The day I drove Thea and Charlie to the airport was the worst day of my life, without question. We rode in solemn silence back to the city. Charlie’s sad eyes often found mine in the rearview mirror. Thea held tight to my hand as I drove, keeping us connected for just a bit longer.
The entire time, I contemplated my options. I wanted to tell Thea I’d find a way for us to be together, but I couldn’t make that kind of promise, not if I couldn’t keep it.
So when we pulled up to the hangar, I took a long breath and prepared for an awful good-bye.
I got out first, waving to the pilots and crew as they approached from the base of the jet’s stairs. They came over and took the luggage, then backed away as Charlie and Thea climbed out of the SUV.
“We’re ready anytime, sir.” The pilot smiled to Thea. “Just come on up when you’re ready and we’ll be off.”
“Thank you.” She nodded at him, then let go of Charlie’s hand, motioning her to my side.
I dropped to a knee, tipping up Charlie’s chin with my finger. “I’ll see you soon, peanut.”
“Okay, Daddy,” she told her feet.
My heart broke as the tears welled in her eyes. I yanked her forward, pulling her to my chest and hugged her tight. “I love you,” I whispered into her hair.
“I love you too.” Her small frame shook as she cried into my shoulder.
I breathed through the crushing ache in my chest, getting my emotions under control. But when I looked up to see Thea swiping tears off her cheeks, a whole new wave of pain hit my center.
The idea floating in my head had to work. It has to. Seeing these two in tears was more than I could bear.
I stood, picking Charlie up off the ground, and took Thea’s hand, tugging her into my side. The three of us held tight to our small huddle. None of us were in a hurry to break apart, but when I saw one of the crew checking their watch, I knew my time was up.
“Call me when you get home.”
Thea nodded, sniffling as she stood back. “We will.” Thea rubbed our daughter’s back and I set her down. “Okay, Charlie. Time to go.”
They linked hands and took a step away.
“Wait.” I stepped forward, taking Thea’s face in my hands. “I love you.”
Her eyes filled with new tears. “I love you too.”
Thea’s explanation for leaving hadn’t been easy to hear. I’d lain awake with her draped over my side for two nights now, replaying her words. And after all those hours of sorting it out and putting myself in her place, I came to a conclusion.
She loved me.
But she also needed to love herself.
If New York made her feel like less, then I wouldn’t ask her to stay. If she needed to be with her family, I had to let her go.
She loved me enough to be honest. I loved her enough to want her to have it all.
I pressed my lips to hers in a hard kiss. “I promise to see you soon,” I whispered against her lips.
She nodded. “You know where we’ll be.”
At home.
I let her go, watching as she led Charlie to the plane. My daughter looked over her shoulder, giving me a tiny wave as she climbed the stairs. Thea never looked back.
She still didn’t believe in promises.
But she would.
It took me two weeks to unravel my life.
Two weeks, and I was no longer a partner at Stone, Richards and Abergel. I was no longer the Kendrick prince, preparing to be king. And soon, I’d no longer be the chairman of the foundation’s board of directors.
“How did brunch go?” Nolan asked, leaning back in his chair as I came into his office.
I collapsed in a leather club chair across from his desk, loosening the knot in my tie. “About as well as I expected. Dad thinks I’m fucking up my life and Mom can’t fathom why Thea doesn’t just move here.”
“They’ll come around. Give them a couple more grandkids. Buy them a lake house in Lark Cove. Once they spend some time there, they’ll understand. Besides, it’s not like you can’t manage the Kendrick fortune from Montana.”
I shrugged. “We’ll see.”
My parents thought abandoning the career I’d worked so hard to build was reckless. They’d been disappointed in my decision to move, especially Dad.
He wasn’t concerned about me managing logistics for the family from Lark Cove. He knew location didn’t matter when it came to handling finances, taking phone calls and returning emails. Dad was convinced that I’d never be seen as a leader if I was living thousands of miles away. He had a point.
So I’d handed over my crown.
Aubrey could take his place because I wasn’t changing my mind. Two weeks without Thea and Charlie and I was coming out of my skin.
“Any word from the firm?” Nolan asked.
“No. I don’t expect to hear from them again.”
The day I’d dropped off Thea and Charlie at the airport, I’d called for an impromptu meeting with the senior partners at the firm. I’d gotten lucky that it had been on a Monday and none of them had been out golfing. Though I’m pretty sure all three of them had wanted to take a club to my head after the first five minutes of the meeting.
“Are they still pissed?”
I shrugged. “I think they’re chagrinned that I outsmarted them. But they got the better end of the deal, so they’ll get over it as soon as they cash a few Kendrick checks.”
Nolan grinned. “Remind me to have you review any and all contracts before I sign them.”
“You got it.”
When I’d bought into the firm as a partner, I’d signed their standard partnership contract. It was fairly boilerplate, outlining the responsibilities of the partnership and the consequences if expectations weren’t met. It also included a nepotism clause, stating that no partner could be in a relationship with other employees. Immediate family members were allowed to work at the firm, but not in the chain of command with the related partner.
All standard.
Including the clause where a partner’s spouse and family members were not allowed to be clients of the firm.
That had been my loophole.
When I’d been offered a partnership, Kendrick Enterprises had been with another firm across town and it was well known that Dad was loyal to them. Since there was no shot at winning the Kendrick business, the senior partners had taken the next best thing: me. I’d become their star, bringing in clients they wouldn’t have earned without my last name.
So my proposal to Stone, Richards and Abergel was simple: they buy me out of my partnership and I bring them the Kendricks. Aubrey had been more than willing to shuck their existing firm, which was full of lawyers who continually double-checked her directives with my father. It was in her authority to change firms, and after I’d asked her to consider it, she’d agreed immediately.
I was letting her deal with Dad’s reaction to the change.
The senior partners had put on a good show, hemming and hawing for at least five minutes before agreeing. They’d even held back their excitement until after I’d left the conference room.
I’d spent two weeks on the phone and in meetings, notifying clients and getting the other partners up to speed on my former portfolio. Finally, yesterday, I’d packed up my office and handed in my keys.
“What do you have left to do?” Nolan asked.
“Not much. Sean has my personal belongings all packed up and ready for shipment to Lark Cove. Most everything else is staying since I’m keeping the penthouse. Now all I have left to do is step down as chair and I’m free.”
“I think this is a mistake.” Nolan frowned. “You can do this job from Montana.”
I chuckled. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were going to miss me.”
“You’re trained. If you leave, I’ll have to break in someone new.”
“I’ll miss you too.”
“Listen, I’ve been thinking about this and I have an idea. Let me bring Piper in so we can pitch it.” He picked up the phone, dialing her extension. Not thirty seconds later, she waltzed into the office and took the chair at my side.
She looked me up and down. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks,” I muttered, knowing she was just saying it out of concern. The circles under my eyes were darker than any I’d sported during law school, but I hadn’t slept much in two weeks. Without Thea in my bed, I’d been restless.
“Okay, so we’ve got an idea.” Nolan leaned his forearms on his desk, nodding to Piper.
“I’ve been playing with the org chart and job descriptions.” She handed me a piece of paper, showing me the current structure of the foundation.
The circle at the top was me, the chairman of the board. Below that, a row of the other board members. Beneath them was Nolan, followed by a row of vice presidents. Next to each bubble was a brief description of job responsibilities.
It was the same as it had been for decades.
“Now look at this.” She handed me a new sheet.
The structure of the circles was the same except one vice president bubble had been removed and its job duties placed with me. With this new structure, I’d be taking over the team responsible for sorting through donation proposals.
My eyes snapped to Nolan and his smug grin. “What about Mike?” He was the current vice president in the role they were proposing to eliminate and had worked with us for a decade.
“He wants to retire. He talked about waiting a year, but I already spoke with him and he’s on board with leaving early. We’ll cut him a check and he’ll move to Florida a year earlier than expected.”
“But what about everything else? The events. The trips. I can’t be here to split them with you.”
“I’ve got them covered. With you weeding through proposals, it will take less time for me to review them. Mike does a great job, but I still spend a lot of time going through everything, mostly so I can get you up to speed. I won’t have to do that anymore. We can either ask other board members to become more active, or we can cut down on some of the events. Worst-case scenario, I go to them all.”
I sighed. “That’s going to cut into your time with your family. I can’t ask you to do that.”
“Not necessarily. If I’m hitting more events at night, then I’m going to cut back at the office. Spend more time at home in the mornings. I can take Tyler to school, hang with Kayla until lunch, then come in for the afternoons and attend the functions when they happen in the evenings. All of that’s possible if you take over Mike’s job.”
“Kayla would be okay with that?”
He nodded. “She’s one hundred percent on board.”
God, this would be amazing. More than quitting my career, one that I’d poured thousands of hours into building, I hated losing my place at the foundation.
It was my passion. It was my connection to my family. And more so, I could do this job and be home every night for dinner. I’d never miss a soccer practice or game. I’d have the chance to make up for the time I’d already lost with Charlie.
The last two weeks had taught me a lot. My eighty-hour workweeks were over. I was trading up for Thea and Charlie.
But if I could keep this tie to the foundation, to my family’s legacy, then maybe I could have my cake and eat it too.
“I love it,” I told Nolan and Piper. “But I just don’t see the board approving the change.”
The chairman of the board had always been a Kendrick, picked purposefully to be the face of the family. Before me, it was my uncle. When he’d been ready to retire, I’d taken over. I didn’t see how the board would want it any other way.
“It’s worth asking,” Piper said. “If they say no, then you can step down like you’d planned.”
“True.” My original plan had been to move and settle in to Lark Cove. When I got bored, I’d find a low-stress job. If this didn’t work out, I could always fall back on Plan A.
But damn, I wanted Plan B.
“The meeting with the board doesn’t start until ten.” Nolan checked the clock on the wall. “We’ve got thirty minutes. Let’s prep to pitch this, instead of the list of recommended chair candidates we came up with last week.”
I grinned at them both. “It’s worth a shot.”
Two hours later, the three of us were back in Nolan’s office, celebrating.
The board had agreed to try this new structure temporarily and see if it worked. They weren’t crazy about the CEO not being in the office from nine to five, or the chairman living in Montana, but we’d somehow managed to convince them that there were more benefits than costs on this one.
“I knew they’d go for it!” Piper hadn’t stopped smiling since the board meeting had adjourned. “And I bet it will be less than two months and they’ll vote to make this permanent.”
I chuckled. “You realize this means you’re going to have to deal with me a lot more frequently now.”
“I’ll adjust.” She winked. “Besides, this means I get to take regular ‘work trips’ to Montana. Didn’t you say you bought a boat?”
Nolan laughed. “We’re just pawns, Logan. Little pieces on her chessboard.”
Piper gave us both a diabolical smile.
“What’s Thea going to think about all this?” Nolan asked.
I ran a hand through my hair and sighed. “I haven’t told her anything yet.”
“What!” Piper shrieked as she punched me in the arm. “You haven’t told her what you’re doing? Oh my god, why not? What is wrong with you?”
“Ouch.” I rubbed my bicep. “I didn’t want to get her hopes up if something came up. There was no guarantee the firm would let me out of my partnership. And I wasn’t going to make her a promise that I wasn’t one hundred percent sure I could keep. She’s had enough people let her down. I won’t be one of them.”
“Oh.” Piper relaxed. “Well, everything is all set here. What are you waiting for?”
I grinned and checked my watch. “My flight.”
“Hi,” I answered Sean’s call as I beeped the locks on the rental car waiting for me outside the airport.
“Did you make it?”
“Yeah. I just got in.” The six-hour flight from New York to Kalispell had put me back in Montana right before dark, thanks to the favorable time change and tailwind. I’d landed with just enough time to call Charlie and say goodnight, then talk to Thea while the plane had taxied off the runway.
“Good.” Except he didn’t sound good. “I’ve got some news.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as I opened the door and slid into the driver’s seat, tossing my bag in the back. “Did you find him?”
Sean had been trying to track down Thea’s email harasser for two weeks without luck. And since the emails to Thea had stopped, it had made his hunt that much harder. But I’d told him to keep digging, no matter the cost. So after hitting one dead end after another, Sean had called in one of his underground hacker friends to help.
“We found him. Does the name Ronny Berkowitz ring any bells?”
Ronny Berkowitz. I replayed it a few times as I turned on the ignition. “No.”
“He’s a local, but from what we can tell, he lies low. He works from his house, building cyber security systems.”
Which explained why Sean had such a hard time tracing his identity. “What else?”
“He’s originally from Dallas but moved to Lark Cove about five years ago. Ronny’s not someone you want around Thea, Logan.”
“Fuck.” I shoved the SUV into drive and floored it out of the parking lot. “Why?”
“He was arrested about seven years ago for stalking a bartender in Texas. Things got fairly intense. He ended up breaking into her house and scaring her pretty bad. Luckily, her boyfriend got home early before Ronny could hurt her.”
My jaw clenched as I swerved around a semi-trailer to get on the highway. Its horn blared as I zoomed past, gunning the engine faster.
“I’ve got a picture of that bartender. Her name is Angela Peters. And she looks a lot like Thea.”
“Call the cops. Now. Send them everything you’ve found, plus the emails you pulled from Thea’s account.”
“I already did. The sheriff is fully briefed.”
“Call them back. I’ll be at Thea’s in thirty minutes, maybe less if I hurry. Until I get there, I want someone outside her house.”
“Will do. What else?”
“Ruin him,” I growled.
“Same drill as last time?”
The last time being when I’d discovered Emmeline had a stalker. Sean had arranged for someone to scare him off. This time around, a few punches to the face weren’t good enough. I wanted Ronny Berkowitz destroyed.
“No. I want him broke. Zero out his bank account. Max his credit cards. Have his car impounded. Get him fired from his job. Expose him as a stalker to the local media. Whatever you can think of. I want Lark Cove to be the last place on earth this guy wants to stay. Can you do that?”
Sean chuckled. “And then some. Now that I’m into his network, I can bring it all down.”
“Do it.” I hung up the phone and immediately dialed Thea.
When she didn’t answer, I tried her again. And again.
“Answer the phone, Thea.”
She didn’t. By my fourth attempt, I was doing twice the speed limit down the highway.
Because my gut was screaming that we’d found Ronny too late.
