CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Labor Day
Helberg is yours. I concede the bet. Give my best to Charley.
C ADE STARED AT the text which had just appeared on his phone from Adam Courtney as he stood in the locker room of the club. He swiped sweat off his brow—caused by the hour he’d just spent on the treadmill—attempting to keep his focus on business. And not Charlotte.
In preparation for his meeting in ten minutes with her brother to declare the winner of the bet—which now wasn’t happening.
Courtney had thrown in the towel, just like Zane a month ago. Cade had won the bet.
He should be contacting his finance team, setting the wheels in motion to snap up the rest of the Helberg shares. No other viable buyers had appeared since the three of them had made the bet on the Fourth of July. He was clear to finish the takeover.
Helberg was his.
But instead of the elation he should be feeling, he felt hollow. Empty. And more alone than he’d felt even as a kid when he’d had no one.
He sat down heavily on one of the locker room benches. He could hear a couple of the other guys who were there on a vacation day, talking about Cornell’s college football team and their chances for the new season, the showers running, a nineties rap anthem playing on the speakers.
But all he could really hear was Charlotte and the last words she’d said to him—hopelessness and confusion in her voice.
What is going on? You have to tell me. You’re starting to scare me.
So he’d told her. Not the whole truth, but enough of the truth so she would know he couldn’t be a parent. He couldn’t even be a partner to her.
And it seemed like she’d got the message, because she hadn’t contacted him in the days since.
Give my best to Charley.
The offhand comment in Courtney’s text seared his brain. Dating Charlotte had won him Helberg. Weird, it hadn’t even occurred to him until this moment that she had given him this victory.
Give it up, man. This is what you wanted, what you worked for. All these years. You can’t go back and change who you are, who you’ve become for her...or for the baby.
He forced himself to switch the phone on and texted his EA. His fingers shaking.
Tell finance to finish the Helberg buyout.
But as he switched the phone off and headed into the showers, the sense of triumph, the validation he should have been feeling, never came. And the hollow ache in his gut became a black hole.
Four days later
Charley stared up at the stunning Art Deco tower which housed the Courtney Collection as the cab she’d taken from the airport sped back into the afternoon traffic. Twenty-five storeys of luxury, elegance, and class, with her brother Adam’s penthouse offices at the top.
Funny to think she’d never visited him here. Just another example of what a coward she’d always been. The truth was, she really didn’t want to be here now. She felt so fragile and wounded and pathetic, and it wasn’t as if she and Adam had ever had a particularly close relationship.
But in amongst all the heartache and recriminations she’d been heaping on herself over the past week—as she wound up her workshop in San Francisco, said goodbye to Rachel and Lanisha, her brilliant seamstresses, and worked out the logistics of her relocation back to East London—she’d realised she owed her brother an apology.
According to the reports of Landry Construction’s historic takeover of Helberg Holdings—which had been all over the business news for two days—Cade had won the bet. Which meant he now owned Montague’s, the jewellery company Adam had been so desperate to buy back.
She had arranged a twelve-hour stop-over in New York en route to the UK to say she was sorry to her brother.
As she introduced herself to the receptionist in the extravagant lobby area—where a towering wall of glass separated the refined elegance of the interior from the manic energy of Madison Avenue during the lunch hour—it occurred to her that her brother might not even be here.
Her hopes were dashed, though, when the perfectly made-up receptionist contacted his PA and directed her to a bank of lifts, stating Adam would see her straight away.
Her heart plummeted along with her stomach as the lift climbed up the building. The scrape of tears which she refused to shed—because she’d shed more than enough of them already—made her throat feel raw.
Her mind started to wander to yet more devastating what-ifs as she was directed into the private penthouse office’s double-height space by a friendly woman called Maggie who had met her at the lift on the floor below. Here too, the glass added so much light her eyes stung. She’d spent a good twenty minutes doing her make up on the flight from San Francisco, though, so hopefully Adam wouldn’t notice the results of her week-long crying jag.
But what if she owed him more than an apology? Would he expect an explanation for why she’d dated Cade Landry for over a month—and then been dropped like a stone?
She covered her belly.
Should she tell him about the baby? She wasn’t really showing yet, but they were siblings after all. And he was going to become an uncle...of the son of the man who had robbed him of Montague’s.
She was swallowing rapidly, trying to get a handle on the latest wave of panic and misery—when her brother appeared on the mezzanine level and jogged down the steps to meet her.
‘Charley? This is a surprise?’ he said, but he didn’t sound angry with her, weirdly. ‘I certainly hope you didn’t bring that bastard Landry with you.’
She jolted slightly before she noticed he was smiling, his expression relaxed. The joke only made her feel smaller and more insignificant, though. And hopeless.
She blinked rapidly, trying to hold back more self-indulgent tears. But as he got closer, his eyes narrowed, and he frowned.
‘Charley, what’s wrong?’ he said with a perceptiveness which threw her back in time, to a memory from long ago. A memory she realised she’d forgotten until this moment. Of standing and staring hopelessly at the broken earth of her mother’s grave while shivering uncontrollably in the cold March wind. Until Adam had taken her hand and squeezed her chilled fingers. And made the shuddering stop.
He was looking at her now the same way—with concern, with understanding, with support.
The choking weight rose up her chest, and a sob lurched out of her mouth. The stinging tears scoured her throat, and the mask of competence and capability she’d been faking desperately for days collapsed...
She started shaking, not aware of what he was saying as he wrapped his arm around her shoulders. He held her close as the misery poured out of her and onto his clean white shirt. The flood of pain, of humiliation, was nothing though compared to the deep sense of loss.
But how can you lose something you never had?
His soothing words were gruff, but gentle and surprisingly not at all judgemental. At last, the raging storm of grief passed, and she became aware of the comforting scent of laundry detergent which clung to him. And the weight of his arm on her shoulder as he sat beside her.
How had they ended up on the couch? She didn’t even know.
He handed her a tissue from the dispenser on the coffee table. ‘Okay?’
She nodded, swiping her eyes. ‘I’m sorry...’ she managed, embarrassed. As well as heartsore. She’d spent the last year trying to persuade Adam she was a competent businesswoman, and now she’d trashed that, too.
‘Don’t apologise,’ he said, but then he surprised her even more when he asked, gently, ‘Can you tell me what the problem is?’
She nodded again. But she couldn’t look at him. ‘Cade left me.’
She heard him curse under his breath, a very un-Adam-like expletive.
‘And I’m going to have his baby.’
His hand tensed on her shoulder. ‘Wait a minute. Landry got you pregnant, then dumped you?’ He swore again, sounding furious.
She blinked. How odd. The show of emotion was so un-Adam-like, that and the fact he didn’t look exasperated with her.
‘To be fair, the getting pregnant bit was a joint enterprise,’ she replied.
He shot off the couch and stormed across the thick carpeting, his rigid strides making his agitation clear. She hadn’t intended to tell him about the baby, because she didn’t think she could cope with a lecture. But all he did was continue to curse about Cade.
‘You don’t blame me?’ she said, still astonished by his reaction as he marched back towards her.
‘Blame you for what?’
‘For getting pregnant with your business rival?’
His frown became a scowl. ‘Do you want the baby?’
She nodded.
‘Then blame has nothing to do with it,’ he said without hesitation. ‘But Landry has responsibilities, to you and to his child.’ He thrust his fingers through his hair, making it stick up in haphazard spikes. ‘I can’t believe it...’ he said, sitting heavily on the couch next to her. ‘I’m going to be an uncle.’
She found herself smiling. It felt good, even though it hurt.
She sniffed. Then blew her nose loudly on the tissue. ‘I didn’t actually come here to tell you about the baby. It’s not due for months,’ she said. It felt important to have his support, especially as it was so unexpected, but it didn’t really change anything.
‘I’m going to kill him,’ her brother said, apropos to nothing.
‘Adam, really.’ She laid her hand on one of the fists clenched in his lap. ‘It’s okay. He’s been very generous. He’s insisting on supporting the baby financially.’ She’d heard from his team the day after he’d walked out. But somehow his generosity only made the whole thing so much worse. Because she couldn’t hate him the way she wanted to be able to hate him.
‘That’s not the point, Charley,’ her brother said, flipping his hand over to grip her fingers—reminding her of the eighteen-year-old who had anchored her once before, when he had been in so much pain himself. ‘The point is he hurt you. He made you cry.’
She clasped his hand, fighting off more tears. ‘Please don’t be nice now, or you’ll make me start crying again. And neither of us wants that.’ She tried to smile. ‘You know what’s good about all this, though?’
He simply looked at her blankly.
‘It’s nice to have my big brother in my corner,’ she said.
He folded her back into his arms. ‘Of course I’m in your corner. Where the hell else would I be?’
She sighed against his damp shirt. ‘I don’t know...but let’s face it, I haven’t always been very lovable,’ she said. ‘Which is probably why Cade didn’t want me either.’
She’d had to face that truth so many times over the last few days as she struggled to make sense of Cade’s abrupt departure.
What an idiot she’d been—building up some ridiculous fantasy they could become a family while busy pretending all her flaws didn’t exist. Convenient, but not reality. Why would she assume Cade would want her for the long haul when no one else ever had?
She had thought they’d made a connection, but what did she really know about honest, open relationships, seeing as she’d never had one of those either?
‘Please tell me he didn’t say that to you?’ Adam demanded, looking even more furious.
She shook her head. ‘Honestly? He didn’t really give me an explanation. He told me he wanted this baby. And somehow I made a silly mistake and got that confused with him wanting me too. But while I was falling in love...he wasn’t.’
Adam dragged her back, his hands gripping her shoulders as he stared into her face. ‘Why the hell would he tell you he wanted the baby if he didn’t want you too?’ he said. ‘It doesn’t sound like you made a mistake. It sounds like he deliberately misled you. And who the hell wouldn’t want you?’
She could feel the tears welling again at his forthright defence of her. If she didn’t feel so broken right now, she would have been able to appreciate it more. Then the other things he’d said registered... ‘But why would he mislead me about wanting the baby?’
‘The bet,’ he said, then cursed again.
The bet? She felt sick. The nausea she hadn’t felt in weeks dropped into her stomach like a stone.
Was that possible? That Cade had been lying to her about the baby? Simply to ensure she would stay with him for those extra weeks? Could he have done something so manipulative?
‘I can’t believe he would be that cruel,’ she said, desperate not to think it of him. But she’d been wrong about so much else. Why not this too? ‘Do you really think he would lie about that?’ she asked, feeling more insecure now, and vulnerable.
‘Honestly, Charley, I don’t know him that well,’ he said, but she could see the sympathy in his eyes and the understanding. Why did that only make her stomach hurt worse? ‘But I do know he’s pretty ruthless in business, and he really wanted Helberg.’
‘But so did you,’ Charley said, still trying to clarify, to reject Adam’s accusations. Cade had never told her why owning Helberg was so important to him, but could it really have been that important?
‘Yeah, I did, because I wanted Montague’s for personal reasons which I now know were pretty misguided.’
‘What reasons?’ she asked. Was it possible that Cade had had really compelling reasons too? Personal reasons? But even if he did, how could that absolve him? And why was she still making excuses for him?
Adam interrupted her panicked justifications. ‘I wanted to get it back because I thought I was to blame for Mum’s suicide.’
‘What?’ Charley’s heart lurched in her chest at the flash of pain in his expression. ‘But... why would you think that?’
He sat back down next to her and took her hands in his. ‘That’s not the point, Charley. The point is I don’t think that any more. Ella made me realise her suicide wasn’t my fault. Any more than it was your fault that both our parents ignored you growing up.’
‘Okay,’ she said, surprised at his intuition...but also strangely empowered by the bold statement. He was right. A part of her had always believed it was her fault. And she supposed she had internalised that hurt, that feeling of rejection. But how did Adam know? Then again, Adam did seem different today. Not just more relaxed and a lot less guarded, but also surprisingly emotionally astute. ‘Who’s Ella?’ she asked, wondering if this woman she had never heard of had something to do with it.
Flags of colour appeared on his cheeks. ‘It’s a long story...and I’d like you to meet her. Soon ,’ he said forcefully. But before she could get over her shock—was her commitment-phobic brother actually in love?—he squeezed her fingers and added, ‘I think we should focus on Cade first. And how exactly we’re going to make him pay for this...’
‘There is no we , Adam.’ She tugged her hands out of her brother’s grip. And stood up. Her legs were still shaky, her insides twisted into hard, greasy knots. But Adam’s support had finally made her realise something important. They had both been failed by their parents. And she’d carried that subconscious belief—that she needed to earn approval and attention, because she didn’t deserve it—ever since she was a child. Did that explain why she’d been such a coward this past week, too...? Dissolving into tears and recriminations and blaming herself for Cade’s desertion, without ever really wondering why he’d left?
She had let him walk. She hadn’t fought. She hadn’t even asked for an explanation. Because deep down she’d blamed herself, still believing that she was essentially unlovable. But if he had done what Adam suspected him of doing—said he wanted this baby just to win a bet...she wanted to know so she could start the long slow process of getting over him. Because if he had, he had never been the man she had fallen in love with—not even close. And the only way to do that was to suck up her pride—and her pain—and confront him. Before she lost her nerve.
‘This is my life, and I plan to sort it out,’ she added, because Adam was still looking at her with sympathy in his eyes. ‘On my own.’
She’d been so scared she wouldn’t be good enough to be a mother. Scared she couldn’t handle it alone. Terrified of coming to rely on Cade. So that when she had fallen in love and he hadn’t loved her back, she’d convinced herself—just like she had as a little girl—that it was her fault, her mistake somehow. But she could see now, whatever Cade’s motives, she hadn’t been wrong to fall for him. She had simply been wrong not to ensure he deserved her love.
To her surprise, instead of arguing with her or doubting her ability to go it alone, Adam simply nodded. ‘Okay, Charley,’ he said. ‘I hope you give him hell,’ he finished with a solidarity he had never shown her before.
Whoever you are, Ella, I love you already.
‘Don’t worry, I will,’ she said, feeling stronger now than she had.
As she left Adam’s office and called a cab to take her to Landry Construction’s offices uptown, she realised that whatever Cade’s motives turned out to be, she would be okay.
The bottom had dropped out of her world. But she wasn’t the one running away. Not this time. That would be Cade.
And not only did she deserve answers from him about why he was running, she also deserved to be loved. And no one was going to convince her otherwise...
Not any more.