by Nicole Snow
“Um, I mean...honestly? As much as you can love a guy who runs over your heart in his fancy Tesla, stops to slather it in that expensive scotch he likes and lights it on fire, then backs up and runs over it again.”
Her laugh is too contagious. I can’t help smiling back as she says, “Relationships are hard. We’ve all been there, and someday you’ll be there again. It’s called commitment because you see it through, even when it hurts.”
“But if I read the letter first, at least I’ll know what he’s thinking.”
“You’re all he’s thinking about,” she says quickly.
“He said that?” My eyes go wide.
“He didn’t need to. He’s grumpier than usual. He never leaves the office. I’m not even sure he’s eating unless Grayson shoves a pile of meat in his face. I know he’s lost a few pounds.”
I smile. “We only ate when I got hungry.”
She raises a knowing eyebrow at me.
A moment of silence passes.
“You know where he is now, don’t you?” she asks.
“Um, right. I left my keycard for the office at the penthouse the day I walked out.”
She digs in her purse and hands me a sleek white card. “Use mine.”
“Thanks.” I stand. “Should we ride to the office together?”
“And be accused of more meddling?” She winks at me. “I wouldn’t dare.”
“Okay.” I plan to move, but my feet are glued to the ground. “Are you sure? He was pretty clear about how much he didn’t love me last time.”
“He was talking from his fool head. I’m confident his tongue has had ample time to listen to his heart.”
“So, if I go in and he doesn’t—”
“If I’m misleading you, you’re welcome to hold it against me forever. Also, I’ll buy you a world-class art studio with my personal endorsement. But I’m not wrong. Why would I be?” she says with a wink.
I want her confidence someday—especially now, when I’m biting my bottom lip.
“Wishful thinking?” I venture.
“My only wish is seeing my grandsons happy, and you. Go.” She motions me on with both hands.
I clasp the white card in my hands and force my legs to work.
I’m terrified and elated.
I don’t think she would have tried quite so hard if she wasn’t sure she was right. But I’ll never forget what he said.
He doesn’t love me.
He’s not the marrying type, and if he were, I’m not the One.
God. I hope she’s right, and I hope I’m strong enough for this.
The whole drive there, I’m ten seconds from taking a detour and heading home. If he’s so torn up about it and cares so much, why hasn’t he come to me?
I keep reminding myself of my conversation with Beatrice. She thinks he loves me. It sounds like his brother thinks he loves me, too.
Am I about to make a huge fool of myself?
I park in the company garage. “You can do this, Paige. If he tells you to go to hell, you haven’t lost anything.”
I stop at the cafè downstairs and order a black drip coffee and a sandwich bursting with curried chicken and bacon. I wave Beatrice’s card in front of the Brandt Ideas elevator.
It dings open.
Nerves swirl so hard my stomach lurches. I wait too long to step out and the doors close again.
Inhale. Exhale. Do this.
It’s a little surreal stepping into a sleek, quiet hallway I haven’t been in for weeks. I squeeze my eyes shut and move one foot in front of the other, stopping at his office door.
“You can do this,” I whisper one last time, even as I’m becoming a human ice sculpture.
Hello, biggest risk of my life.
With my breath stalled in my lungs, I pinch the knob and push the door open.
28
The Blueprints (Ward)
“What are the other options?” Nick asks.
“Well, we could—” The sound of a turning doorknob distracts me, and I look over his shoulder.
I’m expecting an interruption.
Definitely not the kind involving a blond, voluptuous, green-eyed angel who ignites my being with a soul-shock stronger than any booze invented.
I blink once. Twice. Three times.
Still there.
Fuck, she’s real.
She stands in the doorway of my office, wearing the same sassy smirk she used when she’d bring me death by sugar disguised as coffee and decorated with handcuffs. And there’s something nervous written on her too.
Insanity.
Seeing Paige Holly again winds me up in a way I haven’t felt since I was stomping around overseas in the military dodging sniper rounds.
That ambrosia bottom lip pulls into her mouth.
I wish it were my teeth there instead. For a second, I have half a mind to storm over and sign my name on her lips with my tongue.
Only, I’d be the universe’s biggest idiot to scare her away again.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt.” Her voice is so quiet, an octave higher than usual as she gives us a fluttery wave.
Interrupting? I’ve never wanted to see anyone so much in my life.
I search for words to say it, my brain short-circuited, but my mouth isn’t working.
“We were just wrapping up, and he was leaving.” I lance my brother with a stare that promises a lifetime of ass kickings if he doesn’t pick his butt up and move.
Thankfully, he’s a good brother, deep down.
With a knowing smirk, Nick claps his folder shut and walks past her, muttering an “awesome to see you again, Paige.” He gives me one last raised-eyebrow look before closing the door on his way out.
It’s carpe diem, or carpe die.
She takes a step forward. If I sat up any straighter, I think I’d dislocate a disc. Her hands move to her hips and her smirk blossoms into a grin that turns my heart into a poached egg.
“Mr. Brandt, I heard you wanted to see me?”
My fucking lip curls in a lopsided smile.
She’s coy, but formal. Is she flirting, or is she here for something unrelated to—well, my miserable sleepless nights?
Either way, I told Ross Winthrope I’d humiliate myself a million times for this girl, didn’t I?
Here’s my chance.
“I’m so sorry, Paige,” I try to say, but she’s already talking.
“Ward, I’m sorry. I should have—”
We both stop in mid-word collision.
“What did you do?” I ask.
“—I overreacted!” she throws out at the same time.
I close the space between us. We’re toe to toe.
“Let me go first?”
She nods.
“I’m a clusterfuck human being,” I start. “My issues with my parents—”
Her hand moves to my face, silencing me with a single stroke. “Aren’t your fault. I’ll just have to make not trusting me impossible.”
I bend down and plant my lips on her head.
“You already are impossible, but sweetheart, let me finish. My family issues are as resolved as they’ll ever be. Between you, me, and this room, I’ve been talking to a Swiss shrink ever since you walked out.”
Her mouth drops and her eyes fill with awe.
“They poisoned me, Paige, and I’m working like hell to draw out the venom. I was terrified I’d be a monster just like them. I thought I’d never be able to make you happy. But after spending time without you, the only thing I want in the world—the only thing I’ll ever truly need—is your happiness. Preferably with me. So here’s the big question. Can you ever forgive me?”
For a killing moment, she’s quiet, her face set like a mask.
“Of course! The whole fake engagement thing ruffled my deepest fears, too. The crap with Austin left me bruised, and then when I heard you say you didn’t love me and would never marry me after we—well, after we—”
I fold my arms around her and pull her to
me. I love how remembering our passion renders her speechless.
“We made love, Paige, and I started talking stupid. Guess what matters more? What always will as long as I still have a pulse?” I smile into the heated green pools of her eyes, trying not to tremble with the need to fall in.
She closes her eyes and sighs like a whimper.
“Ward—making love? Is that what you’d call it? I felt played.” Her jaw clenches and she turns her head, those green gems so conflicted. “I thought our fun was just convenient.”
My grip on her tightens, heavy as hell with denial.
If only I could rip my chest open and show her my heart.
The wild, drumming throb of my pulse.
The invisible fire that was never there, never my whole life, not before I tasted a girl I learned to love indescribably more than I ever hated her.
This is painful for her, though, and it’s my fucking fault.
I press my forehead to hers.
“Listen. The sex was so good because you intoxicate me, woman. Can’t keep my hands off you, and even when we’re kissing and touching, I always need more. I don’t regret a damn thing. Do you?”
She shakes her head so intently her hair tumbles down her shoulders in a beautiful gold cascade.
“After the way it went down, I wanted to, but I couldn’t. You’ll always be a Wardhole, but hate you? No. I just hated that I wasn’t enough to be your everything. I...I didn’t want to be pushed away again.”
The tears in her eyes dismember me.
“Pushing you away—I was trying to protect you from ending up hurt by me or my bastard parents. Paige, you are everything. You’re breath for my soul. You helped finally fix things. I put my parents in their place and I came clean with Winthrope, and even if that was for me, for the company, it was always for you.”
“Yeah, Beatrice told me. I kinda hoped she was just buying you sympathy since that’s the whole reason we went through all of this.”
I shake my head.
“He would have found out sooner or later. I couldn’t lie any longer. Not after what I did to you. I let him know it didn’t matter because I’d already lost the most important thing in my life.”
“What’s that?” she asks playfully, a sass I’ll always adore behind her tears.
“Do you have to ask?” I answer her with my starving lips.
Fuck, I’ve missed her, every seething second we’re joined like twin fires. Her tongue brushes the seam between my lips, and her mouth opens for me. I caress the inside of her mouth.
She even tastes like home. Everything I’ve ever been seeking. The stuff of right and wrong and forever.
Her leg curls around my thigh, and I’m so hard I could be arrested for packing heat in the building.
My kiss deepens, trying to brand her.
It’s all I can do not to take her right here on the table. I place my palm under her leg and hike her other leg up around me. She tightens one arm behind my neck, running her other hand through my hair frantically without ever breaking the kiss.
I walk to my desk with the little devil’s mouth pressed to mine and warmth pressed to my hardness. I land in my office chair, barely pulling away from her, gasping for dear life.
She lays her head down on my shoulder, joining me on the chair, and I run my fingers through her silky hair.
“You still haven’t said it.” She takes a couple of ragged breaths.
“Never said what?”
She glares at me.
Oh. I’m such a dumbass.
I’m in my office with a beautiful woman I hurt in my lap, and she has to remind me what I owe her.
Is there any help for me?
I hope so, because I can’t fucking stand losing her again.
I tighten my arms around her until I can’t without hurting one of us. We lock eyes. I watch how the light fills her gaze, but only I can make her glow.
“Paige Holly. I love you so much it hurts to breathe,” I grind out, one heaving word at a time, my whole heart pushing it out. “I know what I am without you—an intolerable curmudgeon, haunting this place and making everyone miserable. The three weeks you were gone felt like three years on a bed of rusty nails—you can imagine how that makes me Mr. Congeniality—and it showed me I can live, but I can’t live well.”
She laughs with this hitched, adorable flutter of her chest.
“Bad news, Wardhole. I can’t live without you.”
My hand races to her cheek, tracing her face. I want every inch of her pressed to mine. I’m greedy as hell and I need her closer.
“Yes, you can. You’ve been doing it,” I say.
Sensing my need, she matches my urgency, sliding her perfection against my skin.
“Not really. Today’s the first time I left my apartment since—”
“God, I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she whispers.
But it’s not. I demolished her and I might spend the rest of my life making up for it.
We spend twenty breathless minutes fused together, locked in depths so far beyond raw desire I didn’t know they existed.
Then the door squeaks open and I’m scowling at the intruder.
“Oh, crap. Sorry,” Susan hisses. “I, uh, just came to tell you I have the interviews scheduled for your new EA.”
Paige sits up. “But I’m your EA? Or...never mind. I haven’t shown up in three weeks.”
My smile comes on like whiplash. She still wants to be my EA?
“I’ll come back later!” Susan shuts the door.
“Have you given any thought to the proposal I sent you?”
“Proposal? Oh—the envelope?”
“Yeah. That.”
“Well, I was actually waiting a year to read it,” she says shyly.
“A year?” My jaw drops.
“So I’d be immune to you and all your charms. There’s a lot to protect myself against.” She smiles, running her fingers through my hair.
I stroke my hand through her hair in turn.
“Think you’ll be immune to me now?” I growl, ready to accept one answer.
Her kiss banishes every sane thought in my head but one.
“I’m addicted. Lucky you,” she whispers, before my mouth attacks her again.
Me too, babe.
Me damn too.
“We have to open the package. It has your compensation for me being a very large pain in your very sweet ass,” I tell her.
She lifts off my lap and puts some sorely needed space between us. I keep my arms around her hips, unwilling to let her wander far.
“You’re not trying to buy me, are you, Ward?”
“Never. I just want you to be happy. It’s a proposal—and not the fake marrying kind. You can turn it down if you want, but you’ll make me crazy if you do.”
She laughs. “I’ll have to read it first.”
I kiss her cheeks and then move to her lips. “I’m coming with.”
“Why?”
“Because I never want you out of my sight again.”
Laughing, she leans up on her toes to hug my neck. “I love you.”
And I’m over six feet of stone-cold grinning fool.
“Careful. That’s the first time you’ve said it. Only a billion times to go before we’re even,” I tell her.
“You’re so terrible,” she whispers, her smile drawing out her dimples.
“You made me say it.”
The kernel of truth in her giggle makes me know she’s been waiting a long time to hear those words from my clueless mouth.
Never again, Paige.
Those words will be my daily mantra.
I open the door for my girl, and once she’s inside the car, I dive in and pull her onto my lap.
“So clingy today.” She grins at me like a cat that got the cream. “I didn’t know you could cling.”
“And you mind?” I raise an eyebrow.
“No,” she mouths, a sunburst exploding on her cheeks.
&nb
sp; “I’m making up for lost time. You’ve been gone far too long,” I whisper.
“Yeah, well, I kinda know the feeling.” She kisses me again.
Little minx. Nothing about her expression hides how bad she’s missed the fire we started.
“I’m pumped you guys are back together!” Reese claps her hands together in the front seat, whipping her head around to look back at us.
Paige pulls away from me with an awkward blush.
Moment ruined.
“And I’m getting 'pumped' for a new driver,” I groan.
“Be nice to Reese,” Paige says, shaking a finger.
“Sorry. I’m just over the freaking moon to see some good news,” Reese says. “It’s been heavy around here.”
Big fat hairy understatement.
And there’s definitely a heavy load on my mind during the drive back to Paige’s place—or am I just that obsessed with her emerald eyes?
She doesn’t get to walk when we arrive. I hoist her up and carry her upstairs, over my shoulder.
“You know this is totally unnecessary and completely ridiculous, right?”
“Don’t act like you don’t know what happens when you show up to my office in heels. I’ve just got you back, woman, and I’m not leaving anything to fate,” I tell her.
“Oh, Ward, you’re such a drama hound.”
“With such strong arms. Remember, you’re here forever,” I say dead seriously.
She beats playfully on my back.
Hell, I didn’t think I could grin so much in one day.
When we’re at her door, I set her down. She unlocks it and we walk inside, hand in hand.
“Where’s the envelope? I need to see you open it.”
“It’s in my room. I hid it away so I wouldn’t have to look at it anymore.”
I stop and stare. She’s been tortured these past few weeks, and I was her inquisitor.
“I’m so sorry, Paige.”
“It’s okay.”
“It’s not,” I fire back. “I never meant any of it. I just—”
She turns to face me, covering my mouth with her hand. “It happened, it’s over, and we can’t dwell on it. We’re together now, and that’s what matters, right?”
“I love you, Paige.” I kiss her forehead. “You’ll never have to prompt me to say it again.”
