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“Not exactly, but I hope to soon,” I smirked. “Come on, I’ll show you out.”
I gave Jordan the cold shoulder as I led Daddy out to the lobby. We both stopped in front of the elevator to say goodbye, but I was surprised when he put both hands on my shoulders and flashed an intensely sincere smile.
“I’m proud of you, honey,” he said with a softness to his voice. “I always hoped you’d follow in my footsteps, but I never wanted to force it. And then even as I watched you take an interest in entrepreneurship, I was always half worried you’d lose interest.”
“Not with your blood in my veins,” I laughed.
He kissed my cheek and proceeded onto the elevator, leaving me to return to Jordan—who was mad as a hornet when I walked back into the conference room.
“My office,” he thundered. “Now.”
I would have defied him, but the sternness to his tone kind of turned me on. I was curious to see if he would end up caving into his desires again—once he got me alone, all mad and bothered as he was.
But when he slammed the door behind me, I had a feeling it was not that kind of private meeting.
“What the hell has gotten into you?” he barked, crossing his arms.
“Nothing,” I shrugged. “I was just talking to my dad. If you can’t keep up with our jokes, that’s on you…not me.”
“Jokes!?” he scoffed. “You were practically begging for his permission for…”
“For what!?” I snapped. “For us to work together? News flash, Ashford! We already are! He was the one who started implying things, not me. I was just trying to play it off and diffuse the situation. If I tensed up the way you did, you think he wouldn’t have picked up on the fact that something obviously happened between us?”
He started raking his hands through his hair again—the way he always seemed to do when he was particularly stressed. But this time, he paced as he did it. “My god, what did we do? This was a huge mistake.”
“Calm down,” I huffed, rolling my eyes. He really was being the biggest drama king about it all.
“Calm down!?” he roared. “Cat. Your father has helped me build my career from the ground up. I was no one before him. I talked a good game and was just waiting, hoping…praying for someone like him to give me a chance.”
“Okay, okay,” I groaned. “I got it. He’s fine. He just gave me a big speech about how proud he is of me. Believe it or not…not everything has to do with you, you know? He’s not on to that blip from the other night.”
“Blip?” his face scrunched up.
“You’re impossible,” I groaned. “One minute, you think I’m making too big of a deal out of it. The next, I’m not making it big enough of a deal! What the hell do you want from me!? If anyone’s going to mess this whole thing up…it’s not me, or us, or my father. It’s you.”
With that, I stormed out of the office. I couldn’t stand to be around him anymore. I managed to find enough paperwork and research to keep myself busy for the rest of the day, but I was still tense by the time I made it home.
It would have been a great time to come home to a loving, adoring fiance. But of course…he was pissed at me too, which didn’t help my tension one bit.
“You said you’d call or text when you were going to be this late,” he barked from the kitchen table. The typical empty takeout boxes were still scattered around him as he flipped through the paper.
“I lost track of time,” I defended, and this time it was true.
“Is this how it’s going to be?” he asked, shooting his eyes over his shoulder at me with a disapproving glare.
Oh boy, here we go. I knew the exact lecture I was about to get, because I had been at the brunt of it quite a few times before.
Drew wanted to settle down, get married, and have kids. We were the same age, but he had managed to accomplish a lot more during his life because of his chosen field and because his goals were, in my opinion, not set too high.
But my career was only just beginning. I was in no place to start playing wife and mother, sacrificing everything I wanted for the sake of it. He knew it because I had told him plainly. He insisted we get married anyway. He said he couldn’t live without me. Yet it didn’t stop him from being surprised and angry over everything I had warned him about.
“Yes, this is how it’s going to be,” I defensively reminded him once again. “At least for a while. I’m not where I want to be yet. I have different priorities. If you want someone who’s going to be at home waiting for you every evening, or someone who you never have to wait on…then maybe you better find someone else. Because it’s not going to be me any time soon.”
I saw a hard lump slide down his throat. He slammed the paper down to the table, then screeched his chair across the floor as he stood up.
“Maybe I’ll do just that. Find someone else,” his voice cracked.
Suddenly, I realized…This was not going to be just another one of our fights. This was the fight. The one to end them all.
