At the Billionaire’s Wedding (43 page)

On Sunday morning Cali ran around the estate’s perimeter and, once again, ended at the gazebo. One of Duke’s tech girls was there with a laptop. Cali borrowed it to check e-mail.

Work messages cluttered her inbox, including one with the subject heading “Back to Work” that Dick had sent yesterday morning.

Cali,

Now that the bookmobile project is dead, I’ll look forward to seeing you again in the main branch, Monday through Saturday. Two of those days will include evening hours. If you’re unable to accommodate this schedule adjustment, let me know after the staff meeting Monday and I’ll find someone else for your position. Two of the pages look promising.

Dick B.

Blind to the beautiful morning, and deaf to the tech girl’s “See you, California,” Cali walked back to the house. George had said they’d need to leave by ten. She wished she had another ride to the airport. But if she couldn’t sit for a few hours in the limo Piers had hired, she’d have a tough time living in a city where his name was in the news every week.

She hugged Jane good-bye, thanked Harry and Mark again for showing her the priceless copy of
Pride and Prejudice
, and climbed into the limousine. Soon familiar reality would be hers again. It was far past time.

The Fifty-Eighth Floor

Piers didn’t knock. Putting his hand to the knob, he opened the thick black door and strode into his grandfather’s office. Jacob Taylor Vaughan Prescott commanded the fifty-eighth floor of the Prescott building, alone at the top of his empire except for his secretary’s office, the boardroom, a party room, a private gymnasium, and a track that ran along half the building. Seventy-five and still fit, with silvery white hair and an arresting profile that J.T.—his intended heir—had inherited, he sat behind a desk topped with black granite before a flat-screen computer.

Piers waited. His grandfather had taught him that silence was often more powerful than words. And he hadn’t yet managed to control his temper.

Eyes on the screen, his grandfather said, “I assume you’ve had enough of this foolish little rebellion and are ready to return to work.”

A shaft of icy chill went through Piers. His grandfather sounded remarkably like the emperor in
Star Wars
. How hadn’t he noticed that before?

He didn’t answer.

Finally his grandfather’s hands retreated from the keyboard, and he sat back in his chair. He lifted a brow. “Well?”

“You shouldn’t have done it. It was petulant, the act of an angry child rather than a man of business. You’re already being criticized for it.”

“When I care what the idiot liberals at the
City Paper
have to say about me, I will make certain to inform you. Now, if you have useful information to impart to me, do so. If not, leave me to my work.”

“I’m leaving.”

“Don’t be a fool.”

“I’m leaving, Grandfather.” His sense of relief was so profound that for an instant he could only breathe in and out slowly, and deeper with each inhalation.
Freedom.
For the first time in a decade, he felt free. “I had hoped to go without bad feelings. But your recommendation to the foundation regarding the
America’s Heroes
exhibition convinced me that I don’t need to worry about your feelings. Or your scruples. Nevertheless, I wanted to tell you in person that I’m leaving. I’ll be gone from the building tonight. After she’s wrapped up some tasks, Mrs. Crowley will be leaving as well.”

“To go where?” His grandfather spoke tightly. “Will you have one of the best assistants in the city ladling stew at a soup kitchen?”

Piers laughed. He’d been through the worst already—thirty-six hours of nonstop meetings with board members, lawyers, journalists, and the library’s director. But he’d made it out the other side of this mess, and his grandfather hadn’t won.

“Good-bye, Grandfather. If you can bear to dine with a family of failures, I’ll see you at Mom’s at Thanksgiving.”

He left the office of the CEO of Prescott Global for the last time and went down to his office a floor below. He’d called his secretary in on a Sunday to help put things in order, and she’d greeted him more cheerfully than in years.

“Mr. Prescott, your mother called and asked—”

“Insisted.”

“—that you come for dinner tonight. Your lawyer, Mr. Charlotte, called as well. The funds have been transferred from the account in the Netherlands and will be available for use at the start of the business day tomorrow through Deutsche Bank. And the reporter at the
City Paper
has several follow-up questions. I’ve forwarded those to you.
Philadelphia in the Morning
is requesting a ten-minute spot tomorrow. Should I accept or decline?”

“Accept. Then let’s finish the Bingley Industries report so you can pack that away with the rest. And please tell my mother I’d very much like to see her, but later this week would work better.”

“I’m sure she’ll understand, sir, given the circumstances.”

“Mrs. Crowley, we’ve got a long night ahead of us here.”

“But a good one, sir.”

“I’m glad you’re happy with the change.”

“Honestly, I’d gotten awfully impatient for it.” She shook her head and marched into the meeting room and the stacks of file boxes there, leaving him staring bemusedly. But he understood impatience well enough. California’s plane was due to land in an hour.

That battle wasn’t yet won. She had walls fifty miles high. But her family’s tragedies hadn’t made her cold or withdrawn. Instead, she poured her passion into service to others. And she’d shown him that even when he intended the best, he still operated just like his grandfather. She’d been right about him. But he could change. He’d changed already.

If he could change, she could too. Just enough to let him through the wall. After that, life was going to get pretty damn good.

Cali heaved her suitcase through the apartment door, thinking of Mark and the helpful staff at Brampton, then firmly archiving the memory. Dropping her stuff, she went into the kitchen and switched on the burner under the teakettle.

“Zoe?” she called. No answer. Sleeping probably.

She dragged the suitcase to her room, plugged in her dead phone, and returned to the kitchen to make tea. Leaving it to steep, she went to unpack.

Her phone blinked to life. The text message bell trilled, and messages leaped onto the screen one after another. Below an unidentified number was a message with a time stamp from right before her plane landed:
Crazy woman who doesn’t have an international plan. Hope your trip back was smooth. I want to see you tonight.

An hour later:
Call me, Cali.

Then fifteen minutes ago:
I’ll wait- Piers

She scrolled through the list of calls she’d missed during the week: Work. Landlord. Medicaid rep. Zoe’s OT. At the end of the list was a message from Piers. Her finger hovered over the Play button. She clicked Delete.

He didn’t get it. He didn’t get that she couldn’t even afford
regular
phone service. And he didn’t get that when he disappeared without explanation she would feel like someone had punched her repeatedly in the stomach. He didn’t get that she wasn’t the kind of woman he’d dated before. He was so completely in another world from her, he would never get it.

Setting her phone on her half-unpacked suitcase, she sat down on the edge of the bed and tears ran down her cheeks. Zoe wheeled into the doorway.

Cali swiped her hand across her face. “I’m back.” She tried to laugh it off.

Zoe gave her a sympathetic face. “Wedding envy or jet lag?”

“Exhaustion.” Partial truth. She picked up her phone, turned it off and tossed it on the bed table, then hugged her sister for a full minute. “Did you have fun with Nurse Marcia?”

“Best week of my life. We watched
All My Children
reruns for ten hours every day.”

This time Cali laughed honestly, but it came out burbled with tears she’d suppressed since she’d woken up to find Piers gone and realized she’d fallen for him despite everything. She bent to her suitcase and pulled out one of the sexy shirts Roxanna gave her that had made him want her.

Zoe’s lips pinched. “What happened, Cal?”

“I took your advice.” She tossed the shirt and her jeans into the overflowing hamper. Fantasy over. Back to reality with a hard shove.

“What advice?”

“I hooked up with a hot, rich guy and had mind-blowing wedding party sex in a garden. Also in a stairwell and in both of our bedrooms.” She bent to remove her shoes from the suitcase, but instead hung there with her face pressed into her knees. “There was some very fine making out in a limo, too, and in a stable,” she said, her voice muffled by her jeans. “Oh, and at the pool. Then he left without saying good-bye, and now my heart hurts like hell and it’s all your fault.”

“Bull,” Zoe said. “You wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t wanted to.”

“I know. I said that to try to make myself laugh, but it didn’t work.”

“Has he called?”

“Yes.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

Cali raised her face, damp with tears. “I can’t do it, Zoe. I just can’t.”

Zoe pushed up out of her wheelchair and moved onto the bed beside her. Wrapping her arms around Cali, she stroked her hair. “I’m so sorry you’re hurting, sweetie. So, so sorry.”

“You’re comforting me,” she mumbled into Zoe’s shoulder.

“Is that okay?”

“That you’re well enough to comfort someone else? It’s the answer to every one of my prayers.”

“Who is he, Cali?”

“Who
was
he.” Cali pulled back. “Piers Prescott.”

Zoe blinked. “Big money Piers Prescott?”

“Yes.”

“Wow. When I said hot and rich, I didn’t think you’d really go after
hot
and
rich
.”

“I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to take you literally.”

“Wait.” Zoe’s eyes widened. “He’s the one who funded the bookmobile.”

A sick feeling twined through Cali’s stomach. “How do you know that?”

“It’s been all over the local news this weekend.” She slid back into her chair and spun away. “I’ve got the paper right here,” she shouted from the other room. Cali followed.

Zoe waved the paper at her. “The lefties at the
City Paper
are so excited that for once a Prescott is doing something good for the masses, they did a huge spread on it.”

Cali opened the paper with shaking hands. He’d said his grandfather would never find out. So he lied about that too. She should have expected it. She should have known.

“Apparently Jacob Prescott found out about the bookmobile and threatened to pull the money for that big exhibition, America’s Heroes, that the Prescott Foundation is funding at the library,” Zoe said, “plus three other cultural projects in the city. So Piers came out with it all to get support. I guess it worked. The morning news today said that if the Prescott Foundation walked, both the Barnes Foundation and the Pierpont Morgan in New York would step up to fund
America’s Heroes
. And Piers and his uncle—some doctor, I think—set up a new trust for the bookmobile, so that’s safe too. The editorial in today’s
Inquirer
is less gushing than the
City Paper
, but still seemed impressed. The
Star
was all about Piers at Jane and Duke’s wedding, of course. Apparently that’s where the paparazzi got the news about the bookmobile.” Her eyes went wide. “Holy crap, Cali. You knew he was the donor, didn’t you?”

“I found out accidentally, after he slept with me a few times.” She folded up the
City Paper
, dropped it in the recycling bin, and went back into the bedroom to finish unpacking. Inside the black silk pumps she’d worn to the rehearsal dinner she found a folded sheet of Brampton monogrammed paper.

California, I have to fly back this morning. My grandfather learned about my donation to the library from the paps chasing Duke and Jane. He’s angry with me, and threatening to take board action against the library. I’ve got to go head off disaster. You’re so incredibly beautiful sleeping now, I can’t bear to wake you. And I hope you’re dreaming of me, so there’s some self-interest here too. Enjoy the wedding. I’ll see you at home tomorrow. Call as soon as you land. –P

When she looked up, Zoe was in the doorway. “Accidentally?”

“Yes.” Cali crumpled up the note and threw it in the wastebasket.

“What was that?”

“Oh, just a letter from Mom reminding me not to get involved with guys with whom I have absolutely nothing in common.” Paparazzi. Private jets. Million-dollar donations. Foundations that could cripple a library in one blow. Titans battling it out, using mountains as weapons while the little people below got crushed by the resulting boulders.

Thank God for the paparazzi. She’d gotten a lucky break. The quicker the hit came, the quicker the bruise healed.

“Cali—”

“I’m really wiped out, and it’s 3 a.m. in England now. Are you okay for the night?”

Zoe nodded.