Billion Dollar Boyfriend (Celebrity Love)

Chapter Nineteen

Shelby's hand gripped the doorframe. She could only stare at him as one wordless second passed into the next. None of this made sense.

Aiden had looked every bit the part of Tristan Thornbury this morning at the courthouse, from his tailored suit to his tousled black hair. He had been instantly recognizable to the press, but he hadn't done much to deflect that—it would have been hard for anyone to miss the Rolls Royce he'd pulled up in. Now he stood outside the doorway of her room, dressed in dark jeans and a navy blue hoodie, with a hint of a five o'clock shadow shading his chin. His hair was back to its regular lighter color and sticking out in all directions, as though he'd been tugging on strands without realizing it.

"You're here," she blurted out. How was he here? She hadn't told him where she was staying.

"I had to see you." Aiden's voice was soft and infused with warmth. He raked a hand through his hair, making it even more of an adorable mess.

Not adorable, Shelby reminded herself. Liars aren't adorable.

"You didn't want anything to do with me this morning," she pointed out. "You told me I shouldn't be here."

"I want to explain that." Aiden locked eyes with her. "Is it okay if I come in?"

Shelby heard the click of a door lock from down the hall, and then a creak. Either someone was leaving their room, or they wanted to hear what she and Aiden were talking about. She let her hand drop from the doorframe and took a step back to let him inside.

Aiden closed the door behind him. There was something soulful in the way he continued to look at her, and she knew she could lose herself in those eyes if she wasn't careful.

Focus, she told herself. They were here right now because he'd left her hanging in L.A., and his text this morning hadn't been an invitation to stay.

She turned away from him, breaking the spell of his gaze. "How did you find me?" she asked.

"I called Raine to see if he or Emily knew where you were staying when you didn't answer my texts or calls. Emily gave me the phone number and room number she said you'd texted her. This hotel matched the phone number when I searched online."

Shelby's fingers clenched into fists at her sides. "You expected me to answer you after pretty much telling me to go home and leave you alone?"

"I sent you other texts after the first one," Aiden said. "Did you get those ones?"

"My phone battery died after the first text, but does it matter? You made it clear you want nothing to do with me."

"I wouldn't be here if that was true."

Aiden's fingertips grazed Shelby's hand. She shook her head and pulled her hand away.

"I don't know what to believe when it comes to you anymore. And you know what? Maybe that's fine. I should have called it quits and just moved on instead of coming to find you here."

Aiden watched her for a long moment, his expression unreadable. He cleared his throat. "Is that what you want? To call it quits?"

"Isn't that what you want?" she challenged.

"Not at all."

"But this morning at the courthouse..." she trailed off.

"This morning at the courthouse, I texted you that you shouldn't be there and I hit send before I told you why. I didn't mean that I don't want you here in London. The fact that you are here—I can't even tell you what that means to me. But it terrified me when I saw you there."

"It terrified you?" Shelby narrowed her eyes. "Do you think I came here to expose you?"

"No." Aiden jammed his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. "When you look at your phone, you'll see the next text I sent you. I tried to clarify that I meant you shouldn't have been at the courthouse because it could put you in danger, and that I'd explain tonight if I could see you."

"I'm in danger?" An image of Seraphine flashed through her mind, but she shook it off. Seraphine was a nosy reporter. The only danger she posed was figuring out Aiden's double life and exposing him.

"Being seen with me here when I'm out somewhere as Tristan could put you in harm's way. That's the last thing I want to risk."

Shelby sat down on a tufted chaise, letting his words sink in. "I still don't get it. What am I in danger of?"

Aiden took his hands out of his pockets, then raised his right hand. "Do you see this scar?"

She glanced at the scar she knew well. "That's how I figured out you and Tristan were the same person."

"My scar is from a gunshot wound."

"Someone shot you?" The question flew out of Shelby's mouth. She'd wondered once or twice about how he had gotten the scar. The thought of him facing a bullet wasn't something she had considered or wanted to think about now.

Aiden lowered himself into a chair across from her before answering.

"Someone tried to shoot me—or me as Tristan. They fired the gun when I was outside the house where I used to live in Kensington. The bullet grazed my hand and thankfully didn't do more than that. I still don't know why they didn't shoot again or who did it. The police never found them."

"Is that when you decided to stop being Tristan and start being Aiden?"

"I've always been Aiden." He paused and squeezed the bridge of his nose. "I'm sorry. I haven't really explained all of this before. It's hard to know where to start."

"All I want is the truth," she told him. "Start wherever you want to, as long as you're being honest."

Aiden looked down at the carpet, appearing to collect his thoughts. The room was silent while Shelby waited for him to speak again. Finally, he raised his head.

"I've been Aiden Montgomery for as long as I remember. That's who I was raised as. I knew my parents had adopted me, but I didn't know my name had been Tristan Thornbury when I was born. I didn't know I was the heir to a fortune, or that my biological parents had been murdered in cold blood. I didn't know their real names, either, or that I'd been born in London. Not until a few days before I turned eighteen, anyway, and that's probably the best place to begin."