“Send the paperwork to our lawyers. I can’twaitto buy your little business.” Her eyes gleamed when they met Cara’s. “It’s going to be life changing.”
Cara’s chest constricted. That was it then. She’d be fired; her shoulders slumped.
Confusion warred with relief on Brian’s face. Relief won.
“Fantastic! This calls for a celebration. I have champagne in my office!”
Without another word, Courtney allowed Brian to escort her away, Trey slouching along behind them. Cara was rooted in place. Her limbs felt heavy, and her throat ached.
A gentle touch on her shoulder brought back the realization that she had an audience.
“You all good?” Skye’s eyes were full of concern.
“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” Cara took a deep breath through her nose. “I just need to have a word with mybrother.”
Matt still stood nearby, staring at her angrily. It was clear he had more to say, and she would rather not have everyone hear it. Skye gave her a meaningful look.
“Let’s meet for drinks, and you can give me all the details.”
“Sure,” Cara lied.
“My, my, my! How the princess has fallen.” Matt sneered then chuckled. “It’s like you’re the anti-Cinderella. You’re supposed to end up as the princess, not the maid.”
Here we go, Cara thought. If Matt thought he could hurt her with his pathetic insults, he would need to think again. After everything she’d been through, his words couldn’t hurt her.
“A movie studio, huh? I guess if you get tired of playing movies, you can just tell Mommy, and she’ll let you go back to pretending to be Declan.” Cara pushed her bottom lip out making an exaggerated pout. “Was pretending to be the CEO of a global media empire too difficult? Needed something with training wheels?”
Matt slowly clapped his hands. “I’m glad to see that your natural bitchiness survived the sudden descent into poverty. Or do you think it made you bitchier? I can’t tell.” He shook his head in disgust. “You are filthy!”
“It’s called actually working for a living, Matt. Not just playing a role that Mommy picked out for you.”
Matt’s eyes narrowed, and then as if a switch flipped, all traces of the hatred that had been written so clearly across his face, disappeared. Instead, he frowned and shook his head in fake sorrow.
“Your father was always so proud of you. Always telling my mother how beautiful you looked, how poised, how classy… He liked women who looked, dressed and…” he paused with a slight sniff, his face wrinkling, “smelled like a woman. I can’t imagine how humiliated, howdisappointedhe would be—his only daughter out in public like this. Ruining his reputation by looking like the trash you always were.”
It felt like something had sucked all the oxygen out of her body.
She’d been wrong.
Words could still hurt her.
CHAPTEREIGHTEEN
Wes raisedhis arms high above his head and angled his head from side to side stretching his neck. He’d been working on security protocols all afternoon. It wasn’t his favorite thing, but it was the engine behind their business. He preferred coding, but Nina had caught the flu going around. He had to pick up her most urgent client deadlines.
Lately, they had several businesses add e-commerce, and they wereallasking about leaks. Everyone wanted a shopping app on their webpage but worried about their customers blaming them in the event of a data breach. No one wanted their brand attached to a hack.
Checking the time on his screen, Wes logged it on the digital time sheet Nina insisted they use. She wanted him to log every hour and code it to the correct project. Wes might complain, but the business would have crumbled without Nina and Jin’s business acumen.
Pushing back his chair, Wes wandered into the kitchen and grabbed a beer, collapsing on the couch in front of the TV.
Did Cara have a late shoot tonight?
Wes checked his phone, but there were no missed messages or texts from her. He didn’t remember her mentioning it either, he mused. He sent her a quick text and when she didn’t respond, he called her. Straight to voicemail. Wes frowned. She’s probably just busy, he told himself.
He scrolled through several shows feeling increasingly restless. Wes checked the call sheet Cara had hung on the refrigerator.
She should have been done by now. It’s always possible they ran long, he told himself. There was no reason to worry.
