Chapter Thirty-Three

Reid

My plan to get Carrie out of the office and all to myself after announcing the Grayson Bennett meeting fails. We head for my office door, exit, and Connie is immediately on her feet.

“Where exactly are you going?” she demands.

“We’re headed to the Hamptons for a meeting with Grayson Bennett,” Carrie replies before I have the chance, excitement lifting in her voice as she adds, “This could be huge for us. The deal of all deals.” She’s animated, her beautiful eyes alight with anticipation.

This matters deeply to her, and it matters beyond pleasing the board. I can’t remember the last time anything mattered to me on that level. Until now. She’s making this matter to me on a level I didn’t know anything could matter ever again. I set that bombshell aside for further analysis later.

“Hold all calls that aren’t critical,” I add, “and we’ll need a chopper ready to go in an hour.”

“You mean like your four o’clock conference call with Mercury Bank?” Connie asks. “And before you tell me to cancel it, I’ll remind you that he refused to talk to Gabe and wants you to prove you’re still his man.”

“Right,” I growl, the thundering in my head that comes and goes, hitting me all over again. “That man needs a woman. Maybe then he’ll get over this hard-on for me.”

Carrie laughs, the soft mix of sweet and sexy stirring my impatience to get us the hell out of here and someplace where I can use her as my remedy, “Why the hell did we book that for Friday afternoon again?” I ask.

“You know why,” Connie reprimands, the only damn person other than Carrie, who ever reprimands me, “your client is leaving for Europe for a month tomorrow.”

“In other words,” I say dryly. “I’m taking the call and pushing back our departure.” I glance at Carrie. “It’ll be at least an hour.”

“Let me grab that file I wanted to review with you really quick,” she replies. “Then I can handle the problem while you take your call.” She hurries away.

I have no idea what the hell she’s talking about, but since this is Carrie, I have no doubt, she’ll be making it loud and clear in the near future. I head back into my office and by the time I’m behind my desk, Connie appears in my doorway. “I’ll take care of the chopper and hotel rooms for you both. Do you want me to coordinate a time with Grayson?”

“Let him know the situation. I’ll call him the minute I’m out of my meeting. Do what you have to and then go home. There’s no reason for you to hang around.”

She doesn’t move. “Anything I need to know?”

“Be prepared for press hell on Monday,” I say. “We’re holding a press conference on the Brooks’ case Monday. The deal closed.”

“For a good number?”

“Yes.”

“I’d say congratulations, but the press is your punishment,” she says. “They’ll demonize you in some way, I’m sure. It never ends.”

“Who’ll demonize who?” Carrie asks, joining us again.

“The press comes at Reid no matter what good he does,” Connie explains. “I hate them. I really do hate them.”

“Hate them at home,” I order. “Get out of here, but be in early Monday.”

“Got it, boss.” She heads out of the office and Carrie crosses to set the folder in front of me. “The items you needed are inside.”

Her cellphone rings and she snakes it from her pocket while I open the folder to find four Advil and two Sudafed taped to a piece of paper; her extreme discretion appreciated. She’d been right. I don’t trust easily. I don’t ask for trust either. I’ve done both with Carrie.

“Elijah,” Carrie says, drawing me back to the moment and indicating her phone. “He’s calling me. Reid, I think I should take it and feel out his position. To protect you and us. He might talk to me.”

He will talk to her. He’ll run his mouth and that’s not an option. I’m simply not ready for the hate he could earn me with Carrie. “Talking to him offers him hope that he can turn you,” I say, downing the pills with water before adding, “That empowers him in ways we don’t need him empowered.”

Her phone stops ringing and she purses her lips. “Have more faith in me than you obviously do,” she says. “It also might tell us where his head is now.”

“You know I believe in you,” I say. “You know I do. I know you know that at this point. I’ve shown you that by way of my actions, but you don’t know Elijah like I do. Don’t talk to him.”

“I know this is personal for him and that is always where things get dirty.” She leans on the desk. “If you get hurt, I get hurt. If that doesn’t make you trust me, I don’t know what will.”

“I’m not going to let that happen, Carrie. It’s my turn here. I need you to trust me.”

“I do trust you, Reid, or I’d be gone already, but I need us to do this together.”

“We are. Deep breath, baby. I got this, and I got you.”

“I don’t want you to have me or this. We do this together.”

Connie buzzes in. “Your call is live.”

“I’ll grab it,” I say, and when I’m certain she’s hung up, I refocus on Carrie. “Let’s win over Grayson and we’ll deal with Elijah when we come back.”

“This weekend,” she insists. “We deal with Elijah this weekend. Promise me.”

“I promise we’ll talk about Elijah.”

“This weekend,” she repeats.

“This weekend,” I agree.

“Promise.”

“Promise,” I concede.

“And you never break a promise,” she reminds me, giving me no time to reply. Her, and her perfect backside track across my office and exit, shutting me inside alone.

I reach for the phone, but not without a vow to shut Elijah up no matter what it takes. I’m not losing the only woman I’ve ever wanted to call mine over that asshole.

***

The call lasts every bit of the hour I’d predicted, and the minute I hang up, I dial Grayson Bennett. With the six o’clock hour upon us, we coordinate a nine o’clock dinner at his beachfront home, and I grab my briefcase and head for the door. I find Connie and Sallie already gone, and make my way to Carrie’s office, stepping inside the doorway, to discover her fretting over something on her MacBook screen. I lean on the frame. “Problem?”

Her gaze jerks to mine, the connection between us punching me in the chest. She feels it too, her lips parting, her breath hitching a moment before she recovers. I can almost see her mentally set her reaction to me aside, before she says, “Yes. I have a problem. The numbers on a European project we’re involved with aren’t adding up. I need to go over them with you. Reid, I think it’s a problem.”

“The Westbrook Project?”

“Yes,” she confirms. “That one.”

“I think it might be, too. I was going to talk to you about it. I did some work on it already.”

“You did?” she queries.

“I did.”

She inhales and breathes out on her reply. “I guess that’s why you’re CEO.”

“You’re at the same place I’ve landed on this, baby. I have some ideas we can debate.” I motion with my head. “Let’s go pack up. We have a chopper waiting on us.”

She shuts her MacBook and stuffs it in her briefcase. “I hope your ideas are better than mine. I’ve been worried over this for an hour with no answers.” She stands and crosses the room to stop right in front of me, but she doesn’t touch me. Those emerald eyes search my face. “You’re still feeling—” She catches herself as if she’s afraid we might be heard. “How are you doing with that situation we were dealing with?”

There’s concern in her face, in her tone. It sideswipes me and hits me as hard as that look we’d shared. When has anyone, since my mother died, worried about me? Why have I let this woman close enough for it to happen? Why do I not want to push back? And I don’t. I say simply, “I’m okay.”

She doesn’t leave it alone. She pushes for more. “Okay?” she prods.

“The edge is off,” I say. “And thanks to the drugs you got me, it happened quickly. That usually means it’s not going to get worse.”

She motions toward the outer office. “Are we alone?”

“Yes. We’re alone.”

She closes the small space between us, lowering her voice, as if “alone” doesn’t make her quite feel alone. “Then I was thinking that surely Royce could get you medication under an alias.”

I pull her to me. “I’m better. It’s under control.”

“This time,” she says, “but what if this means your headaches are coming back? It would be good to be prepared.”

“You’ve given this a lot of thought, it seems.”

“Yes, actually. I have. I mean, how are you going to beat Elijah at his game, win over the stockholders, fight the press, and give me unlimited orgasms while battling migraines? That’s impossible, even for a machine like yourself.”

She delivers the words without even a smile, but I laugh. God this woman makes me laugh and I don’t even know what to do with that. “Unlimited, huh?”

“Yes,” she confirms. “I do deserve quite a lot, considering what an asshole you’ve been to me, but I’ll trade you one for one. Maybe if I give you your fair share, you’ll forget how to be an asshole.”

“Maybe,” I tease. “Or maybe not.”

“Probably not,” she says. “But I have to try.”

I sober quickly with her determination, stroking a lock of hair from her face, a crazy, unfamiliar tenderness for this woman overtaking me. “There’s a lot of things I could forget with you, Carrie West, but you might wish I didn’t.”

She catches my hand. “But you’re not going to make that decision for me, remember?”

“I remember. All too well.” I kiss her and force myself to release her for the walk to the elevator. I don’t remember ever having to force myself to let go of a woman, not until Carrie.