“Yeah, well, you know Valentin,” Sofia said, interrupting his thoughts. “All I can say is Galen had better keep his wits about him. If he isn’t careful, Nagy will be clipping his playboy ways next.”
Ilya forced a laugh. “Then you’d be next if we’re going in birth order,” he warned.
“Let’s not go there,” Sofia said hastily. “Well, if there’s nothing else...?”
He knew that once he turned the conversation to her private life, she’d end their call.
“No, but thanks again.”
When Ilya hung up, he made a note to send her a case of her favorite wine. Then he turned his attention to tracking Jen down. With today’s social media, how hard could it be, right?
Harder than he thought, he discovered. If she had any social media accounts she kept them very private. Ilya found himself looking up several old acquaintances to track her down. He was on the verge of giving up and calling in a private investigator when one of her sorority sisters replied to his private message, gushing about how excited Jen would be to hear from him again.
Apparently his ex was living in a trailer park outside of Las Vegas. He looked at his watch. It was a two-hour flight to Vegas. Plotting the flight plan in his head he figured he could be there before dark.
In the next instant he was on his feet and heading back out to the car. It was time to put a stop to Jen’s cruelty once and for all, and win Yasmin back in the process.
Seventeen
He pulled his rental to a stop outside a single-wide trailer that stood out from its neighbors due to its obvious signs of neglect. The paint was peeling, weeds were growing all over the lot and one of the windows was broken and covered with a piece of cardboard. But he didn’t waste a moment getting out the car and going to knock on the door.
“Well, hello there, handsome,” Jen said as she opened the door. The sour smell of alcohol wafted off her. It was overpowering and turned his stomach.
He looked at her in shock. The years hadn’t been kind, but then, neither had she, so he couldn’t be entirely surprised. She still wore her hair the same way, but it was uncombed and looked like it hadn’t seen shampoo in several days. Her skin held a dingy tone. And she was unmistakably drunk, or high, or both. But he wasn’t here to enquire about her welfare.
“Why did you do it?” he asked straight out.
“I’m fine, thank you. And you?” she answered with a sly smile. “It’s been a while.”
“Let’s not beat around the bush, Jen. Why did you do it? Why hurt Yasmin more than you already did?”
She met his eyes and for a second he thought he saw a flicker of bravado there. But then she averted her gaze, her entire body sagging in surrender.
“You’d better come in,” she said sullenly.
He couldn’t think of anything he’d rather do less, but if he was to get the answers he needed he’d have to accept her less than gracious invitation.
“Take a seat,” she said, gesturing to a sagging couch strewn with tabloid magazines and newspapers. The coffee table was covered in empty wine bottles and dirty glasses.
“No, thank you. I’ll stand.”
Jen reached for a packet of cigarettes and put one in her mouth, lighting it with shaking hand. She took a long draw and blew out a steady stream of smoke, obviously in no rush to talk. Clearly she needed a reminder as to why he was here.
“I know you’re behind the emails. What I don’t know is why.”
She shrugged and took another drag on her cigarette. “She deserved it.”
“I beg your pardon?” His voice was icy cold.
“Why should she have you when I couldn’t? Living the high life when all I have is this,” she said, vaguely gesturing toward the room. “I saw the write-up about your wedding in one of these magazines. To be honest, when I heard you’d married her I couldn’t believe it. Her, of all people. She was the reason you left me. I don’t see why she gets to have you in the end. It pissed me off. So I sent her a little message. No crime in that.”
He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. She was obviously in an altered state, but her hatred had a cold, hard logic to it. “What you did was threatening and a criminal nuisance.”
She looked at him again; this time he saw fear in her eyes. “You can’t prove anything.”
“I can, Jen. It’s easy to prove those emails to Yasmin and the Hardacres came from you. It’s how I found you.”
She’d been a clever woman in college. How on earth had she come to this?
“So, you found me. What are you going to do with me now? I can think of a few things.” She ground out her half-smoked cigarette, took a step closer to him and reached out a hand to touch him. “We used to be so good together. We can be again.”
Ilya fought down the bile that rose in his throat. He wrapped his fingers around her wrist and very deliberately removed her hand from his body.
“That is never going to happen.”
“What a shame,” she said with a flippant toss of her head.
“You’re going to face charges for this.”
“Oh, says who?”
“Me. I’ve already lodged a complaint with my local police and forwarded them all the emails you sent to my wife.” He placed special emphasis on the last two words. “I also contacted the Hardacres. They’re cooperating with the investigation, too.”
“Always the upstanding citizen, aren’t you?” she sneered.
“Look, I let you get away with bullying Yasmin once before. I’m not doing it again. The way I see it, we can do this the hard way or the easy way.”
“I always liked it hard,” she said with a sleazy smile. He ignored her, wondering what he’d ever seen in her in the first place.
“Look, one way or the other you’re going to face charges, but if you want leniency, you’ll need to cooperate with me. It’s is entirely up to you.”
She sniffed and reached for another cigarette. “So what’s in it for me? What is it that you expect me to do?”
“For a start, you will send a written apology to my wife for your recent and past actions. You will also explain to Esme Hardacre, in person, why you sabotaged my wife’s contract.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll make sure you face the full weight of the law and I’ll ask the police to file additional charges against you for the hazing incident while we’re at it. Thanks to the photos you sent to Yasmin, I’m fairly sure we can make a pretty good case.”
“You stuck-up bastard. You don’t leave me any choice, do you? Fine, I’ll do it. Although leaving all this behind is going to be such hardship.”
He couldn’t stand to be in the trailer with her a moment longer and went to wait outside while she gathered a few of her things together. It wasn’t until they were in the plane and headed back toward California that he began to hope that maybe, just maybe, he might be able to earn his wife back.
* * *
Yasmin had had Blaze back for a whole week and was grateful for the company. He listened—while she raged and while she wept. Without judgment, without censure, without advice. And she was getting there—recovering from the emotional strain of the last few weeks. Not quite out of the woods yet, but stronger every day.
None of it stopped her missing Ilya, though. Her longing for him was a deep physical ache and she continued to throw herself into long hours at work in between exercising Blaze and seeing to it he had sufficient socialization time at a new doggy day care closer to the airport. He was there today and she kept checking the clock, aware his pickup time was looming.
There was a knock at her office door. Yasmin looked up from her desk, grateful for the interruption. It seemed she spent more time at her desk than flying aircraft these days.
“What is it, Riya?” she asked her friend, who hovered in the doorway with a look of uncertainty on her
face.
“Esme Hardacre’s here to see you. She says it’s very important.”
Yasmin’s heart skipped beat. “She’s here to see me?”
“Oh, yes.”
Yasmin took a minute to tidy up the papers spread everywhere and quickly checked her appearance in the small mirror she kept behind the door. She rarely wore makeup but she should at least slick a little color onto her lips. She dabbed on some of the tinted gloss she kept in her top drawer and shoved her fingers through her short hair, giving it a touch more lift, then straightened her shoulders.
“Please show her in,” Yasmin finally said, taking a deep breath. It was time to see what Esme Hardacre wanted.
Eighteen
By the time Yasmin let herself and Blaze into the apartment later that evening she was exhausted. The meeting with Esme Hardacre had been both awkward and intriguing. Most surprising of all: Esme had come to apologize. Long story short, Jennifer Morton had shown up at Esme’s office and admitted to sending Hardacre Incorporated the damning photos and had confessed they were out of context.
According to Esme, Ilya had tracked Jennifer down, taken her to Esme, and when their conversation was finished, turned her over to the police.
Esme was truly sorry that she and her husband had assumed Yasmin was at fault. She’d asked Yasmin if she would consider signing a new contract with them on revised terms. The ball was now in Yasmin’s court.
She’d wanted to tell Esme Hardacre exactly what she could do with her offer; that had been her knee-jerk reaction. But reason had prevailed. In the end, Yasmin had asked for a few days to consider things, and that was where they’d left it.
Could she do business with someone who’d seen the evidence of the degradation she’d suffered? Would she see censure, or worse, pity, in their eyes every time she saw them again? Her thoughts tumbled round in her mind, over and over. Fiscally it made excellent sense to agree to renegotiate terms and she had to admit to a certain grudging respect for the woman who’d shown up in person to make her apology. Logically there was no room for emotion in all of this. Maybe it really was time to stop allowing that night to define the rest of her life.
Then, as she was showing Esme out, a courier had arrived with an envelope addressed to her. Inside was a letter with “I’m sorry” for a subject line and a detailed apology. The letter was signed by Jennifer Morton. A raft of emotions assailed Yasmin, but through it all was an immense sense of relief that Jennifer’s malicious mischief was over.
While Yasmin reheated the takeout she’d bought the night before, she fed Blaze his evening meal. It was only after she’d eaten, and had taken Blaze out for a toilet stop, that she accepted that she’d allowed herself to be a victim for far too long.
Yes, she’d forged on with her grandfather’s company. Yes, she’d fulfilled both his and many of her own dreams along the way. But all along, she’d given Jennifer far more power and sway over her life than she ever should have. She’d allowed what had happened to her to color everything she did from that night on.
Yes, it had been shocking, but by holding on to it, by nurturing the fear, she’d only made it worse. She’d thought she’d worked through it all, but she hadn’t. She’d only worked around it, never actually facing what had happened to her head-on. Reading Jennifer’s humble apology today—in which she’d mentioned that Ilya had tracked her down and made her come clean—had ripped the blinkers from her eyes. Jennifer wasn’t an ogre to fear and resent. She was her own kind of mixed-up and messed-up human being. And now it was time for Yasmin to shed the past and take back control of her life.
But where to begin? With the Hardacre contract? With Ilya?
Just thinking about her husband made every internal muscle in her body seize up with longing so intense it brought tears to her eyes. It was only when she felt the swish of Blaze’s feathered puppy tail against the back of her leg that she blinked her eyes clear and forced herself back to the here and now.
“C’mon, boy. Let’s get back upstairs.”
He’d become surprisingly agile on the stairs, even in the week she’d had him. It amazed her how quickly he’d grown and how much he’d changed since she and Ilya had found him on the trail that day. Was it only six weeks ago? She swallowed against the lump of emotion in her throat. So much had changed in that time.
Could she even begin to hope that she and Ilya could patch things up? Did she dare trust him again? No matter what he’d done since she left him in tracking Jennifer down and forcing her to face her behavior, he had still deliberately withheld the truth of his involvement in that night. Jennifer’s letter had said he was not a part of the hazing and that he’d only arrived at the beach at the end. But he had been there. So, how had he been involved?
Blaze trotted through to her bedroom, and she heard him settle on his bed with a contented sigh. She switched on the television and desultorily flicked through the channels, not finding anything that held her attention longer than two minutes. In the end she switched the TV off and stared at the blank screen.
Was it an analogy for her future? she wondered. A blank canvas waiting to be written? She started at a knock on her apartment door. She flicked a look at the time on her watch. It was late for someone to come calling. She opened the door.
“Alice?”
The older lady swept past her into the open-plan living–dining area of the apartment and looked around.
“It’s as though your grandfather still lives here,” she commented with a haughty tone.
“Thank you, I like the decor, too.”
Alice sniffed, clearly not a fan. “He always was a minimalist—in life as well as in love.”
“That’s hardly fair. He loved you with his dying breath,” Yasmin snapped back. At the stricken look on Alice’s face, she reined in her temper. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. I’ve had a rather trying day and I took my frustration out on you. I shouldn’t have.”
Alice rubbed her chest a moment before nodding gently. “No, it was called for. I apologize.”
Yasmin sighed internally. Apparently it was a day for apologies and unexpected visitations. “Would you like to sit down?”
Alice moved to the only easy chair in the room while Yasmin resumed her position on the couch. From Yasmin’s bedroom, Blaze bounded across the floor and sniffed at the newcomer.
“So this is the puppy?”
“His name is Blaze.”
Yasmin wondered why Alice was here. She was a little breathless. Whether it was because of the climb up the stairs that led to the apartment or because she didn’t like the dog, Yasmin wasn’t sure.
“Are you okay with him here? I can put him back in my room if you’d like.”
“No, no. He’s fine.”
Alice looked around the room again, her eyes alighting on one of the photos of Yasmin’s grandfather. The older woman rose gracefully to her feet and walked over to the frame, lifting it up and looking at it more closely.
“Such a handsome man and such a clever engineer,” she said in a faraway voice. “And he could dance better than any man I knew.”
Yasmin looked at her in surprise. “Granddad? Dance?”
A soft smile curved Alice’s lips. “Oh, yes, he was quite the dancer back in the day.” She set the photo down and turned to face Yasmin. “I loved him very much, you know.”
“But not enough to marry him, apparently.” Yasmin found it hard to keep the bitterness from her voice.
“He never asked me.”
Yasmin looked at her in shock. “But you knew he loved you.”
“Suspected it, yes. And I loved him in return. But I also loved Eduard.” Her voice broke a little and Alice took in a deep breath. “You have no idea how hard it was, loving two men. Men who had always been friends, whose friendly rivalry turned into a fierce competition over me. Sometimes I think it would have been bette
r if my father had never taken us from Hungary and brought us here to America. But then I would never have had my family, never have built our dynasty.”
“How did you choose between Granddad and Eduard?”
“In the end it came down to one thing. Eduard was the man who told me he loved me. He was the one who asked me to marry him. I was a bit of a silly young thing then, lost in the romance of being pursued by two handsome men without considering the consequences of what would happen next when I chose one over the other.
“Don’t get me wrong. I don’t regret my decision, but I’m truly sorry for the unhappiness that I caused Jim. I’m sorry for how it impacted on the relationship he had with the woman he eventually married and on his relationship with your father and you.”
Yasmin didn’t know where to look or what to say. Alice walked back to her chair and sat down again. Silence stretched between them until Alice spoke again.
“Do you love my grandson, Yasmin?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“It’s quite simple really. Do you love Ilya?”
“No, it’s not simple. He betrayed me. I can’t trust him anymore.”
“Did you know he was the person who swam out to you the night of your hazing? He saved your life.”
“How did you—?”
“Oh, I have my ways,” Alice said with a wave of slender, wrinkled hand. “I’m a firm believer in fate, my dear. There was a reason he was there that night, and it wasn’t because he was a party to what that evil girl did to you. He was there for a far higher purpose.”
“I didn’t know. He didn’t tell me.”
“Did you give him a chance?”
The question hung on the air like an unwelcome guest in the room. Yasmin shook her head.
“No, to be brutally honest, I didn’t give him a chance.”
“Nor would I under similar circumstances,” Alice acceded with a sad smile. “There’s a lot my grandson doesn’t share—with me or with anyone else. He is fierce and loyal, but careful, too. He’s a good man. An honest one. But he doesn’t give his love easily. Nor do you. My dear, you need to decide if your love for Ilya is worth putting aside your past hurts.”
Tangled Vows Page 15
