Chapter 5
Chapter Five
CAL
S abrina Holloway. Boom. She was a roundhouse kick to the solar plexus. I’d walked into my office and nearly tripped over myself when I saw her standing by my desk.
And then I panicked. How she’d come to be here I’d find out later. But she had to go.
And then she was leaving, and I wanted her to stay. She calmly strolled out of my office like there wasn’t history between us, and I was no more important to her than a pesky gnat she’d taken a second to squash before moving along. Her backside was just as lovely as her front. Sabrina Holloway had been a knockout in college, but now—holy shit, she took my breath away. I’d walked into my office, never expecting she would be in there, and nearly lost my mind when I saw her. My body immediately betrayed me. My heart jumped into my throat, and my hands itched to renew themselves with how she felt. I wanted to hug her. I wanted to smile and tell her what a shitty twenty-four hours I’d had. She’d always been a good listener. I experienced a familiar flush of want that I hadn’t felt in years.
I should let her go. That was the best—the smartest—move for both of us. I would not drag her into this dogfight with my father. She’d been his target once before. I wouldn’t let that happen again.
But it hurt to watch her leave. I’d followed her career over the years, and no matter how many pictures of her I stared at, none captured just how remarkable her midnight hair, blue eyes, and cherry lips were. She was so much better in person.
And she was doing what I wanted. She was leaving.
I pounded my desk twice as I fought the internal struggle between what I wanted and what was right. I wanted her to stay. She needed to leave to stay out of my dad’s crosshairs.
I stared at the words she’d written in her loopy cursive:
Three things this room tells me about you.
1.You’re cold inside, which can also mean bitter and lonely.
How a man constantly surrounded by people could be lonely, I wasn’t sure. But bitter, yeah. I was bitter. Other than this company, nothing had turned out the way I wanted. I knew why, and it had been a choice I’d made, but yeah, I was bitter about it.
2. There are no pictures to celebrate your business success. None even on your book. I think it’s because you’re mad at yourself. Is it hard to look in the mirror? How can you open yourself up for dating if this is in the way?
For me, reflecting meant regretting, and I didn’t do that, so looking in the mirror was a waste of time.
3. The Cal I knew and the Cal you are today are not the same person. And something tells me this Cal isn’t very happy.
She’d gotten all that from my office. Or maybe, like me, she’d done an internet research. Either way, she’d gotten it right. And that infuriated me.
I pounded the desk one more time, then pushed off, giving in to my wants. In six long strides, I was outside my office and closing in behind her as she maniacally pressed the down button as if that would make the elevator car come quicker.
“Would you really be a love consultant for me? Set me up with other women? Watch me date?” I stood perpendicular to her and pressed one hand on the wall by the elevator doors. I leaned closer.
She side-eyed me once, then kept her attention on the elevator. “Why is it you have the slowest elevator on the planet? It’s three lousy floors. The Empire State Building’s elevators travel twelve hundred feet per minute. Your building is, what, thirty feet? Travels at a sloth’s speed.”
“The Empire State Building is one hundred two floors. If it didn’t travel fast, people on the higher floors would have to live there, going out once a week, or else spend their lives on the elevator. Answer me. You could really set me up?” Each thud of my rapidly beating heart echoed in my ears.
The elevator chimed, and the doors slid open. She walked into the elevator and turned to face me, a haughty look on her face. “Of course. That’s my job. That is what I was hired to do. Why wouldn’t I be able to?”
I stepped to the threshold and stuck out a hand to stop the door from closing. The last thing I needed was for everyone to find out the extent of our history and jump on it. This train wreck was already off the rails. Bringing Sabrina in was a total derailment catastrophe. So I kept my voice low.
“Because of everything between us.” I gestured to her and then to myself. “I’m the guy who took your virginity. That’s why.”
Her lips parted, hinting at a gasp, her cheeks going pink. Then her eyes narrowed, and I knew I’d sparked her temper. Sabrina had a tell. She stepped forward and rested a slender hand over the left side of my chest. It took everything I had to not flex.
“Calvin.” She looked up at me through sooty lashes. “Calvin, Calvin, Calvin.” She used my full name because she knew I hated it, and with each iteration she drummed her fingers against my chest in a distracting manner. What she said next gutted me. “You may have been the first explorer, but you weren’t the last.”
And then, to get me out of the elevator, she shoved me hard, her hand on the center of my chest, pushing me backward. I was over six foot three and a solid two hundred twenty pounds, and she still managed to knock me off-balance. I caught my footing as the doors to the elevator were sliding shut. I could tell by her stance she had a finger on a button, probably the one for closing the doors. She gave me a finger wave right before they snapped together, and the hum of the machine indicated its descent.
I stared at the steel doors. I had no right to be angry. She wasn’t my girl anymore. Yet the scenarios my imagination created weren’t kind to me. Logically, I knew I’d relinquished any right to have her. And I knew doing so meant she would find happiness elsewhere. I just didn’t want to think about it. Each internet search I’d done had been an act of torture. Yes, I was a masochist. With bated breath, I scanned the information from my searches, expecting at any time to see a wedding announcement or Sabrina in the arms of another.
Sabrina Holloway. She’d been everything—breath, laughter, warmth, and hope. I put a hand on my chest over the spot where hers had been and thought I could still feel heat.
“We need her, Cal. We need to get on top of this story,” Paul said behind me.
I stared at the closed doors, my racing heart returning to normal under my palm. I let out a slow exhalation, then turned to Paul. “Why do we need her specifically?”
My own father had tried to control me by threatening the one thing I wanted to keep safe. Then, because he still couldn’t control me, he’d struck again, only this time, his actions had brought that very person he’d worked so hard to erase from my life right back into it. What a fucking mess.
When Paul didn’t answer, I brushed past him as I went into my office. We could not use Sabrina.
Paul followed me in. “She’s one of the best. She’s got an outstanding reputation, and she’s great in front of a camera. She’ll do an excellent job up against the media. You should go after her.”
I considered enlightening Paul as to how dangerous it would be to have Sabrina associated with the company, then decided against it. It wasn’t any of Paul’s damn business. She hadn’t been the catalyst for my father’s recent attack, though she would be adding an accelerant to the fire. Best to just move past this moment.
I cleared my throat. “If she’s one of the best, then get another one of the best other than her. Simple.” I took a seat behind my desk and avoided all the stuff written on the surface. “Who hired her?”
“Morgan.”
The next question was how my mother knew to approach Sabrina. The logical answer was Jace, because when Sabrina and I dated, I’d kept her far from my family. My mom and sister had been living with my dad at the time, and there was no way I was going to subject her to him. My house had been toxic. That was why we’d always spent our free time with her dad.
I couldn’t imagine my lifelong friend suggesting the company hire her. Jace was the only person other than me who knew the history. He wouldn’t put either of us in this position. He was such a reliable friend that he’d flown in when he heard I’d been shot.
I took out my cell phone and sent Jace a quick text:
Sabrina just left my office. What do you know about that?
Jace
Holy crap. How’d that go?
Much like you can imagine
Jace
Your mom asked about her. She knew Sabrina was a matchmaker because she knew that’s how Meredith and I met. I told her no way was Sabrina a good idea and she shouldn’t be on any list. Paul was there.
I looked up from my phone and glared at Paul. “I’m considering firing you,” I growled.
Paul shot me the bird. “Because I tried to hire a matchmaker that you have a personal connection to? That plays out in the media so much better than hiring someone you don’t know. That’s what you pay me to do. You need to explain to me why you don’t want her here.”
My phone chimed with a new text.
Jace
I’m sorry, man. That must have sucked.
She’s gone now. I scared her off.
I looked at the notes scrawled along the surface of my desk. I should wipe them off. What she’d written wasn’t flattering. Yet, for the most part, it was true. I would argue against having a stick up my butt. Having a serious nature was not the same as rigidity. Besides, I was in a business that required me to be serious. With one finger, I traced a word, then a sentence. Sabrina had always been that type—the sort that made lists and reminders. She got immense satisfaction from checking off a box. She took pride in those pointy marks.
“You need to go after her, Cal,” Paul said. “We’re on borrowed time here. Hitchens has already put out a statement about the improvements their app will have. Plus, we’re getting calls from former clients wondering if they should continue to recommend us. The Peru thing didn’t help. Some are ticked.”
My finger paused on one of the questions she’d written on my desk. Why? Don’t I deserve to know that? After all these years she still wanted to know why. And after all these years, I still had no intention of telling her.
And yeah, she was still ticked. My clients were ticked. I was ticked.
I stood. “As they should be.”
She really did deserve to know why I’d changed on a dime. But not telling her kept her protected. If she knew, she’d fight back.
“I have to take care of something. Find another matchmaker. Start selling the plan. Just leave Sabrina out of this. Please. Trust me when I say she doesn’t solve our problems—she complicates them.”
Deserve. She deserved to be loved and cherished. After what I’d done to her, I didn’t deserve love. When you abused it the way I had—kicked it hard when it was down—love tended to stay away. And rightly so.