Auctioned By The Ceo novel Chapter 29

Logan’s self-deprecating laughter filled the space between them.

“Hardly, I was a late developer, shall we say. Rick was always taller than me, so yeah, I guess he was the popular one. I was his little runt of a brother, the butt of the school jokes, because I’m the older twin by five minutes.” He shook his head and growled again. “I caught up of course and yeah, still not popular. Folks were afraid of me most of the time, especially once I joined Rick in the boxing ring, but this isn’t about me. You were telling me your story.”

Hannah knew a dismissal when she heard one but even that little glimpse into his childhood made her feel closer to him. Logan wasn’t a man to share confidences, and that he had told her this much, meant far too much to her.

Remember, none of this is real.

Surely, if she repeated that mantra in her head often enough it would eventually take root and squash those little insistent seeds of hope that refused to go away. Like weeds they came back time and time again, no matter how hard she tried to pull them out. This wedding was a means to an end, that’s all.

Logan put on his indicators, and to her horror started to pull into a layby and slowed down.

“What are you doing?” She grimaced at the high-pitched tone of her voice, but, surely, he wouldn’t.

“I told you what would happen if you didn’t talk so…”

“Jesus, fine, I’ll tell you. Please, just drive.”

Logan crawled along for a few meters, before he accelerated, and indicating right, joined the A-road again.

“You weren’t popular, because…” he prompted.

“Well, we moved a lot for starters. It’s hard always being the new girl, especially when you have

to wear a secondhand uniform that doesn’t fit properly. Forget when people find out who your mum is. I used to hate her coming to parents’ evening. She always smelled of booze, and she was an embarrassment, you know.”

She risked a glance at his closed off profile, and he nodded just once.

“I can’t say I know. My mum always tried her best for us. It was more us who turned into an embarrassment for her, or rather a constant worry. We both got into trouble a lot, when we were younger.” He shrugged, but the white-knuckled grip he had on the steering wheel told its own story. Hannah thought it wisest not to probe that hornets’ nest too much, and carried on with her own sorry tale of woe.