Page 150 of One Wealthy Wedding

She kisses me goodbye later, and I fight to keep myself from begging her to stay. I head up to Jonah’s suite early, helping myself to a glass of wine as he finishes an email from the terrace. The chef is in the kitchen, preparing fish and grilled vegetables. I’m admiring the view of Monaco and trying not to think about my wife when Lorenzo calls.

“Ciao, Theo,” he says in his usual way, but there’s an undercurrent of tension in the way he says my name. I straighten and look at Jonah, who’s watching me with a cocked head.

We exchange pleasantries in Italian, but I’m only half listening. Miles appears in the doorway, a glass of wine in his hand. I lift a shoulder at my business partners. Lorenzo isn’t getting to the point.

Lorenzo sighs and says, “I have some bad news, I’m afraid.”

My gut clenches. “Cattive notizie,” I repeat for my business partners’ benefit. Bad news. They both straighten and look at me. Jonah is tapping on his phone, presumably translating our conversation, and he must be successful, because his eyes jerk to mine.

“The deal is off.”

I shut my eyes briefly. Fuck.

“Why?” I ask, my voice coming out guttural. I fucking knew it. Lorenzo has been jerking our chain.

“I don’t think the partnership is right for us,” he says smoothly. He’s trying to get out of this with the least amount of damage. I get it.

“What is that supposed to mean? Non avere peli sulla lingua.” I’m telling him not to mince words because I deserve to know exactly why the deal I’ve spent months on, that I got fucking married for, isn’t going anywhere.

He sighs. “Theo, please. Don’t make this worse than it has to be. We found better partners for the building projects.” He names a European investment firm that is smaller than ours but more tenured. Their founder is forty, serious, and blue-blooded. Of course.

Lorenzo and I hang up, and I slump against the wall. Everything I’ve worked for. Gone. My hands shake as I set the phone on the table. I’m not sure how Jonah and Miles are going to react to this.

“It’s over.” I lift my head to meet my business partners’ steady gazes. “The deal is off. They found someone else. Those blue-blood pricks at Assurance and Vie.”

Jonah bites out a blistering curse. “I fucking knew they were sniffing around.”

They sensed weakness, and they took it. Me. The weakness is me. Jonah and Miles are better off without me. “I think I should go.”

“Go?” Miles asks. “Go where? We’re having dinner.”

The chef chooses that moment to step outside and present a platter of oysters and little plates of caviar on blini. I look at the food, my stomach turning. I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve any of this.

“You don’t need me.” I look at Miles. He’ll understand. “I lost the deal. I can’t sit here and eat with you when I do nothing but fuck up.”

“Sit,” Jonah bites out. “It’s a business deal, not heart surgery.”

I sit, gulping my wine and not touching the food. “You really want to leave?” Miles asks.

“Don’t you think I should?”

“Because you lost a deal?” He sits back in his chair, scanning my face with his uncanny gray eyes. “I’ve lost hundreds.”

“Yeah, but you’ve also done so much. I haven’t.”

“Why would you say that? We don’t think that about you. No one’s keeping score.”

Fuck. Miles looks hurt.

“You guys could do this without me. All I do is drink and party, and I’m trying to clean up my act, but it’s not enough.” I’m not enough.

“You’re forgetting all of my own scandals,” Jonah says.

“And mine,” Miles adds. “Remember when I was all over the papers, and I had to fake date Lane?”

“This is different. I’m a liability. We lost a deal a few months ago because of me.”

Miles shakes his head. “You’re not a liability. We couldn’t run our business without you. You’re our partner. It’s not the same with just Jonah and me.”

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