“Fuck,” Ford said as he stared at me from the other side of my desk. “That’s some serious shit.”
Dominick and I had just finished filling him in on everything that had gone down at the restaurant last night and then the drinking that had transpired at Dominick’s house after.
I’d been buried in meetings all day, and this was the first opportunity I’d had to catch up with my little brother.
As we sat in my office, Dominick poured us drinks. My hangover from last night was just barely lifting, and the scotch wasn’t going down as easily as I wanted.
“What has Jo said about all this?” Ford asked.
“We haven’t talked that much,” I admitted. “I called her when I got home from Dominick’s. I was a drunken fucking mess. I barely remember what she said. And our conversation this morning was brief—both of us were running late to work and heading into meetings.” I pushed the glass toward my computer, getting it farther away from me. “This is the first time I’ve been free all day.”
“I wonder what it was like for her, facing her father at work today,” Dominick said.
“Me too,” I replied. “Hell, she had to face him when I left the restaurant. I’m curious what he said to her and what she said to him.”
“So, now what?” Ford asked. “Do you carry on like the conversation with Walter never happened? Do you put things on pause with Jo—”
“Fuck no. There’s no pause,” I said, cutting him off. “Jo Spade is mine. I came clean. I did the right thing. If he doesn’t want to work with me anymore, that’s on him. But it’s not going to affect my relationship with his daughter.”
“Says the dude who was never going to fall in love,” Ford joked.
I flipped him off at the same time my phone vibrated, and I lifted it out of my pocket, staring at the screen.
“Jesus …” I groaned. “Speak of the goddamn devil.”
Walter: Let’s talk. Meet me in the bar of my hotel.
“Walter?” Dominick asked. “What did he say?”
I glanced up from my phone. “He wants to meet up at his hotel.”
Dominick came back with, “Don’t burn the place down, please. It’s my favorite spot in LA.”
I looked at my brother. “Is it?”
“That’s where I met Kendall.”
“Oh shit, that’s right,” I replied. The grand opening was the night he had met his girl on the rooftop. “Don’t worry; nothing is going up in flames this evening.”
My thumbs hit the screen, typing out a reply.
Me: I’ll be there in 15 minutes.
As I stood from my chair, grabbing my jacket from the back of it, Ford said, “What the fuck are you going to say to him?”
I slipped my arms through the holes, adjusting the front on my chest. “Don’t know.”
“That you’re going to date his daughter whether he likes it or not?” Dominick challenged.
I chuckled. “Sure, I’ll use those exact words, and we’ll see how well that goes over.”
“I’m glad it’s you and not me,” Ford said. “I have enough drama in my life between having a four-year-old and needing a full-time nanny.”
“And then there’s baby mama,” Dominick added.
“We don’t talk about baby mama,” Ford snapped back.
“Listen,” I said to them, “while you two bitch this out—or whatever you’re doing—I’m going to go.”
When I reached my doorway, I heard, “Good luck,” and I kept walking down the hallway and into the garage, where my driver was waiting for me.
“Spade Hotel,” I told him, and I looked at the screen of my phone, tapping the necessary buttons to call Jo.
After three rings, her voice mail picked up, and I started my message. “It’s me,” I said. “I’m on my way to meet your father. He wants to talk. I’ll call you when I get out.” A beat passed, and I added, “I love you.”
My office wasn’t far from the hotel, which had made it convenient when Walter was in the thick of construction, the short commute allowing me to get there fast and promptly.
Something my client had appreciated at the time.
Now, there wasn’t a fucking thing about me that Walter liked.
In the few minutes it took us to arrive, I replied to a couple emails and watched the hotel come into view. Once Steven pulled up to the lobby, the bellhop opened my door.
“Welcome,” the bellhop said. “Will you be staying with us this evening?”
“No, just visiting,” I told him.
I walked inside, veering toward the right, where the bar took up a large section of the lobby. Walter had had a heavy influence on the design of the bar, all of it done in dark wood and drab colors—an old-school feel in a modern space.
I saw him the moment I rounded the corner, sitting at the bar, his hands wrapped around a tumbler.
I held my breath as I closed the distance between us, standing behind the chair next to his. “Can I take a seat?”
He nodded.
The bartender immediately approached and said, “What can I get you to drink?”
I pointed at Walter’s glass. “I’ll have whatever he’s having.”
A quick peek around the room told me we were far from being alone. He’d chosen a public spot, where eyes were everywhere, ears were open. The last thing his PR team would want was to hear that Walter had given his lawyer a verbal lashing in front of hotel guests.
This was going to be civil.
I just didn’t know which way he was swaying.
Once the bartender placed a scotch in front of me, Walter took a drink of his and then said, “I spoke to Joanna after you left the restaurant last night.”
“I assumed.”
He kept his eyes straight, not looking at me. “She told me the story of how you two met. You didn’t know who she was; therefore, you didn’t stop it from happening.” He gradually moved his stare, locking with mine. “But once she told you the truth, what happened, Jenner?”
I didn’t know if this was a test or if he truly didn’t know the answer.
“I ended things.” I wiped the corners of my mouth. “I told her it couldn’t work, that I wouldn’t do that to you.” I sighed. “That was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, Walter.”
“But you found your way back to her.” His voice was flat.
I had no idea where this was going.
“Yes.” I attempted to lift the scotch to my lips but didn’t. “Our second trip to Utah is when that happened.”
“That’s quite a gap in between.” His eyes narrowed. “I’m trying to understand this, Jenner. To wrap my fucking head around it.”
“I love her.” I looked at the bottles that lined the center of the bar, my heart remembering that feeling when I’d walked away and the feeling when I couldn’t fight her any longer. “And every day she wasn’t in my life, I wanted her to be. It was miserable.” I turned toward him. “I wouldn’t have rekindled things if I wasn’t serious about her. I wouldn’t have taken the chance, not with the relationship I have with you. You need to know that—that I went into this, knowing I would more than likely lose you as a client and I was all right with that as long as I got her.”
He exhaled. “Jenner, you’ve been with me a long time. We’ve worked on billion-dollar projects together. Last night, I was willing to give that up.”
“And today?”
He drained his scotch and called the bartender over for another. “Today, for the first time in a long time, I saw my daughter’s smile not as bright as it usually is. I saw her mope through meetings and eat lunch at her desk instead of going out with her colleagues. That’s not her. That’s the result of this.” His finger traced the air between us. “Prior to today, I’d never seen her happier. Hell, I thought it was her job that was giving her that smile.” He paused. “Now, I know it was you.”
I was silent for a few moments before I said, “I won’t hurt her.” I halted and then added, “You need to know that Jo’s safe with me.”
That was a promise I’d never intended on making, one I’d never even contemplated before.
But I could say those words to Walter and mean them.
“You bet your ass you won’t hurt her.” He gripped his cup like it was a gun. “I’ll hang you by the fucking balls if you do.”
I took a breath. “Walter, you can trust me. I know that’s easy to say from this end, and given what you just learned, you’re doubting that, but my personal life has absolutely nothing to do with the decisions I make for your company and the way I represent your brand.”
“One of the things my daughter emphasized was your loyalty to me.” He circled the glass over the wooden bar top. “I’ve calmed down a lot since last night. I’m not saying I’m going to shred our contract. I’m also not saying I’m going to invite you to my poker game next week.” He licked the scotch off his lips as he emptied another glass. “It’s going to take me some time to accept the new role you have in my family.”
A role I wasn’t ever stepping down from.
But I kept that point to myself.
“My ex-wife would tell you I’m inconvincible, stubborn as an old mule. And maybe so, but I need you, Jenner—something I don’t want to admit. But like I’ve said in the past, I’ve gone through enough lawyers to know I have a good one. And since I can’t replace you, the best thing for me, my company, and my daughter is to find a way to accept this.”
Any man with an ego like Walter’s would have had a hard time, admitting that. I knew this conversation wasn’t easy for him, but he also knew I respected him, and I wouldn’t be sitting here if Jo were just another girl I wanted to fuck in a restroom stall.
“I won’t do you wrong,” I told him. “You have my word.”
I shot back my whole drink and chased it with some water that the bartender had poured for us at some point.
As I was setting the glass down, Walter said, “I think you forgot this.” He placed my credit card in front of me. “I should have used it for the dinner that none of us ate.”
I chuckled, sticking the card in my pocket. “That’s why I left it.”
“Don’t worry; I’ll be deducting the amount from your bill this month.”
“I expect nothing less.” Knowing we’d reached the end of this little talk, I got up from my seat and held my hand out to him. “Hopefully, our next dinner will end a little differently.”
“Let’s hope.”
He shook my hand, and once he released me, I patted his shoulder and walked out of the bar and through the lobby, climbing into my SUV that was parked outside.
“Where to, Jenner?” Steven asked.
“One second,” I told him and checked the screen of my phone.
Jo: Oh boy. Call me when you leave him. I’m at the office, catching up on work. I’ll be here for a while.