CHAPTER 18

Nigel knocked on Sydney’s office door the following day and waited until she waved him inside.

“Hey,” she smiled as she hung up the phone. “What’s up?”

He had a long talk with Miss Stansbury, which really helped his perception of things, and he decided that there could be no more secrets between him and Sydney. It was obvious, from his reaction to Preston that such a situation might occur again and she would question his behaviour. He had to explain, even if it ended up costing him. “Could I talk to you?” he asked.

Sydney leaned back in her chair. “Sure.”

Too easy. Everything about this was too easy, which only made him more nervous. He couldn’t do it. She deserved an explanation, but now he wasn’t sure he could follow through. She had acted fine when he arrived this morning, made no indication she was still concerned or upset. It had nearly killed him not to open the door to her last night, but he was still so angry then. Now, maybe she’d forgotton about it. Maybe he didn’t have to explain himself at all. “Actually…um…it can wait.” He turned to exit and Sydney called him back.

“Nigel!” She scrambled after him, caught his arm and pulled him back. She had been in terrific spirits the past few weeks, mostly due to the fact that Nigel had returned to his usual stammering, shy self and all that nonsense with Mason was now behind them. His behaviour at that time had frightened her and she worried she might never get ‘her’ Nigel back, but he did come back and while he did seem to possess a better confidence and strength, it only improved the man he was. Then, last night, he seemed to revert back to withholding things from her. She had tried not to pressure him when he came in to work, hoping he would come to her first, now that it seemed he wanted to, he was hesitating. “Spill it.”

Nigel turned back, reluctantly as she released him and leaned against her desk, waiting expectantly. He opened his mouth several times, but then changed his mind and closed it again. He looked at the floor, the bookshelves, the window, anywhere but at Sydney.

“Is it Rose?” Sydney asked, knowing it wasn’t, but wanting to get him talking.

He looked up, startled. “What? Oh, no. She’s…she’s settling in fine, I think. She seems to really enjoy it here.”

Sydney nodded. “Good.” She liked Nigel’s half-sister enormously, despite who her father was, Julia was articulate and intelligent and a perfect sibling for Nigel. They spoke for hours about classical music and literary works. They both loved astronomy. The one big difference is that Rose was not the least bit shy. She was demure, quiet, but bluntly outspoken. It was refreshing for Nigel who always seemed to misunderstand people, and even though she had experienced Rose’s sharp tongue and judgement, she admired the young woman for speaking her mind.

Nigel was still hesitant to speak.

“Are you still having doubts?” Sydney asked, concerned. “You’re nothing like Mason, Nigel. Nothing at all. You’re a good brother…”

“No, no, I...I know.” He sighed. Why had he even started this? “I just…” Another pause. He lifted his gaze to hers and took a step closer. “Syd…There are…were similarities between us. Things…things that concerned me.”

“Nigel…” she protested.

“No, truly. I…I mean, that isn’t what I wanted to talk to you about, but perhaps…” He stared down at the pen in his hand that he had brought in to fiddle with, to give his fingers something to do. Maybe it would help him ease into what he had to say if she knew the source. “I know I’m nothing like him, but…well there were things that we share, whether I chose to like it or not.”

“Like what?”

“Just…habits mostly…” And a couple of medical conditions it seemed. “When we talked he…he described his relationship with my fa…” Nigel winced, slightly. “With Ross Bailey to be, well very similar to the relationship Preston and I have.”

Sydney reached out and rubbed his arm. “Nigel, Mason may have been your biological father, but the man who raised you was your real father.”

He nodded. “I know. I…I was just…I wanted you to be aware of who I meant.”

“I know.”

“Anyway, he said his brother treated him as Preston has treated me, always upstaging him and being fiercely competitive.” Nigel smirked. “A general ass, just like Preston.”

Sydney hid her smile.

“He blamed my father for everything that had gone wrong in his life. He blamed him for stealing away the woman he loved, my mother.”

“He was mad, Nigel. All of us have issues in childhood. Some people are viciously abused and mistreated, and we don’t all grow up to become crime lords and murderers.”

“No, I realize that and I realize that Max chose to use his bitterness as an excuse, but…”

“But?” Sydney prompted gently.

“It’s so much like my life, Syd. He could have been describing me in ten or twenty years.”

“Nigel, that’s ridiculous!”

He looked at her, hard. “Is it? I have a great deal of bitterness towards Preston, Syd. You’ve no idea how much and…and he tended to steal away the affections of any woman I cared about, just as Max claimed my father did to him.”

“That doesn’t mean anything, Nigel. Besides the fact that Mason was a master manipulator and could have been lying in the things he told you, he was probably a bad seed from the get go. Anyone who blames all their misfortune on others is no good to begin with.”

Nigel shook his head. “He was telling the truth, Syd. I know when someone is lying to me and I could see that he was telling, at least what he thought was the truth.”

“So, how does any of this mean anything? You are not Mason.”

“No, but I could be.” He lowered his eyes again and took a deep breath. “Syd, I’ve always tried to be honest with myself, I know my limits and my strengths, and I had to ask myself what would I do.” Intense eyes met hers. “If Preston, the bane of my very existence, stole the woman I loved most in the world. I wondered what my bitterness towards him would turn me into, if that happened.”

“You’ve already faced that challenge, Nigel,” Sydney reminded. “He stole Amanda, and you handled it fine.”

He shook his head. “Amanda wasn’t the love of my life, Syd. I loved her, but…not as much as I thought, or it wouldn’t have been so easy for me to turn her over to the police.”

She thought for a moment. Could he be concerned about Cate. She had thought their relationship was over, but maybe not. Before she could ask, however he took another step closer, invading her space.

“Syd,” he began quietly. “I told Mason that the happiness of the woman I loved was more important than anything, even if she had to find it in the arms of another man. I told him I was nothing like him, because he deliberately set out to hurt my mother for rejecting him. I told him that wasn’t how you loved someone.”

Sydney couldn’t tear her eyes from his, which held such passion, such raw emotion, unnatural for Nigel. “But?” she asked, softly.

Nigel knew he should stop, he knew he was about to ruin everything, but she had to know. He had to make her understand, the way he had forced himself to face the truth. “I never really considered how I would feel if that man that brought her happiness was Preston,” he admitted, averting his eyes for only a moment.

Sydney’s heart went out to him. She knew how much Preston tormented him. “How would you feel?”

When he lifted his gaze, there was such agony in those hazel eyes, that the shock almost took Sydney’s breath away. “Devastated,” he whispered. “I…I’ve tried to never allow myself to let my emotions rule my good sense, but…I know, I know, in my heart, that it would kill me to see her with Preston.”

Sydney reached out to touch his cheek. “Oh, Nigel.”

He caught her hand and held it to his face, closing his eyes for a moment as he gathered his thoughts. When he opened them, they were clear, unwavering. “But I’m not him,” he whispered. “I would never hurt her, because of my own pain.” He paused. “I would never hurt you.”

Sydney’s eyes widened in realization and she finally understood his behaviour yesterday.

“I…I wanted you to know that.” He released her hand suddenly and stepped back. “”That’s all I had to say.” He turned away, before she could respond, and stepped out of the office.

For what seemed like an age, Sydney was too stunned to move, when she did, she rushed out to find Nigel gone. “Where is he?” she demanded of Karen.

“Nigel?” the girl asked, startled.

“Who the hell else would I mean?”

“He…he said he was going to the library to return…” Sydney was out the door before Karen could finish the sentence. She ran down the hall, avoiding students and other faculty members, who glanced at her with mild curiosity. She bolted up the two flights of stairs and spotted Nigel in the second floor corridor.

“Nigel!”

He turned, startled and almost dropped the thick research books he was carrying.

Sydney caught up to him, grabbed his arm and shoved him into an open classroom, where two students were studying. “Out,” she ordered and they scrambled out of the room. She closed the door and turned back to Nigel. “What the hell was that?”

He quivered before her, trying to hold onto his books as a barrier between them. “I…what…” She looked furious. “I never…” She looked ready to tear him apart and he couldn’t even complete a sentence.

“You don’t tell someone you love them and then walk out, Nigel!” Sydney growled, grabbing the books away from him and slamming them on the desk, leaving him naked and exposed to her anger.

“I…” He swallowed, hard and backed up, hitting the desk behind him. “I don’t…I just wanted you...I don’t expect…” He’d blown it. He’d admitted to having deeper feelings that friendship for her and now she was either going to sack him or beat him to a pulp. “I’m sorry!”

Sydney advanced forcing him away from the desk and towards the far windows. “Sorry for what? For finally telling me how you feel, or for lying to me this whole time?”

“I…I was just trying to explain…last night was…I never meant to…”

“How long, Nigel?”

He cringed as his back hit the window, he had nowhere else to run. “How…how long what?”

“How long have you known?”

“I…I’ve always been attracted to you, Syd. You…you’re beautiful…”

“How long, Nigel?”

“T…two years, at least.” He lowered his eyes. He was prepared for the worst, but was not beyond begging, not when it came to something so important, not for her. “Please, Syd. Don’t sack me, if…if you want to beat me up, fine, but…I…don’t break up our team. Working with you has been the best thing that has ever happened to me, please don’t change it, don’t take that from me?”

Sydney’s anger suddenly faded and her expression softened. “You think I’m going to fire you for saying you love me?”

“I...I know you don’t feel the same. I…I know you don’t want a relationship with your assistant, because of whatever happened with the fellow before me. I know you’re off limits and I have adhered to that. I’ve been dutiful and…and abided your rules, but I can’t help how I feel and I know it’s cause for dismissal, but it doesn’t change anything, Syd. I swear I’d never…” His words were cut off as Sydney grabbed him by the front of his shirt and pulled him to her. Her mouth claimed his in a hungry, searching kiss that took his breath away.

When she released him, Sydney could see the confusion in his eyes. “You’re a twit, Nigel,” she sighed.

“I’m what?”

“Why didn’t you tell me before?”

“It…it wasn’t appropriate.”

“Why tell me now?”

He stared at her, trying to understand what was happening, what she was thinking, but for once, he couldn’t read her. “I…I needed you to understand, Syd. I…I wanted you to know that…that I’d never do what Mason did.”

Sydney cradled his face between her hands. “Nigel, I never once considered it. I told you, you’re nothing like him.”

“Really?” He could have saved himself some agony and kept his bloody mouth shut. “Then…then I’m sorry for…for bothering you with it, Syd.”

Sydney smirked. “Is that what you call professing your love to someone, bothering them?” She shook her head and kissed him again. “How horribly British of you.”

“There’s no call to be mean,” Nigel protested.

She wound her arms around his neck and stepped closer, so their bodies were touching again. “I don’t want to be mean,” she admitted, seductively. “I want to be nice.” She kissed his neck. “Very, very nice.” His cheek and his mouth again met the sweet pressure of her lips.

Nigel pulled away. “Syd…What are you doing?”

“I thought it was obvious what I was doing.” She frowned. “I must be out of practice.”

“No, I mean…Why are you…doing this?”

“Kissing you?”

“For starters, yes.”

“Because that’s what couples do, Nigel.”

Nigel’s eyes brows disappeared into his hairline. “Sorry?” he squeaked.

Sydney scowled. “Don’t you want to be my boyfriend?” It sounded deliciously childish to use that term and she grinned.

“You…Your…” Nigel’s mind reeled. Was this possible? Was she saying what he thought she was saying or was he just reading her wrong again? “But we’re friends! We…we don’t…you never…” He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “My head hurts.”

Sydney laughed and started to massage his temples, feeling him melt into her touch. “Poor baby. Is it all too much for you?”

“Frankly, yes.”

“It’s quite simple,” she replied as she watched his eyes close against the soothing comfort her hands produced. “You love me. I love you. Therefore, we are a couple.”

His eyes flew open. “You…what did you say?”

“You heard me, Nigel.”

“You can’t love me!”

“Why not?”

“I…I’m not even your type!” he exclaimed. “You’ve never even hinted…” Well, a few mixed signals here and there were hardly declarations of love, anyway. “You never said…”

“Neither did you,” she reminded, dropping her hands away from his face.

“That was different!”

“Why?”

“Well, I…” He shook his head. He didn’t have an explanation; he just never imagined she would ever feel the same. He repeated her question. “How…how long?”

“Well, you’re very attractive…” she began, using the same ruse as he had.

“Syd, please!”

“I became aware of it when I thought you were dead,” she admitted, quietly. “When we were being held by Tslarov.”

Nigel stared at her in shock. That was almost three years ago. All this time and she hadn’t said anything. “Why?” he demanded. “Why did you never tell me?”

She shrugged. “I was gun-shy,” she admitted. “I didn’t want to ruin what we had and I wasn’t sure you would feel the same. It was complicated because, technically, I’m your employer and I didn’t want you to think I was sexually harassing you.”

Nigel digested this information and leaned against the window, as if needing a little extra support to remain standing. “So,” he finally said. “What…what do we do now?”

“Well, I was getting to that, but you wouldn’t let me finish,” Sydney teased.

“Syd, be serious.”

“I am.” She stepped closer and placed her hands on his shoulders. “I want you, Nigel. I want us.”

“Truly?”

“Unless you don’t want that? If you’d rather just stay as we are, that’s okay too.”

“Syd, it isn’t…I just never imagined I’d have the choice, you know?”

She nodded. She never imagined she’d get the chance to offer it. She didn’t think Nigel would ever make the first move. “Now you do.” She moved closer, their bodies touching. “So, what say you?”

Nigel stared into her eyes, her love obvious, now that he took the time to look. He shyly wrapped his arms around her waist. “I’ve only ever wanted to be with you, Syd. Anyway and every way possible.” He caressed her cheek. “You have bewitched me body and soul.”

Sydney shivered in pleasure at the classic literary line. “Then, I guess there’s only one thing left to do,” she murmured, leaning closer. “To consummate our union.”

“I may faint,” he whispered, half teasing.

“I’ll revive you,” she promised as her mouth captured his.

The End

 

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