Sordid: A Novel

by Ava Harrison

  “What are you thinking?” Grant asks from beside me.

  “How gorgeous it is here. You truly picked a wonderful location to build.”

  “I feel good about it. Now that I have a crew I trust in place, I’m excited for this expansion.”

  “You really are brilliant,” I say, squinting up at him through my lashes.

  I’m rewarded with a breathtaking smile. One that fills my heart more than it should.

  “Thank you for coming out here. I know it probably feels like it was a waste of your time, but you don’t know what it meant to have your support. You’re one of the only people I trust.”

  His words touch me. I wish I could tell him what I’m feeling, but I know better. It will only be met with heartache.

  “Our lunch is ready.” Grant points to a spot in front of us where a beach blanket is spread out across the white sand. Atop it is a large picnic basket. He motions for me to sit as we get closer, so I do, and he goes about unpacking the contents. I’m in awe. Cheeses, vegetables, fruit, and delicious pastries are all laid out in an assortment of color. Lastly, he removes a bottle of champagne. “To celebrate a successful firing and rehiring,” he says shyly.

  “How did you do this? When?” I’m literally speechless at the thought he put into all of this.

  “I must admit, the concierge at the hotel arranged this at my request.”

  “It’s amazing, Grant.” I smile broadly. “Thank you for going to such trouble.”

  “I’d do anything for you, Bridget.”

  He wouldn’t. If that were true, my heart wouldn’t be breaking in two. We’d be planning a future and not saying our goodbyes in a matter of days.

  “Can we just enjoy this day? No expectations but good company and conversation? A celebration of sorts.”

  I nod, needing it as much as he seems to.

  Two hours later and we’re back at his suite with almost two bottles of champagne emptied. I’m feeling suitably tipsy. Instead of getting more talkative as I normally do, I find myself retreating into silence. Grant is doing the same. Neither of us wants to bring up the one thing that’s clearly on our minds.

  “I should go.”

  “I’m not ready,” he says, and we both know we’re not just talking about leaving the room.

  My words were loaded. I need to leave St. Barts, leave The L . . . leave him. I’m a smart girl. I know all these things. But coming to terms with them is something else entirely.

  “I have to,” I mumble. “I’ve decided I’ll resign as soon as we’re back tomorrow.”

  “Please don’t, Bridget. The L needs you.”

  “I can’t work there. Don’t you get that? It’s too hard.”

  “I’m going to make sure you get the job of your dreams, Bridget. My recommendation will afford you your choice of employment. I’ll make damn sure of it. I might’ve fucked everything up, but I can make this right. I can do something right.”

  Tears fall down my face as I study him. He looks dejected and utterly broken himself. Saying goodbye will be the hardest thing I’ll ever do in my life, but it’s what’s best for us both. This push and pull won’t go away, and neither will Chelsea’s threats.

  “Don’t cry,” he says, taking my hand in his. “Please don’t. I can’t stand to see you sad, especially knowing I’ve caused it. It kills me, Bridget. It fucking tears me apart that I can’t fix this.”

  He’s sitting too close. I can smell him. I can feel him. He’s too close, and if he doesn’t move away . . .

  He kisses me.

  Everything around us disappears. Every ounce of sadness is snuffed out, if only for a moment. This magical mirage begs me to stay forever, to never leave its embrace.

  I let him kiss me, and I kiss him back with fervor. Every single part of my body wants more. Craves more. Grant pulls away, looking into my eyes with a fierceness I haven’t seen before. It is carnal, it is lethal, and it can ruin every moment I’d spent trying to get over him.

  “Give me one last night with you. One perfect night before it’s all over.”

  One perfect night? The thought sounds sublime. But can I do it? No. I should say no.

  “I know I shouldn’t ask this of you, but I’m just a man. A weak man who’s desperate for a woman he can’t have.” His eyes beg me. “A man who’s fallen—”

  I cut off his words, not wanting to hear any more. Kissing him again, I smother all chance of him saying the three words I’ve hoped for. Prayed for. The three words that will surely end me.

  “You’re beautiful,” he whispers as I walk us back toward the bed.

  I want to tell him to never leave me. That I crossed the invisible line we set. I want to tell him I did the one thing I promised I wouldn’t.

  I fell in love.

  But I don’t. Tears threaten to fall as I move closer to him. I bury my face in his neck and cry.

  “I love you,” I whisper into his skin, but he can’t hear me. I don’t dare voice the words out loud. “I’ll say goodbye. I will. But not now. Now, I just want you to hold me. Touch me.”

  After we remove our clothes, I lie back with him hovering above me. He widens my legs and positions himself at my entrance, but he doesn’t move. “Condom?”

  “I’m on the pill. I want to feel you. I want to feel all of you.”

  “I’m clean,” he replies.

  “I know.”

  He thrusts into me. Over and over again. “You’re perfect.” His passion consumes me. Enflames me. Owns me.

  “You deserve more.”

  I do. I deserve a commitment. A future. Things he can’t give. I won’t settle for less, but I’ll give my all to him one last time.

  With my body, I offer him all I can’t communicate out loud. With my kiss, I tell him I love him; I tell him I’m lost without him. I make love to him with each pass of my tongue, screaming silently into his mouth all the words I can’t say with my lips.

  All the I love yous I’ll never say.

  He makes love to me. Thrusting in and out. Kissing me savagely. Whispering my name against my lips like a benediction.

  As if I’ll save him.

  As if I could.

  We don’t speak as we clean up, neither one of us wanting to ruin the moment. I want to hold onto us for just a while longer.

  We lie in each other’s arms. The cadence of our breathing is the only sound in the room. With my head on his chest, I listen to his heartbeat. A sigh escapes my lips.

  “Bridget . . .” He takes my hand in his and I close my eyes. “I love you.”

  “You can’t,” I plead.

  “And yet I do. Desperately.”

  “Grant—”

  “No. Let me do this. Let me say this. You deserve to know how special you are to me. I love you. One day you will meet someone, you will fall in love, and have all the things you ever dreamed of. I need you to know, there will never be anyone else for me.” He kisses me again. Recklessly. Passionately. “I can’t let you go,” he mutters against my lips.

  “You need to,” I whisper.

  “I know.”

  After heading to the airport and catching the next commercial flight back to the States, I make it home. The first thing I do is call Olivia. For the first time in a long time, I really want to hear my sister’s voice. She shows up an hour later, the pain in my voice evident enough to make her come.

  “Is it Grant?” she says.

  “I’m so stupid,” I cry.

  “You’re not weak or stupid. You’re in love with him. That’s all.”

  I cry on her shoulder for the better part of an hour. She doesn’t say anything but allows me to feel all the hurt. Live it, own it, embrace it so one day maybe I’ll move on. After a while she pulls away, looking me in the eyes.

  “This pain you feel will subside, Bridge. I know it doesn’t seem so right now, but it will. Someday you’ll have the capacity to love someone else.” She smiles a sad smile. “One day you’ll look back and wonder how you could’ve ever be
en with a man who didn’t respect you enough to leave his wife for you. You don’t want to be with a man like that. You want one who loves you so much he’d move the world for you. Wait for that man to come around. Don’t settle for anything less.”

  “There’s so much more to it. I wish I could tell you, but I can’t. I owe it to him to keep his secrets.”

  “You don’t owe him a thing.”

  “It hurts so bad. I don’t think I’ll ever find anyone like him.”

  “You can and you will. You’re stronger than you think.”

  “I feel broken.”

  “You’re not broken.”

  “I am. I’m not strong like you. You rebuilt your life.”

  “You’re wrong. You’re the strongest of all three of us. You always have been. You’re the glue that has always held us together.”

  Her words fill my soul. Build me up. Give me strength to believe I’ll be okay.

  My door flies open and I jump to my feet out of instinct. Spencer stands inside my door, red-faced and baring teeth.

  “Are you kidding me?” Spencer shouts, coming around my desk and thrusting me against the wall. “How could you sleep with Bridget?”

  Fuck. I should’ve known this conversation was coming. As much as I want to fight back and defend myself, I don’t.

  “You don’t understand,” I grit through my teeth.

  “I don’t understand? Are you fucking kidding me?” His hands turn white. “You’re married and have a daughter and, for fuck’s sake, Bridget’s a kid.”

  “She’s a grown woman. She can make her own decisions. You know nothing about her.” Bridget may be years younger, but she’s not a child. She’s smart and beautiful and I won’t allow him to say anything otherwise. “Not that you’re one to talk. How old is Olivia?” I bite.

  “You’re not good enough for her, Grant. You’re a fucking mess.”

  My eyes narrow and teeth grind together.

  “I don’t need you to point out all of my faults, Spencer. You and our father have been doing it for years.”

  “This isn’t about us, goddamn it. This is about you hurting Bridget.” His words bounce off the walls in angry waves. He still has me pinned against the wall, so I push roughly against his shoulders. He stumbles back.

  “I wouldn’t hurt her,” I yell back.

  “You already have.”

  My shoulders slump at his words. My hand comes up to my head, wiping the sweat from my face. I knew I hurt her, but to hear it from Spencer is the worst.

  “Olivia is consoling her as we speak. She’s fucking broken.”

  “Fuck,” I yell, feeling the need to put my fist through a wall. Anything to stave off the pain his words produce.

  “I warned you to keep your hands off of her.”

  “I’ve never listened to a damn thing you’ve said, Spencer. Why would I start now?”

  Punch. “I said I’d kill you.” Punch. Spencer does as he promised. Putting his fist in my face repeatedly. I should let him. I deserve it.

  “I love her,” I mutter as the acrid taste of copper fills my mouth.

  He stops punching me and steps back. His eyes are pinched and a frown forms on his face.

  “What?” he asks as though he can’t comprehend what I’m saying.

  “You heard me, damn it. I’m in love with her.” I swipe roughly at my bloody lip. “I’d be with her now if she didn’t have me by the balls.”

  “Who? You’re not making any fucking sense.”

  “Chelsea,” I spit out. “Chelsea is blackmailing me.”

  Spencer gasps and steps away. Taking a seat, he swipes a hand through his hair. “Start from the beginning.”

  I tell him everything.

  Every word I speak makes me feel lighter than I have in years. I’ve kept this in with the exception of confiding in Bridget and it feels good to unload years of lies and secrets.

  “Let me help you. Put your pride aside and let me help you.”

  I nod, knowing I need his help. For the first time in a long time, I feel hopeful.

  The next day, I find myself at the park with Isabella. I look around at all the families playing, and jealousy seeps into my blood. That’s what I long for. I long to be a family. To see Isabella on the swing, being pushed, but I don’t see Chelsea’s face in this dream. It’s Bridget I see. Bridget smiling at my daughter, making her giggle. It hurts to think about it because I can’t have it. Not now. Maybe not ever.

  I watch as Isabella runs toward the slide. Her smile lights up my life. She’s always able to pull me from my somber mood. As she rushes down the slide, I watch her face. She doesn’t look like Chelsea, but she’s so familiar to me. I can’t put my finger on why. But to be honest, I probably know who her father is. There’s a long line of business associates Chelsea has flirted with over the years. No doubt one of them or maybe multiple ones had an affair with her. I don’t put it past anyone in my acquaintance to stab me in the back and sleep with my wife. I don’t want to think about it, though. Putting a name to the betrayal would be too much for me. Instead, I watch my daughter and let my love for her be enough. I feel my phone ringing. Spencer.

  “Hello,” I answer.

  “Hey,” he responds. “So, about Chelsea,” he starts and my stomach drops at her name. “I’m looking into her and your little problem, but I’m going to need a place to start. Do you have any information that might help?”

  I rake my brain for anything that could help him and then something comes to me. “Miles, my head of security, has a few files on his computer. Maybe one can be helpful,” I suggest. “Also, I had a private investigator a while back get me Chelsea’s email password. I’ll text you the info.”

  “Okay. Perfect. I have some people working on it with me. I’m sure we’ll find something real soon.’’

  Hearing him say that, I let out the air in my lungs I didn’t even know I was holding.

  “Great. Let me know if you find something.”

  “Grant,” he pauses, “do you have time to go see Dad with me later today?”

  “Yes,” I say before I can second-guess my decision.

  “About damn time,” he asserts.

  My heart drums a steady rhythm as my father answers the door to my impromptu visit. My foot taps on the ground, my nerves refusing to be pushed down. When the door opens my heart almost stops.

  “Dad.”

  All the emotion of years apart pushes its way through my lips. That one word cracks on my tongue.

  “Son.” He isn’t filled with malice or disdain. There’s a deep-seated pain I know I caused. I have a way of hurting the people I love most.

  He steps forward, crushing me in a hug. We hold on for dear life, putting years of distance at rest. We don’t pull apart and we don’t speak, but the silence is welcome. It gives us both a moment to understand the meaning of what is happening. It gives us a chance to digest that after all these years, a truce may come to pass. We might actually move on.

  He pulls away after what feels like five minutes, looking me over from head to toe. When his eyes meet mine, I see the unshed tears misting his sight.

  “It’s been too long,” he finally says.

  “It has and I’m sorry.”

  He raises his hand to stop me.

  “It’s me who should be sorry. I should have never turned my back on you.”

  I shake my head. As much as it hurt, he was right to do what he did. So I tell him as much.

  “You were right. She was everything you thought she was, but I was too blind to see until it was too late.”

  He bites his lip and inclines his head. “I was afraid that was the case.”

  “I was too stupid to listen.”

  My pride has always been my downfall.

  “You were young and in love.”

  I huff. “It was never love. I know that now.” The way I feel for Bridget makes that truth painfully obvious. I never felt this for Chelsea. What we had was lust, plain and simple. My love fo
r Bridget proves that.

  “I’m sorry, Grant. This is one time I wish I’d been wrong. I never wanted this for you.”

  I nod, having nothing to say.

  “What can I do? How can I help you?”

  I laugh, but not because what he’s saying is funny.

  “There’s nothing you can do, Dad. I’m in an unfixable position, one I put myself into.”

  He purses his lips. “Talk to me.”

  I spend the next hour filling him in on everything, from the birth of my daughter to the realization she wasn’t my blood. I fill him in on the vendetta. The greed fueled by the rage that Chelsea ignited in me, and then I tell him about Bridget. When I’m done speaking, he sits silently for a minute.

  “I don’t even know what to say.” He hangs his head. “I failed you.”

  “You didn’t. I chose this path.”

  “Didn’t I, though? I never reached out. I allowed you to leave and put this distance between us. What kind of a father does that?”

  I shrug my shoulders. “You didn’t know.”

  “Well, I do now and I intend to make up for everything.”

  “We all know what hell you’ve lived and why you stayed away.” Spencer steps forward. “Enough with the prideful bullshit, Grant. We’re family and together we will fix it.”

  I didn’t know how, but I knew together we would.

  Ring.

  Ring.

  I reach across my desk and pull my phone to my ear. “Grant Lancaster,” I answer.

  “Grant, it’s Spencer. Can you meet me at my place? We need to talk somewhere private.”

  He’s got something. That’s the only reason he wouldn’t want to talk on this line. Whatever he has must be good.

  “When should I come?”

  “Tonight at eight. I have some friends joining us. I just wanted to give you the heads-up that I had to share a bit of your dilemma. Don’t get fucking pissed.”

  I rack my brain for who and what he could be referring to, but I come up short. At this point, I don’t give a fuck who he’s commissioned if it helps the cause. I’m in.