Inarticulate (18 page)

Punishing.

He spared her one final, torturously long look and then strode down the hall, letting the suite door click shut behind him.

She wrapped her arms around her waist and stared blankly at the open suitcase on her bed. The thought of repacking her things after he’d touched them made her whimper. She didn’t want to deny him. And in the same breath she didn’t want him to claim victory.

Staying meant emotional weakness. Leaving showed professional fragility.

Numb to the world around her, she pulled her cell from her pocket and turned it on. She ignored the continuous beep of updates and the fifteen unread messages noted on her screen, and navigated to her email.

At the top of her inbox sat Patrick Black’s name, the subject—All Interviews Cancelled Until Further Notice.

She clicked on the link and smiled at the email addressed to all Rydel staff. It was an apology. A formal notice from the CEO of Grandiosity over the miscommunication and unintentional stress they had caused. He noted that all interviews were cancelled until a suitable, friendlier approach to the transition could be arranged, and promised to create a positive environment for his future employees.

Savannah wanted to cry in relief.

Something good and solid had sprouted from the ashes of her lust-inspired mistake. There was hope. At least for the Rydel Seattle team members. Her position, on the other hand, was still unclear.

She didn’t want to announce to Spencer that she’d made a mess of the upcoming settlement as well as the opportunity to move on from their relationship. The professional failure was a point of pride. The personal defeat would place her in a detrimental position.

Spencer claimed to want her to move on. He kept poking at her to start dating and broadcasted the lie that he would finally have closure if she found another man.

In reality, he hoped she would try, but fail in the process. He itched to be the white knight. To make up for the mistakes of his past by picking up whatever weak and vulnerable pieces he thought would be left behind if she wasn’t successful in the dating pool.

He wanted her in the exact position she was in, which didn’t leave her in a hurry to get back to Seattle. The only other option was to keep her mouth shut and hope Penny didn’t stoop to a level that involved tittle-tattling.

Decisions, decisions.

The unread message icon glared at her. A constant taunt. There was no time like the present to get another Keenan experience over and done with.

She clicked on the button, and gave a derisive laugh as his name sat right at the top of the screen. Her finger stroked over the letters, a brief moment of whimsy in the forest of devastation, before she tapped to open his text.

She’d been wrong. He hadn’t sent her messages all day. There was only one. Only a solitary brutal notification.

Keenan: If you leave, Penelope wins
.

S
avannah slunk
into her chair and stared at the far wall. She hadn’t left Seattle, not yet, and every day she questioned her sanity over the decision. It would’ve been easier to repack her things and walk away without a backward glance. Only the nasty clutch of responsibility dug its nails into her neck.

If she gave up, Spencer would replace her, and that man hadn’t worked a hard day in his life. He wouldn’t give a shit about the wedding. He wouldn’t care if staff were stressed and fearing for their future. He’d only look at the bottom line—the line that determined occupancy levels—and as long as that was in the black, everything else would go to hell.

All that shouldn’t have mattered, but then she thought of Kelly, whose mother was dying in the hospital. Or Grant, who had only just started to open up to her and speak without stress etching his voice. Or Amanda, who was working her ass off to make the wedding work under the worst of circumstances.

They didn’t deserve to be abandoned, even when she was currently cursing her guilty conscience for pushing her anxiety to the max.

“You need to speak to him. It’ll work out. I promise.”

Savannah raised her focus from the mess of scattered pages on the conference table and met Kelly’s concern. “I know.”

“I mean, you need to speak to him
now
. Get it off your chest.”

A defeated sigh escaped her lips as she nodded. “Give me a moment, will you?”

She hadn’t seen sunlight for at least six hours. Her time had been spent in this chair, at this table, speaking to different parts of the management team in an ongoing attempt to mesh uncooperative puzzle pieces together.

She patted the scattered pages in front of her and came up with her cell. There were numerous emails, texts, and calls that she’d missed while it lay silenced on the polished wood, and she swiped past them all to get to her phone directory. Her finger tapped the unfavorable number near the top and the resulting dial tone increased her lazy heartbeat.

“Savannah…”

“Hi, Spencer.” His voice batted away any homesick feelings that had festered. “Is your dad free to conference call?”

There was a pregnant pause, one that spoke heavily of his concern. “Hold on a second. I’ll check.”

The San Francisco radio station kept her company as she waited. A week had passed since she packed her suitcase to return home. Seven long days, with each one marred with a text from Keenan to greet her in the morning.

Every correspondence was a demand, a brief few words that exposed no emotion.

Keenan: Meet me at the Sated Palate, 8pm.

Keenan: Be at the corner of Lincoln and Park at noon
.

Keenan: I need to speak to you. I’ll buy you a coffee at Winchesters. 10am.

The list went on, and she’d ignored them all.

She should’ve been happy he’d kept tabs on her, that he’d snooped to determine she stayed in Seattle. Only every time she received a message it became harder to pretend she was unaffected by his attention. She’d learned to combat the spike in her pulse by occupying herself with work. Morale had increased. Pessimism was in freefall. Penny hadn’t been on the scene, not via emails or unannounced visits.

Life had settled back into place… too quickly to be comforting.

The only task she hadn’t been able to kick into submission, now that Grandiosity was in her pocket, was the upcoming wedding. Amanda had shared the long list of intricacies the bride and groom expected for the big day. All Savannah could do was cement a smile on her face to hide her lack of confidence. They didn’t have enough staff to accommodate table service for alcohol, let alone provide one server for each table as requested by the happy couple.

But that was a tidbit they were keeping under their belt. For now.

The radio vanished and Mathew Rydel’s voice drifted over the line, “Savannah?”

“Yes, I’m here.”

“I’m here, too,” Spencer added. “What’s the problem?”

Nausea threatened to take hold. “I need to discuss something with you.”

“You haven’t stormed the Grandiosity head office again, have you?” Mathew asked.

“That was ballsy.” Spencer chuckled. “The pole up Grandiosity’s ass isn’t something to be reckoned with.”

“It was far from
storming
.” She hadn’t planned on telling anyone about her meeting with Patrick Black, not until she realized hiding the situation would leave her open to more scrutiny. She ended up calling Spencer three days ago, smothering him with every morsel of information that didn’t involve Keenan and Penny so he wouldn’t be interested in asking more questions. The strategy had worked. He’d been tired of her chatter before she’d finished speaking. “It was merely a conversation—”

“Where you threatened legal action,” Mathew scoffed.

Oh, yeah. She’d forgotten that part. “It was a bluff. We both knew it.”

“Well, now that they’re playing nice, you need to do the same.” Her boss’s tone turned firm. The candor was over. “I want you to leave a favorable impression at the welcome meeting.”

Welcome meeting?
“What welcome meeting?”

A huff of frustration coursed down the line. “I’m starting to question what you’re getting up to over there. When was the last time you checked your emails?”

Her chest thumped a little louder, a little harder, and she gripped the phone tight in her now sweaty palm. “First thing this morning,” she bit back. “I’ve spent every waking minute in this claustrophobic conference room, trying to sort out a problem that could potentially cost us a bucket-load of money. That’s the reason for my call. I need to discuss the wedding we have to cater.”

AKA the task that stole away all unfavorable thoughts of Keenan.

“As is,” she continued, “we don’t have enough staff to cover the function. We’ve had too many resignations—” Kelly had been right about the two waitresses. Tammy and Layla handed in their notice at the start of the week and Savannah had no confidence in them showing up for the time they had left. “—and employees are already covering the workload of other people. I’ve done everything within my power to resolve the issue, but there simply isn’t an easy option. I need your advice.”

“Go on,” Spencer spoke up.

“This morning, I’ve held meetings with the shift manager, as well as the event and restaurant managers, and the head chef. We’ve gone over the staff rosters again and again. The only way I can make this wedding work, is to shut down room service and close the restaurant for lunch and dinner. In return, I thought I could have the chef create a limited list of bar meals that the kitchen should be able to handle during the function.”

She had lists on everything, because lists kept her distracted and distraction was key.

“You can’t call in temporary staff?” Spencer asked.

“I’ve called every recruitment agency, numerous times. I’ve begged, more than once, for the staff who previously resigned to come back, even if just for one night. I’ve done everything possible, and there still aren’t enough people to cover the wedding. Nobody wants to do us any favors the day before Thanksgiving.”

There was silence, the deafening sound filled with disappointment.

“With occupancy at a dangerous level, I can only assume the wedding is keeping our heads above water,” Mathew murmured.

“Yes. That’s right.” The wedding would infuse the hotel with the last burst of life before the inevitable death in a few weeks. “Without the function, we’d sink below the red line.”

“Then do what needs to be done.”

She leaned back in her chair. “Okay. Thank you.”

“And Savannah?”

“Yeah?”

“Check your emails and make sure your attendance at the welcome meeting is noted. I appreciate you going in to kick some Grandiosity ass, but now you need to resolve any bad blood. We can’t afford to be a thorn in their side.”

That thud in her chest increased. “I’ll try my best.”

“Please do. Otherwise, I’ll have to send Spencer to clean up the mess.”

In other words, he’d label her inadequate, just as she’d feared.

“I understand,” she lied. She’d worked too hard and tangled herself in too many strangling vines to let Spencer take over.

Mathew ended the call, allowing her to navigate to her inbox. She expected another delightful message from Patrick, or maybe a restrained email from Penny. Instead, her heart sank at the sender’s name in the middle of her unread messages.

Keenan Black.

Subject: Grandiosity Welcome Meeting.

Every word was professional. Poised. He offered his apologies over previous emails sent by his staff and hoped a casual conversation, while sharing a few drinks at the Grandiosity bar, would be a better way to make introductions. The passage was eloquent, his mannerisms so foreign in comparison to the texts he’d previously sent her, that she knew the message was faux.

It was a provocation.

A checkmate.

A resounding—you-wouldn’t-meet-with-me-of-your-own-free-will-so-I’ll-play-hardball.

Bastard.

She shoved from the conference table and clapped her three-inch heels to the lobby. There was a mob again, familiar faces standing in a circle. This time they weren’t conspiring in anger. They were smiling. Happy. Their conversation littered with laughter and optimism.

“Did you get the email?” Grant called out.

She cringed through a nod. “I guess you did, too.”

He made his way to her, leaving the crowd behind. “We all did. Management, I mean. We’ve already passed the details on to the rest of the staff. I guess your meeting with Grandiosity really worked.”

“Yeah.” She tried to pull off a smile but there was no way the uncomfortable lift of her cheeks was pleasant. “Just as long as everyone is aware that we’ll be in major wedding preparation mode the following day.”

Grant frowned. “Is everything okay?”

“Of course,” she muttered. “Perfect.” There was no way she could admit the meeting was scheduled to manipulate her instead of welcome new staff. “Could you do a call-around and find out attendance numbers? I’ll make sure to RSVP for us all.”

No matter how cloying it was to announce Keenan’s deceit, she needed her team to remain positive. This was an important moment for them. They’d be able to enjoy their Thanksgiving without fearing for their future. They could relax. Unwind.

Her discomfort was a small price to pay to give Rydel employees peace of mind.

There was also the opportunity for retribution.

A genuine smile curved her lips at the thought. If Keenan wanted to keep pushing, maybe she could show him her ability to push back, equally hard, and with a favorable amount of cleavage showing.

S
avannah
,

I used dirty tactics while we were together. I also used them while we were apart. But I have no plan to use them now. I want you to come back to me of your own free will. I want you to forgive me and believe my promise that it will never happen again.

Please don’t blame Penelope for her involvement. Or Dominic for not telling you. It’s all on me. I’m to blame, not only for hurting you but for tearing apart the Augustines with the weight of my lies.

My actions in no way dictate how I feel for you. You deserved better. I only hope you give me another chance to show you how you truly deserve to be treated, instead of Spencer.

Keenan