Chapter 22

The look on Carl’s face couldn’t bode anything good. Standing at the head of the conference table, behind and just out of view of Peter, he met Georgia’s eyes as she entered with Sid. The slight shake of Carl’s head when she met his gaze might’ve meant anything, except the almost imperceptible motion was delivered with a gravity she implicitly understood.

She was screwed. They all were.

Peter didn’t look up from his handheld as she and Sid made their way to the back of the room. It was standing-room only, with most of the rest of the staff already gathered at the table and along the wall by the door. A stack of manila folders occupied the chair to Peter’s right. From this distance she couldn’t tell what was written on the protruding tabs, but suspected they were names.

“Does anyone have anything to say?” Peter swept the room with his gaze, conveniently skipping Georgia at the back.

Shit. Her stomach plummeted. He knew. He definitely knew. How had he found out? Had Carl told him? No one spoke, and her fear built to panic. Someone here had to give her up right this minute. If they did, he’d only fire her and nobody else.

She elbowed Sid and hissed, “Tell him.”

Are you sure? Sid mouthed.

Swallowing hard, Georgia nodded once.

Sid stepped forward, and Peter held up a hand. “Not you, Mr. Deloitte.”

Georgia closed her eyes. Clearly, he wanted her to say it. Wanted her to make the admission. If she did, would it save their jobs? Not hers, of course, but everyone else’s?

Fabric rustled, and chairs squeaked with their occupants’ restless motions. When she opened her eyes, everyone’s gazes were locked on her. Some appeared sympathetic, others fearful. One journalist shook his head. She didn’t have to do this, he seemed to be saying.

But she did. Even if she didn’t owe the truth to Peter, she owed it to her coworkers to save their livelihoods if she could. Though, knowing the man as she now did, she was certain only hers and Sid’s jobs were on the line. He wouldn’t shut down the paper and fire everyone two days before Christmas just because of her.

“Peter…”

He slammed his fist on the table, and everyone, including herself, jumped.

“It’s Mr. Wells, Lady Montrose.” He spat her name like an invective, and her heart fractured from the center outward.

Oh God, he was angry. Angrier than she could’ve envisioned. His eyes had gone stone-cold—hard and dead—as if he’d already walled himself off from her for good. Which, of course, he must have.

“Mr. Wells.” She tried again, walking toward him as she spoke, attempting not to notice the way his jaw muscles bunched. “I don’t have any justification, not anymore. If I ever did.” She reached his side, and he stood to face her, fists balled and gaze unwavering. “But I wrote the column.” His right eye gave a little tic, the only sign her words had any effect on him. Had he hoped she might deny it? Come up with some improbable truth that would save her? Save them? She lifted her chin to bolster her courage. “I was never an assistant to anyone before you. I’m…so sorry.” The rest of her confession stuck in her throat, and she closed her eyes to force out, “As you discovered, I’m Gigi Montrose.”

When she opened her eyes, he’d already moved. Away from her and toward the folders on the chair.

“When I call your name, please come forward,” he said, his back to her. “Albertson.”

Josh Albertson, the paper’s sportswriter, stepped forward and took the folder with a mumbled “Thanks.”

“Please,” she said, knowing what had to be inside that folder. “Don’t do this to them. It’s not their fault.”

He ignored her and kept reading names, pausing as he got to D.

“Donner,” he said quietly.

Carl’s chin snapped up, shock written on his face. He seemed to hold Peter’s gaze a moment, then nodded in acceptance.

“I’m sorry, Peter,” he said quietly and took his folder.

“Me too, Carl.” The term bitter disappointment found new definition in Peter’s reply.

Peter continued on without calling Sid’s name. Someone had apparently misalphabetized the files. He looked around and said, “Fumonti.”

“Stop it!” Georgia hollered. No longer able to stand that these people—so many innocent, good people—were suffering the demise of a career and the loss of a paper they truly loved all because of her. Hysteria welled, and tears soon followed. “Don’t do this to them!”

Ignoring her, Peter called, “Grimsby.”

She flew at Peter, wrenching his arm back and tearing the folder from his fingers. Papers fluttered to the floor, and she jabbed her opposite thumb at her chest.

“It was me!” Tears ran down her cheeks in scalding rivers. “I told you the first day.” And she had, in a matter of speaking. “Don’t do this! Not to them. They don’t deserve it.”

Her accent had gone full British, she knew, but she didn’t care. She was past hiding. Past caring that he hated her. If nothing else, she had to make this right for everyone else, though she couldn’t save herself. Peter looked right through her, his gaze impassive. Uncaring. His anger she could’ve stomached. This, though—the complete annihilation of every feeling, as if he’d never known her—this was her undoing.

“Don’t. Do. This.” The whispered plea abraded the sensitive tissues at the hollow of her throat. “These are good people.”

“Is this hurting you?” he asked, unblinking.

She nodded and swiped both palms over her cheeks, trying in vain to stem the tide of tears.

“Are you humiliated?” This question he voiced more quietly than the first, and she swore she detected a hint of sorrow.

“No,” she said, glad to finally have his attention on her rather than on sacking her coworkers. “I’m ashamed of what I’ve done to you and to them.”

There was a difference between humiliation and shame. The first, Peter would’ve done to her, the other she’d done to herself.

“I would’ve preferred humiliated, but shame will do.” His icy stare made her wonder if the sorrow she’d seen before had only been a figment of her imagination.

“Why?” she asked, aghast.

“Because”—he turned away and held out a folder to the paper’s paid college intern—“then you’d know exactly how I feel.”

Amazingly, her tears crawled back up her ducts and evaporated. “That’d mean you were capable of feeling.”

Peter jerked, then turned slowly to face her, a new shade of livid making an ugly mask of his face.

“Careful,” he said, “or you and Sid won’t be the only two employees I fire.”

“Isn’t that what you’re doing?” She placed her hands on her hips and tilted her head toward the employees who openly gawped at their argument. “Sacking us all? Getting petty revenge on your serfs for failing to bow to your whims?”

“Why, Lady Montrose”—he mocked her with a sweeping bow—“I didn’t know you cared about the plebs.”

“They’re not plebs,” she shot back. “And of course I care. More than you do.”

“Now why do I doubt that?” He drew a file from the bottom of the stack and handed it to her. “Take this and get out. Both you and Sid.”

“Tell me first what you’re doing to them.” She indicated her coworkers with a nod of her chin.

“I suggest you worry more about what I’m going to do to you.” He snapped his fingers over her shoulder as he spoke.

A burly man she’d seen on the sidelines with him at public functions stepped from shadows she hadn’t known existed and took her arm to escort her from the building.

* * *

“I can’t believe he had a security escort waiting.” Georgia pushed the drunken noodles around her plate with her chopsticks. The shimmery pasta slithered over the white porcelain much like the regret churning her stomach, making it impossible to eat.

“I can.” Carl, tie and shirt rumpled, blazer shed, appeared the picture of corporate dejection.

It was the first time he’d spoken since she and Sid had insisted he come with them to dinner. They’d chosen a high-end establishment with shoji-screen partitions that made a private dining room of each table so they could eat in solitude.

“I’m so sorry, Carl.” Georgia squeezed his forearm before letting her hand drop away and taking up her chopsticks once more. “I know he was your biggest client and…your friend.”

Just alluding to Peter’s existence made her heart falter to within a millimeter of stopping. She couldn’t imagine what actually saying his name might do to her.

Carl’s answering laugh sounded rueful. “He was my only client.”

“What?” Sid paused, chopsticks poised with a pile of brown rice balanced on top. “Does he know that?”

“No.” Carl never looked up from his green tea.

Sid and Georgia exchanged glances; then he pointed to her plate. “Are you going to eat that?”

She glanced down. “No.”

“Well, aren’t we a jolly bunch.” Sid pulled Georgia’s plate toward him. “I say we go into business together.”

“I’ll be fine,” Carl said. “I could retire on what Peter put in that folder.”

“What?” Napkin at her lips, Georgia slowly lowered her hand. “The only thing in my folder was a ‘you are being sued for fraud and defamation of character’ letter.”

Though she knew the suit wouldn’t stick, the lawyer fees would be exorbitant. Peter would make sure of it, she knew. Out of the three of them, Sid stood to lose the most. God, she wished she’d never gotten him into this.

“Me too.” Sid shuddered. “He can sue, but I doubt he’ll win anything more than pocket lint from me.”

“He won’t want money.” Carl poured more tea. “He’ll sue for a very public apology and a retraction.”

Georgia took the pot from Carl and topped off her cup, trying to ignore the aching hole in her heart. The one person she needed more than anything to get her through the twin pains of loss and well-deserved self-recrimination was Peter. Barring that, only grim determination and time would do.

“I don’t know where he thinks a retraction is going to be printed, since he fired everyone,” she observed.

“He didn’t,” Carl said, his voice weary.

Sid and Georgia both snapped their heads up to stare at Carl.

“He didn’t?” they parroted in unison.

“I’m not supposed to tell you.” He leaned backward on his cushion, propping himself on his hands. “The terms say I agree to keep the details confidential.”

Georgia’s heart quickened. If everyone got to keep their jobs, then she hadn’t bollixed up quite as badly as she’d thought. Oh, she’d screwed the pooch all right, but she hadn’t ruined everyone’s lives. Just Sid’s, apparently, but maybe she could make it up to him by paying his legal fees and securing him a new job.

“Fuck it. I have a gag order in my severance agreement, but I might as well tell you,” Carl finally said. “Everyone is being transferred to other positions at various Wells Industries subsidiaries.” Carl pushed his glasses up and looked at them both in turn. “But you’re right. He’s closed the paper and plans to tear down the building.”

Sid gave a low whistle. “When that man cleans house, he doesn’t kid around.”

“It’s my fault,” Georgia said, more than a little morose to be the demise of a hundred-and-some-odd-year-old institution as well as more than two dozen careers. New jobs or not, most of her coworkers hadn’t stayed on at the paper for money. They’d done the work because they’d loved it.

“Given that my folder held the same ‘fuck you very much’ missive as yours, I assume Peter thinks I’m at least partially to blame.” Sid gave her an arch look. “Which I am.”

If only Peter hadn’t found out. She’d have kept her promise to Sid and called to tell him today before he left for Christmas with his family. Knowing what she knew now, she realized it had been a pipe dream at best, and a complete delusional fantasy at worst, that he might’ve understood and forgiven her if she’d come clean before he’d found out.

“I don’t understand how he found out,” she mused.

“He called me. He wanted to know your middle name,” Carl said.

“My middle name?” Shifting on her pillow, she thought about her middle names—all three of them—and wondered which one had given her away. “Whatever for?”

“I think for a Christmas present.”

Wasn’t that a knife in her heart. Swallowing hard, she looked away before choking out the words “Go on.”

“I told him,” Carl said after a sip of his tea.

A bucket of ice water thrown over her head couldn’t have stunned her more thoroughly.

“You…you told him?” she sputtered.

“Your middle names!” he said hastily. “That’s all it took to set the ball in motion. And once it was rolling?” He made a helpless gesture with his hands. “It was over before I could even call to warn you.”

“How could he figure out who I was from my middle names?”

“Once he had them, he thought to Google you. Apparently he never had before.”

Silence fell, heavy, as she pictured Peter’s face when he likely saw her standing next to her father at the ten-year family reunion. The picture had been taken ages ago, but the name Earl of Montrose would have been enough to clue him in if Georgia Whitcomb, Lady Montrose, hadn’t.

“He guessed you were Gigi’s sister and that you’d been withholding the information from him.” Carl took off his glasses and fiddled with them, twisting the arms this way and that, until Georgia thought they would come off. “Then he asked me how I knew your middle names.” Carl’s face whitened at the memory, and Georgia saw clearly the moment he’d realized his mistake in revealing that tidbit to Peter. “I’m sorry, Georgia,” he said. “I had to come clean.”

“Did you…” She flicked her gaze to Sid, assessing whether or not revealing Carl’s sexuality was acceptable, given Sid’s orientation and all. The politics eluded her, however, and she finished with, “Come clean about everything? About you?”

Carl’s momentarily widened eyes and glance to Sid said he caught her meaning.

“No,” he said after a moment’s pause and a poke at the orange slices that had come with the check. “I couldn’t. Not then. But I will.”

Thinking about everything they’d both lost, she must’ve pulled a face at him.

Carl sat up, defensive. “What was I supposed to say? ‘By the way, I betrayed you, and I’ve been lying to you. I’m gay and in love with you’?”

“I— No! Of course not.” Georgia pulled the check toward herself and fingered the edge of the paper. “I was just wondering if he knew exactly how much we really love him, if he’d have been quite as angry.”

It was the first time she’d spoken aloud of her feelings or admitted them to herself really. Too little, too late.

“You’re a closet case?” Sid asked after a moment.

“Sid!” Georgia said, aghast, though she’d essentially had the same conversation with Carl earlier in the week. “You, of all people, should know coming out is a personal decision.”

“No.” Carl waved his hand. “No, it’s all right.” He exchanged a glance with Sid. “I was. But not anymore.”

Sid sat back, frowning, and muttered something about losing his touch.

Georgia smirked. Sid prided himself on being able to spot a potential brother in arms—of the nonviolent variety—from fifty paces. And yet Carl had flown under his gaydar all night long.

A tense moment passed while Sid appeared to be contemplating the meaning of life and Carl focused on finishing the pot of tea. Georgia looked from one man to the other, playing visual table tennis, until realization broadsided her. She slowly stood.

“I have to go to the, um…” She hooked her thumb in the general direction of the loo and scurried away to leave the two men alone to sort things out.

As she washed her hands, she refused to look in the mirror, unable to stand the sight of her own face. With Sid and Carl to distract her, she’d survived the last two hours. Home, alone, she knew she’d fall apart. Until she crossed her threshold, she had to keep it together.

When she returned to the table, both men sat on the same side, sharing quiet conversation and a bottle of sake. The murmur of their voices had died as soon as she slid the shoji screen aside and paused in the entry.

“I’m going to get going,” she said.

“Are you sure?” Sid made to stand, but she stopped him with a shake of her head.

“Sure, I’m sure.” She forced a smile, glad that at least something good had come of this disastrous day. “I have a flight to catch.”

“Call if you need me?” Sid asked, and she knew he meant it. He always did.

“I will.” She smiled softly and slid the screen shut.

As she stepped out into the New York night, she wondered when she’d see him again. So much was about to change—had already changed—and her along with it. And that, as they said, was probably for the best.

The cab ride to her building was short. Too short. As she got out and the doorman paid her fare, automatically she looked up. The top of the building disappeared into darkness, making it impossible to distinguish the lights in the penthouse from the others several levels below. If she rang his bell, would he answer? Or would he ignore her? Was there anything at all she could say to make him change his mind about the paper? About her?

When she walked in the door, the concierge handed her a gilt-edged envelope with the condo association’s name emblazoned on the flap. Instinctively, she knew what was inside. With a weary sigh, she grabbed the pen from the black marble counter and scribbled a note on the back. The condo association wanted her gone? She’d oblige them. For a price.

“Please see Mr. Wells receives this?” she asked, handing the envelope to the man.

He glanced at the back, his expression never changing though she knew he’d read what she’d written: I’ll sell it to you for $3.4 million. Going back to London. ~ G.

If Peter so desired, he could gut her flat, just as he’d gutted her heart. She had done him wrong—she’d never deny it—but by loving him, and continuing to love him, she was going to punish herself far more thoroughly, for far longer, than he could possibly dream. There was nothing worse he could say or do to her than what she’d spend the rest of her life doing to herself.