Chapter 34
CHAPTER
THIRTY-FOUR
SCOTT
A s soon as the press conference came to a close, I was out of there. Kendra must have been just as eager to be done because, fast as I was, I was still within earshot when Brett met her offstage.
“I can’t figure out what happened to Tess,” she said. “She should have been here. It felt weird saying all that in her place.”
Yeah, because Tess was who the script had been written for.
I didn’t have time to think about explaining anything to Kendra. I needed to find Tess, and considering that the conference had gone on a good seven minutes after she’d left the room, there was a very good chance she was long gone.
I was hanging on to the slim odds that she’d stuck around.
Instead of slinking out of the conference area the back way like usual, I did the unthinkable and went around front. Ignoring requests for further comments, I pushed my way through the crowd of reporters, looking for any sign of her and finding none. I made my way to the lobby, hoping she’d be there. Then when I went out the doors and didn’t see her on the street, I went back through the lobby to the street on the other side.
“Fuck!”
She was gone. Of course, she was gone. It was exactly what I would have expected if I’d been in her position.
Which was why I needed to find her and explain.
Instinctively, I reached in my pocket for my cell, having forgotten I’d left it on my desk, charging. That helped me decide what to do next. Up to my office it was.
Maybe she’d even be up there waiting.
That thought invigorated my step as I pushed back through the glass doors into the lobby.
And ran smack into my father.
“She shouldn’t be your concern right now,” he said, starting in as though we’d already been having a conversation. “Besides, she’s long gone. If that’s indeed who you’re looking for.”
I was half listening to him, so it took me a few seconds before I caught up with him. “Who are you talking about?”
“The Turani girl. I’m guessing you saw she was here.”
“You saw her too?” At least I knew my mind hadn’t been playing tricks on me.
“I did. We had a lovely chat, the two of us. Got things all sorted.”
My body tensed. Sparks of red crossed my vision. “What did you say to her?”
“Nothing much. Just made sure she understood her place in your life. Funny thing is, I think she got the point all on her own from that press conference. Good choice to run with that. Killed a lot of birds with one stone.”
I could feel my fingers curling into a fist at my side even before he answered. Hitting him wasn’t an option—he’d have me arrested, son of his or not—and though I’d gladly go to jail for Tess, it wouldn’t help matters.
Didn’t mean I couldn’t verbally assault him. “Stay away from her. If I hear you come within six feet of her without me present again, so help me God I’ll?—”
“Now Scott.” He cut me off, giving me a look that said to remember where we were and who he was. In a low voice, he went on. “You certainly aren’t acting like a man who is committed to marrying another woman.”
I had to tread carefully here. Because he was right, and that was exactly what he needed to believe—that I was committed to marrying Kendra. “You never said I had to be faithful. If fidelity is a requirement to being on the board, you and I both know that most of your members would be fired, including yourself.”
His eyes narrowed. Then he gave a tense smile. “Perception, Scott. The requirement is good perception. You did good today. Don’t fuck it up by thinking with your cock.”
He clapped me on the back. Anyone walking by would have assumed he was merely congratulating me. Then, because he always had the last word, he turned his back on me and headed to the bank of elevators that led to his floor at the top.
I stared after him for all of four seconds, thinking of all the brutal things I wanted to do to him. I could have filled the rest of the day with that, but I reminded myself he wasn’t worth my time. Tess, on the other hand, was.
Now that I knew she’d had a confrontation with my father, it was even more imperative that I talk to her. I raced to the elevator, hitting the call button several times, trying to hurry it up. When it finally arrived, I pushed my way through the exiting crowd and glared at the man who started to get in after me.
“Sorry. Elevator’s taken,” I said, pushing the Doors Closed button. My patience was already gone. If I had to endure stops at other floors on the way up, I was pretty sure I’d punch a hole through the elevator wall.
Despite my urgency, when I got to my floor, I took the time to stop at Eden’s desk before heading back to my own.
“I explicitly told you not to send Tess to that conference. Want to tell me how the fuck that message got misinterpreted?” The anger that I’d wanted to unleash on my father came hurling out at her.
And I didn’t care. Didn’t care who heard me or who I hurt. I was too worked up. Too enraged. Too afraid that my plans had backfired and now everything was fucked up with Tess.
Eden blinked at me, her eyes wide. “I didn’t! She came up here, but I told her it was canceled!”
“Then why the hell did I see her plain and clear in the audience?”
“I don’t know! She must have found it on her own. Like I said, she came up here. Told me she’d broken her phone?—”
“Her phone is broken?” That explained why Tess hadn’t answered any of the dozen calls I’d made to her this morning.
Eden nodded. “That’s why she hadn’t gotten the message.”
“Wait a minute.” This was from someone else. A familiar someone else.
I turned to find Kendra. I hadn’t even looked to see who was in the waiting area when I’d stormed in. She must have come up after the whole shindig was over, while I was looking everywhere for Tess.
Kendra walked closer before saying more. Appropriate since this conversation was currently taking place in a very public space. “Are you saying you deliberately wanted to keep Tess from the press conference?”
I let out a huff. “We should probably continue this in private.”
“Yes. That sounds like a good idea.”
Making a note to myself to apologize to Eden later for the attack, I ushered Kendra quickly down the hall to my office. Waste of time. That’s all I could think with every step. How much time I was wasting dealing with people—my father, Eden, now Kendra—when the only person I wanted to be dealing with was Tess.
But now I knew her phone was broken, these minutes didn’t matter. The only way I’d be able to talk to her would be to go to her, and with Tess taking public transportation, there was no way she’d be back at her apartment yet, if that was even where she’d headed.
I could spare five minutes for a conversation that needed to be had.
Wanting to be quick about it, I started in without preamble as soon as my office door was shut behind us. “Look, Kendra, I should have said this before, and I didn’t because…” It would take forever to explain that I’d thought her knowing might ruin the deal with the DRF. (Ironic, I realized now, considering how it was my father that had been the threat, not Kendra.) “Well, reasons. Anyway. I can’t marry you. I’m sorry. That was blunt, and it has nothing to do with you, just I can’t.”
“Oh.” She seemed surprised. “Oh.” Then relieved, a reaction I planned to come back to. “Then why did you want to announce our engagement?”
“Because...well, again, reasons. In quick summation because I need people to think I’m going to marry you, particularly my father, and I realize that’s unfair to ask you to keep up this charade, but I’m willing to, I don’t know, work something out. I mean, I don’t know if there’s anything I can give you that would be as good of a deal as a marriage offer…” Then I remembered her relieved reaction. “Except, you didn’t want to get married either, did you?”
“Actually, no.”
I decided not to be offended, though part of me really wanted to be. “Then why did you decide to say yes?”
“Because...well. Reasons.”
I was curious, of course, but I didn’t have the bandwidth to pry. “Okay, your business. I respect that. As for the engagement?—”
“How long do you want to keep the pretense up?”
“Uh.” God, I felt like a douche, expecting her to want to help out with my ridiculous plan. But I was practicing the Sebastian method—expect it to get it—because I really wanted to get this. “Until all the funding for the DRF goes through.”
“The way the current contract is written, that could take more than a year.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Can I ask why?”
“Of course, of course.” Now, how to make it quick? “Basically, my father is a controlling asshole who refuses to sponsor the foundation unless you and I are married. And before you ask why I care so much, it’s because Tess cares. Oh, yeah, and I’m in love with Tess.”
“ My Tess?”
“I prefer to think of her as my Tess, but yes.”
“Whoa.” She took a deep breath and sat on the arm of my couch, facing me. “Does she know?”
“Yes. Or she did. Before she walked in on that conference and heard me announcing our engagement anyway. I tried to talk to her first, but she wouldn’t answer her phone all morning, and I didn’t want her to hear it without explaining, and since I hadn’t gotten hold of her before it was time to go down for the presser?—”
“You told your receptionist to send her away,” she finished for me.
“Right.”
“Poorly planned, if you ask me.”
She wasn’t wrong there. Part of it was purposeful. Had I known this was how it would play out, I would have rethought that strategy.
“Wow,” Kendra said, toying with the sleeve of her pantsuit, which I now recognized as one that Tess had worn once to our consultation meetings. So that’s why she’d always looked so designer. “A lot of things are starting to make sense now.”
I was thinking the same thing.
“Once again, I’m sorry. We should have told you at your parents’, and Tess wanted to?—”
“But how could you say anything when I sprung up without warning? No, I get it. Trust me, I’ve been told more than once that my impulsivity is inconvenient to others.”
I leaned back against my desk and tapped my fingers on the surface at my sides. “Not going to lie…”
“Hey, you have no place talking about what inconveniences others. You’re asking a lot of me yourself.”
“You’re right. I am.” I fought hard against the creeping disappointment, sure that what I was asking was too much.
“But I’m going to help you.”
“You are? Why?” It was probably not the best reaction, but it was definitely the most honest.
She let out a half laugh. “Well, because Conscience Connect is getting paid a fuckton of money through this deal.”
That had been one of my demands in the still yet-to-be-signed contract. A payment package that would cover both Tess and Kendra.
“But more importantly because I really care about the DRF too.”
I felt the clock ticking. Felt the seconds that I wasn’t trying to get a hold of Tess slipping away.
Still, I couldn’t stop the urge to ask. “Then why didn’t you ever come to SIC with this before? It’s a perfect fit for us. You have to see that.”
“I do,” she admitted. “And maybe I should have. At first, I worried about... You know what? It’s complicated, and right now it sounds like you should be talking to Tess.”
Yes, yes. That’s what I needed to be doing.
I reached for my cell phone before remembering. “Her phone is broken.”
“You could try calling Teyana,” Kendra said somewhat tentatively.
“Right. Good idea.” I circled around my desk so I could better reach the speaker button on my office phone. “Sadie, get me the number for Teyana Lewis. She’s one of the patients in the DRF documentary, so it should be in the permission statements.”
“Or you could just ask me.” Kendra was already pulling her cell phone from her pocket.
“Never mind, Sadie.” I clicked off the speaker, then picked up my cell phone. “Ready when you are.” I entered the digits and pressed CALL.
One ring. Two. Three. Four. Five.
“It went to voicemail.” I considered redialing. “Maybe she doesn’t answer numbers she doesn’t know.”
Kendra hesitated a moment. “Let me try.” Two seconds later…“I got voicemail too.”
I refrained from cursing out loud, though a string of four-letter words ran through my mind. “Thanks for trying.”
“There’s a good possibility she didn’t answer me on purpose,” Kendra said, tucking her phone away. Again, I could feel the tug of curiosity, but she prevented me from pursuing it when she stood up and said, “Guess you’ll have to go to her apartment and talk to her in person. Do you still have her address?”
As stressed as I felt, I couldn’t help smiling. “Yes. Thank you. And thank you for helping me. I still don’t fully understand your motives?—”
Once again, she cut me off. “But does it matter?”
“Suppose I shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Especially not when I had more important things I needed to be doing.
It took more than an hour to clear my schedule. One of my scheduled events I couldn’t get out of—a scandal minimization meeting that my father was also attending. I managed to leave after forty-five minutes and without speaking to him individually, so I called it a win.
By a quarter after two, I was on the road headed to Jersey City. With traffic and parking, it was almost another hour before I was standing in front of Tessa’s apartment door.
She’ll listen to you. She’s going to give you a chance to explain. She loves you, so she’ll want to work this out.
It felt like hours between the time I knocked and when the door opened. When it did, it was only opened a couple of inches, enough for me to see Teyana wearing an expression that said she was not at all pleased with me.
Which meant Tess had told her.
Which meant Tess had come home.
“I can tell I’m not your favorite person right now,” I said, trying to be as charming as I could. “But can I talk to her? Please?”
“As far as I’m concerned, I’d be happy if she never spoke to you again. So what if I lose out on my SIC treatment? Not worth the price of my friend. Oh, and congratulations to you and Kendra. You deserve each other.”
“Teyana, please. No, it’s not...I’m not marrying Kendra.”
“Sure as hell doesn’t sound like you’re not when you announce to a room full of reporters that you are.”
“And no matter what happens, you won’t lose your treatment. Even if the sponsorship gets killed, I’ll pay for it out of my own pocket. I swear.”
She opened the door a little more at that. “Why would it get killed?”
“It won’t.” Not if my father remained convinced about my engagement, it wouldn’t. “I just meant that none of this has any bearing on your treatment. Even if Tess never speaks to me again, but I really, really hope that’s not the case because I love her, and I am definitely not marrying Kendra Montgomery.”
She continued to peer at me skeptically.
“I’ve even told Kendra that it’s not happening.”
She opened the door wider. “You did? How did she take that?”
Her concern surprised me, so it took me a second to answer. “Well, actually. Really well.”
“Huh.” Teyana’s expression relaxed slightly. “In that case, I guess it would be okay if you talked to Tess. If she were here.”
“She’s not here?” I threw my head back in exasperation.
“She left about fifteen minutes ago to go get a new phone. That will probably take the rest of the afternoon.”
I was fortunate enough to always have someone deal with issues like that for me, but I’d heard getting a new phone could be a lengthy process. “Mind if I wait?”
“I wouldn’t mind. But it would be silly if you did since she said she was headed straight to your house as soon as she was done.”
Somehow I managed not to snap. “You could have led with that.”
She smiled. “I could have, but I much preferred watching you squirm.”
“I’m sure I deserve it.” Suddenly, I wondered if this was too easy. “She’s really going there? You aren’t trying to just get rid of me?”
“That would be fun, wouldn’t it? But no. For some reason, she thinks you deserve the benefit of the doubt. Or at least a conversation. She’s a nicer person than I am.”
Thank God for that. “Thank you. I appreciate this, and I promise I’m going to make things better.” I flinched as I said it, hoping it was a promise I could keep. “Can I give you my number in case something changes?”
“Sure. Let me get my phone.” She disappeared for a second, then returned to the door. After unlocking her screen, she handed me her cell.
“I already have your number,” I said, entering my number in her device. “But if I call it will likely say RESTRICTED. I tried calling earlier.”
“Ah, that was you. I don’t answer when I don’t know who it is.”
I handed her the phone back. “I thought that was the case, so Kendra called right after.”
“And her name showed up on the screen, which was why I sent her to voicemail right away.”
I studied her. I’d sensed tension between Kendra and Tess, but I hadn’t realized it extended to Teyana. “You really don’t like her, do you? Why is that?”
“Do you want to stand here and talk about my issues with Kendra, or do you want to go get your girl?”
There was only one right answer, only one answer I wanted to give. “I’m going to get my girl.”