Page 24 of The Temporary Bride

I set my jaw, glancing back at the computer screen. “I just wish it hadn’t been a huge surprise. I wish I’d heard about the MediaSphere plan before the will reading. You know?”

“Yeah,” Reid says, nodding. “I do. I get you.” He hesitates, then adds, “He really never said anything about it?”

“No. Completely blindsided me.” I stand up from my father’s chair and pace across the room, toward the glass decanter of whiskey he kept on one of the mahogany bookshelves. “You want a drink?”

“Aren’t you still working?” Reid asks.

“I can work after one drink. Besides, I’ve been here since seven in the morning.”

“Fair enough.” Reid shrugs. “Sure, I’ll take one.”

I pour us both glasses, walking back over to hand him his. I lean against the back of the desk and take a swallow. It’s good stuff, twenty-five-year-old Macallan, smooth enough that the burn barely registers. Julian Thorne would never settle for less.

“It doesn’t sit right to think that Dad didn’t trust me,” I say, surprising myself with the words. “Not entirely, at least. We worked together for years, and he never really opened up to me… not even about his plans that involved me directly.”

Reid purses his lips, a look of understanding in his eyes. “Well, Dad was never the familial type, was he?”

“No,” I agree, “but this…” I trail off. I don’t really need to finish that sentence. Reid knows what I’m thinking.

“It honestly doesn’t matter what Dad wanted or didn’t want,” Reid points out. “You’re in charge now. You’re the man. You only have to play by his rules long enough to make this stick, and then… it’s your company.”

“True.” I take another sip, savoring the burn on my tongue. I try to tell myself that the unpleasant, unsettled feeling in my stomach is due to the whiskey and not the idea of marrying and then divorcing a woman I barely know.

That’s the plan, right? To ride this out for three years, capitulate to my father’s whims, then Chloe and I go our separate ways? It seems like that’s what she wants, anyway, and… well, it’s all in the future. Not worth dwelling on yet.

“After the wedding, this company will be in your hands,” Reid says. “It’s up to you how you want to run things now.”

I frown at that, confused. “What do you mean by that?”

“You’ll have to decide if you want to follow in Dad’s footsteps, or do what you want to do.”

The rest of my last conversation with my father comes rushing back to me, and it hits me all of a sudden that I won’t have to have those arguments anymore. I won’t have to work around my father’s vision. I can do whatever I want with this company, and if an idea strikes me, there’s nothing stopping me from implementing it.

I don’t have to try to decipher my father’s wishes from the grave. I don’t have to imagine what his vision might have been. At the end of the day, my father’s vision included handing the reins over to me.

“This is going to be weird.” I swirl the caramel liquid in my glass. “I’m so used to… well, a roadblock. All of Dad’s secrets. I don’t know about you, but I always felt sort of… cut off from him.”

Reid nods in agreement. “He never told me anything. I always felt like I was the last to know.”

“I think we all felt that way,” I say. “He was disconnected from everyone. And I don’t think I want to be that way.”

“Yeah?”

“From now on, you can expect to be included fully in the decision-making process. I’m bringing you all into the fold.”

Reid smiles. “Looking forward to it.”

Through the glass wall at the hallway end of my father’s office, movement catches my eye. The elevator doors opposite me open, and Chloe steps out. She’s wearing a navy peacoat that hugs her body. Her heels give her another few inches of height, and her dark hair is loose, hanging around her shoulders.

There’s someone with her. Kyle Jefferson, one of the accounting guys who works on the floor above. He’s talking animatedly and laughing a little too much, even though she remains as stone-cold and straight-faced as ever.

I can’t miss the way he looks at her. And sure… from his perspective, he just happened to catch an elevator ride with a gorgeous woman. He thinks he’ll shoot his shot, see if something lands.

But I don’t like it. The sight of him sends a jolt of anger through me.

My brother’s voice reaches me as if he’s speaking from the other end of a long tunnel. “So what exactly do you think is going to⁠—”

I shift my weight forward and hold up a hand to cut Reid off. He blinks, surprised, as I stride toward the office door.