Chapter Four. Holden
FOUR
Holden
It’s black.
It’s white.
It’s gray.
Leave it to fucking Rowan to throw that back in my face.
My hands fist and my shoulders hurt from being so goddamn tense as I pace the confines of my office like a caged tiger.
That fucking pathetic excuse for a bikini. Ties on the sides and barely any fabric.
Desperate to throw something, I pick up the crystal paperweight from my desk.
Their hands on her. Three pairs of them. Her tanned skin. Their bare chests.
I put the paperweight down. The urge is so goddamn tempting my fingers ache from gripping it.
Her red painted lips. Her sexy smile with them. Her disgusted scowl at me.
I lace my fingers and pull down on the back of my neck as I cover the same ground, the same fucking twenty steps, again, but gain zero goddam clarity.
Her eyes. The hurt in them I don’t understand. She did this. She caused this. What in the fuck am I missing?
I reach for the paperweight, welcome its heft again.
Her complete disregard for me.
My chest aches.
My fingers tighten.
My arm cocks back.
“Don’t you dare,” Audrey warns from the doorway.
The words almost egg me on more, but I lower my arm. I drop it with a thunk on my desk.
And I fucking hate that Audrey has caught me in a moment of weakness. I only show my temper when I care or when someone has gotten past my guard.
She knows that better than anyone.
“I’m in a fucking shitty mood. You probably want to stay away from me.” That’s about as nice as I can be right now.
“You need to go touch some grass, Holden. Remember the reason you’re here.”
I glare at her. “Don’t think for one second I’ve forgotten the why.” But while I might say the words, I also snatch my keys off my desk and walk past her without saying another word.
Or admitting she might be right.
I drive through the well-maintained streets of the town I despise, passing a billboard advertising Rhett Rothschild for city council, before heading across the river and over the pothole-filled, graffiti-ridden ones I feel more at home in.
Past a cemetery and a headstone I still can’t bring myself to visit.
And I end up staring at the only place there is green grass in this whole goddamn town—if you can call the crabgrass- and weed-filled baseball field actual grass.
But the state of the field doesn’t seem to matter to the kids and teens who are on it in their mismatched uniforms and playing with secondhand gear.
There’s a freedom here. To be who you are away from the depressing confines of your dilapidated or dangerous apartment complex.
To impress the girls who are giggling in the stands and watching your every move, or to trash-talk without the consequences of what happens beyond the chalk lines.
To have a chance to be anything but the kid who goes to bed hungry at night or whose mom hustles for drugs or who’s left alone to fend for themselves more times than not.
It’s the one little piece you can control when everything else in your life feels so out of your control.
I know this firsthand.
But here I sit just beyond the outfield fence in my luxury SUV that costs more than most of these families make in several years’ time, and I find an odd peace that I can’t explain.
The game plays on absently in front of me. Balls and strikes seem like life-or-death matters to these kids when they most likely know from experience that they aren’t.
But they suspend disbelief. They pretend.
Just like I pretend that all of this shit isn’t my fault. Rowan. Her complications. Letting her in. And now needing to make sure she stays the fuck out of everything.
I’m not a forgiving man. And yet … Christ.
Rowan.
I run a hand through my hair and replay the events of the past few months in my head.
Past few months? More like the events that took place when Chad and Rhett hit and killed my brother, Mason, all those years ago. The ones that only became more real when the police let them off with zero repercussions, no doubt because their families are corrupt royalty in this goddamn town.
To think how long I watched from afar. How I waited to amass my own empire, my own success, all while trying to figure out the best way to take down the smarmy fuckers who ruined my world.
To show them that there are consequences to every action. And since the law in this town didn’t give them to them, I took matters into my own hands.
Revenge isn’t a word I subscribe to. More like getting what the fuck you’re due. Finally having to pay for the suffering, for the pain, for the life-altering events they set into place.
Not revenge, no. More like fucking karma.
Who knew that a casual, late-night check-in of the Westmore duo would give me the opening I needed to set the wheels in motion?
A few keystrokes to slip behind a firewall were all I needed. Rhett Rothschild and Chadwick Williams in financial peril that they were hiding not only from the world but from their families? My opening.
A bit more research showed that the men had leveraged everything on a shit purchase.
A quick buck they’d planned to turn on a deal that went sour because they were so pompous, so fucking arrogant, that they thought they were untouchable by ill fortune so they never did their research or read the fine print.
Imagine that.
The purchase of TinSpirits was only the means to an end. Controlling ownership in one of the two places they were siphoning money was just the start.
And now that I have them by the balls, I plan to squeeze them until it hurts.
Until they beg for mercy and know an iota of the pain they’ve caused me. And I sure as hell plan on giving them an extra twist as a fuck you from all of us little people who used to work at the Westmore Country Club who they treated as less than simply because we weren’t them.
Expect the unexpected. Isn’t that how I’ve lived my life? Then how the hell did I not expect Rowan? Meeting her. Wanting her. Knowing I needed to stay away from her. And then fucking caving despite every part of me knowing I shouldn’t.
Shit.
Guess that part has backfired, huh?
Steal Chad’s childhood crush, fuck her for the pleasure of it and for the pain it would inflict on Chad?
Guess that backfired. But why? What the fuck does Chad have that I don’t?
Nothing.
Fucking nothing.
I’d bet my goddamn life on it.
But that still doesn’t answer the question.
Antsy and agitated, I get out of the car without thinking.
Glances are aimed my way, sizing me up and questioning what I’m doing here.
A luxury SUV in this part of town usually means one of two things—a drug dealer or a pimp.
I pay them no attention. They’ll see the dress shirt and tie, the shine of my Rolex and the confidence in my walk, and think I don’t belong here.
But I do. Just as fucking much as they do.
With a heavy sigh and a messed-up head, I rest my arms on the left field fence and stare back at the eyes turned my way.
It takes a moment for everyone to get their fill of me before attention slowly turns back toward the game. The inning continues and I watch a runner get thrown out at third.
Manhattan.
The jet ride home.
Feeling like I was on top of the world when we landed.
And then … Chad and his revelation at the country club. The rug being yanked the hell out from under me. Then Rowan finally answering the phone.
Touch some grass.
Fuck that.
Not when I feel like this.
But this one was on me.
I let my guard down. I let the complication in. I let myself feel when numb is all I’ve ever allowed myself to be.
That’s my fault.
I blow out a sigh and shake my head. Is this really fucking worth it? Our twisted histories? The threaded lies? Our twined fates?
“Hey, Three-Piece Holden?”
I snap my head up, more than surprised that I happen to be here when Leo is actually playing. I size him up as he jogs over toward me.
His smile is wide but cautious as he glances over his shoulder and back toward the stands.
He’s still the same teenager I met on the sidewalk weeks ago, but there is a bit more confidence to him now.
A swagger. And I’ve done nothing more than pay him to clean up where he lives—where I used to live with Mason—and give him some goals to strive for, but I like to think I added to that swagger some.
Oddly, I hold on to that.
“Hey,” I say and smile.
“You came to watch me play?” That grin. The surprise in his voice. The pride as his expression lifts.
I may be looking at Leo, but I see Mason.
His innocence. His potential. His presence.
Yeah, it’s fucking worth it.
Sorry, Mase. I got distracted from my goals with the outside noise.
It won’t happen again.