Say You Still Love Me: A Novel

by K. A. Tucker

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  To tail-chewing cats and sneaky psychics, thank you for making both real and fictional life more interesting

  Chapter 1

  NOW

  A spoiled tart.

  Or was it spoiled brat?

  I purse my lips and try not to sneer at Tripp Porter as he drones on with a status update about the continuous permit delays, his monotonous voice flat enough to sink a yapping Jack Russell into a coma. Meanwhile I’m struggling to recall exactly what this arrogant ass called me at the holiday party. Of course, he was oblivious to the fact that I was standing on the other side of the pillar while he bad-mouthed me, his crimson bow tie hanging loose around his collar, his tongue flapping after his umpteenth gimlet.

  It was the same night that Dad officially announced my leaping promotion to the newly created role of senior vice president at Calloway Group—my stepping-stone to president when he retires. With an MBA from Wharton and ten years of experience at CG between summer internships and post grad, he thought I was ready.

  Clearly, Tripp Porter did not.

  And by the thinly veiled smirk that curls his lips every time he looks my way, he still doesn’t. But that could also be because he’s under the impression that he should be in the senior vice president’s role, and not reporting to the twenty-nine-year-old leggy brunette tart who once fetched his coffee.

  Spoiled tart. That was definitely it.

  Who the hell even uses that word, anyway?

  I let my gaze drift around the room of suits—CG’s management team, mostly wealthy white men in their mid to late fifties, afflicted with varying degrees of male pattern baldness—and wonder how many of them share Tripp’s viewpoint, that Kieran Calloway has lost his damn mind, setting up his daughter to one day take over. That I should be finding ways to spend my trust fund, not wasting their time by dragging them into this meeting and demanding answers on two billion dollars’ worth of projects.

  Unfortunately for them, I’m not going anywhere. And I’m beyond fed up, because I heard the same bullshit update from Tripp in the last meeting.

  “So what you’re saying is that you’ve made no progress with the Marquee,” I interrupt loudly, topping my blunt words with a saccharine smile as my French-tipped nails trace the walnut swirls of the polished table. We bought the struggling hotel for $120 million two years ago. I’m the one who brought the project to the table. I’m the one who pushed Dad to buy it, insisting it would make an excellent condo conversion. Dad leaned forward on it for me. And now, despite rounds of meetings and revisions to the blueprints, we still can’t seem to get the city’s approval for construction to begin.

  I catch glances exchanged and brows arching around the table. Some of these people must share my frustrations, right?

  “What can I say, Piper,” Tripp begins, adjusting his navy-blue tie around his stout neck. And there’s that condescending smirk again. “I’ve already told Kieran that we should sell it and cut our losses. The groundwork for this project wasn’t set properly, and it’s taking more time to fix the mess than I anticipated. I’ve got a meeting with the city on the twenty-ninth to get to the root of the problem.”

  I was the one overseeing the project until my promotion and when I left, it was on track. It doesn’t take a genius to hear what he’s implying—that the “mess” is thanks to my poor directive.

  I grit my teeth to keep my composure. “That’s nearly a month away.”

  “Yes, you’re right,” he says slowly. Annoyingly.

  “We’re now six months behind schedule,” I emphasize sharply. “The investors are inquiring.” I don’t have to tell Tripp, or anyone else here, how irate that makes my father, who prides himself on our remarkable track record for reliability and on-time completion.

  Tripp sighs heavily. “I don’t know what to tell you, Piper. It’s the earliest meeting date that old shrew Adriane Guthrie would agree to. You know how inflexible she is. Well, maybe you don’t, but ask your father.” He reaches for his phone and begins scrolling through his messages, as if this conversation is over.

  I wasn’t going to do this until after the meeting, in private. But since Tripp is hell-bent on making me look like some clueless bobblehead, maybe everyone around this table is in need of an education.

  “I spoke to Adriane this morning. We had a lovely chat.” I smile sweetly at Tripp, whose indifferent gaze has been replaced with suspicion. Adriane is a clever older woman whom I sat next to at a dinner event a few years back; we bonded over the same tastes in books and movies, and the same unsavory viewpoints about men like Tripp. She’s always been willing to make time for me. “It seems you missed the last scheduled meeting—”

  “Something important came up,” he smoothly deflects.

  “—without the common decency to phone her,” I finish.

  His bushy brows draw together in a deep frown; he’s no doubt quickly thinking up some bullshit reason for that.

  “I also spoke to Serge,” I add. The senior project development manager handling the day-to-day work behind this project, a guy who puts in twelve-hour days and has a bad habit of chewing on pens as he works.

  Tripp’s eyebrows arch.

  “He was told to forget about the Marquee and focus all efforts on the Waterway project.” Told by you.

  “The Waterway project is the crown jewel for this company. That’s where our focus is right now,” Tripp retorts, his chest beginning to puff out as he gathers his confidence back.

  “Yes. It’s an enormous project. Too large, some are suggesting.” Architecturally beautiful twin towers of mixed residential and hotel atop the city’s waterfront market. “And we’re still looking for investors for that, which means now is not the time to be dropping the ball on our other projects,” I remind him tersely. “Mark?” I turn to my assistant, who sits beside me, studiously typing out meeting notes on his laptop. “Did Adriane’s assistant call back yet?”

  Mark clears his throat, struggling to keep a serious face. “Yes. She has tomorrow morning at nine available.” The same time as Tripp’s standing tee-off time. To be fair, I didn’t specifically ask for a Friday morning meeting when I called Adriane.

  “Perfect. We all know Tripp is free then.” I turn back to Tripp, whose cheeks are flushed with red. “Make sure you bring the right people with you when you go in to meet with her. And call me on your way back with an update, which I expect will be favorable. Unless you need me to come with you to the meeting to help get the final sign-offs?” From the corner of my eye, I catch a few smirks around the table. I don’t acknowledge any of them, though, keeping my steady gaze locked on Tripp, my expression flat.

  “No. Of course not,” he answers gruffly.

  “Good! I think we’re done here, then.” I force a chipper tone. I collect my phone and my notepad and stand, feeling a room of gazes drift downward to my emerald-green dress, the sleeves capped to show off my toned arms, the waist cinched to flatter my curves. Whatever they may think about me running the show, none have ever hidden the fact that they enjoy the view. I don’t particularly relish the attention, but I also refuse to hide my femininity behind wide-leg trousers and bulky blazers because they can’t keep their leering eyes away.

  “See ever
yone at the next meeting.” I stroll out of the boardroom with my head held high, making sure my heels clack extra loud for Tripp, in case he missed the part where the tart just handed him his ass.

  “That was deeply satisfying,” Mark murmurs, closing the distance quickly to walk beside me, his laptop tucked under his arm.

  “Let’s just hope it works,” I mutter, the wave of adrenaline that spurred me on now giving way to anxiety as I wonder what Tripp’s next move in this power play will be, and how I’ll need to pivot. I swallow against the case of nerves and peer up at Mark, meeting his broad smile. “But yes, it was, wasn’t it?”

  Mark is tall—well over six feet—and wiry, which makes every button-down shirt he wears too baggy on his slender frame. I’d love to give him a few pointers in the wardrobe department, but our employer-employee relationship hasn’t reached that stage yet.

  We’re quite comfortable in the “plotting together to trounce misogynistic jerks” stage, though.

  He reaches around me to pull open the glass door to Calloway’s executive wing—executive alley, we call it—and hold it for me.

  “Thank you, kind sir,” I offer dramatically, smiling as I recall the first time he did this, during his interview for the assistant’s position. I had faltered at the threshold, surprised by the gentlemanly gesture. He immediately began backpedaling, promising through stumbled words that the move in no way reflected his beliefs about a woman’s ability to hold her own doors open. He confided later that he was sure he had blown the interview.

  Meanwhile I knew right then and there that, while he had zero experience, he was the right person for the job. Polite, considerate, but also in tune with the twenty-first century.

  “You’re welcome, milady,” he says without missing a beat and with a terribly fake cockney accent that makes me chuckle. Deep dimples form in his cheeks. He’s attractive, with a full head of blond hair that he runs a gel-coated hand through each morning, at most, earnest blue eyes that lock on yours when you’re in conversation, and a clean-cut jaw that makes him look a decade younger than his thirty-four years. If I were interested in dating, and not his boss, Mark might be a man who’d pique my interest.

  But I am his boss, and I’m eons away from heading back down the let’s-get-to-know-each-other path with any man.

  Thanks mainly to the jackass in the custom-tailored navy suit lingering straight ahead.

  I sigh heavily. If there is one person who can deflate my triumphant high, it’s David Worthington. “When’s my next meeting? Noon?” I ask Mark.

  “One P.M.” His gaze narrows on David’s hand as it carelessly flicks the wooden blades of the delicate miniature windmill on Mark’s desk—a gift from Mark’s mom to celebrate his first desk job: a symbol of his Danish roots. A replacement of the one David broke a month ago, doing this very same thing.

  Mark dislikes David—with a passion, I’d hazard—but he has yet to say anything openly. That could be on account of David being VP of Sales & Marketing.

  Or because David’s missing an assistant and Mark has been helping to fill the gap, catering to David’s demanding and sometimes childish needs.

  Or because David’s my ex-fiancé.

  “I’m gonna run out to grab sushi. Do you want me to pick you up some?” Mark offers, eager to get away.

  “No, I’m good, thanks. I need to go for a walk soon anyway. I’ll grab lunch then.” Even with all the glass walls and windows, the air turns stifling around here after too long.

  “ ’Kay. See you in a bit.” Mark nods politely toward David as he passes through to lock up his things.

  I don’t even offer that much, pushing through the door and into my office, knowing David will be right on my heels.

  My office, much like every executive office on this floor save for my father’s, is all glass—glass walls, glass door, floor-to-ceiling glass windows. It affords plenty of daylight but no privacy. I’ve attempted to create some with a decorative coat tree strategically placed to the right of the door and a six-foot potted palm to the left. A few key pieces chosen by an interior decorator—a mid-century-style writing desk, camel-colored leather wingback chair, and a Persian rug bursting with shades of fuchsia, gold, and navy—add panache to an otherwise bland space.

  Entering my small corner of this vast building brings me comfort during the hectic, long days.

  Except when David is in it.

  “Running out to grab a quickie with his boyfriend again?” he murmurs as soon as the soft click of the door sounds.

  I drop my notebook onto my desk with a loud thud. “Mark is not gay. You just want him to be, because you feel threatened by him.”

  David snorts, as if the very idea of him feeling threatened by a guy who doesn’t own a Maserati and lives in a rented bachelor pad on the outskirts of the city is preposterous. “Oh, come on, Piper. The guy spends his weekends running around the park in tights. For fun.”

  “He’s an actor!” Mark was a theater major in college; not exactly a good fit for CG. When Carla from Human Resources passed along his résumé, she did it in jest, thinking I’d catch on quickly and toss it aside. It was my sheer curiosity that got him through my door for an interview.

  “Exactly my point.”

  I shake my head. “You’re an idiot. Besides, that Shakespeare in the Park production is renowned. Maybe you should go and see it before you judge. We built the entire place, after all.” A city contract that we bid on and won, along with several awards in the years following. It was the first development project I ever worked on during my summer internship here.

  David folds his thick arms across his chest and smiles knowingly at me. “So you’ve seen him perform?”

  “I’m going this weekend.”

  “What time? I’ll come with you.”

  “Shouldn’t you be interviewing some poor fool for your assistant’s position? And, by the way, Mark is not picking up your dry cleaning, so stop asking him to.” David knows I’m lying about going to see the play, that I enjoy theater about as much as I enjoy golf, which is exponentially less than, say, sitting on hold with the tech help desk or waiting for my nail lacquer to dry.

  “Not for another hour.” He grabs my apple off my desk and settles into the chair across from me, legs splayed.

  “Try not to scare this one into early retirement, too,” I mutter, focusing on my computer screen as I scroll through my calendar and then my emails, opening one up to read.

  “Oh, don’t worry. I’ll make sure this one is much younger.” He bites into my apple, and I do my best to ignore his penetrating gaze.

  How I fell under the spell of David Worthington, I’ll never understand. I guess it was for the same reason most women fall for him at first: the thick, coiffed blond hair, the playful azure-blue eyes, the square jaw, the straight white teeth, the muscular body that he treats like a temple with daily workouts and zero refined sugar. Physically, he’s an Adonis, and from the first day he strolled through the doors of CG three years ago as the new executive, he had my attention.

  Add the fact that he’s Ivy League educated, whip-sharp, charming, born into the right pedigree, and highly successful, and you have a man who always gets what he wants. For a time, that was me. For almost two years, in fact. But then he slipped that gaudy two-carat diamond bauble—that spoke more to his taste than mine—on my finger and the polished veneer gave way to the ugly reality that David is a classic narcissist.

  I realized that somewhere between him putting a deposit down on a house he knew I didn’t want, telling me about his “guys’ Vegas weekend” trip while he was already on the way to the airport, and strongly suggesting that our marriage would fare better with only one of us working at CG.

  So I set the engagement ring on the dining room table and moved out. It was an easy decision but a tough life lesson, compounded by the fact that I have to see him almost every day. Literally. His office is directly across from mine. I look up from my desk and there he is.

  He devo
urs half my apple before I finally snap with irritation. “Seriously, what do you want, David?” His name is a curse upon my lips.

  “Any highlights from the meeting?”

  “You’ll get the meeting notes by end of day. And why weren’t you there, by the way?”

  “I had a call with Drummond.”

  “Right.” Our potential anchor tenant for the Waterway project, the draw for other retail space leasing. We need them to commit before our project unveiling next month. “How’d it go?”

  “Ninety percent there.” He pauses. “I heard Tripp’s still being a dick.” At least his voice has lost its obnoxious edge.

  Maybe it’s because I miss sounding off about work to David, or maybe it’s because I have no one else to talk to about it—venting to Mark wouldn’t be appropriate—but I abandon my computer screen and lean back in my chair. “It’s like he wants the Marquee to tank out of sheer bitterness.”

  “More like he wants you to tank.” There’s no love lost between David and Tripp. It was Tripp who objected vehemently to my father going external to hire a then thirty-two-year-old David from a New York firm, pushing for Dad to instead bring in one of his cronies to fill the role.

  David frowns in thought. “He’s been here for, what is it, twenty-eight years now?”

  “I don’t care if he laid the first brick to the very first building we ever developed, there’s no excuse for the way he’s been acting.”

  He holds his hands up in surrender. “All I’m saying is that he’s finally seeing the writing on the wall. He’ll never run this company and he’s not liking it.”

  I can’t help the snort. “He’s getting paid enough to fake liking it.” The old toad has a new luxury sedan every year and lives in the swanky estate community of Ferndale with his third wife. He’s far from hard up.

  David smooths his index fingers over his eyebrows. It’s a small tell of his, something he does when he’s thinking, without realizing it. I used to always tease him about it. “Have you said anything to Kieran yet?”