Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The glass-walled office felt more like a cage than a sanctuary as Noah stared out at the Driftwood town square two stories below, searching for a glimpse of Charlotte and her nanny through the canopy of autumn oaks.
They probably weren’t there anymore, since Charlotte had dance class in half an hour, but he searched anyway, as eager to catch a glimpse of Miss Wright as he was of Charlotte.
The admission knotted his gut. Just what he needed, an attraction to the too-young, too-naive nanny to add to all his other problems.
“You hear what I said?” Richard asked behind him.
Noah needed to be present here, now. He turned to face his office and the man on the far side of his desk.
Twenty-plus years his senior, Richard was tall and broad with gray hair thinning at the crown. He’d been Dad’s lawyer and dearest friend, and in the years since Dad’s death, he’d become more than a mentor. He was the closest thing to a father figure Noah had.
Unfortunately, Richard had brought bad news today.
The Tidewater merger, the one Noah had worked for months to orchestrate, the one he’d thought the night before was all but sewn up, was in even more jeopardy than it’d been before.
“Lowell’s all for this new company,” Noah guessed.
Richard shifted in the leather visitor’s chair. “I can’t say for sure, seeing as how I haven’t talked to anyone on the board about it, but that’s a good bet.”
“What do you know about this rival company?”
“It’s Hayes Industries, run by Frederick—”
“Hayes. I’ve met him.” Noah sank into his chair, a holdover from when MidAtlantic Analytics had belonged to his father. He’d replaced a lot of the furniture, but there was something about sitting in Dad’s chair that grounded him.
Sometimes.
But today, the creaking leather made him feel like he was in someone else’s seat, living someone else’s life. Exhaustion pressed behind his eyes—not the good kind that came from honest work, but the bone-deep weariness of fighting battles on too many fronts. Battles that weren’t meant to be his.
Raising a child who belonged to his brother.
Building a business that belonged to his dad.
“What do you know about him?”
Noah considered the stories he’d heard about the man. “I’ve heard he’s tough, plays dirty.”
“Yeah.” Richard sat back with a sigh. “I heard the same, but I’ve never done business with him.”
“Why did Davis tell you?” Noah wouldn’t call the president of Tidewater Logistics a friend, but they’d been acquaintances for years. He seemed like a good guy, but he’d shared something outside the company he’d been asked not to share. Not that Noah minded, but he was curious.
“He prefers MidAtlantic. He doesn’t want to change horses midstream.
I’m sure he doesn’t like the idea of backing out of a commitment, even if it was only sealed with a handshake.
And maybe”—Richard shrugged—“maybe he figures a little competition will bring a better product in the end.” He leaned forward and squinted, the crinkles around his eyes deepening.
He didn’t say anything for a long moment, but Noah felt his scrutiny.
“What?”
“Do you mind if I pry?”
“Since when do you ask?”
Richard sat back. “I know the merger is really important to you, but I don’t understand why. Business is good, right? You’ve taken what your dad built and turned it into something amazing, something he’d never have imagined.”
“Artificial intelligence wasn’t a thing when he died.”
“Even so, you’ve done wonders with MidAtlantic. He’d be proud of it. Of you.”
Would Dad be proud, though? What would he say if he knew how Noah had failed to rein Jasper in?
His little brother had pulled a prodigal, selling his shares in MidAtlantic, taking his portion of their inheritance, and brushing the dust of Driftwood off his shoes.
He’d rarely returned since Mom’s death, just for the funeral and then, a few years later, to dump a daughter Jasper had never told him about.
Sure, there’d been visits—an hour here, a day there.
But while his body had been in Driftwood, his mind had been very far away.
Noah had tried and failed to get Jasper to change his behavior, though it hadn’t been Noah’s job to instill a sense of responsibility into his younger brother.
Noah had been responsible for who he’d chosen to marry. Noah’s short, disastrous marriage had cost him half his assets.
After what Jasper had cashed out and what Marianne had taken, Noah needed this merger to secure their family’s home—a legacy passed down from his great-great-grandfather—for the next generation.
Meaning Charlotte. At this point, unless Jasper accidentally fathered more children, Charlotte was the only heir.
Noah had lost everything else that really mattered to him. His dad, his mom, his brother. He was not going to lose the property entrusted to him.
He blew out a breath, feeling overwhelmed and defeated.
He didn’t want to talk about any of that.
He didn’t want to remind his mentor how his failures had risked Dad’s legacy.
He didn’t want to share his desire to be a good father figure to the little girl who desperately needed him, and he didn’t want to confess that, unlike generations of Ayletts before him, he couldn’t figure out how to care for a family and run a company at the same time.
So he avoided the question. “Any advice on how I should play this?”
Richard’s lips slipped into a smirk. After a moment, he said, “As my daddy used to say, ‘All you can do is the best you can do.’ Just keep showing up and putting in the work. They have the financials now, which prove you’ve run your business well.
Davis—and the honest ones on the Tidewater board—know that nobody else has a product as good as yours. ”
But what if Hayes could compete? Noah was proud of what he and his team had built, the first fully comprehensive AI assistant for nautical logistics companies. MidAtlantic was in a class of its own.
Or so he’d thought.
“I’ll deal with it.” He checked his watch, surprised to find it was already after three. His entire day had vanished into meetings and problem-solving.
The weight of all of it—the merger, Charlotte, the still-unsolved break-in, even his inconvenient attraction to Delaney—pressed down on his shoulders. He needed air and space to think.
He stood. “I should get going.”
“You’re leaving work early?” Richard’s eyes widened as if he’d never heard of such a thing.
Noah gathered his keys from the desk drawer. “Charlotte asked me to come to her dance class today. I promised I’d try, and to be honest, I need to get out of here for a while.”
Richard’s expression softened. “Go on, then. Little girls don’t stay little forever.” He pushed himself to his feet with a groan that spoke of aging joints. “Don’t let this business get to you. You’ve got a great product and a great team, and there are a few on the board pulling for you.”
“Appreciate that.” But Lowell had it out for him. If Noah had to guess, he’d been the one to alert Hayes to the opportunity. He’d do whatever he could to get revenge.
Noah didn’t want to think about the damage Lowell could do to this merger and to his company.
He and Richard took the stairs to the first floor and faced each other on the sidewalk. Richard’s hand clamped his shoulder in that paternal way that always made Noah miss his dad.
“Give that little girl a hug from me,” the older man said.
“Will do. Thanks for the heads-up.”
Noah walked down the block and cut through the narrow cobblestone alley lined with a boutique and a tea shop, where locals sat at wrought iron tables beneath colorful umbrellas.
He nodded to a shopkeeper and an older woman from church, their familiarity both comforting and suffocating in a town where everyone knew the Aylett name.
The alley opened onto another street, giving him a view into the parking lot behind his building. Before Charlotte had come to live with him, he’d walked to work on nice days, but now it felt wiser to have his car close in case she needed him.
At least he could count on Miss Wright to handle emergencies. She’d proved competent over and over, and every day that went by, he relaxed a little more, knowing she could manage Charlotte and all her needs.
The October sun glinted off the cars in the lot, and he quickened his pace, already calculating the time it would take to reach the studio.
When he’d told Charlotte he’d try to make it, he’d already been composing excuses to give when he failed.
But Richard was right. Charlotte wouldn’t stay little forever, and she needed to know somebody was willing to make sacrifices for her.
He stopped short when he reached his sedan.
A woman was leaning against his car.
Lena Monroe pushed away from the vehicle when she spotted him, her red lips curving into a smile that had once seemed sultry but now just looked calculating. She wore a fitted black dress that hugged every curve, her dark hair falling in waves around her shoulders.
“Noah,” she purred. “I was hoping to catch you.”
The sight of her sent him into fight, flight, or freeze mode.
Fight won.
“What are you doing here, Lena?”
She seemed unfazed by his cool tone. “Is that any way to greet an old friend?”
“We’re not friends.” He kept his voice level, though he hummed with anger that simmered beneath the surface. “We used to be, and then you destroyed my life.”
“I made a mistake.” Lena stepped closer, her perfume—something floral and cloying—assaulting his senses. “Marianne didn’t deserve you. The way she bought my story so easily… Honestly, some would say you owe me.”
“Nobody sane would say that.” Noah took a step back, putting distance between them.
“You and I, we belong together.”
“There was never anything between us, Lena. And there never will be.”
“Aren’t you ever going to forgive me?” Her voice softened, taking on a wounded quality he didn’t believe for a second.