Page 26 of The CEO's Revenge

He leaned across his desk. “Four hours, four days, four weeks, four months, four years, four decades, four centuries, I don’t give a fuck. I was locked away for a crime I did not commit. So I’m sorry… not sorry… if it offends your delicate sensibilities that I have no qualms about not defending the reputation I couldn’t care less I have right now.”

Our eyes met and held. I could see the rage boiling inside him. I stared at him, furious at the stand he had taken. I felt my heart plummet and bitter tears burn the backs of my eyes at the prospect of walking out of here without the check, but I refused to allow them to fall.

“So, you prefer to walk out of here empty-handed than take one for the team? That’s a bit selfish, isn’t it?”

“Selfish?” I looked at him incredulously. “I’m selfish when you’re the one who’s going back on your word?”

“One night in exchange for a computer lab for so many poor, under-privileged kids.”

“How could you?” I gasped.

“Take it or leave it.”

I took a step backward, then another. Then I turned and ran to the door, reaching blindly for the handle as the tears had started to fall.

“Savannah?”

Whatever else he had been about to say fell on deaf ears as I fled the office. I did not care who saw me as I ran. I took the stairs, afraid that if I waited for the elevator he would follow. After a few flights, I sat on a landing and allowed the sobs to wrack me for a few minutes. Thankfully, there was no one who felt the need to get their steps in and I had the staircase to myself. When I felt in control once more, I wiped my eyes and continued my journey downward. I changed my initial plan of sitting in the parking garage while traffic ran off. I preferred to sit in traffic bumper to bumper, burning precious gas than to be anywhere near Max at this point.

I drove into the traffic and kept the windows up to keep out exhaust fumes and provide me some amount of privacy as I processed what had just taken place. The tears came once more. The last time I had been this emotional was during that turbulent time when I found out Max was not only an embezzler he was also cheating on me.

My thoughts went back to that night of my twenty-first birthday as I had sat in the restaurant waiting for him, a small box in hand. That small box was still in the back of a drawer in my dresser on top of a picture. I had not thought about it since the night I had put it there when all hell had broken loose in my young life.

After Robert had shown me the pictures, I had naively still held out hope that Max would reach out and we would be able to talk. I was so young I actually believed there might be a different explanation. I had believed in him until the last possible moment. But when the news of his arrest had broken, I had no choice but to believe that if his embezzlement was true, so was the point of his cheating.

I had decided that I wanted to face him one last time and look him in the eye as I confronted him. But fate had other plans. The morning I planned to visit him while he awaited trial, I woke up in pain with cramps. In total panic I saw the blood on the sheets.

And immediately, I knew: I was losing my baby, just like I had lost its father, and there was not a damn thing I could do about it.

At the hospital, I was informed sudden stress levels could affect the fetus, especially in the first trimester and it often led to miscarriages. I remained hospitalized for two days and was told to continue with bed rest for another two weeks when I returned home as my blood pressure was high enough to cause a stroke. Someone my age should not have such an elevated blood pressure.

My mother saw to it that I obeyed the doctor’s orders. As a result, Max’s trial came and went, and he was behind bars before I was back on my feet.

The memories of my miscarried child came up before me, and for the first time since it happened, I allowed it to come rather than push it back. The tears which pricked my eyes, I gave free rein to the flow.

The stress, elevated blood pressure and eventual miscarriage had only one source: Max. I was fine when I went to the doctor to confirm the result of the pregnancy test kit. I was eight weeks pregnant and doing fine. How silly of me, but I had taken the little plastic strip, wrapped it up in a pink bow with blue dots, and placed it in a gift box. That’s how excited I’d been to share my big news with Max. We’d often talked of wanting to be together forever and having a family so I was expecting a night of happiness and celebrations. I would have been better off taking the advice of my friends, who warned me I was too young. It was madness to settle down with the first man who came my way. I thought I knew better. I thought I’d found my soul mate and life partner all in one.

Yeah, after I lost my baby and Max it got bad. There was even a point when I wondered if I was losing my mind.

But time, the quintessential healer, did its job. After a season of unbearable sadness, each day became easier. I could actually wake up and go on with life. Slowly, painfully, I came to grips with the fact that I could not change what had happened. I could not change Max’s infidelity or the fact that he was an embezzler. Nor could I bring back my baby. I could only move on alone and with the firm resolve never to put myself in such a position ever again.

I had not expected to have to deal with Max ever again in my life.

Still, perhaps this was for the best. I needed closure. Perhaps I still needed to see Max’s expression when I told him he had been a father-to-be for a few short weeks. Then I thought about the scene which had just unfolded in his office, and my stomach…

The Max I had known was gone, replaced by a bitter, cynical stranger. The man I had known thought too much of my integrity to ever make the kind of suggestion he had. Then again, can a leopard ever change its spots? Perhaps the Max I thought I knew had never really existed? Perhaps the Max I walked away from an hour ago was the real Max all along?

Had I dodged a bullet four years ago when we were forced apart?

A new wave of anger washed over me as I remembered the callous thing he said to me before I fled from his office.

One night in exchange for a check. Take it or leave it.

The fucking nerve of him. As if I had some kind of obligation to grovel for his money. Actually, how dare he? Max and his disgusting proposition could go to hell for all I cared. The committee would understand I was not going to sink to those depths for a man who was clearly playing sick mind games.

I was shaking, but for the rest of the drive home I was determined not to give him one more ounce of my energy. Instead I concentrated my thoughts on how we could compensate for the lacking funds. I should take another look at the figures and see where we could trim things down a bit. Perhaps we could revert to the original plan. Scaling down and doing the project in phases. Miserably, I saw indefinite cake sales when school started in the fall. Perhaps we could try for an autumn event or something else on the same large scale as the fair.

I pulled into my apartment complex and still full of adrenaline and excess energy walked briskly to my apartment.

---