Chapter 58 Paige
PAIGE
There’s no fever the next day. I feel like myself; better than I’ve felt in days. I spend the morning working, but the sunshine outside keeps inviting me to come out and play. Rafe and I have to sit down for an interview this afternoon with a journalist. But before then… there’s time.
So I text Rafe. He’s upstairs, in his office.
Paige
Tennis court before lunch?
Rafe
Are you well enough?
Yes. I want to move.
Meet you there at one.
I switch into my tennis skirt and top and pull a pair of sunglasses on. I’ve played more in the last month than I have in years. What started as a simple desire to best him has turned into a craving.
I have the itch again.
It’s been so long since I felt that way.
I’m putting my hair in a ponytail when I get a call from one of my Mather & Wilde colleagues. She works beneath the new Maison Valmont CEO but has been there for almost a decade. We know each other well.
The new CEO just warned about layoffs.
When?
In seven months.
The anger that pulses through me is heady and sharp, like the lash of a whip.
I think of Rafe’s hands. Breath for me, Wilde.
Of his confessions in the night and his insistence that I take the medicine the doctor prescribed.
I think of his rapport with the watchmaker in his factory and the way he spoke to them all by name.
He promised me he wouldn’t fire anyone at Mather & Wilde for at least six months. Technically he’s still staying true to his agreement… but only by a month.
And he didn’t tell me any of this himself.
Betrayal feels like heat in my stomach. I’ve been so stupid. Starting to trust him…
I know I never should’ve.
I rush down the marble steps of the villa. Through the kitchen, and the living room, and onto the terrace. Every room I pass is empty. He’s nowhere to be seen. So he’s early to the tennis court, then.
I walk past the lavender hedges with the industrious bees.
I pass the fountain with Egeria, pouring water out of her urn.
She works hard day in and day out. Suddenly I feel angry on her behalf, too.
Did anyone ask her if she wanted to stand there working forever?
Wise adviser to the king. I bet she got angry at times, too. Kings are hard to deal with.
I push open the wooden door to the tennis court.
He’s there.
Standing by the bench, racquet in hand.
He looks at me. There’s a curve to his lips that dies when he sees my expression. Carefully, he sets down his racquet.
“Paige,” he says.
And that’s what hurts the most. He uses my name, and it’s in a careful voice that tells me this isn’t a fluke or a mistake. He meant to do this.
“You look angry,” he says.
“I am angry. And you know exactly why, don’t you?” I close the distance between us. Energy is buzzing beneath my skin, like I’ve swallowed the bees from his garden. “You promised me you wouldn’t lay anyone off. You promised me in exchange for me behaving. And I have behaved!”
“I haven’t laid anyone off.”
“Yet. Your CEO at Mather & Wilde just had a company-wide meeting and warned everyone there would be layoffs.”
He runs a hand through his hair. “In seven months, after the pause you put in place.”
He says it so simply, like that makes it okay. I’m feeling too much at once. “How soon after? The week?” I take a step closer. The angrier I am, the less hurt I feel. “Damn it, Montclair. Just when I thought… Damn it.”
“I followed what you said to the letter.” His jaw works.
“No one will be let go for six months, like I promised. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be long-term changes.
You know your uncle invested in entire vanity departments that are unprofitable.
You’ve said as much yourself! You need to return to the basics, to your heritage. ”
I push against his chest. My hands rest against his t-shirt, warm from the sun. “Those people are like family to me.”
“They won’t be better off if the company as a whole goes bankrupt. We have to tell them early so people can start making plans if they lose their jobs.”
“How long have you known this was coming?”
He hesitates a moment too long. “Three days.”
“Three days?” It feels like a dagger. While I was… he was… the dress shop. His mouth between my legs. Holding me when I was sick. Sweet words and the watch, that beautiful watch, with the wave on it. So similar to my tattoo.
He knew that entire time.
“Yes,” he says, “and as you remember, or maybe won’t remember, you were somewhat indisposed. I wasn’t about to foist a conversation on you about things that could wait.”
“My company can’t wait.”
“You’re impossible. Do you know that? Impossible.”
“And you’re the one who showed me the Artemis factory and told me… told me… that you are a steward of companies. Not a destroyer, not a conqueror.” I shake my head again. He held me while I was feverish and knew about this.
“You should have told me. How could you not have told me?” I push against his chest again. It’s frustratingly solid and firm. He finds my wrists, his long fingers encircling them.
“You would have thrown a fit.” He leans down, his breath ghosting across my lips. “You’re very good at it, and it was not the time. You were sick.”
“Liar. You were scared to tell me.” I break my hands loose from his grip.
He lets go, but his hands find my hips instead, like he wants to keep me in place.
“I did it for you. Don’t you realize that? I’m doing so much more than I usually would for any struggling company I take over, and I’m doing it—”
“For your own bank balance,” I spit back. It’s not fair. None of it. That he makes me feel like this, and that I still want him. “It’s all profits.”
“My bank balance doesn’t need Mather & Wilde. Do you want to see it? Is that it? I don’t need your company. I don’t even need it to do well.” His teeth grit together in an audible snick.
“You’re such an asshole,” I say.
“Yes,” he says, “that’s it. Get angry at me instead of the real problem.”
“Those people are my family,” I say. “And I promised them… I did all of this… to make sure they would have jobs. That the company survives.”
“And it will. You’re making sure that it will. You’re damn good at your job, you know.” Rafe sounds almost furious about that, his voice low. His hands dig into my waist. “Ben wasted you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me yourself?” I ask him. My hand slides into his hair and grips tightly. I’m still feeling too much, but the touch is an anchor. Something to hold on to.
His eyes narrow, but he doesn’t flinch at my tight grip. “Because you would react like you’re reacting right now.”
No, I think.
He’s wrong.
Hearing it from him would have softened the blow. Instead he’d done this behind my back. His hair is silky-rough against my fingers and I think of his mouth against mine.
“I can’t believe I let you touch me like that, in the changing room,” I tell him. Not when he was gearing up to do this.
Another muscle tenses in his jaw. “I can. Because you enjoyed it. Just like you enjoy my kisses, and my touch, and it doesn’t matter if you hate me sometimes, too.”
I rake my hand over his scalp, and his eyes drop to my lips.
The green of his gaze feels liquid. Flowing like the waves of the lake outside the tennis court.
The anger has moved down, settling into a burning fire low in my stomach.
I’m still furious at him and at me, and at the energy that seems to pulse between us whenever we’re close.
We keep taking two steps forward and one step back.
“Nothing to say? That’s unusual.” He leans forward, lips only an inch from me. “You frustrating, maddening woman.”
“You’re not the one to talk,” I say.
And then his lips slant over mine.
I give him a punishing kiss in return. We’re fighting for control over the kiss. It’s not perfect. There are teeth against my lower lip and then my tongue against his, both of us holding on to the other with the same force we should be using to push each other away.
There’s none of his confident seduction from the dressing room.
None of my calculated cruelty from Monte Carlo.
His hands slide down to grip my ass, pulling my hips tight against his. The skirt is short. His fingertips are brushing against the tops of my bare thighs.
He kisses me hard and hot, like he wants to consume me whole.
I find the hem of his t-shirt and slide my hands inside. He has the most annoyingly attractive body I’ve ever seen. Hard muscle flows beneath soft skin, and I run my nails along his back.
“You’re the most confusing person I’ve ever met,” he mutters against my neck. His lips are moving fast and hot over my skin. Down across my collarbone.
I push my hips against his and feel the press of his erection. It sends electricity through me. We’re constantly in a negotiation of power. One takes and the other gives, over and over again.
“I’m not the one confusing things,” I say, and I tug at his t-shirt.
I’ve touched him shirtless before. But it’s never been like this.
He leans back long enough to tear it off and then reaches for me again.
I run my hands over his skin, burning hot with fury.
I shouldn’t be doing this. But I don’t want to stop, and impulse control has never been my strong suit.
“Stop doing this to me,” I tell him between the kisses. The burning inside my chest has moved lower, into my stomach. It’s spreading. “I hate this feeling.”
“That makes two of us.” His hand brushes over my breast, across a hardened nipple that pokes through my top. I use his pause to palm him through his pants.
He’s hard, and I want more of him. I’ve been thinking of him since that party. Of what he looked like and felt like.
And what he’d feel like inside me.
He groans and walks me back until I hit the tennis net. It’s soft behind me. Barely strong enough to hold me up. There’s so much of him. I’ve never kissed him when he was shirtless, with all this taut skin for my hands to brush over.