Hard Rules

There is a knock on the door and I glance out of the window to find a man in a suit and a black sedan idling nearby. A few minutes later, I’m at the Four Seasons, traveling the elevator up to Shane’s suite, a small overnight bag on my shoulder. At Shane’s door I knock but he doesn’t answer, and the fact that he trusts me here alone only drives home why I have to be strong tonight. We have to stop seeing each other. I unlock the door and enter, setting my bag and purse on the coatrack by the door.

I pass the kitchen and glance up the stairs at the bedroom, wondering, Can I really walk away if I make it up those stairs again? But how do I miss one last night with Shane? Tormented, I walk through the living room and realize the patio door is open. Inhaling, I move forward to hear Shane’s voice.

“What exactly are you suggesting, Eric?” Shane demands.

“I’m not suggesting anything,” comes a male voice I assume to be Eric. “I’m telling you what my patient told my nurses. And not just any patient. The wife of a professional baseball player who says he’s using performance-enhancing drugs he gets packaged as something else from your company.”

I catch myself on the edge of the bar from the impact of Shane being involved with more than just a family war. This is criminal, and it’s everything I’ve tried to fight and escape in my life.

“Let me get this straight,” Shane says. “The soon-to-be ex-wife says this drug my company is selling off-label can’t be detected in blood tests?”

“That’s what she claims,” Eric says.

“This is the athlete that is paying for the plastic surgery you’re doing on his soon-to-be ex-wife.”

“Correct.”

“This has dirty divorce settlement written all over it,” Shane replies.

“Shane, man,” Eric says. “I want that to be truth, but she swears that ballplayer who died last month of an unexplained heart attack was using it too.”

“This isn’t happening at Brandon Pharmaceuticals,” Shane insists.

“I hope not, man,” Eric says. “Look. We went to school together. We grew up together. I know you wouldn’t do this, but your family is another story.”

Shane brushes past that comment. “I need everything you can give me on this woman.”

“You know I can’t give you that.”

“Of course you can’t. I’ll figure it out, but I need you to keep me in the loop.”

“I will.”

It’s then I realize the conversation is ending and I’m standing here listening. I turn and rush for the door, messing with my bags as footsteps sound. “Emily.”

Suddenly Shane is standing in the hallway in front of me, and a tall, good-looking man in a dark suit with wavy blond hair is with him. “Hi,” I say with an awkward wave of my hand. “I rang the bell but you didn’t answer.”

“I was just leaving anyway,” the other man says, giving me a nod and then eyeing Shane. “I’ll be in touch.” He steps around us and leaves.

The door shuts behind me, leaving Shane and me alone. Shane steps closer to me, his suit jacket gone, his tie loose, and he looks like sin and sex and torment. “We need to talk,” he says, a lean away from touching me, but he doesn’t. And I sense he doesn’t want me to touch him either.

“I’m listening,” I say, every nerve in my body on edge waiting for some bombshell beyond what I know already.

“There are things happening, Emily, that I can’t, I won’t, risk you becoming involved in. Tomorrow you make sure you get fired and I’ll make sure you get the severance you need.”

This is my out. I should take it and run, but instead I ask, “So that’s it? I quit and go away?”

“For now. We talked about this.”

“And yet you won’t even touch me.”

“If I touch you, I won’t send you home, and I can’t let that happen.” He takes a step backward, as if solidifying those words. When his gray eyes meet mine, they are steel, his decision made. I wait to feel rejected by the coldness of the moment, but I do not. He really means to protect me. There is no other option to him and I am ashamed of how weak I was in protecting him.

I inhale a deep breath as I step to the coatrack, grabbing my purse and bag and turning for the door. I want him to stop me, but I know he won’t. He believes this is the right decision. I’d believed that as well until I’d heard the trouble he’s in. Sitting outside his father’s door, I have a unique window into the family with who Shane is at war. Leaving now is deserting a ship, and a battle post, in the middle of that war. I won’t do that. I’m staying.

“Emily,” he says. My hand is on the door, but the next thing I know, he’s grabbed me, and his hand is on the back of my head. He’s kissing me, deeply, passionately, and then he sets me away from him and opens the door. “If you don’t make my father fire you, I’ll fire you.”

I leave without a word, the taste of his regret, and my own, on my lips, with no intention of anyone firing me. I’m more resourceful than he thinks, and I care too much about him to let his family win.

SHANE

Two hours after I gutted myself by forcing Emily out of my apartment and my life, at least for the time being, Seth and Nick join me at my apartment, Nick making a discreet entry separate from Seth. Convening at the island in the kitchen, both men look weary, Nick with a thick stubble on his jaw, and Seth with his tie loose and his jacket gone.