Page 7 of Thick and Thin

“NO!”

I couldn’t listen to his refusal anymore. This had been the confirmation I’d needed: he didn’t love me. I was nothing more than a possession to him.

So many emotions tore through me and I had to get away from him. In just the space of a few seconds, this man had broken my heart in two ways. He didn’t love me and he stubbornly wanted to keep me from my father.

Turning, I threw open the door and started running—from the east rear hall through the main hallway before I all but flew up the stairs to my bedroom. I was such a mix of emotions, unable to process thought as panic, fury, and heartache filled my veins.

By the time Sinclair walked through the open doorway to my bedroom, I already had one of my small suitcases on the bed, a drawer open as I flung what few things I had here into it.

His voice broke through. “Lise, you’re being unreasonable.”

“No, you are.” As if by a sign from the heavens, the contract I’d signed with him my first week here was the only thing left in the top drawer. And I’d be damned if I was going to take that horrible thing with me. I picked it up and turned to face him, ripping it in half and then continuing to shred it until pieces fell on the bed and the floor. “And I’m done here. You can sue me. I don’t care—but I can’t be away from my father any longer. And, so help me God, if you force me to stay here, I’ll call the police and tell them you’re holding me hostage.”

I hadn’t known those words were going to come out of my mouth until they had—and it was too late to take them back. I couldn’t miss the pain that clouded his eyes…making me realize that he did care, even if it was in a way I couldn’t quite measure or feel.

But it didn’t matter. I had to get the hell out of here. As I continued to throw things in my other suitcase, I even placed Constance Whittier’s final journal into one before throwing in clothes from the closet. I didn’t even bother to fold them.

“You’re being unreasonable.”

“No,” I spat. “You are.” Spying the necklace I’d worn here sitting on a spot on the dresser, I remembered my pearl earrings were in the nightstand, so I placed them both in a little pouch in one of the suitcases, intentionally leaving the diamond earrings. I would take nothing from Sinclair, save his mother’s final journal that he’d already told me he didn’t want. He’d tossed her aside just like he was me, and somehow I felt like I was rescuing her from a loveless home.

I now understood how she’d felt.

After I snapped the suitcases shut, I grabbed my purse out of the closet, leaving everything else behind. Whatever else was there I could replace, but I had to get out. It was strange how such a ridiculously large building could feel stifling.

I decided I would hitchhike to get home. Surely some nice person or people would take pity on me and help. With a suitcase in each arm, I approached Sinclair—but he wasn’t about to move, so I walked around him and out the door.

I’d half expected him to stop me but he didn’t—and as I walked down the west wing stairs for what I believed was the last time, the first tears began to drop onto my cheeks.

Chapter 3

It was the strangest feeling—I’d hated this place when I’d first arrived, how it was almost the exact opposite of the tiny home I’d shared with my father, how everything seemed like it was on display only to show off the wealth of its owner. Silently, I said goodbye to this place that had tried to be my home for the past two months. I knew, as long as I lived, that I would never forget it. Even when the details would fade, the feeling of this place had crept into my bones and would always be with me.

As I reached the front door at the end of the antechamber, I heard Sinclair not far behind me. “Wait.”

It wasn’t an order; it was a request. Had I been calm, I might have listened. Instead, I shook my head and, setting down one of the suitcases, I wrapped my hand around the doorknob.

“Lise,” Sinclair said, his voice almost a growl. When I’d first moved here, that tone used to scare me even while it intrigued me, even when it made me want him. Now, though, it slashed through me like a knife, leaving behind a scar that would never heal.

But Sinclair wasn’t a man to be ignored. Before I could pick up the suitcase again, he took my arm, forcing me to look at him. Except I didn’t see in his face what I’d expected. Here, right now, was the man I’d fallen in love with. His brow had softened and his eyes tried to hide the fact that I was hurting him.

Was it an act? Was he trying to manipulate me into staying?

“At least take my car.”

Those were not the words I’d expected to hear—and, somehow, they fanned the flames of my fury. “No! I don’t want to be beholden to you any more than I already am.” I was immediately aware of how my voice filled the antechamber, and I knew it would echo all the way up to the third floor and likely down the megaphone of the main hallway where it possibly even drifted down the rear hallways.

But I didn’t care if Edna or Greg and his wife heard our conflict. It didn’t matter anymore.

Sinclair’s eyes grew dark. This was the man I’d first encountered on that first night—not the charming man in the hallway needing directions to the presentation but the wealthy man who was my enemy. And he looked like he was ready to go to battle. His voice was low with a dangerous tone, and I knew I was the only one able to hear it, each word punctuated with finality.

“Just. Fucking. Take. It.”

Even after experiencing and loving his softer side, I was no match for this version of him, his Mr. Hyde side. But all my words were gone. I simply gave a quick nod as he closed the door and picked up the suitcase I’d set on the ground.

He’d said it. Two months ago when we’d been bickering over the contract I’d just torn up moments ago, I might have spat out a sarcastic retort, making a dig about the fact that he had more cars in his garages than most people owned in a lifetime.

But I didn’t have that fight in me. Not anymore. Not since the tendrils of my heart had wrapped around him, holding him tightly, wanting to heal the pain of his loveless childhood, hoping to fill his heart with joy and beauty. Now, though, as I followed him toward the west rear hall, I knew it had been impossible. Those tendrils of my heart were being ripped away. Eventually, they’d heal, but I now knew that Sinclair never would. His wounds were too deep, the tendency to be cold too ingrained.

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