RETURNING TO MY office is like entering a walk-in freezer, or perhaps a lion enclosure at feeding time. They’re both standing, and there’s a caged and prowling energy to my business partners. I only ducked out of the room for a few minutes, but something major has gone down in my absence.
I swallow. I can guess.
I keep my smile glued in place. Sterling has worked it out and Hudson has confirmed our fling. My instincts brace for an attack. Except I’m a grown woman, not a child. I don’t have to defend myself to my ex-husband and the man I’ve been sleeping with.
I bring up the next screen on our meeting agenda, acting as if everything is normal. I’ve been acting for days.
‘Excuse me for that interruption. Shall we conclude with the last agenda item—Hudson’s proposal for expansion?’
I wait for them to retake their seats, keeping my eyes averted. I can’t bear to see Hudson’s panicked face, telling me he’s reached his limit. He looks as though he’s already decided we can’t work beyond what we’ve shared this week.
As for Sterling—it’s none of his business who I fuck.
‘Hudson, do you want to zip through your plan?’ Keeping my face a bland mask takes eye-watering effort.
He swallows and launches into his spiel—taking on more corporate investments and fund management for third parties, expanding across Europe and Asia and the rest of the States. We’ve heard it before. On paper it makes sense. But now that I know the driving force behind Hudson’s money-making—to protect the vulnerable parts of himself—I’m determined to take a second look.
‘I’m concerned that we’ll be spreading ourselves too thin,’ says Sterling, voicing one of my own arguments against radical expansion. ‘It will mean a lot more travel for each of us and less work-life balance.’
I wince internally, because Hudson has very little of that. He’s an island. He doesn’t need other people, as he proved yesterday when he left Mum’s memorial instead of confiding in me about Wendy.
‘Not necessarily.’ Hudson clenches his jaw. ‘We start a mentoring program—bring in the best newcomers. Start them off small and make them prove themselves. Dove?’ He turns to me, his beautiful eyes so familiar I see every emotion displayed there.
I look away.
‘My preference at this point is to focus new business on start-ups and continue to manage and grow our existing funds. Personally, I’m as busy as I want to be.’
I meet his stare, resolved. There’s more to life than making money, at least for me, and it seems for Sterling.
The ensuing debate is fraught with an unthinkable disharmony.
Then Sterling’s phone emits a tone, snapping the tension. He checks the screen.
‘I don’t think we’re making progress. Can we revisit this discussion at our next video meeting?’ He stands, tucks his phone into his pocket. ‘Something has come up that I need to sort out.’
‘Of course. Nothing serious, I hope?’ I accept his kiss to my cheek, frowning at the strain pulling at his expression.
‘No. Just New York business.’
We’re all on our feet now, our easy camaraderie a distant memory.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow at brunch,’ Sterling says, to me only. ‘Eleven, the Dorchester. Don’t be late.’
He shakes Hudson’s hand. They wish each other safe flights, but there’s no warmth in their farewell. It cracks my heart in two.
And then he’s gone, his long legs carrying him across the outer office to the lifts with purpose.
With dread sitting in my stomach like a rock, I face Hudson.
‘What happened while I was out of the room?’
He rubs his hand over his face. ‘He figured it out. About us.’
‘I thought as much.’ I wince; I don’t mean to sound accusatory, but I already sense Hudson’s withdrawal. ‘How did he take it?’ I’ve seen him more upset. Something else is going on with Sterling—he’s been distracted this visit.
Hudson’s shuttered expression speaks for itself.
‘He warned me off, of course. He knows us both. He knows that you need more than I’ll ever be able to offer.’ He can’t look at me.
‘What I need is for me to decide.’ Pressure builds at my temples. I can’t avoid this any longer. I’ve been holding myself back for days. Making myself small to accommodate Hudson’s feelings. His fear. I’ve tried to move at his pace. But last night, in his arms, I felt worshiped, adored, loved. Even after he’d clumsily tried to warn me off or sound me out, I’d come so close to telling him how I feel that I had to leave to stop the words breaking free.
‘What do you need?’ I ask, seeing the answer written on his handsome face, that glutton-for-punishment part of me needing confirmation.
His sad smile slashes me deep. ‘Outside of Bold, I don’t need anything, Dove. I told you that.’
I press my lips together and nod. There’s no malice in his stare or his tone, only heartbreaking inevitability, as if we were destined to arrive here.
Only I’m not just going to lie down and take a beating. I’m going to fight my corner, as I always do.
I fill my lungs and inch closer. ‘The thing is, I’ve fallen in love with you.’ My voice breaks but I plough on. I need to say this. He needs to hear it. ‘So you don’t have to need me, but I’d like you to want me.’
His face falls in shock. ‘No... Don’t say that.’
I breathe through the first sting of rejection. I expect a fight. But he knows I’m tenacious.
‘I want us to have a relationship. I know you’re not in the same place yet, that you didn’t want anything to change, but it has.’ I know he feels it too. ‘I just want some reassurance that you want more than to say goodbye. That perhaps one day you could want more. With me.’
I touch his arm, reassuring him that the horror in his eyes is unwarranted. ‘You don’t need to promise me marriage—it’s not the game changer I thought it was. I just want you in my life, and I think you want the same.’
His face contorts with anguish. ‘Monroe...’ His tone is laced with warning, his use of my first name a red flag. I should heed it, but I’ve never been able to accept that something is out of my reach.
‘I’m tired of denying it, Hudson. Of holding back because you’re not ready to hear it. But what if you’re never ready? I’ve got nothing to lose.’
His stare hardens and I wither inside.
‘Why are you doing this?’ He scrapes a hand over his face in frustration. ‘We have everything to lose, don’t you see? We had a good time. Don’t—’
‘What? Ruin it?’ I interrupt. ‘That’s what you were going to say, isn’t it?’
He looks down, his eyes almost black. ‘No... Yes... I don’t know.’ He’s cornered, fighting for his life, and I love him enough to relent.
‘Sterling is never going to accept what we did.’ He stuffs his hands in his pockets. ‘It’s driven a wedge between us already, and that wedge will split Bold apart. We’ll lose it all.’
His words bombard me like arrows. He only cares about money. About professional success. About Bold.
‘I told him it was over,’ he says.
Shock jolts through me. I search his handsome face. How can the man I’ve known for five years, the man I’ve shared this past week with, end this without even telling me first? How can he be the place where I belong?
‘So all you care about is how my love threatens the business?’ Ice trickles through my veins, because I see his excuses for the lies they are. He’s not worried about Sterling, who would have to come around to the idea of a relationship between us, just as Hudson had to deal with our divorce. He’s running scared.
‘I never promised you anything.’ It’s a whisper, almost as if he’s ashamed to hear his own words. ‘I’ve always been alone. I’m happy with that.’
‘Oh, I know. But guess what? I want more anyway.’ I fist my hands on my hips.
‘You had more with Sterling, but you couldn’t make it work. You wouldn’t move, even for him. Wouldn’t live away from your family. So how exactly would we work when you live here and I live in Tokyo?’
‘I don’t know. I hadn’t thought through all the logistics—’
He interrupts. ‘I can’t compensate for your big family any more than Sterling could. What makes you think I could offer more than he did? I’m fucked, Monroe. I always will be. You’re searching for this Holy Grail of relationships—the one...perfection. But you’re looking in the wrong place if you think I’m what you need.’
He grips my upper arms, his wild stare clashing with mine. ‘What do you see when you look at me, when you imagine yourself to love me?’
He doesn’t wait for my answer.
‘You see an ideal, something I’m not. I’m flawed and broken. What makes you think a man with my past can make you happy and give you everything you want—commitment, children?’
I break free of his hold. ‘I’ll tell you what I see. You’re a fraud. I always thought that you were the boldest of us, but you only take calculated risks. You only take risks that aren’t emotional... Because you’re scared, Hudson. Scared to let yourself be vulnerable. Scared to feel and to care. Scared that everything you think you have will be snatched away from you. But what do you really have? What have you truly ever risked, apart from your money? Nothing.’
‘I’m perfectly happy with my life.’ He looks like a man being led to a firing squad.
‘Good for you. But there’s more to life than work and amassing a fortune you’ll never spend. You think your achievements keep you in control, make you worthy. But you’re already worthy—of love. Don’t you see that?’
He shakes his head, dismissing the truth.
‘You think you’re alone. That no one cares. But Mr Oshima cares. Sterling cares. I care.’ My voice breaks, just short of a sob. ‘It’s your strength I love. Your determination. Your passion. You showed me all of those things this week. They’re in you. They are you.’
‘Stop, Monroe.’ His mouth mashes into a grim line.
I can’t. Not until he believes me. ‘You argue that you can’t do emotional intimacy, but you can. I feel it so deeply when we’re together, I can barely breathe.’ I press my hand to my chest and fight the rising panic. ‘You can fool yourself you have everything you need, fill your life with work. But it will never be enough if you’re using it as a way to stay emotionally detached.’
I’ve gone too far, but there’s no point holding back. I’ve survived losing love once, and I’ll survive it again. I won’t compromise my dreams or desires, not even for him.
His face, his entire body, might as well be carved from stone.
‘You don’t have to love me, but until you open your heart and take the risk—that it could fail and it will hurt, but it won’t kill you—you’ll never be content.’
My eyes burn. I push on, uncaring of how much damage we’ve created. ‘I may want things that seem unrealistic to you, like true love and a family. But I won’t compromise. Unlike you, I’m prepared to put everything on the line, to take those emotional gambles, because I know the payoff has the potential to be everything I want.’
I deflate at the futility of my dreams with Hudson. He’s right. He is too damaged to be what I need. He has no desire to change. He told me that in Tokyo.
‘It’s okay.’ I offer a wobbly smile. ‘I wanted more with you, but I misjudged things.’ I swallow hard. This isn’t how I envisioned us ending.
His grief, pain and confusion tell me we’re in different leagues emotionally. I’m expecting too much from him.
‘There’s one more thing you need to hear. I love you enough to go back to just being your friend if that’s all you want. You can push me away, but I’ll never abandon you.’
The drone of the plane’s engines should lull me to sleep, considering how little of that vital commodity I’ve had these past seven days, but I don’t think even a general anaesthetic could knock me out. Every inch of my body aches. Every time I close my eyes I see Monroe’s exquisite face, pale and slashed with pain. Pain I caused. Because I can’t love her back.
No. She wasn’t demanding love. She knows me. Perhaps better than I know myself. And the thing is I do love her. I always have. As a close friend. A respected colleague. A person.
Even perhaps with a romantic love.
I rub my hand over my face, my breathing shallow and tight with panic. It’s not admitting the emotion I find terrifying, it’s trusting it. What do I know about love? What do I have to offer? I’ve never wanted the trappings she has, but that’s not what she asked for. All she wanted was more. For me to be open to a relationship.
I blink, fatigue making my eyes gritty. I glance around the luxurious cabin of my private jet—pristine and empty, just like my penthouse, which is all that awaits me in Tokyo. Is Monroe right? Am I a suit addicted to the office so that he doesn’t have to feel the gaping inadequacies of his life? Is that truly all I want?
I’ll never abandon you.
Her final declaration loops through my head, every pass bringing recrimination and self-loathing. I feel the words, the sentiment and truth behind them wash over me. Haven’t I always felt her acceptance? Hers and Sterling’s? It’s what allowed me to let them into my life in the first place.
This past week, Monroe has shown me that with her I’m safe. She laid herself open to me, even at the end when she saw how huge the chasm is between her own feelings and mine. She continued to offer her friendship, even after I rejected her love. She wants me to heal even if I can’t be whole for her.
And I offered nothing in return.
My hand hovers over my phone—she’s just a call away. Every cell in my body wants her to be happy and fulfilled. To have all of her dreams come true. I want to see her smile and laugh every day, the way she does when she’s around her family.
I think of her a year from now—if Bold as it is currently survives the fallout of my thoughtlessness. Will she visit Tokyo again? Will she be in a relationship? Will her eyes sparkle the way I’ve watched them do a thousand times this week, only for another man?
I grit my teeth and swallow hard. Jealousy is no reason to hold on to something as precious and unique as Monroe.
My phone rings. It’s Sterling. I calculate the time in London. We’re a few hours from Singapore, which means he and Monroe will have just finished their planned brunch after my early departure. What if she’s not okay?
I snatch up the phone and accept the call, my pulse a riot. ‘Hello.’
Sterling sighs down the line. ‘I don’t know whether to tell you what I’m about to tell you, or just hunt you down and kick your ass.’
I make a fist. ‘Is she...okay?’ I hate it that I don’t know. That I have to ask him. That I’m the reason she might not be.
‘She’s fine. She’s the strongest, gutsiest woman either of us knows. That’s why we’re in business with her. It’s also why I’m ringing to urge you not to throw away the only chance you’ll have.’
My throat is tight. Just thinking how much I’ve hurt Monroe makes me want to thump something.
‘Look, man,’ he continues, ‘neither of us knows what you’ve been through, growing up the way you did. But do you really want to be alone simply because you’re shit-scared? Is that a good enough reason to lose her? You’ll never find another woman like her. I know. I lost her too. But I live with that because I was partly to blame.’
I close my eyes, picturing the two of them together—an intimate tête-à-tête where he comforted her and advised her, the way I did when their marriage disintegrated.
‘You know she’s right about you—she’s always right.’ He chuckles, but I don’t have the stomach to join him. ‘That’s why we concede to her more often than not.’
I suck in a breath. ‘What did she tell you?’ I’m too scared to ask if she’s done with Bold and, more importantly, done with me.
‘She said she loved you enough to question the importance of marriage. She said she knew a relationship would be hard for you, but she told me how you’ve been putting yourself out there emotionally, with her and with Blackhearts, and it gave her hope. She said she expected too much from you. So now you have to ask yourself one question. If you could only wake up one more day, would you want to wake up alone or by her side?’
I concentrate hard, allowing the emotions I usually push away to flow through me as I contemplate his scenario. The end of the world, a zombie apocalypse, me struck down with some terminal disease...
I recall the dawn breaking after Typhoon Kano on that first morning. Think of all the dawns I’ve witnessed this week—a week of hardly any sleep. Monroe was beside me for most of them. Would I even want one last day alive without her...?
‘Fuck...’ I whisper under my breath, because the answer is so straightforward. I don’t want tomorrow without her, or the next day, or the day after that.
Sterling’s snort reminds me that he’s still listening. ‘I’ll never say I told you so,’ he says. ‘Just make this right.’
‘What do I do? How do I change?’ My voice whines with desperate panic.
‘Don’t ask me, man, I have my own shit going on. Besides, for some crazy reason, Monroe seems to love you just the way you are. That’s a good place to start.’
We disconnect and I fire off an email to Hina, instructing her to cancel all of my meetings for the next week. Then I head to the cockpit to speak with the captain. He’ll have an hour to refuel and lodge a new flight plan.
We’re going back to London.