After a mumbled, borderline incomprehensible apology, Stella simply finished the presentation abruptly and ran out of the room.
Stella knew what it must have looked like to her colleagues. Worse, Stella knew that the senior directors were most likely wondering what the hell they were doing employing her in the first place, let alone considering her for a VP role.
I screwed it all up.
They’ll all think I’m a total joke.
I may as well quit now…
Stella lifted her head out of her hands and looked around the garden. Not even the wonderfully curated bushes and soothing trickle of the mini waterfall were of any solace.
To say that it had been a bad day at the office would be the understatement of the year by some distance. Stella had not only performed poorly, but she had done it right in direct view of Lauren Treen.
Stella knew that Lauren would have relished every single moment of seeing her suffer like that, and it would give Lauren even more fuel to try to undermine her even more.
Things weren’t looking good.
More out of hope than expectation, Stella took her cellphone out of her pocket to check to see whether Logan had finally decided to break his silence and get into contact with her.
Sadly, there were no messages from Logan.
Logan didn’t do social media either, so Stella hadn’t even been able to try to keep tabs on him that way either. As far as Stella knew, Logan could have been lying unconscious in a side alley - or worse.
But part of Stella wondered whether this wasn’t just the real Logan making a return. After all, Stella had lost count of the times that Logan simply disappeared off the face of the earth back in their college days.
Perhaps for all his good intention in the last few weeks, Logan was simply too set in his ways to every truly change. It was possible that Logan had reverted to type and taken himself out of the heat.
But unlike other times when this had happened, Stella felt like this was the final straw. She may have said similar on other occasions, but Stella truly felt it now. Logan had walked out and left Stella hanging during an important period in her life.
Stella wasn’t sure if she could forgive Logan this time.
It’s always the same.Logan leaves, I hurt.
Maybe a leopard never changes its spots.
Maybe Logan was never truly a Daddy at all…
Chapter 16
The last thing Logan would ever have wanted would be to hurt Stella. So it had been with a heavy heart that Logan had decided to go it alone and try to solve the Cole Rodgers problem by himself.
The way Logan figured it, the less that Stella knew, the better.
And even if this meant keeping Stella totally in the dark, then that was just the way it had to be. Of course, Logan knew that Stella was smart. If Logan stuck around at Stella’s place, Logan was sure that Stella would work out what was going on and try to stop Logan – and this just wasn’t an option as far as Logan was concerned.
As Logan woke up in the small, single bed motel room, he felt his head throb. One too many beers in a nearby dive bar had seen to it that Logan wouldn’t be waking up feeling as fresh as a daisy that day. Far from it, in fact.
Logan had found the motel on the road that led out of Blue Rock, and it was the kind of place that Logan knew Stellawould never frequent. It may have been Logan’s pride kicking in, but even the thought of Stella finding him in such a low rent, frankly horrible motel was something that Logan couldn’t handle.
As Logan wandered out of the small, damp-ridden bathroom and into the motel bedroom, he stopped and looked at his surroundings. The walls were all an off-white color and had seen better days. The carpet underneath Logan’s feet was worn and lifeless too.
This place was fortunate to have been awarded the two-star rating it displayed in the reception lobby, that was for sure.
But Logan had little choice.
Logan didn’t have the money to splash out on one of the boutique hotels in Blue Rock. Even if he did have the money, Logan really didn’t want to risk being spotted by Stella.
Cole had Logan in a tough spot.
