Can't Buy Me Love (16 page)

Her body trembled in his grip and his anger grew. How dare she pretend. How dare she try to make him believe that she’d merely wanted his approval, to be a part of his company when everything was so clear to him now.

“I guess you’ll fit in nicely at Metro Media.”

Cole moved his eyes over her in the most unseemly of ways. His gaze lingered first on her breasts and then her hips. If she was willing to sell herself to the highest bidder, he may as well examine what he’d lost. He leaned forward, his lips as close to her ears as he dared.

“I hear Ryan Murphy is more willing than I to sample the in-house goods.” He let go of her arm. He couldn’t stand to touch her. Didn’t want her near.

A gasp wrenched out of Meg and she covered her mouth with her hand. The tears spilled out now and cascaded over her cheeks.

He didn’t care. She was treacherous and deceitful and she deserved to cry. She deserved her tears. She deserved her pain. She cried only because she’d been caught, of that he felt sure. He’d foiled their plan. Nothing more, nothing less. It was business, plain and simple. Business gone bad.

*

Panic grabbed at her throat. Tears blinded her vision. Meg rushed into the hall. She had to leave. To get out of this house. Away from him.

How could he think… How could he believe… How could—

“Meg?”

Meg stopped and pulled her fingertips under her eyes, erasing the tears that streaked her makeup.

She took a deep breath and forced herself to hold it together.

“Allison.” Meg attempted a smile. “Stan.” From the looks on their faces she realized her smile must appear crooked and false.

“Darling,” Allison said, and reached out her hand. “Are you okay? Is Cole okay?”

“I just…I had some news. I’m sorry,” Meg said, and stepped backward, away from the Mortons.

 The pain was too dense. Her heart pounded in her chest and sobs choked her throat, threatening to break free. She couldn’t do this. Not now. She couldn’t maintain her composure and force herself to be calm, and strong, and quell her tears. It was nearly impossible to speak or breathe.

“I’m sorry, I have to go.”

Meg fled like Cinderella, the clock finally striking twelve. She wasn’t Cole’s princess, not now, not ever. She was merely a girl pretending to be confident and composed. Her heels echoed against the marble as she rushed to the giant front door. This time she had no flip-flops, no keys, only her high heels and a certainty that no matter what Cole said or believed, she would find her way home.

Prim stood just outside the front door with Fallon McKenzie by her side.

“You’ve made an egregious mistake,” Prim said to Fallon. Prim handed the valet her ticket. “Please, get me my car.”

Fallon wore an earpiece just like the security guard who decades before escorted Meg and her mother from a company holiday party. And just like then, Meg attempted to shield herself from the hundreds of prying eyes as corporate big-wigs and their spouses handed over the keys to their Bentley’s and Porsche’s to the dozen valets before walking down the stone path to the ball.

The whispers and furtive glances of her colleagues stung and set loose Meg’s worst nightmare. She felt as if the letters
s-l-u-t
were emblazoned on her dress in bright red. She was a mess: tear-soaked face, wrecked hair, streaked makeup. The whispering campaign would begin this very night. She’d given Cole every bit of ammunition to destroy her.

 Meg opened her crystal-beaded clutch and pulled out her BlackBerry. She wouldn’t need it once Cole was finished destroying her reputation. No one would ever return her calls—she’d be persona non grata. Meg walked to the trash bin near one of the valets and tossed her BlackBerry into the barrel. Finished. Done. She’d start fresh. She didn’t know where and she didn’t know how. But damnit she would.

“Come on,” Prim said.

The valet held open Prim’s car door and Meg fumbled for the passenger side. She took one final glimpse at Cole’s Bel Air mansion. She had dreamed it might one day be her permanent home, but then again, she’d been fool enough to think that Cole Jackson actually loved her.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Stupidity wasn’t an asset and yet it seemed to be a product of which Cole had a surplus.

“This is it? The emails in this binder is all the evidence there is?” Cole tossed the infernal black binder onto his desk and stared at his director of security.

“Plus her friendship with Miss Morgan.”

Where was the smoking gun? Where were the treacherous plans? Where were the sordid details of meetings with Metro Media executives and payments for information?

Cole’s jaw muscle flinched. Where was the evidence he needed so that he could write off Meg just as he’d written off his uncle and countless others who had swindled and lied and used him out of greed and selfish desires. He needed proof to stifle the pain that sliced through him each moment of each day without her.

“You have nothing else?”

Fallon McKenzie looked away.

This wouldn’t do. Cole needed more to convict the woman he loved, a woman who had served him faithfully for more than three years. He needed eyewitness accounts of covert meetings with Ryan Murphy. A phone call between her and Metro Media executives. Suspicious charges on her company card. Large deposits or withdrawals from her personal accounts. But after days of intense scrutiny by his crack security team there was nothing. Nothing more than a few emails between Meg and her best girlfriend, Prim.

“It would seem there wasn’t a leak. At least not an intentional one.”

Cole’s eyes burned into Fallon. “Explain.”

“Metro Media uses the same techniques we do. They’ve been monitoring Prim’s calls and emails for the last three years.”

Rage coursed through Cole. Rage laced with frustration. Pain hammered his head with the depth of his loss. Meg had looked at him that night, her eyes filled with confusion and hurt, and his heart had suspected the mistake—but his fears propelled him. He reeled off false accusations as if they were truth.

She didn’t fight back and her restraint only fueled his fire. Disloyalty. Suspicion. Betrayal. All words that Cole now realized should be directed toward him. He could see clearly now that his senseless anger had cooled and he’d examined the so-called smoking guns in the black binder.

There was nothing.

These emails proved nothing other than Meg’s loyalty to Comnet and to him. Of course she got offers. Ryan Murphy was no idiot. What smart competitor wouldn’t make an offer to the employee Cole relied on the most? But she’d turned each offer down swiftly yet diplomatically.

And now it was too late.

“That’ll be all,” Cole said, and dismissed Fallon from his office.

He wanted to rage, but he was the one who glanced briefly through the binder and, instead of examining the papers with a cool head, immediately concluded the worst and condemned Meg.

Cole dropped into his chair and scrubbed his hands down his face. His life was empty. He’d lost everything.

Without her laugh his house felt like a giant mausoleum. His business? He was neglecting it. He heard rumors about TBC that he didn’t have the drive to fight. Stan and Allison were at first shocked and then evasive when he told them of Meg’s departure.

Meg was his best shot at closing the TBC deal and she was his only shot at finding love. He’d managed to destroy the biggest and most important deal that he’d ever close, and he didn’t mean TBC.

“Excuse me, Mr. Jackson?”

Cole lifted his head from his hands with no attempt to hide his defeated expression. His assistant, Jordan, stood in the door, a tentative look on his face.

“I have Stan Morton—”

“No calls,” Cole said, his voice limp. “Maybe this afternoon.”

He didn’t want to speak to Stan. Hear the words that he suspected Stan would say.

“Sir.” His new assistant’s voice rose an octave. “I don’t think—well, Mr. Morton isn’t on the phone, he’s—”

“Here,” Stan said, and filled the doorway to Cole’s office. “I’m here and I’m unannounced.”

Sadness drifted through Cole and settled behind his heart. He could barely look at Stan without memories of Papagayo and dinner and Meg flooding his mind. Cole’s assistant backed out of the office and closed the door.

“I know it’s impudent of me to show up like this, but I was almost certain you were dodging my calls.”

“There’s been something else on my mind.”

“I imagine so.” Stan sat in one of the office chairs across from Cole’s desk. “That was quite a shocker at the Comnet Charity Ball.”

Cole winced with the mention of the ball.

“A good businessman knows when he’s made an error in judgment,” Stan said.

Cole was unsure whether Stan meant Stan’s own error as far as selling TBC or Cole’s much more grievous mistake with regards to Meg.

“Everyone makes mistakes,” Stan said. “But it’s how we rectify them that is the measure of a man.”

Stan didn’t smile or condemn Cole, but watched him as if he understood fully the drama playing out in Cole’s life.

“You understand that Allison and I won’t be selling TBC to Comnet.”

Cole nodded. Stan didn’t want TBC to be with Comnet, he wanted TBC to be with Meg.

“A better offer? Perhaps Metro Media?”

Stan shook his head, and a slight smile curved the corners of his mouth. “We’re not taking any offers for TBC. We’re looking at bringing someone into the company.”

 Ah, of course. Who could it be? Perhaps a CEO from Asia? Or from one of the movie studios? Studio heads were always losing their jobs and needing another one quickly.

“I wanted to do this the right way,” Stan said, “face to face. Let you know that we’re not selling to anyone else. Allison and I decided we’re not ready to let TBC go just yet. Also, I know the TBC licensing agreement with Comnet is up for renewal and I’d like the new president to negotiate on behalf of TBC.”

“Sounds fair,” Cole said.

Cole stood and followed Stan to the door. Cole really didn’t care what happened to TBC. Part of him didn’t even care at this moment about Comnet.

Stan stopped before opening the door. His eyes were softer, those of a man who’d weathered more than sixty years of life’s ups and downs.

“You know women don’t fall out of love fast. In love? Faster than a horse headed home to the barn. But out of love? Not fast at all.”

“Have you…”

“Seen Meg?” Stan finished Cole’s unasked question.

Pain sliced him. He had Comnet security watch her house. At first, in his rage, he’d convinced himself that he wanted proof of Meg’s disloyalty. But as the days wore on with nothing but platinum reports from Comnet security Cole realized he wanted to know how Meg was, but somehow didn’t deserve to ask.

Soon he’d have to pull back the security detail that he had posted in front of her beachfront apartment or be labeled a stalker. This was the only kind of information he’d ever have about Meg. Conversations with friends of friends. Perhaps he’d bump into her at a charity function or holiday event. He’d get to read the occasional article written about her rise through the media world, and she would rise.

He’d already heard rumblings of offers. A multitude of companies were interested in wooing his former assistant turned executive. And not because she’d slept with her boss. Only a handful of people even knew about the affair. One of which still stood in the room.

“Professionally, I’d say she’s ready to run a company. As for her personal state? I’m going to find that out soon enough.”

“Wait.” Cole squinted his eyes. “Didn’t you say you were planning on bringing someone in? To run TBC?”

Stan nodded. “Sometimes the ideal person just presents themselves. A man would be a fool not to seize that opportunity in business” —a smile trickled across his face—“and in life.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

“Put down the Oreos.”

Prim stood just inside the front door of Meg’s apartment. A spare set of Meg’s keys dangled from Prim’s fingertips. Showered and dressed, she appeared to be a member of society as opposed to the lifeless lump Meg had become on her couch.

“And you might consider a shower.”

Prim walked across the room, cutting a path in front of the television, Meg’s only companion for the past week. Had it been only seven days? She’d nearly lost track.

Prim opened the muslin drapes, letting in bright blue sky and sunlight. Meg covered her eyes with her hand.

“Too bright,” she mumbled, and turned back to her daytime TV. She wasn’t ready to give up her wallowing. Not now. Not yet.

Her original pain, like a stab wound to her heart, had turned into a dull thud as if she’d dropped a brick on her toe, but the humiliation still ate a huge hole inside her whenever she thought of that night and
him
.

“You don’t answer your phone.” Prim reached for the empty bag of cheese puffs and the half-full bag of Oreos. “You tossed out your BlackBerry.”

Meg had trashed her BlackBerry before leaving his manse, but the memory of him—the desire for him—hadn’t been nearly as easy to leave behind.

“How is anyone supposed to reach you?”

“That’s the point.” Meg finally looked at Prim, not really wanting to meet her friend’s eyes. Not wanting to be judged. “They’re not supposed to reach me.”

“I see.” Prim wrinkled her nose and surveyed the mountain of trash in the kitchen. “Maybe it’s this that smells” —she lifted a full trash bag—“and not you.” She tied off the plastic ends and headed for the door with the foul-smelling remains of pizza, ice cream, and Thai takeout.

“Maybe it’s both,” Meg said.

Prim meant well and was doing exactly what any good friend should, but Meg wasn’t ready to face the world. She wasn’t strong enough to let the judging eyes of every person she worked with pass over her.

Prim reentered, dusting off her hands. “Next up, a shower.”

“You look pretty clean to me.” Meg stuffed an Oreo she’d hidden under a cushion into her mouth.

“Funny,” Prim said sotto voce. “Not me. You.”

“I’d like to see you try.”

Meg wasn’t moving and Prim couldn’t lift her no matter how many times a week she went to Pilates. She’d get back on her feet and stop feeling sorry for herself when she was good and ready—perhaps in another month or two.