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Her mother’s attention drifted to the window and she sighed.
‘Your father and I met and married when we were very young. We loved each other greatly. And when you came along we loved you even more. But unlike some couples who are able to grow together, grow up together, we just...didn’t,’ she said, with a small shrug of her shoulders.
‘So you stayed together because I got sick? That’s even worse,’ Emma said, guilt piercing her already fractu
red heart.
‘No, sweetheart, we stayed together because we loved you,’ her mother said, her voice and tone adamant and powerful. ‘And that love was a strong, beautiful amazing thing that saw us all through the darkest of times. Neither me nor your father would change a day of it.’
Emma felt a huge weight lift from her chest as the fear that had been holding her back for so long left and was replaced with the truth in her mother’s words.
Looking back, it was as if the memories that she had always shied away from had been freshly painted over, dusted in fine golden light, showing her different images. Where once she had felt guilt and sadness, she now felt strength and light. Seeing the way that they had stayed together as a gift.
And in that moment she realised that Antonio had been right. She had been running away from him. Consumed by her own fears, she had run away from her feelings. She had not stayed with Antonio when he had most needed her. Worse, she had done the very thing she had always been scared that someone would do to her.
‘Oh, Mum...’ Emma couldn’t help the cry falling from her lips. ‘I left him...’ she said, tears trembling at the edges of her eyes.
Her mother laid a reassuring hand on her legs. ‘From what you told me, Emma, he had a decision to make and he had to make it by himself.’
‘Mum, I love you. So, so very much. But I have to go.’
* * *
Antonio resisted the urge to place a finger between his collar and his neck in an attempt to loosen the feeling of a noose tightening around him. He could not—would not—show any sign of weakness in front of his father or Bartlett.
They were in the boardroom at Bartlett’s sleek offices, just a few blocks over from Antonio’s own office. That he was being forced to breathe the same air as his father angered him. But he had to let that anger go. Bartlett had promised a decision today, after final pitches from himself and Michael Steele, in a move that was both highly unusual and had taken on the air of a courtroom with closing arguments.
His father had blustered through his determined statements—more of the same kind of financial arguments that had been printed in the world’s international press over the last week. About how Michael’s age and experience gave more weight to his investment and the promise that he could best his son financially.
Which he couldn’t.
But apparently the more he said it, the more Michael thought Bartlett would believe it. Michael had also made asinine suggestions as to Antonio’s scandalous reputation and the damage it would do to Bartlett’s company—in spite of his recent, perhaps even convenient engagement—and once again Antonio’s anger that his father should involve Emma in this had been swift.
But just as swift was the recrimination that he had brought Emma into it himself.
Antonio took a moment, after his father had finished, and Bartlett turned his attention to him. He checked his feelings, checked his decision and felt at peace. Possibly for the first time in years.
‘So much has been said about the strength, might and determination that got my father here,’ Antonio began. ‘About how he’s the right man to invest in your company and see it into the future. But I disagree. And not just because I don’t believe him for a second.’
He pushed the threads of anger aside, holding on to the purpose of his intention for the meeting. Holding on to the memory, the realisation of what Emma had shown him.
‘It’s not very often that business deals come down to right and wrong. You’re a man of strong morals, Mr Bartlett,’ he said, holding the older man’s gaze, needing him to see the truth of the words he was about to say. ‘And if I’m honest—truly honest—I can’t say the same of myself.’
He saw the shock on Bartlett’s face, heard the small gasp that spoke of his confusion at a man appearing to sabotage his own pitch.
‘I came after this deal not because I want to invest in your company, Mr Bartlett, but because I want my father not to.’
He didn’t have to look at his father to know that he was practically vibrating with glee—he could feel it in the air, the drop in temperature from Bartlett’s end of the room matching the raised heat from his father’s.
‘And in order to do that I betrayed and treated badly a woman of such high integrity that she would put us all to shame. She certainly put me to shame,’ he admitted, feeling the words ring true in his heart. ‘She showed me that I was reaching only for revenge when what I should have been reaching for was to be better than him—better than my father. A better man for myself and the woman I love. I did and still do want to invest in your company, Mr Bartlett. But not at the price of my morals or my heart. And I should warn you that if you choose my father, you’ll be selling your soul to the devil. Make your decision, Benjamin. And once you have—whatever it is—there is a matter I’d like to discuss with you. One that I’d like to help with, if you’ll let me.’
With that, Antonio got up from his chair and turned—expecting to leave, expecting to walk out into the sunshine of a New York summer, expecting to track down Emma wherever she might be and beg her forgiveness.
But it seemed she had other ideas.
Emma was standing in the doorway of the boardroom, and his first thought was how truly amazing she looked.
Her eyes shone, and her hair was loose around her shoulders—it was the first time he’d seen it so during the day, outside of the nights of passion they had shared. She was dressed in a brightly coloured dress that hugged her chest and waist, flared about her legs, and a simply outrageous and uncharacteristically Emma pair of high heels encased her feet.
