Page 182 of Modern Romance March 2025 (5-8)

Don’t tell her.

He knew she would use it against him in the meeting, but he seemed to be on a full bender of self-destruction because he snapped, “No, it’s not okay, Carmel. Yesterday she had a taste of what she married and rightfully spat it out.”

“Sheleftyou?” she asked in a shocked hush. “But what about this meeting?” She motioned toward the boardroom where everyone was taking seats. “You married her for this.”

“I know that.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling as though he was being drawn and quartered. Pulled in too many directions.

Because he hadn’t married her for this. This takeover had been the justification he’d used to make sense of his desire for her. After one brief meeting, she had stayed in his memory forfive years. She hadn’t been gone twenty-four hours and he felt as though he’d had a limb amputated.

He never should have let her go.

His phone vibrated and he reached to silence it, but saw Stella’s face on the screen.

“Stella.” Words piled up in his mouth. He didn’t know where to start.

“It’s Beate. We’re in the hospital,” her sister said with an unsteady hiccup. “Pappa pushed Stella down the stairs.”

“What?!” His shout was so loud, everyone inside the boardroom stopped to look. He snapped his fingers at Derik and started toward the elevator.

“Don’t say that!” He could hear Stella saying in the background. “Give that to me. Atlas, I’m fine.” Her voice came on the line, adamant but shaken. “It was more of a stumble.”

“Are you hurt?” he demanded, heart stumbling.

“I put out my arm to stop my fall and it needs an X-ray. I told Beate you’re going into a meeting and that I’d call you later. You should have let it go to voicemail.”

“I don’t care about a stupid meeting, Stella. I’m leaving now. Get the jet readied for Bern,” he ordered Derik, who was hurrying alongside him with the rest of his entourage. “Where’s your father? Did he hurt anyone else?”

“The police took him for questioning. One of the neighbors saw it and called them. At least this time it’s not his word against mine.”

“Thistime?” He nearly lost his mind.

They all crowded into the elevator, but he stopped one of the suits and pointed him back the way they’d come. “Tell them my wife is in the hospital. They can have their meeting without me.”

“I’m telling you I’m fine,” Stella insisted. “Oh. They’re here to take me to X-ray. Go into your meeting. Call me after. I—I’d like to know how it goes.”

They would talk in two hours or less, he resolved as he ended the call and ran his hand down his face, shaken to his core. What had he expected would happen if he let her go back there alone? What anidiot. What a blind, callous idiot he was. Even if she forgave him, he never would.

As he climbed into the back of the SUV, Carmel slid into the seat on the other side, taking the spot his assistant would normally use.

“What are you doing?”

“Coming with you.” She made a show of straightening her pleated skirt.

“No.” He held up his hand to keep the driver from shutting the door, even though some tourists were aiming their phones to catch a snap of both of them inside the car. “I know you enjoy it when I suffer, but this amount of schadenfreude is in poor taste, even for you.” He flicked his hand, ordering her to leave.

Her mouth pursed. “You would go with me if the situation was reversed.” She leaned to see Derik, who was hovering with confusion. “Get a message upstairs. Tell them if Daddy is left in charge, and Atlas takes all his money out of DVE, then I’m taking Davenwear and all of my share of the assets, too. I refuse to stay on a sinking ship.”

Atlas was floored. “Is that really why you came in today?”

“I’m not as blind to Daddy’s shortcomings as you think I am,” she said haughtily. “I’m learning how to look after myself, same as you. Now let’s go.” She waved with annoyance at the men on the curb. “We have a flight to catch.”

The door slammed and the driver got behind the wheel while Derik took the passenger seat, already relaying Carmel’s message to someone over his phone.

“Will she be okay?” Carmel asked with quiet concern as they pulled into traffic.

“I don’t know.”

Physically, it didn’t sound too serious, but emotionally, Stella had to be traumatized. He wasn’t even there and he was filled with anguish.

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