Chapter 2
Denver, Colorado
Present Day
“Damn it. Why couldn’t I do something, say something?” Caitlyn Coryell slammed her front door and threw her keys across the room, where they bounced off the wall.
This is just great. Now she was talking out loud to herself.
Surely just one more thing for Richard to criticize.
“‘Just who do you think you are?’ That’s what I should have said to Richard.
” Cate shook her head. “I should have said something, anything, to Richard.” Instead she’d just let him usher her out, like she was a small child. Like nothing at all had happened.
Cate walked woodenly down the hall to her bedroom, kicking off her sandals and tossing all her packages onto the middle of her bed. She went back to the living room and flopped onto the sofa, pulling her legs up until she could rest her forehead on her knees.
“I’m so pathetic.” Maybe Richard is right. Wasn’t he always? Maybe it was all her fault. If she could just be more
“More what,” she mumbled, absently twisting the diamond ring on her left hand. “Not more. Less. Less like me.” Cate heaved a deep sigh and sat up. “Less afraid.” Afraid and powerless to make even the simplest decision.
I sound like a sulky little girl. She picked up the telephone and dialed.
The hollow echo of the telephone ringing sounded for the third time.
Pick up. Jesse should be in his room by now.
It had to be around midnight in Barcelona.
She needed him to answer. Though she was close to all three of her older brothers, she was closest to Jesse.
He wasn’t just her brother; he was her best friend.
There was no reason for him to still be out. They had contacted the office this morning. The mission had gone well and the hostages were safe. The team should have been at the hotel long ago.
Fourth ring. Come on, Jess. Pick up. Pick up. Pick up. Cate paced anxiously across the living room, stopping to tuck a box of tissues firmly under her arm. She’d need them for the good cry she was planning later.
Fifth ring. “PICK UP THE PHONE!” Cate yelled desperately, just as she heard the answering click on the other end of the line.
“Whoa there, no need to ? Cate, is that you? What’s wrong?” Jesse’s sleepy confusion was evident.
“Sorry, Jess. I was just being impatient. Nothing’s wrong.” Unless you count finding my fiancé having sex on his desk with his receptionist the week before our wedding as something.
“Well, baby sister, you dragged me out of bed at ? what time is it anyway? What’s going on?” That was more like her Jesse. He sounded annoyed.
Maybe calling Jesse wasn’t the smartest thing for her to do but she had already started. “Richard said, that is, we sort of had a disagreement, and, well, I’ve been thinking about what Richard said, and ? ’’ Her voice trailed off as she vividly recalled the “disagreement.”
She had thought to surprise Richard with a picnic lunch since he’d told her he was too busy to get away from the office and meet her.
He was busy all right. And all three of them had certainly been surprised.
The blonde on the desk had screamed and Cate had dropped the basket of food, lemonade darkening the pale, thick carpet after the glass container shattered.
Jesse’s voice brought her back to the present.
“Answer me, Cate. What did he do? You say the word and I am so on the next plane home. I’ll have my foot up his ass before he can even think of another thing to say.”
At least Jesse was completely awake now.
“No, Jess, you know I don’t want that.” Not that her brother couldn’t do it, with his black belts in God only knew how many martial arts.
She closed her eyes and watched it all happening again.
She had backed out of the office into the hallway, but couldn’t seem to think to move from the spot outside Richard’s door.
This couldn’t be happening to her. The door had opened and Richard had grabbed her arm, pulling her into the office as the blonde receptionist sidled past on her way out.
She didn’t even have the courtesy to look embarrassed.
“Why?” she had asked him, hating the hurt in her voice. “Why would you do this to me?”
“I wasn’t doing anything to you, Caitlyn. It meant nothing. You know I’m under pressure with the new cases I’ve taken on. How many times have I asked you to have sex with me? If you had, I wouldn’t have been forced to find my relief elsewhere.”
“You’re blaming ? that”—she pointed to the desk, unable to find the words to describe what she’d seen—“that ? behavior on your work?”
Richard had led her to the large leather sofa in his office, waiting for her to be seated before he perched himself on the arm. Always the perfect gentleman.
“No. If there’s any fault to be placed here, it’s yours. I’m a man with needs. I’ve made that clear to you.”
Cate shook her head to banish the memory. On second thought, it might not be a good idea to share the whole scenario with her brother. “Besides, Richard says it’s my fault anyway.”
“That’s bullshit. Richard’s full of it, and you deserve better than him.” Jesse always ended up here when they talked about Richard.
“All I need from you is, I need to ask you a question, and I need your promise that you’ll be completely honest with me. Will you do that?” She might as well get on with this.
“That’s what big brothers are for, Caty Rose. I excel at being honest, given the chance. Fire away.”
“Richard says I’m not adventurous, that I’m stuck in a rut, doing the same things day after day, until I’m not even living life anymore.”
“My fault?” she’d asked Richard. “How can your doing ? that ? possibly be my fault?”
Richard had given her that haughty look she’d seen him use on others in the past, the waiter who took too long to bring the wine or the sales clerk who didn’t jump fast enough.
“You live life like some kind of spinster. The only thing you show any enthusiasm for is Coryell Enterprises. I constantly have to take a backseat to your daddy’s company and your work there. ”
“What my father and brothers do is important. They risk their lives to save people.”
“I’m not saying it isn’t important, Caitlyn.
I’m saying that you treat me as if it’s more important to you than I am.
You have no adventure of your own. You spend ten to twelve hours a day running that office, coordinating everything that goes on there.
You deal with some of the most powerful people in the world, but look at you.
You’re in a rut. You don’t fix yourself up unless I remind you to.
What am I supposed to think? How can I pursue a career in politics without a wife at my side who understands my needs?
One who’s willing to sacrifice for my career? ”
“I’m adventurous.” She’d desperately grasped at the only part of his censure she could, her stomach clenching in horror as he criticized her passion for her work, the one thing she truly felt she excelled at.
His cold laughter stung. “Really? Then prove it. If you have any adventure in you at all, you’ll have sex with me right here, in this office, right now.” He’d stood then, straightening his tie. “But you aren’t up to that, are you? That’s simply too out of the ordinary for Caitlyn Coryell.”
Her fault. He’d said it was all her fault.
“Do you think he could be right?” She hated the wimpy, pleading note she heard in her voice.
There was a long pause on Jesse’s end. “Okay, fine. You know I don’t like Richard.
I never have. How many times have I told you he’s not right for you?
You want honesty, well here it is. No, honey, you aren’t adventurous anymore.
Your last big adventure ended up with you ass over end flying off a horse. ”
She shuddered at the painful reminder. It had been so exciting to sneak out for a ride on her father’s horse, at least for the first few minutes. What is it they say? It’s all fun and games until somebody almost gets killed. She’d spent weeks recovering from that accident.
“But more important, Caty, is the change in you since you met Richard. The longer you’ve dated this guy, the more withdrawn you’ve become.
You’re so busy trying to be exactly what he wants you to be, you’re like some ‘Richard robot.’ You should listen to yourself talk.
You can’t go more than five minutes without a ‘Richard says’ in your conversation. ”
Jesse was on a roll. “You fix your hair the way Richard wants, you attend the society functions Richard wants, you’re forever starving yourself trying to lose weight because Richard wants, you wear the clothes Richard wants.
Hell, you aren’t even going to wear Grandma’s wedding dress, and you and I both know you’ve wanted to do that your whole life. ”
“Richard said he only wanted the best for me, that he loved me.” She barely noted that she’d referred to him in the past tense.
“I am so sorry to be the one to say this to you, but it’s way past time someone did.
Richard doesn’t love you. Anyone can see it.
If he did, he wouldn’t be trying to change everything about you.
You’re great just the way you are. Richard only loves Richard.
And the Coryell money. That and all the potential political allies he can meet through Coryell Enterprises.
He’s slime, Caty, and you need to drop him like a bad habit.
” Jesse stopped to draw in a ragged breath.
“He’s simply an ambitious lawyer.” She defended him now out of habit, though that wasn’t really much of a defense for the man she was supposed to love more than anything.