by Sonya Weiss
“Because you’ve wanted him for years.”
“Guilty as charged.”
“Still haven’t heard from him?”
Maddie shook her head, then stared down into her lap where her hands were tightly clasped. “I don’t expect to.”
“It might help to prove to him that Grandfather really does have dementia and that our father seized that as an opportunity to take everything.”
“I’m not interested.”
“You don’t mean that. You’re hurt,” Dani said gently. “Cole loves you, and he has to be hurting, too.”
Not wanting to discuss Cole anymore and poke at the gaping wound loving him had given her, Maddie deftly changed the subject. “I can hardly believe everything that’s happened in our family.” She was still having trouble coming to terms with the fact that her father had stuck his father in a poorly run nursing home that wasn’t even in Texas. He’d left Samuel in Chicago. Probably because he didn’t want anyone back home to know what a cheap thief he was.
She and Dani had spent hours together trying to figure out how to come up with the money to move him to a better facility until they could sue Ned on his behalf.
When someone knocked, Maddie said, “That should be Joy.”
Her friend swept into the apartment with her arms loaded down with bags. “Bought a few things I thought you might like and maybe some help.” Joy put the bags on the counter, then reached into her back pocket and took out a business card. “A friend of a friend knows an attorney who specializes in cases for the elderly.”
Maddie took the card. “Thanks.”
Joy unloaded the bags and stacked the ice cream in a row.
Maddie groaned at the sight of all the pints of ice cream. “The last thing I need to do is pity eat.”
“There is a time for everything under the sun, and ice cream was made for the aftermath of breakups.” Joy dug a box of spoons out of the bag. “My first breakup nearly killed me. He gave me the whole ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ speech. I cried for a week until I realized I didn’t miss him as much as I missed his brother.”
Maddie and Dani laughed.
“The first time Brody asked me out, I told him I didn’t date jocks.” Dani smiled at the memory. “He said he’d quit the team.”
“You want to talk about what went wrong with you and Cole?” Joy asked. “Might help to get it off your chest.”
Maddie looked at the clock. “That would take hours, and I have to leave for a job interview in fifteen minutes. Besides, if I’m going to walk down that painful avenue, I’ll need something a little stronger than ice cream.”
Sammy ran inside the apartment and hopped up onto a chair. “Where are they?” he asked Joy after looking around for her sons.
“They’re cleaning their room. I went in there last night to put away some of their clothes, and that place was a mess.” Joy tousled Sammy’s hair. “You want to go over and help them?”
Sammy eyed the ice cream. “No thanks.”
Dani dished out a helping for him. “What do you say, son?”
“Valerie’s mom gives her chocolate sauce and sprinkles,” he said at her prompting as she set it in front of him.
“I was thinking more along the lines of you saying thank you.”
“Oh.” Sammy looked at the ice cream. “Valerie’s mom gives her more.”
“Valerie’s mom also makes Valerie go to bed an hour before your bedtime. I’ll be glad to make your life more like hers if that’s what you want.”
Frowning, Sammy dug into the ice cream. “When I’m older, I’ll stay up later and I’ll have chocolate sauce and sprinkles.”
“I’m looking forward to that,” Dani said. “As you grow older, you get to have more responsibilities.”
Sammy’s frown deepened, and he ate in silence after that.
The alarm Maddie had set on her phone so she wouldn’t be late rang. She grabbed her purse, told her sister and Joy she’d see them tonight, and hurried out to her car.
…
Day seven. He was better off without her. Everything was back to normal. The way Cole liked it. No complications. He rose from behind his desk after his secretary announced he had a visitor. The minute Pierce walked through the door, he asked, “Did you get it?”
“Sure did. Are you ready to end this?” He held out a card. “Here’s the address where Samuel Russell is staying.”
Cole took the card. Pierce had managed to get an emergency injunction preventing Ned Russell from absconding with the money and assets he’d transferred into his name.
“Since Samuel left the hotel in a financial mess and Ned helped cover that up, a lawsuit against him will recoup the losses you sustained.” Pierce was grinning widely, clearly delighted at having thwarted Ned.
Cole knew he should feel happy. He should feel like justice was finally unfolding for him and his friends. He didn’t. Emptiness made him feel hollowed out, but he refused to entertain the idea that it could have anything to do with Maddie. He tucked the card into his pocket. “I’ll go alone on this one. What’s wrong?” he asked at the strange look on his friend’s face.
“I have to tell you something, and you’re not going to like it.” Pierce cleared his throat. “Ned bribed my paralegal for information. That’s how Maddie’s father knew how much money you’d given her. I think…maybe she was completely innocent.”
Cole’s heart pounded. Had he been so blinded? He swallowed. “No, it can’t be. Even if she was innocent in that, she still lied about her grandfather’s dementia.”
“Are you positive?”
“Yes.” Because he had to be positive he was right and she was wrong. Otherwise, he’d blindly, foolishly destroyed the best thing that had ever happened to him. Maddie.
While Pierce was still questioning that statement, Cole left the office and made his way out to his car. The Russell family had made their millions by not caring who they had to hurt to get what they wanted. Samuel deserved what was coming to him. He put the address into the GPS and headed farther into the city.
The business district faded in his rearview mirror, and after he’d driven half an hour, he approached a section of the city where the buildings were run down. He frowned when the GPS navigator announced he’d arrived at the destination. He parked and checked the address on the card. It was a nursing home, and from the looks of it, not a very well-kept one.
Thinking this could be another one of Ned’s ploys, Cole got out and made his way inside. He noticed that the scent of bleach didn’t quite cover up the odor. He went to the front desk and asked for Samuel’s room.
After getting the information, he walked slowly down the dimly lit hallway until he reached a small boxlike room at the end. He pushed open the door and nearly ran into Samuel. The man had the same expression on his face he’d had when he’d seen him at the restaurant, and with a sharp pang, Cole realized that expression was one of nonrecognition. The other man’s hair was sticking up in tuffs. His clothing was wrinkled, and he looked unkempt.
Samuel moved sideways and reached out his hand to steady himself against the wall. “I asked for pudding.”
“Do you know who I am?” Cole asked, searching the older man’s face.
Samuel frowned, looked toward the window, then back at Cole. A few seconds later, his face cleared. “The doctor?”
“Excuse me, sir.” Behind Cole, an employee entered the room with a change of sheets. “Are you his attorney?” she asked as she swiftly stripped the sheets from the bed. “It’s a shame what his own son did to him.” She shook her head.
Samuel turned to look at the employee. “I want pudding.”
“I know you do, but you have to wait for dinner.”
“Tell my wife to bring me some,” Samuel beseeched.
The woman sighed. “Sure thing, Mr. Russell.” She gathered the dirty linen and as she passed Cole said, “His wife passed away a long time ago. He keeps asking when she’s coming to get him. From what the intake director sai
d, Mr. Russell’s son brought him here and just left. Won’t even answer the phone when the home or his doctor tries to reach him.”
Samuel had been abandoned? Though Cole didn’t like the man, he wouldn’t wish that on anyone. “No one has come to see him?”
“His granddaughters were here this morning. I think they’re a lot closer to him than his own son. Maddie has visited every day since she found out what her father did. She promises him she’s going to get him out of here.”
After she left, Samuel took a few steps forward and stopped. He looked around the room. “I want to go out there.” He pointed to the hallway.
As they moved from the room, Samuel staggered and held his hand out, trying to reach for something to stabilize himself. Cole stepped closer and guided the older man’s hand until it rested securely on his arm. “I’ve got you.”
“Are you my friend?”
“I know your granddaughter, Maddie.”
Samuel smiled. “Maddie lost a tooth. I have to put a dollar under her pillow.” He ambled quietly by Cole’s side, then whispered, “Ask for two puddings.”
Cole tracked down the dining room supervisor and arranged for Samuel to have what he wanted. As he turned to leave, Samuel called out, “Can you bring me a pudding tomorrow?”
He couldn’t get out of there fast enough. His heart felt like it was being squeezed in an iron grip. He sat in his car and gripped the steering wheel. He didn’t want to feel anything for Samuel but contempt, but he’d ended up feeling sorry for the other man. If he, as much as he disliked Samuel, could feel that way, to see her grandfather like this must be crushing to Maddie.
Cole bowed his head, trying to find a buffer against the pain coursing through him. “What have I done?” he whispered aloud.
She hadn’t lied when she’d said he had dementia. Like he’d accused her of. He’d played right into Ned’s hands. Maddie’s own father had twisted everything. Cole had been an idiot.
He had to find a way, if there was even the slimmest of chances, to fix everything. He merged into traffic and drove silently back the way he’d come. When he arrived at the office, he found Mason and Jake waiting for him. “What are you two doing here?”
“We’re staging an intervention,” Mason said.
“Because we’re tired of you snarling around here one minute and moping the next,” Jake said as he leaned back in Cole’s chair and propped his feet on the desk.
Cole shoved his feet off the desk as he walked past on his way to a leather chair in the corner. “For the record, I don’t mope.”
“For the record, you do,” Mason said. “You missed a meeting.”
“I know.” Cole told them where he’d been and what he’d seen. “I can’t stand the guy.” He leaned forward and rested his forearms on his knees. “But I can’t leave him there like that. Maddie loves him, and to see him like that has to break her heart.”
“So? What do you care? Maddie’s not your problem.”
“She was never a problem. I was. I screwed everything up, and I don’t know how to fix it.”
“Have you tried calling and apologizing?” Mason asked.
“Or groveling?” Jake suggested.
“I haven’t talked to her since she left without saying a word.”
Jake laughed. “The thing about women is that they say plenty without having to utter a single word.”
Cole looked at him, then Mason. “What’s he talking about?”
“She told you she loved you, but she left without saying goodbye. That means you hurt her,” Mason explained.
“Or she’s mad enough to want your head on a spit,” Jake said.
“Or maybe both,” Mason added.
“I love her,” Cole said quietly. “And I want to win her back.” He took out his phone, not wanting to wait another second to tell her she was the love of his life. When she answered the phone, he rose and paced the office. “I love you. I want you back.” He pulled the phone away from his ear and stared down at it.
“What happened?” Jake asked.
“She said, ‘So?’ and hung up.”
“Now what?” Mason said.
“Now, I put things right,” Cole said and walked out of the office without another word. He just hoped it wasn’t too late.
Chapter Eighteen
Maddie hugged a pillow as she sat cross-legged on the sofa. She would start her new job at a rival hotel next week. Though she’d start as an assistant to an assistant in the administrative department, there was room for advancement, and who knew? Maybe even a place in the future for her to transfer out of Chicago and far, far away from the heartache known as Cole Mitchell.
Until his phone call three days ago, she’d been on the road to recovery. Well, not so much a road as maybe a path. Hearing his deep voice in her ear had nearly undone all her hard-won peace of mind. Which she didn’t have a whole lot of in the middle of the night when she woke up missing him so badly that she ached.
Then yesterday morning, flowers and an apology note had arrived. He loved her and wanted her back. Big deal. That didn’t mean he realized how much he’d hurt her. She couldn’t go through that again, being with Cole until the next time he didn’t trust her. Because of what her grandfather and father had done to him, Cole would always be short in the trust department toward her.
No, thanks. She was moving on. Even if she was going to have to create a twelve-step plan to do so. Step one: Don’t think about him. Step two: See step one. She thought about him later during most of the drive to her grandfather’s nursing home. So far she was off to a successful start. Not.
Maddie parked and went inside. She’d just bypassed the desk when the director called her attention. Francis, a harried-looking woman in her early sixties, said, “Your grandfather was moved. Didn’t you know?”
“Where?”
Francis named an upscale nursing home several miles away, and relief ran rampant through Maddie. Her father had come through after all. She didn’t know what it had taken for him to grow a conscience, but she was grateful. She thanked the woman and left.
Twenty minutes later, she walked into the new nursing home and could have wept from joy. The place had been created to look like a neighborhood. The entry of each of the individual rooms had a porch space holding rocking chairs and various plants or flowers.
She knocked lightly on her grandfather’s door and heard him moving slowly but steadily toward her. When he opened the door, his face didn’t bear a single sign of recognition.
“May I come in?” she asked gently and held up the bag of cookies she’d brought along.
Samuel took the cookies with childlike delight, then turned wordlessly around and shuffled back to a chair in front of a wall-mounted television. Maddie looked around the room, noting how clean everything was and how much more space he had.
She settled into the chair beside him. Her grandfather opened the cookies and began eating one. “I’m so thankful Dad moved you here.”
Samuel kept eating.
“It’s about time he did something selfless,” she muttered.
From the television, a reporter was talking about some guy standing in the middle of— What? Maddie paid attention to the screen. That was Cole standing in the middle of the ballroom at the Rice River mansion with his hand outstretched.
She gasped and put her fingers against her lips. The camera panned to an orchestra softly playing at one end of the ballroom. The reporter said Cole had been there all night and she was hoping the “lucky woman” would come forward.
“Him,” Samuel said as he stared at the television.
“Him what?” Maddie couldn’t look away from the man on the screen standing as still as a statue.
“He’s my friend.”
That got Maddie’s attention. “Your friend?” Her heart beat faster. “Did he move you here?”
Samuel frowned. “Do you know my wife?”
“I…yes.”
“Ask her to bring pudding.”
&n
bsp; Maddie swallowed and nodded. “I will.” She rose and leaned across to give her grandfather a hug. “I love you.”
He dug another cookie from the bag.
Maddie hovered until he looked at her. “I’ll be back.”
“Thank you, miss.” He held up a cookie.
“You’re welcome.” Maddie blinked back tears and left the room. She found the supervisor, Evelyn, who told her that her grandfather’s bill had been paid a year in advance.
Evelyn checked her computer. “All future bills are to be mailed here.” She rattled off Cole’s business address. She peered over the top of her glasses. “He was such a nice man. I overheard him telling someone on the phone to make sure Samuel’s daughter-in-law is taken care of. Apparently, the son, Ned, left both her and his father penniless.”
The world shifted beneath Maddie’s feet. “I-I didn’t know that.” She rose, feeling like she was moving in slow motion, and walked out to her car. She sat behind the wheel until she pulled herself together enough to drive back to her apartment.
Cole…he’d… She paced her living room. He’d taken care of her grandfather and even provided for her mother when they’d given him nothing but unkindness. She had to… Maddie paused for a second, then rushed into her bedroom to search for the dress she’d worn to the masquerade ball. She dressed and ran out the door. She had to get to Cole.
…
Reporters from various news stations milled around outside the mansion. Cole had contacted them himself, hoping to get the word out to Maddie. He’d tried calling and sending flowers to no avail. So here he was, standing in the middle of a ballroom with his hand outstretched. An excited buzz of conversation began by the door, and when he looked, there was Maddie.
She was wearing the same dress she’d worn for the masquerade party. Tears glistened in her eyes as she ran across the room to take his hand. “How long have you been here?”
“A while,” he said, drinking her in as he wrapped her in his arms. It had been hell without her, and this…this felt like paradise.
“How long would you have waited?”
“As long as it took.” He swept her around the room, oblivious to the cameras rolling. “I was king of the idiots, Maddie.” He leaned his forehead against hers, breathing in her sweet scent. “I’m sorry. Come back to me. Let me spend the rest of my life showing you how much I love you. How much you matter to me.”