Merger to Marriage (Boardrooms and Billi - By Addison Fox Page 0,50
stiff, stoic demeanor held her back. There’d be time enough for all of it once they were in the quiet privacy of her apartment. Time enough to work through whatever had gone so horribly wrong at dinner. Because whatever she’d deluded herself into believing all week, there was no way she was walking away. No way she could leave him when he was hurt like this.
Other than his request that they wait to talk, Holt stayed quiet for the duration of the ride. Only after the endlessly silent ride to her apartment did he finally speak as they stood before her door. “I’ll call you in the morning.”
“If you think you’re going to turn around and leave, guess again.”
“Look—”
“Oh no. I put up with the silent treatment in the car, but we’re going to discuss this.”
“Now’s not the time.”
“Now is the perfect time.” She finished with the third lock and swung the door wide open. “I’ve got some things I need to say.”
The darkened apartment beckoned them inside, and she moved through the room to turn on all the lights. It was a simple thing, but the need for brightness was almost palpable. Whatever they needed to say to each other, it needed to be out in the open. They were going to deal with it.
“Would you like a drink?”
“I’m fine.”
Mayson headed for the kitchen and snagged a few bottled waters. She wanted one, and she suspected that before their conversation was finished, he’d be glad she’d retrieved a second for him. When she rejoined him in the living room, she was touched by the figure he made as he stood by the darkened windows. It was so like the moment she’d come upon him at the beach, the first day they were reacquainted. He was so damned solitary.
“Talk to me. Share this with me.”
He turned from the window, his face blank. “Why? So it can taint you? So I can put you in a position where you have to sit across from a family friend and hear him make accusations about my background, and clearly my ethics? Ethics, by the way,” he reached for the water bottle she’d set on the coffee table and pulled off the cap with a harsh twist, “that we didn’t exactly honor by making up our little engagement.”
“It’s our business, and Teddy Craddick would do well to remember that. I don’t owe him my personal life and neither do you. If he doesn’t want to do business with you, that’s his choice, but let’s get over the worry that he’s got any say at all in what happens between us.”
“He does have a hell of a lot to say about my mother, and he’s hardly wrong.”
“She forced you to make choices. You can’t think you’re responsible for those things. Actions you were forced into as a child.”
“Situational ethics, Mayson, nothing more. None of it changes the fact I haven’t turned her in.”
“She’s your mother.”
“And she’s a criminal.”
“Have you helped her as an adult? Participated in anything that could be construed as illegal?”
“No.”
“Has she told you about what she’s doing?”
“There’s no reason to play back my actions as saintly.”
“And there’s no reason to play the martyr, either.”
He stood up to pace again, and she couldn’t tear her gaze from his large form as he crisscrossed the room. “It’s hardly that simple. I did talk to a detective years ago. Thought I could do something about the situation. Despite my input, they weren’t able to pin anything on her, and I had to ramp up my office security to avoid recrimination once she figured out the police were nosing around.”
“So you did right by the situation.”
“So right I shut down any further involvement. At that point, I had employees to worry about and their safety at the forefront of my thoughts. If the police couldn’t be bothered to take my input, there was no reason to keep barking up that tree and putting others in danger.”
“Again, I fail to see how that’s your fault.”
The bleak calm that rode his features dissolved in an instant as he turned on her. “Because she’s still out there. Still conning her way through life. It ebbs and flows depending on whether or not she’s snagged a rich partner, but she always ends up right back in the same place. I’ve spent my life trying to put distance between myself and that, and still it follows me like a stench I can’t remove no matter how hard I try.”
“I don’t know