Chapter 47 #2
She walked past me toward the boardroom with her spine straight and her face set with purpose. I stayed where I was, watching my husband walk toward me and knowing everything was about to change—one way or another.
We were back to where I’d started the day, outside the boardroom, pacing like our collective anxiety might somehow influence the outcome inside. Only this time, it wasn’t just Colin and me.
It was all of us.
Alex came to a standstill beside me, close enough that I could feel the heat of him through his suit jacket, one hand tucked into his pocket and the other resting lightly at my back like a steadying weight.
“I can’t vote on this,” he said, maddeningly calm for someone who had just wagered close to a billion dollars on my future. “Neither can Sterling. It’s a conflict of interest.”
Sterling leaned against the wall a few feet away, his phone in his hand, but he wasn’t actually looking at it. Colin hovered near the window with his jaw set so tight, I worried he might crack a tooth.
“What does that mean?” I asked quietly, glancing up at Alex’s profile and noticing the knot at the back of his jaw. “If you guys can’t vote…”
“Nora has to vote in our favor,” he finished honestly. “But even if she does, we need a full majority to swing this. Her vote alone won’t be enough.”
I searched his face for doubt or fear, but there was none.
All I saw was anticipation and urgency, a need for this to be done and to get to work.
He glanced down at me, the expression in those green eyes so steady and sure that looking at him made me feel like I’d had a warm, comforting blanket wrapped around my shoulders.
“Our offer is sound,” he said. “They’d be idiots to turn it down.”
I so badly wanted his certainty, to crawl inside it and hide until the vote was over, but I couldn’t, so I just slid my hand into his and waited.
Time seemed to do strange things in that hallway, minutes stretching and warping.
Every sound felt amplified, from the hum of the lights, to the distant ding of an elevator, and Colin’s foot tapping against the floor until I shot him a look and he stopped.
Alex leaned down when my brother’s incessant tapping cut off, looking deep into my eyes as he murmured, “Are you okay?”
“I think so,” I lied.
He squeezed my hand but didn’t say anything else, just staying by my side like he’d never leave. That was becoming my favorite thing about him, not the grand gestures or the scorched-earth devotion, but the way he knew when to fill the silence and when to let it be.
When the door finally opened and Mom stepped out, everything in me went still.
She didn’t smile right away, her face a mask of composure.
For half a second, I was back in my childhood, trying to decipher her moods like it was a survival skill, but after taking in a deep breath, she looked at me and smiled.
“Westwood and Sons is now the owner of Thayer Steelworks,” she announced. “You did it. It was a unanimous vote.”
I didn’t realize I’d been holding my breath until it came out of me in a broken rush. My vision blurred instantly, tears springing up faster than I could blink them away. Colin let out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sob. He pulled me into a crushing hug.
We’d done it. We’d actually fucking done it. No, he’d done it.
The Thayer lawyers came streaming out of the room next, already talking about next steps, timelines, and public announcements as they passed us.
Some stopped to shake Alex’s hand while Sterling clapped him on the shoulder, saying something about drinks later that I didn’t quite catch because Colin was still holding on to me like if he let go, it might all vanish.
When he finally released me, I pressed my face briefly into Alex’s chest, breathing him in and grounding myself in the solid strength of him. Oh, my God. He actually did it. We’re not losing Thayer. Or our jobs. I get to rebuild our name without Andrew or anyone else calling the shots.
It was almost too good to be true, but then Alex leaned down, his mouth brushing my temple. “We should celebrate.”
I huffed out a wet, half-laugh and lifted my head to look up at him, his face blurry through the tears I only now realized had welled in my eyes. “All I want is to go home.”
He pulled back just enough for his gaze to meet mine. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I said, my voice hushed with disbelief, awe, and the startling realization that he’d actually saved the company. “Let’s go home and watch our shows in our pajamas. With food that didn’t come from a catered pastry tray.”
His mouth curved into that soft, private smile he saved just for me. Then he caught my lips in a gentle, lingering kiss that was completely unconcerned with the fact that half a dozen people could see us right now.
“I guess that’s what people do for fun when they’ve been married for seventy-five years, huh?” he murmured against my lips.
I laughed, the sound bubbling up through the exhaustion and relief. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Perfect,” he replied quietly. “I’ll order in whatever you want. Even if it’s from that place with the weird noodles you like so much.”
“They’re not weird,” I protested. “They’re authentic.”
“They’re deeply weird.” He pumped his eyebrows once, then turned to let Nate and Colin know we were leaving.
My mom was already gone, and for the briefest moment, I wished she’d still been there so that I could thank her, but ultimately, I supposed we both needed space and time to process everything that had happened.
So I just took Alex’s hand and we walked away from the boardroom together, neither of us looking back.
As we climbed into his car, it hit me all at once that we were finally safe. The company was safe. My job was safe. My place in the world, something I’d fought for with everything I had, was finally, truly secure.
And somehow, impossibly, so was this, the marriage we’d entered into as an arrangement. Ironically, in the end, the votes Alex had procured through the deal hadn’t been what had saved the company.
What had done it was me letting someone stand beside me, say I’ve got you, and actually mean it.
Alex Westwood had done it all his way, and simply by trusting him enough to do it, we’d not only made sure Thayer would remain standing, but we’d found love in the last place I would’ve gone looking for it—a business deal.
A deal that had changed every aspect of my life for the better, even if I was still waiting for my youngest brother to come around to the idea. Teenagers, man.