Lovers at Heart (The Bradens, Book One: Love in Bloom Series)

Chapter Twenty-Eight, Lovers at Heart

“I thought Max was with you.”

He closed his eyes against the urge to snap at her. “She was.”

“Trouble in Loveland?”

“Savannah, not now. What do you need?” He calculated how much time it would take him to get to the airport, drive to Max’s apartment, and set things right.

“Sorry. It’s Dad. He’s sick, and I’m really worried about him.”

“I just saw him. He was as strong as an ox.” I’ll have to convince Max that acquisitions aren’t all that important to me. How can I do that? I’ll hire someone to do them. I’ll pay the attorney double if I have to. Treat had built his empire based on his keen negotiating skills and his belief in personally being involved with every transaction. He’d entrenched himself so deeply that there was never a need to look outside of his own abilities, partnered with his legal and financial advisers, when it came to the acquisitions. Now he was seeing another side to what he’d always done. He’d been hiding—from life, from commitment, from love. For the first time in his life, he realized, he cared about someone enough to want to stop hiding. There’s got to be a way.  

“Treat, are you even listening to me?”

The edge in Savannah’s voice pulled him back to the call. “Sorry. Tell me again.”

“Treat. You have to come home.”

“I’m on my way.” He hung up and called his travel agent, who had him booked on a flight out of Provincetown forty-five minutes later.

He called Max on the way to the airport, and as the phone went to voice mail, he realized that Max hadn’t checked her phone once the whole time they’d been together. In fact, he didn’t remember even seeing her phone, which made him wonder if she’d even get his message—but he had to try. “Max, please don’t do this. I love you, and we can figure this out. My dad’s sick. I’m headed there now. I’ll call you once I know what’s going on.”

BY THE TIME Max arrived at home it was almost noon, and she was exhausted. She’d cried so much on the plane, the stewardess asked her if she needed medical help. Not unless they can fix a broken heart. She dropped her bags on the floor and fell into bed.

Nine hours later, Max woke up feeling like a wet dishrag. The headache that thumped and squeezed was only a minor discomfort compared to the ache in her heart, but she’d done the right thing. You can’t take an aggressive, successful man and steal him out of his element for good—that would be like caging a bear. Eventually the bear would recognize the bars for what they were and tear them down—even if it meant hurting the person who had been nurturing him, tending to his needs, loving him, for years.

She wandered into her living room feeling dazed and hungover. She eyed the couch, but the memory of Treat sitting beside her on it was too much to bear. You did this to yourself. He begged you to make a life with him. The emptiness was like nothing she’d ever known. She went to the refrigerator and swung open the door. Blech. Nothing looked good. She needed something, but she couldn’t pinpoint anything that would fill the void.

After wandering aimlessly around the apartment, she finally grabbed a book and went back to bed. Within the first page, she was sucked back into sleep.

THE NEXT MORNING, Max lay in bed stewing over what she’d done. She had no energy to get up from her comfortable bed. She wasn’t hungry, and though she knew she should get up and go to work, her motivation had slipped away somewhere in the night. She closed her eyes and faded in and out of sleep until late in the afternoon.

She hauled herself out of bed and went to the little balcony off the living room, where she pressed her hands against the cool glass, thinking of Treat. If she closed her eyes, she could feel the bay breeze against her face and smell the salty air. She could feel Treat’s hand on her leg. She opened her eyes with a start.