Tess sighed. “What do you expect me to say?”
“Nothing. I don’t know. It’s a hard situation, but right now I don’t feel I can take the job.” He looked almost like a dog trying to nose the bone her way after he’d already gnawed off the fattest parts.
“Oh, please. Who passes up a job like this?” she said, trying not to hiss at him.
God, please tell me he’s not that stupid. Please tell me this isn’t some capricious acceptance of a job. She couldn’t handle it if he treated it like it was no big deal.
Graham shrugged. “Everything’s pretty much ruined. I can’t be your father’s pawn in a game I don’t even understand.”
“Pawn?”
“Well, something’s up. Otherwise you would have been in on this from the beginning, right? I don’t know why your father has done what he’s done, but I’m wading in uncharted waters without a compass.”
Tess didn’t want to admit he was partly right, didn’t want to forget the asshole status she’d assigned him. None of his admissions fixed anything in the world falling apart around her.
“I’m not going to lie. I need this job—it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me—but I never slinked in. I never took anything from you. I’m not saying I’m blameless or you shouldn’t be angry, but don’t paint me as what I’m not. I was a jerk to you, but I did nothing wrong in regard to this job.”
“A jerk I can deal with. This? Not so much,” she said, turning her head toward the far bank of Algiers Point. She didn’t want him to see the cracks in her. Didn’t want him to know how much his callous disregard almost a month ago had dinged her pride, had made her wonder why she wasn’t good enough for a guy to want as more than just a good time.
Why buy the cow... Her mother’s voice echoed inside her head.
Maybe that was Tess’s problem—she wanted to be in love, craved the touch of a man who would love her back, so much she plunged in without checking the depth.
In Graham’s case the water had been about six inches deep.
Splat.
Graham moved closer, his steps sounding sympathetic, even though Tess knew that was impossible. “Don’t,” she said, flinging out a hand.
“What?”
“Don’t come near me.”
He stopped, resting his hands on his hips. “Look, it will be easier for everyone if I dissolve the contract and move on. It’s the least I can do in this situation.”
Tess snorted. “The least you can do? Whatever. Spare me your sympathy.”
“It’s not sympathy. I’m trying to do the right thing.”
“Well, don’t. I’m not working here. My father obviously doesn’t value me enough to think I can handle our family business. I won’t waste your time with how that makes me feel. He’s not giving the job to me so I could give a rat’s ass who takes it.”
Graham searched her face with shuttered eyes of arctic blue. “I can break the contract.”
“No, you can’t. My father gets what he wants, and he’s never played well when it comes to business. If you quit, he’ll sue you, wrap you up in red tape and hire someone else.”
Graham swallowed again. Hard. “Surely once I tell him our relationship—”
“Why? We don’t have a relationship. It was sex. Meaningless sex. Let’s not make it what it isn’t. Besides, why would he care? He’s a misogynist Italian who could have run the mafia but decided he’d rather screw people legally. Don’t let his Hush Puppies shoes fool you. Frank Ullo’s a shark.”
Graham seemed to think about this. “I still don’t feel right though. Doesn’t feel good to me.”
So now he feels bad? He should have felt bad two weeks ago when she put her heart on the line and called him, when she told him she’d never felt this way about anyone and asked him to call her. That’s when he should have been honorable and at least given her the decency of a call.
But she didn’t say that. Instead she shrugged. “Too bad. You’re the new boss. Might as well start thinking about who you are and how you want to be perceived by everyone here. He’s not going to let you go easily. He doesn’t care about ‘feelings.’”
Graham shook his head and she could feel his frustration. Welcome to the club, buddy.
“How can I take your job?”
“It wasn’t my job. My dad made his point—this is his company. Not mine. I suppose your first order of business will be to hire my replacement.” Tess stared toward the door. Like a wave heading her way, she could feel the emotion inside her building. She didn’t want to stay here any longer with a man who had rejected her as a woman. The man who had taken what she thought to be hers.... A man she still felt an ungodly attraction to even as her world unwound. Tess could pull off the ice-princess routine for only so long.... She was coming undone, and she’d be damned if she did it in front of anyone. Much less him. “See ya around.”
She tried to slide quickly by him, but he reached out. “Wait, Tess.”
“Please don’t touch me,” she begged, her voice almost at a whisper. She really couldn’t stand the tenderness in his touch. He felt sorry for her. That was all. And something about that hurt more than if he’d been the ruthless son of a bitch she’d wanted to paint him as.
“What can I do to make this right?” he asked, his voice plaintive and so freaking sincere.
“You can’t. Only I can make this right by moving on and proving I can be more than daddy’s little girl. The best you can do is to take care of this company. There are a lot of good people here and they deserve better than a half-assed job by their new boss.”
She wrenched her arm from his grasp and climbed the steps that would lead her to a place she loved...a place where she no longer belonged.
Quitting had been her choice and it had been one she had to make. Her assumptions had gotten her nothing but wounded pride, but she knew she wasn’t part of this business merely because her name was Ullo. She was good at her job. She’d brought in new accounts and the floats she oversaw were detailed and cost-effective. She hadn’t done well because her father owned the company...she’d done well because she’d pushed herself to live up to his name.
And now she would take her experience and foresight to a new company. She would show the world—and her father—just how good she was.
“Tess?” Graham’s voice carried on the river breeze.
He stood etched hard against the muddy waters and soft emerging spring green of the brush along the riverbank.
“I’m sorry.”
Tess lifted her chin. “At least someone is.”
CHAPTER SIX
GRAHAM TWISTED THE KEY in the door of the apartment he’d rented two weeks ago and pushed inside.
What a crappy day.
The dim room was hardly welcoming with an old leather couch that had a rip in the arm, a big-screen TV perched on a less than sturdy table and a single flowered armchair donated by his brother’s girlfriend. The place looked pathetic, but it would have to do until he could afford some new stuff. Currently, he had bills due and wanted to take Emily camping at the beginning of summer.
The contract he’d signed had given him a nice salary, a large enough expense account and a car. Soon, he’d be back to where he once was, replenishing his meager savings and funding the retirement fund he’d depleted. The severance package NASA had given him had helped buffer the loss he’d taken on the sale of his condo.