He was using me for some financial mark. He still is, and I have to let him. I want the company back. I can’t walk away and he knows it.
He was just plain using me.
When finally the subway ride is over, I exit to the street, and I scan, making sure Reid isn’t anywhere in sight. If I see him, he’ll try to pull me back under his spell. It won’t work. Not this time. But he’s not here. He’s not. I don’t know why this upsets me. I don’t want to see him. Anything he would say now will not erase what just happened. I hurry into my building and wish for my things that are in the hired car, where I’d left them. There are things in there I need and now I’ll have to buy them again.
I enter my apartment and press myself against the door, the only thing holding me up right now. I was falling in love for the first time in my life, with someone using me. I really don’t know what to do with that. Tears leak from my eyes and I swipe them away. He doesn’t deserve my tears. And as for my father? Why would he not warn me about a war? He never said there was a war. Reid called it a war and after what just happened, on that, I believe him. My cellphone rings again and I grab it from my purse to find Reid’s number, not my father’s. I hit decline. My phone buzzes with a text from Reid that reads: Please talk to me. I can explain. I want us. I need you.
My heart squeezes. He can explain. I don’t even know what “us” means and as for needing me, I get that now. I’m part of his investment. My phone rings again. It’s him again and I want to take comfort in him trying to reach me, but nothing with Reid feels real anymore. I walk to the couch and sit down. Being home alone feels off. How is that possible? I love this place. This is my space, but mentally, I was ready to be in his, perhaps more than I even realized. My phone buzzes with another text from Reid and I lay down and hold my phone above me to read: I’m downstairs. Come down. Let me come up.
I type one word: No.
It hits me then that Reid has the money and wherewithal to get past security and when my phone rings, I answer this time. “Go away,” I breathe out.
“Never,” he promises, his voice low and gravelly. “I’m not ever going away. Let me come up.”
“No.”
“Carrie, we need to talk.”
“You said it all with that investment talk with your father, who is my enemy, and I didn’t even know.”
“I was going to tell you tonight.”
“After I met the family and you made sure if I bolted I’d stick around professionally?” I shut my eyes, emotion welling in my throat.
“That’s not how it is. Please. I need to see you. I need you to look into my eyes and see the truth.”
“Of course you need me to look into your eyes. When I’m with you, you’re the snake charmer, but then that makes sense. I’m the cobra. I’m just like my father, and we both know there are things about him you could tell me, too, but I guess that doesn’t serve you well.”
“I’m not leaving. I’ll stay here until you come down.”
“Then you better ask them to bring you a pillow and blanket.” I hang up. He calls back. I dial my father.
He answers this time. “Carrie,” he says. “What’s happening? I just heard your message. I was about to call.”
He’s lying. I realize now that I know this. That he has this weird pitch to his voice when he lies that I’ve always ignored. “You and Mike Maxwell are enemies.”
“That is, in fact, accurate.”
“You didn’t think I needed to know that?” I demand.
“I’ve been that man’s enemy for years. It’s never affected you.”
“I’m working with his son.”
“Who I told you was a problem. I told you to get out.”
“And you knew I wasn’t. You should have been specific. He hates you. Why?”
“We go back a long way.”
I think of Elijah and how easily personal hate drives professional anger. “You’ve gone after him. You’ve tried to hurt him.”
“Of course I have. Every fucking chance I got.”
“And his family?”
“Carrie—”
“That’s a yes. I’m working with his son. You didn’t think I needed to know that you’d tried to hurt him?”
“I told you, you need to come here. Now.”
“No. No, I have a chance to save the company and I’m going to.”
“He won’t let you.”
“I have a contract,” I say. “He will. He has to.”
“There’s a loophole or a plan to destroy you after he gets whatever he wants out of this. I promise you.”
“You underestimate my legal expertise and my ability to hold my own with anyone.”
“This isn’t about your skill. It’s about your morals. You have too many to survive a Maxwell.”
“In other words, you don’t? Who are you?”
“A man who holds his own, even with the nastiest of them all.”
A man I don’t know, I think. “What else don’t I know?” I ask.
“I have no idea what that means.”
“There are people who will work with me now that you’re gone.”
“We all make enemies.”
“We all make enemies? I never knew we had enemies.”
“I have enemies.”
“Apparently, that means I do, too. Can I get a list or is it too long?”
“You’re going too far with this.”
My phone buzzes with another call that I ignore. “What’s in Montana?”
“Money. You know that.”
“My money,” I say. “I put so much of my money into your investments and I’m tired of not knowing what I’m really getting. Blinded, I trusted you. No more. I love you, but I clearly don’t know you. Are your morals why mom left?”
“That’s uncalled for. She left. She left you, Carrie.”
“Right. It was my fault.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“I want details on the Maxwell war.”
“You’re not getting them.”
“They took over our company.”
“Walk away, Carrie.”
“This is my life.”
“I will take care of you.”
“I’ll take care of me. I need to go.”
“Not yet. Talk to me.”
“Now you want to talk? Are you sure about that? You avoid me.”
“What happened? Because obviously, something did.”
“I met Mike Maxwell. I’m waiting to meet you, too. The real you. When this is over, when I get the company back, I need that to happen.”
“You’re blowing this out of proportion.”
“We lost the company to a hostile takeover by your enemy. I’m not blowing this out of proportion. I need to go.”
“Carrie—”
“I’ve already said things I’ll regret later, even though you deserve to hear them. Don’t push me to say more. I’m not in a place to show my normal restraint right now. We’ll talk later if you actually take my calls.” I hang up.
My phone buzzes with a text from Reid: It’s not our war. I didn’t go after your company to destroy it. The stockholders were taking him down anyway.
I don’t answer. I now know that he is a part of the war. My father tried to hurt him and his family. I flashback to the party and the kitchen and squeeze my eyes shut as the tears start to flow.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Carrie
I don’t know how long I lay on the couch, weeping away my emotions but when it’s over, it’s over. I have to pee. As crazy as it is, that’s what brings me back to the present, to me. The need to take care of myself on some level, I guess. I stand up and without any real decision to do so, go upstairs to the bathroom. I go pee only to discover that I’ve started my period, because of course it’s early. I'm a ball of stress, that must have been a trigger. And yes, this has to happen right now and of course, I don’t have enough of what I need to manage this new-found problem until morning.
I cont
emplate ordering online, but I don’t even have my computer. Reid does and he also has my bag with important items, most of which I can buy tomorrow but I need my MacBook. Actually, I have my old one that I kept for emergencies when I upgraded. So yes, I could order online, but tampons, aren’t exactly something I want the delivery boy delivering. Leaving, however, means potentially running into Reid. Is he still downstairs? No. Surely not. It’s been about forty-five minutes now.
I fix my face the best I can and decide that I’ll run to the corner store but to be safe, I dial the security desk. “Is the man that was waiting on me still there?”
“He left about fifteen minutes ago.”
He left. Of course he left. I knew he would. “Thanks.” I disconnect, slip on a hoodie and head for the door. The coast is clear. The man I thought might be falling in love with me while I fell in love with him, left.
Once I’m in the elevator I hold my breath anyway. He won’t be in the lobby. I was just told that he’s not. I don’t want him to be there. I so want him to be in the lobby, and that’s a problem. I can’t trust him. I need to remember that I cannot be with a man who I’m sixty seconds from falling in love with who I can’t trust. How can I even fall in love with someone I don’t trust? Does that mean I do trust him? Or that I’m just a fool who wants to trust him, therefore, I’m convincing myself that I can trust him? Why am I thinking these things? He was horrible to me at the party. No one who cares about you acts like that. I’m business with a side of sex. I press my hands to my face with anger and pain. The doors open and my heart thunders in my chest, adrenaline surging through me.
I exit the car and scan the lobby to find no signs of Reid, a discovery that stabs me in the heart because I’m one big self-destructive mess right now, apparently. Or I will be if I don’t watch myself. The man not only kept something huge from me, I know he’s got another secret. I know he knows something about my father and he won’t tell me. Obviously it’s something he believes will turn me against him.
I hurry out of the door and my eyes land on the railing where Reid and I had met that night, not long ago, because as he pointed out, we have not been together long enough for it to be long ago. He’s not there. Of course, he’s not. Why would he stand there when I’m inside?
I rush down the sidewalk and hurry to the store. I grab a pint of Ben and Jerry’s, a candy bar, skittles, and almost forget my tampons because I’m on my period and heartbroken, which apparently makes sugar a critical need, and brain cells optional. I can’t be heartbroken. Reid was right. We haven’t been seeing each other that long. I need that ice cream. Which will mean, I’ll then need to work out in the building gym twice as long next week because I can’t run, since I’ve bumped into Reid doing just that before. I really need to call the realtor. I have to move. If I give up everything, no one can take it from me anyway. I need to stop. I’m rambling in my own head. I’m having a rambling conversation with myself.
Ben and Jerry’s, here I come.
I’m almost back to my building when my gaze falls on that same spot by the railing this time, but this time, Reid is there and my heart explodes into a charge at the sight of him. He’s leaning forward, his head bowed, and even from a hundred feet away, I can feel the torment radiating off of him. God. I want to go to him. I want to kiss him and touch him and tell him I trust him, but how do I know his torment is about me and us? How do I know it’s not about letting his grand plan go awry? I have a random flashback of us on the beach and Reid telling me how into me he was.
“I can’t wake up and not think of you,” he’d said. “I can’t go to bed and not think of you. I wanted to tell you about my settlement. You’re in my head, Carrie. I don’t even want to get you out anymore.”
“You couldn’t if you wanted to,” I’d teased, but I remember the twist in my gut as I’d added, “Because we have Grayson to close and a board to satisfy.”
It’s like some part of me knew he was using me. I’d even tried to tell myself to revel in living in the moment because I knew there wouldn’t be more. But he’d been so good at convincing me there would be more. He’d sensed I was worried about the business side of our relationship. I go back to the beach again, to how he’d gotten me past those feelings:
He’d rolled with me, his leg still between mine, those blue eyes staring down at me. “What just happened?”
“Nothing happened.”
“You think this is all about the company. That we’re here and now and gone when this is over.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“It’s not about any of those things,” he’d said. “I told you, Carrie. I don’t want to share you. I’m obsessed with you and it’s not the kind of obsession that goes away. You’re with me now. I’m with you now. Say it.”
“Reid—”
He’d kissed me, a silky caress of his tongue before he’d ordered, “Say it.”
I blink back to present, I’d known then that I was in deep, so very deep, and so I’d done it. I’d said it. “I’m with you now and you’re with me.”
And then he’d gone in for the kill and added, “Do you know how many women I’ve said that to? None. No one but you. This isn’t about a deal or a company. This is about you and me and us.”
Us.
He’d convinced me there was an “us” that reached beyond business until his father blew it all for him.
I turn away and run toward the building, entering the lobby and forcing myself to walk to the elevator. I step inside and the doors are shutting as I hear, “Carrie, wait!” And for just a moment, he’s standing across from me, our eyes connecting, as the door finishes sealing me inside. We’re divided, broken in every possible way.
Chapter Fifty-Three
Reid
I wake Sunday morning on the couch with a bottle of scotch next to me and a bitch of a hangover, the likes of which I’ve not experienced in a decade. The fact that I didn’t go to bed because Carrie was supposed to be there with me, only makes me want another drink, which I won’t take. I don’t have the luxury of being drunk, not with my father to deal with. But holy hell, when in my entire life have I wanted a woman in my bed, no, in my life? Now. That’s when. Fuck. I drag fingers through my hair and stand up, walking to the kitchen where I grab the Excedrin and down two pills with a bottle of water. I’m going to get another fucking migraine thanks to this hangover. I can feel my temples throbbing. I grab my phone from the pocket of the sweats I put on after I showered last night and check it for a message from Carrie, one I know won’t be there. I’m right. It’s not there. I can’t get to her until Monday. I know this. She’s not going to talk to me before then. She doesn’t understand my father. She doesn’t know what was in my head and I can’t even make her understand. I need out of here. I need to run. I down another bottle of water and head to my bedroom. By the time I’m there, I’m dialing Carrie instead of dressing.
She answers. She fucking answers. “Reid.”
Damn, I like my name on her lips. “Let’s meet.”
“No. And I’m going to work from here tomorrow.”
That pisses me off. “No,” I say, hardening my voice. “You are not. Because that’s not what CEOs do. And I’d say this to anyone else, too. You want to run this company, you need to step up, no matter how personal or rough it is.”
“Right. I need to step up and make your investment worthwhile.”
“Damn straight. You protect everyone’s investment. That’s what CEOs do, and the staff needs to see you there making that happen. If you want my support with the board, you come to work tomorrow. Do you understand?”
“I’ll be there.”
I lower my lashes, hating that I just had to do that, but it was for her own good. She wants this. I know she does and I’m not going to let my father, and me for that matter, get the best of her. “I’ll see you then.” I disconnect and shove the phone into my pocket, about to climb out of my skin. My phone rings and I snatch it up, hoping for Carrie, but it’s my fathe
r.
I grimace and answer the call. “Father.”
“We should meet.”
“After I draw up your retirement papers. I’ll let you know when they’re ready.”
“Or you’ll ruin me,” he states.
“Yes. With a smile on my face.”
“I made you, boy.”
“I couldn’t be more aware of that fact right now. I’ll be in touch.” I disconnect and call Gabe.
“We need to talk. I’m on my way there.”
“I had a feeling that was coming,” he replies.
“I’m running. I’ll be there in under an hour.”
“Running. That tells me you and Carrie didn’t make up.”
“Not even close.”
“Man, Reid. That sucks. What are you going to do?”
“Make him pay.” I disconnect and head to my closet. A few minutes later, I’ve brushed my teeth, and I’m now dressed in running shoes, a T-shirt, and a hoodie. I walk to the front door, snatch my keys from the entryway table, and stare at Carrie’s bags on the floor right beside mine where I left them last night. I open the fucking door and exit. I need out of here.
A few minutes later, I’m running, music blaring in my headphones in an effort to block out everything but the run, but it doesn’t work. I’m replaying that kitchen scene with my father. He’s such a little bitch. In the moment, standing in that kitchen, all I could think of was to contain his attention on Carrie and get her out of there. A strategy I blew when I went after her, which means it was all for nothing. I could have just wrapped her in my arms, ushered her out of there and forced my father out. I need to tell her that. I stop running and pull my phone from my pocket, but shove it back inside. I need to tell her in person and if that means waiting until tomorrow, I’ll wait.