Chapter 26
26
My driver takes us to Soho and we pull up to the curb, next to a pale yellow building with those fire escapes that have been turned into a zig zag of small balconies. But the building has charm. It’s somehow very…Ivy. Artsy and romantic, with a decorative flair.
I help her out and take her bag from my driver. “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” I tell him.
We go inside and I can tell it’s strange for her having me here. She’s been quiet since we left my place, still adjusting to the warp speed of whatever we’re calling this. “I can’t believe you own the building now.” She pushes the elevator button for the fourth floor.
“I don’t own it. You do.”
The elevator doors seal us in. The thing feels rickety and ancient as it starts taking us up and I make a mental note to have it upgraded.
“Want to do it in the elevator?” I joke, nudging her gently.
“Stop,” she scolds me, her cheeks getting pink. She’s suddenly self-conscious on her home turf.
But I know by now how turned on she gets when she blushes like that. How wet she probably is for me right now. “That’s cool. We’ll have other opportunities.”
She gives me a look, biting back a smile, but she doesn’t reply.
I get it. It’s overwhelming. I basically steam-rolled over her entire life with too much too soon, probably, but it’s something she’s going to have to get used to. Even if she hates me by the end of the month, one detail might tie her to me for life. Either way, she’s getting every single one of her dreams answered and then some, in spades. It’s my new mission in life.
She asked for it when she sat on my lap that first night and kissed me with those soft, pink, perfect lips, squirming and wet, then singing to me with her angel’s voice. It’s not my fault I’m fucking whipped.
We get to her apartment and she unlocks the door.
The place is tiny but nice. There’s a small living room with tall windows that let in a lot of light. Outside is a minuscule balcony that has enough space for two chairs, a small table and some plants. I can see a yoga mat out there, where she must have left it on Friday afternoon.
Imagine if Cleo hadn’t called her. Imagine if she hadn’t needed the money for her brother’s tuition and refused to do it. I’d never have met her. I’d have lived my whole life not knowing that the most beautiful girl in the world was out there, swanning around just waiting for me to discover her. What if I never had? I would have been doomed to be a lonely, miserable grump for the rest of time.
I make another mental note to send Cleo flowers and give her a huge bonus.
It’s clear to me now that Cleo did this on purpose. She knew Ivy was drop-dead gorgeous but couldn’t see that about herself and had shut down all relationships because she was snowed under by the life she was busy carving out, a little desperately. Cleo also knew my brothers were worried about me and my dumpster fire of a love life. She hoped the two of us might click. And she packed Ivy’s bag but conveniently forgot to pack panties.
Well done, Miss Cleo. You’re getting a raise.
She set us up.
I can admit Cleo irritates me to no end, but I owe her one and it’s a doozy.
“So, this is it,” Ivy says. “It’s small but I love it.”
She walks into the postage-stamp-sized kitchen and I follow. There’s a kitchen table that barely fits and two chairs. Everything is neat and tidy except for the odd football jersey or baseball hat or empty orange juice carton left on the six inches of counter space. Signs that a seventeen-year-old boy lives here.
The dynamic is easy to read. All the girlish stuff is organized and thoughtfully placed. All the oversized little brother stuff is messy and haphazard. It reminds me again that she’s done this the hard way because she had no other choice. She’s been a parent to him as well as a provider.
The kid and I need to talk. He’s a genius but a punk—as all three of my brothers were when they were seventeen. Josh got into Columbia and he also somehow managed to reappropriate funds from a Bahamas bank account into his own—which is basically the digital equivalent of breaking into Fort Knox. I could use someone like him and so could Cash. I’m sure the two of us can come to an agreement that works for both of us.
Ivy’s leaning a hip against the kitchen counter, arms folded across her chest. “I should probably clean up a little before Josh gets home and I have a million emails to answer.”
“Are you kicking me out?”
“You can sit there and watch me answer emails if you want to.”
I walk over to her, towering over her. She’s so small. So perfect. I touch a finger to her chin and tip her face up to me. “Look at you. You’re so beautiful.”
Softly, I kiss her, touching my tongue to hers, dizzy with lust that has sharp, heart-piercing claws that dig and slice all the way down to my soul.
Fuck. How am I so in love with her?
Both our phones are buzzing.
She glances at hers. “I should probably take this. I’ll see you later, okay?”
“You sure you don’t want me to stay?”
Her smile is heartbreaking. Because I’m not going to see it for at least three hours. “I’ll be fine.”
“I’ll either come get you or I’ll send a car for you,” I tell her, and my voice sounds husky. “You’ve got my number. Don’t go anywhere. Make sure your doors are locked.”
She places her palm on my chest, pushing gently, walking me to the front door. “Goodbye, Alexander.”
It’s fucking unbearable. “Not goodbye, Jones. Later.”
She stands on her toes and kisses me. “Alex?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For everything. I mean it. I can’t…I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you’ll move in with me.” I lean in to kiss her again and she lets me, but then she smiles and gently pushes me out the open door.
I feel like someone is ripping out my heart, beating and bloody, and now expects me to go out there and leave it behind and somehow still function. “Later, baby girl. Be ready for me.”
Fuck.
“Grumpy” takes on a whole new meaning once I’m back at work. I’m like a shark in the water, feeding on anyone who happens to rub me the wrong way as I swim through the next few hours.
Cash and Noah are already in my office.
“Why do I give you people so many keys?” I grumble.
“Good morning to you too, sunshine.” Noah hands me a mug of coffee, patting me on the back sympathetically. “You’ll be okay.”
Cash has helped himself to my desk chair and has his feet propped up on the corner of my—and my father’s and grandfather’s before me—mahogany desk. He’s got the relaxed air of a man who’s getting laid whenever he wants with a woman he’s in love with. I’m happy for him, I really am, but I’m too mired in my own agony right now. “Make yourself comfortable,” I tell him.
“I hear the weekend went well.” Cheerfully. The other two have obviously told him all about Ivy.
I glare at him. I should have the air of a man who’s getting laid whenever he wants with a woman he’s in love with. But it’s too fucking raw. Too new. And I’m here, instead of where I should be, in bed with her…licking that sweet pussy until she’s coming in my mouth.
“Oh, shit,” Cash laughs. “It’s worse than I thought.”
Noah isn’t helpful. “Told you.”
Cash is enjoying this. “Dude, I get it, believe me.”
“I’m in love with her.” I don’t even mean to tell them. But the magnitude of it feels like it’s consuming me. It wants out. Besides, they already know. Noah’s met her. He saw how fucking gorgeous and perfect she is. “I met her three days ago and I’ve already asked her to move in with me.”
Cash’s eyebrows go up, and he can’t suppress another impish smile. “What did she say?”
“She’s thinking about it. She agreed to come home with me tonight.” I think. Did she?
“It’s rough to begin with,” Cash says philosophically, like he’s the expert in this scenario. “Once you get a ring on her finger it gets easier.”
“Thank you, Wise Leader.”
Noah laughs.
Someone knocks on the door.
“I’m expecting Bruce.” Bruce Drake is the lawyer who leads the Maddox Enterprises team. I open my office door for him and he comes in, taking a seat at the table.
“I’ve got all the info you wanted on Roy Laine,” Bruce tells me.
“Let’s hear it. I want this matter settled today.”
Bruce leafs through some of the paperwork he’s brought with him. “He’s embezzled over twenty-five million dollars from the law firm he works for, Finlay & Hobbs of Stamford, where his title is Senior Divorce Lawyer.”
Cash lets out a low whistle, looking at me, then Noah, then Bruce. “Who’s Roy Laine?”
“Ivy’s father, I’m guessing,” Noah says, and I don’t correct him.
“Ah. The plot thickens.”
“Three years ago,” Bruce continues, “his bid to become partner—his fourth—was denied. Soon after that, he began slowly siphoning the firm’s money into three separate Bahamas accounts. He’s covered his tracks very well. Incredibly well, in fact. But one of those accounts had ten million dollars withdrawn last week. It was deposited into a new Bahamas account with the name GnarlyDoomRiderX15.”
I stare at Bruce for a few seconds. “GnarlyDoomRiderX15?”
“Yes, sir.”
Josh, you need to be smarter than that. Way too obvious.
“Who the fuck is GnarlyDoomRiderX15?” asks Cash, amused.
“The kid we’re about to hire,” I tell him, “once I make sure we can curb his felony tendencies.”
“Mr. Laine is waiting in the lobby to meet with you, Alexander,” Bruce tells me.
“Does he have any idea why he’s here?”
“I told him you needed some advice about a prenup. It’s one of his areas of expertise. Along with custody arrangements.”
Which is how he was able to pay so little in child support and make sure two of his kids lived lives of quiet desperation. I buzz Esther. “Show Mr. Laine to my office, please, Esther.” To the others, I say, “I’m going to need a minute alone with Mr. Laine.”
The three of them get up and head toward the door. Cash pats me on the back as he walks out. “We’re here if you need us, bro.”
“Thanks.”
While I’m waiting, I pace in front of the wall of windows, staring out at the Empire State Building. Maybe for the very first time in my life, I feel like I can almost relate to the stone-cold grit my father approached everything in his life with. Maybe that’s what having kids will do to a man. Drive you to focus so hard on success and the illusion of safety at all costs, you’re willing to kill all joy as you bulldoze your way toward it.
Actually, no. Fuck that.
I plan on showering my girl with so much joy she’ll be rolling in it.
Naked. Wet. So happy she’ll give me anything and everything I want.
There’s a knock on the door.
I open it, bracing myself against the fury I already feel for this man.
He’s dark-haired, younger than I was expecting. Maybe around forty-five. I’m almost relieved to see he looks almost nothing like Ivy. His eyes are green, not gold.
This observation hits me.
What color eyes will our baby have?
Ivy and I didn’t actually get to the point in that conversation where she told me what she’s intending to do. I made it clear how I felt but it suddenly feels like a glaring omission that I don’t know one way or the other what she’s thinking. And right now she’s alone and I have no idea how she feels or if she’s okay.
I should fucking be there. I’m her rock now. I need to make sure she knows we’re in this together, so there’s not a shadow of a doubt in her mind that I’m all in. Did I do enough?
With a desperation I don’t even recognize, I want her safe. And I want that baby safe. And if there isn’t a baby, then we’ll make one. I’ll take her to fucking Tahiti and keep her in my bed until she’s round with our baby and suntanned and so happy she feels like she’s dreaming me.
I don’t have time for this shit. I need to go.
I don’t bother shaking his hand. “Take a seat, Mr. Laine.”
“I was honored you chose me to work with you, Mr. Maddox. Your reputation precedes you.”
“So does yours,” I tell him, cuttingly. “I’m afraid I’ve called you here under false pretenses, Mr. Laine. And I’m going to make this really fucking quick.”
“Oh?” He’s suddenly uneasy.
“It has to do with your embezzlement of more than twenty-five million dollars from the law firm you work for.”
He stands up.
“Sit down, Mr. Laine.” Fuck, I sound like my father. And I use that. Right now I need it. “This is what’s going to happen. You’re going to stop stealing money, immediately, before you end up behind bars. Your other two kids might need you at some point.”
I’ve already decided I’m not going to force him to return the money. He would end up in jail. And so would Josh. I’ve also decided I don’t want another cent of this fucker’s money anywhere near either Ivy or Josh. They don’t need it anymore.
“Mr.—”
“You’ll call off Jack Dempsey. Today. As soon as we finish this conversation. And if either one of your two oldest children ever sees or hears from him again, I’ll instruct my lawyers to anonymously present your crimes—in excruciating detail—to the authorities. We have enough to put you away for a very long time, Mr. Laine. Possibly for life.”
He’s speechless, the coward.
“You’ll allow the individual who withdrew ten million last week from one particular offshore account to keep it, uncontested. The matter is closed. And you’ll put fourteen million into trust funds for your two youngest children, divided equally, with their names solely on the trusts—not yours—to be given to them when they turn eighteen. My lawyers will be discretely contacting you in the coming weeks to make sure you can prove that this has been done.”
He’s given up protesting. He understands that I’m not fucking around.
“That leaves you with just under one million dollars of your own. And you’ll still have a job, if you can keep it. My final stipulation is that you’ll never contact Ivy or Josh again unless they contact you first. Do you understand these terms, Mr. Laine?”
“Y-yes. You know them?”
Do I know them? I resist the urge to punch the asshole. “That’s irrelevant to you. Any other questions?”
“No.”
“Good. I won’t take up any more of your time, then.” I stride over to the door and open it, practically running for the stairs because the elevator’s too slow. To Esther, I say, “Show him out.”
I reach Soho around twenty minutes later. The car is stuck in traffic so I end up getting out and running down the street like a fucking lunatic. I’m almost to the building when I realize I have no way to get in. I’m about to call Ivy’s number when I see a kid getting out of a cab. He’s tall and slim, that gangly teenage phase when you’ve grown a foot in six months and haven’t had a chance to beef up yet. I know who he is instantly. The dark hair and the golden eyes are dead giveaways.
I follow him to the door, which he opens by punching a code into the keypad. “Hold that, would you?”
He does, taking in the suit, the crazy look in my eyes, maybe, and the couple of inches and thirty or more pounds I have on him. He’s suntanned from his weekend away.
We wait for the elevator together. “Do I know you from somewhere?” he asks. It happens. I get written up a lot in the Economist, the Wall Street Journal and so on.
“Alexander Maddox.” I hold out my hand and he shakes it.
“The Alexander Maddox? Investment guru and CEO of Maddox Enterprises?”
“Guru might be overstating it.”
“I’m Josh. Josh Laine.” He’s got a decent handshake, which is always a good sign. He walks into the elevator, punching the button for the fourth floor as the doors slide closed. “What floor do you want?”
“Four. Thanks.”
He eyes me curiously. There are only two apartments on the fourth floor. Which means odds are pretty good I’m going to the same place he is.
“We’ll wait until Ivy’s with us, then I’ll tell you everything you want to know,” I tell him. “You and I need to talk.”