Chapter 23
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Never in Kat’s life had she felt so on edge.
She’d planned on going to New York in about a week to update her father on the project and make sure Chaz hadn’t messed up any of the projects she had been overseeing before she left.
One week. She was supposed to have at least one week to come up with the speech she’d planned on telling her father—the one where she put her foot down and told him she wanted something a little different than what they’d both planned.
The plan of moving out to Montana.
She stared at her hands and urged them to stop shaking. Her father was currently in a meeting. It had gone long. Normally she wouldn’t have batted an eye before stepping inside and quietly observing the meeting from the sidelines. She’d earned that right.
But the Kat who had been strong-armed into choosing an arranged marriage or moving out to Montana temporarily wasn’t the same Kat who currently couldn’t stop bouncing her knees while seated in the waiting area outside her father’s office.
This Kat was borderline terrified to find out how her father would react to her ideas. The plan had always been that she’d work here, with him. Even if he gave Chaz the promotion, she’d still be on site as support.
Her lip curled at that thought. Even with her interest in moving to Montana and starting up another location, she didn’t like the idea that her father would give her anything but the top leadership role.
The buzzing in her purse drew her attention from her father’s office door. Leo had called several times since she’d left. He’d messaged, too.
She hadn’t planned on leaving without notifying him, but she couldn’t bring herself to speak to him until after she’d met with her father.
The last thing she needed was to be rattled by Leo.
Clearly, her father wanted to meet with her about something important.
She needed to be in the right headspace to handle whatever it was so she could push forward with the bigger plan.
Kat closed her eyes briefly as the buzzing stopped.
Leo wasn’t going to be happy about her ignoring him.
Heck, he probably thought she was ghosting him.
Maybe she should message him that she’d see him when she got back from New York.
Her visit here would only be a couple of days unless she was needed.
Regardless, she’d be back by the start of the new year.
The sound of deep voices and the click of a door had her eyes flying open and her head snapping up. She rose, straightened her shoulders and plastered on a smile that was as professional as they came.
Men filed out of her father’s office. A couple looked surprised to see her and offered her smiles as well. The last two to exit the office were her father and Chaz.
“Kat! I didn’t know you were coming back today.” Chaz crossed the distance between them with arms outstretched. It was like he hadn’t seen her just a few days ago. His visit had been short and while things had been strained when they’d parted ways, no one could tell.
She stood stiffly as Chaz pulled her close. Her eyes met with her father’s. Why wasn’t she surprised that she couldn’t read him? He didn’t look pleased to see her, but he also didn’t look angry. He was just as stiff as she was—and studying her just as closely.
Her eyes narrowed on him as Chaz stepped away. “Hey, dad.”
He gestured toward his office. “Let’s talk.”
Kat shot a look at Chaz whose expression didn’t give anything away. He was smiling but that didn’t mean anything. He could be upset and still wear that fake smile. The hairs on the back of her neck lifted as she forced herself to meet her father’s gaze. Something was up. That much was clear.
Clenching and flexing her hands, she strode past her father into his office.
When the door shut, she turned, surprised to find that Chaz hadn’t joined them.
Her gaze lingered on the door as her father moved toward his desk.
Before she could ask him to be straight with her, his words sliced through the quiet room.
“You’re going to marry Chaz.”
“I—what?” Her mouth fell open, eyes whipping around to glare at him. “Dad, you said—”
Suddenly, her father looked more tired than she’d ever seen him.
Haggard.
“If you want to guarantee the position.” He dragged a hand down his face and sighed as he pulled back his chair and slumped into it.
“I’ve thought about this long and hard, Kat.
I know I told you that you could oversee the project in Montana to show your capabilities and you have.
But I have to be honest with you. The plan has always been that you would run this company with Chaz by your side.
The two of you are a good team. You work well together. ”
“Yeah, but so do half the people on your payroll.” Kat hated how her voice shook. She despised the way her heart stuttered and felt like it was going to stop beating all together. Immediately she thought of Leo and the feelings she’d started to develop for him.
This couldn’t be happening to her. Why now? Why after she’d spent so many months in Montana letting her guard down was her father going to rip the rug out from under her feet?
“No.”
He slowly rose from his seat at her sharp tone. “No?”
Speaking through clenched teeth, Kat lifted her chin. “You can’t hold a promotion over my head like this. You can’t force me to marry someone I don’t love.”
“Love?” he scoffed. “My daughter doesn’t care about love. Not since her mother passed away. Have you forgotten who I am? I’m your father and I know you better than you know yourself.”
She wanted to argue with him, to put him in his place for thinking he could strong arm her into doing something that would ruin everything she’d started to love about her life.
This felt like a betrayal of utmost proportions.
There was no way Chaz wasn’t aware of the plan.
Come to think of it, it explained the way Chaz had stopped by.
The way he’d pulled her into a hug not even five minutes ago.
It all felt too convenient. Had they been planning this behind her back?
What was she thinking? Of course they had.
Closing her eyes and taking several deep breaths, she did her best to center herself. “I’m not the same daughter you sent to Montana, dad. I’ve grown up.”
This time her father laughed. It was a bitter sound, one that snaked through her being and made her wonder if she knew him like she thought she had.
“You can’t truly believe that.” He was still standing, still glaring at her.
He shook his head derisively. “The daughter I raised wouldn’t allow herself to lose sight of her future. ”
“What is that supposed to mean?” she demanded. “I haven’t lost sight of anything.”
“Haven’t you?” His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward. They were half a room apart and yet she could sense the menacing undertone of his voice. “Tell me about Leo.”
If she wasn’t seated, she might have actually stumbled back a few steps. “What?”
“Leo Chambers, wasn’t it? The young man who came to all those meetings with Jane and Noah. He’s supposed to be the liaison between you and that ranch where we’re building the center. Last time I saw the two of you together, you were at each other’s throats.”
“Has Chaz said something?” Her thoughts were reeling.
She racked her brain for any memory of Chaz witnessing the way she spoke to Leo.
Had he seen something? Heard something? She hadn’t thought Chaz was capable of snitching on her, but then at the same time she hadn’t been thinking she needed to keep the budding relationship a secret.
She was about to tell her father she had every right to date whomever she wanted to, but her words caught in her throat.
Slowly, he lowered himself into his chair.
He picked up a pen and kept his eyes focused on it as he tipped it from one hand to the next.
“Imagine my surprise when Mr. Chambers strolled into my office to inform me that you had no intention of taking the promotion you went to Montana to earn.” His eyes were searing right through her.
Kat’s gasp echoed around the office. Heat flared beneath her skin. Leo wouldn’t do that. He wasn’t the type to go behind her back and royally ruin everything she was working so hard to obtain.
Her hands balled into fists as she and her father continued their stare-down.
She’d never backed down from a fight—but to be fair, she’d never been pitted against her father like this before.
The whole arranged marriage to Chaz had been the first time she’d pushed against her father’s wishes.
She could already imagine that her father assumed she was making these sorts of interactions a habit.
Finally, her father caved first. He sighed and settled in his chair once more. “Kat, I don’t claim to know what you’re going through in your personal life, but I do know what you want here.” He stabbed his finger on his desk. “This empire. It was built for you.”
She opened her mouth to retort—to tell him it sure seemed like he built it for Chaz, too, but she thought better of it.
“You have an entire future waiting here for you. Maybe it’s my fault. Maybe sending you out to Montana was a mistake. I’ll take responsibility for that. You weren’t ready to be out on your own where outside influences could sway you from the path you wanted.”
Once again, she opened her mouth but he held up a hand. “He told me, Kat. Mr. Chambers told me all about your interest in opening a location in Montana.”
She blinked several times. “He… did?”
“Yes. And I’ll tell you right now, that’s not going to happen.”
“But—”
“No buts. I didn’t get where I am today by making decisions on a whim. This is about business, not some crush.”
Several emotions flooded her system.
Guilt.
Fury.
Mortification.
Her decisions weren’t based on her feelings for Leo.
Sure, her budding relationship with him would be easier if she could relocate to Montana, but it wasn’t the driving force.
She loved being there for more reasons than that.
There was a sense of peace and belonging that she hadn’t felt here in the city.
For the first time in her life, she’d felt closer to grasping that clarity most people rarely got a chance to do.
“Before you tell me that I’m wrong,” her father continued, ripping her from the spiraling disappointment she could feel seeping into her soul, “let me make myself perfectly clear. You have no experience running a corporation. I know you assumed that the promotion here would be the same as if we were to open a new location. But it’s not.
You would have no support system like you have here.
I’ll still maintain my spot on the board and Chaz—”
Her hands shook and she started to vibrate with fury. “I’m not going to marry him—”
He didn’t seem to hear her. –“would help carry the burden. Besides, opening a new location is more than simply maintaining the status quo. You’d have so much work to find the balance of several moving parts.”
Well, he had a good point about that one, but there were ways around that. Bringing people from New York, even temporarily to help train new employees, for instance.
“I don’t want to argue with you, Kat. I brought you back early so I could make it clear where I stand. There is no reason to draw out the rest of the week when I already made my decision.”
When had Leo even come? Kat racked her brain to try to figure out when that might have happened and she came up empty. He’d been gone the last day or so, but his mother had said he was going to an auction or something nearby.
Her father’s brusque voice was sharper than she expected as he drew her attention back to him. “I’ll let you sleep on it. Since you weren’t supposed to be here for a week, I’ll let you take this time to mull it over.”
Kat gaped at him. “One week? You want me to decide whether I’ll marry Chaz in a week? Do you even hear yourself? I don’t know him. Not like that.”
He gave her a flat look. “Come dear, you’re not seriously telling me that you care for Mr. Chambers, are you? When he told me…” He chuckled mirthlessly.
“Told you what?” she demanded.
“It doesn’t matter. He was spouting nonsense. You’re confused.”
If she wasn’t already feeling like she’d been knocked off her feet by this conversation, she might have snapped at him that she was far from confused. But the fact was, maybe he was right.
She didn’t know what she wanted now.
Leo had gone behind her back to speak to her father and that felt like the worst kind of betrayal.
She wasn’t going to get the Montana location.
And if she wanted the career she’d spent her life working for, she would have to marry Chaz to get it.
All because she’d taken her eyes off the ball and let herself catch feelings.
Not just for Leo.
But for Montana, too.
“I can’t decide in a week, dad,” she rasped. When he didn’t immediately speak, she finally forced herself to meet his eyes.
“By the project’s end, then.”
She nodded numbly. “Fine.” Without another word, she grabbed her purse and strode from her father’s office.