CHAPTER 36
Drake
Samantha tried to make herself look fragile as she stood in front of the three of us. She even lowered her eyes and glanced up at me through her lashes, like that would help her case. “I did what I had to. For you, Drake.”
Cole slammed his fist into my desk. “Bullshit! This contract is disgusting, Samantha. It would never stand in court. Never mind the fact Sonnie seemed fucking shocked by it. Yet, it somehow has her signature. What do you know about that?”
I picked up one of the papers Sonnie had thrown on the floor and scanned it. My stomach immediately soured and I pinched the bridge of my nose. “How did you get her to sign this?”
She kept her eyes on her six-inch heels. “It was Paul’s idea.”
Price sank heavily into my chair and rested his head in his hands. “We should’ve called it off in the beginning when we realized what it would do to her. She’s right to fucking hate us.”
Ignoring Price, I focused on my ex-wife. “How did you get her to sign, Samantha?”
“Paul had someone at the salon ask her to sign a receipt, but it was the contract. It was all his idea! He wanted to make it extra secure so she couldn’t hurt you guys. You just let her in and you didn’t know her. We had to protect you!”
“You’re fired.” I walked behind my desk and pulled out my personal checkbook. “I can pay you a fair severance now and you can leave without making a big deal or we can fight this in court and you can spend whatever money you have left on lawyers, just to lose. With the evidence of you tricking someone into signing a contract going public, I doubt you’ll find much work and for that same reason, I guarantee you the judge wouldn’t require me to pay you a single fucking dime. It’s your choice.”
She met my gaze with large tears in her eyes, but I didn’t believe them. “Please, Drake. You loved me at one point. Think about that.”
“Make up your mind, Samantha. Either way, you’re fired. Should I call security to have you removed?”
“No! Please. Just… Give me the check.” She stood up after I scribbled out an amount and ripped the check out of my book. When she saw the amount I was giving her, her mouth fell open and her eyes widened. “Drake! This isn’t enough!”
I scribbled out another check with five thousand less and snatched the previous check from her before giving her the smaller one. “You’d better hope we can fix this mess with Sonnie. We were never okay with your plan to make her the bad guy. We care about her. We were hoping things would work out and the public would forget about how we’d let them hate her. If you ruined our chance with her, I’ll make sure you never work in this town again. Hell, this state!”
“I say we turn her and Paul over to the police. What they did is illegal.” Cole glared at her. “Is there anything else we should know?”
Samantha, staring down at the check, shoved it into her pocket and stood up, the meek act over. “I told her about our threesome and that you, Drake, have been sneaking over to my house every time she’s out with one of the others. Was that necessary? Nope. I just think she’s a little too uppity, if you ask me.”
The three of us remained silent as her words sank in. My heart raced painfully and for a moment, I wondered if I was old enough to have a heart attack. She’d made sure to really finish off any chance we had at getting Sonnie to forgive us. I hadn’t been sleeping with Samantha, but why would Sonnie ever believe me?
“Jesus, you idiots really do care about her, don’t you?” Samantha strode across the office to the door and shrugged. “Sucks, doesn’t it? Once upon a time, I really cared about you, Drake. All because of a few mistakes I made, you wrote me off completely. Just like she’s going to write you off now. I hope you spend just as many years hurting as I did.”
I watched her leave in silence and ran my hands through my hair, clutching at it angrily. My brain kept replaying everything Sonnie had said and everything Samantha said and I couldn’t form a coherent thought to save my life.
“Cancel that fucking check.” Price stood up from the desk and walked around to me. He stopped in my face and gripped my suit. “This isn’t your fault. It’s all three of our faults. We weren’t open and honest with her and now she thinks she can’t trust us. We’ll fix it, though.”
I took a deep breath. “Will we?”
He narrowed his eyes and let go of me. “Yes. I’m not losing her.”
Cole swallowed and sank into one of the chairs in front of my desk. “Maybe she’s better off without us. Look at what we let happen to her. Most of the shit Samantha told her is bullshit, but we did sacrifice her. No matter what we told ourselves, we made a choice and that choice directly hurt her. We don’t fucking deserve her.”
“Maybe not, but I’m still the selfish, greedy asshole I was a couple of weeks ago. I’m not lying down and letting her walk away without trying. She thinks we don’t care about her. She thinks this whole thing was just some fucked up stunt to help secure our business. I’ll be damned if she leaves us without knowing we care about her.” Price looked at both of us and shook his head. “Do whatever you need. I’m going after her.”
My feet were moving before my brain registered what I was doing. It didn’t take it long to catch up, though. “Yeah, I’m coming. I can’t let her leave thinking I wasn’t solely focused on her.”
Cole stayed in his seat. “I’m not doing it. She doesn’t deserve to be put through anything else. We’ve done enough.”
“You don’t think we know that?” Price grabbed the front of Cole’s shirt and yanked him up. “Tell me you don’t love her.”
Cole’s eyes widened and he brushed Price’s hand away. “What are you talking about? Stop it.”
Price grabbed him again. “Say it. If you don’t love her, say the words. I won’t hold it against you. Neither of us will. Why would you fight for a woman you don’t love? So, just say the words and I’ll let you sit here and do whatever you want.”
Shoving Price, Cole got in his face. “What the fuck do you want from me? You saw the pain in her eyes when she came in here. You want me to help inflict more? I won’t do it!”
“Say you don’t love her.”
Cole growled and shoved Price harder. “Fuck off, Price!”
“Say it.” I stepped closer. “Say you wouldn’t feel like a piece of you was dying if you never saw her again.”
Cole’s anger crumpled in front of us and he slumped back into the chair behind him. “I can’t.”
“We fucked up, but who’s going to love that woman more than us? Who would give her more, take care of her more, or cherish her more? No one. No one’s going to treat her better than we will. We just have to show her that. We’ll tell her what happened and tell her how sorry we are. She cares about us, too. I know she does. This will be fine.”
Halfway through Price’s speech, I understood how panicked he sounded. He didn’t believe the last part of his speech. He didn’t believe it would be okay. My stomach clenched painfully and the back of my mouth watered as the urge to vomit struck me. Price had no hope for us, despite what he said.
Cole seemed to know that, too. We’d been best friends, basically brothers, for so much of our lives. We knew each other better than anyone in the world. There was no lying to each other. We all knew none of us had much hope of winning Sonnie back. We were each so ashamed of our actions I wasn’t sure we thought we deserved her back.
We had to try, though. I was too terrified to say it, but if Price had told me to say I didn’t love Sonnie, I wouldn’t have been able to. She had so quickly become the center of my world with her sly smiles and willingness to give herself to us. “Let’s go.”
Cole and Price looked at me, surprised. Cole took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah, okay.”
Price repeated the actions. “Yeah. We can do this.”
I let out a bitter laugh and moved towards the door. “Maybe we think of something better to say before we get to her.”