12. Declan
TWELVE
DECLAN
Roland Caine sat across from me like a man who owned the table. Well, if we were being factual, it was his table.
Julian would have a laugh when I told him about this.
"Mr. Hale." He stood when I walked in. He extended his hand. "I've been looking forward to this."
I took the hand he offered. "So have I, Caine." I unbuttoned my jacket and sat. Graham took the chair behind me and to the right. He was silent.
“So…you’ve come to talk me out of my business.”
I laughed. “On the contrary, I’ve come to show you I’m the best thing for your business. I know all about your company.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Really?”
I nodded. “I know your father ran a print shop in Queens.
He had thirty-two employees. He printed church bulletins, local newsletters, and the classifieds for three different newspapers.
When those newspapers folded — one in '88, two more in '91 — it took the shop with them.
Bankruptcy. And that was where you came in. You were twenty-three, right?"
I didn’t wait for him to respond. I continued, "You bought your first radio station. WKRN, a little AM station in Jersey City. Borrowed every dollar. From AM radio to FM. From FM to local television. From local to cable. From cable to digital. Did I miss anything?"
He chuckled and pulled out a leather portfolio. "Not quite. Let me show you what the machine looks like today." He pushed it toward me. "It's all there — audited financials, subscriber data, platform metrics. I don't hide the numbers. I built this with my hands, and I'm proud of every digit."
I took the bound report and passed it behind me without looking. Graham took it.
"I'll have my team review the documentation. Thoroughly."
"Of course. I'd expect nothing less."
Caine shifted and talked about his company a little more, trying to hint at why he couldn’t let go easily.
Then the conversation came to an end, quicker than I expected.
He unbuttoned his jacket. He picked up a photograph from his desk and turned it toward me.
"My wife, Evelyn." He set the photo down but kept his fingers on the frame.
"She's hosting a charity gala tonight. Pediatric cancer research.
Her passion project." He looked at me. "If you're serious about this acquisition, you should be there.
These things aren't just parties, Declan.
They're where the real conversations happen. "
"I'd be happy to attend."
"Good." He leaned forward. "And, Declan, don't come alone. I'm an old-fashioned man. I like to see who a person surrounds himself with. Tell me more about them than any balance sheet." He smiled. "Bring someone. A partner. A friend. Whatever you call them these days."
The smile I gave him was the polished one. "I'll be there."
We shook hands. Graham and I walked to the elevator together. Once the doors closed, I turned to him.
"The documentation. How does it look?"
Graham adjusted his glasses. "I reviewed it while you were talking."
I tilted my head. "You reviewed a forty-page financial summary in thirty minutes?"
"The numbers are clean. Revenue figures match the public filings. Subscriber data is consistent with the platform's reported metrics." He paused. "It checks out."
I frowned. "That was fast. Are you sure?"
"I'm sure." He met my eyes. "It checks out, Mr. Hale."
Something about the speed of it nagged at me, but Graham had been at my side for a decade. If he said it was clean, it was clean.
The penthouse was quiet when I got home. The lights were dimmed. The kitchen smelled like the roasted chicken Mrs. Parrish made.
Thea was on the couch.
Lena was asleep on her chest. Thea was reading with one hand — another romance novel, bright cover, seemed like a different one from the nursery. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, her legs tucked beneath her. She was wearing leggings and an oversized T-shirt.
I stopped in the hallway. I'd seen her hair down once before. In my bed. The night I pulled the pin, and her curls fell past her shoulders. The memory of it was so immediate that my hand tightened on my briefcase strap.
She turned a page without looking up. "How was the meeting?"
I stiffened for a beat and finally moved. I didn’t know she’d seen me.
"It was work." I set the briefcase down and loosened my tie. I walked to the kitchen and poured a glass of water.
I leaned against the counter. She still hadn't looked up from the book. "I need you at an event tonight."
That got her attention. She looked up. "Why?"
I took a sip of water. "It’s business. I’m required to show up with someone. Will you do me the honor of being that someone?"
She was quiet. “Declan…”
I left the glass on the counter and moved to the living room. “Please. Treat this as a networking event for your nonprofit. You won’t even know I’m there.”
She sighed. "What would I wear?"
"I'll handle that."
"I don't need you to buy me a dress."
"I know, but you’re doing me a favor. It’s the least I could do. I'll have options sent over. You choose. Whatever you don't want goes back." I smiled. "Think of it as a professional courtesy."
"A professional courtesy."
"Between colleagues."
She held my gaze for three seconds. Four. Then she closed the book — her thumb holding the page — and said, "Fine. But I'm wearing whatever shoes I have."
The ballroom was gold and crystal and the soft murmur of money being polite. Chandeliers the size of small cars hung from the ceiling. A string quartet played music that sounded expensive. Waiters in black moved between the tables, carrying trays of champagne that nobody needed, but everybody took.
I was in my element. Black suit. Tailored shirt.
I moved through the crowd, greeting, smiling, shaking hands, and remembering names and wives' names and children's names.
I checked my watch. Thea should be here any minute.
Her makeup ran late, and Caine had already started calling. So we agreed to meet here.
I was barely paying attention to the conversation one of the guests had dragged me into.
When Thea walked in, I stopped moving.
The dress was midnight blue. It was the one I thought she'd choose — simple, floor-length, fitted through the waist with a low neckline. She'd done her hair up, with the same stray curl at her temple.
No other jewelry except gold studs in her ears and red lipstick. She looked like herself, which was, as always, the most devastating thing about her.
She caught my eye across the room. I raised my glass. She walked toward me, and the crowd between us parted without being asked.
"Ms. Calloway," I said like a true gentleman, letting my eyes travel over her, then back to her face. "You clean up well."
"Don't start."
I smirked. She fought a smile. We were off.
She was good in the room. Better than good. She talked to donors about the nonprofit. People leaned in.
Caine’s wife, Evelyn, took her card, squeezed her hand, and said, "You must come to our next board meeting."
Thea was charming because she was completely herself in a room full of people who were completely not, and I watched her do it from across the ballroom.
She caught my eye during a toast. She looked away first. I didn't.
The band started, slow and golden, with a saxophone leading. Couples moved onto the floor. Thea was standing near the bar, talking to a woman from the board, when a man approached her. Tall. Dark suit. He said something. She laughed. He held out his hand.
She glanced at me. Through the crowd, her eyes found mine. It was as if she was asking permission she didn't need from a man who had no right to give it.
I nodded. Why wouldn't I? She wasn't my date. She wasn't mine. She took his hand. They walked onto the floor.
I watched. I told myself I was watching casually. I was a man at a party, watching the crowd.
Then his hand settled on her waist. She put her hand on his shoulder. They moved together. She laughed at something he said, and her head tilted back, and the light caught the line of her throat. The very spot I kissed before I drove myself into her.
She looked more relaxed with him than she ever did with me.
Jesus. I can’t take this anymore. I put the drink down. I walked onto the floor.
"Mind if I cut in?"
The man looked at me. He knew who I was. Everyone in this room knew who I was, so he stepped aside. Smart choice.
I took Thea's hand. My other hand found her waist — the exact spot where his hand was. She looked up at me. She knew what just happened. Her lips twitched until they finally gave and lifted into a smirk.
"That was subtle," she said.
"I'm not a subtle man."
"I've noticed."
The band played. We moved. My hand was on her hip, and the physical memory was there — underneath the fabric, underneath the evening, and underneath every careful boundary we'd built since she moved in.
I've touched this body before. She's been this close before. We knew what each other's skin felt like. We knew how the other person kissed.
My hand shifted on her hip and found the exact spot I held the night I kissed her on the street corner. The curve of bone beneath the fabric. The warmth of her skin through the silk.
She inhaled sharply, then let out a long breath that deflated her shoulders.
I cleared my throat. "You look beautiful tonight."
Her eyes dropped to my mouth. She caught herself and looked away, at the chandelier, at the band, at anything that wasn't my face.
But her hand tightened on my shoulder. I pulled her closer without deciding to, close enough that her cheek was near my jaw. We didn't speak. The room turned around us. And all I felt was the pull between us, steady and enormous, like the tide coming in.
The song ended. We stepped apart. She let go of my shoulder. I let go of her waist. The distance returned, and it was the coldest thing in the room.
"I need some air," she said and turned to walk away.
I followed her onto the balcony because I couldn’t help myself. She wrapped her arms around herself. I shrugged off my jacket and draped it over her shoulders without asking. She pulled it tighter. Didn't argue.
That was new.
"Can I ask you something?" she said.
"You can ask me anything."
"Why didn’t we ever talk about…” I watched her throat move. “Why did we never talk about that night?"
I gripped the railing. "I don’t know."
Her dark eyes met mine. “What if…what if I wanted to talk about it?”
The air between us vibrated. She was close enough to kiss. I knew she'd let me. I could see it in her eyes, in the slight part of her lips. Her body was angled toward mine. The inch between us was charged and shrinking.
But before I could even move, the balcony door opened. A burst of music and laughter filled the air. A couple stepped out, champagne glasses in hand, mid-conversation. They saw us and smiled apologetically.
The moment shattered.
Thea straightened and pulled the jacket tighter. "We should go."
The drive home was quiet. Thomas drove. Thea looked out the window. Lena was at the penthouse with the night nurse recommended by Dr. Kaplan.
Thea went straight to the nursery when we arrived. I followed. I told myself I was checking on Lena. I told myself it was a father's instinct. Both were true. Neither was the whole truth.
She was leaning over the crib, adjusting the blanket, and touching Lena's forehead with the back of her hand. Lena seemed to be sleeping.
I walked in and stood beside her. Both of us looked down at Lena.
My mind was loud. I was attracted to her. I couldn't pretend otherwise. But this was complicated. The last time I let someone in, the last time I broke my rules, kept the penthouse, let myself consider something permanent, I ended up with a broken heart.
But Thea wasn't Kira. Kira wanted to be seen by a man who couldn't see her. Thea didn't want anything from me. She didn't want my money. She didn't want my world. She didn't want my name or my status.
She wanted nothing, and that was the confusing problem — I didn't know how to be wanted for something I couldn't provide.
I sighed and leaned down into the shadows of the crib to kiss Lena goodnight. I quickly realized my error.
My face was close to Thea's…inches. I could feel her breathing. I turned my head. She turned hers. And we were right there, suspended over the crib, close enough that the decision was already half-made before either of us made it.
I kissed her.
Or she kissed me. Her mouth was soft and warm. She tasted like champagne. My hands found her hips without thinking. She didn't pull away. Not at first. For ten seconds — the longest, most honest ten seconds of my life — she kissed me back.
Then she pulled away. Her hands came up between us. She stepped back.
"You can't…I can't…we can't…"
She turned. She walked out of the nursery. Her footsteps moved down the hall. The guest room door closed.
I stood there. My hands were still raised, holding the shape of her hips. I looked down at my hands and didn't recognize them.