by Shayne Ford
I take a few more steps toward the windows, convinced that no one else is in the room. Casually, I flick my gaze to the other end.
A young man sits at the table.
Dark-haired. His profile looks familiar, his silky hair brushing the collar of his crisp, azure, button down shirt.
His head is tipped down as he reads something on his phone, a second man standing not far from him, looking out the window.
I run my eyes on that man’s back.
He’s tall, about the same age, and his shoulders are broad. His hands are in his the pockets, his fancy, black pants falling perfectly on his backside.
Strands of blonde hair touch the collar of his white shirt.
My heart stops as I get hit by recognition, my legs turning to butter.
Slowly, I unclench my teeth and part my lips, trying to send a fair warning to Maya, yet no sound rises from my throat.
Distracted and taken with the view, she bumps into me. Startled, she lets out a small scream and a chuckle that quickly draws their eyes to us.
Shade glances over his shoulder, the moment we connect eyes my insides turning into rubble.
The seconds stretch as I stare breathlessly at him, unable to utter a word.
Surprise washes over his face too––not the best kind. His eyes darken as the new reality sinks in. I cannot breathe. He fights back his first reaction, coldness rolling onto his face.
Frozen, I take him in.
There is tension in his jaw, and in his shoulders. He turns around all the way to face me.
He studies me a well.
Slowly, my gaze goes down on him, and then up to his handsome face. He’s lean, and muscular, the way he used to be. His features are more expressive now. His eyes are deeper, more mature.
Chad shifts in his seat as well, our eyes connecting for a moment.
I notice the same kind of transformation in him too. They both look more mature than a while back.
Chad sets his piercing eyes on me, a light flashing through his gaze as the recognition sets in for him too. He swings his gaze away from me. The moment he connects his gaze with Maya’s eyes a gasp falls from her lips.
A small smile dies quickly on his lips.
He pushes his chair back and rises to his feet as Maya’s hand clutches mine. Her skin is cold and damp like mine.
As if the moment is not awkward enough, our host begins to make the introductions.
The sound of our names echoes in the air, making everything feel surreal.
Shade’s stare burns my face as I listen to the woman, trying to make sense.
But nothing makes sense now.
Why them?
Why us?
Why here?
Why do we have to meet like this?
Then the reality comes back into focus, and it finally hits me. Oh, no. This can’t be happening.
They take a step toward us, their faces unreadable. I quickly grab Maya’s hand and squeeze it so hard she winces in pain.
There’s no way in hell this thing is going to happen. Not the business presentation, and not even a conversation.
I peel my fingers off Maya’s hand and throw her a suggestive glance.
Without a word, I spin around and rush outside.
“Tara? Wait.”
Maya’s voice rings out behind me as I dash past the elevator. I push the stairwell door open and take the stairs down without looking back. The door shuts behind me with a thick, metallic sound before my heels tap against the concrete stairs, tearing the silence all the way down to the first floor.
I make it outside in record time.
I rush to my car, pull the door open and slip in.
Frantically, I fumble through the contents of my purse, pull the key out, shove it into the ignition and turn the engine on.
I throw one last glance at the entrance.
Nobody seems to be following me. I wait a few more moments before I call Maya. She doesn’t answer.
My patience grows thin. She’s probably back there talking with them.
That’s fine. She’ll find her way back.
Without a second thought, I pull out of the parking lot and onto the road.
As I steer away, I notice his car, a silver Ferrari, parked in the side lot.
Yes, he does stick with what he likes, provided that it’s a car.
8
SHADE
What are the fucking odds?
Chad and I lock eyes for a moment as Maya’s voice echoes down the hallway, calling Tara.
I dash after her, and catch up with her, just as she slides the stairwell door open, ready to follow Tara.
I grab her by the elbow. She turns around and looks at me, her eyes washed with surprise and filled with a lot of questions.
“Let her go...” I say the first thing that comes to my mind.
Silently, she studies me for a few moments before she glances away from me as Chad stops by my side.
“I should go,” she says softly, not much anger in her voice.
We might have a chance with her.
“Let’s go back in the room and talk,” I say.
Chad takes her hand.
She doesn’t pull it away, yet her eyes get washed with sadness.
“Chad,” she murmurs, a faint smile clinging to her lips.
“Maya...” he says, emotion beaming in his voice.
Her eyes turn quickly misty before she swings her gaze to me.
“I don’t think she wants me here with you,” she says.
“She’ll be okay.”
She turns her eyes to Chad. A small smile tugs at his lips as he watches her in silence.
A few moments later, we walk back into the room.
He pulls a chair out for her at the table while I close the door behind us. Chad and I sit with her as well, and we all stay quiet for a moment.
She is the first one to speak.
“There won’t be any deal,” she says, swinging her gaze between the two of us.
“I know.”
“We didn’t know when we came here...” she adds, her voice smooth and quiet.
“We didn’t know either,” I mutter before a few more moments of awkward silence tick by.
I slide the file to the side.
“The company doesn’t need capital,” I say.
“She knows it, and we’ve discussed it, yet she wants to expand the company, and we need help to take it to the next level. We’d probably be able to find investors if we needed extra capital at some point, but it’s not the case right now.”
“I have no doubt. It’s a great business,” I say.
Her eyes light up for a moment, and then her faint smile dies out.
“Where were you all this time?”
We lock eyes for a moment before I flick my chin in Chad’s direction.
“His home in Europe.”
“She waited for you,” she says, sadness draping over her eyes. “Not now... Then,” she clarifies.
A sharp pain crosses my heart.
She studies me in silence.
“What’s her life outside of work?” I ask after a moment.
“The company is her life right now. It’s a lot of work, but she loves it. If you want to know more than that, you need to ask her.”
“I’m not so sure she wants to talk to me.”
“She will talk to you at one point or another, but now, is probably not the best time. It wasn’t easy for her.”
“It wasn’t easy for me, either.”
“You left without a word, Shade. So many things could’ve happened.”
I smile, my mind drifting away for a moment.
She’s right. It was a stupid thing to do, but at the time, I thought that it was the only way.
Absently, I pat my pocket for the pack of cigarettes.
I fish one out.
“But they didn’t,” I say, hoping to hear the same thing from her.
“Some did,” she says.
She pauses
for a moment, her gaze slanting down while I observe her for a few long seconds before I light up my cigarette.
“What about you?” I ask after I breathe out a soft stream of smoke.
She lifts her gaze and looks at me before she shifts her eyes to Chad.
“I’m good… I think. I work a lot. The company was her idea, and she built it from the ground up. She also wanted me to be her partner.”
“You’ve done a great job. Both of you.”
“Yeah... We have,” she murmurs before she flicks her gaze to the window.
A sad smile flits through her glistening eyes.
“I need to go now,” she says as she shifts her focus back to us, her eyes are no longer soft and warm.
Smoothly, pushing her chair back, she rises to her feet. Chad and I do the same.
“I’ll take you home,” he says with a steady voice.
She looks at him but doesn’t say a word.
A moment later, she turns around and walks out the door while Chad follows her.
SHADE
It’s late afternoon when the door at the beach house opens, and Chad saunters in.
I shoot a gaze across the room.
Sprawled in the lounge chair on the terrace, a file open on my lap, I take a moment to study his eyes.
“How did it go?” I ask, blowing the smoke to the side.
Undoing his shirt, he walks to the bar. He takes it off and tosses it on a chair.
“I gather not well,” I mumble to myself.
Fifteen minutes later, showered, changed into a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, a drink in his hand, he crashes onto a nearby chair.
He takes a swig and shakes his head.
“We should fire Jack,” I say, half-jokingly.
“It’s not his fault. We hardly check any names unless we know we’re interested.”
“Well... We are now. They’re fucking good,” I say tossing the file on his lap. “They had tremendous growth. Profitable from the first quarter. No debt. They are well on their way to reach eighty million dollars annual sales by the end of next year.”
“They do?”
He arches an eyebrow.
“Mmm-hmm. They fucking do.”
He opens the file and scans the information as I clasp my hands at the back of my head and wait.
He closes the file and throws it on the table.
“You know that this is not possible. They will never sit down with us and talk business. It will never happen. “
“I was hoping you’d bring back some good news,” I say.
Slowly, he shakes his head.
“Well, there isn’t good news. Maya’s just more forgiving and civil about it, but Tara would have nothing to do with us. And I don’t blame her, really.”
Shooting me a side glance, he takes a sip of his drink.
“I’m talking strictly business here,” I say. “They may get someone else to pour the cash they need in. They may also get screwed in the process. At least, with us, they’d know that we won’t do it.”
“We’ve already done it. Remember?”
It’s hard to miss the sarcasm in his voice.
“I’m talking about their company.”
He glances at me again.
“Is that your pitch? ‘Cause if it is, it’s catchy as hell...” he says.
“It’s the only pitch, really.”
His eyes linger on my face.
“You said you don’t want Tara. Why are you so eager to get a slice of her business?”
“It’s a good business, and I owe her that much. I want to help her and protect her.”
“You’re so full of it, Hennessy. She’s done a great job without you. She’ll be fine. And with or without a slice of her business, at the current valuation of our business, we can easily pull out a billion each in a year or two, so why bother?”
“Call me sentimental,” I say, my lips curving into a smile. “In a way, I’m the godfather of her business.”
His eyebrows lift, a grin arching his lips.
“Really?” he asks incredulously. “What’s up with that catchy company name?”
“Inside joke,” I say, smiling nostalgically.
“You’re just weird,” he says letting out a small laugh. “And a liar,” he adds, grinning.
“Why’s that?” I ask, smirking.
“You want her. You always did. You’ve never fooled me,” he mutters, as he pulls his gaze away, and looks at the horizon.
A few moments of silence pass by before I speak.
“Yes, I’ve always wanted her, but I can never have her if she throws me under the bus at the drop of a hat,” I say, seriously this time.
TARA
Someone knocks on my door, the sound bouncing around my place.
I stride to the entrance and pull the door open.
Maya walks in.
“Thanks for waiting for me,” she says sarcastically as she tosses me a suggestive look.
“I’m sorry. I figured you weren’t going to run downstairs after me.”
“Well, your rushed departure was a bit over the top.”
“Who gave you a ride?”
She arches an eyebrow, a smile sprouting on her lips.
“Really? Chad?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
She slides onto the couch, her eyes on me.
“How come you didn’t know we were supposed to meet them?” she asks.
“I didn’t ask for their names. And what Lauren said to me didn’t raise a red flag. She said that we were meeting a couple of European investors. They’re not Europeans.”
“Well, at least you know where he was all this time.”
“You want coffee or something?” I ask.
“I’m good. I’ve had enough stimulation for one day.”
I grab my cup of coffee and claim an armchair not far from her.
“Some investors. This is the Universe making bad jokes on us,” I murmur before I take a sip of coffee.
She doesn’t say a word as I set the cup down.
For a moment, I look down, sunk in thought.
“So what’s gonna be?” she asks.
I take a sip before I set the cup on the table.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
She leans back against the sofa and crosses her arms over her chest, slowly raising an eyebrow.
“The investment capital.”
“Oh... Yeah. That’s not gonna happen.”
“You’re not even considering it?”
“It’s out of the question. Not with them anyway. There’s no way I’m doing this move with him. This is about my company, and I can’t be that close to him. Besides, I don’t think that there’s anything to consider. It’s not only us who have to make a decision. It’s them as well. And things are pretty clear, so far.”
I pause for a moment.
“Have you talked to Chad about it?”
“No. I didn’t talk business with him,” she says, her eyes darkening.
“What happened?”
“Nothing. I wish things were different.”
Slowly she sheds her jacket and sets it to the side before she runs her hand through her hair.
Her eyes brim with sadness.
“What did he say to you?”
She looks down for a moment, her chin quivering as tears pool in her eyes.
“The truth,” she says with a shaky voice. “It’s nothing that I haven’t suspected before,” she murmurs. “I never thought that it would hurt so much. After all this time, it’s still like an open wound that never got the chance to heal. He said that he had no idea what to do then, and he’s not proud of it. That he regrets it. The timing couldn’t be worse, and the distance between us didn’t help either. Same things I’ve always said. There wasn’t much to hold us together. In time, he realized that I was special, even though he knew so little about me...”
She pauses.
“Did he say that to you?”
She lowers her head, a tear falli
ng on her skirt.
Running her fingers under her eyes, she smiles and wipes away more tears.
“Yes, he did. And I know exactly what he meant because I did the exact same thing. I tried to talk myself out of him and joke about it as if it wasn’t important. I thought that ignoring his memory would help me forget him. In reality, all I did was lie to myself. I really wanted to believe that we were nothing more than a one night stand, but when you feel something for a man after all this time, you know there’s way more than that. We both regret it.”
“I‘m sorry.”
She gives me a soft smile, her eyes filled with tears.
“There’s nothing to be sorry for. Things happen the way they do. At that time, I couldn’t possibly think that someone like me would be interested in someone like him, for more than, you know... a roll in the hay.”
“Are you going to see him again?”
“I don’t know.”
“Would you like to see him?”
“I don’t know that either. I mean... If it ends the same way, hell no. Definitely, no.”
She moves her gaze away from me while I push to my feet and stroll to the kitchen.
Moments later, I bring back two cups filled with ice cream. I hand her one and a spoon.
A grin lights up her face.
She sinks her spoon into a creamy mound quietly tastes it.
“Did he say anything about Shade?”
She lifts her gaze and studies me for a moment.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know... Is he going to be here for long? Where is he staying?”
“Mmm... That’s a good question. I don’t know how long they intend to stay. Shade has a house by the ocean. ”
“He does?”
“Mmm-hmm. And they’ll fly back together.”
“Where do they live?”
“Chad lives in Monaco. Shade? I have no idea. He has a home on the Italian coast, I think. Other than that, hotels.”
My smile drops from my lips.
“What is it?”
“Nothing.”
“It doesn’t look like nothing.”
“I know that Italian place. He took me there on vacation.”
I go quiet while she waits for me to continue.
“Never mind.”
I wave the memory away.
“It’s nothing. He, um...” I continue and then I pause.
“He what?”