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“I sure do,” Jessi said. “Okay, I see your point, but I think you should have let me go back in there and pop him one. He was definitely being an ass today.”
“He was on the spot. His cousins wanted him to gut all of us and he must have felt torn. I should have gone easier on him,” Cari said.
“No, you shouldn’t have,” Emma said. “It doesn’t matter where he was coming from. He owed you the respect of talking to you before he went in there with his proposal. They have to worry about their bottom line, so I’m not saying he should have done anything differently as far as cutting Jess and me, but he shouldn’t have sprung it on you the way he did.”
She wasn’t surprised to hear Emma defending both her and Dec. Emma had always been fair-minded and she understood the way that business worked. They all did. “I guess I was just hurt, and the anger from Kell was scary. I don’t want my son to be related to them. They are all so hard.”
“I agree,” Jessi said. “Allan isn’t as bad as Kell, but you could see that they were definitely all united.”
Cari sighed. “I’m kind of mad at Grandfather for doing what he did—cutting Thomas Montrose out of the business. I wonder why he did it.”
“I don’t think we’ll ever know. But you’ll certainly have a good story for DJ when he’s older about why we don’t like his dad’s family.”
That made Cari sad. She knew she’d let anger get the better of her today and she wished now that she hadn’t. She should never have stayed on in her role once Dec came into the picture. She was never going to be blasé where he was concerned. “I should have stepped aside.”
“It’s too late now. We just have to move on,” Emma said. “I think the staff would go with us if we started a new company.”
Cari shook her head. She didn’t want to be part of a new feud with the Montrose cousins. One where she and her sisters were starting on the losing end. She’d sacrificed too much to the feud already and she was done with that.
“You don’t think they would?” Emma asked. “Dang, I thought they were more loyal.”
“They might, but then Playtone would come after us again. I don’t want to keep fighting the same battle,” Cari said. She looked over at her son and decided it was time to go home. She wanted to hold on to DJ and pretend that she hadn’t stripped emotionally bare in front of Dec and he hadn’t just left her standing there naked.
“I’m tired, girls. I think I’m going to head home. We can meet tomorrow to figure out our next moves.”
“Are you okay to drive?” Jessi asked. There was concern in her voice and Cari wondered if her sister realized that a broken heart hurt worse than any other pain. Then she remembered that despite that outer toughness Jessi had a really soft heart.
“Yes,” Cari said. “I’ll be fine.”
She scooped DJ up off the floor and said good-night to her nephew. Once she was in her car and driving toward her home, she realized she didn’t want to go back there tonight. She didn’t want to sleep in a bed that smelled of Dec or walk through her own house that was now filled with memories of him.
She drove to the Ritz Carlton and checked in there, and as she lay in the king-size hotel bed, she thought about the last time Dec had left her and how long it had taken her to get over him. This time felt so much worse.
She ran a bath and then climbed in with her son; he played in the water and she realized that his little world hadn’t changed. She envied him the fact that no matter what had happened today or in the past he wouldn’t remember it.
* * *
It took Dec and Allan all afternoon to get Kell to agree to give Jessi and Emma a chance to prove their worth to the company.
“I’m not going to accept mediocrity from them,” Kell warned.
“I don’t care as long as they have a chance to prove themselves,” Dec said. “It’s really all we can do at this point.” He looked at his cousins and let out a breath. “I’m going to need a few days off to win Cari back.”
“She said she loved you, dude, I don’t think it’ll be that hard,” Allan said.
“She said she felt like a fool for loving me,” Dec reminded him. “I should never have let her walk out.”
Kell got up, walked over to him and clapped his hand on his shoulder. “You will win her back. What can we do to help?”
“You no longer care that she’s a Chandler?”
“You have a son, Dec, and as you pointed out earlier, that changes everything.”
