Page 36 of A Billion-Dollar Heir For Christmas

“If you will excuse me,” he said, in that same way, whole winters in his voice, “there are calls I must make.”

He did not look up again, dismissing her that easily. That completely. And Lillie staggered a bit as she left his office, from the weight of all that raw pain of his.

It was inside her now, whether she liked it or not.

And it sat heavy on all the fear and panic she’d been fighting off for too long now. Because she could see the future now, and it was the one she’d been afraid of all the while.

She kept going until she was in that central courtyard, where flowers still bloomed even now. Birds sang as if no one had told them it was December. If she closed her eyes it might as well have been the height of summer, green and lush.

“Almost as if your grandmother never agreed to forgo of all the gaudy light and color you think is so beneath you,” she muttered under her breath, but out loud the same. Scowling down fiercely at bright purple and pink and orange flowers, but seeing only Tiago’s frozen expression. Hearing only his frigid words.

Feeling those icicles like knives, cutting deep.

Leaving her reeling. Bleeding. Carved into chilly little pieces.

She sat down heavily on one of the stone benches near a small fountain that burbled and sang. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine it was her very own Christmas carol.

And Lillie always had loved a good Christmas carol.

When she opened her eyes again, the sun was on her face, and it couldn’t have been less Christmassy if it tried.

And Lillie thought, at last, that it was high time she fought.

That she harnessed all those passions she’d been looking for all her life, and dived straight into them, for a change.

Because nothing good had come to her from waiting. Or wondering.

Or hoping he might see the light all around him.

It was high time she showed him.

As Tiago kept informing her, and not only when he was being fierce and cold from behind a desk, she was a Villela.

And if she was tracking all of her lessons, one thing was clear in all the stories they told her. All the history on both sides of his family. Not to mention her own proud Scottish heritage.

When in doubt, they all did exactly as they pleased and sorted out reactions later. It might as well be the family motto. She reckoned she might have it sewn up and put on a fancy bit of tartan while she was at it.

Lillie took a deep breath, then blew it out, hoping any leftover icicles went with it.

But then she got up and marched back into the house to find Leonor.

Because she intended to fight with everything she had to the future she imagined, not the one he was threatening her with.

And she was going to start by having the Christmas she wanted, whether Tiago liked it or not.

CHAPTER NINE

THEFIRSTHINTTiago had that things had gone horribly awry in this home that was meant to be his sanctuary was when he left his office late a few days later, then stopped dead in the hall outside.

Because he could hear singing.

And for a tense moment he actually wondered if he was hearing ghosts, after all—

But with the next breath, reality returned, and he was more concerned that he was having some kind of a medical event, because ghosts weren’t real. Not even his.

Still, the singing continued.

Tiago followed the sound from his wing of the house into the main section, not sure if he was relieved or more irritated when it became clear that he was not, in fact, imagining things. There were choirs singing.