The others shuffled down the stairs, but I stayed on the steps to tell him what my brilliant plan to fix things was. He listened, but stared at the wall over my shoulder, and wouldn’t look me in the eyes. I felt like I faced a firing squad, the verdict guilty. He offered no sympathy, no vote of confidence, only a hard set to his jaw while the muscles worked in his neck, telling me there were no good thoughts running through his head.
“I’ll meet with Jeremy. You go wait in the office. Now.”
I nodded weakly and hurried to do what he said. Leo followed behind, but stood next to the back door to wait for Jeremy. It hadn’t occurred to me what would happen if we were caught, or if Leo found out we’d used his van. It hadn’t crossed my mind about the trouble I’d put myself, my friends,
his business
in by using his company van. His security firm would be ruined.
His dad’s business would be ruined.
His parents would hate me, Leo would hate me, everyone would hate me. And I’d deserve it from behind prison bars. I gulped at the lump in my throat and went to sit in my office with the others.
Matt stood beside Gen in the office. I hadn’t even realized he was there. His arms were crossed, and his brows drawn as he stared at the three of us criminals sitting on the couch across from them.
“What were you thinking?” Gen breathed.
“I had to. She threatened to ruin dad’s business just like she ruined mine. She said she called the city already about writing him up for a bunch of tickets that would make him close.” I sighed. “She’d do it too. I believed her.”
She knelt in front of me and felt my cheek with her hand. “You’re ice cold.”
“It’s my fault,” Roxanna muttered.
I shook my head. “No, it’s my fault. The idea was mine.”
“I didn’t know we were kidnapping anyone,” Richard said, his voice dull. He looked like he was in shock. I think we all were.
Gen stood and went to stand up against Matt’s chest. He put his arms around her, hugging her.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
“It’s going to be okay. Jeremy’s coming with the contract in exchange for his mom.”
“Hostage,” Roxanna corrected.
I blinked. She was right. We’d taken a hostage. Wasn’t a crime of that nature worth at least five to ten in a maximum security prison? I swallowed hard. “Once I have the contract, everything will be fine.”
Gen stared at me. “You’re probably right. She won’t want that getting out.”
I nodded. “Right. I mean, it would ruin their reputation.”
“So where’s Leo?” Gen asked.
“Waiting for Jeremy.” What I didn’t say was how bad it would be for all of us if Jeremy didn’t deliver the contract after all.
What started with the Buchanans being evil, manipulative, horrible people had ended with our stupidity.
Deborah had merely nudged me along, but in the end, if my plan didn’t work, I would be the reason I lost my boutique, and my freedom. The reason my friends might go to jail.
“I need to use the bathroom,” I muttered and stood. No one spoke as I left.
I shut myself into the bathroom and sat against the wall, staring at the door. I didn’t get up until the stairs groaned under someone’s feet. When I stepped out of the bathroom, Leo stood in the hallway talking to Matt. They both looked over at me, then Matt disappeared back into the office. I stayed right where I was, too afraid to move. Too afraid of the disappointment and detachment in Leo’s eyes.
He handed me an envelope. “She’s not pressing charges, and your ex promised to keep his mouth shut. They want this to go away. He’s taking her home.”
He turned without another word, and my heart squeezed into a tight knot. Reaching out to grasp his arm, I said, “Leo?”
“Don’t.” He shrugged my hand off his arm, and it fell to my side. When he turned, I took a step backward, surprised by the ice in his gaze. “I get that I hurt you when I broke up with you, Lexie. I get that you don’t want to trust me again. But this shit you pulled tonight...” He shook his head, and the muscles in his neck flexed with anger. “It was stupid and reckless. Jesus, Lexie!”
“I know, it was so, so stupid. I’m so sorry. I swear, it wasn’t supposed to happen like this!” My eyes pleaded with him to believe me. “It all just blew up.”
“You should have talked to me, trusted me.” He raked his hand through his hair and let out a heavy exhaled breath.
“No, that’s not—”
“You could have sent everyone here to jail,
including me
.”
“I’m sorry, I am. I—”
“I can’t do this anymore. I can’t keep chasing you around, hoping you’ll let me in when you keep pushing me away.”
He turned his back on me, and I reached for him again. “No, please.” I could hear the desperation in my voice. “Leo—”
“No.” He stopped, but he didn’t turn around. “I’m done, Lexie. If you want to spend the rest of your life getting revenge on your ex’s family and doing stupid crap like you did tonight,
sneaking around,
fine. Just leave me out of it.”
A sob caught in my throat as he walked away, leaving me in the hallway alone in a dirty ball gown and holding an envelope. I stared down at it, too tired, too disgusted with myself, to look inside at the item I’d been stressing about for months.
I looked up to see Jeremy standing beside the back door, Deborah at his side. He shook his head at me, then opened the door for his mom to step through.
Deborah’s gaze zeroed in on me. “I’d like a moment alone with Lexie.”
“Like hell,” Gen said, and I looked over my shoulder to see her standing behind me, arms crossed.
I touched a hand to her shoulder. “No. It’s okay.” I gestured to my office, and Deborah followed me through the door.
“That man said you had some demands for me. I’d like to hear them.” Her black dress was filthy, but not as soiled as my white gown. There’d be no returning it now. I had no idea what it would cost for the damages.
“I want back in the bridal expo,” I said, crossing my arms. I had the upper hand now, and after the hell she’d put me through, I wouldn’t back down. “I want you to go to the bank and tell them I’m not a bad investment. I want you to tell all your rich friends how great I am, how wrong you were about me. I want you to leave me alone,
leave my family alone.
”
“Is that all?” she asked, her words dripping sarcasm.
“And then you and I, and Jeremy—we’re finished.
This
is finished.”
She stared at me, her gaze thoughtful. Then she said, “Fine.”
“Fine,” I repeated.
“You surprise me, Alexis,” Deborah said, with a hint of…
respect
? It couldn’t be, could it?
“Why?” I asked.
She placed her hand on the door handle and said, “Perhaps I was wrong to judge you not suitable for Jeremy.”
After all of this, after everything she’d done, this was the conclusion she’d come to? Now?
I shook my head. “No, you were right. I was never meant to be a part of your family. Goodbye, Deborah. I hope I never hear from you again.”
She turned and walked out of the room, and I stood there with the envelope clenched in my fist.
Gen appeared in the doorway. “Come on, let’s get you home.”
“I’m ready,” I said. All I wanted to do was sleep. The night’s events weighed heavily on my shoulders, and I pictured the distant look in Leo’s eyes.
“Roxanna left with Leo. Richard’s out in the car.”
“Where is Matt?” I asked as I sat down in the passenger seat of her car.
“He drove the van to Roxanna’s so Leo could take it to the office in the morning.”
“I’m really sorry to have involved you, Gen,” I said.
She reached over to my lap and squeezed my hand. “It’s okay. Everything’s fine now.”
Later, after Gen dropped Roxanna and Richard off, we sat in the parking lot across the street from my apartment building with her car running. As exhausted as I was, my legs wouldn’t move to take me inside.
Staring at my hands in my lap, I said, “I really screwed things up, didn’t I.” It wasn’t a question. I glanced over at her. “I don’t think Leo is ever going to talk to me again.”
“Do you love him?” she asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. I do.”
“Why didn’t you tell him?”
I looked down at my dirty dress. There was a tear in the skirt, and I had no idea when it’d happened. “I was waiting. You know, for the right time.”
She frowned. “You didn’t tell him because you were scared he wouldn’t say it back to you.”
My lips trembled. “I’m so stupid.”
“Come here.” She pulled me into her arms, hugging me over the console. “You aren’t stupid. You’re afraid of getting hurt, and I understand. And so will Leo when you talk to him.”
I sniffed back my tears and put my hand on the door handle. Pushing the door open, I said, “Yeah, maybe.”
She touched my arm as I turned to get out, stopping me. “You and Leo are meant to be together. If you never tell him how you feel, he’ll never know.”
Later, I stared up at my bedroom ceiling while sleep eluded me. My thoughts were with Leo, with the man I wanted more than anything, who was more out of reach right now than ever before. I’d really done a fine job of screwing things up with him, and all he’d done these last few months was be there for me. He’d done everything to show me how much I still meant to him, and even after his explanation of why he broke up with me—a selfless sacrifice—I pushed him away.
He was the only man I had ever felt safe with, and I’d been too scared to trust him, too caught up in my own messy life and misery to let him in. I would fix this. I had to. I just hoped he would forgive me. I hoped it wouldn’t be too late.
I have to make this right.
The days following the kidnapping were a blur. I half expected the police to show up at my door to haul me away in cuffs. I had no idea how Deborah explained away her absence at the masquerade ball, or why she’d come back with a dirty, tattered gown. She must have done it successfully because there was no ride to the police station in handcuffs, no media storming my door. Only silence. Empty, heavy, unbearable silence. I missed Leo.
The contract was tucked inside a safety deposit box. I wasn’t worried about Deborah going back on her word. A dirty secret like that getting out would ruin any future political career for Gerard, and maybe even Jeremy for his involvement. Deborah would never risk it. Maybe now she would behave. Maybe she’d stop being a monster and work on being a better mother and person. Maybe she’d let Jeremy and his new girlfriend live in peace—no contracts, no ultimatums, no runaway brides. I wouldn’t hold my breath for her redemption. People like her didn’t reform. Regardless, she wouldn’t haunt my life anymore. She’d follow through with her end of our deal, but only because she had to.
Deborah had already spoken with the bridal expo’s event coordinator. I was on the itinerary again, and in two weeks
Once Upon A Dream
would be part of the runway show. What a nightmare these last few months had been. Looking back, I cringed at how badly things had gotten out of hand. When I thought about it, the entire events of the last few months played out in my head more like a bad movie. One where, in the end, the girl didn’t get the guy and success was a bittersweet aftertaste. My boutique would be okay, but my heart would not. I worked long hours at the boutique, perfecting my plans for the expo, and at home I fell into exhausted, dreamless, lonely sleep.
I wondered if Leo missed me as much as I missed him. Roxanna said he’d barely spoken since the botched kidnapping. Not just to her, but to anyone—he threw himself into his work. What kind of jerk does something so outrageous, including three possible felony charges, endangers the people she loves, drives wedges between family members—drives the man she loves away to the point where he won’t even talk to her?
This one, that’s who.
Selfish, self-absorbed coward—that’s what I’d been. So wrapped up in my problems, so wrapped up in myself, I hadn’t considered anyone else. I hadn’t considered how me not being able to move past our history enough to trust the love he offered would hurt him so badly that he would leave me. And this time, it had been my fault. I’d been such a coward, so scared to open up to him and tell him my fears. This time, I had pushed him away. For so long after he’d broken up with me, I’d longed for a second chance with him, only to ruin it.
You’re a jerk, Alexis Anne.
Earlier, when I’d talked to Roxanna on the phone, she’d told me Leo had gone to visit his brother. I turned my car in the direction of the cemetery without thinking. I only wanted to be there for him, if he needed me. I couldn’t imagine if something were to happen to one of my sisters, how I would feel every year on the anniversary of her death. The idea of it choked me up with tears, and my heart ached for him.
I sat in my car at the curb outside the cemetery gates and inhaled a deep breath. I worried what he might say when he saw me, worried he might tell me to go away. I wouldn’t blame him. There was a minivan parked between my vehicle and Leo’s, a reminder of the rift between us, the one I’d forced there. All he’d done since his return was try to be with me. With every step he’d tried to take forward, I’d taken two steps back.