Nine
Sarah and Violet were crawling around when Bryce got home. They scooted around pushing little wooden blocks like cars around, and making the sort of noises that babies tended to make. Rose had long since stopped wondering whether or not there was any particular meaning to the cooing noises.
Duncan had left hours ago. There might have been a thousand reasons for it, but Rose had told him to go, which was certainly one of them. Bryce came into the room, his tie loosened around his neck and his shirt spread a little at the neck.
“How are the girls?”
“They’re doing fine.”
“And the business?”
Rose took a long breath. “I don’t know.”
“Don’t know?”
Rose’s head hurt. It felt as if it hadn’t stopped hurting since she got pregnant, except for the few, brief periods where she managed to sleep through the night. That wasn’t nearly as much help as it should have been, though.
“Someone’s trying to buy it up.”
“Oh.”
“What am I supposed to do? This isn’t my area of expertise.”
Bryce shrugged. “You’ll figure it out.”
No, Rose thought, frustrated. I won’t. “I just don’t know what I’m doing here. You can’t just expect me to suddenly become a businessman overnight.”
“Everyone stumbles once or twice.”
“You’re a real charmer, Bryce Kilpatrick. Just help me, will you?”
He let out a long, low breath. “You want to know what I’d do?”
“What would you do?”
“Cut and run. Take the employees you bought the company to acquire and get the hell out of dodge. Take your money, dump your assets, and leave.”
“I didn’t buy the company to scalp a few employees, Bryce. I didn’t buy the company in the first place.”
“Well there’s your problem right there,” he said. There was a hint of teasing in his voice. Rose didn’t have much interest in being teased. Violet picked up one of the blocks and started smacking it into the ground. Part of me worried that she was going to dent the flooring. Part of me figured that if a hundred-ninety pound man could walk around on it, then it could handle the arm strength of a six month old smacking a pine block into it. “You’re emotional about the property.”
“It’s my job, Bryce, and I’m not going to be the owner for all of three minutes before I dump it. That would be stupid.”
“It would be even stupider to lose a ton of money on a property that’s not going to pay you back, don’t you think?”
Rose looked down at Sarah. She had crawled over and was trying, vainly, to get her attention and maybe stand up. She got up onto her feet, then failed entirely to get anywhere close to standing before she fell back onto her butt. Rose picked her up.
“I need help, Bryce. I don’t need you telling me that I should just walk away from my problems and hope that it’s better luck next time. Besides, if your goal was to get the IRS to avoid looking too deeply into your affairs—and apparently now my affairs, too—then I don’t think that dumping a property and making a ton of liquid cash is the way to do that.”
He sucked in a breath. “Look, I don’t know what to tell you, Rose. I just know that I wouldn’t hold onto it. I’ve been told that I have good instincts for these things. I’ve certainly made more money than I’ve lost, and I usually assume most things are going to make me money, rather than lose it for me.”
“Well, maybe I don’t have your instincts.”
“Then do what I said. Get rid of it. Call your guy and tell him to sell.”
“I already told him to buy.”
“Well, that’s your mistake right there.”
Rose’s teeth grit together for an instant. Then she decided that she had a better option, anyways. She looked down at Sarah, who smiled up at her like there was nothing going on around. Like she was as happy as a little clam. Rose couldn’t help smiling. It wasn’t fair that the little girls could have this effect on her. She was supposed to be angry.
“You’ll figure it out,” Bryce said. “It’s your company. You’re not going to go broke just because it goes under, okay? So if you’re worried, just…”
He trailed off. Rose spoke with a tone that belied the words: “I’m done with this conversation, Bryce. You should play with Violet.”
He nodded at the edge of her vision, and scooted forward until his butt slid off the couch cushion and onto the floor.
“How are you doing, little lady?”
Violet immediately rolled onto her back and looked up at him. He tickled her with one hand. It was easy to be angry with him when he talked. When he talked about business, it was even easier. But watching him play with the little girl, who he didn’t even realize was his little girl, it was almost enough to make up for how much of a jerk he was.
Almost.