His cousin shrugged, reading off a few more things about Mr. Money, mostly stuff that didn’t really matter to Isaiah: more on his lifestyle, education. Isaiah began to half listen as other things came to mind: Kelli’s own admission that she was grossly under qualified. Jesus, could he really have been that wrong about her? Was she some kind of con artist and Isaiah fell for it? He couldn’t help thinking of her reaction to his telling her that up until a year ago he and Nathan had been living with his little brother. That it wasn’t until he got married and AJ bought them homes to live in had he moved out. It was all she really had to go by as far as Isaiah’s real financial status. If money were all she’d been interested in, she’d seen it in AJ’s beachside mansion. She must’ve thought it was what she was coming into with Isaiah. Not that Isaiah hadn’t invested well over the years, but if that were the case, he was glad now she didn’t know the truth or she might still be here with him and his stupid ass thinking it was all for love. As much as his heart was still arguing that there was no way she could’ve faked her feelings for him so well, the evidence was too damning.
Isaiah turned when he felt the cuff on his arm begin to tighten. The automatic blood pressure monitor activated every few minutes. He tried to take a deep breath, but it hurt too damn much, so he focused on relaxing himself. In spite of all that, Isaiah still didn’t like anyone insinuating Kelli might be someone’s whore, not even Moe, who likely had a lot more to share with him about the girl who still owned his heart. Even with all of his cousin’s playful smirking, Isaiah knew his own expression had gone hard the moment he confirmed she’d taken the job she’d first claimed she had no intention of taking. He was certain Moe had noticed.
“Good news, if you wanna call it that,” Moe said with that ever irritating smirk of his, “is the main house on the property, what they call the Great House and the house Walker lives in, has over twelve guest rooms. There are a couple of buildings on the property with over ten condos each. But not all of the condos are occupied right now. He has two empty, and as far as I can tell, Raquel checked into a swanky hotel nearby three days ago and is still there. So I could be wrong about her title being code for something else. If he had other intentions, you’d think he would’ve moved her into the Great House with him, right? Have access to her whenever he wanted?”
Just when Isaiah was beginning to feel the tiniest bit better about all this, Moe added something else.
“Of course, he could just be doing it for appearance’s sake. Conveniently, the hotel she’s at is just two miles from his place. He could always send for her and have her back at his place in under five minutes. And I have to assume it was his idea to keep her so close, since it’s his credit card that’s paying for her suite there. She’s just the listed guest.”
Isaiah let his head fall back in frustration. Nathan walked in just as the cuff on his arm released the pressure on his arm and beeped. “How we doing?” he asked as all three glanced at the monitor in question.
For the past hour or so, Isaiah had been trying to ignore how increasingly difficult it was beginning to get to breathe. It just hurt too much to do so. He’d purposely let Moe do all the talking, only nodding in response. He’d already been warned not to let the pain get too bad because it could cause hypertension. But in this case, if his blood pressure had spiked, he was certain it had nothing to do with the pain but rather everything Moe had just laid on him.
Not surprising, the nurse was in there soon enough, giving him that same scolding frown she gave him often. “Blood pressure’s up,” Leonor said, pushing a few things on the monitor. Unlike his younger nurse, this one was a bit more cantankerous. “What’s going on, Isaiah? Are you in pain?”
She lifted a brow as the blood pressure cuff on his arm started squeezing his arm again. “Not too—”
“Don’t talk,” Leonor snapped, shutting him up mid-sentence and making his brother and Moe chuckle. “Wait until the machine is done. But I can already tell you are. You’re running a fever.” She came around the other side of his bed and pulled the rail down. “You might have an infection in your wound or your lungs. This is why it’s important to tell us if you’re in pain. Pain is a good warning sign for many things.”
Leonor lifted his blanket, put on her stethoscope, and listened to his chest. When she asked him to breathe in, he did his best, but it hurt like hell and a groan escaped him. “Hurts bad, huh?” Grudgingly, he nodded. “Not good,” she said with a frown, and the blood pressure machine went off again. “Even higher now. I need to call the doctor.”
“The doctor? Why?” Nathan asked with that same anxious expression he and all his siblings had worn those first few days. He was already pulling out his phone. “Is something wrong?”
Leonor placed the oxygen mask on Isaiah. “Your brother’s lungs don’t sound good. Pneumonia is a very common complication in patients who’ve had major surgery like his.” She turned to Isaiah. “The doctor needs to take a listen and decide how aggressive the treatment for it should be. I’m giving you a stronger dose of antibiotics along with painkillers. You need to take deeper breaths and try to cough—get some of that gunk in your lungs loosened up and out of there.”
She turned to Moe and Nathan, who was already doing something on his phone, no doubt alerting the other troops. “No more talking for him. He needs to reserve every bit of energy now for his breathing. It’s the only way he’ll strengthen those lungs.” Leonor pointed at the paperwork in Moe’s hands with a frown. “If that’s work-related or anything that might stress him out, put it away.”
The moment she was out of the room, Isaiah turned to Moe. It surprised him to see his usually defiant cousin already closing the file. But even he seemed a little alarmed. The nurse rushing out of there the way she had, informing them that Isaiah likely had pneumonia, was enough to have both Moe and Nathan exchanging concerned glances. “Anything else I need to know?”
“Don’t talk,” Nathan said, a bit exasperated. “Did you not hear what she just said.”
Isaiah rolled his eyes but stared at Moe for a response. “Raquel leaves in four days.”
“Who?” Nathan asked.
“Where to?” Isaiah asked, feeling his chest tighten, and was irritated with himself for still caring—needing to know. “For how long?”
“She’s gonna be everywhere.” Moe flipped through his paperwork. “Mostly Europe for the first month—”
“Month!” Isaiah said then hacked and groaned at the pain it brought on.
“No more talking, Sai,” Nathan said even firmer than the first time then turned to Moe. “Who’s Raquel?”
“The girl he was watching in New Mexico.”
It took a second, but then Nathan nodded and turned to Isaiah, who was already feeling woozy. “Kelli’s short for Raquel,” Nathan said quickly before Isaiah could try to explain.
The doctor and Leonor came in to examine Isaiah, but the pain killers were in full effect now. Isaiah could barely respond with nods and shakes of his head. After listening to Isaiah’s chest for just a moment, the doctor said something about a chest tube. They’d be bypassing the X-ray. The last thing Isaiah saw just before he passed out was Olivia and AJ rushing into the room.
~*~
Kelli
Kelli stared at the television. Turning it on now was like playing Russian roulette. The odds she’d turn it on and there’d be some kind of coverage of what she least wanted to hear about were too great. She hit power and waited the few seconds it took for the monitor to turn on. The moment she saw AJ’s face and that damn interview she’d come across a few times already she turned off the television set and tossed the remote across the bed. She hated the media, and she was officially done turning on any televisions anywhere. Just because they were hell bent on replaying the same thing over and over again, didn’t mean she should be forced to hear about it. She was so over it.
Just like all the times Kelli had thought she might be able to stop thinking about him, her efforts were sab
otaged. Today she’d planned on staying preoccupied, and the first damn thing she saw when she turned the TV on was his brother’s press conference appearance again. As she always did, Kelli hit the off button before listening to a single word. She could hardly believe they were still harping on this.
Pissed but determined to not let thoughts of him ruin yet another one of her days, she got up, stalked into the bathroom, and washed her face. After a long while of slapping the water against her cheeks in frustrated anger, she stared at the weary face in the mirror.
“Don’t start,” she whispered. “Don’t you dare start feeling guilty about not even waiting to hear an update. It’s not your business anymore.”
Kelli lifted her chin, grabbed a towel, and stalked out of there. She’d been a prisoner for too long. Isaiah had consumed too many of her thoughts for over a year now. She wasn’t going back to that hell again. It was time she had a life she could enjoy.
Why shouldn’t she enjoy the traveling? Why should she feel guilty about anything—about taking this job. He wanted nothing to do with her—made that perfectly clear. Now that she was free to live her life, she wouldn’t be moping around or on the run. She’d had a lot of time to make up and planned on doing just that—living her life and not looking back.
It’d still be a few days before her condo at Mr. Walker’s estate would be ready for her to move in. In the meantime, he’d put her up at a very nice hotel near his family’s ranch. First, he’d offered to let her stay in one of the many guest rooms in the main house on the ranch, the one he lived in. But Kelli passed, saying she’d be more comfortable at a hotel, even said she’d pay for it herself, but he’d insisted on paying for her.
It was only when her phone rang that she realized she was walking around her suite at a snail’s pace. Glad for the distraction, she answered it. “Hi, Mr. Walker.”
“Raquel, I told you to please call me Zach.”
“Okay,” she said with a weak smile, grabbing the notebook she’d prepared for his call and taking a seat on the edge of her bed. “Hello, Zach.”
“I got to thinking about our call today. Since I skipped lunch, I was thinking maybe we could discuss next week’s itinerary over lunch somewhere instead of over the phone. The restaurant right there at your hotel is one I eat at often because, aside from their fine cuisine, they also have a great selection of comfort foods. You know the kind of food that tastes like Mom made it?” He chuckled softly. “Not that my mom or even grandmother ever cooked much, but one of the nannies did. Have you had lunch?”
Kelli turned to the barely touched slice of pizza she’d bought from the place next door for her late breakfast and sighed. “I had a slice of pizza earlier.”
“Oh. Well, perhaps you’d like dessert? That restaurant also has some of the best desserts in town.”
Kelli thought about it for a moment. She was about to politely decline then changed her mind. Maybe comfort food was exactly what she needed. It might do her good to get out of her room, away from the television, and do something that might be construed as social for the first time since . . .
“You know what? That actually sounds good. Can you just give me like twenty minutes to change and get cleaned up?”
“Sure, sure,” he said cheerfully. “No need to dress up or anything. I know you’re a stylist and image consultant, but today, you can be off the clock.”
They confirmed where and when they’d meet, and Kelli got to changing as soon as she was off the phone. Despite his saying she shouldn’t worry about dressing up, there was no way she was going down there looking like a bum. Maybe if she knew the guy better. Even that made her slow and think of Isaiah again. How quickly and easily she’d felt comfortable with him, as if she’d known him forever.
Shaking off the thoughts, she finished twisting her hair up in a bun, covered the circles under her eyes with concealer, and dabbed on a little lip gloss. She’d dressed a pair of jeans up with a dressier top and a pair of wedge shoes that matched her small handbag. After applying some light makeup, she gave herself a once-over in the long mirror in the bathroom then sprayed on some perfume.
Exhaling long and a bit exaggerated, Kelli walked out of the bathroom, wondering how long it’d be until she was feeling normal again. Maybe, once she could stop dreading turning on the television or opening her browser, she could make some progress.
Mr. Walker was already waiting for her downstairs at the bar where they’d agreed to meet. When Isaiah had asked her about Mr. Walker on the plane, Kelli had been vague for good reason. She’d heard it in his tone almost immediately. Not only was Mr. Walker an exceptionally good-looking man, he’d actually shared a little about himself in her initial interview. He explained about having recently acquired his masters of science in business analytics. He’d also mentioned being single. It came up when he explained all the traveling they’d be doing. It was also one of the things he’d wanted to make sure she’d be open and available to do—traveling with him—very frequently. He reiterated often that she’d be gone for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. Since, at the time, she’d been single and ready to leave her life behind, she’d assured him she’d been more than willing. It was pathetic that in such a short time she was right back to where she’d been then: desolate, alone, and single. Kelli only hoped that traveling the world would be enough to distract her from any unsettling thoughts that she’d made the wrong decision.
He stood up from the barstool he’d been sitting on when he saw her. His light gray eyes sparkled as he smiled, taking her in. “Would you like a drink before we eat?”
Kelli shook her head immediately. It was silly, but she always felt weird drinking in the daytime, unless, of course, she was in Vegas or in an environment like the chili cook-off. Gads. Why did her head always have to bring him into her thoughts? “No, thank you, but go ahead and finish.”
“I can finish this in the restaurant. I’ve already paid for it.”
Glancing up at one of the televisions mounted above the bar, Kelli agreed with a nod and started quickly out toward the restaurant with Mr. Walker. Was there nowhere she could turn and not be reminded of Isaiah? One of the handful of interviews that’d been airing all week of AJ was on again. Kelli couldn’t get out of their fast enough.
As they were escorted to their table by the hostess, Kelli made an observation. Mr. Walker hadn’t brought a briefcase or even a folder. He’d made it sound as if this were a business lunch. She’d likely be having a lot of lunch and dinner meetings with the guy, possibly lots of breakfasts too. Hell, she may as well try to enjoy it.
They sat, and this time Kelli did order a glass of wine. So what if it was still early in the day? She could use a glass right about then. So when the waitress took their drink order and Mr. Walker ordered another whiskey on the rocks, she decided what the heck? After some small talk about her stay at the hotel so far and his telling her that her condo might be ready sooner than he expected, they got right down to business. She got her answer about why he hadn’t brought a briefcase. Apparently, he had everything he needed in his phone.
Kelli felt like a dinosaur sitting there with her notebook and pen. But she worked best taking notes on paper then transferring everything onto an Excel spreadsheet on her laptop.
She ordered the chicken pot pie at Zach’s recommendation. He’d reminded her again to call him that, and then she caught herself again a few times almost referring to him as Mr. Walker. But by the time they’d sat there eating for nearly an hour and she’d had a couple of glasses of wine, she was feeling a bit more comfortable with him, and for the first time that week, the wine hadn’t made her weepy. She’d actually laughed a few times.
More than likely it was the alcohol, but Zach had opened up to her about himself in a way she never would’ve expected so soon. The previously very professional and reserved man she’d met on her interview and again when she’d reported to work a few days ago, had a vulnerable side she’d been surprised by. The whiskey had maybe made him open
up a bit too much. But she was glad she found this out now rather than later.
When they were done with lunch and after Zach had already ordered another bottle of wine they could share, Kelli decided to balk. She felt bad because it was too late to cancel the bottle, but she’d already begun to giggle a little too much with the two glasses she’d had.
Just as they brought the bottle out, Kelli excused herself to the ladies’ room for two reasons. She wanted to make sure she hadn’t rubbed any of the concealer off from under her eyes. The dark circles had begun to get pretty bad. But she also needed to gather her thoughts about everything Zach had just admitted to her.
She walked out of the restaurant toward the ladies’ room, refusing to even glance in the direction of the bar with the mounted television sets. The last thing she needed now was another reminder of him.
“Is that why you haven’t bothered to check on how my brother’s doing?