by Lauren Smith
Leaving him and the island had left a hollow ache in her chest that felt like homesickness. How could she feel homesick for a man she had only spent one week with?
Because she was in love, a complete and utter fool in love.
10
“Randall wants to see you,” Kayley told Blair two days later.
Blair pushed away from her desk and left her cubicle. Kayley gave her shoulder a squeeze before Blair walked to her uncle’s office. With each step, her nerves ratcheted up a notch.
She hadn’t spoken to him since she’d gotten back from the Caribbean, and she had a feeling he was going to chew her out for failing to get Denver to sign the contract. She’d spent the last two days completely racked by a major self-confidence issue in herself. She knew that her presentation had been stellar, and she’d hoped—apparently quite foolishly—that Denver would see the value in her work and sign, no matter his personal feelings. Clearly, she hadn’t been good enough for him to have a change of heart. And now she’d have to listen to her uncle take her down a peg for her failure. She’d lost her shot at a promotion and her father’s share of the company.
Dismal was not a word Blair liked to use, but it seemed to fit her mood right then. The words seemed to bunch together inside her head and made her feel sick.
When Blair entered Randall’s office, he was actually smiling. That could be good or bad, and by the look in his eyes, she honestly couldn’t tell.
“Sit down, Blair.”
With a sense of déjà vu, she sat down and waited for him to speak.
“Do you know what this is?” He held up a stack of documents.
“A contract?”
Her uncle’s smile widened. “The Seven Seas Beach Club contract. Exclusive advertising, five years, no out clause. You did it.”
“Denver signed it?” Her heart leapt into her throat. She’d done it. She’d won him over. Euphoria nearly made her dizzy, and she struggled to stay seated when she wanted to get up and scream in joy.
“Denver?” Her uncle’s eyes narrowed at her use of his first name.
“I mean Mr. Ramsey,” she corrected. “He really signed it?” She’d done it. The promotion was hers, and her father’s half of the company was hers. Still, the victory felt hollow.
Randall’s shrewd gaze stayed on her face. “No, his operations manager did, but he has signing power for Ramsey, so it’s perfectly binding.”
That thin thread of hope she’d been holding on to withered away. Simon had made the decision to hire her, not Denver.
“Whatever you did, however you did it, you hooked him.” Her uncle’s predatory smile lessened her victory even further.
Denver hooked me, she thought silently. Then she forced herself to stop thinking about him. She’d done what she was supposed to, and now she and Randall had some business to settle.
“I’ll move into the empty account executive office by the end of the week. We can get the ownership paperwork drawn up for my half of the company then too.” Blair focused on the positive aspects of Denver’s company signing the contract and not about the fact that she’d left her heart behind on the northern shore of Paradise Island.
“About that . . .”
Something cold and slick slithered through her insides, filling her with a sense of unavoidable dread.
“While you were gone, I decided to hire someone to fill the spot. I got a great kid fresh out of Wharton business school. Real smart. You’ll enjoy working for him.” Each word her uncle uttered chipped away at Blair’s tightly held control, but the man continued, oblivious, his hand waving dismissively at her. “We can discuss the ownership thing later this year. It’s not a good time right now to make any major changes to the company ownership. Our new clients need to see stability.”
A faint ringing started in Blair’s ears, and her stomach clenched enough that she winced. Her uncle was still droning on about client expectations, and something inside Blair finally snapped.
“You never planned to hold up your end of the bargain, did you?” she blurted, interrupting him.
Randall slowly leaned back in his chair and met her gaze. His feigned politeness vanished, and he met her with blunt honesty.
“No. I didn’t. I expected you to fail to sign him. But really, I just needed you gone for a week while I brought on the new account executive without any fuss.”
Blair stared at him. Without any fuss? He considered her a fusser for wanting a promotion for her hard work? In her mind, she was throwing everything breakable at the windows until they shattered. On the outside, she was calm, a smooth-flowing river. She stood and drew in a deep breath, feeling as free as she had back in the water of the Exumas, when Denver had held her in the rolling waves.
“I quit, effective immediately.”
His brows arched, and the smug look on his face vanished as he sputtered, “You’ll lose everything you worked for here. We can still discuss the ownership issue, just not now. You really need to learn patience, Blair. That’s the problem with you millennials—”
“That’s just it, Randall. It’s not an issue. It was an agreement between us. One you let me enter into in good faith. But I have no faith in you anymore, so I’m done with you, with all of this.”
“You think someone else will hire you in this city? Or in New York or LA? I’ll tell everyone—”
“I’m not going to work for anyone else. I’ll start my own company.” It was something she’d spoken to Anne Hudson about while she’d been in the Bahamas. Anne had politely nudged her into considering the idea of leaving Bay Breeze behind if her uncle never fully recognized her talent and hard work. But until this very moment, it had just been an idea, not a necessary reality.
Randall dared to laugh, and Blair clung to her control by a thread. “With what resources? You have no idea what it takes to run a company like this.”
Blair smiled coldly as she played her hand. “I have a company that would invest with me.”
“Who?”
“It doesn’t matter. The point is, you won’t be able to pull any strings to stop me. I’ve outgrown you and this place.”
She started for the door.
“Walk out and you lose everything,” he warned.
She placed a hand on the doorjamb and looked back at Randall. There was no going back, and she was relieved. He’d actually made it easy for her to leave.
“I have nothing to lose, and I have you to thank for showing me that.”
As Blair stepped out of his office and briskly walked back to her cubicle, she felt like she could breathe for the first time in forever.
“What happened?” Kayley asked in a whisper as she followed Blair to her cubicle.
“I quit. Denver’s company signed the contract, and Randall lied about the director position and the fifty percent ownership. So I quit.” Blair pulled out an old file box from underneath her desk to start filling with her personal things.
“Oh my God.” Kayley was smiling. “I love you so much right now. What are you going to do?”
“Start my own agency.” Blair could feel her confidence growing by the second. She had all of the contacts, she knew every aspect of the business, and she was ninety-five percent sure if she called Anne and Jack Hudson and explained the situation, the Fawkes Group would invest in her start-up agency.
“When do we start?” Kayley asked as she helped to box up Blair’s belongings.
“We?” Blair nestled a picture of her and her father inside the box as the last item that marked the small cubicle as hers.
“Yeah. I’m coming with you. Once word gets out that you’re leaving, some others will join us.”
“You think so?” Blair lifted her box and, with one last look around, headed toward the elevators. Kayley promised to wrap things up and secretly spread the word before she turned in her notice in a few days. Blair took the elevator down to the parking garage and loaded her box in the trunk. Settling in behind the wheel, she took several deep breaths before she starte
d the engine. She had one last dark cloud hovering on the horizon. She had to tell her father she’d lost his company and they’d never get it back.
Blair drove her car out of the city and headed for her parents’ home on the lakeshore. She needed to speak to her father and tell him what had happened with Randall.
It was lunchtime when she drove up the circle drive to the cozy cottage. Her parents had downsized their lives after the scandal all those years ago. Her mother was a cardiologist and worked three days a week in the city. Her father had retired early and was running a nonprofit to promote literacy in inner-city Chicago. It kept him focused and doing something positive in the world, which was important for his peace of mind. More than ever, Blair understood how he felt.
Her mother answered the door and hugged her. Melanie Ashworth was a willowy beauty in her late fifties. Blair favored her mother in looks, and she was glad, as her mother was still gorgeous.
“Blair, what are you doing here? It’s a workday. Is everything okay?”
“I’m okay.” Blair loved her mother, but sometimes, even as a grown woman, she felt she had to explain herself. “I have to talk to you and Dad. Is he here?”
“Yes, on the back patio. I’ll make some drinks.”
“Thanks, Mom.” Blair walked through the house and paused at the back door when she spotted her father at the patio table under the shade of the porch. Behind him stretched a lazy shoreline and the soft rolling waves of the lake. Even though it was only a lake, she imagined Denver there, strolling barefoot in the sand, wearing a white button-up shirt partially open at the throat and his sleeves rolled up. She shook off the wishful vision.
She knew Denver would never come here to her father’s house, but her memories of him were so strong, so tangible, that her mind seemed able to conjure him up instantly. Would they ever fade, the echoes of those glorious hours spent with him in paradise? Or would they stay just as sharp, just as clear in her mind when she was old and gray?
Blair focused on her father, the man who was there in front of her, the one she owed an explanation to.
“Dad?”
“Honey? What are you doing here?” Her father’s head rose from the paperwork he had been looking over, and he beamed at her. A knot twisted in her gut.
“I need to talk to you.” She sat down beside him. “It’s about Denver Ramsey and Uncle Randall.”
Her father’s smile vanished, and he looked away toward the water briefly.
“What do you need to talk about?” he finally asked.
“I’ve always suspected Randall pushed you into going to the FBI about Denver’s father. Was I right?”
“I . . .” Her father swallowed hard. “I was always a fool when it came to Randall. As a little brother, you want to believe that your older sibling is a hero, that he is never wrong, never the villain. But Randall . . . he was nothing like the man I dreamed him up to be. I spent my much of my life hero-worshipping a dream. He convinced me that Richard Ramsey was committing fraud, and I didn’t face the truth that I’d been played for a fool until it was too late. Telling the FBI that my brother ‘told me to do it’ isn’t a real defense, and I owed it to the Ramsey family to take ownership of my actions that caused them so much pain and heartache.”
Blair reached across the table and clasped her father’s hand and squeezed it.
Her mother came out on the porch with three lemonades and sat down close to her father.
“Why the sudden interest in the past?” her father asked.
She drew a deep breath. “I quit my job today. I walked out of the company for good.” Blair stared at her hands, heat filling her face.
“You quit?” Her mother’s tone was soft, compassionate. “What happened?”
“It all started when Randall made me the offer I’d been waiting for.” She explained the stakes, including her pitch to Denver Ramsey and his proposal to play-act as engaged to convince investors he was a good person to risk their money, and how when she’d returned from Paradise Island having accomplished it all, her uncle had played her. She left out the part where she fell in love with Denver, but her mother’s raised eyebrow at the mention of the engagement ring said more than her words could have. “And so I left,” Blair finished.
Her parents sat in silence, absorbing her story, watching her.
“Dad, I’m so sorry I lost Bay Breeze. I wanted to get it back for you, so you and I could run it together—”
“Honey”—her father caught her hand—“I love that you tried to do that for me, but I can never go back to that life. This is my penance. I owe Denver Ramsey and his mother everything for what happened to Richard.”
“You wouldn’t have come back?” Blair was stunned. She’d never realized her father wouldn’t have gone back if he’d had the option. Advertising had been his life.
“No, it’s Randall’s world now. I’m doing better things with my life. It’s okay to let that go.”
A new wave of relief filled Blair. She hadn’t let her father down, hadn’t disappointed him. She stared out at the water again, missing Denver and the Seven Seas beach so much it hurt.
“I hate knowing Denver is stuck with Randall and that contract, but I couldn’t stay there, not after watching him hand my job to some kid who just graduated business school and hasn’t put in the time or work yet. Did I do the right thing by leaving?”
“It’s always the right thing to stand up for yourself and your values.” Her father squeezed her hand. “So what’s next for you? What will my darling daughter do now for the world?”
“I was thinking I would open up my own agency. I love the work and don’t want to stop. I even think I have a couple who will invest in me, thanks to Denver.”
“Then that’s what you should do,” her mother said. “We support you, no matter what. Now finish your lemonade.”
Blair laughed and reached for her barely touched drink. In that moment, she knew how lucky she was to have them both. Denver had only his mother left. A sudden strong wave of homesickness nearly knocked her over. She wanted to rush into the water and find Denver waiting for her, his arms wide to catch her so they could walk along the shore, hand in hand, water rushing over their bare feet. She wanted to be in his bed, feeling his body above hers, his lips worshiping hers, and she wanted to cover his face with kisses and never leave him again. But that was a fairy tale, and while she sold fairy tales to others for a living, she couldn’t sell it to herself. So she stood on the shore, the water lapping at her bare feet as twilight gave way to moonlight and the waves washed away the shattered pieces of her heart.
11
“You have a visitor,” Simon announced as he appeared in the doorway to Denver’s office.
“I thought I didn’t have any meetings this afternoon.” Denver scrolled through his phone calendar, double-checking.
“He’s not on the schedule, I’m afraid,” Simon answered carefully, and Denver recognized immediately that he wasn’t about to like whoever came through his door.
Simon stepped back, and a man entered the office. Every muscle went rigid in Denver’s body, and his bones creaked as he moved a mere inch away from his desk before freezing. Paul Ashworth stood in the doorway to his office. He looked older than Denver remembered. Fifteen years had been enough time to deepen the fine lines that bracketed Paul’s eyes and mouth and to streak his hair with gray. Denver started to tell him to go to hell, but then he noticed that Paul’s brown eyes were the same color as Blair’s, a unique shade that held a rich hue of umber tones mixed with russet and amber. Blair’s eyes . . . how many times had he gazed into those eyes as he experienced the most exquisite pleasure of his life? How many times had he lain still in bed just as the first rays of sun kissed her skin and her dark lashes would flutter open to reveal the glow in those brown eyes and his breath would catch at the sight?
“Please, give me five minutes, and then I’ll leave.” Paul’s quiet tone held a hint of desperation, and that alone kept Denver from crossing t
he room to throw a right hook to the man’s face—that and the fact that throwing a punch at this man would be like hitting Blair.
“Five minutes,” Denver warned.
Paul cleared his throat. He didn’t try to sit, nor did Denver offer him a chair.
“My daughter is in love with you.”
Whatever Denver had expected him to say, that wasn’t it.
“I’m sure you didn’t expect me to say that. But it’s the truth. I know I have no right to ask you for anything, Mr. Ramsey. I cost you your father, your future, the life that you expected to have. I carry that grief and guilt always. I know forgiveness is not possible. I’m here to beg you not to let her go if you love her half as much as she loves you. But if you loved Blair . . . if you still do . . .” Paul’s voice roughened, and his eyes were overbright.
“Even if I did love her madly, it would never work.”
Paul smiled sadly as he saw the misery Denver could no longer hide.
“Love should outweigh hate, every single time. You and I don’t have to see each other or speak. If you are in Blair’s life, if she’s happy and you’re happy, I’ll stay out of the picture. You understand? Her happiness is all that matters.”
“How could you even know that she loves me?” Denver asked, the words cutting him deep as he tried to imagine her feeling half of what he felt in that moment: lost, desperate, desolate.
“How do I know? Right now my child is on the shore of Lake Michigan, watching those waves, and I know she wishes she was here with you instead. Her heart is shattered. If that means anything at all, then please, go after her. Give her the life you both deserve. And for what it’s worth, you became a man your father would be proud of. You’ve proven to the world that nothing can keep you down. You’re a fighter. If you love my daughter, fight for her.”
Denver and Paul regarded each other for a long moment, the space between them full of memories and feelings, good and bad, and yet . . . Denver began to see what Paul meant. The good memories he had with Blair, they outweighed everything else. Was loving her betraying the memory of his father?