by Tricia Jones
“No, it wasn’t that. I mean… What I mean is it was only a temporary thing anyway. Him and me. What hurt his pride had to do with business, and his lying to me about buying my cottage.”
“He lied to you?”
“Yes. Not exactly. He didn’t tell me the whole truth.”
“He was trying to salvage some family honour, no doubt, and the Board was very jumpy, not to mention the investors.” Beth leaned forward. “I don’t know if he told you, but our cousin left him one hell of a mess to sort out.”
“He didn’t say much.” Even if he had, Chloe wanted Beth to say it all again. She just wanted to keep talking about Nathan, even if it was only about business. She wanted to hear every last little thing that affected the man she loved. The man who had unlocked her heart and tossed it back to her so carelessly.
“Well.” Beth settled into “tell all” mode, scooting her chair closer and leaning her folded arms across the white linen tablecloth. Unwittingly, Chloe mirrored it. “Nathan gave Ryan this one last chance to carve out a place for himself in the company. At first he seemed to be doing okay. Finding a wonderful site for the marina hotel was the jewel in his crown, of course, and he knew it would give him big brownie points as far as pleasing Nathan was concerned. Things weren’t as simple as we were lead to believe—you’ll have to ask Nathan about that.” She sent Chloe an enigmatic smile. “Soon Ryan was up to his old tricks, which invariably involved women, and married ones at that.
“To cut a long story short, he took off when the husband of his latest conquest gave him the ‘this town isn’t big enough for the two of us’ speech, leaving a stack of problems, angry investors and half-negotiated contracts. Nathan had to step in and sort out the mess, and despite his own feelings for Ryan, he values family loyalty. When we lost our father our uncle, Ryan’s father, was very good to us. When he died he left the company to Nathan. He had his reasons, but Nathan has always felt responsible for Ryan. If Nathan didn’t tell you the truth about the purchase of your cottage… Like I said, you’ll have to ask him about that.” She reached out and covered Chloe’s hand with her own. “I wish you’d just allow him to explain them to you. I don’t think I’ve ever seen two people as miserable as the two of you.”
Chloe stared down at their clasped hands, the tears she battled threatening to erupt under Beth’s gentle coaxing. “He’s only miserable because I wouldn’t sell him the cottage. I dented his professional pride.”
“He couldn’t give a toss about the cottage, at least not from a business point of view.”
The gentle squeeze of Beth’s hand was Chloe’s undoing. “I told him to go.” It came out almost as a sob. She took a deep breath, but the tears came anyway. “I told him never to come back.”
It had been the hardest thing she’d ever done, and she’d spent the last few weeks of her life regretting every harsh word she’d said to him. He hadn’t tossed her heart back to her, she’d done that herself. She’d been unreasonable and unforgiving. Even when he’d tried to explain, she’d pushed him away. If she felt wretched now, she had nobody to blame but herself.
“Come on.” Beth eased back her chair and stood. “I’ll just settle this bill and we’ll go somewhere more private and talk.”
Ten minutes later, on a quiet bench overlooking the sea, Chloe spilled everything that was bottled up inside her. Beth was so easy to talk to, and she seemed to understand Chloe’s fears. “I never wanted to feel so deeply about anyone, then have to face the prospect of losing them. I just didn’t want to ever go through it again. I just pushed him away. He was patient and understanding and all I ever did was give him grief.”
Beth’s fingers tightened around hers. “I experienced very similar feelings after I lost my first husband,” she said. “I’d lost our father, of course, but Nathan sort of took on that role. Then, when I lost my husband, part of me said, ‘no more, never again’. Love always finds a way, though.” She touched Chloe’s hair. “Give yourself a chance to be happy.”
“I’m trying to. I don’t want to shut myself away anymore, I just want to see if I can build some sort of life for myself. A social life, I mean. God. That sounds pathetic.”
“It doesn’t.” Beth patted Chloe’s knee. “What about Nathan?”
Chloe shook her head. “It’s too late.”
“Never too late, as they say. Why don’t you take the afternoon off and go and find out.” Beth glanced at her watch. “He said something about taking his boat out, but you just might catch him before he leaves.”
“He’s here? Nathan’s here?” Everything inside her lit up.
“Came over from Cannes last night. Said he needed to tie up some loose ends.”
Chloe’s heart pounded. Was she one of them? Her mind slipped back to that day they were caught in the storm, when he’d looked deep into her eyes and warned her that he liked to tie up his own loose ends.
She had to see him. Suddenly she had to see him. She had to know.
Instinct had her clutching Beth in a grateful hug, then she was hurrying back to the restaurant’s parking lot. She turned the ignition, then sat back and exhaled. What was she doing? What would she say?
Chloe shook her head and popped the car into gear. She wouldn’t think about it, she wouldn’t rehearse anything. All she wanted was to see him. The right words would come. Whatever else, the right words would come.
She kept her promise to herself not to think about it until she arrived at Sharp’s Point and saw Nathan’s convertible on the drive. Her tummy gave a shuddering lurch. What if he told her to go? What if he had a woman with him?
Nausea threatened but she willed it back. She was here now and she’d go through with it. Whatever the cost. She would tell him how she felt and how much she cared for him.
When her third knock brought no response, she hurried around to the terrace and peered into the side window. The house seemed empty. Beth had said something about Nathan taking his boat out.
Halfway down the steps leading to the jetty, Chloe realised the cabin cruiser was gone. Her gaze searched the sea, but the heavy clouds and the threat of rain had kept water activity to a minimum. There were a couple of stalwart windsurfers, and in the distance a yacht headed inland, but no sign of Nathan.
She dropped onto the step, refusing to acknowledge the heaviness assaulting her limbs, the ominous fluttering of her stomach.
Nathan was at sea…and a storm was brewing.
The tears she wanted to shed wouldn’t flow, and she just sat on the step, the chill of stone seeping through her bones. All the fear she had ever felt was nothing compared to the one overwhelming fear for Nathan. All the hurt she had experienced, all the pain. Oh, God, she would go through it all willingly to have him in her life.
Please, she prayed, please don’t take him from me before I get the chance to explain. Before I get the chance to tell him how much I love him.
She had to get down to the harbour. Find out if Nathan’s boat was still out. If it was, she would alert the coastguard…
Then she was running up the steps, panic fuelling her speed. As she hit the last step, she heard it—the unmistakable sound of a car engine. The taxi pulled into the drive and there was no mistaking the identity of the man who stepped from the back.
Nathan flashed her a look as he paid the fare and, as the taxi drove away, walked toward where she stood frozen on the top step.
“A pleasant surprise.” His voice was cool, polite. He wore jeans and a charcoal sweater, the dark colours supporting his grim expression, the imperious aura surrounding him as he came in front of her. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”
Chloe swallowed. She was so pleased to see him she just wanted to launch herself into his arms, but when he folded those arms across his chest, anxiety took the place of relief.
“I wanted to…I had lunch with Beth and she said I should ask you about Ryan.”
“Did she now.” His expression grew even darker, his mouth a grim line. “Then we’d better go i
nside.”
He didn’t touch her. Didn’t attempt to reach for her elbow as he might once have done, or wrap those long fingers around her arm to guide her through to the living room. There was no easy nudge at the small of her back.
Without asking, Nathan poured them both a brandy. He needed it, if she didn’t. He hadn’t for a moment expected to see her again, and the sight of her running up his steps had damn near stopped his heart. She was more beautiful than ever. All that hair flowing around her shoulders, her skin flushed, those pretty brown eyes aflame—and reeling him in like some hormone-crazed adolescent.
His knees felt non too steady as he turned to her, but he wasn’t about to make a fool of himself where she was concerned. Not any more. Besides, she’d likely come to lambaste him about something.
Bet your life she hadn’t spent the last few weeks walking around like a lovesick idiot; concentration shot, appetite dulled, heart busted.
All he’d come back for was to make sure Beth had everything under control, to arrange for his boat to be serviced and made seaworthy so he could sail it back to Cannes, and to get this bloody woman well and truly out of his head—and heart.
Chloe sat on one of the sofas, fearing her legs might give way at any moment. She took the brandy Nathan offered and waited as he sat across from her.
Any hope she’d been harbouring disappeared beneath the weight of his indifference. He hadn’t touched her, had barely looked at her. He looked grim and forbidding, like he didn’t have the inclination to waste another moment of his life dealing with her. She had gotten it so wrong. The reality of the situation doused that little glimmer of hope that she actually meant something to him. Something real. Something permanent. At their last meeting, he had accused her of not wanting to deal with him, with them. Perhaps now he was counting his blessings she hadn’t. Perhaps now he was free of her, back in Cannes where a man like him belonged, enjoying a carefree lifestyle with a fun-loving and less complex woman on his arm.
“I didn’t realise Ryan left you such a mess to sort out.” She said it for something to say, something to assuage the nerves bubbling in her throat. “Beth explained some of it.”
He gave a careless shrug. “It goes with the territory. Most things are easily fixed, and memories are short when profit outweighs problems.”
There was a cold, almost callous, intonation and Chloe’s heart chilled along with it. “That’s a harsh view of people,” she managed. “It’s not always profit that’s uppermost on people’s minds, most have their very livelihoods invested. If things go wrong, it’s not just a matter of losing a few shares to them, or the difference between a new yacht or keeping their old one. It’s the very core of their survival. We’re talking homes, jobs—”
“Which brings me to an especially unsavoury aspect of my cousin’s business priorities.” He stared down at his brandy, thoughtful for a few seconds. “It appears my cousin went out of his way to ensure you had no choice but sell your cottage to Poseidon.” He looked up, his eyes still cold, calculating. “It seems the sole agency carrot was only part of his plan.”
Chloe gripped her brandy glass. “I don’t understand.”
“Ryan realised the site of your cottage was a perfect location for the new marina hotel. But you didn’t want to sell, so he made it his mission to make it so you couldn’t refuse. It appears he knew exactly the right button to press.”
“By promising me sole agency?”
Nathan shook his head. “Even more devious. My guess is he realised you were no pushover, not like many other women he had dealings with. I’m betting he tried on at least one occasion to get you into bed, but when you refused, as I assume you did…”
Pain stabbed at her chest, but she knew he was saying it to goad her.
“Ryan had to make it impossible for you to keep the cottage,” he went on. “I’m betting he suggested those premises by the waterside would make a great location for whoever got to sell the marina apartments. By that time he’d insinuated the sole agency contract was yours for the taking, and you got sucked along in his little plan.”
“You make me sound like some bimbo who couldn’t see a con job staring her in the face.”
“On the contrary, I see someone who was looking for a sound business proposition but had the misfortune of trusting a man who made a career out of getting his own way regardless. While you were perhaps reckless, acting on verbal promises alone, it’s understandable in the circumstances.”
“In the circumstances?”
“You were looking to expand, and jumped on what you considered a solid opportunity offered by a prestigious, usually honourable, company. The pity of it all is that its representative in those dealings was a contemptible bastard. Your experience reflects badly on my company, for which I hold myself entirely to blame.”
“You weren’t to know.”
“I knew my cousin.” Nathan swirled the brandy in his glass. “The blame lies with me for allowing him free rein on this project.”
Chloe edged forward on the sofa. “Why did you?”
“I considered I owed him, or rather his father. When my own father died, I took his place on the Poseidon Board. My uncle nurtured me, probably out of some misdirected loyalty to my father, who had saved my uncle from bankruptcy a few years earlier. My father almost bankrupted himself in the process, nearly lost the company. It was the stress of it, according to the doctors, that caused his health problems and ultimately his death. My uncle held himself responsible.”
Nathan took a long breath. “Anyhow, before long I began to enjoy the wheeling and dealing, made a few acquisitions of my own, which settled the Board’s initial queasiness, and helped negotiate our expansion into the European market. Ryan was a few years younger than me but showed no interest in business or the sea. His interests were more in the entertainment industry.” He threw her a smile, wry and fleeting, but it was a smile and the warmth of it spread through her.
“When my uncle died, he left his shares in the business to me with the proviso I give Ryan a chance to prove himself. My uncle left Ryan property and shares in other companies, so he wasn’t destitute, but within two years he’d drunk and fornicated his way through it all. He spent the last eight months in and out of an alcohol abuse centre, and when he came out the last time assured me he had learned his lesson. I wanted to believe it for my uncle’s sake, and I thought maybe the time was right to make good on my promise. Apparently, my judgment was off.”
“You couldn’t know that. Perhaps he really did try.”
“Don’t stick up for him, Chloe.”
“I wasn’t. I just think that—”
“Who bid against you at the auction? Who bumped the price up to virtually double the market value for a property that needed as much spent on it to get it habitable? Who made it so you had no option but to sell your home to finance that new, dilapidated property?”
“Ryan?”
“None other. Then before he could make good on the sole agency agreement, if indeed he ever intended to, he was chased out of town by the irate husband of his latest conquest.”
“He wanted me to be financially strapped so I’d sell him the cottage?” Chloe said it almost to herself, trying to make all the pieces slip into place. “He said he wanted it for employee accommodation, or at least he implied that, and all the time he intended to tear it down for the marina hotel.”
“And a nice little sideline,” Nathan added. “A lucrative agreement involving fishing rights, which would have kept him in easy street for a few years.”
Chloe sighed, heavily. “There was never any guarantee I would have been awarded the sole agency contract, was there?”
“No. It would have needed to go forward for the Board’s approval.”
She kept her eyes on his for a few seconds longer. “What sort of a fool am I? Here’s me thinking I’m some astute businesswoman, and all the time…” She drank the rest of her brandy in one and let the heat of it salve her throat, sending much nee
ded warmth into her chest. “I appreciate you telling me this.”
Nathan scoffed. “I intend doing much more than telling you.” He leaned forward and fixed her with a steady gaze. The heat from him, the scent of him, made every nerve ending she had tingle and pulse. “My company will reimburse the amount embezzled from you. We’ve had a market appraiser reassess the value of the auctioned premises, and he’s confirmed the guide price figure at the time of your purchase. There’s just a couple of legal papers to sign and I can have the cheque in your account in a matter of hours.”
“I can’t… I mean, you don’t have to do that.”
“I do.” Nathan raked long fingers through his hair. “You could’ve lost everything.”
I already have, she thought, watching him. Those loose ends did involve her, but only, it seemed, in matters of business. She was just another one of his cousin’s messes.
Really, she should be grateful. It was proving hard to keep everything on an even keel. Her finances were stretched to the limit with renovations and, as she’d decided to stay in the cottage and rent out the flat, she’d applied for an extension to her bank loan to get the flat ready for occupation. She had yet to hear if her application had been successful, a factor which had caused her a few sleepless nights, and now here was Nathan throwing her a lifeline. She really should be grateful.
She couldn’t summon gratitude. What she wanted from him, the only thing she wanted from him, had nothing, absolutely nothing, to do with business or finances.
What she wanted was him. She’d known it from the moment he bent down to retrieve those auction papers. However tightly she’d locked her feelings away so she wouldn’t, couldn’t, be hurt again, from that first moment she’d caught him staring at her, she’d known. That’s why she’d fought him so hard.
Only a short while ago she’d sat on the steps, searched the sea, and realised beyond a doubt that some things in life were worth the risk. Were worth the pain of losing. He was worth that pain, that risk. And she would take it.
