Chapter 3
In front of his building, a couple kissed beside an Aston Martin. Cole admired how the woman’s body curled against the man, compelling him to crave the goddess he held this morning. The first and only woman to spark his interest to consider breaching the barriers he erected after the death of his wife. For months he eyed Dina Wright, debating if he was ready to take a chance on another woman. In the past, the indifference she wore had stopped him from approaching her. Seeing her scared on the street today, his protective instincts kicked in and he’d rushed over without thinking.
Prepared to confront whatever or whoever scared her, he wasn't equipped to fight the ambush of feelings coursing through him when he’d kissed her. Then he did the unthinkable by walking away.
The distress on her face stayed in his mind for almost a block before the heaviness in his chest weighed him down. He hurried back, but the spot was empty, except for the beads that had flown out of her grasp.
He stuck his hand in his pocket and rubbed the stones, reliving his and Dina’s kiss. Sexy and sensuous, her kiss was so hot it made a man grateful to be in her presence.
He snatched a couple peanuts, his food of choice when agitated, from the jar his assistant kept filled for him on his desk, and popped them into his mouth. Work needed to get done, but with Dina filling his brainwaves, the likelihood of him getting any task completed was slim. He groaned and said through the open door to his office, “Leslie, has my appointment arrived?”
His phone rang. “No sir, I was about to buzz you. They rescheduled. Your sister-in-law is on line one.”
“Thank you.” He rested back in his chair, wishing he had a huge bag of peanuts now, and hit the button. “Hi, Teile.”
Sobs came over the line. “C-o-le.”
The “this-isn’t-going-to-be-good meter” zipped into the danger zone. “Are your parents okay?” A stab of guilt for not visiting his in-laws much over the last year wormed under his skin.
“It’s Shelly.”
No one had spoken his wife’s name since her death. The accident had shocked everyone so much, her name hadn’t been mentioned. It was as if speaking of the dead would bring harm. Teile saying her name after all this time concerned him. “What about Shell?”
“Mom found…oh God.” Teile sucked in a deep breath and the sobs momentarily subsided. “I’m sorry, Cole.”
Why apologize? “Teile, I don’t mean to sound inconsiderate, but you are talking in circles. Please, say it.”
“Shelly killed herself.”
The calm, cold words stiffened his resolve. He kept it together after the accidental death of his wife, now to hear she committed suicide left him feeling weak and unsure. “No, she didn’t. Her car hit a barrier on the side of the road. A one-car accident on New York highways isn’t unusual. You saw the police report.” Even as he spoke, he could easily see how the evidence could lean toward suicide.
“She meant to.”
“After two years, the police found evidence to support this?” Cole asked in an attempt to keep an even tone at the ludicrous thought and his churning stomach.
“No, they didn’t. Mom did.”
The receiver felt like he struck a hammer to his ear. He leaned forward, braced an elbow on his desk, and pressed his fingers over his forehead to suppress the pain slicing through his head. “Give me the facts.”
“Mom found a letter, dated the day before Shelly died,” she said, clearing her throat. “After her death, we grew tired of opening sympathy cards and stuck the letters aside. This morning, Mom decided to go through them. A letter from Shelly was in the mix.”
“And,” he growled, his patience growing thin with Teile taking her time.
“I’ll read the letter to you.” The sound of paper crinkled, and Teile coughed before she came back on the line. “Let me read this all the way through. Don’t stop me.”
The churning in his gut turned into a burn. “Start already.”
“Mom, Dad, know that I love you and Teile very much,” Teile said, her voice sad and withdrawn as she read. “I’m sorry I’m not a stronger person. My confidence plummeted with the loss of the baby.”
His jaw clenched and his blood pressure rose, making the hammer beating on his skull worse, yet he kept quiet.
“Cole doesn’t want me. I can see it in his eyes. I can’t bear to go through a divorce. I know I’m a failure, as a wife and mother. By the time you receive this, I will have gone to a better place. Please, don’t be mad. I had no choice. Love always, Shelly.”
Air whooshed out of his lungs. How had she ever thought he didn’t want her? What the hell had he done to give her that impression? He figured she’d go through a mourning period after the death of their unborn child before wanting to try again, not take her own life. “I took her to the doctor for the depression.” His words were clipped, so tight his usual business voice used during the tensest of meetings vanished. “They prescribed medicine.”
“I know,” Teile said, barely above a whisper. “I don’t think she took them. She thought you were controlling her.”
“Control her?” Cole’s voice grew louder. “So, she killed herself to pay me back?”
“Don’t yell.”
He rubbed the area between his eyes to relieve the throbbing. Whatever Shelly had done, it wasn’t Teile’s fault. “Sorry. I’m stunned.”
“I better go. Mom and Dad are pretty upset. I snuck into their bedroom to call you.”
Not surprising. “Thanks for calling me.” Cole hung up the phone harder than he meant, but damn it, his nerves were on edge.
Anger coursed through him. He spun his chair and gazed out the window, seeking the skyline to clear his thoughts. White clouds streaming from airplane exhaust broke the vivid blue hue. By the weekend, approaching storms would hit Manhattan. Cole clenched his jaw, grinding his back teeth together, thinking how his life paralleled the approaching storm. Just when you thought everything was peaceful, boom, a storm hit.
He and Shelly had their differences, but he didn’t stop loving her. She was his wife for God sakes. That meant something to him. He’d honored his vows no matter how frustrated she made him with her constant accusations of infidelity. Even when she dropped by his office unannounced, she still made absurd claims. Couple that with her thinking he didn’t want her because she miscarried…he dragged his fingers through his hair. “Women!”
If he ever let another one in his life, it’d be too soon. To care and trust someone, to think the world of them, and they not believe a word he said…ridiculous. “I’ve made a living on integrity and honesty,” he muttered, his anger picking up momentum. His own wife, the one person who should have been on his side, knew him best, didn’t have faith in him. In the end, she killed herself because of him. How in the hell was he supposed to process that bit of news?
“Fuck it!” He whirled out of his chair and headed for the bar on the first floor. “I’m done for the day,” he said to Leslie as he passed by her desk. “Take the rest of the day off.”
Her eyes brightened. “I’ll forward the phones to my cell after I clear your schedule.”
“Perfect.” He had no pressing issues to deal with today. Tomorrow was a different story. Two advertising agencies would pitch a campaign for his new invention. “See you in the morning.”
“Good day, sir.”
He raced down the stairs, swung open the door, and paused. On the right, the bar offered a way to escape which he tried to avoid, especially so close to work. Right now with the way he felt, he wouldn’t stop at one drink. On the left was the gym. He could take his frustration out on a punching bag.
Stepping into the gym, he spotted the only other person in the room. Charlie ran on the treadmill and eyed the TV screen hanging on the back wall. From the looks of his friend’s soaked hair and clothes, he’d been running for a while.
“How goes it, Cole?”
“Good, thanks.” Cole headed toward the locker room until Charlie whistled. Cole edged backwards to look at the television.
A newsman talked about the upcoming game. Charlie, known for ogling beautiful women, wasn’t about to notice a guy.
“Not the TV.” Charlie snickered between labored breaths. “Look.” He nodded toward the small window in the door, leading to the hall.
Cole craned his neck. A blonde-haired woman with peaches and cream-colored skin stood on the other side, the woman who filled his every waking and sleeping moment.
Had Dina come by to see him?
“I hope she rents office space. I’d love to see her in here,” Charlie said in his hound dog southern twang.
Cole snarled and shoved through the door.
“The owner chose to remain anonymous,” Cole’s property manager said.
“No, that’s not it. I—” Dina’s words faltered and her eyes went huge with a stunned sort of delight as they landed on Cole. “I keep running into you.”
Feeling the weight of the beads in his pocket, he replayed their connection this morning, wishing for more. “My good fortune.”
Her smile lit up her skin like the moon reflecting off water.
To have her pressed against him now…her hair spread across his pillow, breathing in her mango scent, him—
“Where is he?” A woman all but shouted in a tone that screeched like fingernails on a chalkboard from the lobby desk, interrupting the image he conjured up of him and Dina.
“I want to speak to him now!”
His former mother-in-law’s voice hadn’t changed. The timbre was still as stale and annoying as the first time he met her. “Excuse me.”
He strolled around the corner from the woman he wanted to the person who would surely give him grief.
“Beatrice,” he said, interrupting her from torturing his receptionist anymore.
Beatrice Biltmore twirled around, her red hair swinging out behind her, and her brown eyes lit on him. “Don’t Beatrice me. We need to talk.”
“We do.” He wished he’d chosen the bar and scotch. “Would you like to sit in the lounge?”
“No. Outside. I don’t want people to hear me yelling.”
The hammer returned, striking him between the eyes. “It’s too late.”
She glared at him. “Daniel will join us. He’s parking the car.”
The obedient puppy hasn’t changed. “Shall we?” He opened the door to the cool, autumn sun and motioned to the patio off to the side. This time of day, no one lingered. They’d have privacy. After pulling out an iron chair for Beatrice, he sat next to her. “I can only imagine this visit has to do with Shelly.”
“You don’t have the right to speak her name.”
“That’s harsh, darling.” Shelly’s father sat beside Cole. “How are you doing, son?”
His former in-laws paying him a visit struck him as unusual, which considering the recent circumstances he wasn’t too surprised, but now Daniel Biltmore calling him son when he hadn’t during the time he was married to their daughter made him downright suspicious. “I’m okay.”
“Well, we’re not,” Beatrice snapped, her mouth quivering, and tears pooled in her eyes.
“Understandable.”
“Stop with your smugness.” She swiped at her cheeks. “We were family. For you to act high and mighty with us isn’t acceptable.”
“You’ll have to forgive me. I’m not sure which tact I should take while I figure out if I’m under attack or not.”
“You’re not under attack,” Daniel said. One thing Cole could count on was Daniel’s deadpan expression no matter what happened. When Shelly told him she was getting married, he’d nodded, forced a smile, but nothing more. When she passed away, he’d nodded at the guests and stared.
“Yet you blame me for what your daughter did.”
“I-I…how do you know?” Beatrice asked, her hand covering her mouth.
“Teile,” Daniel said, leaning back in his chair. “She called, didn’t she? Told you about the note, did she?”
“A minute ago. How’d you escape?” Teile’s scrutiny was hard for anyone to dodge. He should know. He’d been dodging her since Shelly died to no avail.
“We left when she went to take a shower. You’re not at fault, son.”
Hearing Shelly’s dad let him off the hook for any part of her suicide didn’t rid the guilt and pain stinging his chest.
“But you didn’t live up to your side of the marriage,” Beatrice interrupted. “I want it back.”
Had he missed something? With the way this family talked in riddles, it’d take forever to get an answer, at least one he understood. He decided to play along to see if it would expedite the process. “Okay, I’ll give it back.”
“Good.” She patted Daniel’s hand. “He’s not as bull-headed as you claimed.”
They settled back with smiles on their faces as if they had conquered the world.
Between the two of them, he didn’t know if he was coming or going. It was about time, he gave them a dose of their own medicine. “As soon as you tell me what it is,” he said, watching their expressions.
Beatrice’s features slid into shock. “The certificate we gave Shelly and you when you decided to get married.”
Unbelievable, the situation grew more confounded. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“The conditions for us to give you the money were simple. As long as you were a good husband, you didn’t have to pay back the money. You were not. The bond reverts back to us,” Beatrice said while Daniel searched for who knows what in the sky.
“Is that even legal?” Cole scoffed.
Beatrice kicked Daniel under the table. “We had you at your word,” he said.
Cole’s head spun. He rose, paced the small confines of the screened-in patio, and tried to repress his temper. “How can you accuse me of not being a good husband?”
“Because Shelly’s not here.” Tears streamed down Beatrice’s cheeks.
“This is asinine. By default, I’m the fall guy?”
“You were supposed to take care of her.” This came from Daniel, the obedient puppy.
“Damn it, I did,” Cole said, kicking himself for letting them get to him enough that he raised his voice.
“No need to shout. We want to talk, not fight.”
“Then, Daniel,” Cole pressed his lips into a tight line and regrouped before they knew how loud he could yell, “I suggest you try a different angle.”
Daniel regarded him. “Our daughter was sick. During her life she had bouts of depression.”
Cole thought she dealt with emotional turmoil only after her miscarriage. “I wasn’t told.”
“No. Shelly didn’t want you to know. She thought she’d lose you,” Beatrice said, tracing a circle with a finger on the glass-top table.
The muscles stretching across his shoulders gnarled, joining his throbbing head. “If you knew this then why are you on a fishing expedition?”
Beatrice stood, approached him, and touched his arm. “Our emotions are all over the place. We lost our daughter and you at the same time,” she said in a compassionate tone, her eyes and mouth turned down.
Darn that woman could manipulate. In the past, they didn’t want much to do with him. “You could have had a relationship with me but refused. Again, I ask, what do you want?”
Her hand dropped. The sympathetic expression replaced by her normal hard-edged look. “The certificate. You gave us your word.”
Ah, yes, money. “You heard me give it?”
“Well…no…Shelly said you did,” she stuttered.
“Why are you coming to me with this now?”
“We never thought you weren’t a good husband until we read the note,” Daniel said.
For once, he wished Daniel would think for himself. Cole spun around and stared at the busy street. Damn, this all was too much. Their daughter, his wife, was sicker than he thought. “Mr. and Mrs. Biltmore,” he said, facing them. “I never saw a certificate. I never heard mention of one until this moment. And why would I agree? I don’t want your money. Never have.”
Daniel and Beatrice exchanged glances.
“We thought your acceptance of our terms was strange when you already had a thriving business.” Daniel looked up at his thirty-floor building and sighed. “Our Shelly had some issues.”
“Ones I wasn’t aware of,” Cole said, realizing how much he’d overlooked in his own home. “She was a good actress.”
“She was.” Beatrice gazed at Cole with soft eyes. “There’s something else you should know.”
He didn’t like the sound of it. Two years and nothing from these people and now they wanted to dump on him? What the hell? “Let’s hear it.”
“Shelly didn’t lose the baby.”
Another bomb detonated, bile rose to his throat, and he stilled his hands in his hair. “What do you mean?”
Beatrice pinched her lips together.
“Tell him,” Daniel urged.
“She had an abortion.”
The veins in Cole’s neck bulged. Rage filled his vision. “At four months?”
“Technically, she was fifteen weeks,” Beatrice said, rubbing her hands together.
“You’re comparing apples to oranges.” The levity of his wife killing their baby hit him in the gut. He slumped in a chair a table over, braced his elbows on his knees, and held his head, his hands trembling as his fingers dug into his scalp.
She killed my child.
For a long stretch of time, he sat there not moving, just breathing in and out. His wife killed his baby and said she had a miscarriage. Who in the hell did such a thing?
Someone cleared their throat and he looked at them with tears stinging his eyes. He had to get out of there, away from them before he did something he regretted, like hit someone. He stood and moved toward the door, without a word.
“Cole, the certificate,” Daniel said.
In the business world, Cole had met cold, ruthless people, but never to this extent of people being so ignorant they didn’t know when to shut up. “Un-fucking-believable,” he said, not turning around and not slowing his pace when they kept calling his name.
The city streets weren’t busy enough to take his mind off the ache coursing through his soul. Furious, hurt, and stunned that his wife, the woman he planned to spend his life with and be the mother of his children, could have been so heartless.
Too afraid he’d hit the next person who walked by, he shoved his hands in his pockets and scanned the street. A café with a sign in the window, advertising happy hour all day, twinkled in the distance.
The audacity of his in-laws to drop a bomb and ask for money in the same breath confirmed their irrational behavior. Damn, he should have told the receptionist he was unavailable and stayed in the gym to work out his frustrations.
“Taxi!” A female voice yelled through the early afternoon air and seeped between the cracks of his hardened fury. Dina. He covered up the unexpected emotion her presence gave him and made a half-hearted comment. “It’s fate.”
Dina peered over her shoulder and arched an eyebrow before dropping her arm. “Is it?”
The flicker of unease across her petite features fascinated him. “We keep bumping into each other.”
“So, we do.” A taxi stopped beside her. “Until next time,” she said and disappeared inside the taxi.
Cole stared at the yellow car diminishing in size as it drove away. “Did I say fate?”
“Yeah, you did.” Charlie snuck up behind him and smacked him on the back. “Let’s grab a beer.”
The shit he just went through, he could use one or two. “Perfect.”