by Jamie Knight
I loved him so much it hurt, but there was no way I would let him, or any man, humiliate or doubt me the way he had, ever again.
I needed to stay strong. I wouldn’t bend, and I wouldn’t break. I held my hands in fists and looked him in the eyes.
“Thank you for saying all of that. I appreciate your honesty, but it’s too late. I can’t be with someone who would think me capable of such deceit. I don’t know what I’m going to do, but whatever it is, it’ll have nothing to do with McKenzie Tech. I never want to see you again. The second you accused me of stealing from you, you lost me.”
And with that, I walked out of his office. Somehow, from somewhere, I got the strength to do it without breaking down.
Melissa waited by the coffee bar.
“Leaving so soon?”
I turned towards her and glared.
“So, you’re my friend now?”
“I’ve always been your friend, Reese,” she said, with pleading eyes.
“Not when you thought I was stealing from Kane, you weren’t.”
“He’s my boss and my best friend. I’ll protect him no matter what. And things clearly weren’t as they seemed. Please sit. Let’s talk.”
She pulled a wooden chair out from the bar and gestured towards it.
“I’ve talked enough for one day,” I said.
I turned on my heel and walked quickly towards the elevator. Melissa didn’t try to stop me.
The faster I got away from McKenzie Technologies and these people, the better off I’d be. I didn’t want to be part of their world. I didn’t want to be part of their games.
Chapter Thirty-One
Kane
It had been three weeks since Reese had walked out of my life and those three weeks had been hell. Pure soul-destroying hell.
I’d thrown myself into work, had traveled when I didn’t have to, but nothing took my mind off her and thoughts of the asshole I’d been. I never should have accused her of something so horrible.
Reese was a good girl and a good employee, and she always had been. I should have seen through the evidence. I should have known it was Linda. Now, nothing would ever be the same.
Last night, Ray had talked me into going to the Dark Club with him, but not even the sight of writhing, half-naked girls gave me a hankering. They weren’t Reese. They didn’t have her smile, her ass, her tits, or her wicked sense of humor. So, I left quickly.
She’d moved out of her apartment, and I didn’t know where she’d gone. There were no social media updates, no Facebook or Instagram photos. No one I sent looking for her could find her and all her work friends kept silent. Something I could respect.
“Are you going to keep this pity party up all night?” Ray asked, sitting on a barstool beside me. “You need to find her or get over her.”
I shifted my weight and straightened my tux jacket. We were at McKenzie Tech’s charity ball. The one I had asked Reese to help me plan.
It was supposed to be our big reveal—the night when we officially announced our status as a couple. Now, I was here alone.
I leaned into the bar and picked up my glass of whiskey. With a subtle twist of the glass, I swirled the amber colored liquid and watched it cling to its container. This was my third or fourth drink.
“I’ve been trying to find her. She doesn’t want to be found,” I snapped and took a sip.
The whiskey burned a bit as I swallowed. The pain felt good.
I waved my hand at the bartender for him to refill my glass and he did.
Ray eyed me—obviously judging my increasingly drunken state, but he didn’t say anything to me. And that was why we were friends.
Melissa crossed towards us quickly, her black heels clicking on the ivory tile of the ballroom floor. She stopped short when she saw me hunched over the bar. She gave Ray a look and they seemed to have a silent conversation. I ignored them both.
We had rented one of the fancier hotels in the city and had it professionally decorated. Flowers lined the tables, silver streamers hung from the roof; it was all exquisitely done, and people seemed to be enjoying themselves, but I found it hard to care.
Melissa frowned at me.
“Kane?”
I glared at her, silently urging her to get to the point or leave me alone.
“Ashton is here,” her voice hitched with worry. “He’s looking for you.”
She nervously pulled at the fabric of her dress. It was blue, similar to one I had had Reese try on for me. My breath shook with the memory and I closed my eyes for a second.
When I opened them again, I was calm and collected. It was time to reassure my friend and business partner that everything was okay, when it clearly wasn’t.
“Fine,” I told my PA, “let’s get this over with.”
I crossed the ballroom with Ray and Melissa following at my heels. Ray and I straightened our tuxes and Melissa soothed her dress. By the time we found Ashton we looked perfectly put together.
Ashton was also dressed to the nines in an expensive tux. Unsurprisingly, he was alone. I knew he dated or found women to warm his bed, but it was unusual for Ash to commit to anything, much less a relationship. He liked to only depend on himself. I was lucky he agreed to connect our businesses.
“Ash!” I greeted him with a smile and held out my hand.
He took it and smiled back. His shake was firm and commanding.
He had been in much better spirits, ever since Ray had informed him that we had caught the embezzler and gotten the money back. He didn’t go into details about who had done it or who we thought had done it. And Ash didn’t seem to care, as long as the matter was fixed.
“Kane,” he said. “This is a wonderful event. I’m pleased to see McKenzie Tech doing such good work. You know how much I enjoy giving to charities.”
“Of course, and I assume that you approve of the choice of charity tonight?” I asked.
Ashton laughed.
“Who’s going to say no to puppies and kittens?” He raised one eyebrow at me. “I assume this was your new lady’s idea?”
My breath caught, and I couldn’t find any words. I had forgotten that I promised Ash that I would introduce him to Reese tonight.
Melissa stepped up and took Ash’s arm.
“Would you like a drink, Mr. Smith?” she asked, ever the perfect hostess.
Ashton smiled at her briefly, but he didn’t miss my earlier reaction.
“Melissa. Ray. Why don’t you two give me and Kane a second, please?”
He kept his eyes on me.
“Let us old friends catch up.”
It was an order in the guise of a suggestion.
Ray took Melissa’s arm and led her over to the dance floor.
I opened my mouth to reassure Ash, but found that I just couldn’t make myself smile or say anything. He sighed, draped an arm over my shoulders, and led me back to the bar. It was a direction I was happy to go in—my whiskey was waiting for me, and I greatly needed it.
“So, she left you,” he stated.
I didn’t argue.
“Did you deserve it?”
I nodded, unable to deny the truth.
“I thought she was the one stealing money,” I admitted, “but it was a set up. I messed up bad, Ash.”
He nodded and took a seat on one of the barstools.
“And you apologized?”
“Yes. She just doesn’t trust me anymore.”
I hunched my shoulders.
“She quit and went into hiding.”
“I see.”
He looked over at the bartender and ordered a scotch. We stood in silence until his drink came and he took a sip. “I’m sorry, Kane. I know it is soon and the merger just went through, but I could cover for you for a bit—if you need to take a vacation or something.”
I sat down on the stool next to him.
“Thank you, Ash. I don’t know what to do. I don’t feel right without her.”
We sat in companionable silence, sipping ou
r drinks, and watching people dance. Ray had left Melissa with her boyfriend and was now dancing with Eileen from accounting.
They made a pretty good couple; Ray was one of the few men in the room who was taller than Eileen’s six feet tall frame. I watched them have fun and looked sadly at the other couples. When the song ended, Ray drifted back towards us.
My eyes caught on Sloane and her narrow, haughty face. She was coming our way as well, in a tight silver dress; a bright grin plastered to her lips. She held out her slim hand to Ashton.
“Hello, Mr. Smith. I’m Sloane. Would you care to dance?”
Ash’s eyebrows went up in surprise at Sloane’s forward nature. He sifted to look at me briefly and I mouthed the word No, just to give him a quick warning about Sloane—she wasn’t someone he wanted to get involved with or even just hook up with.
He gave a slight nod, took her hand, and led her to the dance floor.
Ray took Ash’s seat. He was nervous and jittery.
“Relax, Ray.”
I took another sip of whiskey.
“Ash and I are fine.”
“It’s not that. Oh. Eileen is going to kill me.”
He frowned and fidgeted some more.
I wanted to grab him by the lapels and shake him.
“What’s going on?”
“I know where Reese is.”
My breath caught. I turned to face Ray and poked him in the chest with a finger.
“What do you mean you know where she is? Tell me now before I punch your pretty-boy face.”
“Eileen and Sloane will kill me.”
“Who cares! What do they have to do with this?” I snapped. “Out with it.”
“Let’s just say Eileen and I have been getting quite friendly. She’s friends with Sloane, who is not the ice queen she pretends to be. I just overheard them talking, and Sloane is helping Reese.”
“Sloane hates Reese.”
“They seem to have buried the hatchet. Sloane’s been staying at her father’s house, and Reese has been staying at her apartment in town.”
Unconsciously, my hand curled into a fist, but I wouldn’t punch him.
“You’re a bastard, you know that? You could have asked Eileen sooner. For weeks now, you’ve watched me drown my sorrows in enough alcohol to drown a sailor.”
“Jesus. Talk about self-pity.”
“If you weren’t my best friend, I’d fucking cut your dick off.”
“After tonight, I have a feeling Sloane will do that for you.”
He pushed me off the bar stool.
“Why are you still here? Go get your girl.”
I nodded and stumbled towards the door.
That was an excellent suggestion.
And it was all I could think of doing now that I knew where she was.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Reese
I would never be able to thank Sloane enough for letting me stay at her plush, midtown apartment. When I stepped out of the elevator after walking out on Kane, Sloane had been waiting for me in the lobby and had offered me a place to lie low for a few weeks.
She said she felt sorry for me and that I didn’t deserve what Linda and Simon had put me through. That part of the blame was hers because of the rumors she’d intentionally spread about me. It was the closest thing I’d ever get to an apology from her and that was okay.
I took her up on the offer, and for the past three weeks, I’d been hiding out at her apartment while she was staying at her father’s. It was a little like being on vacation or on the run.
While I was laying on her plush suede couch looking over at the park, I could pretend I was someone else for a bit. Someone who didn’t just lose the love of her life.
I didn’t go online, and I didn’t talk to anyone. I didn’t even Google Kane—as hard as that was. I didn’t give a crap about anything.
Every day, I simply went through the motions. I woke up, I sometimes showered, and I lived on takeout. I hadn’t cried in a few days, which was progress.
I couldn’t hide out at Sloane’s forever and I would have to find an apartment soon. I needed to start looking for another job, get back to the real world and get on with life.
One thing was for sure, though— it would be a cold day in hell before I ever fell in love again.
Before I moved into Sloane’s, I’d packed up all my good luck charms and threw them in the garbage—including my star pendant. It was about time I relied on myself for my own luck, which meant all of my talismans and superstitions had to go.
It was hard, letting go of the past and things I relied on to give me comfort, but I had to. If I wanted to move on, something that had happened in college could no longer dictate my everyday decisions.
When I did get up the courage to go out, I walked under ladders. I stopped throwing salt over my shoulders. I stopped asking the universe to send good luck my way, and I no longer wore my pendant, but that didn’t stop me reaching for it every now and again.
But I kind of liked my new way of life. It was freeing—liberating.
I loved Kane, God how I loved him, and it would be a long time before I stopped loving him, if ever. But time healed wounds, or maybe time just made them more bearable.
A knock sounded at the door and I sat up on the couch.
It was probably Sloane.
For all her faults, she allowed me my privacy and didn’t barge in whenever she felt like it.
Tonight, I would tell her I was moving out and that she could have her home back. For a spoiled princess, she was quite nice, sometimes.
I pulled the door open.
“You know you can come in without knocking. It’s your apartment…”
My words faltered when I saw that it wasn’t Sloane standing there.
It was Kane.
He looked as tired as I felt. His eyes were bloodshot, and more stubble than usual covered his jaw. He was in a tux, but it was wrinkled and creased. In fact, he looked wretched.
My instinct was to pull him into my arms and to tell him I loved him, but when I went to do that, my heart ached, reminding me of all the pain he’d caused me— all of the accusations he’d thrown my way.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, more sharply than I’d intended to.
“We need to talk.”
His tone was even, but his eyes begged me.
I blocked the entrance, not allowing him to come in. “We said everything that needed to be said in your office. I’m tired, Kane. I don’t want to do this right now.”
“Too bad, because you’re going to listen.”
He pushed past me and strode into the apartment.
“Give me five minutes. That’s all I need, and if after that you still want me to leave, then I will.”
“Fine,” I said with an exasperated sigh, “five minutes and not a minute more.”
“Where’s your necklace?” he asked, motioning his head towards my chest. “You’ve never taken it off before.”
“I don’t need it anymore. I’m done with luck charms. They don’t seem to work anyways.”
I put my hands on my hips.
“Why are you here, Kane?”
He ran a hand through his already disheveled hair.
“Linda’s trial is set for next month. A company lawyer should be in touch soon for your statement.”
I rolled my eyes.
“I know, we’ve already talked. Anything else?”
The pained look was back in his eyes.
“I love you, Reese. I mean it. I want us to go back to what we had. What I did was wrong, and I’ll never forgive myself, but I need you to forgive me.”
If I forgave him and told him that everything was okay, what would that mean? Would it mean that he’d think he could walk all over me for the rest of our lives?
For the second time since this mess began, he fell to his knees.
“Marry me, Reese. Let me spend eternity making this up to you. I’ll never forgive myself for hurting you in the way
that I did. I don’t want to spend my life without you. Our time together showed me what was missing in my life. I want to love and to be loved. There’s no color in my life without you. There’s no laughter without you, either.”
He was breaking my heart all over again.
“We can be each other’s good luck charms,” he said.
“I thought you didn’t believe in luck.”
“That may be, but the night in the art gallery was made up of the luckiest few hours of my life. You know I’m not superstitious, but since the day you left, my luck has changed for the worst. I feel as if everything is falling apart.”
Forgiving him would be so easy, but would it be the right thing to do?
“The intensity of my feelings for you scared the shit out of me. After Sadie died, I didn’t think I’d ever fall in love again. Didn’t think I wanted to, but then you came along. I thought I could keep you at arm’s length. Have you as someone I could go to when I needed a release, but you made me want to love, to share my life with someone, to have a family. Every night I want to go to bed with you, and every morning, I want to wake up with you. Say you’ll take me back.”
I rolled my lips between my teeth, needing a few seconds to compose myself. My body and heart ached for him, but my mind warned me to stay away.
“Promise me, Kane. Promise if you ever have any doubts about me or about us, you’ll talk to me first. If this is going to work, we have to trust one another implicitly. Promise me that.”
“I promise,” he whispered. “I promise from this day forward that nothing in my life will be as important as you are. Your happiness—our happiness—is number one.”
I knelt in front of him and took his hands in mine.
“I love you, Kane McKenzie. I’m sorry for the pain you endured after losing Sadie. Maybe the universe did bring us together. Maybe luck brought us together. Maybe it didn’t. But yes, I’ll marry you. I love you more than you’ll ever realize. I tried to hate you, wanted to hate you, but I couldn’t.”
Tears swam in his big brown eyes, but he was too much of a man to let them fall. He cupped his hands around my cheeks and pressed his lips to mine.