PRAISE FOR RACHEL VAN DYKEN
“The Consequence of Loving Colton is a must-read friends-to-lovers story that’s as passionate and sexy as it is hilarious!”
—Melissa Foster, New York Times bestselling author
“Just when you think Van Dyken can’t possibly get any better, she goes and delivers The Consequence of Loving Colton. Full of longing and breathless moments, this is what romance is about.”
—Lauren Layne, USA Today bestselling author
“The tension between Milo and Colton made this story impossible to put down. Quick, sexy, witty—easily one of my favorite books from Rachel Van Dyken.”
—R. S. Grey, USA Today bestselling author
“Hot, funny . . . will leave you wishing you could get marked by one of the immortals!”
—Molly McAdams, New York Times bestselling author, on The Dark Ones
“Laugh-out-loud fun! Rachel Van Dyken is on my auto-buy list.”
—Jill Shalvis, New York Times bestselling author, on The Wager
“The Dare is a laugh-out-loud read that I could not put down. Brilliant. Just brilliant.”
—Cathryn Fox, New York Times bestselling author
ALSO BY #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR
RACHEL VAN DYKEN
Covet
Stealing Her
Red Card
Risky Play
Kickin’ It
Liars, Inc.
Dirty Exes
Dangerous Exes
The Players Game Series
Fraternize
Infraction
The Consequence Series
The Consequence of Loving Colton
The Consequence of Revenge
The Consequence of Seduction
The Consequence of Rejection
The Wingmen Inc. Series
The Matchmaker’s Playbook
The Matchmaker’s Replacement
Curious Liaisons Series
Cheater
Cheater’s Regret
The Bet Series
The Bet
The Wager
The Dare
The Ruin Series
Ruin
Toxic
Fearless
Shame
The Eagle Elite Series
Elite
Elect
Enamor
Entice
Elicit
Bang Bang
Enforce
Ember
Elude
Empire
The Seaside Series
Tear
Pull
Shatter
Forever
Fall
Eternal
Strung
Capture
The Renwick House Series
The Ugly Duckling Debutante
The Seduction of Sebastian St. James
An Unlikely Alliance
The Redemption of Lord Rawlings
The Devil Duke Takes a Bride
The London Fairy Tales Series
Upon a Midnight Dream
Whispered Music
The Wolf’s Pursuit
When Ash Falls
The Seasons of Paleo Series
Savage Winter
Feral Spring
The Wallflower Series (with Leah Sanders)
Waltzing with the Wallflower
Beguiling Bridget
Taming Wilde
The Dark Ones Saga
The Dark Ones
Untouchable Darkness
Dark Surrender
Stand-Alones
Hurt: A Collection (with Kristin Vayden and Elyse Faber)
Rip
Compromising Kessen
Every Girl Does It
The Parting Gift (with Leah Sanders)
Divine Uprising
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Text copyright © 2020 by Rachel Van Dyken
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Skyscape, New York
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Skyscape are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781542020886
ISBN-10: 1542020883
Cover design by Letitia Hasser
Cover photography by Lauren Perry
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Chapter One
JULIAN
They say you never come back from death the same. I was evidence of that. Everything felt foreign, like I wasn’t supposed to be in my own body, like something had altered my soul while I was sleeping and when it returned, it didn’t quite fit in the body that woke up.
I snorted into my whiskey as the people around me talked in hushed voices like they were afraid my mom was going to jolt awake in the casket if they were too loud.
She was dead.
Dead.
I’d just seen her a week ago at the hospital; she’d been suffering with gastroparesis, a disease that made it impossible to digest food and sometimes even water. She’d been doing so well, and then one minor infection sent her into a downward spiral that even the best doctors money could buy couldn’t fix. Couldn’t help. Couldn’t save.
An infection. Like a paper cut that gets ugly and red and refuses to go away, that’s why she lost her life, not even the fucking disease but a side effect.
It was like she knew something was wrong. Right before she died, she’d made me promise to reconcile fully with the very twin brother who had stolen my life.
While I was in a coma.
How’s that for a blockbuster movie?
And that ridiculously beautiful and intelligent woman had told me she loved me and made me say it—made me promise to try to be the bigger person—out loud. It was the last time I saw her, the last time I held her hand.
Her hands were cold now.
Placed at her sides perfectly, her makeup flawless, her dark silky hair arranged around her head like she was merely sleeping and waiting for her prince to rescue her, though we all knew the ugly truth. My father had been more dragon than prince, and the fact that she made it through their marriage unscathed was a miracle. He thought money meant he didn’t have to suffer consequences and that love could
be bought. He had no idea that the price would always be something he could never afford.
“How are you holding up?” My brother Bridge’s voice interrupted my morose thoughts and intense concentration in the direction of the room that held our mother’s body.
I didn’t want a viewing.
Neither did Bridge.
But it was never just about us.
It was about our family name.
About what our father would also want, even though he no longer controlled Tennyson Financial, the largest financial corporation in the US. Even though he divorced our mother and cast her aside when we were teenagers, splitting my brother and me up in the process. I remained with my father, while Bridge lived with our mother.
But today, my father wanted the world to see the Tennyson men gather in strength, and I’d like to think that the bastard even suffered a bit of a broken heart at the sight of the love of his life without breath in her lungs and warmth on her skin.
The old Julian would have said he deserved it.
The Julian that woke up from that coma couldn’t even look in the direction of the casket without tearing up and wanting to throw glassware all over the mansion.
“Fine.” My voice was clipped, forced. “I’m fine, you?” I took another slow sip, my jaw clenched as Bridge stared me down.
We were identical twins.
He was a bit broader than I was, but now that I’d taken up lifting in order to work out the rage I had over the fact that he’d stolen my fiancée, it was even harder to tell us apart.
“Liar.” He tilted the bottle of Jack into my glass. I let him, because I wasn’t numb yet, because it hurt, because I had nobody to talk to.
Because I couldn’t talk to him, not when I was still so angry at him.
It had been four months, and I still couldn’t look at Izzy, who was now his wife. Because then I’d see the pity in her eyes, the sadness, the need for me to forgive her so she could get rid of her own guilt.
“Yeah, well, I’m a Tennyson.” I lifted the glass to my lips. “What else you got?”
“You’ve been distracted lately.” He pointed out the obvious, making my teeth clench. I needed him to be hateful, not caring, so I could continue hating him.
I scowled. “Can we not do this? Not only is the place crawling with media, but I don’t need another lecture from my big brother on how to run my own company.”
“That’s not what this is about.” He lowered his voice. “This is about you running yourself ragged, showing up to work looking like you haven’t slept in years, dark circles under your eyes, cracked knuckles like the punching bag you spar with was pissing you off too much, the constant bouts of shouting I hear coming from your office when your secretary forgets to remove a staple before you shred something.”
I rolled my eyes. “She has one job.”
“This isn’t you.”
“Bullshit, this is the me you’re going to get—”
“I met with the board.”
This time I looked up into his green eyes, my all-too-familiar rage building like a pulse at my temples. He wouldn’t. He didn’t. Betrayal wrapped around my neck like a chokehold. “You did what?”
“The board, they’re worried you’re losing your grip, they wanted to see if I could force you to take a quick vacation.”
I snorted out a bitter laugh. “I was in a coma for four weeks. Thanks, but I already took enough time off.”
“You know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t.” I jutted my jaw out, as if that would make me taller, and stood chest to chest with him.
“Guys.” Izzy was suddenly at our sides. Her hand was on my shoulder, and I hated that I missed the way she used to touch me. I’d lost her the minute I brought her into this family when I thought I could balance my need for my father’s approval with her love.
I had lost everything.
Everything.
My body swayed with exhaustion as she locked eyes with me and said, “Not here, not today.”
“Tell him that.” I gritted my teeth and glared at my brother.
Bridge shook his head like he was disappointed in me, again. I couldn’t take it, I wanted to strangle him, to scream, to run headfirst into the nearest cement wall and just let it all disappear.
Maybe then I’d feel something.
Maybe something would knock sense into me.
“Jules.” Izzy cupped my face with her hands. I clenched my jaw and drew back a few inches. Her touch was almost painful, because it was no longer just for me.
Now she was pregnant with his child.
Now my life, the life I had planned with her, was as dead as the mother I never got enough time with.
My resolve was cracking.
My anger snapped into a downward spiral of sadness that had me wanting to run in the opposite direction so she didn’t see the break in my defenses.
“Take the vacation,” she whispered, her eyes full of unshed tears. “You can’t go on like this.”
“I can,” I lied, wanting more than anything to look away from her perfect mouth, and the way it pressed into a firm, disapproving line that reminded me of all the reasons I was never good enough for her, and all the reasons my brother was.
“No.” Her voice was soft, and then a solitary tear ran down her cheek, dripping onto the hardwood floor in slow motion. That tear was for me, it was for us, it was a tear that said so much more than words ever would.
Sometimes I hated myself.
Some days I hated her more.
Bridge looked ready to pummel me, probably because his wife was crying and I was the reason.
I hung my head, breaking eye contact. “Will three weeks get you guys off my case?”
“Yes.” Bridge breathed a sigh of relief. “I’ll tell the board, they’ll be thrilled you’re actually taking the mental health days.”
I nodded, dumbly wondering what I was going to do alone in my new apartment for three weeks, when Bridge pulled something out of his pocket and handed it to me.
It was an old Polaroid of us at the cabin in Vermont. Our dad had had the place remodeled a few years back to make it look more modern, but a lot of the furniture was still the same, right along with the memories of my mom taking us sledding, making chili, and laughing late into the night around the campfire that we’d proudly built just for her. Our cabin was our escape from it all—Dad always cut his time there short and would often make excuses about having to go back to the city.
And we were always so thankful that he was gone. Once he left, our time there felt almost magical. The cabin was our own personal Disneyland, the happiest place on earth.
Some of my best memories were made there with my mom and Bridge.
It hurt so much to stare at the photo of Mom standing between my brother and me, her smile healthy, bright.
Tears stung my eyes. “The cabin?”
“You can do whatever you want.” Bridge sighed and held the picture out for me to take it. “But they just got snow, and I know it would make Mom happy for one of her boys to be back there, celebrating, not mourning her death, but celebrating her life.”
I cracked then.
With anger.
With sadness.
I took the picture and shoved him away. I didn’t want his embrace, and I didn’t want his love.
I just wanted to be alone.
The cabin . . .
Was the perfect place to start.
Chapter Two
KEATON
“Who is Keaton Westbrook?” I said it out loud about a dozen times as I gripped the steering wheel of the rental car and made my way down the dark road to the cabin I’d rented.
Was I just the daughter of some influential celebrity couple?
Was I just a college graduate trying to publish my very first book?
Was I a failure?
Was I still sad?
Depressed?
Was I even
okay?
These are all the questions that pounded me on my way to my mini vacation to find myself, to see who I was without him.
Because I had defined my life up until that point as my parents’ daughter. I was loved all over the US for my adorable celeb parents, and then I was nearly worshipped for my relationship with one of my fans.
A guy I’d met in the cancer wing at the hospital where I volunteered.
A guy who had changed my life forever.
A guy who became so much more than just a guy.
I went from barely living, not even appreciating my own oatmeal in the morning, to looking at every single moment as a gift. I went from selfie-taking influencer to appreciating small things, even when it rained.
God, he’d loved the rain.
You’d think it would depress him.
Not Noah.
He said rain meant that something new was coming, that fresh starts happened after a rain shower, and that we could consciously start anew.
So it made sense that it was raining as I drove to the cabin I’d rented for the month, didn’t it?
It was a sign he was still with me.
Even though he never got his fresh start, his death brought me mine, along with my first publishing deal about our complicated relationship.
About our love.
Only I was so blinded by the pain of losing him, the pain I had thought I could pour into the pages, that I was stuck and on a deadline I couldn’t force myself to meet.
Maybe because that meant we were finished, maybe because every time I thought of writing “The End,” I couldn’t breathe.
I was a year out of college.
I volunteered.
Sponsored ads for products on my Instagram and YouTube channels.
Had my own beauty line at Sephora.
And in between those projects, I had my laptop, and I still couldn’t write the first chapter.
Because it made it true.
It made his death real.
I tried not to cry as I hit the accelerator and thought about his soft golden hair, the way it would stick up on all ends when I ran my fingers through it. Men in Hollywood would kill for that hair. Noah was too beautiful for words. Even when he started losing his hair, his eyebrows, even when he lost the ability to speak.
He was enough.
He would always be enough.
More than I would ever deserve.
I rubbed the tears on my cheek away as my GPS told me to take another right. I pulled into a long driveway and sighed in relief. Too much time in the car did that to me, it made me reflect.