Page 7 of Never and Always
“Okay, but haven’t we all been a little silly at one point or another?” Nick asked in that lighthearted jovial manner she always liked abouthim.
“This is so fucking not the same thing.” Glenn shook his head. “Nick, she screwed around with her accountant and now the bastard’s stolen two million dollars and taken herbusiness.”
Nick looked at her again, his expression plain and unreadable. “When did this all happen?” he askedher.
She pulled in a deep breath and dabbed her eyes, wiping away the tears so she could see him properly. “It’s been aweek.”
“A week!” Glenn yelled. “Mia, this happened a week ago and you waited until now to tell me? Why didn’t youcall?”
Things were going from bad to worse. “I was working with the police to try and get the moneyback.”
The situation only actually reared its ugly head five days ago. The first sign of the ugliness was going into work to find out that none of the staff had been paid. Neither had the trade accounts, and her suppliers were calling for answers. Like most companies, she’d set up all payments to come out on the last working day of the month. With it being the first week in September, some of her staff who had children wanted to squeeze in another trip, for some it would be their only break, to utilize what was left of the summer. The school term started back the following week. Mia couldn’t have felt worse when at least three of her therapists had to cancel their plans. Then the cherry on top of the nightmare was getting that gut-wrenching feeling to check her safe after she discovered the business accounts had been cleaned out. When she did she discovered it wasempty.
Up until that point she’d been calling Alan to no avail. Everything in her told her it was him, but she didn’t believe until she saw the emptysafe.
It was only then that she knew it could have only been him. He was the last person in her house, the last person besides her in her bedroom. The only other person who could have known that the safe was a safe, because she’d covered the door with a simple painting of a golden retriever. Only someone who’d seen her go inside it would have known it was asafe.
“You should have called me,” Glenn blurted, cutting into her thoughts. “Why didn’t you call me, message me orsomething?”
“I thought it was best to try and fixit.”
“Mia—”
“Glenn, come on, shouting isn’t going to solve anything,” Nick cut in, much to Glenn’s fury. “Mia, what did the policesay?”
“Nothing, they just took details from me and said they’d investigate and let me know when they had any updates. When I realized how long this could all take I decided to comehere.”
Glenn laughed a dark, cynical laugh that made her feel sick. “I just can’t believe this. I really can’t. If you had better judgement none of this would have happened. If you didn’t screw every guy who shows you attention this wouldn’t happen. Fuck!” Glenn snarled and stormed out of the room, leaving her withNick.
He slammed the door so hard the books fell off the top of the shelf and came down crashing to thefloor.
Mia gazed out the window feeling completely foolish. She couldn’t bring herself to look at Nick; embarrassment was killingher.
Embarrassment over the situation and from what Glenn said. He made her sound like some kind of whore. She supposed she deserved that, after all she just lost their two million dollars and was surely about to lose the art collection,too.
Glenn was right, she was stupid. Stupid for everything. Stupid for disclosing what she had. Stupid for being sotrusting.
It was all complete shit. And she didn’t just do herself in by trusting Alan. She hurt Glenn, too. She’d gotten his moneystolen.
A warm hand rested on her shoulder, bringing her mind back out of thought andremorse.
Nick.
She wanted to enjoy the warmth he gave and the comfort she felt just from his simple touch, but she couldn’t even bring herself to meet his gaze. He moved closer and kneeled down beforeher.
“Hey, babe,” he said with a softness that melted herheart.
Now that he was right there, inches away from her, she couldn’t help but meet his blue gaze, and doing so gave her a little sense of hope. It was his friendly face and that look of adoration he always had when he looked ather.
He wasn’t shouting at her or reminding her of how incredibly stupid she’d been. He was just beingNick.
“Hi,” she responded in a smallvoice.
“It’s been awhile.” He smiled, revealing his gorgeousdimples.
“Glenn never told me you were back.” She decided on small talk because she wanted to distract from the situation at hand, but her hands startedshaking.
He noticed and took both her hands intohis.
