What She Wants Tonight

by Jillian Neal

  Jack’s eyes widened and then his head fell into his hands.

  Tears pricked Meridian’s eyes. “Jack, I’m so sorry, but it seems that it was around the same time that Clayton got his colon cancer diagnosis that you left Denton Distilleries and started looking for a job.”

  He lifted his head and stared down his father. “You set me up. You had me sent to Holder County. You and Senator McCoy put me there because you knew I’d run for DA. You even orchestrated who my roommate would be at Duke all for your bottom line.”

  Finn shook his head. “That’s all we’ve ever been to Dad. I thought you knew that.”

  Palmer refused to speak, and Meridian’s head weighted with a nod. “Clayton knew if they didn’t get someone else in the office willing to run against me and win that my family would have another notch of power to keep the mustang program going.”

  “Oh my god, that’s why you hate her so much!” Jack raged in his father’s face. “If I’m in love with her, then I won’t keep playing your puppet against her family!”

  “It’s actually even worse than that,” Sloan stepped in. “For the past four years, since Jack’s departure from the company, it would seem that Jude McCoy hit on another round of bad luck. Papers from Davidson to Randlett ran stories where Jude claimed thousands and thousands of acres of his rye had been destroyed by fire. No one thought too much of it because there had been fires in the area. Only, Denton accepted shipments of rye that are inordinately close to the amount of rye that Jude said had been destroyed.”

  Meridian forced herself to go on. “One of my cousins is a firefighter. He searched the database records for me. If there were fires on McCoy’s farm, he never reported them to any rescue services.”

  “Un-fucking-believable!” Jack’s fury spilled off of him in hot waves. “So, he was able to take a massive tax write-off, you got free rye, and let me guess—the way you paid for it was in campaign finance donations to the senator.”

  Meridian was certain that was the case as well. Sloan confirmed, “Denton issued checks—that you signed, Uncle Palmer—to Rye Freedom. I didn’t think much of it at the time other than that McCoy must think himself quite the farmer to have a business by that name. But I started digging today and discovered that Rye Freedom is a Super PAC that helps keep McCoy in his seat.”

  Meridian gave her closing argument. “The police arrested Marsden for conspiracy before I left to come out here. He was the ideal person to bring charges against Holder Land and Cattle. His brother made certain that the Oklahoma Bureau of Land Management report failed to include that four of the mares were pregnant, and Marsden himself was already looking for a payout from my family. I suspected that your father was who was paying for Marsden’s new legal team, but that wasn’t quite right. It’s Senator McCoy. If they can prove in court that we’re not caring for the horses, from what we can tell, the Senator will use his sway with the governor and the state senate to destroy the program and the horses. Marsden and his brother are just their front men. His brother knew they’d sent us pregnant mares and timed the lawsuit to try and create evidence for their case, just like you suspected.” She hoped that might help bolster Jack somewhat.

  “The picture,” Jack choked.

  Meridian was afraid he was losing it. “What?”

  “One of the pictures of you is missing. Does McCoy have it?” He narrowed his eyes to slits as thin as blades as he glared at his father. It took Meridian a second to understand which picture he was referring to.

  Dread and shame threatened to claw through her chest, but she refused them. That’s what men like this wanted her to feel, and she refused.

  “The senator has a right to an insurance policy.” Palmer latched onto what it appeared he thought was going to be his saving grace.

  Meridian laughed in his face. “Oh, do tell me which of his websites and rags he plans to run it in to try to keep me quiet. I’ll send them the rest.” She shook her head. “Those pictures were for your son, but if you are that morally bankrupt, and you can’t find it in yourself to think of anything but your bottom line, then go right ahead. I don’t care what you do to me. I only care that you are so willing to hurt your own sons for a business deal. People are going to judge me no matter what I do, so I’m going to do what I know is right.”

  Jack shook his head. “I can’t…I just…can’t.”

  He stalked out of the room. Meridian turned to run after him, but Finn caught her shoulder. “Let me talk to him.”

  “I’m coming with you,” she argued.

  “Someone needs to stay here to make sure he’s still sitting in that desk when the auditors show up.”

  Greer turned the corner into the office just then. Meridian had no idea how much he’d heard. “I’ll make sure he’s sitting there.” He shook his head as well. “I can’t believe this, Dad. I was the one that defended you to them and then you do something like this. I know you never really thought I was as good a businessman as Jack, but I’m going to try to negotiate your ass out of this with the IRS by making sure you pay back every single penny you owe. I will not let every single person who depends on Denton for a job be out of work. On one condition—you will raise every salary of every single person who works for us. You will give everyone enough hours for them to qualify for complete healthcare, and if they’ve been with us longer than ten years they get a chance to buy into the company. I should’ve spoken up a long, long time ago. I’m sorry I didn’t. But I am now.”

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Jack had no patience for waiting on the elevator, so he flew down three flights of stairs until he was finally out of the hell that existed inside the building. Only now, he had no idea where to go or what to do.

  Defeat filled his lungs, leaving no room for oxygen. The human mind clung to assurances, and he had none. The particles of his life drained through his hands, too small to hold. Everything he’d thought he’d earned had been handed to him. No matter how hard he’d fought to become the king, he’d always been his father’s pawn.

  “Jack, wait!” Meridian’s plea was muffled through his agony. Even she hadn’t been earned. He’d been put there to hurt her, to keep her from getting what was rightfully hers. If not now, someday surely she would resent that.

  He continued to run toward the gates though he had no idea where to go from there. He was a man with no place to call his own because he’d earned nothing.

  “Dammit, Jack, would you stop?” Finn urged. But Jack kept going.

  Until Barrett Holder’s voice reached him. “Son, I am too old to chase you all over Louisville. Now stop and listen to me.”

  Having no idea why that had done it, Jack slowed and turned back to face them.

  Barrett shook his head at him. “I am so sorry for all that you’ve been put through.”

  Jack rolled his eyes. “I’m not some poor little rich boy, sir.”

  “I’m aware of that.” He paused a minute to catch his breath. “I’m also aware that you have no idea who to trust because the people that you thought you could rely on have let you down time and time again. But here’s what else I know—you can trust yourself. You can also trust the people who really do love you, not for what you can do for them, but for who you are. Meridian, your cousins, your brothers. I know that’s mighty hard to do right now, so just trust you. Look at what you’ve managed to do. You were put in a position to hurt my family, and instead you earned our respect and ultimately the hand of Meridian. You were there to disrupt, and you’ve created one of the best groups of prosecutors our county has ever had. You should’ve seen them today all helping her fight to protect you because they admire the hell out of you and so do I.”

  Jack shook his head. “I took what was supposed to be hers. My ego overran my good judgment, and I played right into their hands. She should hate me.”

  “Well, I don’t,” Meridian defied. “I love you, and I don’t care if you’re the DA. I don’t need or want that position.” She held her hand out to the dynasty he
adquarters that stood behind them. “Look around you. A really well-thought-of man from a century or two ago said, ‘Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.’ He wasn’t wrong. Greed is never satisfied. We studied it in law school, remember? My family doesn’t need to hold every seat in our county. We need to serve the people that we can help and feed the people who need meat. That’s our job. My job specifically is to help you put away men who are bad, men who want to control absolutely, and to protect the people that they hurt. I want to keep doing that with you. Please,” her voice shattered right along with his heart, “don’t walk away thinking that you don’t deserve me, because that’s what he wants.”

  She edged closer. “Remember? Sometimes you just have to do something really rebellious to remind them who you are. Please,”—she stepped close enough for him to reach her—“be a rebel with me. Let me show them who you are and that we won’t be controlled.”

  Jack wasn’t certain of anything but the fact that he wanted her to be right and that he was too weak to deny her. So, he took her hands and pulled her into his arms and clung to the only thing that would ever make any sense to him at all.

  A small round of applause broke out, making her laugh. Jack lifted his head. Lila’s whistle reached them long before she did. “The IRS is here. Uncle Palmer and Dad are pretty much set to maim, but they’re both signing paperwork promising to make payments until everything is caught up. It doesn’t come near to solving all of the ass-backward issues this distillery has, but it’s a start. They’re going to want to talk to you and Sloan, but I think as long as they make regular payments, no one will end up in federal prison.”

  “I can’t believe you managed this.” Jack was truly in awe of Meridian.

  “We did this,” she vowed. “You and me and a whole lot of people that love you. It wasn’t just me. I didn’t call the IRS. I didn’t even know about the picture.”

  “Still,”—he brushed her hair behind her shoulders—“you were brilliant in there.”

  She beamed at him. “I’m brilliant everywhere.” She laughed.

  “And that is sexy as hell.” He barely had strength enough to flirt with her, but he managed. She was the best lawyer he’d ever seen. He used what waning powers he had to make sure that she knew they’d figure this all out together.

  “The most annoying part of all of this is that Senator McCoy will likely get by with just a slap on the wrist. Men like that almost never pay real consequences,” she fussed.

  Jack agreed. “There are a lot of people in jail that shouldn’t be, and the ones that should will never darken the doors.” He gestured to his father’s office. “It’s infuriating, but we can fight it.”

  “Maybe we can change it,” she urged.

  Her grin filled him. It gave him something small to cling to, a place to start, a known to hold in his hands.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  A week later, Jack sat at his desk reading newspaper headlines about the ethics complaint against Senator McCoy. He shook his head, still largely unable to believe what Meridian had uncovered.

  She opened his office door and slipped inside with a coy grin.

  “Did you need something, Ms. Holder?” he drawled flirtatiously.

  “I missed you.”

  Jack struggled to wrap his head around every lie he’d ever believed, but it was much easier when he stood in the presence of her truth. “I was in bed with you less than an hour ago,” he teased her.

  “I know.” She came around his desk, and he gave himself a moment to draw a deep breath of her scent mixed with his cologne. “What are we looking at?” she asked.

  “I think I figured out why my mother was so adamant that I try to talk Tiff and Brent into going on with their marriage.”

  He loved that look that formed on her features that said she was impressed with him. He’d happily live his entire life just trying to impress her. “Okay, why was your mother so into them being together?”

  “One of my mother’s key business skills is being able to see the writing on the wall before other people notice that it’s there. The Denton ties to Brenton Cox’s family PR business are through the Fitzgeralds. My mother was terrified when I told her who I was bringing to Tiffany’s wedding, but she managed to keep it mostly to her standard haughty remarks until the Fitzgeralds announced their divorce.

  “She knew if you figured out about the Denton ties to Senator McCoy, they would need the skill set of Brenton’s family to keep the Denton name out of the news. So far, not one paper or news source has mentioned my father at all. She got her wish even though Brent and Tiff still aren’t going on with the wedding as of yet.”

  “Taking down a dynasty isn’t a one-shot deal,” she reminded him. “Did you ever figure out why the Fitzgeralds are divorcing?”

  “He wants out of the bottling business,” Jack informed her what Sloan had found out that morning.

  “Why?”

  “Sloan thinks he’s been fraternizing with a woman at least half his age who apparently believes that corporate greed will be the downfall of humanity.”

  Meridian considered that for a few minutes. “I don’t necessarily disagree, and that’s a different take from the normal gold digger, I guess.”

  Jack shook his head. “They’re not getting divorced because he’s having an affair. They’re getting divorced because he wants out of the business. Their whole world is so fucked up I still can’t believe I was able to get out of it.”

  “I’m so proud of you,” Meridian gushed.

  Sometimes they both felt like their entire relationship had grown in spite of a million interruptions. So someone knocking on the door wasn’t a surprise, but Jack was tired of it. “Go on a trip with me,” he begged.

  “What?”

  “Anywhere you want. Just me and you. Please, I need to figure the rest of my life out, and I want to do that with you uninterrupted.”

  “Okay.” She nodded. He loved watching her mind work. “We could go to the Grand Canyon, or, oh, I’ve always wanted to see the California coast but it’s kind of cold right now. My family has a chalet in Telluride. We could go there.”

  “Anywhere, just not here. Come in,” Jack finally answered the current interrupter.

  If he’d known who was at his office door, he might’ve begged for her to go on a trip with him later. This took priority. Thad McCoy walked in his office, looked at Meridian, and blushed. Jack’s fists clenched of their own accord.

  “I brought you this.” He handed Jack an envelope.

  Maintaining his cool, Jack stood, took the envelope, and managed a nod. “Meridian, sweetheart, this is Thad McCoy, my college roommate and apparently the son of a federal felon.” He knew her picture was inside that envelope. Thankfulness and fury went to war in his gut.

  Meridian gave him a cool nod. “Lovely to meet you.” No one in the room thought she was being sincere.

  “Look,” Thad launched into the speech Jack had assumed would come. “I didn’t know any of that shit that our dads and my uncle were into. I broke into his office to get that back for you. I’m sorry about all of it, but I didn’t do it. It wasn’t me. It’s just politics. Besides, we were frat brothers. You can’t just walk away from that.”

  Jack rolled his eyes. “This,” he held up the envelope, “is not politics. It’s breaking and entering a government facility along with theft by taking. It’s ten to twenty minimum. You, and your father, and your uncle, and my dad are not above the law. So, I will walk away from anything or anyone that proves that whatever team it is they’re playing for is more important to them than standing up for the people who are being hurt by their tribalism. You delivering something to me that was stolen does not make us cool,” he huffed. “It makes your father a thief and a liar and basically just completely morally bankrupt. So, get back to me when you’re calling out his bullshit, and then we’ll reminisce about our frat boy days.”

  That earned him another one of those Meridian smiles
that said he’d just impressed the hell out of her again. Yeah, making her do that for the rest of their lives. That was a truth he could build on.

  “I did tell my dad he’d gone way too far messing with you,” Thad insisted. “I told him you’d figure out a way to have him arrested.”

  “Yeah, but listen to yourself. You protected me because we used to be friends, because you know me. Would you have done the same for all of the other people your father has inevitably hurt along the way? The ones you didn’t room with at Duke?”

  Thad looked utterly confused by the question. “I don’t know. I never really think about Dad’s job.”

  Meridian nodded. “Maybe you should think about it.”

  “Okay, I guess.” Defeat sank slowly through Thad’s tone. “For what it’s worth, I’m happy if you’re happy,” he vowed to Jack.

  “I am happy.” Jack wondered for a moment if that was true. There was still so much wrong with the way the Dentons did business. Even if they did pay back all of their back taxes, they’d hurt people along the way. But in that moment, with Meridian by his side and the chance to right so many wrongs in their future, he decided he was happy.

  “Good.” Thad glanced from Jack to Meridian and then to the door. “I guess I’ll see y’all around.”

  “Bye, Thad,” Jack urged. “Close the door behind you on your way.”

  Once he was gone, Meridian clutched the envelope to her chest. “I know I talked a big game in your dad’s office about not caring about this, but I’m really glad we have it back, and I’m going to need you to completely support me in my delusion that they didn’t make a copy of this.”

  Jack wrapped his arms around her, keeping her and the photo safe by the might of his body. “I am so sorry that I got you into this, and I will completely support that delusion because it is all that is keeping me from going out to the parking lot and beating the shit out of him for looking at what’s mine. I’m trying to be a really cool, laid-back, non-sexist, ally kind of man who knows that your body is your own, but I’m failing at the moment.”