Chapter 29
Samuel
Tip #29: Even the best laid plans can spiral out of control. Try not to get too possessive/obsessive when that happens. It’s a red flag.
I stood up, tossing my phone on the meeting room table, and started unrolling the sleeves of my now-wrinkled button-up.
Miguel checked his watch. “I can’t wait to get home. It’s been a long week.” He smoothed his goatee. “Are you going to see Natalie tonight?”
“We don’t have any plans.” I stretched my arms over my head as I considered my oblivious fiancée and the game I was playing to win her over. “But I’m planning to call and see if she’s free.”
“It’s such a shame,” Miguel said. “She could have you wrapped completely around her little finger if she just knew you loved her.”
Before we could continue our conversation, Isaac returned to the meeting room and looked around expectantly.
“What’s up?” I asked.
Isaac slipped his hands into the pockets of his trousers. “Did you have a nice visit with Natalie?”
I frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“Charlotte texted me,” Isaac said. “She ran into Natalie coming into the building as Charlotte was heading out. Charlotte gave her directions to the meeting room.”
I shifted, my posture tensing—had something happened to Natalie? How could Charlotte have chatted with her and Natalie not appeared by this point?
“That’s odd,” Miguel said.
“Yeah, it is.” I strode to the far end of the table to grab my suit coat and shrug it on. “She must have gotten lost somewhere in the building. I’d better call her.”
My phone chimed with a new message. Isaac leaned over the table where’d I’d tossed it and read the screen. “You don’t need to bother, Sam. Natalie just texted you.”
Relief washed over me as I strode back to Isaac, my hand outstretched for my phone.
Isaac’s expression shifted into a frown as he stared at the screen.
“What’s wrong?” asked Miguel.
“This text… she says: Great news—Owen and Jenna are officially going out,” Isaac read aloud. “This means we can plan our breakup.” He looked up at me, puzzled. “What is she talking about?”
A knot formed in my stomach.
No.
No, no. I was so close to winning her over, so close to getting the only thing I’d wanted in my adult life. I needed to talk to her and stall, to give me more time.
I snatched my phone from Isaac’s hand. “I need to make a call.”
As I stepped out of the meeting room and into the hallway, I hit Natalie’s speed dial number.
“Come on, Nat,” I muttered under my breath, my voice barely audible over the insistent ringtone echoing in my ear. After several rings, I was greeted by the chirpy sound of her voicemail message.
My concern was sidestepping closer to panic as I disconnected the call.
I tried her number again, hope and desperation warring within me. Once again, her voicemail was the only response. “Damn it.”
I needed to talk to her and delay her idea of a breakup. But we were engaged, which meant she’d be motivated to do it delicately. Surely that would give me plenty of time. Right?
I ignored the nagging voice in the back of my mind that reminded me I’d had a decade already and had still failed. I paused to text her when I reached the entrance of the office building, taking pains to keep the text’s tone light.
Hey, just wanted to chat about Owen and Jenna. Also, Charlotte said you came by Warner Print, but I never saw you. Everything OK?
If I could get her talking, I could assess her feelings. Hopefully we could work things out and I could salvage this.
I gripped my phone tightly when I saw the message marked as read, but then nothing. No reply, no explanation. Just silence.
The feeling of dread that had been gnawing at the edges of my mind grew stronger. Something wasn’t right.
“Think,” I muttered to myself, trying to come up with a strategy. “What else can I do?”
The answer came to me in a flash. It was quite possibly overreacting, and at the very least pushy, but I could head to Natalie’s apartment. I needed to see her—to look into her eyes and make sure she was OK. And if that meant showing up at her apartment unannounced, so be it.
“Great.” I leaned against my Porsche, utterly defeated about half an hour later.
The howling wind and snow flicking my face hardly fazed me, and I barely noticed the cold despite only having my suit coat—I was too concerned about Natalie.
Her apartment was dark. Not a single light shone from what I knew were her two windows in the tiny brick building.
Still, I couldn’t just stand there without trying. I walked up to the locked gate and buzzed her apartment.
Nothing happened, and the sinking feeling in my chest grew heavier.
“Come on, Nat.” I glanced back at her dark windows as I returned to my car.
I grabbed my phone and dialed her number once more. This time, when her voicemail greeted me, I left a message, working hard to make sure my voice sounded natural. “Hello, Nat, I’m just trying to get ahold of you. I have some things I’d like to talk over with you. Sorry for bothering you, but could you please get back to me?”
I hung up as I climbed into my Porsche. I tossed my phone onto the passenger seat, ignoring the thin layer of snow that swept in with me.
What if I was blowing this out of proportion? What if my desperate attempts to reach her were only scaring her?
“Natalie said we could break up once Jenna and Owen were solid. But I proposed to her. The engagement means she can’t break up with me very quickly, so I still have time to win her over,” I said, trying to make myself feel better.
If that was true, why did it feel like I’d already lost her?
My phone rang, and I snatched it up, hoping to see Natalie’s name on the screen. Instead, it was Isaac. Disappointment coursed through me, and I tossed the phone back onto the car seat, running my hand through my hair in frustration.
It seemed I needed to give her time. Coming on too strong might ruin things. I’d wait until tomorrow, which seemed like an eternity away.
The following morning, Saturday, I pulled up in front of Natalie’s parents’ ranch house, parking my Porsche at the curb. The sleepless night had taken its toll on me, leaving my eyes gritty from exhaustion. My worries about Natalie gnawed at my insides as I stepped out of the car and walked up the salted driveway and then across the freshly shoveled sidewalk.
Taking a deep breath, I rang the doorbell and waited.
After a moment, the door opened, revealing Patty, Natalie’s mom. Her smile was welcoming, which I took as a good sign. “Hello, Samuel. Come on in.”
“Actually, I’m here to see if you or Paul have heard from Nat,” I said. “She sent me a text last night, and I’ve been trying to get ahold of her ever since.”
Patty looked confused, her brow furrowing in concern. “I haven’t heard anything this morning. But when I called Owen last night, he texted back saying he and Natalie were out together so he couldn’t pick up.”
A wave of relief washed over me, only to be replaced by tension as I recalled that Owen was the only Mann family member who knew about our farce of a relationship.
What on earth was going on? It felt like I was missing something, but I didn’t know how to fix it, as I didn’t know what was going on!
“Are you OK, Samuel?” Worry etched a crease of concern between Patty’s eyebrows.
“Thank you for asking, but I’m fine.” I felt anything but. “I just really need to talk to Nat.”
“Alright, Samuel. But take care of yourself, OK? Maybe take a nap, you look exhausted.”
“Will do.” I turned to leave.
“Drive safely—and look out for deer,” Patty warned me with the old Wisconsin adage before she shut the door.
I started the short walk back to my car, feeling guilty that I hadn’t recognized how amazing and kind the Manns were until I started dating Natalie.
As soon as I reached my car, my phone buzzed in my pocket. Pulling it out, I saw that it was my mother calling. With a resigned sigh, I answered the call as I opened the car door and got in. “Hello, Mother.”
“Samuel, what on earth is going on?” Mother’s voice was lined with worry. “Isaac and Miguel are at my house telling me you’re not actually engaged to Natalie?—”
“Everything’s fine,” I cut her off before she could really get going. “I just need to talk to Natalie. Have you or Isaac happened to hear from her?” I asked, fearing the answer.
“No, we haven’t. What’s wrong, Samuel? Why won’t you tell me?”
“Nothing’s wrong.” I leaned my head back against the headrest. “I have to go. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Wait—” Mother started, but I hung up before she could say anything else.
Sitting there in my Porsche, I darkly wondered what I had done wrong. I must have done something, because Natalie wasn’t the type to go radio silent. I racked my brain for any clue.
Yesterday I’d texted her good morning over breakfast, using the pretense of asking her what her schedule was for the weekend. Her reply had seemed happy, and she’d used multiple emojis. I’d been downright smug when she sent me a picture of the chocolate strawberry latte she got during her lunch break with Owen. It was only since my unexpected proposal that Natalie had started initiating friendly texts that had nothing to do with our relationship, so this had been a win.
I knew she’d gone back to work after lunch with Owen, and the next I’d heard of her was when Charlotte texted Isaac that she’d met Natalie when leaving Warner Print. Charlotte had stayed after hours to help Isaac with our meeting, so Natalie must have come after the meeting was already wrapped up, when everyone from the office was already gone.
All of that was logical—Natalie worked, too, so it would take her some time to get over to Warner Print. But I didn’t see anything unusual, and how could—wait.
When Charlotte left, the meeting was officially over. Isaac had gone back to his office to fetch his coat, and Miguel and I had talked about a couple of different topics, one of which was Natalie.
Could she have overheard my conversation with Miguel? But it wouldn’t matter if she had. We hadn’t said anything negative about her or the Manns.
Unless… she’d heard the conversation, realized I was in love with her, and understandably freaked out. If she learned the personal enemy who’d been dogging her since high school was madly in love with her, that would be enough to make anyone nervous.
If that was the case, my multiple calls and texts, and visit to her apartment wouldn’t have helped reassure her that I was an emotionally well-adapted individual.
“Great.” I rubbed my temples. “Way to go. I’ve become the creepiest fake boyfriend ever.”
Maybe I could talk to Owen. He knew about us, and he’d been with Natalie last night. But would contacting him be too much?
My phone rang. I grabbed it and stared at the screen as Jenna’s name flashed across it.
Jenna wasn’t Natalie, but she might have a clue what was going on with Natalie since apparently she and Owen were official based on the text Natalie had sent. With that hope in mind, I swiped to answer the call.
“Hello?”
“Samuel Warner, what the hell is going on?!” Jenna’s normally bubbly tone was hot with rage.
“What?” I asked, confused.
“How could you not tell Natalie you’re in love with her?” Jenna’s voice was growly, like an angry tiger.
“Oh.”
“When Owen told me this morning that you two were fake dating, I couldn’t believe it. The entire Warner family knows you’ve been head over heels for Natalie since college! How could you go along with this crazy idea and not just tell Natalie you’re in love with her?” Jenna’s voice grew louder until she was practically yelling into the phone.
“I wanted to, but it was never the right time,” I said.
“It was never the right time?” Jenna echoed me in a mocking tone. “Samuel. You are the CEO of Warner Print. You’re supposed to be smart! So! Logically, you should know, then, that any time since Natalie asked to fake date would have been the right time !”
Jenna’s biting words didn’t bother me. Jenna was sweet until you crossed her, and then she came out swinging.
“I thought I could get around it if I tricked her into falling in love with me while we were fake dating.”
“Tricking someone into love isn’t a great start to a relationship,” Jenna said. “Why would you do that instead of coming clean?”
“Because if I told Natalie, I could lose her forever,” I growled.
“Yeah, well, it looks to me like you’re still in danger of losing her, so it’s not like your ploy was a great fix!”
“You don’t get it. If I lost my chance with Natalie?—”
“No, I completely get it,” Jenna interrupted me. “Opening your yap and telling Natalie you love her and hearing her reject you is a lot more emotionally terrifying than hoping you could trap her into something. But here’s the problem with your plan: They both depend on Natalie making a choice! It was always up to her whether she’d accept or reject you, and despite how much more terrifying it might be for you, she personally would have looked a lot more favorably at you if you’d grown a spine and told her instead of all this stupid subterfuge!” Jenna ranted.
I fell silent.
What could I say? Jenna was right.
Because of my cowardice, I’d royally messed up. Natalie’s rejecting me was always going to be a risk I couldn’t mitigate. Talking to her about it seemed impossibly hard because of my feelings, but if I loved Natalie as much as I claimed to, I should have been willing to risk myself on her behalf.
I rubbed my gritty eyes with my thumb and pointer finger. “If you’ve talked to Owen, you must know how Natalie is doing?”
“Yes!” Jenna barked. “She cried her eyes out last night because she overheard you and Miguel chortling to each other, obviously about something stupid.”
I frowned. “Is she that upset that I love her?”
“No! She still doesn’t know how you feel because, Samuel Warner , you didn’t tell her! Instead she’s convinced you saw the fake relationship as a business transaction and you’ve been focused on how to use it for Warner Print’s advantage.”
“How that could have been her takeaway? I don’t know what part of the conversation she overheard, but it was mostly Miguel reminding me that my progress with Natalie wasn’t totally real since the entire relationship was a farce.”
“I don’t know either. But you better think about how you’re going to fix it!”
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to cause any strain on your relationship with Owen.”
“You didn’t, because Owen and I act like adults and talk things out!” Jenna snarled. She let out an aggravated sigh, and when she spoke again her voice was significantly softer. “I’m upset and informing you that you need to fix this because I care about you . You’ve been in love with Natalie for so long, and Natalie is such an amazing person. I want this to work out for you.”
“Have you seen her?” I asked. “Do you think it’s already beyond fixing?”
Jenna was quiet for a moment. “I chatted with her for a little bit. She’s not angry with you, if that’s what you’re asking, but it’s almost worse. She has no idea about your feelings but believes you’ve been hiding something from her. You’ll have to do something to prove her trust in you was warranted.”
It wasn’t the answer I was hoping to hear, but at least now I knew what was happening. “Do you know where she is?”
“Not right this moment,” Jenna said. “But I’ll text you when I find out—if she is ready to face you.”
“Got it. Thanks, Jenna.”
“Yeah,” Jenna said. “Consider this your payback for the work you and Natalie did to smooth things over between our families. Take care of yourself.”
“Sure,” I agreed without any feeling. “Bye.”
“Bye.”
I sagged in my driver’s seat.
Natalie was OK.
She completely misunderstood everything about my feelings for her, but I couldn’t blame her when I’d been a piss-poor communicator for a decade.
I’d do my best to make it up to her, though. I just didn’t know how I’d convince her how I really felt…