Page 55 of Bride on the Dotted Line

I look up from my phone, watching as the breeze toys with a loose strand of her hair. The ocean rolls toward our feet, then recedes, leaving a wash of dark sand and seaweed in its wake.

Fuck,I want to say.

You have no idea, I want to say.

The more time I spend at Harwood Restaurant Group, the better her scenario sounds. Not the husband for hire thing—the finally opening my restaurant thing. The leaving it all behind thing. My CEO position, my father’s expectations, Roderick and Lionel, the path my life was meant to take.

Thebeinga husband thing.

I glance down at her again. She’s smiling distantly, eyes on the horizon, cheeks red with the sun reflecting off the soft sand. My resolve sputters like a faulty engine, goosebumps rising on my arms.

Her husband. In another life, I’d like to beherhusband. Or boyfriend. Or … something.

But I can’t say that. I shouldn’t even be thinking it. I have to think of her future, and mine.

I type, ‘Could be lucrative,’ and swallow the rising tidal wave down.

I get a call from my father on our last night in Fiji, while I’m busy grilling lobster tails on the deck.

“Dad?” I say, propping my phone between my shoulder and my ear. Garlic butter drips from the brush I’m holding over the lobster, the fire beneath crackling. “Everything alright? What time is it there?”

He doesn’t bother withhello.“Did you see it?”

His tone is too flat for this call to be anything good. I set down my brush, turning to stare into the horizon. Sienna is just visible through the villa’s window, speaking to her mom on the phone, reclined on the living room couch.

“See what?”

“I had Alvin send you an email. Check it.”

I look down at the lobster, estimating three more minutes of cooking before it turns to rubber. “I’m busy right now, but I can?—”

“Check it, Nicholas. While I have time.”

There’s no refusing Victor Harwood. I sigh, rubbing a hand on my apron. “Fine. I’ll put you on speakerphone. Just a sec.”

The e-mail from Alvin is at the top of my inbox. It’s a forwarded news article, and for a split-second, I think that whoever the PI is working for finally released an exposé about Sienna. There’s a cold plunge in my chest.

Then I read the headline.

“Why are you sending me this?”Finance Tycoon Brothers Exit Company to Chagrin of Shareholders.“Roderick and Lionel left their jobs?”

My father’s voice is toneless. “They’re looking for new opportunities. Have you thought about what I said at the gala?”

“The gala?” The only thing coming to mind is the sound Sienna made when I put my mouth to her bare shoulder in my kitchen. It takes me a second to remember the conversation Victor and I had by the champagne tower. “You mean what you said about hiring Lionel.”

“Yes, Son, and ridding yourself of this pointless grudge you have. You would do well with men like Roderick and Lionel on your team. Now’s a good time to strike while the iron’s hot.”

The sensation that gathers in my gut is so dark and angry. It feels like a storm cloud. I turn back to the grill, my jaw tight. Lemon juice and butter sizzles on top of the lobster tails.

“It’s not going to happen.”

“Nicholas—”

“No.” Maybe it’s because I’m in Fiji, an ocean away from my father and Harwood Restaurant Group, but the refusal just flies out of me, involuntary. “Roderick will never work at a company I own, Dad. Neither will Lionel, for that matter.”

Silence on the other end.

More silence.

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