29. Kate
Kate
"You might want to sit down for this," Gertie said, not even bothering to look up from her iPad as I stepped into the office.
Her glasses slid down her nose, and her expression was that special blend of excitement and mischief only Gertie could pull off without looking like she was plotting a bank heist.
"Why? Did someone finally outbid me on that boutique space on Bay Street?" I teased, dropping my purse on the leather bench and toeing off my ankle boots.
"Worse," she deadpanned. "The zoning commissioner just leaked something.
Quiet, not public yet—but that old community college across the river?
The one with the busted pipes and asbestos nightmares?
Where the junkies and the homeless go to crash out?
It's about to hit the auction block. State’s unloading it. "
My heart skidded.
That campus—decrepit, forgotten, overgrown like something out of a dystopian novel—was a sleeping giant.
"You sure?" I asked, my voice suddenly small.
"Like sin in Vegas," Gertie nodded. "Building’s condemned, but the land’s prime. 200 acres. One hundred of it touches the water. You know what that means."
I swallowed hard. "Michael."
"Michael," she confirmed. "And not just him. Rumor is his Vegas uncle’s in town. It’s a whole thing. Cuban cigars, whiskey, half-dressed waitresses... mafia real estate bingo. My neighbor’s daughter is a cocktail waitress in the VIP room. She heard it all.”
My stomach twisted.
"I have to beat him to it," I whispered, more to myself than to her.
Gertie cocked a brow. "Then you better get moving, sweetheart. Because that man doesn’t blink when he wants something. And I know you’ve got vision, but he’s got bulldozers."
I grabbed my coat, gloves, keys. My heart was thundering like a war drum.
"Where you going?"
"To walk the land.”
The old campus sat like a broken jawbone on the edge of the river, half the buildings crumbling under the weight of time and graffiti.
I parked the Jeep at the busted chain-link fence, sliding through the bent section that still bore the rusted "No Trespassing" sign.
My boots crunched through dead leaves and broken glass.
Amber stayed behind, sniffing near the car. Even she knew this place had ghosts.
The wind whipped at the edges of my black pea coat, and I stuffed my hands into the pockets, drawing it tighter around me. I stood in the center of the cracked main quad, surrounded by the carcasses of buildings built in the sixties—too new to be beautiful, too old to be safe.
But I didn’t see the rot.
I saw a stage rising where the lecture hall once stood.
Glass panels soaring like sails, white and gleaming, designed like the Sydney Opera House.
I saw boaters pulling up to docks at sunset.
A summer concert series. Students with violins tucked under their arms. My grandmother’s voice echoing like wind chimes through the atrium of a brand-new conservatory for the arts.
The Kathryn Peters Conservatory of Music.
Grief slammed into my chest like a wave.
I remembered the feel of Grandma’s voice in the dark, lullabies that carried me through the worst nights after the accident.
My parents had died on a rainy Thursday, coming back from a fundraiser.
I was eight. I'd been at school. I didn't even get to say goodbye.
The nightmares came that night—and every night after.
Until Grandma sang.
Music had saved me.
But here... here maybe it could come back.
"You okay?" Gertie’s voice came through the phone as I put her on speaker.
"Yeah," I whispered. "No. I don't know. I just—this land, it could be beautiful again. Not just money and gloss and roulette wheels. Real beauty. Music. Healing. A second chance. I feel something sacred here. In my bones.”
"Then we better get your paperwork in," she said. "Because if we don’t, he’s going to turn it into a casino, a helipad, and a water park with goat yoga."
I laughed, the sound raw.
"No," I said, eyes scanning the shoreline where my dreams hovered like ghosts. "This one’s mine."
And it would be. Even if I had to fight the man I loved to get it.
Even if I broke his heart. Or mine.
Within two hours, I’d contacted three state senators, two congressmen, and a few council members I’d gone to high school with who hadn’t sold their souls for luxury condos and wine bars. People who remembered the town before the high-rises.
My proposal? "The Land Will Sing Again.”
A vision. A revival. A conservatory of musical arts, named after my grandmother, Loretta Miller Peters.
Her legacy—her lullabies—would live again.
I pitched an open-air amphitheater modeled after the Sydney Opera House.
A new campus that married performance with healing arts.
Boat docks to bring in talent and escape traffic.
All green-certified. Sustainable. Uplifting.
I offered 5 million over his rumored bid.
In cash.
Bitcoin, mostly. Cashed out at the right time. Years ago, I’d invested in things people laughed at. Cryptocurrency. Vintage bourbon. Water rights. I hadn’t told Michael that part.
Now I was more than wealthy—I was secure. But no one knew it. My condo? Comfortable but not showy. My clothes? Designer, but subtle. I didn’t flaunt it. Didn’t want to be used. Didn’t want to be a target.
"You really gonna keep this from him?" Gertie asked.
I nodded. "He’d never let me buy it. Not now. Not if he knew."
Five nights later, I sat across from Michael at the casino’s private restaurant. Candlelight flickered. The steak was perfect. The wine was older than me.
He slammed his glass down so hard red sloshed over the rim.
"They sold the damn college," he growled.
I stiffened.
"North Star Holdings," he bit out. "They outbid me. By five million. Paid in cash. Vegas is pissed. The tribe’s breathing down my neck. Everyone thought that deal was ours."
My heart raced.
He was furious.
"You think it’s a shell?" Brett was already at our table ready to take orders.
"It is a shell," he snapped, pulling out his phone. "I want names. I want to know who the hell is behind it. Find them. Hell, run over their cat, make a two a.m. house call… I don’t care, Brett. Scare the shit out of them. Do what you have to do—get that deal for me. Burn their holdings to the ground. I want the CEO’s head on my pike.”
He stood and paced. Right in front of me. Seething. And I sat there—his lover, his fire, his sanctuary—and the CEO of the company that just turned his empire inside out.
He didn’t know.
But soon he would.
And I didn’t know if our love could survive it.
Guilt weighed around my neck like a chain anchor, dragging behind me with every step I took toward him.
He didn’t even look up when I entered the suite—just stood there at the bar, sleeves rolled to his elbows, the soft glow of the pendant light cutting shadows across his back like slashes.
A half-empty glass sat on the counter. He didn’t slam this one down. He just stared into it.
I should’ve said something then.
Should’ve told him the truth before it cracked both of us in half.
But the words tangled in my throat, thick and jagged. How do you tell a man who trusts you with his scars that you’re the one slipping the blade beneath his ribs?
He finally turned, and the weight of his gaze knocked the air clean out of my chest.
Not angry anymore.
Not barking orders into his phone.
Just… tired. Worn down. Frayed around the edges in a way I hadn’t seen before.
“Baby,” he said, voice rough like sandpaper, “I need you.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Just… hold me.”
His vulnerability cracked something wide open in me. This man—this empire-wielding, heat-packing kingpin—looked at me like I was his only lifeline.
And maybe I was.
Maybe that was the problem.
I crossed the room, slowly, the plush carpet muffling my steps as I closed the distance between us. He sat down heavily on the couch, elbows on his knees, running a hand through his dark hair like he didn’t know what else to do with his hands.
I sank to my knees in front of him.
Pressed my forehead to his.
Wrapped my arms around him.
He didn’t speak for a long time. Just exhaled against my shoulder like he could finally breathe. His arms came around me, crushing me to him, as if someone might rip me away if he didn’t hold tight enough.
He buried his face in my neck, and I felt the tremor in his body—just a small one, but it rattled me.
“They think I lost control,” he whispered. “That I let someone get too close and cost us everything.”
I couldn’t breathe.
“They think it’s you.”
Guilt weighed around my neck like a chain anchor, dragging behind me with every step I took toward him.
He didn’t even look up when I entered the suite—just stood there at the bar, sleeves rolled to his elbows, the soft glow of the pendant light cutting shadows across his back like slashes.
A half-empty glass sat on the counter. He didn’t slam this one down. He just stared into it.
He was unraveling. Not in the way most people do. No pacing or yelling this time. This was something colder. Sharper. It terrified me.
I should’ve told him then.
Should’ve confessed everything before it broke us both.
But the words stuck, thick and jagged in my throat. How do you tell a man who trusts you with his darkest secrets that you’re the one slipping the knife between his ribs?
He finally turned, and the weight of his gaze landed on me like a punch.
“They think my phone’s been bugged or that you are a mole,” he said quietly. “That land was sold before the state ever listed it. Before it hit auction. That deal was supposed to be ours.”
I said nothing. My heartbeat roared in my ears.
He rubbed his jaw. “Only one bid was supposed to come through. Mine. Not even the tribal council knew. We kept it out of texts, calls. Locked down.”
He paused. Then added, “You were the only person I spoke to that week about it. I suggested the state leaked it. Some paid staff worker selling intel for cash under the table…”
And still… he looked at me like he wanted to believe I couldn’t be capable of that kind of betrayal.
“You didn’t,” he said firmly, almost like he was willing it into existence. “You wouldn’t. You don’t even talk business. And I told them that.”
I swallowed hard.
"They think I lost control," he muttered. “That I got distracted. That I let someone get too close and cost us.”
He exhaled hard.
I froze.
His voice dropped lower. Dangerous. “I told them if they came for you, I’d bury them. All of them. And I meant it.”
He still didn’t know.
And he was protecting me—at war for me—against men with real power and old grudges.
Men who’d kill first and ask questions never.
I wanted to tell him.
I wanted to be the woman he thought I was.
But that land? That vision? It had been born from grief and built on the ashes of everything I’d lost. I couldn’t give it up. I wouldn’t.
So I lied.
“I’m here,” I whispered, kissing his jaw, his temple, his hands. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Even if I already had one foot out the door.
Even if the foundation we’d built this love on was cracking beneath us.
Because tonight, he needed me and I didn’t know how to be anything else but his.
That night, he touched me like he was afraid I’d disappear.
No words at first. Just his body covering mine, hands framing my face, mouth dragging slow and reverent along my jaw. The way he looked at me… it wasn't lust, not entirely. It was something deeper. Something that made my chest ache.
Like I was his last chance at peace.
Like I was the only thing tethering him to this world.
“Michael,” I breathed, barely more than a whisper, but it was enough to make his lips pause against my throat.
His fingers trembled as they slid under the hem of my camisole, pushing it up and over my head with care like I was fragile, breakable. I wasn’t. Not with anyone else. But with him?
I wanted to be.
He kissed his way down my sternum, between my breasts, over my stomach, slow and deliberate. Worshipping. Like each inch of my skin was his prayer. He didn’t just strip me bare—he peeled me open.
By the time he sank inside me, the stretch and slide of him filled something in me I didn’t know had been empty.
We moved together like we’d done this for a thousand lifetimes—like we were stitched together by fate, by fire, by something ancient and aching.
My fingers buried in his hair, his mouth pressed to my collarbone, our sweat slick between us as the bed creaked beneath the weight of everything we couldn’t say aloud.
He whispered my name against my skin like it was the only thing he knew for sure.
“You’re the only good thing in my world,” he rasped, his voice cracking as he rocked into me, deeper, slower. “The only light. Do you know what that means to a man like me?”
Tears pricked at the corners of my eyes. My nails dug into his back.
“I love you,” he said, voice broken and raw as his rhythm faltered, as his body tensed.
And then he was spilling inside me, buried so deep it felt like he was carving his name into my soul.
I wrapped my legs around him, holding him close as the tremors rolled through both of us.
“I love you too,” I whispered into the dark, lips brushing his temple as he kissed me, again and again, like he couldn’t stop. Like he didn’t want to.
We lay tangled in the sheets, the scent of sex and skin clinging to the air, hearts still racing in the quiet aftermath.
Outside, the wind howled off the bay, but inside, all I could feel was him.
And all I could think about… was how long I could keep pretending I hadn’t just shattered the heart of the only man I’ve ever loved.