Page 3 of The Good Billionaire
“I’m your sister’s maid of honor. Your parents don’t know we’re separated.” She breathed. “I love them, Sebastian. I won’t hurt them. Especially Savannah. It’s up toyouto tell your father what’s going on.Notme.”
Kennedy and I had to fool everyone for my sister’s wedding next weekend, make my family believe everything between us was hunky-dory. She’d been living somewhere downtown for six months.
Clearly, things weren’t hunky-dory.
With my sister teaching in Cincinnati and my parents retired in Atlanta, it’d been easy to keep my separation from Kennedy a secret.
I had only told my cousins Luke and Tristan because they were my best friends. They agreed to keep my secret. Then my sister had gotten engaged a few months ago and wanted a Christmas wedding in Manhattan. A small family affair, and that made Kennedy the prime candidate to be Savannah’s maid of honor.
“What’s going on, Kenna? What the hell are we doing?” I pulled her into my chest, my mouth hovering above hers. I didn’t think a kiss would make the last miserable six months go away, but it was a damn good start.
Those gorgeous eyes of hers went heavy-lidden on me. There. I cracked her open.
“Come home with me, Kenna,” I whispered. “Our home.”
Shaking her head and wriggling away from me, she said, “I can’t. Didn’t Luke show you the papers from my lawyer? We’re getting a divorce.”
CHAPTER TWO
Kennedy
Ileft Sebastian feeling like a stunned mess. Being so close to him and almost kissing him had sent me into a freefall of emotion. I grabbed my coat leaving my clothes in the locker, and then headed out in my scrubs. Didn’t want to risk another run-in with Sebastian.
Didn’t trust myself.
Why had I ignored Seb’s texts? His voice could break me, that was why. And why had I refused to see him? The man was barely human, he was so gorgeous. Classically. Tall, broad, strong cheekbones with heart-melting green eyes.
Almost melted this Hart...
Sure, looks weren’t everything. In fact, the stunning Adonis he’d turned into came with age. I met him as a skinny boy at Johns Hopkins ten years ago. Sebastian had been different from other guys there. Sweet, kind, funny. Oh God, he’d cracked me up. I fell in love with him after the first kiss.
I’d been twenty-two and unprepared for how much a man could rock my world. But Seb had fallen hard too. We’d dated all through med school and got married a few months before graduating. He’d proposed the year before.
I would never forget his reasoning for getting married while we were still in school.
“You’re it for me, Kenna. Forever. I want you to practice medicine as Dr. Hart, like me. The two of us, we’re a team.”
And for years we were. The surgeon and the anesthesiologist at Lincoln Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland being my home state. Moving to New York had been the first nail in the coffinwhen I’d gone to one hospital and he went to another. Then came the opportunity to start his own surgery center. He’d asked me to join him, but I’d made a name for myself at Mercy.
Was this partly my fault?
Sure, he’d offered to make me head of the department at theCenter, but that would have been a hollow, unearned victory. I had my pride too. I could never compete with a brilliant surgeon.Theywere rock stars. Anesthetists were staff. Dispensable.
Still, my own victory had arrived. And all on my own. Right after Savannah’s wedding, I would start my new job as Head of Anesthesiology at Memorial Hospital. My grand achievement and I couldn’t even tell my best friend because that was Sebastian and I was furious with him.
All these thoughts pounded in my head during the cab ride downtown to the apartment I’d been renting since leaving my husband.
Inside my apartment, I closed the door and breathed. Willed away tears from seeing Seb and almost kissing him. A few hours in that operating room with him had wrecked me. A moment near his lips made me dizzy. Being with Seb was one unending rollercoaster ride. But lately, we’d been riding on separate tracks. How in the world would I survive an entire weekend with him? Savannah was arriving next Friday. A weekend wedding blowout at Seb’s cousins’ hotel, The Sterling in the heart of Manhattan.
That reminded me to call Tristan.
Exhaling, I shrugged out of my coat and poured a glass of red wine first.
I’d lied about the date.Mean, I know...
From my pantry, I took out a box of Kraft mac and cheese. With the macaroni cooked and mixed with the cheese and milk, all bubbling up, I grabbed my planner for Savannah’s wedding and called Seb’s cousin Tristan, the COO of The Sterling.
“Hey you,” Tristan answered the FaceTime call. Now, if there was a face that closely rivaled Sebastian’s it was Tristan’s. “I thought you were calling me a few hours ago?”
