she told herself. Everyone was eyeing her haughtily. Lace recognized one of the girls, and she immediately offered her hand. “Hey. Carole, isn’t it? You went to school with my brother Slade?”

  Carole blinked. “Slade…Wyndham?”

  Lace nodded with a smile. “I’ll let him know I bumped into you.” Since she rarely made it to the society pages, she was a nonentity as far as the people here were concerned. But her brother? Her very rich and famous brother?

  “Oh my, you’re Lace, right? You’re all grown up now,” Carole was gushing as she air-kissed Lace’s cheeks. Lace knew her type well. Carole was the kind to always hedge her bets, and she’d never risk being in a catfight with a potential future sister-in-law as much as possible.

  One down, a gazillion to go.

  Lace worked hard. She couldn’t remember working as hard as she was working now at eliminating the competition. She bribed who she could, scared who could be scared, and did everything to get rid of the girls hanging on to her man until there was just one left.

  That was when she realized she had wasted thirty minutes of her life. She shouldn’t have bothered with the others, dammit. This – this woman who was stuck to Silver like glue, his arm around her waist – this was her greatest hurdle.

  A tall, sexy brunette, she seemed closer to Silver’s age and just as sophisticated.

  “Lace, I’d like you to meet Eva.”

  From now on, Lace thought, she was going to hate the name ‘Eva’ forever. Then she saw Silver’s fingers tighten around the woman’s hip.

  Silver’s gaze met hers. “She’s the fuck buddy I got after our split.”

  Oh. Lace blindly fumbled for something to hold on to. Her fingers encountered one hard arm, and uncaring of who it was, she just hauled the man close to her, needing something to keep her upright.

  “Well, hello there,” Anonymous Male said. He sounded startled, his voice bearing a faint trace of a European accent.

  Silver’s jaw hardened, and a muscle started ticking when he saw Lace clutch at another guy.

  She looked at Eva. Shouldn’t the other woman be mad now? Hadn’t Silver just called her a fuck buddy in public? Didn’t she mind?

  But Eva only smiled at Lace.

  Apparently not.

  Her gaze never straying from Lace’s face, Eva stroked Silver’s cheek, her lush red lips curving as she pouted. “Naughty boy. You’re not supposed to call me that even if it’s true.”

  Lace clutched at Anonymous Male’s arm harder.

  “Sweetheart, are you all right?”

  “Don’t call her that,” Silver snarled.

  Fury flashed in Eva’s eyes. “Why do you care? I was the one in your bed last night—”

  Lace looked up at her companion. He was a very good-looking man, almost as handsome as Silver March, Lace thought numbly, in her very biased opinion. But right now, she didn’t really give a damn about his looks or anyone else’s. Right now, she just needed someone to help her walk out of this shithole before she fell apart.

&nb
sp; “Could you please take me away?”

  SILVER

  She was free to do whatever she wanted.

  He told himself the words over and over, reminding himself that it was over between him and Lace. She was just too young, and he was tired of running after her. But then he saw Gabriel taking her hand—

  He stood corrected.

  Lace was free to do anything but leave with another man.

  In a second, he had released Eva. “I’m sorry,” he told her abruptly before going after Lace.

  “What do you mean you’re sorry?” Eva screeched from behind.

  Not bothering to look back, Silver caught hold of Lace’s hand. “Where do you think you’re going?” The first touch of his fingers seemed to work like a trigger. Lace suddenly turned into a hellcat, kicking and hissing for him to let her go.

  Around them, cameras started clicking, but Silver didn’t give a damn. All that mattered was keeping his woman in his possession.

  “Let go of me!”

  Behind them, Eva was screaming. “Come back!”

  “Yes,” Lace hissed at Silver. “Go back to your fuck buddy!” Unshed tears shone in her pretty eyes. The sight of them made him furious and guilty at the same time because he knew she was only glaring at him to stop herself from crying.

  Damn her. It wasn’t fucking fair that just the sight of her tears wrecked all his defenses, making him feel something that he had been doing his damnedest to kill.

  For a moment, it was as if the whole world melted into the blackness, leaving just the two of them alone.

  Ah, dammit.

  He really did love her still, and this girl, his little rebellious lamb.

  She loved him, too.

  Struggling to keep his voice even, he said harshly, “You’re not going anywhere.” Behind her, he caught sight of his brother, who was frowning. Silver nodded at Steel, an acknowledgment that he had everything under control. And he did. He only had to see her again, and it was just like when they had first met.

  One look into her eyes and he knew that even though she had said a lot of shitty things about him, they had been all for show. Even though she had practically ground his heart under the sole of her hundred-dollar Nikes, everything she did – it had been all for show.