Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
The moment the shelter door swung shut behind the police officer, Alyssia sank into a nearby waiting room chair.
She leaned the back of her head against the wall, closed her eyes, and let the rising sun warm her face.
Exhaustion rolled through every inch of her body.
She was pretty sure last night had been the longest night of her life.
Of course, just like the second longest night of her life, it had started with Tate, and her making a fool of herself.
She shouldn’t go there. But she was too tired to hold back the unwelcome memory. Exhaustion seeped through her, dragging the memory with it. That night, eight years ago. She’d just barely turned eighteen, and her date to senior prom had canceled last minute.
When Tate found out, and asked if he could take her, she thought it was because he liked her.
Teenage-her hoped he’d finally figured out she like-liked him, and he felt the same.
She’d been in heaven the whole night. Some of her friends were dating college guys, but her, she got to show up with someone who was post-grad.
He’d been the perfect date. Sweet, attentive, a gentleman. Her friends insisted that meant he loved her. At eighteen years old, and crushing hard, that was exactly what she needed to hear.
She bit back a bitter laugh at the unwelcome rush of images and emotions. She’d thrown herself at him. Getting laid on prom night—all the movies told her that was a guarantee, and who better to lose her virginity to than the man of her dreams?
Turned out he was just that kind to everyone, and that he’d only asked her as a favor to her brother.
She sniffled and forced herself upright, shoving away the rest of the memory and the ache in her gut. Now she’d made the same mistake again.
But had she? He’d been interested, she knew it. The kind of reaction he’d had to her last night. Even before she touched him he’d been turned on.
“Ms. Tippins.” A familiar voice burned away the last of her wandering thoughts, and she snapped back to the now.
Bryce Thompson. Sick dread made her insides lurch.
She had a feeling he was about to become the bane of her existence.
The older gentleman stood a few feet from her chair, not a single wrinkle or piece of fluff on his suit.
His hands were clasped in front of him, and his dark eyes narrowed and locked on her.
“Good morning.” She scrambled to her feet.
Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. Sure, he’d made it clear in the past he thought her shelter was a waste of resources.
That he was planning to tear the entire building to the ground to make room for retail property.
On top of that, she’d just finished filling out a police report that directly involved his family.
Yeah, this was going to suck. She should have gone home as soon as she had the chance. It wouldn’t have been fair to leave her staff with this burden, though.
His jaw-set expression never even twitched. “I understand you have my dog.”
She could bend the truth a little. Tell him no, they didn’t have anyone’s dog until the animal was adopted into an actual caring family. Delaying the inevitable wouldn’t make things better. “I understand the same thing.”
“I’m here to retrieve him. How much do I owe you?” He pulled a checkbook from his jacket breast pocket.
This was too easy. He was being too calm. Alyssia’s ill-ease grew, rolling through her and dragging more exhausted tension to the surface. “There’s no charge. I can’t—”
“No wonder you don’t make any money here.” The corner of his mouth pulled up in a sneer. “I’ll take him and leave then.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the morning volunteers—the guy was as solid as a brick wall and almost as wide as he was tall, and normally a total sweetheart—step forward.
She met his gaze, but didn’t motion for him to stand back.
Sweet disposition or not, his bulk was intimidating, and his presence made confronting Mr. Thompson that much less terrifying.
“You can’t take him.” She pushed the words out quickly, not talking over Thompson as effectively has he had with her, but still determined not to be interrupted again.
“The new owners will pay whatever fees are associated with his care, and until then, he’s not ready to be moved.
He’s still recovering, and will be for several more days. ”
“I see.” He scribbled in his checkbook and tore the piece of paper out. “Then I’ll be back when he can be moved.”
“You can’t take him home.” Damn it, why wasn’t he listening to her?
Frustration crawled under her skin like a million ants, and she shoved her hands in her pockets to hide her clenching fists.
She dragged up every ounce of forcefulness she had, and crammed it into her voice.
“He belongs in a good home where he won’t be hurt again. ”
He locked his gaze on hers, eyes hard and unyielding. “I’ll be back in a few days.”
He set the check on the counter, and was through the front door before she could say anything else.
A whole new wave of frustration crashed over her, mingling with everything else that had been the last twelve hours of her life, and sapping away her restraint.
She had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep a string of profanities from spilling out.
She grabbed the check off the counter, cringed at the four-figure amount he’d randomly chosen to write it for, a tore it into little tiny pieces.
It didn’t solve anything, but the simple act made her feel a little better. A little.
* * *
“Alan.” Tate stood at the front of the conference room. He capped the dry erase marker and set it on the tray of the white board before turning to his administrative assistant. “Do you have this?”
Alan nodded, and Tate let his attention travel around the room, scanning the remaining faces. “Any other questions or concerns?”
He was met with a series of shaking heads and smiles. He was lucky he had a solid team on this project. Technically they were all on loan from Skriddie as contractors. The lines of the new business venture were blurred, but he was close to making the crowdfunding venture its own entity.
While it was nice to get back into the technical side of things, especially getting to meld it with the marketing he loved, he’d been working directly with sales so long that a good group made the transition easier.
He turned back to Alan. “Action items?”
His assistant ran through the list, and Tate made sure everyone was ready for their test users to launch by the end of the week.
Tonight with Alyssia had to be all business.
Not that it would be anything else. He still didn’t know what had happened yesterday.
His pulse twitched at the memories—the way she tasted, the tiny gasps she made when they kissed, and the combination of frustration and desire she’d managed to overload him with.
He tried to shake the thoughts away. The meeting wrapped up, and everyone headed back to their desks.
Images of Alyssia still taunted him as he made his way to his office.
Damn it, why was she getting in his head now?
They’d dealt with this and moved on all those years ago.
Or, at least, he thought they had. She’d barely been legal when he’d offered to be her last minute date for her senior prom.
She’d looked gorgeous in that dress, no longer the little girl who tagged along with them as kids.
And when she’d all but thrown herself at him—both too much and nothing like last night—he’d had to tell her no.
The rambling combination of fantasy and denial skidded from his mind when he pushed open his office door.
Speaking of relationships that had jaded his reality.
An older woman sat in the chair across from his desk, not looking up at the soft creak.
She scrolled through her phone. He personally knew her hair wasn’t that shade of auburn, but not because her hairdresser had made any mistakes hiding the gray.
He hid his sigh. “Are you here for business, or personal reasons?” Her answer would determine how he addressed her.
He didn’t like keeping his tone so formal, but years of having it drilled into his head didn’t leave him much choice.
There were no favorites in his mother’s business world.
Especially when it came to family. Though more and more their recent run-ins made him wonder if she was pushing things in the other direction.
Discounting his ideas because of their relationship.
He wasn’t sure if she was doing it to prove there was no favoritism, or for some other reason, but each time they talked business, he became more convinced he wasn’t imagining it.
She locked her phone and returned it to her purse, never turning to look at him. “Personal.”
He wasn’t sure if that was a relief or not. He gave her a light kiss on the cheek before moving around his desk and dropping into his chair. “It’s lovely to see you, Mother.”
“Of course.” Her smile was as formal as his greeting.
“How are things going, darling?” Her soft southern accent slipped in, adding a layer of artificial sugar to her words.
He might not see it that way, except he knew the lilting drawl vanished the moment she was in a business meeting and felt like it would make her appear anything less than intelligent and businesslike.
“Fantastic. I’ve been drumming. Women think it’s sexy as all get out.
And I’m thinking of trading in the Bentley for an F-150.
” He cranked his own drawl a couple of notches, poured out the clichés she saw as being ‘too hick’ for people like them, and never let his pleasant expression slip.
“Y’all should stop by this weekend if you’re free. ”
Her eye twitched and he knew he’d pushed the right buttons. Maybe he shouldn’t have, but sometimes her sense of propriety rubbed him the wrong way.
Still, she kept smiling. “Sounds wonderful, darling. How’s your little project coming along?”
He resisted the urge to snarl at the disdain in her question.
She hadn’t supported the idea for the crowd-funding offshoot.
Had shot down his bids to rent the Skriddie’s resources, saying that wasn’t the industry they were in, and as COO of her husband’s company, she had that kind of veto power.
“I thought we weren’t discussing business. ” His voice was flat.
“So right.” Her eyes hardened, and her lips drew into a thin line. “How’s Jared’s baby sister doing? The one who follows you two everywhere, bless her little heart?”
That’s where this was going. Please let him be wrong. Let this be something he couldn’t even begin to guess at. “She hasn’t done that for years.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m positive. And she’s fine.” Wonderful, sexy, dangerously alluring. Great, that’s what I need to be thinking about right now. Not.
“So you are on speaking terms with her. Are you personally handling her user experience for this little project of yours?”
His mother already knew all this. Frustration swelled inside. This wasn’t the time to let his cool slip. “I wouldn’t put it that way, but I am her contact. You’re not here on business, remember?”
“Of course. Tell her to drop the charges against Bryce Jr., and give him back his dog.”
She’d almost cut straight to the point. That was odd. “Why are you asking me?”
“You know her.”
“Jared knows her. She’s his younger sister. You’re not in his office tossing passive aggressive formalities at him.”
Her mouth pulled up at the corners, but her eyes were cold. “Mr. Tippins has work to do.”
And Tate had the entire afternoon free? He clenched his teeth. “Why doesn’t Mr. Thompson have this conversation with Alyssia himself?”
“He tried. She was unreasonable.”
That almost made him smile. A hint of relief amid his mounting irritation. “I can’t imagine.”
“Talk to her.” She stood. “Make this vanish.”
“Or your boyfriend won’t put out tonight?
” Tate winced as soon as the words passed his lips.
He’d let his guard slip for just a moment, and he shouldn’t have done that.
Just because everyone knew his parents had an open relationship, and his mother had spent as much time in Bryce Thompson’s bed as she had her own in the last several years, didn’t mean it was appropriate for anyone to talk about it.
Oh well, too late to take it back. “Sorry. Gentleman caller.”
Her eyes narrowed and she locked her gaze on his face for several seconds before turning away. “She won’t like the alternative, and experience tells me that means you won’t either.”
The moment the door swung shut behind her, he clenched his hands into fists and dug his knuckles into his closed eyes.
Stars danced against his eyelids. He took one deep breath and then another, struggling to find his composure again.
He didn’t even know where to start unraveling his fury.
Had that conversation really just gone that way?
He took one more breath and tried to turn his attention back to work.
It wasn’t like his mother—or Bryce Thompson for that matter—was going to order a hit on Alyssia or anything so ludicrous.
They were verbal bullies. His best bet was to make sure Lys got her site up and running as quickly as possible, funded her shelter expansions, and put this unfortunate coincidence behind her.
He slammed his fist into the arm of his chair. Why couldn’t he believe it was going to be that simple?