Vows They Can't Escape. Heidi Rice

he suggested. His first preference was to leave forty-five per cent of Carmichael’s stock to you and the controlling share to your spouse as the new CEO. As no such marriage was contracted at the time of his death, he has put the controlling share in trust, to be administered by the board until you complete a five-year probationary period as Carmichael’s executive owner. If, after that period, they deem you a credible CEO, they can vote to allocate a further six per cent of the shares to you. If not, they can elect another CEO and leave the shares in trust.’

      That deadline had passed a week ago. The board—no doubt against all her father’s expectations—had voted in her favour. And then Bill had discovered his bombshell—that she had still technically been married to Dane at the time of her father’s death and he could, therefore, sue for the controlling share in the company.

      It might almost have been funny—that her father’s lack of trust in her abilities might end up gifting 55 per cent of his company to a man he had despised—if it hadn’t been more evidence that her father had never trusted her with Carmichael’s.

      She pushed the dispiriting thought to one side, and the echo of grief that came with it, as Dane punched a number into his smartphone.

      Her father might have been old-fashioned and hopelessly traditional—an aristocratic Englishman who believed that no man who hadn’t gone to Eton and Oxford could ever be a suitable husband for her—but he had loved her and had wanted the best for her. Once she got Dane to sign on the dotted line, thus eliminating any possible threat this paperwork error could present to her father’s company—her company—she would finally have proved her commitment to Carmichael’s was absolute.

      ‘Jack? I’ve got something I want you to check out.’ Dane beckoned to someone behind Xanthe as he spoke into the phone. The superefficient PA popped back into the office as if by magic. ‘Mel is gonna send it over by messenger.’

      He handed the document to his PA, then scribbled something on a pad and passed that to her, too. The PA trotted out.

      ‘Make sure you check every line,’ he continued, still talking to whomever was on the other end of the phone. He gave a strained chuckle. ‘Not exactly—it’s supposed to be divorce papers.’

      The judgmental once-over he gave Xanthe had her temper rising up her torso.

      ‘I’ll explain the why and the how another time,’ he said. ‘Just make sure there are no surprises—like a hidden claim for ten years’ back-alimony.’

      He clicked off the phone and shoved it into his pocket.

      She was actually speechless. For about two seconds.

      ‘Are you finished?’ Indignation burned, the breathing technique history.

      She’d come all this way, spent several sleepless nights preparing for this meeting while being constantly tormented by painful memories from that summer, not to mention having to deal with his scent and the inappropriate heat that would not die. And through it all she’d remained determined to keep this process dignified, despite the appalling way he had treated her. And he’d shot it all to hell in less than five minutes.

      The arrogant ass.

      ‘Don’t play the innocent with me,’ he continued, the self-righteous glare returning. ‘Because I know just what you’re capable—’

      ‘You son of a...’ She gasped for breath, outrage consuming her. ‘I’m not allowed to play the innocent? When you took my virginity, carried on seducing me all summer, got me pregnant, insisted I marry you and then dumped me three months later?’

      He’d never told her he loved her—never even tried to see her point of view during their one and only argument. But, worse than that, he hadn’t been there when she had needed him the most. Her stomach churned, the in-flight meal she’d picked at on the plane threatening to gag her as misery warred with fury, bringing the memories flooding back—memories which were too painful to forget even though she’d tried.

      The pungent smell of mould and cheap disinfectant in the motel bathroom, the hazy sight of the cracked linoleum through the blur of tears, the pain hacking her in two as she prayed for him to pick up his phone.

      Dane’s face went completely blank, before a red stain of fury lanced across the tanned cheekbones. ‘I dumped you? Are you nuts?’ he yelled at top volume.

      ‘You walked out and left me in that motel room and you didn’t answer my calls.’ She matched him decibel for decibel. She wasn’t that besotted girl any more, too timid and delusional to stand up and fight her corner. ‘What else would you call it?’

      ‘I was two hundred miles out at sea, crewing on a bluefin tuna boat—that’s what I’d call it. I didn’t get your calls because there isn’t a heck of a lot of network coverage in the middle of the North Atlantic. And when I got back a week later I found out you’d hightailed it back to daddy because of one damn disagreement.’

      The revelation of where he’d been while she’d been losing their baby gave her pause—but only for a moment. He could have rung her to tell her about the job before he’d boarded the boat, but in his typical don’t-ask-don’t-tell fashion he hadn’t. And what about the frantic message she’d left him while she’d waited for her father to arrive and take her to the emergency room? And later, when she’d come round from the fever dreams back in her bedroom on her father’s estate?

      She’d asked the staff to contact Dane, to tell him about the baby, her heart breaking into a thousand pieces, but he’d never even responded to the news. Except to send through the signed divorce papers weeks later.

      She could have forgiven him for not caring about her. Their marriage had been the definition of a shotgun wedding, the midnight elopement a crazy adventure hyped up on teenage hormones, testosterone-fuelled bravado and the mad panic caused by an unplanned pregnancy. But it was his failure to care about the three-month-old life which had died inside her, his failure to even be willing to mourn its passing, that she couldn’t forgive.

      It had tortured her for months. How many lies he’d told about being there for her, respecting her decision to have the baby. How he’d even gone through with their farce of a marriage, while all the time planning to dump her at the first opportunity.

      It had made no sense to her for so long—until she’d finally figured it out. Why he’d always deflected conversations about the future, about the baby. Why he’d never once returned her declarations of love even while stoking the sexual heat between them to fever pitch. Why he’d stormed out that morning after her innocent suggestion that she look for a job, too, because she knew he was struggling to pay their motel bill.

      He’d gotten bored with the marriage, with the responsibility. And sex had been the only thing binding them together. He’d never wanted her or the baby. His offer of marriage had been a knee-jerk reaction he’d soon regretted. And once she’d lost the baby he’d had the perfect excuse he’d been looking for to discard her.

      That truth had devastated her at the time. Brought her to her knees. How could she have been so wrong about him? About them? But it had been a turning point, too. Because she’d survived the loss, repaired her shattered heart, and made herself into the woman she was now—someone who didn’t rely on others to make herself whole.

      Thanks to Dane’s carelessness, his neglect, she’d shut off her stupid, fragile, easily duped heart and found a new purpose—devoting herself to the company that was her legacy. She’d begged her father for a lowly internship position that autumn, when they’d returned to London, and begun working her backside off to learn everything she needed to know about Europe’s top maritime logistics brand.

      At first it had been a distraction, a means of avoiding the great big empty space inside her. But eventually she’d stopped simply going through the motions and actually found something to care about again. She’d aced her MBA, learnt French and Spanish while working in Carmichael’s subsidiary offices in Calais and Cadiz, and even managed to persuade her father to give her a job at the company’s head office in Whitehall before he’d