Love is in the Cards

by K. L. Brady

  Tessa examined her feelings as he cut himself off. She questioned whether she was ready for "the talk," wondering if they had anything to gain by confronting the could'ves, should'ves, and would'ves they'd skirted for five years. But he pushed the words out before her heart could decide what it wanted.

  "Why did you—I mean, I thought we—in one minute you'd convinced me commitment was bigger than the institution. You said marriage was a staid tradition that would stifle our creativity. I called BS at first, but it didn't matter over time because I loved what we shared. The next thing I know, you ambushed me at dinner with a proposal. You pulled a total one-eighty on me without warning, and I had no idea why."

  "You're right. You're absolutely right."

  "Something happened to change your mind; I'm certain of it." She rested her mug on the coffee table.

  He hesitated to confess it, and then he spoke. "The night before I proposed, my father called me into his office. You remember our fathers were barely speaking? The break was fresh, tempers flared. I had tunnel vision. I was so focused on us that I asked him for the Sweet Hart cards seed money without thinking."

  "Wow. Some things never change."

  "Exactly. Not only did he refuse me the investment, but he threatened to cut me off, trust fund and all, if I started a business with you."

  "Me? He hated me that much?”

  "He didn't hate you. He just didn't think you were ambitious enough for me."

  "So, you didn't tell him about the business plan."

  He nodded. "In his defense, he was afraid I'd leave him, too, and another fracture would leave Hart vulnerable to a takeover or an acquisition."

  "It's all coming back to me. Dad loved your father. He just wanted to make a name for himself."

  "Oh, I know. After a heated argument, Pops agreed to fund Sweet-Hart, if I dropped the Sweet and built it as part of Hart Enterprises. At dinner that night, he told me to give you up. You were the traitor's daughter. When he couldn't turn me against you, he worked on my sisters. They patronized him for power."

  "Wow."

  "Turns out, it was all a lie. It wasn't about you. It wasn't about Uncle Brian. It wasn't about Sweet Media. He'd been keeping a secret. I kept my promise not to reveal it...until right now."

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Tessa

  * * *

  Cody's father had changed the course of their entire relationship with one night, one dinner, one secret. Tessa had always assumed he disapproved of her, of their love. Until now, she didn't know another reason for the break up existed. After all these years, Cody would finally confess the truth.

  “Remember the monsoon dinner? While you were in the ladies’ room, he whispered in my ear five words that changed my life forever: I’m dying of prostate cancer.”

  "What?"

  “He was dying. Stage four. Inoperable. It turns out the feud was never about leaving. He wanted Uncle Brian to stay and take over Hart Enterprises, but he had too much pride to ask him. Maybe he loved him too much to request that he give up his Sweet Media ambitions."

  "I can't believe this."

  "Well, I hope you'll believe this," he began. "Before you and I fell in love, the thought of marriage gave me hives. But proposing to you filled me with indescribable...joy."

  Joy? She could've fallen over with the breath from a whisper.

  "I could envision us exchanging rings and dancing. I could see myself carrying you over the threshold. I wanted to propose, and I wanted you to say yes. But I fumbled my words, I know."

  "You? Fumble your words? That's just crazy talk," she said with a snicker.

  "It's not intentional," he continued. "I hear the words one way in my mind, and they sound different coming out of my mouth. It's my struggle. If you didn't understand that I wanted a true partnership with you, please, charge it to my head and not my heart. I figured once we got married, Hart would be—"

  "Yours."

  "Ours, Tessa. Once you took my name, everything I owned would've been half yours. Remember when we were ten, and I wanted to play Big Business?"

  "Well, you wanted to be CEO, but you wanted me to be the secretary and didn't want to share the seat."

  "Exactly."

  "So, I gave you a swift kick in the family jewels to bring you to your senses."

  He laughed. "When I asked you to marry me, that was me sharing the seat. I wanted to give you ownership of the company your father helped build. I wanted our families to become one. My father would've been forced to accept us or lose the only heir that wanted the throne, that would run the kingdom the way he did."

  "I had no idea, Cody. But I was afraid maybe you were right. Maybe I was weak."

  "Stop. You're one of the strongest people the universe ever created. I said that in anger and frustration."

  "Since my mother passed away,” Tessa began, “my whole world revolved around two people, two men—you and my father." She leaned forward and propped herself on her knees. "I'd been shrouded in my father's shadow—and then yours. Everything I'd ever done had been a reflection of you and him, even our vision for Sweet-Hart cards to some extent."

  "That's not true."

  "Yes, it is. Rejecting your proposal was not a refusal to be your wife. I hadn't wanted anything more before you convinced me otherwise. I just didn't know myself; I didn't know my own strength—and I needed to find it. I needed to find out if I could succeed without you...heck, if I could survive without you."

  "And you did. You created Keep It Real from nothing."

  She glanced at the card he sent her. "Well, not exactly nothing."

  "I meant, from your heart."

  "Probably more from my pain."

  "You were wounded. But you brought much-needed truth to people's lives, and you put food on your employees' tables."

  "You can't possibly believe that. Because if you did, then why would you acquire it?"

  "You think I acquired your company despite my pride in you?" He shook his head. "No, I bought Keep It Real because of it. The truth is your father is in deep financial trouble."

  "What? But he never—"

  "He's struggling to make payroll, and he needed a major cash infusion. That's why he sold Keep It Real to me. He received numerous inquiries, but he entrusted it to Hart because he knew I'd protect it."

  She gasped, and the room began to spin. Financial trouble. Cash infusion. All this time.

  "Sweet Media was deep in the red and overburdened with debt, at least until I stepped in. I offered a premium to help him. And I wanted to save your valuation by heading off rumors that I picked up a bargain."

  That's why he paid the premium? Gratefulness replaced her anger. She glanced up to the heavens to thank the angels that brought him back.

  "In another year or two, Sweet Media would've ceased to exist, and Keep It Real would've vanished right along with it. The truth is your revenues were keeping Sweet Media afloat. You're no failure; you never were. I would've told you sooner, but your father knew you'd never consent to leave Sweet Media if you knew he was in trouble."

  Shaking her head in disbelief, Tessa pressed for more answers. She wanted to know, needed to know. "So, you bought it to help save my father?"

  "No, I bought it because of you. Losing Keep It Real would've broken your spirit, your heart. And standing by and doing nothing to prevent it, that would break mine. I couldn't watch you lose everything you've worked so hard to achieve. And you may have if I didn't step in."

  Holding her hand in his, he unearthed her sweetest treasure, one Tessa feared she'd never recover: her faith and trust in Cody Hart. She thought she'd lost them in what felt like an ocean of loneliness, on her own island, surrounded by loss and pain. He'd once been a twinkling star in her darkness, her comfort, her joy, and now, sitting here beside her, he was her savior.

  Tears trickled down her cheeks. "Then why break it off and disappear from my life, leaving only a card?”

  "My father was dying. Hart needed me. And for us to
have any real chance, I had to let you go, to give you the opportunity to pursue your dream, to become the self-made woman you wanted to be. If I didn't, you would've resented me, my name, and everything branded as Hart."

  Tessa pressed her hand to her heart; it'd started beating so wildly she thought it might pump out of her chest.

  "Losing you was unbearable, but killing your dream—that would've been unforgivable. So, I let you go, always knowing no matter what I did, no matter who I was with at the moment, no matter where in the world I may find myself, I'd be there for you, even if you refused to need me."

  For so many years, she wondered why he'd disappeared, this beautiful man who cherished her, who believed in her. The man who, at one perfect moment in time, was the sun around which she anchored her entire world. Before now, she never quite understood how a star so brilliant could burn away so abruptly, so absolutely.

  In hindsight, she understood their parting to be a mercy, an eclipse, a brief darkness to make way for the light. Fate had once more placed him before her, still loving her, still honoring her.

  "Believe it or not, sometimes I walk through this world feeling invisible, you know. I mean, physically, people see me every day—but they don't really see into me, nobody does, not the way you do."

  He brushed his hands over his face to conceal the tears in his eyes.

  “You are the only one who truly sees me, the me inside, the me who always knows what she wants but overlooks the things that she needs. You see me. And, in the way you see me, I see the me I want to become."

  At a loss for words, Cody smiled as he stroked her cheek with a feather-light touch. She exposed a smile that mirrored his. Then she gripped his hand and pressed his palm against her face.

  Tessa whispered, "I've so missed—"

  Gently, she dropped his hands and softened her voice to a hush. She hated fighting against the desire in her heart, but she must.

  "You missed what?" he asked. Cody now sat on the edge of his seat, anxious for her to speak.

  "I wish we could turn back time to the minute, to the second, that you lost yourself in me," he said.

  He fixed his eyes on her, willing her to speak.

  In the wisp of a flash, she'd embraced the idea of "us" again. The moment was fleeting—reality set in too quickly.

  "Nothing," she replied. "You're with Chandra. Married in a month. I'm not homewrecker material. I'm a front-end tire. I'm not the spare in the trunk."

  "What about you and Kyle? You two seemed quite—chummy," he said, trying to deflect.

  "I haven't seen dodging that adept since fifth grade. Remember little Jimmy Newman during the Hart Summer Leadership Camp?"

  His laugh was hearty and deep, so she continued.

  "He got slammed in the back with a dodge ball and peed himself. On the upside, he never got hit again."

  They both folded over in laughter. Not that the story was funny. It wasn't. Laughing together just felt so sweet.

  "I miss that."

  "What?" she asked as her giggles tapered off.

  "The sound of your smile. At work, sometimes I stare out the window, and I hear echoes of it in my mind."

  Tessa's face warmed into a subtle blush. She shifted her gaze to the ground. "I've made so many mistakes."

  He lifted her chin with his index finger. "We've both made mistakes."

  "I suppose." She patted his hand one last time. "Thank God for second chances....for friendship."

  "Friendship," he said flatly.

  Kyle. He came into her life like an autumn breeze, cool, sweet, full of possibility. She needed him in a way. He revived feelings she thought dead. Kyle helped her first prioritize her needs above all others, but Cody made her remember the best of herself.

  "Your heart is always in the right place. It's one of those things I've always loved about...you."

  The "L" word pushed him upright from his slouch. "But you've got your work cut out for you. I guess that's my signal to leave."

  She nodded. "That would probably be for the best, right?" Her mind went fuzzy, and then, in an instant, it was clear. She agreed with his plan to leave, but she wanted him to stay.

  He went through the motions, all of them, stood up, stretched, grabbed his suit jacket, and inched toward the door in stutter steps, seemingly thinking and not thinking, almost saying something and then not saying anything.

  He grabbed the doorknob, but he never got the chance to open it. She pressed her hand against his to keep him from leaving. "Please. Don't go. I know I don't have the right to...I mean, you don't owe me...the thing is I—"

  "Shhh..." He pressed his finger to her lips to hush her. "You don't even have to ask, Tessa. I don't want to go. I need you, too."

  Without a second's hesitation, he pulled her into his arms. His kiss was low and then deep, intensifying with every ebb and flow of their lips, bodies, and minds. Their hands roamed wildly, driven by a tide of emotion too powerful to stem.

  Entangled in each other's arms, they drifted in uncoordinated steps to the couch. After allowing the passion to burn for a little longer, they made the only kind of love they needed to make at that moment—they held each other close, fell asleep wrapped up in each other’s arms with only their shoes removed.

  Tessa spooned against him, knowing they'd come a long way but grateful they'd refrained from going too far. Everything that happened mattered to the future, but nothing happened that they couldn't take back.

  The next morning, she awakened cradled in his arms. As her world crumbled around her, he gifted her with the one thing she needed more than the sweetness of his kiss or the comfort of his arms. Without a requirement or request, he gave her his presence, a sense of security. Five years had passed, but their love remained unchanged. All doubt and uncertainty about his heart dissipated. The newfound confidence filled her with the strength to do what she needed to do next.

  Tessa slipped out from under him, tipped into the bathroom, and called Mia. She had a plan to fix the trust she'd broken, and the task started with Keep It Real.

  "Sorry to ring you so early, but I need you to set up a team meeting for this morning. Let's make it ten," she whispered.

  "With creative?" Mia replied.

  "With everyone."

  "Mind if I ask what this is about?"

  "Not at all," Tessa said, making her bestie cling to the pause. "We've got to get ready. Changes. We're making some changes. Big ones."

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Cody

  * * *

  Cody sloshed through the melting muck outside and into his office, cheesing from ear to ear, his pinstriped suit barely containing him. Even in the city's frigidness, the winter sun warmed Cody's face as much as the night spent with Tessa warmed his soul.

  "Good morning!" he sang as he floated through the office.

  Ms. Dee and everyone with half a clue judged him with suspicious side-eyes as he passed, looks he tried to ignore. He was feeling Tessa's vibe and kill it they would not.

  After settling in his executive chair, he spun around to face the window. He leaned back and clasped his hands behind his head, allowed his mind to drift and mentally replay the night in slow-motion—how she pulled him so close, not even air could stand between them, how he'd stood witness to her tears and dried them, how he sensed her pain and relieved it.

  He became the man he should be, the man he wanted to be. Instinctively, he resumed his role as the man who really saw her, who saw the woman she allowed few others to know.

  His stomach rippled and flopped as he recalled the feel of her body pressed against his, at the thought of everything about Tessa, the way his hand followed the curve of her hip, to how she twisted her body to hide her subdued snores, to the way she smelled of lavender and jasmine.

  In a dream come to life, he awakened next to her and indulged in the softness of her body as it spooned against his in a still-perfect fit.

  And she always made him laugh with no effort, like the moment her eyes bulg
ed when she woke up in his arms, apparently shocked he was still by her side.

  He couldn't blame her. He should've left, but he couldn't let go.

  Chandra forbade him to return home, but Tessa made him remember home is where the heart is, and his heart lie with her. He wouldn't go back, not now, not ever.

  After urging Tessa into a hot shower to wash off her sadness, he lost himself in her kitchen, the one place outside of her bedroom where he could display a few new tricks.

  "You cooked all of this...for me?" Tessa said, witnessing Cody’s culinary genius.

  Wrapped in a thick terrycloth robe, Tessa wandered into the kitchen, searching for her morning coffee, and found him wearing her "Kiss the Cook" apron. He'd fried spinach and cheese omelets and homemade hash browns, a long way from the Captain Crunch and toaster pastries he used to serve during their lean days.

  "You know how I do," he said in his less than humble brag while thumbing his nose.

  "Yes, I know exactly how you do." She waved her hand over her trashcan's motion sensor to pop the lid and peer inside.

  "What are you looking for?"

  "The delivery bags."

  "If you don't sit down and eat! I cooked this beautiful meal, and you're in here talking smack. The only thing you need to worry about is smacking your lips."

  She devoured the meal with gusto.

  Later, she emerged ready for the office. He couldn't recall what she wore. He only remembered how she looked. Tessa glowed, and her natural-colored lips turned into a wide smile as she shook her head. He was mesmerized by the way her cocoa skin could be so perfect and faultless without a hint of make-up.

  If life were kind and perfect, he'd have been free to ask her on a date, and, with each day that passed, he would consume every second, hour, minute of her time. But unfinished business, from both sides, stood between them.

  The sound of quick steps toward his office snapped him out of his daze. He paused in the brief silence and then hummed K4. Could it be Tessa? Could she be that anxious to see him again? He was eager for her to enter. But the figure that appeared in his doorway didn't belong to Tessa.