by Karen Booth
“I’m not doing a damn thing to help my sister ruin her life. Believe me, some day you’ll thank me.” He opened up his laptop and stared at the screen.
She sat back, folded her arms across her chest, crossed her legs. She wagged her foot, brainstorming a new approach.
“Is there something else?” he asked.
“Nope.” She shook her head with fierce determination. “I’m not leaving until we talk this out. I don’t care if I have to sit here all day.” She dug her phone out of her pocket. “I can do a remarkable amount of work sitting right here.”
“Mr. Langford?” Adam’s assistant’s voice broke in over the intercom.
“Yes?”
“I’m so sorry to interrupt, but I have an urgent phone call from Samuel Haskins. He says it can’t wait.”
Anna grimaced. Sam Haskins had held a seat on the LangTel board of directors longer than anyone, even before Anna had been born. He was big on propriety and manners. He would never ask Adam to interrupt a meeting unless it were a life-or-death situation.
Adam picked up the phone. “Put the call through.” He tapped his pen on the desk nervously, his forehead creasing. Right then she could see how much things weighed on him. It was the same sort of look her dad had when things at work were a bear. “Sam. What can I do for you?”
His sights darted to Anna after a few seconds. “So we were right all along.”
What in the world could they be talking about? And did it have something to do with her? Why else would he look at her like that?
Adam nodded in agreement, but there was anger in his eyes. “Yes, of course. Whatever you think is the best course of action, but clearly we have to stop these guys. Now. I’ll clear my schedule and we’ll get on it right away. It’s all hands on deck.” He glanced at his watch. “Yes. I’ll see you in an hour.”
“What’s going on?” she asked, trying to disguise the worry in her voice.
“Your boyfriend? Jacob? He’s heading up a secret investment group. They’re the ones buying up LangTel stock.”
Her heart felt as if it didn’t know whether to leap to action or keel over. “What are you talking about? That can’t be right. I just saw him last night.” I’ve been seeing him every night. This couldn’t be right.
“Jacob Lin and a bunch of guys with a lot of money are preparing for a hostile takeover of LangTel. He’s trying to destroy the company our father built, Anna. He’s trying to destroy our family’s livelihood.”
“That can’t be right.” Her eyes darted all over his office, desperate for some sign that this was all a bad dream. “I’ll go talk to him. Right now. This must be a mistake.”
“It’s not a mistake. Sam has the evidence. And if you were looking for proof that Jacob is scum, here it is.”
* * *
Anna had never just shown up at Jacob’s office. Not once. But here she was, standing in front of his desk after storming in, eyes wild, chest heaving, looking as though she was about to explode. What a relief that he’d put the bag from Tiffany’s in his desk drawer. From the look on Anna’s face, this was not the time to propose marriage.
“I’m going to have to call you back,” he said into the phone, not waiting for a response before he hung up.
“Please tell me it’s not true,” she blurted, a distinct tone of panic in her voice.
Oh, no. His stomach sank as if he’d just swallowed an anvil. “Tell you what’s not true?”
“You and your investment group, Jacob. Please tell me it’s not true. Please tell me that Adam got some bad information. Because right now I feel like I’m going to be sick.”
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His worst nightmare had just come true, but he couldn’t lie to her. He’d already endured the guilt of not coming out with it in the first place, or even better, not starting the endeavor at all. “Please let me explain.”
All color drained from her face. “Oh, my God. It is true.” Her voice was fragile and delicate, as if she’d just been broken in half. It killed him to hear her sound like that and he was responsible. “I can’t even believe this. Did you sleep with me just so you could get information about LangTel? Because Adam thinks you did. Has this whole thing been a big lie?”
“No. Of course not. How could you think that?” He stepped out from behind his desk, but she shunned him with a quick turn of her shoulder. The physical pain of her rejection resonated deep in his body, but he couldn’t deny that he had it coming. “Adam knows about us?”
“Yes, Jacob. I went to him this morning to tell him. Do you know why?”
He shook his head. He couldn’t imagine what had finally prompted her to share the thing they’d been hiding all this time.
“Because I hated the sneaking around. I wanted to give us a chance, a real chance. And now I find out that you were trying to destroy my family’s company all along.” The pain of the betrayal was clear as day on her face. She was shaking like a leaf.
He wanted to pull her into his snug embrace and make everything okay, fix the massive problem he’d created, except he couldn’t. It wouldn’t help anything. He’d messed up, in tragic fashion. “Will you please sit down so I can explain everything?”
“What could you possibly say that’s going to make me feel any better?”
Again, she was right. “Look. I know now that I shouldn’t have started this, but the reality is that I never in a million years imagined that you and I would become involved the way we have. That came completely out of left field.”
“And it would’ve been so awkward to roll over in bed and whisper in my ear that you were trying to take over the company my dad built from nothing. That definitely would’ve put a damper on the sex, huh?”
Every word out of her mouth drove the knife in his heart a little deeper, but he didn’t dare flinch. He deserved it all. “I went on the counteroffensive the morning after we first made love. That’s what I was doing out in the garage before we left. I called my closest friend in the group to try to convince them to back off.”
“So what happened? Why are you guys still trying to do this?”
“We aren’t trying to do anything. They ousted me. Yesterday. They were tired of me pushing so hard to end the LangTel takeover.”
“Does that mean you have no more pull with them? They’re really just going to go ahead and do it without you?” She sighed and stared out the window. “This is getting worse by the minute.”
“They say they’re going to. I don’t really have a way of knowing. Believe me, I’ve been racking my brain, trying to come up with a way to stop them.”
Her jaw tensed. She shook her head. “What was the plan, Jacob? Tell me the plan you had before I came along. If you want any chance of redeeming yourself in any way to me, tell me the plan.”
“We planned to get enough stock to take over the board of directors and oust Adam as CEO.”
“Oust Adam or oust the CEO?”
“Is there a difference?”
“In six months, there will be.”
He almost wanted to laugh at his own short-sightedness. Of course. The board of directors was probably already trying to oust Adam. He hadn’t thought about that. “Do they already have a successor picked?”
“You’re looking at her.”
It was as if all air in the room stopped moving. Anna? CEO? What had he done? “You?”
“Yes. Me. My dad gave his blessing before he died, but they had to put Adam in place first because that had always been the plan. I’m supposed to be the next LangTel CEO. It’s my dream job. Not that it’s going to happen now.”
No. Good God, no. He’d set a plan in motion to take away the dream job of the woman he loved. “Please let me try to find a way to fix this.”
“You just said you’ve been trying to fix it for over a month. How
are you going to magically make it happen now? And how am I supposed to trust you? We’ve been involved for weeks now, and the whole time you knew there were plans to dismantle my family’s company. The company my dad spent decades building. You were best friends with my brother, Jacob. You stayed at our house. And now you want to destroy us?”
“I never wanted to destroy you. Never.”
“Yeah, well, whether it was your intention or not, that’s exactly what you’re doing. You’re destroying me and I can’t sit around and watch it happen. Which is exactly why I never want to see you again. Ever.” Her lip quivered. Was it because she was so angry? Or did it kill her to say those words as much as it killed him to hear them?
“I love you, Anna. I love you more than I ever thought it was possible to love someone. Please don’t do this. I need you.”
A single tear leaked from the corner of her eye. “You love me? Why do you decide to tell me that now? When you have to save your own hide? Why couldn’t you tell me last night when I was making you dinner for your birthday or singing you a song or...” Her eyes clamped shut. “Or when I was telling you that stupid story about the ridiculous letters. Do you have any idea how betrayed I feel right now?”
Again he was overwhelmed by his need to touch her, but everything in her body language said she would absolutely kill him if he took another step closer. “You have the right to feel all of this. I made a huge mistake and I’m so sorry. I just want the chance to make it better.”
“I’m sorry, Jacob. I can’t give you another chance at anything. Ever.”
“But what about my feelings for you? Does that mean nothing?”
She stood a little straighter and looked him square in the eye. “Actually, it would have meant everything to me if you hadn’t betrayed me. Because I love you too and now I have to figure out a way to fall out of love with you.”
She loves me. The full repercussions of his one vengeful act came at him with full force. He was about to lose the one thing, the one person, he truly cared about—Anna. “Then don’t do it. Give me the chance to make it right.”
“I can’t. You took my love and threw it away. And that means we’re done.”
Twelve
Optimism. Anna would’ve done nearly anything to cultivate a single optimistic thought as she stalked through the LangTel halls to her office. The satisfaction she’d once felt about working here was gone. LangTel was officially embroiled in a battle for survival, against a threat that was impossible to defeat because there was no real way to build a stronghold. No one knew who the mysterious big investor was, and as much digging as Adam and Anna did, they came up with virtually nothing.
The fact that Anna had slept with the enemy only made her life more miserable. Luckily, Adam had remained discreet about that fact, but it had made Thanksgiving especially tense. She prayed he wouldn’t say something about it to their mother. It was bad enough that Evelyn Langford had to know about the threat of takeover—LangTel was the bulk of her sizable nest egg, after all.
For the moment, Anna’s days were spent jumping through hoops for the board of directors, which had gotten her exactly nowhere, as they were likewise all consumed with the threat of a takeover. It all added up to one thing—her dream job felt more out of reach than ever.
And then there was her personal life, which in many ways felt more like her personal death. Having gone from the high of being with Jacob to the low of discovering what he’d been doing behind her back the entire time they were together had been far worse than jarring. It felt as if she’d been pushed off a cliff with no warning and most certainly nowhere soft to land.
Anna’s assistant, Carrie, filed into her office with a cup of coffee. “Is there anything else I can get you this morning, Ms. Langford?”
“No, thank you.” Anna settled in at her desk for the ten minutes of her day she actually looked forward to—reading the newspaper. At this point, she clung to the little things that made her happy. There weren’t many.
“Oh, before I forget, Ms. Louis was looking for you this morning.”
Anna glanced at her watch. “Can you buzz her and let her know that now is a good time?”
“Certainly.” Carrie closed the door quietly behind her.
Anna unfolded the business section and was immediately sickened by the headline beneath the fold. Sunny Side had sold. To a rival telecom, no less.
She quickly scanned the article, her heart pounding, half out of shock and the other half out of anger. Somewhere in there was sadness, but she hadn’t given in to that yet. It said that the sale was orchestrated by Jacob. So much for the big delay on their patent application. Was that another of his lies? Carefully crafted to lure her in? To what end, she did not know—seek revenge on Adam, get inside information on LangTel. Jacob had everything to gain and she’d had everything to lose. She simply hadn’t known it because she’d trusted him—with business, with her heart and her body. Bastard. Just when he couldn’t have possibly betrayed her in any worse a fashion, he had to go and twist the knife in her back. First he’d tried to destroy her family, then he yanked away her most promising business deal.
So that was it. Jacob really had moved on, in every way imaginable. The thought made tears sting her eyes, but she had to face the truth. There hadn’t been so much as a peep from Jacob since they’d broken up. Not a single word. She’d spent nights wide awake, wondering why it had all gone so wrong. Why was the perfect guy also the one who most hated her family? Why was he the man who had so easily betrayed her? It felt like some cruel joke, a tragic twist of fate.
And Jacob? He apparently wasn’t quite so torn up by what had happened, moving ahead with the Sunny Side deal. Nope. He’d gone right back to work, making his millions. Perfect.
Her eyes drifted to the picture accompanying the headline. Jacob had that smile on his face, the one he wasn’t quick to share, the one you had to coax out of him because he played everything so close to the vest. She missed that smile so much that it made her ache. And it was a longing for more than just him, it was a longing for the way she’d been with him—happy. It was also a longing for the possibilities of “us.” Between her dad’s illness, death and the company’s troubles, the future had seemed bleak and uncertain for over a year. The notion of “us” had lifted her out of that state, but it hadn’t lasted long.
Holly rapped on her office door. “Carrie said you have a minute.”
Anna shuffled the newspaper aside and collected herself. “Yes. Of course. What’s up?”
“I wanted to ask if you can sit in on my meeting tomorrow morning. Everybody seems to react more favorably to bad news when you’re in the room, and there’s a lot of bad news.” Holly sidled in and plopped a muffin down on Anna’s desk. “Here. I brought you some breakfast so you can’t say no.”
“Is that blueberry?” Anna scrunched her nose. The aroma had overtaken her office with an artificial, off-putting smell.
“Yes. Isn’t it your favorite?”
Anna shook her head. “Usually. I guess I’m not very hungry this morning. Thank you, though. I appreciate it.”
“Let me get this out of your way then.” Holly reached for the offending pastry and marched it out of Anna’s office. She returned seconds later. “Are you feeling okay today? You look a bit pale.”
Anna hadn’t been feeling well at all—tired and blah. Probably a bug of some sort. December was right about time for the first cold of the season. “I’m okay. Just a little run-down.”
“Yeah, I hear that. I have the worst PMS right now.”
PMS. A thought flashed through Anna’s mind—when was the last time she’d had her period? Miami? That was two months ago. “I know how that goes.”
“So you’re in on this meeting? Please say yes.” Holly smiled and batted her lashes.
“Sure thing,” Anna agreed, now distra
cted by the new direction in which her malaise seemed to be pointing.
Holly left and Anna immediately pulled up the period tracker app on her phone. The notification was right in front of her seconds later. Forty-two days late.
“I’m never late,” she muttered to herself, her brain slowly catching up. She pinched the bridge of her nose. No. There’s no way.
She shook her head and dismissed it as silly. She couldn’t be that. She couldn’t be pregnant. It had to be stress. She hadn’t just been under a lot of it, she’d been buried in it. Sucking in a deep breath, she ushered foolish thoughts out of her head and got to work.
A half hour later, her stomach rumbled and growled. The muffin might have been disgusting smelling, but she probably should’ve eaten it. She rolled her chair over to the office credenza where Carrie had stashed some snacks. A protein bar seemed like a good idea, but the moment she tore open the package and got a whiff of chocolate and peanut butter, her stomach lurched again.
It has to be the stomach flu. I should go home.
She packed up her laptop, put on her coat, and stepped out of her office. “You know, Carrie, I think I’m coming down with something. I’m going to work from home for the rest of the day, but it’d be great if you could run interference for me, at least a little. Just tell people to send me an email if they need me.”
“And Mr. Langford? What do you want me to tell him if he asks?” Carrie cringed. Adam had bitten her head off last week. It was hard to blame him at this point.
“You’re welcome to tell him I’m sick.” No use sugarcoating it.
One of the company drivers took Anna back to her apartment, but she asked him to stop by the pharmacy on the way there. She dashed in, grabbed some pain reliever and seltzer. The line at the register was long, which only gave her more time to think about the improbable. Was she? The doctor had told her it was a virtual impossibility. Virtual. That didn’t mean an absolute zero.
She turned back for a pregnancy test, admonishing herself for giving in to these ridiculous thoughts. As if she could be pregnant by her brother’s biggest enemy, the man who’d started the war on her family’s corporation. The entire idea was ludicrous.
