The Miami Millionaire (28 page)

Jake sat looking at the large photographs spread out on the table before him and wondered why he hadn’t looked at them more closely before, when he had first seen them.  He looked at Victoria’s face as she looked at Mark Cavendish, and there was no tenderness there, only frustration and at times anger.  He didn’t need to pick up Bruno’s report to know Victoria had not stolen the file and was trying to get it back from him, but he didn’t understand why she hadn’t told him about Mark steeling the file as soon as she found out.  Jake had a team of security who could have retrieved it for him, this wasn’t the first time something like this had happened and it probably wouldn’t be the last.  Was she so worried about him finding out and her losing her job that it was more important than her talking to him and confiding in him?  Jake sat back in his chair and remembered her expression when she told him there was nothing more between them - she was as cold as ice and showed no emotion whatsoever.  He rubbed his forehead, he really had got her wrong - she wasn’t sweet at all, Victoria was cold and calculating, and had a heart of stone.

Jake read the full three page report from Bruno and then stopped at the summary.  He already knew everything but he read through the summary making sure he had the full facts correct:

“Mark Cavendish left Creative Technology Holdings’ offices with a small in-flight travel suitcase.  After leaving the building Mark Cavendish visited a few shops and then went to the Four Season Hotel where he was staying in room 586.  He received no visitors until he met with Victoria Pembrose in the Terrace Restaurant.  Their meeting in the restaurant lasted about ten minutes where they argued over a file which was originally in Mark Cavendish’s possession.  Mark Cavendish left the restaurant with the file and was closely followed by Victoria Pembrose.  They both went back to Mark Cavendish’s room where they stayed for approximately fifteen minutes (it was at this point when I telephoned you).  You came to the hotel and had a conversation with Victoria Pembrose in the hallway, and then left.”

Jake huffed, a conversation indeed!  He thought Bruno had played that part down considering they had a flaming argument and his dreams of his beautiful sweet Victoria just fell apart in front of him! He frowned, hadn’t he dismissed Bruno before his argument with Victoria?  Jake realised Bruno hadn’t left and had continued to monitor Mark and Victoria.  He read on eager to see what happened after he left the hotel.

“After you left Victoria Pembrose in the hotel corridor she strongly requested Mark Cavenish joined her and they both went to the business suite in the hotel where they met with a lawyer who had confidentiality agreements drawn up for both herself and Mark Cavendish.  A third agreement was drawn up between the two parties but it was a personal agreement and nothing to do with CT Holdings (I was able to secure this information from a contact of mine at the hotel.)  Mark Cavendish then returned to his room whilst Victoria Pembrose left the hotel with the legal documentation.  I asked another colleague to continue with the surveillance during the night and Mark Cavendish did not receive any visitors or leave his room.  However in the early hours of the following morning Mark Cavendish left the hotel and went straight to Miami International Airport and boarded the early morning flight back to London.”

Jake put down the paper and sighed, he had jumped to conclusions and assumed Victoria had been party to Mark stealing his file but he could now see for sure she hadn’t.  In fact, regardless of anything else, he was incredibly grateful to Victoria for successfully stopping Mark from selling the information in the file.  Jake put the pictures together in the file and wondered what the last piece of paper was, he had read the report on Mark Cavendish in full, and the summary, so there shouldn’t have been anything else, but there was one more piece of paper with just a few lines printed on it:

“Just to finalise the subject with regards to Victoria Pembrose and the confidential file, Victoria came to the Security office concerned that as she was leaving today there may be some misunderstanding with any paperwork she was leaving the building with.  She returned her office key and security badge to me, and asked me to log what papers she had in her possession, and emptied the contents of her handbag onto the table for me to thoroughly search.  There was no confidential information in her belongings.  Victoria Pembrose left the building at eleven thirty this morning.  I feel it necessary to add that in addition to this Victoria Pembrose expressed her innocence at the illegal removal of the confidential file.  I checked the security cameras from this morning for when she was in the CT Holdings offices and saw that upon arrival she went directly to your office where she waited until she met with you.  Then Miss Pembrose returned to her office where she stayed for a few minutes, she then came directly to our security office, and finally left the building a few minutes later.”

Jake put down the paper.  What did Bruno mean by Victoria was leaving yesterday?  He hadn’t told Victoria to go anywhere and he assumed she was in her office all day.  Jake realised he wouldn’t have known if Victoria had been in her office unless someone told him otherwise.  He had deliberately been avoiding her, both yesterday and today, to give himself time to think about what happened.  The whole situation with Victoria, Mark Cavendish and his confidential file had knocked him hard - he was crushed when he saw Victoria coming out of Mark’s hotel room and he had reacted on impulse.  Then when he saw his file in Victoria’s hand and thought she had betrayed him and stolen from him, it was like someone had taken a knife to his heart and slit it open.  He had stood in the corridor devastated, and even now Jake was still having difficulty seeing past his pain and blind rage.

Jake reached for his phone and looked at his watch, it was just after ten o’clock at night.  He thought for another moment and stood up putting his feet into his deck shoes.  He needed to see Victoria and he had a feeling he had a lot of apologising to do.  Jake pressed Victoria’s number on his phone but it went straight through to her voicemail.  He waited a minute and pressed her number again, but again it went through to voicemail.  Walking to the huge apartment windows looking out at the Miami night lights in the distance Jake looked back at his phone and searched the internet for Victoria’s hotel.  He pressed the call button when he located it.

“Good evening the Hollywood Beachside Boutique hotel.”

“Hi, can you put me through to Victoria Pembrose please?”  Jake asked politely.

“I am sorry sir but Miss Pembrose is no longer a guest at this hotel.”

Jake stood still as a cold chill ran down his back.  That couldn’t be, Victoria had been staying at the little hotel near Hollywood Beach since the days she arrived.  He was sure, he had picked her up from there himself.

“Are you sure?  Can you double check please.”

“I will just check for you.”  There was silence for a minute and then the voice returned, “No sir I am sorry but Miss Pembrose checked out yesterday.”

“Thank you.”  Jake said putting the phone down as he stared out across the illuminated night sky.  His mind went around in circles, Victoria wouldn’t be with Mark because he flew home yesterday morning, that was what Bruno said and he had a sense of relief with that thought.  Then he pressed the button for Bruno’s mobile phone.

After a minute of ringing Jake heard Bruno’s voice through his phone.

“Good evening Mr Cumberland, is there something I can do for you?”  Bruno wasn’t used to his boss calling him late on a Friday night and after the last couple of days of unusual events he wondered if his services were going to be called on again, not that he minded, the overtime was always good.

“I am sorry to disturb you Bruno but I just read your report and the addendum at the end.  When you said Victoria said she was leaving yesterday, where was she going?”

“Back to London Mr Cumberland.   She left an envelope for Andrea which I took up to her at the same time as I gave you my report.”

“Thank you Bruno.” Jake disconnected the call.

With adrenaline pumping through his veins Jake pressed the button on his phone for Andrea.

“Jake, is something wrong?” Andrea answered surprised to hear from him so late.

“Sorry to disturb you but do you know where Victoria is?”  Jake asked hoping with all his heart not to get the answer he suspected he would.

“She went home Jake, back to London.”  Andrea sounded surprised that he would even be asking her, “Isn’t that what you arranged yesterday morning when she was in your office.”

“No!”

“Oh, I thought you two had ……”  Andrea trailed off not knowing quite what was going on between her boss and Victoria.  She knew Jake and Victoria had played everything down when they were at work, but it hadn’t slipped her notice they had both fallen madly in love with each other.  Firstly she had never known Jake to take a woman back to his apartment – Jake liked it that way, his apartment was his one place of solitude away from his public image of a playboy and the many women who wanted to be in his bed.  And secondly Andrea had never seen Jake look at anyone the way he looked at Victoria!  As for Victoria, she hadn’t spent a lot of time with her but what little time she had spent with her she found Victoria to be a genuinely nice person, and yesterday when she saw Victoria looking at the photographs on the gossip pages of the internet she knew the look of a woman whose heart had just broken when she saw it - and Victoria had the look!  Andrea had tried not to let Victoria see she was trying to get a glimpse of what Victoria was looking at when she saw her face go white with the sparkle of tears in her eyes, but she managed to get a little peak and then went back to her computer pulling up the website for herself.  Then she knew exactly why Victoria was trying to hold back the tears.  If it had been her and she was in love with Jake then she would have felt the same way - to see him with another woman in his arms and then him leaving a nightclub with the same woman in the early hours of the morning must have been heart breaking, and Victoria certainly looked like her heart just broke.

“Go on Andrea, what were you going to say.”

“Jake I know something has been going on with you and Victoria and I must admit I thought she was someone special to you.  But seeing as you hooked up with Natasha Montage the other night I guess I was wrong.  I assumed you finished it with Victoria and you both decided she would return to London.”

“No that’s all wrong.  Why would you think that?  And anyway how do you know about Natasha Montage?”

“I thought you had something real going on with Victoria.  I must admit for a moment I actually thought you were in love with her.”  Andrea decided she would be completely honest with Jake since he asked her in the first place.

“Yeah that part you are right about, I really liked Victoria.”

“Just liked?”  Andrea questioned, she knew it was more than that.

“Just move on, will you.”  Jake wasn’t in the mood.

“So why did you finish it?”

“I didn’t, she did!”  Jake walked back to the sofa and sat down heavily.

“Well if you didn’t finish it with her then what was the other night all about?”

“The other night?”  He was confused.

“Natasha Montage?  Really Jake, I thought I knew you but you surprised me.  Boss or no boss I will tell anyone they should keep their pants on when they are with someone else!  Do you know how much you hurt Victoria when she saw those photos?”

“What are you talking about Andrea?  I didn’t sleep with Natasha, I took her home because she was plastered.  We both had way too much to drink but she was in no fit state to go home by herself.”

“Yeah Jake, whatever!  I’m your assistant not your mother.”

“No really!”  Jake said thinking he needed to get onto the internet and see what photographs Andrea was talking about, and then he remembered Victoria saying something about photographs telling the truth and how she had got him wrong.  Jake sighed as he realised that whatever Victoria had seen, she had assumed exactly what Andrea was thinking too.

“Then if you really loved Victoria what were you even doing getting drunk with Natasha in the first place?”

“I hadn’t planned it.  I was out with some buddies having a few drinks, a lot happened yesterday and I was annoyed with Victoria.  I guess it just got a bit out of hand, but nothing really happened, honest.”

“Whatever Jake, we can talk about this tomorrow if you want to because I am out at dinner at the moment and people are waiting for me.  But in answer to your question, Victoria flew back to London yesterday, she has gone home, and I don’t think she is coming back.”

Jake put down the phone and opened up his laptop to the latest celebrity gossip pages.  He rubbed his forehead as he looked at the photographs of himself with his arms around Natasha, and then the two of them leaving the nightclub together.  He read through the text below the photograph and groaned aloud wishing he hadn’t been such an idiot!

CHAPTER TWELVE

Victoria sat in the chair opposite Ben Churchill’s desk.  She pulled her knee length black skirt down a little further as she saw his eyes briefly flicker to her legs and back up to her face again.

“So after all your kicking and screaming you now want me to move you to a different account?”  Ben Churchill said confused, wondering what prompted this unexpected request.  Victoria had been back in the London office for just under a week, he had been thoroughly surprised and pleased with the campaigns she put together, and now everything was set to go ahead within the next week.

“Well I hardly kicked and screamed, but yes I did put my foot down a bit but only so I could show you what I am capable of rather than just be brushed aside for one of the existing Account Managers.  You would have done the same in my position.”

“Probably.  But I wouldn’t be throwing away the opportunity to work on one of the largest campaigns going, for whatever reason I don’t know!  I wouldn’t be stupid enough to do that.”

Victoria sat and thought ‘
no I don’t suppose you would, I don’t suppose you would be stupid enough to fall in love with your client and then have your heart trampled on and be made and absolute fool of. But hey, it is complicated!
”   She had no intention of telling her boss it was breaking her heart every day working so close to Jake, dealing with his company and products without actually being able to see him and touch him.  She ached for Jake’s touch, to feel his hands on her skin and to hear him whisper in her ear, and then let his tongue leave a red hot burning trail down her neck until he kissed her passionately there.  She shook her mind away from that and returned it to Ben Churchill who was sitting opposite her.

“No Mr Churchill I don’t think I made myself clear.  When I said I am resigning, I meant I am resigning from Churchill, Turnbull & French altogether, not just from the CT Holdings’ campaign.”

“What?  Why?” Ben Churchill spluttered, “I never thought I would say this Victoria but you are very good at what you do, and I don’t say that to many people.  Why would you want to leave now?”

Victoria knew it was extreme but it was the only way she was going to get away from the pain and memory of Jake.  Every day when she walked into her office building no matter where she tried to hide she would see Jake’s products or hear about his company or his name.   For the first few days she tried to ignore it but it was just getting worse and worse, and she couldn’t’ ignore it anymore.  It was bad enough that there was a pre-campaign ripple in the media about Jake’s great new products coming over, no one knew exactly what they were yet but there was a rumour that they were connected in some way to his GPS tracking system and people were getting very excited about it.  At least at home she could ignore the papers and not look at the internet, but she couldn’t get away from it at work even if she didn’t work on Jake’s campaign, and she needed to get away from Jake to get over him. 

It had all but destroyed Victoria these last few days seeing Jake in the American gossip columns with one woman or another, looking as divinely gorgeous as ever as he dined out one night or enjoyed a few drinks in a club on another.  She knew she shouldn’t be looking but she couldn’t help it, and what little part of her heart which hadn’t been broken now crumbled too.  Victoria couldn’t take the constant feeling of pain anymore and she needed to get as far away from Jake as possible, and the only way she could do that was to leave her job and start somewhere new. 

“I can’t explain it, but it is for personal reasons.  And maybe you are right Mr Churchill, maybe I don’t have what it takes.”  She said thinking how quickly and easily Jake had replaced her with more women, and how she hadn’t seen that coming and maybe she should have!  She winced at the memory of how Jake told her he loved her and yet that very same night he had slept with another woman!  What kind of man did that?  And what kind of woman was she not to see through his seductive lies and fall for it?

Ben Churchill sat back in his chair and folded his arms across his large belly. 

“Oh I see.”

Victoria hoped he didn’t see and she hoped her cheeks weren’t giving away the feeling of humiliation she felt inside.

“Mr Churchill, in the last two months I have gone through a lot of personal things and I am afraid it has put me in a position where I cannot continue working in your company.”

“Okay Victoria if that is what you want.  When will you be leaving?”

“As soon as I have handed over Jake’s, Creative Technology Holdings’ account to Gina.  Then I think there will be no reason for me to continue, so I will go then.”

Ben Churchill nodded his head.  It was a shame, he was sure Victoria didn’t know how good she actually was, and now he wished he had given her more of an opportunity a long time ago.

Victoria stood up and walked out of Ben Churchill’s office.  She walked back to her desk and saw an e-mail waiting for her from Andrea - she was flying into London on Sunday to liaise with Victoria on the London launch and campaign.  Victoria looked blankly at her computer screen, it was time to start looking for another job!

Andrea walked into Jake’s office, “Okay everything is ready, I am flying to London on Sunday.”

“Will that give you enough time, we launch on Wednesday?”

“That’s plenty of time, I will meet with Victoria on Monday, we will go over any last minute details and then it’s all systems go.” 

Jake nodded and looked back at the screen on his desk.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go to London yourself?”

“No, I want you to go.”  Jake said without looking away from the screen.

“But aren’t you going to come over at all, and put that ‘Jake’ appearance in?” Andrea said putting up jazz-hands to emphasise the attention Jake brought to each of his appearances.

“Nope.  You can manage, I know you will.”

“Yes I know that, but aren’t you at least a bit tempted to go?” 

Jake pushed back in his chair, he knew exactly what Andrea meant, and yes he was tempted beyond belief to go to London just so he could see Victoria again.  He really wanted to see Victoria, but he wasn’t going to.  Andrea knew most things about Jake after so many years of working as his personal assistant, but this he didn’t want her to know – he didn’t want anyone to know just how much he wanted to see Victoria and hold her in his arms again. 

When Jake realised Victoria was gone and had left without even saying goodbye he thought someone might as well have ripped out his heart and stamped on it.  He had really fallen for Victoria - he loved her like he had never loved anyone else, ever!  He didn’t have any false ideas about Victoria returning into Mark’s arms.  No, the photographs from the night at the Four Seasons hotel showed how much she detested Mark, let alone love him anymore!  But Jake couldn’t believe the way Victoria could so easily and coldly walk away from him - she had made him her ‘rebound-guy’!  Jake cringed, he was nobody’s rebound guy to be used, well not unless Jake wanted it that way and they both knew what they were doing.  But with Victoria that wasn’t what he wanted at all.  Jake wanted to be the love of Victoria’s life, and if he couldn’t be that then he didn’t want to be near her, because he didn’t think he could bear seeing her and not being able to be with her the way he wanted to.  And he wanted to be with her, around her, and in her – Jake wanted Victoria so much he ached for her.

“Don’t push it Andrea.” Jake said whilst giving her a look telling her the conversation was over - he had a lot to think about with the upcoming product launches and keeping Victoria out of his mind was proving hard enough without his assistant planting her firmly back in there.

Andrea walked out the room thinking Jake was his own worst enemy.

Jake spent his days working hard, filling the quiet moments with meetings he didn’t really need to attend.  Unnecessary meetings were definitely better than time on his hands letting his mind wander to Victoria, wondering what she was doing now.  And his evenings were filled with dinners accompanied by pretty women or drinks in the bars with a selection of friends until the early hours of the morning.  At the end of the evening Jake returned home alone, declining offers of hours of passionate fun with beautiful women who were more than happy to spend time in bed with him, no strings attached.  He knew he could have taken up any of these offers but he didn’t want to.  Even though it had been over a week since Jake last felt Victoria’s skin on his and tasted her lips, he could still close his eyes and feel her.  He didn’t want anyone else, and as much as he hated to admit it, he just wanted Victoria. 

So many times over the last few days Jake had picked up his phone and gone to dial Victoria’s number only to put it back down again before it had a chance to ring.  What good would it do to talk to her, to hear her voice?  It would simply make his craving for her worse - hearing her voice and not being able to touch her would be excruciating!  On Sunday when Andrea left for London he had tried to pretend he didn’t wish it was him flying across the Atlantic.  It could have been him if he wanted to, but he didn’t want the inevitable pain that would bring.  He sighed as he put his phone down one more time but jumped as it rang as soon as it touched his desk.  Jake saw Andrea’s number and answered it.

“Hi Andrea, how is everything going?”

“Really well, you are going to love it.  Everything is set for the day after tomorrow, when you release the press statements at lunchtime we will be releasing the ones over here just before business opens.  Then we have a whole programme of promotions going on from there.  So all is good here.”

“Excellent.”

“Jake there is something I want to tell you.”

“Yes, go ahead.”  He heard the wariness in Andrea’s voice and sat upright waiting to hear.

“It’s about Victoria….”

Jake interrupted Andrea before she could go any further, “No Andrea, I told you before you went to London, I don’t want to hear anything about Victoria.”

“Not even if it is connected with your campaign?”

“No.  You are there and you can deal with anything.  I don’t want to hear Victoria’s name mentioned again.  Is that clear?”

“Perfectly.”  She was far from pleased, there was something Jake needed to know but if he was going to be pig-headed about it then he could just wait and find out himself, because he surely would.

Wednesday morning came around far too quickly for Victoria.  She met with Andrea on Monday and left Churchill, Turnbull & French that very same afternoon - she had everything in place waiting, and Gina was already to take over - it had only been a matter of Gina waiting to be introduced to Andrea when she arrived which had prevented Victoria from leaving before then.  As soon as Victoria left Churchill, Turnbull & French she went back to the little apartment in Putney which she had rented upon returning from Miami and packed a bag.  She didn’t feel like being around to watch the media frenzy which would ensue over the next few days and weeks.  Victoria decided now was as good a time as any for a short break.  If things had been different with Mark then she would have been looking forward to a honeymoon soon, but since that was not the case and hopefully she would be starting a new job, as soon as she found one, then she was definitely entitled to a few days away in the beautiful English countryside.  It may not have been the beautiful Miami beach, but England in autumn was incredibly beautiful and Victoria decided that a few days at Alice’s house in the countryside surrounded by the rusty coloured leaves changing colour and the green hillsides was just what she needed right now.  So she put her bag in the back of her car and set off to Gloucestershire.

“Hey Vicky I am off to work now.  Will you be okay?”  Alice called as she wrapped her warm scarf around her neck and picked up her bag from the front door.

“Yes I will be fine.”  Victoria said as she stood at the bottom of the stairs dressed in a pair of warm pyjamas with a cup of steaming hot chocolate in her hands.

Alice looked at Victoria one more time before she left, she knew her friend was putting on a brave face - she saw the look on Victoria’s face when she flipped through the internet and saw photographs of Jake with one woman or another.  Alice told her not to torture herself by looking at the photographs, but Victoria insisted she was just keeping up to date on Creative Technology Holdings’ news.  Alice knew better and she wished she could help Victoria, but not even a best friend could heal a broken heart.

“Besides I am calling the head-hunter back later this morning, he said he had a few possible job options for me so it is not all doom and gloom.”  Victoria said waving her friend goodbye and walking back into the living room.

Victoria sat down on the soft sofa and switched on the television.  As much as she knew she shouldn’t, she couldn’t help turning the channel to the morning news and sat listening to the news reader telling everyone about the fantastic new innovative products based on GPS tracking which Creative Technology Holdings had just released in the UK.  Victoria wasn’t surprised, not by a word of it, she had been expecting to hear about Jake’s amazing new products, especially since she had written the press release incorporated into the morning news feature.  She smiled despite her heavy heart, she was proud of what she had created – it was going to be a fantastic campaign, even if she wasn’t there to actually see it through herself.