Chapter 24 Black Sheep Who?
BLACK SHEEP WHO?
RONAN
It was a beautiful day in Boston. The sun was shining, the trees were billowing green across the Common, and the summer air was so bright and crisp that you could probably hear the crack of the bat at Fenway if you stepped outside.
I didn’t notice a damn thing as I sat in the fourth of an interminable number of meetings that seemed to fall under the job description of Presumptive Interim CEO.
Whatever the fuck that was.
Today was my first day of training to take over the official “helm” of Blackguard Holding.
Brendan and Simone were heading back to the farm after his retirement celebration, and while Dad had decided (against his doctors’ orders, of course) that he was spry enough to work today as an ongoing part of his “mentorship” (translation: making sure his remaining children didn’t fuck up his company).
I was supposed to be learning how to be the man in charge until that position was made official.
But all I could see, all I could think about, was Laney.
Laney in that simple gray dress. Laney as she watched me across the room at the museum. Laney falling to pieces on my hand while I whispered filthy things to her in the night, then slipped my fingers into my mouth after, eager for the taste. A promise of so much more.
And yet, there was a problem. It wasn’t a matter of things going wrong. It was more the sneaking suspicion that they were going too right.
She felt too good in my bed. Less than twenty-four hours in Boston, and she felt too good in my life.
I’d gone into this with the assumption that it was going to end, eventually.
Yes, she thought we were “giving it a try,” but I knew myself.
I’d fuck things up because that’s the piece of shit I was.
Now it was becoming increasingly evident that doing that was going to screw me up more than ever.
And I was starting to wonder if I could handle it.
Not the greatest headspace to be in when I was supposed to be proving to my family and a lot of old rich men that I was competent, reliable, and steady—basically all the things I’d done my best not to be for thirty-five years.
“—which brings us to the quarterly profit analysis,” Liza Kelly was saying from the far end of the table, where she was reviewing the numbers across the company’s different sectors.
A PowerPoint was projected on the screen behind her, and I had a brief flashback to my tenth-grade math teacher, who had taken my virginity in my dorm room.
Christ. Liam wouldn’t appreciate the comparison of his mom to Mrs. Cunningham.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
I shouldn’t look. I was in a meeting. An important meeting with people who were constantly evaluating whether I was up to this job. Especially Bas Huntington, who sat across the table, watching me like a vulture waiting for his next meal.
I still hadn’t gotten over the fact that even my father couldn’t keep Huntington out of the boardroom.
Aside from the fact that the two men had been enemies for years (Dad had snaked one too many companies out from Huntington’s smaller private equity firm), there was also the consideration of just how Huntington had come to be here in the first place.
It wasn’t great when his son, obsessed with Brendan and everything he had, decided that the best way to take his revenge was to kidnap Brendan’s girl and hold her ransom.
Even worse, when that very bad move had resulted in the untimely deaths of Ezra and his henchmen, though not before Brendan had signed over his personal shares to Ezra—which had then been inherited by his father as the next of kin.
I still had no idea if Huntington knew about Brendan’s hand in his son’s death, or if he suspected that I had anything to do with its cleanup.
He’d attended every board meeting like a gargoyle, looming over everyone and taking silent notes.
Still, the fact that he had opted to take the seat on the board over pursuing any further legal investigation told me, at very least, that the man was ice fucking cold.
And that should have scared everyone.
Fuck it.
I pulled out my phone, anyway.
Laney
Checking in. Finally done unpacking.
Her text was followed by a selfie of her sitting next to the closet space I’d designated for her things, a shy smile on her face, those green eyes as bright as new grass.
Fuck, I wanted to be there. I wanted to tackle her into that bed and keep her there for a week. Weren’t newlyweds supposed to get honeymoons? Time to adjust to married life, preferably naked, for at least a month or two?
What was the fun in getting married if I didn’t get any of the perks?
With a quick look around the table, I sent a reply.
We’re going to need a bigger closet.
It was only partly true. Neither of us were a clothes horse, but the Charlestown house was small.
I kept another wardrobe at my “public” penthouse closer to the office, the one where I never slept but had been known to entertain the occasional guest, and where the family stylist delivered the monkey suits required of a Black.
Inwardly, I frowned. Yeah, I probably needed to set Laney up with Kate after Dad’s crack at her wardrobe.
Dad was just being a dick, but he had a point, mostly about her lack of preparation for this life.
I’d bought her some clothes, but who knew if she even liked any of them?
While I personally liked the way she dressed, she was about to be under the microscope in a serious way, and wearing thrift store finds and her mother’s costume jewelry wasn’t going to do her any favors with the rags.
Another text came in.
Laney
How’s Shea?
I hid a snort and typed back.
As if she knew we were talking about her, Shea immediately rolled her eyes and mimed sticking a finger down her throat like she wanted to vomit. Apparently, she wasn’t quite as drunk as I’d thought last night, since this morning she was full of complaints about how loud Laney and I were.
I suppressed a smile but flipped her the bird as Liza continued on about market projections.
Shea’s hungover, but fine. My balls, on the other hand, are sky blue.
Laney
Poor baby. Perhaps we’ll pick up where we left off, husband.
Husband?
That was relatively new. She’d barely used the word, if at all. Me, I’d been calling her wife since I saw that ring on her finger, but it was mostly to rile her up, right? Come to think of it, I’d never really questioned why the designation rolled off the tongue so easily.
“Husband, indeed,” I murmured.
“Ronan.”
I looked up to find everyone around the table staring at me. “What?”
Owen huffed. “Liza was asking if you had any questions.”
“What? No, I’m good.”
Owen just shook his head while Shea looked nervously at our father. Dad was busy glaring at me.
“I’d like to see a comprehensive list of expansion projects currently in the works.
” Huntington’s voice was rough and commandeering as he interrupted our family squabble.
He was still reading the reports Liza had handed out.
“If we’re going to approve increased expenditures, the board will need transparency on where it’s all going. ”
“The board has never asked for that before.” Dad’s voice was just as even, but every Black sibling, as well as most of the executive officers, could hear the knife’s edge just the same.
Huntington, however, either didn’t know it, or didn’t care. “We’re just doing due diligence. Seems reasonable, given all the upheaval.”
I frowned. It wasn’t unreasonable, what he was saying, but making demands at all was new. What was his goal after weeks of hoarding observations?
“Ronan can provide that list by end of day tomorrow,” Liza put in smoothly. “Right, Ronan?”
That, unfortunately, was the moment I looked back at my phone to see if Laney had texted back.
She hadn’t. And now I looked like an asshole.
“Right,” I said without any fucking clue what I was being asked to confirm. “Sure thing. Without a doubt.”
A low growl sounded from Dad’s end of the table. “Is something distracting you, Ronan?”
When in doubt, deny, deny, deny. “Nope. Just taking notes.”
Shea snorted. Owen shook his head.
“On your phone?” Dad asked.
Now I was the one who was pissed off. It was one thing to ask if I was distracted.
It was another completely to take me to task in front of everyone, including my own prospective employees.
Yes, it was his company, but he was technically on leave.
I was the one who was supposed to be taking charge.
Dressing me down in front of people I was supposed to lead wasn’t the way to smooth that transition.
“Digitally,” I said smoothly. “It’s the future, Dad. Not all of us need pen and paper.”
If I didn’t appreciate being humbled, you can imagine how Niall Black reacted.
“Is that so?” He was speaking through his teeth now. “Perhaps you could share these notes with everyone. Liza can surely project them with her presentation.”
“I don’t think that’s necessary. I’ll have the list of whatever for Bas here tomorrow.”
Those black eyes bored into me, soaked with challenge. But here’s the thing about third children: we’re the wild cards. We live on challenges. We will stare back until everyone around us is just as uncomfortable as we are.
Was engaging in a poorly planned game of Owl the most adult behavior in the world?
No.
Was it going to do anything to ensure the faith and trust of the other people in this room?
Doubtful.
Was I going to do it, anyway?
Every fucking time.
Unfortunately, Niall Black wasn’t one to lose staring matches any more than I was. It took Huntington’s voice one more to pull both of us from our little detente.
“See that you do,” he said. “The board has an ongoing interest in reviewing all your contributions. Especially given your new situation.”
That had my attention. “Situation?”