Page 33 of The Bride's Billionaire

As soon as he picked up, she said, “Tyler. We messed up. I should have never followed along with your crazy spontaneous plans.”

He bristled. “Whoa,mycrazy spontaneous plans? I seem to remember one thing I really loved about you was yourownspontaneity.” She couldn’t blame all this on him, even though he himself already had. It was different coming from her.

“Whose idea was it? Look, I’m not really trying to place blame. I called…well, I don’t know why I called. I guess just wanted to feel better.”

“No one feels better when blame becomes part of the conversation. Look. We might have lost the biggest chance for either of our companies. I wasn’t super excited to think we’d be sharing the bid but that was better than not having it at all.”

“You wouldn’t have wanted to share? Who are you, Tyler?”

“Who am I? I’m a businessman. Sharing is half the profit, same amount of work. Surely you can understand that.”

The pause was long enough that he began to second guess his tone. Then she finally said, “Well, goodnight. Let me know if you hear anything.”

“Goodnight.”

He couldn’t talk to her right now. He had other things to do; mainly, orchestrate a plan that would keep Sperring bottlers in the picture even if Finley was out.

* * *

Kayla couldn’t sleep.She flipped around so much that she couldn’t straighten her sheet again without turning on the lights. This was not going to work.

She opened her laptop and began to research. She and Tyler had blown it. With a tiny opportunity to share the bids, they’d gone and blown it by being crazily immature the night before. Who’d have ever thought her dating habits would matter to a potential customer?

She flipped through all her previous research. The part she’d skipped in her presentation was how she excelled compared to all her competitors. She had specific statistics about Sperring bottlers that might be useful to share at this time. Perhaps she’d pre-empt a phone call and show up early at the office to apologize and further explain.

With those thoughts and new notes as arsenal, she tried to drift off to sleep. Once sleep at last found her, she was woken up by her alarm after what felt like five minutes.

“Okay, here we go.”

She took a taxi and rushed to the office, where she hurried up the elevator, barely smiling at the receptionist as she walked quickly toward Mr. de Santos’ office. She figured she’d have the most influence with him and that he’d been the most disillusioned by hers and Tyler’s story.

Everything was quiet, too early perhaps for anyone to be outside their offices. But Rogerio’s office was cracked open, and she recognized Tyler’s voice from within. Of course he had beat her here.

“And so after you look at all the options, you can easily see which bottler excels above the rest. I wish it could be differently, believe me. But what one bottler lacks in taste, the other has in spades.”

Anger simmered. Even though she’d been planning to come in with comparatives also, hearing from his own mouth how subpar he thought her company drove rational thought from her mind.Lacks in taste?

She stepped up to the door and tapped.

“Come in.” Mr. de Santos must be in there with them.

They stood when they saw her. Tyler’s eyes opened wide as if caught red-handed, and she supposed he was. She narrowed her eyes. “What are you doing here, Mr. Sperring?”

“Just finishing up some additional reports.”

“I see. I think there is more information to share when considering which bottlers are par or subpar.”

“I think you’ll find I’ve been more than fair.”

She hardly noticed the other two men in the room. “I heard what you just said. You’re here, it’s not personal, I’m supposed to be okay with the fact that you’re trying to push me out. Even though you know how much I need this, even though my brother—” Her voice broke. “Look, I get it.” She turned to walk away.

He called after her. “Kayla. You don’t even know what you’re talking about. You’re just going to walk away angry?”

“Yes, Tyler. I’m done.”

Mr. de Santos called down the hallway to Tyler. “Come, Mr. Sperring. We have more to discuss. I find what you’ve disclosed most interesting.” He paused. “And Miss Finley?”

She turned.

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