Love Me Last

by Parker, Weston

  Now, I just had to figure out how to tell Mallory.

  She hadn’t been happy the previous day, when I had first told her I suspected Tim. But she had cooperated with helping me dig up some of the information that the company had on him. I had used that to look up other details on the man as well, and now I was pretty sure I had all the evidence I needed.

  He definitely hadn’t been doing what Mallory had hinted at—helping them out with taxes in a way that I just didn’t recognize. I grinned a little, just remembering her attempt at a flimsy excuse for the man. Mallory hadn’t meant to insult me, I knew. She was just grasping for straws, trying to hang on to her belief that everyone in the company was loyal to her and her family.

  I honestly admired the fact that she had that conviction. It showed a lot about how they did business around here. Some might think it was naïve, but personally, I thought that if you showed people that you trusted them, they were more likely to want to do a good job for you.

  But you did occasionally get the assholes who took advantage of it. At this point, I was pretty sure that Tim was one of those guys.

  Sighing, I stared down at the notes I’d made on the file I’d created. It would be up to Mallory to decide how she wanted to handle things. Mallory and Charlie, maybe, although the older man was out for the day.

  I wondered if maybe I should hold off and wait until the next day, hoping Charlie would be back. But at the end of the day, Mallory was the head of the company, and I knew that she was curious to know the results as soon as possible. And with the IRS audit looming, the sooner this was solved, the better.

  Besides, I trusted Mallory to handle things fairly. She wasn’t likely to fly off the handle or get too emotional. She would listen to the facts. I was sure of it. And she deserved to know just what Tim had been up to for all these years. It was her company.

  Still, it took me most of the afternoon to steel myself before heading over to her office, and it wasn’t just because I was trying to make sure I had all the evidence I could possibly come up with.

  Mallory looked surprisingly subdued when I walked into her office. But then again, she had to know exactly what I was doing there. I gently set the file down on her desk. “I have the guy,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry.”

  Sighing, she flipped the cover of the file open, then nodded and closed it again. “Tim,” she said flatly. I nodded, and she shook her head. “I just can’t believe he’s been taking advantage of me like this,” she said. “I mean, I’m sure you’re right, you’ve compiled all the evidence. But I never would have suspected him.” She was quiet for a long moment. I thought about saying something, but I knew she needed to come to grips with this herself.

  Finally, she looked up at me. “Honestly, being in business sucks sometimes when you’re a woman,” she said. “He would never have done this to my grandfather.”

  I cleared my throat. “Actually, uh, I’m sorry to tell you this, and I haven’t looked at things all the way back to the start of the business, but there’s a very clear pattern here, one that he’s worked out over a long time. He has started to skim off more and more lately, which I think is what finally tipped Charlie off to it. The guy got cocky. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he hadn’t been doing this to some degree all along.”

  Mallory stared at me and then gave a short, bitter laugh. “I probably shouldn’t feel relieved to hear that,” she said. “I can’t believe that Gramps got taken advantage of.” She pressed her fingers against her closed eyelids. “Well, thank you for the work you did. I want you to come back when Charlie’s here so we can go through the details, tie up any loose ends and get everything straightened out. And maybe talk about how to keep this from happening in the future.”

  She looked timid as she said it, suddenly not so much the confident boss that she’d always been. At first, I thought it had something to do with my news about Tim. She must be gutted to find out this guy that her family had trusted for so long had been stabbing them in the back for years now.

  But then, I wondered if there wasn’t something more to it than that. Now that I had figured out where the problem was and who was behind it, my work here at the winery was basically done. Which meant that she and I were back to wondering if we would ever see one another again.

  Of course, there was still that Valentine’s Day party that she had asked me to go to. But would she rescind that invitation now that I was no longer an employee? Maybe it was just for people who worked there.

  “I’ll be around for a little while longer,” I assured her. “Remember, it’s a flat fee for the project, and I’m seeing this through to the end.”

  Mallory’s face cleared. But before she could say anything else, her phone started ringing. “Hold on,” she told me, answering the phone with a crisp hello. Her face turned ashen as she listened to whoever was on the other end. When she hung up, the look she gave me was haunted.

  She shook her head a little as though she needed to clear it, then got to her feet, grabbing her stuff. “I’m sorry, I have to go,” she said.

  “What is it?” I asked immediately.

  “It’s just, it’s my—my mom,” Mallory said, her voice sounding choked.

  I knew better than to ask if everything was all right. I didn’t know the whole situation there, but she had mentioned something before about her mom being sick. “Let me drive you,” I told her.

  “I don’t know,” Mallory said. “I could be there for a while,” she trailed off.

  I fought the urge to roll my eyes. “You’re in no state to drive,” I told her bluntly. “And besides, I’m finished with everything I can do here today. Next step is to talk to you and Charlie about it in more detail. But I can’t do that if both of you are gone.” The attempt at levity was lost on her, but I couldn’t blame her for that.

  As she shrugged into her coat, I caught her shoulders. I peered into her eyes, waiting until she was looking at me before continuing. “Let me drive you,” I told her quietly. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”

  Mallory paused, staring at me, and I could tell that she was battling within herself. She usually was so calm and collected, the epitome of a boss. Here she was, showing me this weaker side of her. I could tell she was struggling, that she didn’t want to fall to pieces. And oh how I wished there was some way for me to tell her it was okay. But we didn’t know one another well enough just yet, and I had no idea what her mother was dealing with.

  Finally, Mallory nodded, and that was something at least. “All right,” she said.

  I led her out to the parking lot, barely pausing to grab my own coat from my office. When we got to the hospital, I pulled up to the front doors. “Head inside, I’ll go park and catch up with you inside,” I told her.

  Mallory nodded, barely looking at me as she jumped out. I wasn’t sure that she would really want me to stay, but on the other hand, if the worst happened, God forbid, I didn’t want her going through it alone.

  When I got into the waiting room, Mallory had already disappeared. But I settled in to wait, pulling out my phone. The first thing I did was text Ace. At the hospital, somethings up with Mallory’s mom—can you watch Booger for me this afternoon?

  He immediately responded that he could, and I felt relief wash through me. I was really going to have to find a way to pay him back soon for all this babysitting time. I knew that I’d been asking a lot of him lately. But he loved to spend time with his nephew, and soon, I would be finished with my work at the winery and free to spend most of my time with Booker again, just like normal.

  I felt my heart pang at the thought of that. Soon, I’d be done with my work at the winery. What would that mean for me and Mallory? But now wasn’t the time to be worrying about that. I just needed to let things take their course. We’d managed to find the time outside of work to see one another a couple of times now, and that meant we would still keep seeing one another outside of work if that’s what we wanted.

  Scrolling through various things
on my phone, I was getting more and more bored. I tried not to think about what it meant for Mallory to still be back there somewhere behind the closed doors at the end of the waiting room. Surely that was a good sign, wasn’t it? Surely it meant that her mother wasn’t in surgery or anything like that.

  I hoped so, anyway.

  When Mallory finally came out late that evening, she looked exhausted, but she wasn’t crying. She did look surprised to still see me sitting there. “I came out to check and see if you were still here,” she said. “But I didn’t think you would be.”

  I shook my head. “I wouldn’t leave while you were still here,” I told her softly. “How is she?”

  “She’s going to be all right,” Mallory said, glancing away from me. “I’ll fill you in on the details later, okay?” There was something in her expression that bothered me, but I couldn’t figure out what to say. It was almost as though she didn’t want me there.

  A couple of days ago, when I had driven her home and she had asked me to go to the Valentine’s Day party with her, I’d started to think that maybe we were really dating, that maybe we were going to figure out a way to make things work between us. Now, I didn’t know what had changed, but between the impending closure of my contract at the winery and this, it was like there was more space between us than ever.

  It was a space I didn’t know how to close. I wanted to reach for her, but I was afraid that if I did, she would only take a step back. Was it that she didn’t want me to see her worried about her mother? But that didn’t make any sense. It would only be normal for her to be worried about her mom. Normal for her to want to lean on me a little bit, too. I was just here to help, I hoped she could see that.

  “You should probably get home,” Mallory was saying. She paused, “I’m not sure if I’ll be at work tomorrow, but I’ll keep you posted. No sense in you showing up if I’m not there.”

  “Right,” I said, swallowing hard. “If you need anything, just let me know.”

  “I will,” Mallory said, but she sounded distant as she turned to head back through the metal doors.

  Standing there, I watched her leave, wanting to go after her. But what could I say? I had the distinct feeling that I had done something wrong, but I just didn’t know what. And unless I knew what it was, there was no hope of fixing it.

  Mallory disappeared, leaving me there alone. After a moment, I sighed and headed for the doors on the opposite end of the waiting room, then out into the bitter winter night.

  Chapter 28

  Mallory

  Mom was struggling to sit up when I walked back into her room. “Where were you?” she asked suspiciously. “You said you were going to get ice. You were gone a lot longer than it should have taken just to get ice.” She frowned at the cup that I handed her. “I don’t want ice anyway. You know what I want? A big cheeseburger. But I guess they won’t let me have that here.”

  “You know that even if they let you have that, you’d get sick,” I sighed. It was the same thing every time. Rush to the hospital because Mom had some sort of scare. Another round of treatments, another round of tests. She was always okay in the end. And she always hated the fact that she was in here. The first couple times, I had relented, bringing her the food she actually wanted. But then I’d found out firsthand just how nauseous her medications made her. I wouldn’t make that mistake again. No matter how much she complained about the ice.

  Mom knew the drill by now anyway. She might have complained about the ice, but she put a few chips in her mouth and crunched them audibly. I knew she was probably hungry, another side effect of her medication, apparently. But she wouldn’t actually want to eat anything for another couple hours at least. Not until she’d gotten some rest and the queasiness had gone down.

  “So, where were you?” Mom pressed. “Did you manage to finally find yourself a hot nurse to flirt with? There’s got to be some around here somewhere.”

  I shook my head. “No, Mom,” I said. I wasn’t sure that I was ready to tell her about Hayden just yet. About the fact that he cared enough to drive me to the hospital, no questions asked. About the fact that he had waited out there for hours and hours until I’d finally gone to check.

  Somehow, I still couldn’t believe that he had waited all that time. Actually, he looked like he planned to sit out there the whole night until I insisted that he leave. It wasn’t that I didn’t want him there. I liked the thought of having him out there, a strong and silent support if I needed him.

  But the more I thought of him out there, the more I just wanted to fold myself into his arms and cry. Because even though Mom was going to be all right, this time, I knew she wouldn’t be all right forever. This disease was slowly starting to win. One of these times, it would be the last trip to the hospital. I was starting to worry that it would happen all too soon.

  I didn’t think Hayden would have minded if I had cried. In fact, he seemed like he was just waiting for it to happen. That he was ready with a hug whenever I needed it. But I wasn’t ready for him to see that just yet. He shouldn’t have to comfort me when we barely even knew one another. And I definitely wasn’t ready to talk about all this with him just yet. It was enough that he knew Mom was sick. Enough for me to know that he was there if I needed him.

  “Well, if you weren’t flirting, did you at least talk to the nurses about letting me out of here?” Mom asked. “It’s time for me to either go home or go to Jesus. And honestly, at this point, I don’t really care which.”

  I tried not to grimace at the flippant way she said it. I knew she realized how much it would hurt me when her time was eventually up. I knew that she was scared, and I knew that joking was her way of dealing with things. But at the same time, I hated to hear her talk like that.

  “They’re not ready to release you just yet,” I told Mom, already preparing for another onslaught of frustrated griping. Before she could start, I tried to change the subject. “You know, this afternoon, right before I got the call from the hospital, I was talking to the guy we hired to look through the books.”

  Mom looked like she still wanted to argue about something, anything really. But for the moment, she played along with my change of subject. “And?” she asked. “Did he figure it out?”

  “I haven’t reviewed all of the evidence yet, but apparently he believes that Tim, the CPA, has been up to no good,” I said. “Can you believe that? Hayden says that he’s been skimming profit off for years now. Maybe even clear back to when Gramps was there. He said he thinks the only reason Tim got caught now is that he’s been taking more and more lately, making it more obvious when Charlie was going through the books.”

  Mom shook her head. “You know, your grandfather never liked that old ass,” she said. “Neither did I for that matter.”

  “Really?” I asked in surprise, wondering how I could not have known that for all these years. I mean, sure, I didn’t have particularly strong feelings about Tim one way or the other. I’d never gotten to know him that well, but I’d always respected him. He had worked for the company forever. But now that I thought about it, I realized he had always held himself apart from the rest. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so surprised when Hayden brought me his findings.

  But it made me wonder what else I might have been missing at the company. What else had been going wrong right under my nose? I couldn’t think about that right now. Especially not since Mom was back to griping.

  “I’d better be out of here before the Valentine’s Day party on Friday,” she said, and there was a threat in her voice like she thought she could make the universe sit up and listen. I didn’t think it worked that way, but then again, by all estimates, Mom shouldn’t have made it this long. If she wanted to go to that party, I was damned sure she would be there.

  How much of that was wishful thinking, I couldn’t really say. A Valentine’s Day party without her there seemed hard to imagine. She always made an appearance, at least. Though in recent years, she’d stayed out of most of the festivi
ties and left early, claiming that it wasn’t fun now that she wasn’t allowed to drink.

  “Do you have a date this year?” Mom asked suddenly, peering at me.

  I hadn’t been sure if I wanted to tell her about Hayden just yet. And I probably should have checked with him before promising Mom she could meet him. But on the other hand, I had already met Booker. And Ace, come to think of it. I knew Hayden’s whole family already. That had to count for something.

  I didn’t want him to feel like I was putting too much pressure on us, but on the other hand, I really did want Mom to meet him and Booker. Truthfully, I wasn’t sure how many more chances we would have for that.

  But no, I didn’t want to think like that. I refused.

  Smiling at Mom, I plowed ahead. “Actually, I do have a date,” I told her. “Remember that guy that I went on the date with, the one that I told you was so terrible?” I asked her. “I ended up giving him a second chance.”

  Mom stared at me for a moment, and I could tell she didn’t believe me. What would she think when she met Hayden? Oh, I knew that Booker would charm her. And Hayden probably would as well. But would she think Hayden was too good for me? Or would she not like the fact that he already had a kid out of wedlock?

  But one way or another, I had committed to it now. As long as Mom was still breathing, she was going to be there at that Valentine’s Day party. One way or the other. And now that she knew I was going to be there with someone, she wasn’t going to stop until she figured out just who that someone was. The only way out now would be if Hayden didn’t show up at all.

  And I supposed that was always a possibility, but I didn’t think it was a very likely one. Hayden had shown me that he cared about me. And he had genuinely seemed excited at the prospect of going to the party with me. Unless I had offended him by kicking him out of the hospital. I really hoped I hadn’t.