CHAPTER 46 Ford Bradley
Well and Truly Alone
Vegas?
She’s going to fucking Vegas?
Maybe she’s there for work. But I keep coming back to another reason. Maybe she chose to go back there right now because she decided to choose Archer after all.
Friends becoming more is something people read about in books. It doesn’t happen in real life just because one person has pined for the other for years.
What the fuck was I thinking? Allowing myself to get to this place was pure fucking stupidity on my part.
I should’ve listened to my brain. Instead, I went with my heart, and now I’m married to someone who’s ditching me for Chicago and Vegas and thinks I don’t believe in her.
Of course I believe in her.
I go to bed alone. I wake up alone. This is just like how it used to be, except back then, I held onto this streak of hope that someday I’d admit my real feelings to her.
Well, I did. And now…it’s over. I think. Maybe. We’re paused, anyway, and I don’t like how it feels.
I realize that in many ways, I did this to myself.
I should have told her when I got the offer on the mansion.
I get that now. I should have given her a chance to plead her case before I accepted that offer.
I guess there are a lot of things I should have done differently.
Not give into temptation, for one. Not listen to my heart—for another.
It’s just a painful reminder that emotions wreck everything. Back when we were just friends, I wished we could be more. And now that I’ve had more, I wish we could get back to what we had before.
Perhaps I should have listened to my siblings, too.
Liam was pretty insistent that I shouldn’t sell, but I went with my gut.
My gut puts logic over emotions, and financial responsibility won over whatever ties we have to that place.
Besides, would letting Tatum gut the place to turn it into her dream venue really be any better than selling it to strangers who are going to live there?
I know the answer even as the question forms in my head.
No. She’d preserve it and respect it, and it’s why she wanted to work with Madden.
It would stay in the family for generations to come, mirroring Winston Manor in so many ways.
Just because we can’t all live there doesn’t mean we can’t all find a purpose for the place.
Everleigh’s wedding. Maybe eventually Liam’s and Ivy’s, too, if that’s what they want.
Our family may be falling apart between losing our mother and our father going on trial for some pretty serious crimes, but maybe the mansion was the one thing that could’ve bonded us together.
But I sold it.
And now she’s going back to Vegas, maybe going back to Archer, going back to how life was before.
She’ll get there only to realize she never should have left, just like she’s done so many times before, and I’ll be stuck here all alone, walking into the room that was once hers and staring at the three cups left behind on her desk with regret.
It feels like I’m well and truly alone.
I suppose I could join in on one of the invitations that I’ve gotten for workouts or to join my buddies for a night out, but in the last couple of weeks, I haven’t accepted any of them.
All that means is that fewer of them are coming through to my inbox.
And all that means is that I’m sitting by myself on a Friday night.
It’s not like I’d go pick up a regret, as Cole would put it. Hell, I barely did that in my pre-husband days, but now there’s a hell of a lot more to lose…even if I’ve already lost it.
I finally decide to text Cole anyway.
Me: When’s the next workout?
He doesn’t respond until the next morning.
Cole: Monday at eight. Kellan’s place.
Me: Count me in.
Cole: Too bad you missed out on last night. Found myself not one but *two* regrets.
Me: Living life in the fast lane.
Cole: Something like that. On my way home from their place now. At least I’m not inventing reasons to get them to leave.
I don’t really know what to say to that, but another text comes through from him before I say anything at all.
Cole: What’s up with you?
Me: What do you mean?
Cole: Where you been lately? Busy with the wife?
Me: Something like that.
Cole: Everything okay?
Me: We’ll talk Monday.
Cole: See you then.
I should’ve taken him up on his line of questioning.
Maybe it would’ve helped to get some of this load off my chest. I’m not sure Cole Andrews, the biggest playboy on the Tampa Bay Beasts, would have much advice to give, but I guess I’ve been wrong about these things before.
Still, I put him off. And that’s why I’m surprised when the front desk calls up to me fifteen minutes later.
“I have a Cole Andrews here to see you.”
“Send him up,” I say.
A minute later, he’s knocking on my door, and I open it.
“You look like shit,” he says to me, surveying me from head to toe.
I tilt my head and study him for a second. He doesn’t look like he just came from a wild night with two ladies at the same time, but I guess that’s not something you can see on a person.
Heartbreak, however, must be a more visual type of thing.
“Warn a guy when you’re stopping by so I can clean up a little,” I say.
“Not for me, man.” He chuckles as he steps past me into my place. “What’s going on?”
“She left.”
“You? Town? Left clothes on the floor? I’m gonna need you to be a little more specific.” He plops himself down on my couch, and I walk over and sit across from him.
“I don’t know. She needed some space, and now she’s in Vegas, probably getting back together with Archer because she always gets back together with him. I think I might’ve fucked up my one chance with her.”
“She’s married to you, man. She’s not getting back together with your brother. Pull yourself together and think rationally. It’s like the one thing I can count on with you.”
I shoot him a glare.
“What the hell did you do?” he asks as he sticks his feet up on my coffee table. “I thought you had this all worked out.”
“I sold my parents’ mansion.” I throw both hands up in one of those I don’t know kinds of gestures.
He wrinkles his nose. “And that somehow fucked your relationship with her?”
“She wanted it. She wanted to acquire it for her brand, gut it, reno it, and turn it into a wedding venue.”
“Ahh,” he says, nodding as he moves his feet back to the floor and leans forward with his elbows on his knees. “Why didn’t she buy it first if she wanted it?”
“Finances, for one thing.”
“So you sold it to someone who had the money, thus killing that conversation,” he guesses.
“Yeah. A cash offer that killed her dream, apparently. I guess I didn’t know I needed her permission to sell my own parents’ house.”
“Fucking women,” he commiserates.
“Yeah…except truth be told, it’s not all that simple. She has a point. It should’ve been a decision we made together. A partnership. She feels betrayed that I sold it without telling her. She found out from Zillow.”
He holds a hand to his chest in mock surprise. “From Zillow?” he repeats.
I chuckle. “Yeah. She should’ve heard it from me. I knew she wanted it, but I wanted to distance myself from it. I put up money to get my dad out of prison, and when the sale closes, I’ll get my money back. But it’s not just that. She feels like I don’t believe in her vision, in her dream.”
“Because of one house?” He looks confused.
“One house that holds a lot of history for us. She saw it as a fallen kingdom she wanted to rebuild. I saw it as a tie to my family I wanted to sever.”
“Sounds to me like she’s throwing a tantrum because she didn’t get what she wanted.” He sinks back into the couch and crosses his leg over his other knee.
I blow out a breath. “She isn’t. She’s hurt that I never gave her the chance.
And honestly…I think she might be right.
For a while, I started to wonder if the only reason she ran to me after she left Archer was because he wouldn’t give her what she wanted.
She turned to me thinking I would. But then I didn’t. ”
“This isn’t a very convincing argument that she’s not throwing a tantrum,” he points out. “You got any coffee, by the way? It was a late night, and my head’s pounding.”
“Yeah.” I get up and walk over toward the coffee pot, and I pour him a cup as I talk.
“We were a little busy planning our own wedding, making a playoff run, and working on Devon and Lindsay’s wedding.
Her phone’s been blowing up with new clients, and she’s been overwhelmed, so it just didn’t come up again until it was too late.
Her needing space is less about a tantrum and more about her setting a boundary that she’s not going to stay with someone who doesn’t fully believe in her and support her vision for the future of her brand. ” I hand him the coffee mug.
“Thanks. Do you?”
“Do I what?” I ask.
“Believe in her. Support her vision.”
“Of course I do,” I say, my voice full of passion. “I think she’s fucking brilliant and will succeed at anything she puts her mind to.”
“Yeah, you’re definitely a man in love.” He presses his lips together and sighs. “So what are you going to do?”
I shrug. “What can I do?”
“You said you’ll get the money back when the sale goes through. Are you saying it hasn’t actually sold yet?” he asks quietly.
It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve had the thought, but I suppose it is the first time someone has voiced that thought aloud.
“No. The sale isn’t final,” I admit.
He raises his brows. “Then I think you know what you need to do.”