“My friend?” she murmured, dreading the answer.
“Lincoln Greene,” Mr. Page said. “He came by the house on Sunday and let us know about Connor’s most recent behavior and his threats to you. We felt it was important to come straight to you and get everything out in the open.”
“He shouldn’t have done that,” Sadie said quietly. He had no right to do that behind her back.
“It’s a strange situation we find ourselves in,” he said, making Mrs. Page scoff and direct her attention back to Cocoa. “But what Connor is doing is wrong. We’re going to do everything we can to get him help and stop him from contacting you again.” He paused for a moment, gathering his thoughts. “And, it was important to me that you know, we would never send him out here to harass you. While I can’t say we forgive you for what you did, we believe in the justice system and we believe that you have the right to live your life in peace.”
The words should have soothed her, but instead they whipped the anger that was swirling inside her into a firestorm. How dare Lincoln go to the Pages and interrupt their lives.
Worse, he’d done it on her behalf, as if they needed her to disrupt their lives again, no matter what Connor was doing. He’d never said a word, never mentioned in the dozens of texts and conversations they’d had since he’d gone back to Boston for the week that he happened to stop by their house.
She stiffly wrapped up the conversation, walking them to their car and seeing them off before robotically going inside and locking the door behind her.
Leaning her head against the hard surface, she banged her head on it, once, twice, just to jar some sense in her brain. How could he go behind her back like that, do something so heavy-handed?
So personal.
Sadie shook her head, unable to comprehend the feelings coursing through her, the betrayal and humiliation she felt. Instead, she stalked though the house and out into the backyard where her real family waited for her.
❖
Lincoln stewed at work on Friday, paying absolutely zero attention to the work on his desk. Sadie hadn’t been taking his calls since Wednesday afternoon, nothing but radio silence from her. He’d texted. He’d called. He’d emailed.
Everything short of smoke signals and showing up at her house, he’d tried.
Since the one time she’d picked up, giving him a short, “Don’t call here anymore,” she’d been unavailable.
In his gut, he knew it had something to do with the visit to the Pages. She’d somehow found out and was pissed. He knew when he was doing it that it was a possibility, he just hadn’t thought she’d totally shut him out. Yell at him, throw a few glasses maybe, pull her old haughtier-than-though routine. Hell, he’d take anything.
Anything but deafening silence.
Lincoln tapped his thumb on his desk, leaning back in his chair as he contemplated his next move. Going out to her place was at the top of his list, but he hesitated to outright disregard her wishes. That’s why he was in the position he was in, as it was. Doing it again seemed counterintuitive.
On the other hand, letting things lie as they were couldn’t stand either.
She could stew all she wanted but he wasn’t just going to let her handle the Connor situation on her own.
And, he wanted to see her. He didn’t care if it was for nothing more than groveling at her feet if he had to. He wasn’t too proud to beg, as the old song said.
“Who is she?”
Lincoln looked up to see Dylan James in the door of his office. He’d kept Sadie a secret for all the weeks they’d been seeing each other, he wasn’t about to crack now. But even speaking in generalities had to be better than keeping it all bottled up.
“You’ve been disappearing for days at a time for weeks. Now you’re in here brooding and stewing over something. It can only be over a woman.”
Dylan invited himself in, taking a seat in front of the desk, his usual smile stretched across his face.
“So, who is she?”
“Someone who’s pissed at me, at the moment.”
“What’d you do?”
Lincoln leaned way back in his seat, taking on a relaxed pose he didn’t exactly feel.
“She hasn’t talked to me long enough to explain it, but I’m guessing it’s because I went over her head and overstepped.”
“Women hate that shit.”
“Everyone hates that shit,” Lincoln pointed out. “But her especially. She’s got this whole independent thing going on and is used to doing things on her own.”
“And you stepped on her toes?”
“More like I stepped on her foot, and her back, and her face. Maybe both feet,” he added, feeling worse with every word. “But she got herself into a shitstorm and put herself in danger.”
Dylan considered him for a minute and then gave a nod.
“What’s Mercedes gotten herself into now?”
Annoyed, Lincoln glared at Dylan. “What makes you think it’s Mercedes?”
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s not like Brady sent you out there to see the woman you’ve loved since we were sixteen and you’ve had a smile on your face ever since.”
“I have not,” Lincoln argued weakly.
Dylan shrugged. “No skin off my nose. I mean, Brady keeps saying she’s changed, and if you’re that happy, she must have, because she used to do nothing but make you frown. I won’t be the one trying to talk you out of it. Happy is happy and love is love. Hell, I fell in love with a woman in a coffee shop that was pregnant with her sister’s baby. Not exactly the definition of uncomplicated, but I wouldn’t change a thing. So, again, what’s Mercedes into now?”
“Sadie,” Lincoln corrected. “She goes by Sadie now.”
Dylan’s brows raised up to his hairline. “Really?”
“She’s changed, Dylan. Really changed. She’s not the same girl you remember.”
“That’s a relief.”
Lincoln rolled his eyes.
“Why did no one tell us it was time for a gossip break?” Brady asked as he strolled in, Grant right behind him.
“Lincoln was about to tell me what he did to make Sadie so pissed at him.”
“Want me to call her?” Brady asked as he took a seat next to Dylan, leaving Grant standing behind them both, a frown on his face.
“Who the hell is Sadie?” he asked.
“My sister,” Brady replied, as if she hadn’t been swept under the rug for the last seven or eight years.
“Since when have you been getting in deep with Mercedes again?” Grant asked, a scowl overtaking his face. He didn’t give anyone time to answer his question. “Since you’ve been secretly seeing whoever it is that keeps you so damn chipper.”
Dylan and Brady both hid smiles behind their hands.
“Someone could have said something,” Grant growled, annoyed with being so blind he couldn’t see what had been going on right in front of him. “Is that why you didn’t come to the Cape for the fourth this year?”
“Sadie and I spent the weekend in the city,” Lincoln confirmed.
“But, now she’s pissed at him,” Dylan reminded them. “And he’s stuck here, distracted and broody.”
“I’ll just call her.”
Lincoln wanted to argue: what a childish thing to do, sending his friend to do his dirty work. But, she wasn’t taking his calls and even if it was just to hear her voice and reaffirm that she was safe out there, he would take it.
“Don’t be pushy,” Lincoln said. “Just say you’re checking in, and make sure she’s okay out there. Make sure nothing’s happened.”
“What do you mean, make sure nothing’s happened? What the hell do you think is happening?”
“Just do it,” Lincoln said, leaning his elbows on his desk.
Hesitantly, Brady took his phone out and pressed the screen a few times, the ringing of the phone filling the room when he put it on speaker.
“Hey,” Sadie’s voice said shortly when she picked up. “What are you doing calling in
the middle of the day?”
“Just checking in. Haven’t talked to you in a couple weeks.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“So,” Brady dragged the words out, his eyes meeting Lincoln’s. “What’s going on?”
“Not much, really. Training a new dog this week for a client. He’s a good dog, but I swear he doesn’t get tired. Just brings that ball back over and over until my arm is ready to fall off. I finally ordered an automatic ball-throwing machine. Cost me a couple hundred bucks, but so far, it’s been worth it. Cocoa,” her voice murmured, muffled and away from the speaker. “I know baby. It’ll be okay.”
“What’s wrong with Cocoa?” Lincoln whispered to Brady.
Brady parroted the question to Sadie, his brow bunched down.
“Oh, she’s suffering a bit of heartache at the moment. We’ll survive.”
Brady leaned back. “We?”
“Huh?”
“You said, we’ll survive, which implies you’re suffering a bit of heartache at the moment, too. Whose ass do I have to kick?”
“Mine,” she said, resignation leeching through the tinny speaker. “I told myself not to get involved, though come to think of it, I told you sending Lincoln out here was a bad idea, so I guess your own too.”
“What’d Lincoln do?”
“Doesn’t matter,” she said.
“Like hell it doesn’t,” Brady argued, staring at Lincoln. “What did he do?”
“Are you guys all having a meeting in here and didn’t tell me?” Audrey’s voice, sudden and sharp, came from the doorway and they all looked at her, guilt written plain on their faces. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you four.”
There was absolute silence from Sadie’s end of the line and Lincoln felt his heart hit the bottom of his stomach.
“Sade,” he said quietly. “I just needed to hear your voice.”
“Really? What did Dylan and Grant need? Just sitting in on your conference calls?”
The four of them had been caught doing a number of things in their days. Booze, women, fast cars—they’d done it all and they’d been caught, red-handed a number of times. The guilty expressions Lincoln saw around him surpassed any of those times, all of them feeling complicit in the act.
“Sadie,” Brady said. “Linc was just worried about you. He wanted me to make sure things were good with you. Dylan and Grant just happened to be in the office at the same time.”
“Great, so now he has you going behind my back, too.”
He wanted to argue, but she was right.
“Someone needed to say something,” Lincoln argued. “Someone had to do something, Sadie, and you damn well know it.”
“You could have talked to me about it first, Lincoln.”
“You would have said no.”
“Of course I would have said no!”
“We’ll just go,” Dylan said quietly.
“Don’t bother,” Sadie told them, her voice filled with angry pride. “This conversation is over.”
The line went dead; Grant and Dylan slinked out the room, leaving Brady glaring daggers at Lincoln.
“Want to tell me what the hell I just stepped in there?”
No. He didn’t want to tell him, but someone had to know what was going on.
So he told Brady everything. About Connor and the blackmail, his subsequent visits and violence. He told him about the money she’d been siphoning from her trust allowance and handing over. He told him about his visit to the Pages and how they’d reacted, and about the legal steps they’d taken to get Connor off her back.
Sadie could be as pissed as she wanted to be.
As long as she was alive, he’d figure the rest out.
14
A week later, things were marginally better.
Lincoln hadn’t seen Sadie, she hadn’t taken his calls, but she’d answered a few texts.
Persistence paid off, apparently, and she’d finally responded.
Her answers were short, telling him she was still mad, that she needed time, and most importantly things had been quiet. Her security system was working well, she was being careful and there was no sign of Connor. He’d been served his restraining order and hopefully, was going to keep his distance.
Lincoln had been hoping to talk Sadie into attending her father’s annual birthday gala with him, but he’d put his foot in his mouth before he’d been able to. Instead, he found himself tying his bow tie alone in his house, getting ready to attend solo.
She probably would have said no, he reminded himself, but he’d hoped. He’d imagined him talking her into it and being the one to escort her back into her family fold, as if he could someone help bridge the gap and salvage what relationship she had left with her father.
No such luck.
Lincoln never minded attending the gala, so much. The business contacts alone were worth their weight in gold. It was the social scene that he hated: the women his parents tried to fix him up with, the gabby gossip and paparazzi bullshit that made his skin crawl. He’d wanted to show up with Sadie on his arm through the backdoor and skip all the formality, getting her integrated back into her old life.
For now, he’d take the fact that she’d texted him back as a win and let the rest go.
His phone pinged with a text, Grant letting him know that he was waiting outside. With one last look at his tie, Lincoln headed to the gala, not nearly as excited as he would have been if it had been Sadie waiting on him.
❖
Sadie felt herself caving as the days went by, her anger with Lincoln softening around the edges. There was still annoyance there, simmering under the surface, but it wasn’t so sharp anymore.
The visit from the Pages had turned out to be the best thing about her week. While she hadn’t apologized, which she’d regretted all week long, she felt a sort of absolution she’d never expected to find. They hadn’t been furious with her; they hadn’t filleted her emotionally which she wondered if she didn’t deserve. There was a sadness that ran between them, underlying but ever-present, that spoke volumes.
But there was no hatred. No rage.
In fact, Mr. Page had made sure to let her know that she’d done nothing to deserve the violence Connor had inflicted on her. He’d told her that she shouldn’t have paid him any money, that she owed him nothing.
He’d told her before he left that he’d make sure that Connor didn’t come near her anymore, and she believed him.
The experience had been eye-opening and in turn, she felt waves of relief wash over her as the week went on. Her shame was still there, what she’d done to Dani Page still in the forefront of her mind, but she thought she might be able to move on a little.
And it was because Lincoln had gone to see them. She never would have bothered them about the thing with Connor, knowing they wouldn’t want to see her face or hear from her. But Lincoln had no such compunction and he’d stepped in on her behalf.
In that vein, she began answering his texts, thinking it was a step in the right direction of at least speaking with him again. She hadn’t invited him back out to her house and he hadn’t mentioned it, both of them knowing they were on shaky ground, but it would come.
She missed him terribly, her world just a bit boring, her heart a bit empty. He was at her father’s birthday gala, a big ostentatious party Lori threw every year, so she hadn’t bothered to ask him to come visit, but she’d call in the morning and see if he wanted to have dinner or something. Well, not too early because she knew how he felt about mornings.
Sadie rummaged under her kitchen sink, searching for a bottle of cleaner she’d put under there. It was a natural cleaner and she wanted to scrub a little area of her pool deck that was shady and growing mold. With nothing else to do, it seemed as good a thing to do as any.
She’d finally found it when Aggie let out a quick series of barks, urgent and sharp. Sadie jumped to her feet just as Aggie raced into the kitchen, agitated and still barking. Aggie rarely barked at all and when she did, i
t was just a yip here or there. But this was something totally different, a warning that made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.
When Lola started, her deep howls echoing through the yard, Sadie started to get nervous.
She raced into the yard, looking for whatever it was that had caught their attention, her mind warning her that it could be Connor Page, but there was nothing there, her backyard just as empty as it had been before she’d gone inside. Aggie ran ahead, turning to bark again, then running a few more steps.
Sadie followed, unsure, but taking Aggie’s actions as a sign that she wanted to be followed. Every few steps, Aggie turned and barked, leading Sadie through the back field and to the edges of her property.
When they got to the wood line, Aggie just lost it, whining and barking, lunging at the woods as if there were someone back there. Sadie reached her side and put a comforting hand on her back. When Aggie approached the woods, entering the shadowy canopy, Sadie hesitated.
Then it hit her.
Cocoa.
Cocoa was always in the woods, always playing in the mud, in her favorite place, and she was conspicuously missing. Heedless of her previous concerns, Sadie raced headlong into the woods, determined to find her dog.
“Cocoa!” she yelled, hoping the echo would reach her wherever she may be.
She imagined her running out from behind a tree, covered in mud and smiling her dog smile, tongue rolled out of her mouth.
Aggie was making a beeline, like she knew exactly where to go and Sadie followed. Her legs got slapped with underbrush, prickers snagging her flesh, and she continued, not feeling any pain, the terror in her heart overriding all her other senses. When Aggie crested a little hill and barked, then sat and let out a low whine, Sadie knew she’d found something.
The sounds she made as she scrambled to the top of the hill and looked down were close to inhuman, a panicked wail that fell from her with no control. She threw herself down the incline, sliding down feet first, clambering for purchase as she slipped on leaves and debris.
Cocoa was lying on her side, half in the stream and half on the bank. And there was blood. So much blood. Her fur was dark and matted with it, her belly flayed wide open.
No Love Left Behind (Boston Billionaire's Club Book 1) Page 17