Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75457 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75457 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 377(@200wpm)___ 302(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
I nod. “It’s important to me too.”
“I let her down.” He tosses his head back to look up at the ceiling. “I won’t let her down with this.”
“You let her down?” I huff out a laugh. “I’m the one who let her down, Holden. I skipped town, remember?”
His gaze finds mine. “I stayed and had to step aside as CEO when I filed for divorce. Do you know how hard that conversation was, James? Telling Grandmother that my marriage was over wasn’t easy.”
“I can’t imagine that it was.” I lean both elbows on the table. “What happened with you and Finella?”
I expect him to tell me to go to hell, but he shakes his head. “It was such a goddamn mess.”
I want to press for more, but I watch as he pours himself another glass of red wine. He downs half before he lets out a heavy exhale.
He glances toward the windows again. “She cheated on me. She was fucking Bern Fancher.”
I swear my jaw drops open. “Bern Fancher?”
Bern Fancher was just one of my brother’s best friends from his time spent at The Buchanan School. Three other guys rounded out that close-knit group.
Holden nods. “They were in my bed, going at it like rabbits when I came home from work one night.”
“Jesus.”
“I walked into the bedroom, saw his pale ass, and her hand on his back with my ring on it.” He huffs out a stilted laugh. “I kicked her out of my apartment that night.”
“Good.” I tap a palm on the top of the table. “I’m sorry, Holden.”
“Me too.” He eyes me. “She came crawling back the next day whining about everything I’d lose if I divorced her. She brought up the business and how I’d be handing my share of Carden back to Denia, but my pride, James. I knew then that my pride was worth more than the money.”
Surprised by that admission, I take a deep breath.
“You’re shocked, right?” He tries to smile but fails. “You’re shocked that I didn’t suck it up and follow through with the marriage to retain control of the company.”
I don’t know how to answer that, so I shrug. “Maybe.”
“Grandmother wanted all the details.” He trails a finger over a stain on the wooden tabletop. “She wanted to know why I couldn’t make the marriage work.”
“You told her about Finella cheating, right?”
He shakes his head. “I didn’t say anything right away. I explained why it was over about a month after I filed for divorce. I needed time to process it all.”
“You’re still processing.”
He glances at me. “I’m getting there. Her cheating forced me to face a few things about myself.”
“What things?” I question.
“Whether I really loved her,” he admits. “I was fucking pissed that she took Bern to bed, but I realized that maybe I didn’t love her the way I thought I did. That was a hard pill for me to swallow.”
I fill my wine glass again while I listen.
“I asked her to marry me so I could inherit the business.” He scrubs a hand over the back of his neck. “I think I would have done it at some point, but when I look back now, Finny and I were on and off for years, and not once during that time did I go buy a ring.”
“That says something.”
“It says a hell of a lot.” He barks out a laugh. “Look at you. You bought Sinclair a ring when you were what… seventeen… eighteen?”
My brother and Denia were the only two people who knew about that.
“Seventeen,” I whisper. “I bought it when I was seventeen.”
“That’s love,” he proclaims. “You knew then. I never knew with Finella. I never felt the pull to marry her until it came with the prize of control of the company.”
That’s a confession I didn’t see coming.
He rubs his jaw. “It’s been a long day. I’m going to call it a night. We’ll head out to the beach at daybreak. It was Grandmother’s favorite time of the day.”
“Wake me up when you’re ready.” I move to stand. “I’m sorry, Holden. I’m sorry about Finny and everything else.”
He follows my lead and pushes to his feet. “It was the best thing that happened to me. Some days it doesn’t feel like that.”
I reach for his empty plate before scooping up mine. “Like the day I found you wasted in your office?”
He laughs. “Yeah, like that. Finella had sent flowers twice to say how sorry she was to hear Denia died. I returned them with a go to hell note attached.”
“Good.” I set the plates down to pick up my wine glass. “Let’s toast to whatever is waiting around the corner for you.”
He picks up his glass and taps it against mine. “To better days ahead, Jameson.”
“To better days,” I say. “To only better days ahead.”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT