Some Like It Ruthless (A Temporary Engagement)

by Bryce, Megan

  Come on, Maggie. Remember what happened when you mixed up your friend with your enemy.

  It was hard to remember with Cole. Partly because she didn’t want to believe he was her enemy.

  She hadn’t wanted to believe it twelve years ago, either.

  She would just have to walk that fine line. Forgive, but not forget. Use him to help her, just keep those arms away from her.

  Keep that hard chest, those long fingers, away from her.

  And not sit in his lap.

  She glared at the Mercedes keeping her from a cold shower, trying to connect it to a face, a name. If she knew who was inside, she could go in prepared. As it was, she was debating whether to go in relaxed and unkempt or to tuck in her blouse and tidy herself up.

  She finally decided she didn’t care enough to make the effort. And her untucked blouse would hide the fact that she’d eaten more today than she had in the last week.

  She took out her ponytail, fluffed her hair, and looked at herself in the mirror. She looked soft and relaxed, not hard at all, and Maggie smiled humorlessly.

  Caution: objects in mirror are harder than they appear.

  Once inside, she found Ginny and Tanner entertaining Jackson Harwood. They all stopped talking at her entrance, eyeing her. Ginny blinked a few times, then smiled. Tanner blanked his face and Maggie realized he was sober.

  Jackson was not. He said, “I guess that answers that.”

  Maggie sat, crossing her ankles and for once wishing her skirt was longer. “I didn’t realize there was any question.”

  “You and Cole haven’t been seen together in years. And then, boom, you’re engaged?”

  She nodded. “I guess it does seem unlikely.”

  “Especially considering what he did to Tanner here.”

  Maggie looked at Tanner, at his clear, if hooded, eyes. She said, “It hasn’t been easy on him.”

  Jackson leaned forward. “But maybe it’s not so surprising considering what you did to him.”

  She didn’t look at Tanner again. “Birds of a feather.”

  “A pair of vultures, you mean.”

  “I could say the same of you.”

  Jackson snorted, though not because he disagreed with her. “And just how much is it going to cost Cole to buy himself a respectable name? Maybe he doesn’t know that quality has suffered the last couple years and Caldwell isn’t worth what it once was.”

  Maggie would cut off her right hand before she showed Jackson how that hurt.

  Cole was right. The truth was pretty ugly.

  Jackson looked down at her legs, at her shoes. “Or maybe it’s not your name he’s buying.”

  Maggie imagined kicking him in the teeth. “Whatever it is you think Cole is buying, know this: he prefers to get others to pay.”

  When he looked back up, she smiled at him. She said, “People like you.”

  “Seems like I’ll have to pay whatever he wants since I don’t have a pair of thighs he can slide between.”

  “You do. I’m just not sure he’d take you up on the offer.”

  That seemed to quiet him for a minute and Maggie pictured Jackson Harwood sitting in Cole’s lap playing video games.

  She’d always wondered if perhaps her sense of humor was a little off-kilter because the thought made her chuckle a little.

  Jackson leaned forward, an ugly look on his face. “If he did, it would be because he was trying to warm back up.”

  Maggie settled back in her chair, Jackson’s refrain on her coldness in bed familiar ground.

  “Jackson, you are drunk. I’m not sure you’re even going to remember this conversation. I’ll have to remind you of it, sometime when Cole is around to hear.”

  Jackson’s face turned red and he flung his arm out. “He’s going to crush me anyway!”

  “True. But now he’ll crush you with his fists as well.”

  “What do you want, Margaret? I don’t want to end up like Tanner here.”

  Maggie looked at Tanner and wanted to crush Jackson herself.

  Tanner shook his head at her, his eyes still shuttered. Ginny went to stand behind him, her hands on his shoulders.

  Maggie said, “First, an apology.”

  Jackson closed his eyes, put his head in his hands. He whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  Maggie’s eyes widened and she was glad Jackson wasn’t looking at her to see it. He must be afraid indeed if he would capitulate that quickly.

  Made Maggie wonder what else she could get him to do.

  She was not above being petty but there was a better way of making him pay.

  Maggie said, “And I want my rate down to two percent and a one-year moratorium.”

  Jackson blanched, opening his eyes to stare horrified at her. “You know I can’t do that.”

  She smiled, remembering Cole saying she didn’t want anyone to agree to her terms. Here, at least, he was right.

  She stayed silent, letting Jackson Harwood come to his own conclusion about whether he wanted to take his chances with Cole Montgomery.

  It didn’t take him long to decide. He said, “And you’ll keep Montgomery off me?”

  She nodded, wishing she could say otherwise.

  He sighed deeply, then nodded in return. “Deal. I’ll have the papers ready first thing Monday morning.”

  “Excellent. Now get out of my house.”

  He stood shakily. “If you weren’t such a bitch, if Montgomery wasn’t every bit his father’s son, this would have gone differently.”

  She huffed out a laugh. “That’s probably true, Jackson. It also would have gone differently if you weren’t such a pig.”

  Tanner stood, stepping between them and grabbing Jackson’s arm, leading him to the door.

  Ginny said, “We called a car for him. His is still at the club, not that he could drive it anyway.”

  Maggie nodded, and when the door closed behind the men, Ginny said, “Ugh. Why do we deal with him?”

  “Business is war. Sometimes you have to work with those you’d rather be shooting.”

  “My only consolation is he probably feels the same about us.”

  Maggie pushed away the ugliness, tried a little laugh. “He does now.”

  Ginny’s eyes wandered to Maggie’s untucked blouse, up to her loose hair. “You seem pretty okay with throwing Cole’s weight around.”

  “I use the tools at my disposal.”

  “Mm-hm. If that were true you would have told Jackson that heat wasn’t a problem with Cole.”

  She could have. But she liked to think she’d matured in the last decade.

  And she knew Jackson hadn’t forgotten the first time she’d compared him unfavorably. Not entirely her fault since he’d been telling anyone who would listen how frigid she was in bed.

  Jackson Harwood had not been one of her brighter ideas. But when a girl wanted to erase the feel of someone’s arms, replace the image of a certain someone leaning over her in the dark, she was not always as picky as she should be.

  Maggie resisted the urge to shift in her seat. “It’s not what it looks like.”

  “Really? Because you look. . . happy.”

  “I thought I looked tired.”

  Ginny nodded. “Tired and relaxed and happy. Did you spend the whole day together?”

  Maggie remembered that the day had started at five. “Yes.” She smiled. “And it looks like it was pretty productive if it got Jackson Harwood here and drunk.”

  “He hooked on to Tanner at the club and wouldn’t shake loose. I texted you.”

  Maggie dug through her purse, finding her phone, remembering Cole had turned it off.

  “Sorry. I would have told you to get rid of him.”

  “Because you were busy?

  “Playing video games.”

  Ginny laughed. “Cole plays video games? You play video games?”

  “It seems as unlikely as Cole and I getting engaged but it’s true nonetheless.”

  “Your secret is safe with me.�
�

  Maggie smiled, wondering if anyone would believe they’d spent the evening shooting spies.

  She said, “Thanks, but it won’t happen again.”

  “Why not?”

  “It was a nice break. But I have too much to do to spend an evening wasting it with video games.”

  Ginny waved towards the door. “It wasn’t wasted, remember?”

  Tanner came back in, heading straight for the liquor. He filled a tumbler half full and downed it. Then he refilled it and turned around.

  He said, “I spent the whole day at the club. Jackson was the worst of them but everyone is running scared.”

  Maggie smiled, imagining the club filled with hand-wringing men. There were a few of them who, if she was the vindictive kind, should be worried. But she’d always thought success was the best revenge.

  Unless your name was Jackson Harwood.

  “Thank you, Tanner.”

  His soberness seemed even more noteworthy now. He’d spent the day at the club and he hadn’t had a drink? Spent the day at the club listening to men bitch and complain about her and Cole?

  Well, maybe he’d had his own reward after all.

  He said, “They don’t know what to make of you two. Except that this can’t be good. They want to know what you want. What will make you happy now that you’ve hooked yourself a big fish.”

  Maggie pursed her lips. Unhappy that she hadn’t been enough on her own terms.

  First she’d been her father’s daughter and now she was Cole’s woman. Not successful except when she was standing behind a man’s name.

  She said, “What did you tell them?”

  “That you want to save Caldwell. And Cole wants to smash.”

  She nodded. “That was good thinking.”

  Tanner took another sip, looking down into the glass. “Didn’t take a real genius to come up with that. I’m not even sure I was the one who did.”

  Ginny said, “And they might not think Cole is the only one who wants to smash after they hear the deal you made with Jackson tonight.”’

  “That kind of deal is reserved for him only. I couldn’t help myself.”

  Although a one-year moratorium would really help.

  Her debt was strangling her, and she might be loosening the noose a bit but survival was nowhere near guaranteed.

  She was almost sorry there was only one Jackson Harwood she could browbeat.

  Tanner said, “It won’t take much to convince everyone that Jackson gets his own special deal. I might even be able to spin it as you being willing to work with anyone if you’re willing to work with him.”

  Maggie stared at Tanner, wondering if it was fair to use him, wondering what was in it for him. He saw her look and said, “They’ll listen to me. They think I hate Cole and that I’m on their side.”

  Cole wasn’t the only one Tanner had reason to hate.

  Maggie said, “Are they wrong?”

  If she could have come up with any solution other than firing him, she would have. You don’t fire family. She still felt like she’d thrown him overboard, the first casualty of their sinking ship.

  He downed the rest of his drink, sighing softly. “Oh, I hate Cole. And I would return the favor and destroy him if I could.”

  Ginny went to him, sliding her arms around his waist. She said with conviction, “You wouldn’t. Not if it meant hurting us, too.”

  He looked down at her and whispered, “Never.”

  And no matter what Cole had done, no matter what Maggie had done, she knew that was true. Tanner would never do anything to hurt her sister. Never do anything to hurt Caldwell Holdings, on purpose.

  The company belonged to Ginny just as much as Maggie. Even if both of them forgot it occasionally.

  Tanner put his drink down, wrapping his arms around his wife and Maggie pretended not to see the shimmer of tears in Ginny’s eyes.

  They said love was blind. Maggie’s had been. She’d loved, blind to Tanner’s faults.

  But somewhere in the years since Ginny had married Tanner, Maggie had realized that real love, lasting love, wasn’t blind. It was wide-eyed and accepting. It was give and take. It weighed the good against the bad. It saw all the dark recesses and didn’t wither.

  Lasting love was about balance, and Ginny and Tanner balanced each other.

  Maggie rose, leaving them alone and heading for a shower. No longer needing a cold one, thanks to Jackson Harwood. And she again imagined kicking him in the teeth, and for good measure, Cole smashing in his face.

  A one-year moratorium might not feel as good but hopefully it would hurt more in the end.

  A two percent interest rate would be the gift that kept on giving.

  And if she wished she could let Cole loose, watch him destroy the man. . . oh well. She could always picture the look on Jackson’s face when he realized that was what she wanted to do. That he really was going to have to pay to keep that from happening.

  She smiled and thought she just might need a cold shower, after all.

  Tanner refilled his glass again, taking it to the chair and sighing when he sat down.

  Ginny followed to sit in his lap and when he snuggled into her, when he didn’t push her away, she almost cried.

  He said, “I’ve got a few meetings lined up to discuss projects. In exchange for putting in a good word with Maggie. And Cole.”

  She pulled her head off his shoulder and he grinned at her. He said, “I don’t know why they think Cole will listen to me but I will not look a gift horse in the mouth. And I know Maggie will be fair anyway.”

  “Except if you piss her off like Jackson.”

  “He has a talent. It takes a lot for Maggie to lose her temper.”

  “He deserved it.”

  Tanner nodded. “If she’d heard him at the club, she would have called Cole up herself and told him to have at it.”

  “And you didn’t stand up for her?”

  “Why would I? She doesn’t need me to protect her. She does just fine by herself.”

  Ginny frowned at him and he ran his hand down her hair. He said softly, “And everyone thinks I hate her just as much as Cole.”

  He should hate Ginny just as much as well. She’d known that Maggie was going to fire him, had known that the debt would have kept piling up if they didn’t and had been afraid that they would lose everything.

  She put her head back down and squeezed him, holding him to her. The guilt eating her.

  Tanner said, “I don’t hate her. She stepped on my pride, that’s all.”

  Ginny squeezed him harder. “That’s all?”

  He squeezed her back. “I’ll survive. That might be my special talent. To use whatever I have to survive.”

  She was quiet at that, remembering how unhappy her father had been when they’d married, how he’d thought Tanner was just marrying her for money, for connections. But Daddy had been wrong.

  Tanner hadn’t married her for any reason except he loved her.

  He’d married her then because he’d needed her money and connections. And what good would it have done to wait, when he’d needed her then? They would have married eventually anyway; Ginny would have followed him to the ends of the earth.

  But she preferred to stay in Texas.

  Ginny said, “I’d like to come with you, when you go discuss your projects.”

  “You would?”

  She nodded, looking back up. “I’d like to know what you’re looking at, thinking of. Maybe we can be partners, bounce ideas off each other. Maybe start something together, just us.”

  “Doesn’t Maggie need you?”

  “She has Cole now.”

  Tanner was quiet, took another long sip, and finally said, “You think she does?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Cole is not. . . trustworthy. She should know that and I don’t know why she’s trusting him.”

  “They were good friends for a long time.”

  Tanner gave her a disbelieving look and
she said, “Maybe he feels bad about that.”

  “And maybe he’s just looking for a way to do the same to her as he did to my family.”

  “I don’t think he is. Why would he help save Caldwell if all he wanted to do was destroy it?”

  “Because he’s Cole Montgomery. How many times did his father make a contract only to turn around and break it? To use it to destroy? It’s in his blood.”

  Ginny said, “We can’t judge him by his father.”

  “No, we can judge him by what he did.”

  “And what he hasn’t done again since?”

  Tanner said, “He hasn’t been in a position to do it again since. He was working his way out of his own bankruptcy. Too busy with his wells. But now he has the time and the means. And the opportunity.”

  She didn’t have an answer to that and Tanner said, “He hates me, Ginny. He’ll destroy anything that is connected to me.”

  “It was a long time ago, Tanner.”

  “You think either one of us has forgotten?”

  Tanner hadn’t. Common sense would say Cole hadn’t either.

  Ginny said, “And what if Cole does destroy Caldwell? It would have been lost without him anyway. If he wants to destroy it after saving it, is anything really lost?”

  “You think it won’t matter to Maggie? To have hope again and then lose it? Lose it to someone who is supposed to be helping her?”

  Ginny knew it would destroy her sister.

  Maggie had been friends with Cole for years, had been sleeping with Cole when he’d bankrupted Tanner’s family, but that had been the end. Maggie hadn’t seen him again.

  She’d become harder, more closed. Less trusting, more alone.

  Maggie had been betrayed once. To trust again and then be betrayed again?

  Who could survive that?

  Ginny remembered how Maggie had looked tonight. Happy. Soft.

  She said, “She has Cole right now. Whether or not he’s trustworthy, we’ll just have to see. I’d still like to be a part of what you’re doing. Still like to make something of us together.”

  Tanner needed her, no maybe about it. If her sister needed her later, so be it. But right now, Maggie was okay

  Tanner stood, carefully pushing her off his lap. He walked to the drinks and stared down.

  He said softly, “I’m sorry, Ginny. Sorry that I can’t give you anything you want.”