High Stakes

by Cheryl Douglas

  “I’m sorry about that.” Liam opened his hands. “I’m an open book. You can ask me anything you want to right now. Whatever you need to know to put your mind at ease.”

  “Where’d you go to school?”

  “Yale, business major.”

  Trey glanced around the luxuriously furnished office. “Can’t say I’m surprised. I heard you’re stinkin’ rich. That true?”

  Liam laughed at his candor. “If you’re asking if I’ll be able to take care of your daughter, the answer is yes. Very nicely.”

  “How do you feel about this business of hers?”

  “I think it’s great. It’s sounds as though she’s very passionate about it.”

  “She is.” Trey nodded. “She needed a distraction. When I saw what she was doin’ to herself after she ended her engagement, I knew I had to do somethin’ to help her. I didn’t wanna see her end up where I was after her mama and I split years ago.”

  “You and Alisa’s mother aren’t together anymore?”

  “We remarried a long time ago. Thank God she forgave me for bein’ stupid enough to let her go.”

  Liam knew he would feel the same way if he let Alisa go. He leaned forward and laced his fingers on the desk. “What can you tell me about this Nick character?”

  Trey chuckled. “You mean aside from the fact that I hate his guts?”

  “Alisa tells me he’s trying to get her back.”

  “He was, but who knows, maybe he’ll back off when he finds out she’s married.”

  “He better.”

  Trey and Liam exchanged a glance before Trey finally smiled. “Alisa says she’s sure you’d never cheat on her. She right about that?”

  It gave Liam hope, knowing that Alisa had told her father she thought he was trustworthy. “I’d have to be the stupidest son of a bitch alive to cheat on her, now wouldn’t I?” He smiled. “Believe me, one thing I’m not is stupid.”

  Trey grinned. “No, I doubt anyone would think to call you that.”

  “Alisa was worried you were gonna pull the funding for her business because she married me. You plan to do that?”

  “No, I might threaten, but I’d never really do it. I know how hard she’s worked to make this happen.”

  “I’m glad to hear that.” Liam sensed they were developing a good rapport, so he decided to take a risk. “Your daughter loves you; she just wants you to be proud of her. I hope marrying me won’t tarnish your opinion of her.”

  Trey tipped the cowboy hat back on his head as he stared at Liam. “I was real disappointed when I found out what she’d done, madder than hell. But now that I’ve met you, I gotta admit, I can sorta understand what she sees in you.”

  Liam smiled. “Thanks.”

  “So, a good buddy of mine is the head of security for Titan Records…”

  “And?”

  “He’s an expert at findin’ out things people would rather keep hidden.”

  Liam laughed. He knew Trey was testing him, trying to make him buckle under the pressure. “I’m not perfect. I’ve done things I’m not proud of, but I’ve never done anything I’m ashamed of, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “You had a kid with a woman who bailed on you.”

  He held his hand up. No one, but no one, was going to call his daughter a mistake. “I’m glad she’s out of my life, and I wouldn’t trade one second of the past thirteen years with my daughter for a billion dollars.”

  Trey smiled and pointed at him. “I like you, goddamn you. I didn’t want to. I wanted to hate you, in fact, but I can’t. You’re a good man, and maybe, just maybe my daughter made a good call marryin’ you.” He leaned forward and offered his hand. “But that’s not to say I don’t wish she’d dated you a couple years just to be sure.”

  Liam took the hand Trey offered. “I can respect that. But sometimes things just happen, when you least expect them to, and you have to go with it, see where it might lead you. So, does this mean we have your blessing?”

  Trey chuckled as he got to his feet. “Let’s not push it. We’ll just say I don’t wanna kill you anymore and leave it at that for now.”

  Liam laughed as he walked Trey to the door. “Fair enough.”

  Alisa needed to see her mother. Hopefully she had some insight into how her father’s meeting with Liam had gone. Just thinking about it made her want to succumb to the nausea she’d fought all day.

  She walked into her parent’s house, the house she’d grown up in, and nostalgia overcame her as she looked at the portraits lining the walls and framed pictures crowding the table tops. Pictures of the three of them, her as a baby and little girl, her parents together, so happy and in love. She wondered if she would ever be lucky enough to find what they had, a best friend, lover, and soul mate. Someone who had your back, no matter what happened. Was it even possible to think about building that kind of relationship with Liam when the obstacles separating them seemed so insurmountable?

  Sierra walked into the foyer and, without a word, opened her arms.

  Alisa gladly walked into them, finally surrendering to the tears that had lurked beneath the surface of her professional façade all day. “Oh God, Mom. What have I done?”

  Sierra gripped her daughter’s shoulders, holding her at arm’s length. “I was hoping you’d be able to tell me that. What were you thinking?”

  “I wasn’t thinking.” That wasn’t entirely true. She’d been thinking about how handsome and intelligent he was, the fact that he was a gifted business man, loving father, considerate employer. He’d been so attentive to her, and she got caught up in the mystique, the man behind the multi-millionaire’s mask.

  “Oh, baby,” Sierra said, stroking her face as she wiped away her tears. “Everybody makes mistakes. It’s gonna be okay. We’ll figure out a way to get you out of this.”

  Alisa knew this was the moment of truth. “That’s just it. I’m not so sure I’m ready to get out of this marriage.” She could barely see the look of shock on her mother’s face through her watery eyes, but the tightening grip on her arms was a telltale sign.

  “Maybe we’d better sit down, so you can fill me in on what happened yesterday.”

  Sierra took her hand and led her into the comfortable family room where she and her mom used to sit around the big-screen TV, eating candy bars and chips as they talked and watched sappy Sunday night movies when she was home from school and taking a much needed break from modeling.

  “I met him on the plane.” She heaved a sigh as she sank down on the huge sectional and wrapped a throw around her shoulders. “He sat down beside me, and we talked for a while.” Until she got angry with him for making a snide remark about her modeling career. She smiled at the memory. Liam wasn’t the kind of man to pull punches and she loved that about him.

  “You must have gotten to know each other quite well in that short time.”

  She thought about the things they’d shared over dinner. He’d told her about his father; she told him about Nick cheating on her. She learned how much he loved his daughter and that he was a devoted son who was trying to be a better man than his father was. “He confided in me about his family. I don’t think he’s comfortable confiding in a lot of people.”

  “That begs the question, what made you so special?” Sierra smiled as she tugged a lock of her daughter’s hair. “You know your daddy and I think the sun sets with your gorgeous smile, but what made him realize you were so special in a matter of hours?”

  This was the first time Alisa had even considered telling anyone the truth about what she felt for Liam. Her father would condemn her for being so naïve, and Lena was so fixated on his power and wealth, she wouldn’t be able to see past that. But she knew her mother was the one person who would keep an open mind and try to appreciate the situation from her perspective. “We had this incredible connection.”

  Sierra reached for her hand. “Tell me about it.”

  “I don’t know if I can describe it. He really listened, and he got me, y
a know?”

  “I think so. Your daddy and I had that connection right from the beginning, too. Of course, we waited quite a while before we got married.”

  Alisa leaned her head against the back of the sofa and closed her eyes. “I know it sounds crazy, but I felt something with him that I’d never felt before. Not even with Nick.” She opened her eyes to look at her mother. “Do you believe in love at first sight, Mom?”

  “Of course I do. I fell in love with your daddy the first time I laid eyes on him on that football field back in college. I knew, without a doubt, that I was gonna marry him someday. I didn’t know how or when, only that I would.”

  “I wish I was as certain that I made the right call marrying Liam.” She sunk her teeth into her bottom lip. “How did you know for sure that Daddy was the one?”

  “I don’t know that I really figured that out until we were apart.” Sierra smiled. “Things weren’t always perfect when we were together, Lord knows, but my worst times with him were still better than my best times without him. I think that’s when I realized that I had to face facts. We were meant to be together.”

  “You guys are so lucky,” Alisa said, sighing. “To have found each other, and to still be so happy and so much in love after all these years.”

  “I’m grateful every single day that fate brought him into my life.”

  “Is that what you think it was?” Alisa asked, looking at her mother. “Fate?”

  “I do.” Sierra brushed Alisa’s hair off her tear-streaked face. “Is that what you think prompted Liam to sit down beside you on that plane yesterday, fate?”

  “I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Maybe.”

  “Tell me about him.”

  “You mean you haven’t Googled him?” Alisa chuckled. “Come on, Mom. You can’t expect me to believe that.”

  “He’s handsome, rich, successful, well educated…” She ticked his attributes off on her fingers. “A devoted father, but I want to know what you made him think he might be a man you could spend the rest of your life with.”

  Alisa sucked in a breath. Was he someone she could spend the rest of her life with? “Well, it’s the little things the rest of the world doesn’t know about him. He’s very protective of his mother. He treats all of his employees with so much respect. He’s been hurt in the past, badly, by a woman who couldn’t see past the dollar signs to the incredible man he is on the inside.”

  Sierra tucked her legs under her. “It sounds like you got a glimpse of that man.”

  “I can’t imagine how any woman could meet him and not fall in love.” She covered her mouth when she realized what she’d said. Had she really admitted to her mother that she was in love with this man? Was she? Was that even possible?

  Sierra laughed at her reaction. “Relax, it’s just the two of us. You know you can say anything to me and I won’t judge you. It’s not a question of whether or not I think this is right or wrong. It’s about how you feel.”

  “I don’t know how I feel yet, that’s just it. I’m still trying to figure it out.”

  “Okay, then how does Liam feel?”

  “He wants to try and make it work.”

  “Why?”

  That was one of the many reasons her mother was one of her best friends; she wasn’t afraid to ask the tough questions, even when Alisa didn’t think she was ready to answer them. “He claims what he feels for me is real. He wants to try and make this work.” She wrinkled her nose when she thought of his proposition. The more she thought about it, the more distasteful it seemed. “He offered me ten million dollars if I would give him a year to try and make this marriage work.”

  “What did you say to that?”

  “I told him I was filing for divorce and would have the papers to him by the end of the week.” An image of Liam and the look of disappointment on his face when she made that announcement flashed through her mind, and she wished she could rewrite those few minutes of their history. She was surprised when she realized that was the only thing she would change.

  “Are you sure that’s what you want? Maybe he has the right idea. Perhaps you should give it a little more time before you decide where to go from here.”

  “I don’t know.” She moaned. “I’m just so confused.” She glanced out the huge window overlooking the expansive grounds. Night fell hours ago, and she couldn’t help but wonder what had happened between her father and Liam. Had he finally consented to the divorce, with her father’s coaxing? The thought left a knot of tension in her stomach that told her she wasn’t ready to make that decision yet.

  Sierra admired the ring on her daughter’s left hand. “It’s beautiful. It looks a lot like—”

  “Nana’s ring, I know.” She smiled at the memory. “Liam spotted me looking at it in the window of the jewelry store. I told him how much I liked it and how much it reminded me of nana’s ring, and next thing I know…” She held up her hand, unable to suppress the smile tugging at her lips. “I’m wearing it. Clearly my husband knows nothing about self-restraint.”

  The word husband sounded so foreign on her lips, but not distasteful. She rolled it around in her mind, trying to get used to it. Liam Bryson was her husband. She wasn’t Alisa Turner anymore. She was Mrs. Alisa Bryson now. She had to admit, it had a nice ring to it.

  “It sounds like he’d do just about anything to make you happy. Men like that are a rare find.”

  “I know.”

  Alisa couldn’t help but think of Nick. His desires had always overshadowed hers. It was difficult to admit that she ever thought she was in love with a man who’d proven to be so self-absorbed. Maybe Liam was right; she was too inexperienced to think about forever when she met Nick and agreed to be his wife. But a few years and a broken heart bought her some valuable life experience that would serve her well this time around. She wasn’t as trusting with Liam as she was with Nick, but was she forcing him to pay for another man’s sins?

  “Honey, I don’t want to get too personal, but this could be a factor if you do decide to end the marriage. Was it… consummated?”

  Though she and her mother were close, they hadn’t talked about sex since Alisa was a teenager and her mother warned her about the importance of protection. “Um, yes.”

  “Did you have too much to drink last night? Did he take advantage of the situation to—”

  “No! It was nothing like that.” She forced herself to draw a breath to calm down. She hadn’t expected to instinctively need to defend Liam. “If anything, he was trying to get me to slow down. He kept asking me if I was sure it was what I wanted. He even tried to walk away.” She thought about the panic she felt when she saw him preparing to step on the elevator and she realized her chance to become his wife was slipping away.

  She’d woken up that morning blaming Liam for what happened, but in the hours since, she had to admit to herself that she wanted it as much, maybe even more than he did. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just that I don’t want you guys to blame him. This wasn’t his fault.” That morning, Alisa was so sure her marriage was a mistake, but the more she thought about it, the more it began to feel like fate brought them together for a reason.

  The front door slammed and Alisa winced.

  “Sounds like your father’s home,” Sierra whispered. She got up and met Trey in the entrance to the family room. “Hey, hon, how was your flight?”

  “Uneventful, just the way I like it.” He gave Sierra a hug and kiss before gesturing toward their daughter. “You mind if I have a word with her? We still need to talk about a few things.”

  “Of course. I’ll just be in the kitchen if you need me.” Sierra turned toward her daughter. “Grease is on TV in a few minutes. You wanna spend the night?”

  The thought of doing something as mundane as pigging out on junk food with her mother, watching one of their favorite old movies, and curling up in her childhood bed was exactly what Alisa needed to soothe her battered soul and aching head, but she needed to find
out where things stood with her father first. “Maybe.” She glanced at Trey out of the corner of her eye, trying to read his mood. “Can I let you know in a bit?”

  Sierra winked. “I’ll prepare the snack tray, just in case.”

  Trey settled in on the sectional beside her. “So, I met your husband today…” He cringed dramatically. “Sorry, that’s gonna take some gettin’ used to.”

  She smiled. At least he seemed to be in better spirits than he had earlier. “How did it go?”

  “I went there determined to hate him. I was gonna demand he agree to annul the marriage and leave you the hell alone.”

  Alisa’s heart began to race. What if Liam had conceded? In the face of her demands, coupled with her father’s, she could hardly blame him. “What did he say to that?”

  “We never really got that far.” Trey smirked. “I couldn’t bring myself to hate him, as much as I wanted to.”

  She allowed herself to breathe again as she whispered, “Really?”

  “Yeah, really.” Trey looked down at the empty space on the couch between them. “This is so damn hard for me, baby. I saw what you went through with Nick, and I don’t ever wanna see anyone hurt you like that again.”

  Alisa moved closer, settling into her father’s arms as he stroked her hair. “I’m not five years old anymore. You can’t threaten every bully on the playground.”

  He chuckled. “Don’t I know it.” He rested his chin on the top of her head. “I actually wanted this guy to be a bully. I thought if he was, I’d just be able to shout him down ’til he gave in.”

  “But it didn’t work out that way, huh?”

  “Nah, he started talkin’ to me about his daughter, and I knew he understood where I was comin’ from.” He drew a deep, shuddering breath. “I don’t think he intends to hurt you, though I know there are no guarantees. So I guess this is one of those times when I’m just gonna have to trust you to make the right decision.”

  Alisa tipped her head back, shocked that her overbearing father actually seemed willing to wave the white flag. “Are you serious? You’re gonna let me figure this out on my own?”