15. Blythe #2
The item ran in forty-eight hours. By Friday, the Friday of his deadline, my father was locked in a room with his lawyers and three very unhappy bankers, and no call to Stan was made that Friday, because a threat is only as good as your free time.
I took his. For a while, that was enough.
And Stan? Stan required no handling at all.
Posy’s column tracked him for me better than any investigator: the new marriage, the club dinners, a yacht that went out at sunset more evenings than it didn’t, rarely with his wife on it.
The man was too busy celebrating what he’d stolen to notice what was being stolen from him.
His attention had never once been where his money was.
I could have told Birdie that. She’d find it out the way I had.
***
Tonight was a celebration. The Bellcliff bar, low lighting, dark wood, where deals got made over bourbon and secrets got traded like currency. The wood was dark and polished, the bartender was discreet, and half the conversations happening in this room were probably illegal.
I ordered a lemonade because my stomach had been queasy all week. Morning nausea that wouldn’t quit, probably from stress, probably from the constant emotional roller coaster of the past month.
Reid slid onto the barstool beside me and ordered the same, with a wink.
He’d left his jacket in the car and rolled his sleeves, and his forearms came to rest on the dark wood, thick, tanned, dusted with hair, the watch he never checked sitting loose on one wrist. When he tipped his glass back I watched his throat work and had to turn and study the bottles behind the bar like they were about to be on an exam.
The bottles were not interesting. I crossed my legs and squeezed.
“Solidarity?”
“Something like that.” He took a sip, watching me over the rim of the glass. “How are you feeling?”
“Victorious.” I grinned at him, feeling lighter than I had in days. “Did you see Patrick’s face when we told him about the CFO? I thought he was going to cry.”
“He might have. I wasn’t watching his face.” His eyes held mine, warm and intent. “I was watching you.”
My stomach flipped. “Reid-”
“I know. I know.” He held up his hands in mock surrender, that small smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “Professional. I’m being professional.”
“You’re being a menace.”
“I learned from the best.”
We sat there in companionable silence, sipping our lemonades, watching the crowd. There was a particular pleasure in it, sitting in the heart of Newport society, quietly demolishing everything they’d built, and nobody knew except us.
I scanned the room, cataloging faces and connections out of habit.
“The woman by the window,” I murmured. “Green dress. That’s Helen Ashworth. Her husband handles Chadwick’s port contracts in Boston.”
“Interesting.”
“Very interesting.” I smiled. “I think I’ll say hello next week.”
“You’re terrifying.”
“Thank you.”
A commotion erupted from one of the private rooms at the back of the bar. Raised voices, the sound of glass breaking. The bartender tensed. A few heads turned, conversations stuttering as everyone tried to see what was happening.
The door burst open, and Stan Chadwick stumbled out.
He was several drinks past drunk, shirt untucked, hair disheveled, face flushed with alcohol and naked desperation. His eyes swept the room, unfocused and searching, until they landed on me.
He stopped dead.
“Blythe.”
He crossed the bar in an unsteady line, bumping into a table, knocking over someone’s drink without apologizing. The whole room was watching now, the pleasant hum of conversation dying into interested silence. This was better than anything on their phones.
“Blythe.” He reached our table and grabbed my wrist, his fingers digging in hard enough to hurt. I could smell the whiskey on his breath, could see the bloodshot desperation in his eyes. “You have to stop. You’re ruining me.”
“Let go.”
“I can’t fix it.” His voice cracked, pitching higher. “I can’t - everything’s falling apart, and it’s your fault, and you have to come back and fix it. You’re the only one who knows how to-”
“Stan.” I tried to pull my arm back. His grip tightened, fingers grinding into bone. “Let go of me.”
“You owe me.” He was leaning into my space now, his breath hot and sour, his eyes wild. “After everything I gave you, after everything I did for you, after seven years of putting up with your failures and your disappointments and your constant fucking-”
“Get your fucking filthy hands off my wife.”
Reid’s voice was quiet. Almost conversational. But something in it made every head in the bar turn.
He hadn’t moved from his stool. He was still holding his lemonade, still perfectly relaxed in his seat. But his eyes had gone flat and cold, and there was a stillness in his posture I’d never seen before, dangerous enough to make the hair stand up on the back of my neck.
Stan laughed, an ugly sound. “Or what? You’ll bore me to death with tide tables?”
Reid set down his glass. Stood up slowly.
He was a foot taller than Stan. Broader. Bigger in every way. And when he reached out and took Stan’s hand off my wrist, he did it without appearing to move at all, just a shift of weight, a twist of fingers, and suddenly Stan’s grip was broken and a bone in his hand made a small, wet sound.
Stan went white. His knees buckled, and he sat down hard on the nearest chair, cradling his hand against his chest.
The entire bar went silent.
I watched them re-evaluate Reid Navarro in real time.
The awkward hedge fund manager who couldn’t make small talk.
The nobody with no name who’d been failing at Newport society for four months.
I watched their eyes change. Respect, maybe.
Or fear. The understanding that this man was more dangerous than he appeared.
But Stan was too drunk to stop.
“She was my wife first.” He was slurring, his eyes wet with self-pity. “She’ll always be mine. You think you can have her? You think she’ll ever really be yours? She was mine for seven years. I know every inch of her. Every-”
“The next time you say her name.” Reid’s voice was still quiet, still calm, but underneath it now was ice and steel and the promise of violence. “The next time you speak to her at all. You’ll find out exactly how far I’m willing to go for her.”
Butterflies. Actual butterflies, at twenty-nine years old. Ridiculous and undeniable.
I stood up and took Reid’s hand. His fingers closed around mine, warm and steady.
“Come on. Let’s not get mixed up with scum.”
I walked past Stan toward the door. And as I passed, I kicked him, subtly, just a tap to his shin, just enough to make him wince.
He deserved worse. But it was enough for now.
Outside, the air was cool and clean. I walked fast toward the car, my heart pounding, adrenaline singing through my veins.
“Blythe.” Reid was jogging to catch up, his voice worried. “Blythe, are you all right? Did he hurt you? Let me see your wrist-”
I turned around, and I was laughing.
“That was satisfying.” I was giddy with it, high on the victory, drunk on the look on Stan’s face when Reid broke his grip. “Did you see his face? Did you see-”
“I saw.” Reid was staring at me like I’d lost my mind. “You’re not upset?”
“I’m the opposite of upset.” I went up on my toes and pressed a quick kiss to his mouth. “Thank you.”
He froze.
Completely, utterly still. Like I’d turned him to stone with my lips.
His tongue darted out, tracing the place where I’d touched him. The dark eyes were fixed on my face, and he looked almost pained, like something inside him was breaking and reforming at the same time.
Then his hands were on my waist, and I was backed against the car, and he was looking down at me with an expression that made my knees go weak.
“What was that,” he murmured.
“A thank you.”
“Well.” His voice had dropped an octave, rough and wanting. “I’ve got a fuck-ton of things to thank you for.”
I laughed. “Then why don’t you thank me?”
He watched my face. His gaze jumped between my eyes, searching, asking permission. His hands tightened on my waist, pulling me closer.
“Fuck it,” he whispered.
He came in slowly. So slowly. Giving me every chance to stop him, to pull back, to say no.
I didn’t move. I leaned in.
His mouth met mine, and the world disappeared.
It was a real kiss this time. Full and desperate, his tongue sliding against mine, his hands pulling me closer. I melted into him, my fingers fisting in his shirt, and I could feel exactly how gone he was, pressed against me, hard and wanting, making no effort to hide it.
The kiss went on and on. I forgot where we were. Forgot who might be watching. Forgot everything except the taste of him, the feel of him, the way his hands had snuck up under my shirt to hold my bare waist.
He broke the kiss finally, pressing his forehead to mine. We were both breathing hard. His thumbs traced circles on my skin, gentle and possessive.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been so grateful in my entire life,” he said.
I laughed. He chuckled, his eyes shining, a smile on his face that was going to absolutely ruin me.
My stomach was a riot. Butterflies and wanting and, underneath those, a pull I wasn’t ready to name.
“Let’s go home,” I whispered.
He nodded. Stepped back. Opened the car door for me like a gentleman.
I slid inside, and he closed the door, and I pressed my fingers to my lips, thighs locked tight together, every nerve in my body still lit up like a struck match.
We shouldn’t have done that. It complicated everything: the arrangement, the plan, all the neat clean lines of it. I ran my thumb across my lower lip, where I could still feel him.
I was going to do it again at the first opportunity.
I smiled the whole way back to Windrose.