Billionaires, Bad Boys, and Alpha Males (116 page)

The next step was even worse.
 

She had no choice but to show up at his
home and demand to see him.

Changing into a decent outfit (a sleeveless
blue dress and sandals), Nicole left the apartment and took the train out as
far as she could, and then grabbed a taxi to take her the rest of the way to
Red’s mansion.

She tried to keep herself calm as they
got closer and closer.
 
When they
finally arrived at the front gate, the taxi driver turned to her.
 
“You sure this is the place?” he asked.

“I’m sure,” she said, a horrible feeling
coming over her.
 

The guard at the gate was someone she
didn’t recognize.
 
An older man with
a bald head and white mustache, he glanced inside at her and then spoke to the
driver.
 
“Can I help you?”

“This girl asked me to take her here.”

“Name please?” The guard said, now
directing the questions at her.

“Nicole.
 
Masters.
 
It’s an emergency.”

“What sort of emergency, ma’am?”

“I need to see Red—I mean, I need
to speak to Mister Jameson as soon as possible.”
 
She tried to keep the neediness and fear
out of her voice lest this stranger assume she was one of Red’s groupies, a
stalker who’d carried out some delusional fantasy of seducing the powerful
executive.

Red had told her such things happened
from time to time and the security guards would all be well aware of it.

Nicole hated that she fit the profile,
and she hated Red for putting her in a position of having to beg to see him.

The guard retreated back to his booth and
picked up the phone.
 
He had a brief
conversation.

Nicole’s heart was pounding again.
 
When the man came back to the taxi, he
was stone faced and unapologetic.
 
“I’ll relay the message ma’am.”

“Is he here?”

“I’m not at liberty to say.
 
But I’ll do my best to make sure he
knows you’ve stopped by and that the matter is urgent.”

“I promise you, he’ll really want to
know—“

The guard held up a hand.
 
“I understand ma’am.
 
This is the best I can do.”

The tears were in her eyes as she nodded
and sat back in her seat.
 
“Okay.
 
Thanks.”

The taxi driver glanced in his rearview
mirror at her.
 
“Are you all right?”

“Yeah.
 
Just take me back to the train station,”
she said softly.

***

There was nothing to do but go back to
the apartment and sulk and fret and pace.

She couldn’t sit still and watch TV or
read a book.
 
There was nobody she
trusted enough to call or talk to about this, other than Red.
 
And apparently he didn’t want to talk to
her.
 
She couldn’t even be sure he
was home or knew she’d come by.

After all, the word around town and in
all the gossip sites was that Red had lit off for unknown territories; they had
him looking like Tom Hanks in Cast Away.
 
Bearded, perhaps wearing nothing but shorts and a tattered old t-shirt,
stumbling about on some faraway beach and drinking Coronas, eating clams,
getting that beer belly he’d always sworn he’d never get.

If Red were in such a place, doing those
things, then perhaps it would disturb him to know that back home he had a
pregnant ex-fiancé who desperately wanted to have a word with him.
 
Or maybe not.
 
Maybe Red had specifically run away in
order to never again be confronted with a needy chick asking something of him
that he could not give.

But even if he was trying to get away
from her entirely, Nicole knew she had to have this conversation with him, even
if it was the very last one.
 
It was
her duty to tell him she was pregnant with his baby, and then it would be up to
Red whether he wanted to shirk his obligations or not.

How can I get in touch with him? She
wondered.
 

Nobody seemed to know where he was, his
work email was nonfunctional since he was no longer at the company, and she
couldn’t get past the front gate of his house.

If only she knew some of his friends or
family members that might have spoken with him recently, someone who might have
a sense of where he’d be staying right now.

His mother was a nightmare, and Nicole
doubted they’d spoken at all since he kicked her out of the house.
 
Even if they had somehow talked since
that horrible day, Nicole doubted that mean old crab would tell her anything
helpful.
 
She’d probably just take
the chance to throw in a few of her vicious digs about why Nicole wasn’t worth
her son’s time.

Pacing back and forth in the kitchen,
chewing her bottom lip, Nicole suddenly thought of Red’s younger brother,
Jeb.
 
Jeb had been nice to her and
they’d even had a pretty warm conversation the very last time she’d spoken to
him.

She didn’t have his number, but she knew
his name and also knew he had a family practice just outside of Chicago.
 

Nicole ran to her laptop and quickly did
a Google search for Jeb Jameson, family practice, Chicago.
 
A website came up that she knew had to
be his.
 
Her heart racing with
excitement but also fear—if Jeb didn’t know how to reach Red than she
would be at a total dead end—Nicole picked up her phone and quickly made
the call before she could second-guess herself.

A moment later, a friendly sounding woman
picked up.
 
“Jameson Family Medical
Group,” she said perkily.

“I need to speak with Doctor Jameson,”
Nicole said, trying to steady her voice.

“Are you a patient, ma’am?”

She debated lying.
 
But what would be the point of
that?
 
Instead, Nicole said: “I’m a
friend of Dr. Jameson’s brother, Red.
 
There’s been an emergency and I need to speak with Dr. Jameson as soon
as possible.”

“Oh.”
 
The woman sounded confused
momentarily.
 
“Can I get your name
please?”

“Nicole Masters.”

“Let me go check and see if the doctor is
available.
 
Hold one moment.”

After a brief click, the muzak started up
and Nicole waited, chewing on her lower lip and circling her kitchen, sometimes
walking heel to toe, sometimes on her tiptoes.
 
She was thrumming with energy, nervous,
trying to allow herself some hope even though she knew this was a long shot at
best.

Finally, after what felt like hours, Jeb
picked up the line.
 
“Nicole, what’s
happened?
 
Is my brother okay?”

Instantly, she felt horrible for saying
it was an emergency and frightening him.
 

“I think so,” she said.
 
“I don’t know for sure.”

“Tell me what’s happened.”

“Well, you know that he got fired from
his company and then he sort of disappeared on everyone.”

Jeb sighed heavily into the phone.
 
“I know.
 
I haven’t heard from him either.”

Nicole’s heart sank.
 
“The thing is, I really need to talk to
him.
 
It’s something very, very
important that he’d want to know about.
 
But I can’t find a way to reach him.”

“When’s the last time you spoke to him?”

“The same morning you left.
 
He sent me away and that was it.”
 
She tried to hold back her tears but
they were about to break through.
 
Especially now that it looked just as hopeless as ever for her to get in
touch with him.

“Well, he certainly hasn’t been in
contact with me.
 
As you saw, we
didn’t leave things on the best of terms.”

“I know.
 
I’m sorry about that, Jeb.”

“Is there something I can help with,
Nicole?
 
Are you okay?”

She let out a shake exhalation.
 
She so badly wanted to share her news
with someone, and Jeb was a doctor, he’d understand.
 
But she couldn’t tell Jeb before his
brother even knew.
 
“I’m okay.
 
But I do need to find him.
 
Is there anywhere he might be, anything
you can think of—someone I can call?”

“Nobody I know personally.
 
Red has always played it close to the
vest.
 
There’s no one I can think of
to call that would know where Red is.
 
You’d have been the one that came to mind, but clearly he’s treated you
badly as well.”

“I just…I wonder if there’s a place that
he might retreat to.
 
Maybe
somewhere away from the media,” she said.
 
“Some people say he’s on a tropical island with a new face, drinking and
fishing and living like a beach bum.”
 
Nicole tried to laugh.

“You know, there is a place, come to
think of it.”

Nicole’s face lit up.
 
“There is?”

“I have no idea if he still even owns it,
so take this for what it’s worth.”

“Anything, anything!” She cried, grabbing
a pen and piece of paper.
 
“Tell
me.”

“A few years back, he took me for a
weekend getaway to this tiny little ramshackle cabin out in the middle of
nowhere.”

She felt the shorthairs on the back of
her neck stand up as he said it—knew that this must be the place.
 
“Where exactly was it?”

“Somewhere in Vermont.
 
Let me think…” he hummed.
 
“I think the town was Bristol.
 
Bristol, Vermont.”

“If you were me, how would you find the
cabin again?” she asked him.
 
“Do
you know what road its on?”

“God, it was so long ago.”
 
He thought for a while.
 
“It was way off the beaten track, but I
do remember that there was a beautiful lake close by, and a little farm that
had apple picking and that sort of thing.
 
It was called Beaumont Farms, I believe.”

Nicole wrote everything down as fast as
she could.
 
“There can’t be too many
cabins in that area, right?”

“Right.”
 
He didn’t sound as excited as her.
 
“Nicole, please don’t take this the
wrong way.”

“I won’t,” she said, anxious now.

“Just be careful with your
expectations.
 
Like I said, I don’t
even know if Red still owns that cabin.
 
And even if he does, that’s just one place he happened to bring me years
ago.
 
He’s a very wealthy man who
could just as easily have flown to Australia and be doing a walkabout right
now.”

She nodded.
 
“I know, I know.”

“If you’re lucky enough to find him, the
chances are low that he’ll greet you with the kind of reception you’re hoping
for.
 
I know my brother, and if he’s
trying to get away from all his pressures and disappointments—then I
imagine you might be the very last person he wants to see right now.”

Nicole nodded but couldn’t bring herself
to respond to his comments.
 
They
hurt.
 
She was scared, pregnant and
alone.
 
And now one of the people
who knew Red best was telling her that this was a fool’s errand.

“If you need to call me for anything,”
Jeb said, “just let me know.”
 
And
then he gave her his personal cell number, once again asking her to call him
for anything, at any time.

Grateful for his kindness, Nicole thanked
him profusely before they got off the phone.

Once she’d hung up, Nicole studied the
piece of paper with her chicken scratches on it.
 
It looked like pure desperation; nothing
on that paper would lead her to Red.
 

Vermont.
 
Beaumont Farms.
 
Cabin near a lake.

This was all she had, her only hopes of
finding the man she loved, the man who’d left her, a rich man who had the
ability to fly anywhere in the world on a whim.
 
What were the chances he’d gone to this
one place—this silly shack stuck out in the middle of nowhere?

Nicole decided she was going to find out.