Take Me: The Complete Series (Power Play #1-4) (24 page)

My jaw gapes open. It would be on the floor if it could stretch that far. Am I really hearing what they’re saying? Did Declan really just say that he’s been doing stuff behind my back this whole time? And did he really just say that
Isaac’s
been involved?

I stumble forward. My legs are thick and heavy. It’s like when you have a horrible nightmare and something is chasing you, but you can’t get your feet to move fast enough to take you to safety. Is this really some nightmare? This can’t really be happening, can it?

Tawny’s voice echoes in the background. I’m not sure what she’s talking about, but it’s obvious she hasn’t noticed that the world is crumbling in front of my very eyes.

But it’s not a nightmare. It’s really happening.

My feet drag forward until I’m all but pressed against the little rail separating the restaurant area from the rest of the shopping center. I’m all but leaning over the table, my eyes locked and glaring at Declan, though he doesn’t seem to notice me until I’m close enough to smell him.

He smells like an asshole.

Declan’s eyes flit towards me. It starts as a quick, casual glance because of my sudden appearance at the table, but quickly turns to a look of shocked surprise when he recognizes me. My glaring eyes hold his look for a long moment before he says anything. My mother shifts in her chair to look up at me, but I’m too focused on the asshole sitting in front of me to pay her any attention.

“Hannah, what the fuck are you doing here?” His voice screeches a little.

“Tell me it isn’t true.” I’m on the verge of shaking in anger. “Tell me that you haven’t been playing me for a fool this whole time…”

“Hannah, you shouldn’t be here. You’re supposed to be at the office, still.”

“Don’t give me that
bullshit
. Tell me what’s going on.
Now
.”

The shocked look on Declan’s face fades as he composes himself. He gives a quick glance around before leaning closer to me.

“Keep your voice down, there’s no need to cause a scene.”

“
A
scene
? You haven’t even begun to see
a scene
, yet. Tell me what’s going on, right now, or this is going to get a whole lot worse.”

My heart is pounding so loudly in my chest that I can barely hear anything else going on around us.

“Hannah, really… You’re embarrassing yourself.”

My eyes snap over to my mother as soon as the words come out of her mouth. She gives me a cold, unflinching look.

“Embarrassing myself? How would you even know what that means? You don’t have an ounce of shame in your whole body…
Barbara
.”

I refuse to acknowledge to her face that she’s my mother.

Her head croons back just slightly and she cocks an eyebrow. She looks like she’s about to say something else, but the words die in her mouth. For only an instant I let a little smirk tug the corner of my lip. Catching her off guard feels like a victory, even if it’s only a small one.

When I turn back to Declan I fix him with a look.

“Well? I’m waiting…”

“This is ridiculous. I don’t answer to you, Hannah. You’d be smart to remember that.”

“Tell me what’s going on,
now!
”
 

I slam my palm into the table, making their lunch plates rattle. Both Declan and my mother jump back a little, startled by the sudden outburst. I feel Tawny tense at my side.

“You may as well tell her, she’s going to find out sooner or later,” my mother says.

Declan considers her for a second, then nods his head in agreement.

“I suppose you’re right.”

When he turns back to face me, he’s got a cocky, smug little smile on his face.

“We’re selling the company,” he says, flatly.

The entire world stills around me. Everything freezes in place as my brain tries to handle what he just said. Did I hear him right?

“You’re doing
what
?”

His smug look spreads even wider.

“Don’t look so shocked, I thought you’d be relieved. Aren’t you happy to hear that BMG isn’t going out of business?”

The rush of information is almost too much for me to handle all at once. I give him a wide-eyed stare.

“So everything you told me was just a lie?”

Declan lets out a tiny laugh.

“Wake up, Hannah. I just told you that to keep you busy. I couldn’t have you running around the office messing up the sale without even realizing what you were doing.”

“I don’t understand…” I say, trying to piece everything together. “Why would you want to sell the company if it’s not in trouble?”

His brow pulls together and he gives me a look.
 

“It’s time to grow up, Hannah, you’re not living in a little fairy tale world, anymore. Times have changed, and you have to change with them. And for us, that means we get out of the game while we’re still ahead.”

He shares a smile with my mother, who chirps out a tiny laugh before giving me a look.

“Come now, dear, you didn’t think BMG was going to be around forever, did you?”

Her tone is dripping with condescension. It’s just enough to set me off.

“Why are you even here, Barbara? Did they run out of booze down at the country club or something?”

“Calm down, child. Declan’s right, it’s time to start acting your age.”

“I am
not
a child anymore.” It feels like another person is saying the words. As though that deep growl I hear can’t possibly be coming from inside of me. “How dare you even talk to me. After all these years of being away you think it’s just fine to show up and start digging into things that are none of your business?”

Her eyebrows arch even farther as she gives me a sardonic look. It renews the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.

“
None of my business
?” she repeats, a tiny laugh escaping her lips. “Child, what makes you think that BMG is
none of my business
?”

I swear, if she calls me
child
one more time I’m going to lose my shit.

Wait… why does she sound so sure of herself?

“What are you talking about?”

“I’ve owned a piece of BMG ever since the divorce… Dear child, I knew you were naive, but I didn’t know it was
this
bad.”

She gives Declan a satisfied smile when she finishes insulting me. He returns the smile as though they’ve just shared some kind of inside joke. The smirk on his face may as well be a punch straight to the gut. Actually, I’d rather be punched in the gut than feel the way I’m feeling right now. The thought of my mother having anything to do with BMG sickens me. It’s not like she ever did anything to help make it a success.

I take a few slow breaths to recompose myself. Then I fix Declan with the most assured look I can come up with.

“Well I’m glad you two are playing all nice and everything, but you’re forgetting one thing…”

He cocks a brow, his mouth quirking to the side.

“And what might that be?”

The contempt in his voice is overwhelming. He doesn’t think it’s possible that I’ve thought of something he hasn’t.

“You’re forgetting that I own a piece of the company, too. And I’m not about to sell it for anything.”

His lips remain pinched together tightly as he considers me for a long moment. At first I’m ready to gloat my victory, but that feeling is quickly replaced by a sense of impending dread as I begin to realize what the smile on his face actually means.

“You see, I
did
think of that. And that’s the exact reason I offered your mother a hefty premium for her shares.” He leans forward. “Now, with her shares, I have controlling interest in the company. And do you know what that means?” He doesn’t even have to say anything more. I already know what’s going to come out of his mouth. “That means that I can authorize the sale of the company, and your shares will be sold, as well.” His blue eyes bask in their victory for a few moments before he finally eases himself back in his seat. “Don’t worry, though. You’re going to get rich off of this deal, too.”

I stare between the both of them, at a near loss for words.

“Why would you sell to him if you knew he was going to sell the company?”

“Oh, I don’t care about the money. I’ve already got more than I know what to do with… I’ve wanted to sell those shares ever since I got them. I just refused to ever sell them back to Bill.”

I can’t believe this is really happening. I can’t believe I’ve been so foolish this whole time. How could I not know that Declan was up to something? How could I not have seen through all of his lies?

Isaac.

I round on Declan, again. This time it’s not very difficult to give him a hateful look.

“What did Isaac have to do with all of this? You said he was playing his part… what did you mean?”

His eyes flash, gleefully.

“Your sweet Isaac is the whole reason any of this is possible.” He doesn’t even try to hide the fact that he’s enjoying destroying me. “Without him, we wouldn’t be making so much money…”

The next few minutes are a blur. I’m not exactly sure what happened after my entire world was ripped apart. One moment I’m standing there ready to straddle Declan and ring his neck, and the next Tawny is ushering me toward one of the cabs sitting outside.

She pays the cabbie extra, telling him there’s more where that came from if he can get us back to my apartment building as fast as possible. My heart pounds violently in my chest the whole way there. Everything I see looks like it’s tinted in red, and there’s a ringing in my ears that manages to drown everything else out, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

How could I have been so stupid? How could I have been so blind? How many signs had I missed? How many times had the truth been dangled right in front of my face and I hadn’t even seen it? How could I have let everyone play me for such a fool?

But even worse, how could I possibly have believed all of Isaac’s bullshit? I knew from the moment I met him that he is trouble. I knew I should have stayed away from him. But I hadn’t been strong enough. Even after I had found out he’d been lying to me from the beginning I still hadn’t been strong enough to keep myself away.

But enough is enough. Those are mistakes that won’t be happening again. Now I know better.

By the time we make it back to the apartment, a coldness has settled on my shoulders. I’m not frantic and panicking anymore. I’m just pissed. Tawny starts making some hot chocolate, telling me all about how it will make me feel better. She says hot chocolate is her secret weapon for anytime she’s feeling sad, or mad, or depressed, or anything, really. I watch her as she gathers everything in the kitchen.

Despite all of the anger swirling through me, I’m numb on the inside. It feels like I’m watching a sitcom on TV or something. Like this isn’t my real life.

“Don’t worry, Hannah, you’re going to get everything figured out.” She sets the mug of hot chocolate on the coffee table. Thin wisps of heat waft out of it. “I can’t believe they did that to you. And your mom…”

I give a tight shake of my head. I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I don’t want to think about it. Tawny’s so focused on trying to calm me down that she completely misses the frustrated look on my face as she sits down next to me on the couch.

“So, what are you going to do? You can’t just let them get away with this…”

“I don’t know if there is anything I
can
do!”

I let out a growl of frustration, still surprised that the sound is coming out of me. Tawny rubs my shoulder in her comforting way, giving me a soft look but not saying anything for a few minutes while I process everything.

Really, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. Is there even anything I
can
do? With Declan owning the majority share of the company, he’s the one that gets to call all the shots. There’s nothing that can stop him from doing whatever he wants with it.

But the thing that’s even more annoying than all of that is the fact that I can’t stop thinking about Isaac. Even with Declan telling me he’s going to sell off Daddy’s dream, the very company I’ve been building my life toward, I can’t help but be even more bothered by finding out Isaac is still lying to me. Despite everything he’d said on that second date. Despite the fact that he’d asked me to come away with him.

My heart skips a beat when I remember that fifth card he’d given me on our date—the card that had asked me to come away with him. In an instant everything starts to make sense. I thought he’d been trying to do something sweet, but really he’d been trying to get me out of the way so this deal could go through. I bet Declan had put him up to it. Hell, I bet Declan had offered to pay for the trip out of town.

I have to get to the bottom of it. I have to confront Isaac and give him a piece of my mind. I can’t let him go on thinking he’s getting away with something, thinking that I’m just some naive girl that he can manipulate.

“What are you doing?”

Tawny gives me a confused look as I leap off the couch and grab my phone.

“I have a score to settle,” I say, not looking up from the screen as I start texting a message.

“
WE NEED TO MEET. NOW
.”

One way or another I’m going to let him know how I feel. Maybe that’s the only thing that I can control, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to let him walk all over me, again.

“
Hello, kitten.
”

“
Where are you?
”

“
What’s wrong?
”

“
Just tell me where you are, we need to talk.
”

“
Met a friend at McGilly’s for HH. Meet me at my place in an hour?
”

I frown at my phone. There’s no way I’m going to wait an hour. I need to give him a piece of my mind
now
, while everything is still fresh. I don’t care if he’s having drinks with the President, nothing is going to stop me.

I recognize the name of the Irish pub, and thankfully the cab ride there doesn’t take too long. It’s after five on a Friday afternoon, though, and the place is packed.

I push my way through the crowd gathered at the front of the pub and start working my way back to the bar. My eyes scan the place, wildly, looking for the Stupid Brit, but it isn’t until I’ve made it all the way to the far back of the pub that I finally see him sitting in a corner booth. He’s wearing his usual black, leather jacket, and he has that annoying, smug smile on his face.