Adam

by Katie Dowe

  “I know, my dear,” he told her smoothly. “But I also know that he is planning on asking you to marry him. Would you please have lunch with me and allow us to talk?”

  “Okay, I will meet you there.”

  *****

  In the tormenting weeks to come, she was going to regret not telling Adam about the lunch date but then she would assure herself that if she had told him she would not have known what his father and grandfather had in store for him and what she could do to stop them, even if it meant losing everything in the process!

  He was waiting for her when she arrived, and as before, she was greeted by Lennie at the door and brought over to the table where Abraham Whitmore was seated. She was relieved that the table was not one that she and Adam had been seated for their dinner, but this one was at the far side of the room. There were not many people there for the afternoon lunch hour, and even if there were, she and Abraham were afforded privacy. He waited until their lunch had been served and they had eaten before he begun.

  “I wish things were different,” he said with a note of regret in his voice as he used the snowy white napkin to dab at his lips. “I can see that you have made Adam happy and I find myself regretting you are who you are.”

  Amber looked at him with a frown, the rest of the meal forgotten. “What do you mean by that?”

  “It means that we cannot allow Adam to marry you, my dear, because that would be taking things too far. We pretended that we were on board with this thing between you two because we figured the attraction as it were would run its course in the typical ‘Adam’ fashion. He was always fickle when it came to matters of the heart, so we figured that you would be one such case, but when he started sprouting this nonsensical idea of marrying you, we realized that we had underestimated his fondness for you and we cannot allow it to continue.” He leaned forward, his silvery eyes cold. “You see, my dear, we would never welcome someone like you in our family, and it would stand against everything we believe in!”

  Chapter 15

  Amber felt the trembling inside her body and fought it! There was no way she was going to allow this despicable despot to see that he was scaring her! “Someone like me?”

  He nodded. “You are a Gardner and that has been established throughout the years that a Gardner and a Whitmore would never be together, not only the fact that your great-grandfather had the nerve to lie with my great-grandmother and almost ruined her life, but frankly you do not have the requirements to be a Whitmore wife.”

  “And what requirements would that be?” Amber forced herself to remain calm. She had heard her phone vibrating in her pocketbook and knew that it was Adam calling her. She could not talk to him right now. After this disaster of a lunch, she would but not now!

  “We are not biased in terms of the color of a person’s skin but we have never had a-” He struggled to pick the least offensive word to let her know what he was talking about and Amber sat back and waited for him to come up with one. “A colored person in our family and we are not going to start now.”

  “I see,” Amber said slowly. “A colored person as you put it would only taint the so-called impeccable bloodline, is that it?”

  He nodded. “I do not mean to offend you-”

  “I think we are way past that.” She threw down her napkin and started to get up.

  “Sit, please.”

  “I am leaving and unless you want to see how ‘black’ I am, just try and stop me,” she warned.

  “You have just proven my point.” His voice stopped her. “I know that you are going to run straight to Adam to tell him about our conversation-”

  “What gave that away?” she asked him sarcastically.

  “I really think you should take a seat and hear what I have to say, Ms. Gardner.” He took out a folded paper from his jacket pocket and placed it onto the table.

  “What’s that?”

  “I am sure Adam told you that he had a trust fund with thirty million dollars set up by his mother that became active when he reached the appropriate age.”

  “I don’t care about his money!”

  “I realize that, but what you need to realize is that Adam was born into extreme wealth and is used to having the things that money can buy. When that is taken away from him, he is not going to survive on his looks alone.”

  “You do not give him a lot of credit.”

  He inclined his head at that. “Maybe I don’t, but I happen to know my son, and I do know that as much as he claims to love you, if he had to give it all up because of you, he will end up resenting you for the rest of his life. The love will not stand under that pressure and will die eventually.”

  “He has his own money,” she pointed out, ignoring the sick feeling in the pit of her stomach.

  “The trust fund is controlled by me,” he said with a slight smile. “He is in control of it as well as the apartments, the yacht, and everything else he supposedly owns, but it is all controlled by me. When his mother set up the trust, I persuaded her to put me in control of everything and she agreed because as much as she loved our son she realized that he was reckless and had the tendency to act first and think after.”

  “What are you saying?” Amber whispered, but she knew what was coming! Dear God, she knew exactly what was coming!

  “I am saying that I am prepared to offer you a check for a million dollars if you just go away and leave my son alone.”

  Amber stared at him with extreme loathing. “I don’t want your money.”

  “I was afraid you would say that,” he said in regret. “The only thing left to do is to make sure you never see Adam again. I am going to revoke the trust if you continue seeing him and cut him off from everything he is entitled to. He will be out of the apartment, not allowed back on the yacht, and he would be out of our lives if you marry him. It is entirely up to you how this turns out.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Amber fought the wave of panic and despair as she looked at the man who reminded her so much of the man she had fallen in love with!

  “See for yourself.” He thrust the folded paper before her and she opened it up, quickly scanning the legal document, skipping over the legal terms until she came to the section that undoubtedly stated that Abraham Whitmore had control of the trust. She lifted her head and stared at him, her eyes wide, and her hands trembling.

  “You love Adam, why are you doing this?’

  “Precisely because I love him,” he told her simply. “I cannot bear to sit by and see him make the biggest mistake of his life.”

  “We love each other!” She tried one last time to plead with him to make him see that he did not have to destroy their lives!

  “It will pass,” he told her coolly. “You are going to tell Adam rather convincingly that you never want to see him again.”

  “He will never believe me,” she said numbly, not believing that she was agreeing to this.

  “Then it is up to you to be so convincing that he does or face the consequences. He loves you, my dear, but will he love you when he is suddenly poor?”

  “I have money-”

  “Ah, yes! I understand that your designs are quite the success! Congratulations by the way! I am sure that during the past month since you have been enjoying the luxury that is associated with being a Whitmore, you have seen the extent of our wealth and know that we are not merely wealthy but our riches surpasses even so-called kingdoms. The little that you are earning as a designer does not and will never come near to what Adam is used to and knowing him he would never allow a woman to support him. Aside from extreme wealth, we also have extreme pride. It is a Whitmore curse or blessing, call it what you will.”

  “You are willing to tear his life apart just because of a stupid feud?” she asked shakily.

  “That ‘stupid feud’ as you put it almost destroyed our family, Ms. Gardner.” He got to his feet and took up the document. “I am trusting that you will do the right thing.”

  Amber watched him leave; a tall, hands
ome man with an almost regal bearing and knowing that he had the power to destroy anything or anyone in his path. She had been too happy and too complacent and she had fooled herself into thinking that his father and grandfather had given up on breaking them up. She had fooled herself into thinking that they had accepted her and now this! How was she going to tell Adam that she never wanted to see him again? How was she going to convince him to move on with his life? To forget about her? How was she going to be able to live without the man who had become so much a part of her life? But if she went to him and told him what his father had said, how was she going to live with herself knowing that she was the cause of him not living the life he was used to? She had been out with him and had seen how he fit in with the people of his society, she had seen how those same people were eager for his approval as if he was some sort of a king and in his own right he probably was! She had seen the sumptuous luxury of the yacht which looked more like a five-star hotel than a simple water vessel. His apartment was straight out of the pages of Modern Living and had taken her breath away with its elegant décor. His cars were the latest in designs with the latest gadgets and when he went to restaurants he was given the best tables with the managers themselves coming forward to tend to his needs. He commanded attention wherever he went and it was second nature to him. He would never be satisfied living in her small, two-bedroom home in her small neighborhood and go and make a living in some corporate office. She could never do that to him. She loved him too much, and because she did, she was going to have to let him go. Even if letting him go meant that he would be taking her heart with him!

  *****

  She made excuses not to see him later by telling him she had some designs to finish and when he was with her she did not get a lot finished. “You expect me to stay away from you tonight? Are you punishing me for something?”

  “Then I would be punishing myself,” she told him lightly. “It’s just one night, Adam.”

  “One night is way too much time to spend away from you. What am I supposed to do in the meantime?”

  “Catch up on your reading.”

  He paused and then asked her the question she had dreaded. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes. Why?’

  “You sound off, darling. Are you sure everything is okay?”

  “You sound like a mother and even my own mother has never sounded like one. I am okay, Adam, stop fussing,” she told him firmly.

  “Why do I get the feeling that I should ignore what you are saying and come on over just the same?”

  “I would like to think that we are at a place where you respect my wishes.”

  “Very clever of you to use that on me,” he told her dryly. “Okay, love, I will stay inside my empty apartment and my even emptier bed consumed with thoughts of you until tomorrow.”

  “That’s all I am asking.”

  “If I cannot sleep, I might have to call you and ask you to take off your clothes so that I can visualize making love to you,” he warned her. She laughed at that, the only genuine one she had managed for the entire day.

  “I will be turning off my phone.”

  “You are mean. Okay, darling, I will see you tomorrow.”

  “Goodbye, Adam.” Her voice sounded a little sad and gave him pause.

  “its goodnight and I swear I am going to get what is bothering you out with my charm and my ability to make people confess,” he promised.

  Amber hung up from him and propped her face into her hands, her body trembling. She had come home from lunch and had just sat there on the sofa without taking off the clothes she had worn to the restaurant as she tried to think about what she was going to do. She had told herself on the drive home that there had to be a solution. Adam had told her that he was not worried about his family cutting him off because of the trust fund, but he had obviously not seen fit to read the document in its entirety. It had clearly stated that his father was in charge of it and that said father had told her that he would have no qualms about cutting Adam off and leaving him without a penny if he went ahead and married her. She had tried to spin it a different way, trying to come up with answers, but the heartless bastard who was Adam’s father had made it plain and simple that he would go through any length to make sure that they were not together and Amber loved him too much to take him away from the life he had always known. She could survive on very little and she had over the past when the times had been lean, but Adam was used to extreme wealth and she would never ask him to give it up for her! Not while she loved him so damn much!

  *****

  He came over that night right after he had left the office and brought a bottle of wine with him which she wished he had not done because she had no intention of prolonging the agony. In a few minutes, she was going to ask him to leave and stay out of her life and it was going to take everything she had to convince him to do so. In the process of doing that, she was going to drive a knife into both of their hearts and turn it to deliver the final death blow and she was aching with the idea of doing so! So there would be no reason for the expensive bottle of wine when she was going to wipe that sexy smile off his handsome face with a few words. She avoided his lips so that the kiss landed on her cheek and ignored his puzzled look as she made her way into the living room. She had turned up the heat because the coldness had somehow permeated the slabs of the walls.

  “Want me to get the glasses?”

  She shook her head and at on one of the single sofas. “Would you please have a seat?’

  He looked at her with a frown but did as she requested. “What’s wrong?’

  “I have enjoyed our time together-”

  “What the hell are you saying?”

  “Please, let me finish.” She took a deep breath and continued on. “You have been a very good friend and a fantastic and generous lover, but this is not going to work, Adam.”

  He stared at her for a moment and then burst out laughing. “Very funny, darling, you almost had me there.”

  “Adam, please listen!” She was getting agitated and realized that in order to pull this off she was going to have to give the indication that she was tired of him – of what they had. “You are the most handsome man I have ever seen, you are wonderful in bed, and I enjoyed the moments we were together, but I am afraid I have gotten bored of the monotony and I would like you to move on to someone else. I intend to. It was fun while it lasted, but this is where it ends. You think you want to marry me, but the truth is I would never marry someone like you and I am not ready for that kind of commitment yet. My career is taking off and I want to explore it, I want to put everything I have in it and you have become a clingy distraction. I want to tell you that we can go back to being friends, but I know you will never accept that so I have to say it is goodbye.”

  Amber sat there in dread as she stared at him. His expression had turned stony as he listened to her, and during the last few sentences, his face had been wiped of all expressions. “Why are you doing this?”

  “I already told you,” she said calmly as she got to her feet. He stood up as well, his broad-shouldered frame dwarfing her and the expression on his face sending a shiver through her body. “I have some work to do so I would appreciate you leaving.”

  “I am not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on!” he told her coldly as he moved towards her.

  Amber stepped back quickly, knowing that if he touched her, even lightly, that it would be all over and she would end up pouring out her heart to him, begging him to tell her that it was going to be okay and she could not do that! She could not ask him for an assurance that he could never give.

  “Poor Adam!” She made her voice deliberately insulting. “You are not used to women blowing you off so of course you would want an explanation as to why that is. I need space from you, honey, and I am asking you to give it to me. You are stifling me and I am on the road to become one of the hottest designers there is and I need the time to be able to do that. Surely, you understand?”


  He stopped and stared at her, not quite believing that she was speaking to him like this! Not his Amber! Not the woman he had fallen so in love with! Something was wrong! Something that she was not telling him! His family! His eyes narrowed as he looked at her. “Did my father or grandfather say something to you?” he demanded.

  Amber felt her heart hammering inside her chest and was surprised that he had not heard it! “Your family?” She forced a laugh. “Still trying to find excuses as to why I am dumping you, honey?” She saw the murderous rage that came over his face and took a step back. “It’s all me, honey. I don’t want this relationship anymore.”

  She saw the visible effort he took to rein in his rage, and with a last look at her, he turned and left the room. Amber did not move until she heard the front door slam, indicating that he had left. It was not until then that she dropped down onto the carpet and gave in to the awful wracking tears that shook her body and threatened to drown her! Amber felt the aching agony and the emptiness invading every inch of her body as the tears ran unchecked down her cheeks. She was unaware that the agonizing pain of telling the man who she loved that she did not love him anymore had crumpled her to the ground! She did not know anything, not the fact that she could not stop crying or that she had stopped crying and fell asleep right there on the floor!

  *****

  Adam hurled the glass into the elegant fireplace, getting satisfaction from the crash of the fine crystal. Amber had left him! She had told him that the relationship had run its course and that he was clingy and she needed space. He had searched for indications that she was lying and that she was being forced to say what she did, but there had been none! He had called his father and demanded to know what was going on and if they had anything to do with the awful scene he had just experienced back there at her place, and his father had responded before he asked the question. “Adam, we were just thinking of you, son! We have not seen the lovely Amber in the last two weeks and were thinking of inviting her to dinner. We also thought that we would have heard wedding arrangements by now.”