by C. C. Snow
My assistant placed the packet on my desk. “Open it and see. I’m sure you’ll find it interesting,” she said before walking out of my office.
Mystified by her cryptic remark, I glanced at the return address. It was from a respected law firm in New York City. Sliding my finger underneath the flap, I pulled out the stack of papers. On the top was a short letter.
Dear Mr. Troy Weston,
Please find enclosed our client’s transfer of ownership of fifteen shipping ports from Smythe Corporation to Weston Enterprises. The attached contract outlines the terms of the transfer. Once you sign the contract, there are no further legal obligations or financial remuneration owed to Smythe Corporation.
Respectfully,
Jonathan Messer
General Counsel
My heart thumping wildly, I skimmed through the contract. Everything looked legitimate.
I blew out a long breath and muttered, “Fuck.” My world had been turned upside down. What the fuck was happening? How did Nichols know this was what I was after and why would he hand it to me on a silver platter?
I picked up my phone. “Kayla, can you get Carter Nichols on the phone?”
“I’ll call now.” A long pause passed before she came back on the line. “Uh…Troy, Mr. Nichols is no longer working for Smythe Corporation.”
Shock yanked me to my feet. “What? Who the fuck is the CEO?”
“Gwendolyn Smythe-Lawrence.”
“Shit,” I said hoarsely, my chin dropping to my chest.
Smythe-Lawrence was the last name of Carter’s fiancée, now wife.
Gwen must be one of the sisters—one of Elle’s half-sisters. One of the members of her family I never knew she had. Briefly I wondered if this was the same friend she had invited for Christmas.
I had recoiled when she told me she had cheated on her sister. Not only had she betrayed a member of her own family, she had been lying to me the entire time about her background. I had done a search on the Smythe-Lawrences, but there had been no mention of a Gabrielle Lazzaro. Nor had there been any family photos with her in them.
It felt like I kept getting new pieces of the puzzle, but none of them fit together.
“Troy?”
“Sorry, Kayla. What did you say?”
“Do you want me to get in touch with Ms. Smythe-Lawrence?”
“No. Get me an in-person appointment with her as soon as possible. If she says no, remind her I own a quarter of the company,” I said, coming to a sudden decision. “And have the jet on stand-by.”
“Got it.”
As soon as I hung up with her, I made another call.
“Menendez here.”
“Serge, have you tracked her down yet?”
“No, sorry, Mr. Weston. She must be using an alias.”
I slammed my fist into my desk in frustration. “It’s a long shot, but try the last names of Smythe or Lawrence. And Serge, I don’t care how much money it takes or how many laws you need to break, I need you to find her ASAP,” I said urgently and ended the call.
It was finally dawning on me how much I had fucked up.
When Jake told me that someone had stolen files off my computer, my mind had instantly jumped to how Sophia Chandler had put Jake and the company through hell. When all evidence had fingered Elle as the thief, I felt like a battering ram had been slammed into my gut, sending me reeling into a dark abyss of pain and doubt.
Then I was transported to the moment when I was introduced to John Howe and his fiancée. Veronika’s face had been chalk white as she stared at me with huge, blue eyes filled with guilt and dread.
Lies. Deception. Infidelity. Greed.
Only Elle had played me a thousand times—nay, a million times—better than Veronika. I had fallen in love with her. I thought she felt the same way, but it had all been an illusion she built lie by lie.
Rage and vengeance boiling over, I had lashed out viciously, needing to draw first blood. And I had taken sick satisfaction in seeing her face blanche.
“What is the one thing in the world you could never forgive me for doing?” she had asked.
“Nothing. There’s nothing you could do that I wouldn’t forgive you for.” And she had called me out on my lie.
“Cheating would be at the top of my list. Also doing anything to hurt my family.”
An ominous weight sat heavily on my chest. It was becoming clear to me she had not cheated on me and she had done nothing to hurt my family. I didn’t know how or why she did it, but somehow she had orchestrated the transfer of the ownership of those shipping ports.
“How about lying?” she asked.
“Depends on the reason for the lie.”
I closed my eyes, bitter regret on my tongue. She had lied to me. Many, many times, but I had never given her a chance to explain why. I had only hurled accusations at her.
God, hadn’t she asked to talk to me when we arrived back at my apartment? And in front of the nursery? Had she been ready to tell me everything?
“Fuck…I’m sorry, baby,” I said, dragging my hands over my face. If my gut was right, I had destroyed the best thing that ever happened to me.
Chapter 24
Troy
Four hours later, I strode onto SC’s executive floor and almost crashed into a guy carrying a ladder over his shoulder. I glanced around, curious about the hum of activity at this hour. Men with power tools were roaming the halls, measuring and making notes. Executives scurried anxiously behind them.
I smiled. The remodeling probably meant there was a shake-up among the top brass at the firm. The CEO had been busy. Good for her.
“Sir, can I help you?”
I swung my gaze to the woman at the reception desk. She was in her late-fifties with a short bob and a no-nonsense manner.
“Yes, I’m Troy Weston. I have an appointment with Ms. Smythe-Lawrence.”
“Just a minute, sir.” She nodded and picked up the phone. “Gwen, Mr. Weston is here.” Hanging up, she stood up and walked from behind her desk. “Please follow me, Mr. Weston,” she said, leading me down the hall to a corner office.
Next to the door was a shiny new placard. Gwendolyn Smythe-Lawrence worked fast.
With a brief knock, the receptionist opened the door and waved me inside.
Coming to an abrupt stop, I stared in shock at the young woman standing behind her desk. She didn’t look old enough to get into a bar, let alone run a multi-billion dollar firm like Smythe Corp.
Gwen looked nothing like her half-sister. She was built on delicate lines, her body slender and petite. She had thick blonde curls and china blue eyes. Her dark suit contrasted starkly with her porcelain skin. There was an air of fragility surrounding her, but she stood proudly, her shoulders thrown back, and I realized she and Elle shared a spine of steel.
“Ms. Smythe-Lawrence, it’s nice to meet you,” I said, holding out my hand. “Thank you for seeing me on such short notice,” I said.
She gave my hand a firm pump. “Mr. Weston, you didn’t give me much of a choice,” she said coldly, waving to the guest chairs in front of her. “Please have a seat.” Pulling at the hem of her blazer, she sank into her chair.
“Where is Carter Nichols?” I asked, ignoring her frosty reception. I was the enemy after all.
Her eyes flickered. “Based on recent revelations, the board saw fit to remove him from the position.”
I eyed her with concern. Being CEO was a tough job and this woman-child was in for the ride of her life. “How old are you?”
She lifted an imperious brow. “I don’t see how it’s any of your business. Even if you do owe twenty-five percent of the company.”
My lips curved with admiration. I was beginning to see more and more of Elle in her attitude.
She shifted her weight and crossed her legs. “Mr. Weston, why don’t you tell me why you requested this urgent meeting?”
Appreciating her directness, I took the contract out of my briefcase and placed it in front of her. “I w
ant to know why you signed over these ports to us. You must know those routes are worth millions and will only increase in value.”
Her eyes flicked to papers before she pushed it toward me. “I am well aware of the value.”
“Why are you giving them to Weston?”
“I don’t owe you any explanations.”
“As a stockholder of the company, surely I have the right to know why the new CEO would hand over millions in assets for no apparent reason.”
“As the major stockholder of the firm, I think I have more of a say than you do.”
My brows rose at the revelation. So Elle had passed on the list of names to her half-sister instead of Nichols. Part of me nodded in approval at her show of loyalty. Had I been in her shoes, I would have done the same.
“I can always go through my attorneys to find out.”
Her lips thinned and she hesitated for a few seconds. “I received a phone call from a friend. She told me my family’s company was under siege and offered me a chance to save it. I had recently inherited some funds and could afford to buy up the shares. In exchange, I had to give up the ports. It was worth it to me to lose a limb—a valuable one—to save the whole. Besides, I would have done it anyway as a favor to someone I care about.”
At having my suspicions confirmed, I felt the ache bloom in my chest. “Tell me where she is,” I rasped, leaning forward.
“I don’t know to whom you refer, Mr. Weston.”
“Don’t play games with me. Tell me where Elle is.”
“Go to hell,” she said, showing emotion for the first time. Her eyes flashed with hostility. I had a feeling this spunky woman was the real Gwendolyn Smythe-Lawrence, not the aloof woman I met minutes ago.
I ran my palm over the tense muscles at the back of my neck. I needed to find Elle. I needed to beg for her forgiveness. And I needed to win her back.
Without her, I was a zombie, a dead man stumbling numbly through the day. Without her love, I was…empty. Nothing. The worst time of my day was the split-second moment between sleep and wakefulness. I’d forget that she was gone and reach for her. When my fingers encountered air, the emptiness would hit like a nuclear bomb in my chest.
I regarded the woman in front of me. She was my last hope for finding Elle.
“I am already in hell,” I said, letting my raw pain seep into my voice. I decided to lay myself bare. “I fucked up,” I admitted. “I hurt her. I need to talk to her. To ask for her forgiveness. Please, Gwen. I love her.”
Her eyes widening, Gwen studied my face intently for long minutes. She pushed to her feet and I slumped in defeat. My plea had not worked. She was going to kick me out of her office.
“Did you know Elle is my half-sister, Mr. Weston?” she asked, pacing restlessly in front of the window.
“Yes. And please call me Troy,” I said, hope stirring.
She halted in front of me and then turned to look out at the view of the East River. Her voice lowered. “Did you know I’m not supposed to know she’s my half-sister?”
My breath halted in my chest.
Her blue eyes returned to me—wet with unshed tears. “Everyone thinks I’m clueless, but I see more than they think.”
Her doll-like appearance would deceive many people, myself included, but the sharp mind underneath was impressive as hell. In that moment, I had no doubt she would resurrect this company out of its ashes.
She started to move again, her hands fidgeting nervously. “I met Elle when I was seven. She just showed up on our doorstep one day, looking lost and scared. My sisters and I were told she was living with us because her father had died and our dad was her appointed guardian. She called our father Uncle Patrick.”
“Where the hell was her mom?”
“Graziella had remarried and decided to move back to Italy with her new husband.”
“Jesus,” I muttered, my heart aching for the teenager rejected by both her parents. Rage and contempt surged for her asshole of a father who wouldn’t acknowledge his own daughter and for her selfish bitch of a mother who would leave Elle in a snake pit. What a fucked up family life. No wonder she freaked out about meeting my mom and dad.
As if she knew what I was feeling, Gwen nodded. “As you could surmise, my mother hated Elle and she forbade my sisters and me from associating with her. For Meredith and Jemma, the edict was not a problem.” She smiled wryly. “For me…well, let’s say I couldn’t resist. Elle looked so lonely and sad and I was drawn to her.”
She shrugged lightly. “I guess I was pretty lonely too. I started to sneak into her room to talk to her. At first she was standoffish and wary, but I got it into my head that we were going to be friends and I was a stubborn little thing. It was a silly idea because what could a twelve-year-old possibly have in common with a little girl? But somehow we…clicked. Thinking back, I supposed our friendship was inevitable. Loneliness forges a strong bond. I was the youngest and always felt left out of the family and Elle was the outsider. Even before I found out the truth, I already felt like she was the sister of my heart.”
“How did you find out?” I asked, my voice gruff with emotion.
“It was the day of Elle’s high school graduation. I was supposed to go visit my grandparents with my sisters, but I pretended to be sick so that I could sneak out to attend the ceremony. As I was passing my father’s study, I overheard my parents fighting about whether they should pay for Elle’s college tuition. My mom was ready to cut Elle loose, saying she had done her duty in raising my father’s bastard.”
Jesus. What fucking assholes. And nobody was going to attend her graduation? I couldn’t remember a time my parents missed a Little League game, let alone a graduation.
“It wasn’t like we couldn’t afford it.” A note of bitterness entered her voice. “My father argued that as her guardian, it would cause a scandal if he didn’t pay for her education. That convinced my mother. There was nothing more abhorrent to Evelyn Smythe than to be the topic of gossip. Elle left for college two months later. That was the last time she saw my parents except at my sister’s engagement party. And she only attended because our father made it clear it would raise eyebrows if she didn’t.”
My fingers clenched into fists and I wished Patrick Lawrence were in front of me so I could teach him a life lesson about being a decent man.
Seemingly drained, Gwen sat down with a heavy sigh. Her eyes met mine, clear and direct. “Elle is a wonderful person. Never has she said an unkind word about my mother or our father even though they did their best to pretend she didn’t exist.”
“Because I know what it’s like to not be seen.”
My heart contracted painfully as I recalled her soft words in that alley. It hadn’t just been her mother…it had been every fucking person in her life. And when Nichols came along…Jesus…he only saw her as a pretty trophy. A conquest.
The sudden knowledge was as sure as the rising of the sun, the roundness of the earth. The asshole had lied to her about his relationship with his fiancée. I didn’t know the details and I didn’t need to. After what she witnessed between her parents, Elle would never willingly be the other woman. God, how it must have eviscerated her to realize she had been conned.
Her eyes sad, Gwen continued, “She has kept up the pretense that we’re only friends because she doesn’t want me to think less of my parents, especially our father. She’s kind and caring and is always willing to help others, but she has problems making lasting connections with people. I’m sure you can understand why. In her life, there are three people she truly loves: me, Ethan, and…you. And she still can’t trust us completely.”
An H-bomb went off in my chest and I lowered my head into my hands in despair. Elle had trusted me—at least she had been on the verge of trusting me—but before she could take that final step, I had betrayed her. She had been ready to tell me everything before Jake interrupted us. I knew it in my bones.
For years, she had been forced to keep her parents’ secrets and when she fo
und the courage to tell me, I had spat in her face.
Yes, she had stolen the files, but I had done something far worse. I promised her I would never willingly hurt her, yet I had used the most devastating weapons in my arsenal. I was no better than her father and Nichols.
“I guess I shouldn’t expect anything different from a woman who would be willing to sleep with an engaged man.”
“Get the fuck away from me. You make me sick.”
Flinching at the memory, I dug my fingers into my scalp. I couldn’t blame her if she never forgave me. I had told her I didn’t care about her past, yet I had used it against her like a bludgeon.
Who gave a damn about the men in her past? My sex life sure as hell couldn’t withstand the scrutiny.
It didn’t matter that she had goaded me by bringing up Veronika. If I hadn’t been blinded by rage, I would have remembered that Elle was nothing like my ex. No…no, I wasn’t going to make excuses for myself. I had fucked up.
“I should be shot,” I pushed through my tight throat.
“You’ll get no argument from me.”
I raised my head and begged, “Tell me where to find her.”
“I don’t know,” she said softly, a throb of regret in her voice.
“You’re lying,” I said, even as I saw the truth in her eyes. I didn’t want to believe it because if I couldn’t find Elle, I was lost forever.
“I’m sorry, Troy. As you probably know, her phone is disconnected. She occasionally responds to email, but she won’t tell me where she is.” Her eyes shimmered with tears and a drop ran down her cheek. She wiped at it impatiently and shook her head. “The last time Elle ran away, it took her two years to contact me.”
I clenched my jaw in determination. “I’m going to find her.”
Gwen’s eyes seemed to warm in approval. “I hope you do.”
Nodding at the contract, I stood up. “I won’t be signing that. The ports are going to be essential for SC’s comeback.”
Gasping, she got to her feet and stared at me with huge eyes. “But…but wasn’t that the whole motivation for the takeover?”