Chapter Fifty-Three. Rowan
FIFTY-THREE
Rowan
I wake with a start.
Strange room. Strange place. Familiar smell. Holden.
I sink into it and the comfort it brings.
But then last night comes back with a vengeance. The phone call. My dad. The hospital. Needing Holden.
I reach out to the nightstand for my phone out of habit but know it’s not here. Within seconds I’m up and moving, slipping on Holden’s T-shirt that I presume he left folded for me on the edge of his bed, and moving out into his great room to find it.
For a second, panic strikes. What if something happened to my dad and no one could get ahold of me? What if they texted and called and … but my panic is short-lived as I find my phone where I set it on the coffee table.
I look for my mom’s and Rhett’s texts first to make sure that nothing has worsened.
Relieved and glad to read there are signs of improvement, I begin to scroll through the rest of the texts.
They’re from people wishing my father well, from friends reaching out to see if I need anything, and one from Holden telling me he left to get us coffee.
Coffee. The man knows the way to my heart.
But then I startle when I see the clock on the wall that says eleven in the morning.
Whoa. I can’t remember the last time I slept this late. With a deep breath and a shake of my head, I pause and realize where I am. In Holden’s place. The first time, so I give myself a second to take a look around.
It’s clean lines and classic decor. Modern in feel but not in furniture. The furniture is lush and looks like you could sink into it and never leave. At the same time, it looks like it’s never been used. It’s bright without being obtrusive and neutral without being boring.
The hallway to where the master bedroom is has four other doors.
Three are open, one is closed. No doubt the rooms are never entered.
I don’t figure Holden for the type to entertain.
In fact, I don’t recall ever hearing him talk about anyone outside of the office; just his brother, and at rare times his mother.
I twist my lips and move toward his kitchen.
The counters are clean with a lone espresso machine in the corner and a dish towel folded in a perfect square on the island’s far corner by its sink.
There is nothing else there—not a coffee cup overturned, not a dish rack waiting to be emptied, not a protein bar left out to be consumed.
It’s sparse and cold and makes me kind of sad for him.
Curious, I wander toward the massive stainless steel refrigerator, taking bets with myself that it’ll be completely empty when I open it.
It isn’t.
But it isn’t what I expect either. Two shelves of the fridge are filled with nice rows of stacked meal prep containers. Another shelf is for milk and condiments. The third has row after row of bottled water with containers of chopped vegetables and fruit, ready for consumption.
The man either just had his fridge stocked or he rarely eats. I’m leaning toward the latter simply because I know him. Food is a necessity but not something he takes time to sit and enjoy.
Except for with me.
The thought sneaks in before I can stop it. So does the warm fuzzy feeling that last night left me with.
I didn’t mean to come here. That’s a lie. I did mean to. But I fought it. I drove for about an hour until the tears came and the fear subsided into the weirdest mix of uncertainty.
I needed someone.
I needed Holden.
But with the warm feeling, with that soft slip into each other, comes the guilt that this is where I ran to last night when I needed comfort. Not to my mom or my family. Not to Chad who has known me my whole life or to my girlfriends who were on standby—but to Holden.
I jump when my phone rings. The unknown number throws me but with my dad in the hospital, I scramble to answer it, not knowing if the call has something to do with that.
“Hello?”
“Miss Rowan Rothschild, please.”
“I’m sorry, I’m not interested,” I say.
“This is Ethan Salas with Bettermint Bank. I have you listed as a beneficiary on an account here for Eleanor Rothschild. Let me see here … your grandmother, I believe.”
“Yes? How can I help you?”
“She closed out the account a few months back, but never collected the remaining funds in it. I wanted to set up a time for you to come and collect those funds or find a way to get them to you. Regardless, a signature will be needed to confirm receipt.”
“Okay. Um. What account was this for again?” I look at the space around me, wanting to find something to write with and a scrap of paper to take this all down.
“She had two accounts with us you were listed on. This one would be Monarch.”
Monarch?
“Okay.” Where would my junk drawer be if I were Holden Knight?
I open the top few drawers on the far bank of drawers in the kitchen.
Apparently he doesn’t have one. “One sec, Ethan, so I can get your information. I’m not …
at my…” But on the fourth try, I pull open a drawer, moving a blue folder aside that sits on top of everything to find an orderly, non-junk-looking drawer.
I grab a pen from its proper tray but when I lift the folder up to see if there is Post-it note somewhere under it, several papers from inside it fall out.
Post-it note secured, I write Monarch, Ethan, and Bettermint Bank on it but it’s then that my eyes catch the words on the papers that have fallen in the drawer. It’s then that the Post-it note and the pen in my hand are completely forgotten.
It’s then that my world turns upside down.
TinSpirits Master Sell-Off Plan.
TinSpirits Packaged Liquidation.
I shuffle through the titled pages, one after another, before realizing that Ethan is still on the line. “I’m sorry. Uh. I need to call you back. Something … someone is here.”
I end the call without even hearing a response as I pick up the entire folder and begin looking at one page after another.
Each piece of paper shattering my faith in my judgment of people. In the sanctity of Holden’s promises. In the trust he falsely earned again. In the real reason Holden is here in Westmore.
Holy shit.
My hands tremble and my heart races. I have to get out of there. I have to go. I have to—
“Row? You up yet?” Holden calls out as the front door clicks shut and his footsteps fall on the tiled floor.
I stand in his kitchen, thoughts racing and heart aching. Our eyes meet. “You’re breaking apart the company and selling it off piece by piece?” My voice is way steadier than I feel.
Holden glances at the blue folder on the counter but his face doesn’t show a flicker of emotion as he sets a cup of coffee down in front of me. “I got pastries,” he says. “Doughnuts. Croissants. A few other things from that new deli just down the street.”
“No more lies, remember? Isn’t that what you said before? No. More. Lies.” Please tell me I’m wrong.
He turns to face me, head angled to the side and the slightest flicker of irritation in his jawline.
“You promised me this wasn’t why you bought the company. You made me feel crazy for asking. No more lies, Holden.”
“Ask the question, Rowan.” His voice is barely a whisper as he stands and stares at me.
“Did you buy TinSpirits to sell it off and destroy it?”
“Yes.” Unflinching.
I try to process this. To understand this. To fathom this.
“I asked you a couple months ago. You lied to me.”
“And months ago we didn’t have this agreement. The no more lies. Now we do.”
“So just like that, you’re going to take what my family has created, has owned, and destroy it.”
“Partially, yes.”
“Partially?” I ask. What? How? I mean … my throat feels like it’s closing in and my chest feels like it hurts to breathe. “Why?”
“I have my reasons.”
“Your reasons?” I shake my head and move around the counter so there is nothing between us.
“I came to you last night. I was vulnerable and needed you like I’ve never allowed myself to need another person and you …
you took it. Took what I gave you. Took it knowing all of this was going on in the background.
That this folder was sitting in a drawer ten feet away. You used me, Holden.”
His jaw clenches and his Adam’s apple bobs. “I believe it was the other way around if I remember correctly.”
“Fuck you,” I shout at him. He nods, stoic, when all I want is a reaction, a show of emotion, anything. “You’re a bastard.” Another nod from him. “Fight me,” I shriek. “Fucking fight me.”
“It’s probably best if you go now, Rowan,” he says as he moves to grab my car keys from the coffee table and put them next to my cell phone.
“How can you stand there and be so calm? So callous? How can you—”
“Be a good businessman and sell off the parts of the company that are dying and costing us money? Easy. That’s what I came to do.”
Bring it back to business instead of talking about us. Instead of bringing it back to my shattering heart and fucked-up head. Both of which he created.
“You know what TinSpirits means to me, Holden. I’ve poured my heart out to you over this.
I’ve fought with you to show you and prove this.
” There’s no way he can mean this. “Even if this was your intention in the beginning, you’re still willing to go through with it now, after us?
After knowing what this company means to me? ”
“Unequivocally. Nothing changes my endgame.”
“I don’t believe you.” The words stick in my throat.
“Then don’t. I’ve told you all along that you shouldn’t. Facts are facts, Rowan, and your brother ran this company into the ground for his own reasons.”
“What would those be?”
“Ask him.” He shrugs. “That’s not for me to say.”
“Screw you, Holden.”
He stares at me, the muscle pulsing in his jaw, and then with absolute indifference states, “I believe we did that already.”
I don’t know the sound I emit but it’s a mixture of frustration and hurt.
Of pain and disbelief. Of my heart breaking and belief in him shattering.
“I came here last night because I needed you. Because I’m head over heels in love with you despite everything you say to me, every goddamn warning you give me not to believe you’re a good guy. ”
The words are out, the ones I can’t take back, but he doesn’t even flinch at hearing them for the first time. At knowing I’m in love with him.
It hurts to breathe. The action. The air. Everything about it.
“Say something,” I scream at him. “Fucking act like you care.”
But he doesn’t do or say anything other than stand there with his eyes locked on mine and disinterest emanating off every part of him.
He’s shut down. His wall is up. There’s no reaching him now.
I love him.
I love him and I said it and now I can’t take it back as the truth strands in the no-man’s-land between us.
But even worse than that feeling is the fact that Holden stands before me, body taut, tears welling in his eyes, jaw clenched, and doesn’t say a fucking word.
Not one.
And my heart breaks all over again.
“I have to go.” My voice cracks as I collect my things and head for the door.
“Rowan.”
My body stops on reflex but it feels like my heart keeps going and slams into my rib cage. The pain is more excruciating than I’ve ever known.
He says my name but it’s not to stop me from leaving. It’s not to explain or to apologize. It’s to ask me something.
It’s for himself. How fitting.
I give him the only answer I can think he’d be asking a question to. I give it to him because I need something in return.
“Don’t worry. I know. I can’t tell your little plan to anyone. I read my contract. I know anything I see or say to you is under strict NDA or I could be prosecuted. Fine. Fuck you, but fine. But if what we shared meant anything to you, do me one favor.”
He stands there and dips his chin down to tell me to ask.
“Don’t destroy TinSpirits while my dad is on the road to recovery.
That will kill him. He has a weak heart and now he’s hurt.
That company—our company—is his pride and joy.
Knowing it’s ending, his family’s legacy is going to be destroyed, will make him lose the will to fight.
Promise me you won’t sell off a single piece off it until I know he’s going to be okay. ”
There is a long pause while we stand and stare at each other with a couch between us that we made love on last night. Because we did make love. There is no question about that.
“I’m sorry, Rowan. I can’t make a promise that I won’t keep.”