The Real Heiress Returns Five Brothers on Their Knees novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Six Knocks
Coralie takes a morning-after pill in a hotel suite and tells her lover she never wants children, then lands at the airport where her brother says she paid a man to kiss her. The man's name turns out to be the one her sister calls her fiancé.
There were six knocks on the suite door, and Winslow knew who it was before he opened it.
"That's my assistant," he said, pulling his hand off my hip. "He knocks twice, then three times, then once."
"You gave him a code?"
"I gave him one job this morning."
He crossed the room in his shirtsleeves and came back with a small paper bag.
Inside was one white pill in a blister pack and a bottle of water.
I stared at it, annoyed.
He had planned this before I woke up.
The condom had slipped last night.
We both knew it.
I had been about to bring it up, and he had already sent a man across Chicago with the answer.
"You could have asked me first," I said.
"I'm asking now." His jaw was tight. "Do you want it?"
"Yes."
I took the pill from his palm and held it.
"I'll swallow it at the airport," I said. "My flight's at noon."
"Coralie."
"I won't forget. I've never missed a dose of anything in my life."
He tried to smile and didn't get there.
"Don't worry," I said. "I'm not having a baby. I'm not good with kids, and I don't want any."
Winslow went still.
"You don't want kids," he said slowly.
"Does that bother you?"
"No." He unscrewed the water bottle and handed it to me. "Then we leave it there. I'd never push."
His voice was easy.
His jaw was not.
I put the pill in my coat pocket and let it go.
We had one set of rules, and I had made them myself.
No last names, no families, and I leave before morning.
It had been a month.
We met in a bar in Tacoma, where he said, "Winslow, in shipping."
Every weekend since, there had been a hotel suite.
I had stayed past morning twice, and both times I had hated myself.
"Tell me one thing about your family," I said.
I was leaving, and I felt like breaking a rule.
He raised an eyebrow.
"They're a pain." He sat on the edge of the bed.
"Since I was nineteen they've been trying to hand me a woman."
"Who is she?"
"A girl I've never met. I've never gone to a single dinner."
"Lucky girl."
"Unlucky. She's got no idea I'm ignoring her."
He caught my wrist with his right hand.
The silver lighthouse ring was cold against my skin.
He kissed the inside of my wrist.
"Come home tonight," he said quietly. "I'll cook. You can eat and glare at me."
"I'll try."
My face went hot, and I looked at the floor.
At the gate in Seattle, I was still thinking about his mouth.
Which was why I wasn't ready for what was waiting at the end of the arrivals hall.
A man in a camel overcoat stood with his arms folded.
Next to him stood a slim blonde woman in a pale pink coat, holding a bouquet.
My brother Colton.
My sister Brynn.
I had seen them in photographs for three months.
They had both said on the phone that they could not wait to meet me.
Brynn ran at me. "Coralie! Oh my God, you look just like Mom."
She hugged me hard and smelled like roses.
"Sorry about the airport, it's a zoo," she said into my hair.
"Dalton's stuck at the office, but we'll take care of everything. Nothing has to change for you."
It sounded kind.
I let myself believe it for a heartbeat.
Then Colton looked at me.
He started at my mouth.
My lips were still swollen from Winslow's, and I knew it.
I had not had time to be embarrassed about it.
"Rough flight?" he asked. "Your mouth looks stung."
"Hot wings," I said.
He did not believe me.
He kept looking at my lips, and then he looked at the rest of me.
I'm a size fourteen. I have my mother's arms and my own opinions.
Colton took in all of it, and I watched him decide something.
He said it to Brynn, low.
Not low enough for the family beside us, or the driver, or the woman holding a sign for someone else.
"Nobody kisses a girl like that for free. She probably paid."
Brynn's hand went to her mouth. "Colton!"
"I'm just saying what everyone will think."
"Give me your suitcase," he told me a moment later, flat and polite.
"I've got it."
I walked past him.
I had been told for twenty-six years that I was Coralie Marsh, a cook's daughter from Tacoma.
For three months I had been told I was a Livingstone.
I did not feel like either one in that hall.
So I took my own bag and walked to the taxi line.
Brynn caught up before the doors. She was out of breath and apologizing, pressing the bouquet into my arms.
"He's an idiot, I'm so sorry. Please come to dinner tonight. Everyone's dying to see you."
She laughed shakily.
"Besides, I'm a wreck. Winslow Taft finally said yes to meeting us tomorrow."
"Who?" I said.
"My almost-fiancé. I've only ever seen a picture. A silver ring with a lighthouse on it."
The taxi's door was open.
My phone buzzed in my hand.
It was a message from a contact I had saved as one letter.
E: Come home tonight.
The ring on his right hand was a silver lighthouse.
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