Her eyes, now well adjusted to the half light, scanned the room. Yes! Right there, on the table, sat his computer. He’d left it open, obviously in a hurry to get back to bed after he’d secured the new passwords on the bank accounts. Had he simply let it go into sleep mode, or had he shut it down completely, she wondered, picking her way through the furniture. She really wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. She had no idea how long it would be before he realized she was missing from the bed.
Sophie lowered herself onto the sofa and placed her finger on the mouse pad, a sigh of relief sawing through her as the screen brightened and came to life. She keyed in Zach’s password, one he’d given her several months ago when he’d needed her to retrieve data for him on a rare occasion that he’d left the computer behind in the office.
She caught her lower lip between her teeth, worrying at the tender flesh as she decided where the best place to start looking for information might be. Email or general files? Email, she decided, and opened the program, then quickly typed Philmore Center into the search window.
As she did so, a worrying thought occurred to her. She’d been so quick to suspect Zach of some wrongdoing, but what if he was in contact with the Philmore Center because of something wrong with his health? A sharp stab of concern struck her square in her chest. He was always such a loner, mixing but never really socializing, always working long hours.
Alex had probably been his closest friend, and Alex was missing. Had Alex discovered something about Zach and his past, his mental health even, that Zach wasn’t happy about? Sophie tried to quell her overactive mind and focus instead on the results that had come up from her search. There were several emails both to and from the Philmore Center. She scrolled down to the earliest one, dated only days after Alex was last seen.
She opened the email and began to read. The more she read, the angrier she became. Okay, so her investigating hadn’t led her to any answers about Alex Santiago’s whereabouts, but it had certainly led her into some new insights into Zach’s character. From the looks of things, despite no support from the rest of her family, he was about to commit his ex-wife into a mental institution. She’d heard of some crazy things in her time but what kind of man did that to his ex?
*
He didn’t know what had woken him, but Zach was surprised to discover he was alone in his bed. He waited a few minutes, but Sophie didn’t return from wherever she’d gone. Dawn was still some time away, so he doubted she’d woken hungry and gone looking for food. He rose from the bed and grabbed a pair of sweatpants from his drawer, hoisting them to his hips before heading out of the room. No lights on anywhere, he noticed, his concern rising. Had she gotten up and headed downstairs, only to fall somewhere?
He checked each of the formal rooms off the main entrance. No, no sign of her there. The kitchen, maybe? As he entered the kitchen, he heard a click from the den. What the…?
He stopped in the doorway, watching Sophie as, with her face lit from the computer screen, she clicked and scrolled her way through something. A cold, burning fury lit deep inside of him. He should have known she was too good to be true. What was her angle, he wondered. And what the hell was she finding so damn interesting on his laptop? He stepped forward. Sophie was so engrossed in what was on the screen she didn’t hear or see him. He stepped closer, looking at the computer screen as he did so. She was reading his private email.
Zach moved swiftly, leaning over her, his hand reaching for the laptop and closing it with a snap. Sophie jumped backward against the sofa before rising swiftly to her feet.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Zach asked, working double time to keep his voice low and even.
It was no small feat, given the wild anger and sense of betrayal that warred for supremacy inside him. To his absolute surprise, though, instead of making some excuse or even some apology, Sophie blasted straight back at him with both barrels.
“More to the point, what on earth do you think you’re doing? I knew there was something up with you, I just knew it. I thought it had something to do with Alex, but it’s worse than that.”
“Worse?” Zach gripped the back of the sofa with both hands to stop himself from reaching for her and giving her a darn good shake. “What could be worse than a friend, a well-respected businessman, going missing for no apparent reason?”
“Locking your wife into an institution and throwing away the key, for one!”
Zach straightened and shoved a hand through his hair. “This is ridiculous. You don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
“I’ve read enough to see that you want her out of your hair. You forget, I’ve fielded her phone calls to you. I’ve seen how distant you are afterward. For whatever reason, she’s still very dependent on you. You even mention it in your emails to Dr. Philmore. I used to think it was strange that you two still had so much contact together since your divorce, and clearly you do, too. I guess you’ve had enough, haven’t you? Why else would you be planning to lock her away? Don’t you think that’s just a bit too draconian?”
“Draconian?” He shook his head slowly, his cynicism clear in the smile he gave her. “You really have no idea.”
“You think?” Sophie replied with a snap, her arms crossed tight in front of her. “Well, let me tell you, it looks like you want her out of your hair. You want her institutionalized. How on earth can you even consider such an act against her?”
“Maybe to save her life?” Zach shot back. “I told you, you have no idea what you’re talking about. Anna is a danger to herself. She’s already made a couple of unsuccessful attempts on her life since our son died two years ago.”
“Your son?” Sophie looked shocked. “You have a son?”
“Had,” he corrected. “He died six weeks after he and his mother were in a car wreck. He was only ten months old. Anna lost control of her car on a wet road and slid sideways into a bridge abutment.”
The words he spoke were simple, yet every one tore at his heart again as if the loss had been only yesterday.
“A-and Anna?” Sophie asked, sinking onto the chair again.
“She walked away with nothing but whiplash and more guilt than any parent should ever have to bear.”
“Oh, my Lord. That’s awful.”
“She’d been trying to teach me a lesson that night. Showing me that she wouldn’t be there waiting for me when I came home late. That she wasn’t at my beck and call. Things had been strained between us before Blake was conceived, in fact we’d already begun separation proceedings when she discovered she was pregnant.” Zach dropped onto one of the sofas and leaned his elbows on his thighs, his head dropping between his shoulders, the weight of all that had gone wrong in his marriage like a millstone around his neck. “We’d argued on the phone when she told me she was going out. I’d warned her the roads were tricky, to just wait until I got home—that we’d talk then. But she wouldn’t listen.”
The memory burned, painful and fresh in his mind. His mad dash home to discover her car gone from the garage, the house empty—worse, Blake’s crib empty when he should have been tucked up asleep with his favorite teddy.
“I didn’t know where to begin to look for her, but I didn’t have to wait long. The police came to my door within minutes of me getting home. She was hysterical, they said, but that was nothing compared to the quiet after she was released from the hospital. Her parents just put it down to grief, both for Blake and for our marriage when she insisted we continue with the divorce we’d begun almost two years prior, but it was much more than that. She’d always been fragile, but losing Blake, being responsible for his death, that broke something inside her.”
Zach dragged in a deep breath and let it out again before continuing. “It’s nearly two years exactly since Blake died and Anna went missing this week. I was fearing the worst. Thankfully she’s turned up again, but I’m not prepared to take that risk again that next time she won’t turn up and that it’ll be a policeman instead, on her
parents’ doorstep or mine, telling us that this time she’s succeeded in taking her own life. She desperately needs help before it’s too late. I’m determined she will receive it.”
“Zach, I’m sorry. I really don’t know what to say.”
Sophie’s voice sounded small. She looked small, as if she’d retreated in on herself. All her anger against him had dissipated in the face of what he’d told her.
But his anger had not. It welled anew and filled his heart, where he’d begun to care, begun to think that perhaps with Sophie he could think about a new start, a new relationship.
“There’s nothing you can say, now, is there? You know, if you had any questions, all you had to do was ask me. You didn’t need to go snooping behind my back.”
“I thought you were hiding something to do with Alex. I never had any idea that you were trying to help your wife.”
“My ex-wife,” he corrected, but then her words slowly sank in. “You actually thought I had something to do with Alex’s disappearance? You slept with me, thinking that I might be responsible—perhaps even for Alex’s death? Oh, yeah, that’s right. You were prepared to come at me, guns blazing, over putting Anna in a secure unit. Of course you’d suspect me of doing something terrible to Alex.” He stood up and shook his head in disbelief seasoned with a fair dose of disgust. “What kind of woman are you? I thought we had the start of something special but you were just using me, weren’t you?”
“Zach, I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” she protested, also rising to her feet, throwing her hands out as if imploring him to believe her.
“But you believed I might be capable of it. What were you planning to do? Seduce the information out of me?”
He watched as her face flamed with color—as her eyes dropped, unable to meet his accusing gaze a second longer.
“You were so secretive. I know I should have known better, should have trusted you, but every time I’d come into your office you’d obscure your computer screen or cover the mouthpiece on your phone if you were on a call. I don’t know.” She shook her head. “In light of everything that had happened, I just started to get suspicious. And while it started that way, with wanting to seduce information out of you, it’s not like that now.”
“You seriously expect me to believe that when I’ve just walked in on you on my laptop reading my private email? Excuse me if I find your protestations just a little hard to believe. Besides, don’t you think the police questioned me thoroughly enough? You thought you possibly knew more than them or at least enough to believe I was guilty of doing something so stupid?”
“I’m so sorry, Zach. Please forgive me. Like I said, I should have known better. What you’re trying to do for Anna is noble and kind and good. Just like you are. I can see that. I could see it all along, but I wouldn’t let myself believe it. I’m the fool here. The crazy, stupid fool.”
“And what if you were right, Sophie? What if I was the kind of guy who was capable of dispatching another man to wherever, whatever Alex has gone to? Don’t you think that if you had concerns you should have taken them to the police and not embarked on some ill-advised personal investigation? Didn’t you think that you might be putting yourself at risk, too?”
“Please, Zach, please give me, us, another chance.”
Tears shone in her eyes. Tears of genuine regret, he had no doubt. But he couldn’t find it in himself to forgive her. Not for believing something as nefarious as him possibly being responsible for another man vanishing from the face of the earth—a man who was not only his friend and business partner, but her boss, as well.
“That first time we made love, you said I could trust you. I believed you, and now you’ve proven me wrong. Go get dressed, I’ll call you a cab,” he said flatly.
Sophie took a step toward him, her hand out as if to touch him, but he stepped back, avoiding her.
“Don’t,” he warned. “I can’t be in the same room as you right now. Just…go.”
Twelve
Sophie let herself into her apartment just as the sun was beginning to peek its pale-golden face over the horizon. A new day, yet to her it felt like the end of the world. She’d betrayed Zach’s trust in the worst way possible.
Her apartment looked just the same as it always did, yet Sophie knew without doubt that everything inside her had changed. She’d ruined everything. She—who was always so careful, always so considered—had destroyed her chance at happiness with a wonderful and worthy man. It was one thing to plot, however far-fetched it was, with Mia over lunch, and another thing entirely to act upon it.
She walked into her bedroom and turned back the bed before methodically unpacking her weekend bag and putting things away, with the exception of her dress, which she put in the hamper for dry cleaning. For once she couldn’t take any comfort in mundane activities. Not when it felt as if her heart was breaking in two.
Sophie dragged on a pair of cotton pajamas and crawled into her bed, pulling the covers up over her and blocking out the cheerful light of day. Right now she didn’t want to face the world, or anything or anyone within it. She’d made what was probably the worst mistake in her entire life and against every caution she’d given herself, too.
It was midafternoon when she awoke with a bitter taste in her mouth and a heaviness in her chest that made her want to cry out loud. She scrubbed her teeth in the bathroom, then went to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water before curling up on her couch and staring emptily at the blank television screen.
No matter which way she turned things around in her mind, she’d been in the wrong. Zach had been decent and good and professional every step of the way. She had been the one to promulgate the kiss between them after that dinner at Claire’s, not him. She had been the one to actively entice him and flirt with him in the office in the days afterward, even after pushing him away after their first kiss. She had been the one to make that first move, to make love to him, to experience the most incredibly uplifting and fulfilling lovemaking she’d ever had the pleasure to encounter. And she knew why it had been so very special because, somewhere along the line, she’d fallen completely and utterly in love with Zach Lassiter. And she’d been the one to destroy that love with her senseless suspicions and irresponsible behavior.
She lifted a hand to her face and pressed her fingertips tightly to her mouth to hold in the wail of grief that rose from deep inside her.
All her life she’d been the one who fixed things, who made things right by taking the load of others, by organizing the sphere in which she lived. But now she’d done the exact opposite. She’d hurt Zach; she’d pulled apart his trust when he’d so carefully, so cautiously, given it to her.
How could she fix this? Was it something she was even capable of? She doubted it. A man like Zach didn’t commit easily, not when he already had so much happening in his life. The fact that he continued to work so hard to save his ex-wife from hurting herself and her family—no matter how blind they remained to her vulnerability—spoke volumes about his character.
Deep down Sophie had always known he was that kind of man. So why had she been so imprudent as to believe he had something sinister to hide? What business had it been of hers?
She owed him a massive apology and she needed to know exactly where they stood. Okay, so she knew he probably wasn’t in the frame of mind to accept anything from her right now, but at the very least they still had to work together until this business with Alex was resolved. If she could prove to him that she fully accepted she’d been in the wrong, that she could make it up to him somehow, that she’d be even better at her job than she had been before, then maybe, just maybe, he might consider giving her, them, another chance.
Before she could change her mind, Sophie picked up her phone and dialed Zach’s cell. He picked up on the fifth ring and she couldn’t help wondering if he’d been prevaricating between answering and letting her go to voicemail. Before he could answer, she began to speak.
“Zach, please, hear me out. I
know you probably don’t want to talk to me right now—”
“And you’d be right. What is it, Sophie?” he replied, weariness weighting his every word.
“I…I…” The words that had been clear in her mind faded on a swell of insecurity. Silence echoed through the earpiece of her phone, forcing her to fill it. “Zach, do I still have a job?”
“That’s a good question,” he answered slowly. “You betrayed my trust. In the same position, would you continue to work with someone like that?”
Sophie wrinkled her brow. She could discern nothing from the tone of his voice. Nothing of the boss she’d worked with these past weeks. Nothing of the lover who’d filled her heart and driven her body to heights of pleasure she’d only ever dreamed of. A small sound of pain rose from deep inside her. She’d ruined everything.
“No, I guess I wouldn’t. Not without a very good reason, anyway. But Zach, we have good reason to keep working together. Without me there you’ll only be able to work at one-third capacity. Even with a temp to help you, between Alex’s responsibilities and yours, you’d still be struggling.”
She heard him sigh through the phone as her words rang true. Pressing her advantage, she continued.
“I know I deceived you, Zach. I went against everything I know in my heart to do so and I’m more sorry than you’ll probably ever understand, but I can’t leave you in the lurch at work. Not now. Please, at least let me have another chance there.”
“All right, but step one toe out of line and—”
“You won’t regret it, Zach, I promise you.”
He made a sound, somewhere between a snort and a laugh, before answering. His words, when they came, chilled her to the bone.
“I already do. Every second,” he said before severing their connection.
Sophie sank slowly to the floor, the phone still clutched in her hand. She’d wanted to know where she stood and now she knew.
*
Sophie had to haul herself into work the next morning. Getting up early wasn’t the problem; she’d barely slept a wink all night anyway. No, it was the prospect of seeing the recrimination in Zach’s eyes that was the hardest thing to deal with. She knew she couldn’t put it off. She, of all people, knew how important it was to face up to things, to keep putting one foot in front of the other, day after day, week after week. Eventually a new normal asserted itself. One you could live with. After all, wasn’t that how she and her mother had coped after Susannah had gone to live with her aunt?
Something about the Boss... Page 10
