Chapter 18
Matthias
My nerves on edge while I wait for my nine o’clock appointment, I walk out to where my assistant Donna sits at her desk and remind her no one is to come in until after I’m done.
“I don’t want to be bothered, so whoever needs to see me, no matter what the problem is or how urgent they claim it is, do not let them interrupt my nine o’clock. ”
She nods, and in her husky voice, says, “I won’t let a soul through, Matthias.”
I probably didn’t have to tell her that for the third time this morning, but the last thing I need today is one of my brothers strolling into my office during my meeting as they have a tendency to do.
Kellen is the worst offender, but that’s likely due to the fact that he works here and has an office just a couple floors beneath mine.
Still, I don’t need anyone distracting me today.
“Do you want me to alert you to when Miss Dwyer arrives, or would you like me to send her on in as soon as she gets here?” Donna asks.
Since I often have her keep people out here waiting on me, it’s not a silly question. I’m not playing any games today, though, so there’s no need to make her stay out here.
“No, send her in as soon as she arrives. I’ll be waiting.”
I walk back into my office and try to sit down, but I’m too jumpy.
I don’t think I’ve ever been this nervous about a meeting with anyone, much less Cynthia Dwyer.
I’ve known her for years. For God’s sake, we practically lived together for my entire first semester at college.
She knows me almost as well as my family does, so I have nothing to be nervous about.
Except the entire reason for our meeting.
After checking the time on my watch for what must be the tenth time in less than two minutes, I see the second hand finally signal it’s nine am. My heart races, so I stand up to walk around my office. A little exercise never did anyone any harm, right?
Sure, except with the way I’m feeling right now, my heart might explode out of my chest if I walk too fast. Jesus, I can’t believe I’m this nervous. I need to get it together, or Cynthia is going to think I’ve lost my mind.
A quick tap on the door is followed by it opening, and she walks in looking as confident as ever.
That’s a good sign. I notice she’s done something new with her hair.
Maybe some kind of highlights to make the brown more golden?
I’m not sure. I simply recognize she looks different than the last time I saw her a few days ago.
“Matthias, how are you?” she asks before leaning in to give me a hug. “Sit down. Let’s talk. I have some things to tell you.”
Jesus, I don’t think my nervous system can take this kind of overload. If she doesn’t tell me something to put a fucking smile on my face in the next minute or so, I might just stroke out.
“Good, I guess,” I say as I take a seat at my desk and she sits down in front of me. “How are you?”
While she rifles through her briefcase and pulls out a stack of papers, she answers, “Same. Good. You know how it is.”
Ordinarily, if this were one of our usual meetings, I’d ask for specifics, but today I don’t have the bandwidth to discuss some issue with her dog or how the escrow process with the house she’s buying has become a bear and a half.
This isn’t one of our usual meetings, though. Today I’m all business, or at least the business she and I have together.
“So what’s the word?” I ask far too eagerly.
If this were a normal business meeting and she wasn’t my lawyer, I’d likely have given away any upper hand I have by being so impatient. Thankfully, that’s not going to hurt me with Cynthia.
When she looks up from her stack of papers, I know the answer isn’t the one I want. She nods, practically swallowing her lips, before she sighs.
No, that’s never a good sign from your lawyer.
“She won’t sign. That’s what her attorney told me right before I walked in here this morning. She simply won’t.”
Fuck!
I’m to blame for this mess. I was so busy dealing with the death of my father, being upset with Ava being with Theo and then his death right after we fell in love that I never dealt with the one issue I should have.
Then I had to run King Industries and create a life with her and now three kids that I completely forgot.
Now that damn problem has come back to haunt me.
“She won’t take the money?” I ask, desperately wishing that could solve this problem.
Cynthia frowns and shakes her head. “Nope. And she doesn’t care about the house either.”
Furious at myself, Jillian, and this whole fucking mess, I stand up and begin to pace through my office.
“Then what the hell does she want? We didn’t own anything together other than the house and a couple cars, but she’s had them all this time.
Fuck, she had the house this whole time. I thought she was living there.”
“She was. In fact, when I put it to her attorney that you’ve been paying for that house all this time and could easily take it back and throw her out onto the street, he didn’t seem to care at all.”
I stop next to Cynthia’s chair and let my shoulders sag, finally feeling defeated over this divorce disaster.
“What do I need to do? She doesn’t want money or the house I thought she cared about.
Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it. If I don’t, I won’t be able to marry Ava in less than two weeks, which will break her heart.
I can’t do that to her, not because of this.
So tell me what you think I should do to fix this problem. ”
For a long moment, Cynthia doesn’t say a word. I get the feeling she has an idea, but for some reason, she’s hesitant to say it. She doesn’t have to worry about it being too outrageous. If there’s even a chance it might work, I’ll do it.
Finally, she answers, “She wants to meet in-person.”
Damn. I wasn’t expecting that.
“Really? Why?”
She scrunches up her face and says, “I get the feeling Jillian has something she wants to say to you but doesn’t want to do it through her attorney. We’ll be there, of course, but I won’t be surprised if she asks to speak to you one-on-one.”
I sit down behind my desk again and blow the air out of my lungs.
“I can’t imagine why. We weren’t married very long.
She broke up with me over the phone when I came back here to handle my father’s passing.
Not that I blame her. We weren’t exactly the picture of a loving couple.
I mean, she was cheating on me with some guy for months before we split. ”
That seems to make Cynthia perk up. Jotting a note on the stack of papers, she smiles.
“Let’s keep that in our pocket. It might help us.
In the meantime, we need to fly to London to get this straightened out.
As long as we do this tomorrow, she agrees and signs the papers so I can get them filed the next day, I’ve got a judge I know will fast-track this.
But we have to do it tomorrow, or we risk running out of time. ”
I hate the idea of telling Ava we need to push back the wedding, so if a trip to London is what I have to do to, so be it. I can’t let her down after we had to cancel our wedding the first time.
Dammit! If only I had gone through with all the stupid paperwork that first time, I would have known this Jillian issue existed. God, I’ve created a fucking mess, and I have no one but myself to blame.
Resigned to flying to London to get Jillian to agree to divorce me on her terms entirely, I sigh. “Fine. We’ll take the company plane. I can have us flying out late tonight and be there for start of business day tomorrow at nine. Sound good?”
“Sounds great! Teterboro, right?” Cynthia asks as she begins to pack up her briefcase.
“Yeah. I’ll call the pilot now. Say eleven o’clock? That way we’ll get there with a few minutes to spare so we can get our heads together before walking in. Tell them we’ll meet at nine at the King Industries headquarters there.”
She gives me a sly smile before heading toward my office door to leave. “Let’s hope she doesn’t have an issue with that too. She might not want to do it there because that could give you an advantage.”
“I can’t see how that would be since I’m willing to give her whatever dollar amount she wants, a house, and whatever the hell else she could demand. I’m not exactly the one holding the cards here.”
Looking back at me, she smiles. “Don’t worry. I tend to get a bit cranky on transatlantic flights, so they won’t be meeting with nice Cynthia. Maybe that will shake them up a bit. See you tonight at eleven!”
As I collapse back down onto my office chair, I try to remember why the hell I married Jillian in the first place. It wasn’t like it had anything to do with love. I went to London to try to forget I loved Ava. Not that moving away worked.
Then I remember. I married her to make my father happy. He thought she’d make a perfect wife, and her father agreed, so the two of them hatched a plan to get us together.
I look up at the ceiling and silently curse him out. If only he never told me I had to forget how I felt about Ava, none of this would be happening right now.
But who’s to blame—my father for forcing me to marry a woman I didn’t love or me for not taking care of this divorce all those years ago—doesn’t matter. All that matters is I get this handled so come two weekends from today Ava and I can finally stand before our family and friends and say I do.
Ava’s feeding Elizabeth when I walk in the door, and all I feel is guilt for what I’m going to do.
I should have handled this before now, and tomorrow, I have to fly across the Atlantic to fix it.
Hopefully. I don’t know what I’m going to do if I can’t.
The thought of disappointing the woman I love crushes me.
Her face lights up when she sees me. Sitting at the kitchen table with Elizabeth in her arms, she smiles.
“Hey, you! Look who’s up for dinner just in time to see you.”
She holds up my daughter, and I give her a kiss and then her mother. “Hey, little lady. Did you miss me?”