MATCHMAKER (A Billionaire Bad Boy Romance) (15 page)

The care and compassion in the vet’s voice, that she knew her patient and knew the situation so well that all Cherise had to say was Sterling’s name, made Cherise start to cry. “Yes, please.”

“I can be there in an hour.”

“Thank you,” she managed, and hung up.

Once upon a time, Cherise thought she wanted to be a vet, and this, right here, was why she’d decided it would be easier to study people’s brains and how they worked. Around each other, people put up walls and were guarded. One of the richest men in the world sobbed openly over his dying dog. Something about animals brought out the best in people, brought their hearts into the light, whether they wanted them there or not.

Sterling couldn’t marry Jenna.

She put one hand on his back, and her other hand on Ambrosia’s leg.

They cried until the vet came, and Brad Chadwell showed her in.

STERLING

There was nothing left. Only emptiness. Grief gnawed at him from the inside, eating his mind, his heart, his guts. He knew he should eat something. Every thought he had made him think of Ambrosia. What would it be like to eat something without her big brown eyes hoping expectantly he’d share?

And Jenna. Her tone. Like this wasn’t the most important moment of the last twelve years of his life. When he told her he thought it was almost the end, she’d just responded with a stony silence. So he told her he was fine, and he’d handle it on his own.

Cherise had fallen asleep on the leather chaise lounge, curled around a pillow. Black dog hairs clung to her sweater, and he almost lost it again. As if he had it together to lose…

His throat hurt from crying, and his eyelids felt like sandpaper.

He remembered his father, rambling around the house like a zombie after his mother was killed in the drunk driving accident. Sterling had been eight, and his father had called a cab to the office because he had important work to do on a Saturday night. His mother decided she’d stay at the party and drive home when she was done. They’d had a fight about it. She told him he was married to his work and needed to get his priorities straight. Sterling had been home with the nanny.

He was supposed to be asleep, but the nanny’s worried tone on the telephone woke him, and he’d crept from his room to watch her pacing the kitchen, bound to the wall by the phone cord.

The hosts said she’d left hours ago. His father snapped at the nanny, saying she was probably trying to teach him a lesson.

The police came to the door, and Sterling saw it all as they explained to the nanny what had happened—a car ran a red light and impacted the driver’s side of his mother’s car at almost fifty miles per hour. She was dead before the EMTs arrived. The nanny took this all in with poise and grace and called his father back while the police officer waited. Like a scared mouse, Sterling crept out to talk to the officer while the nanny got on the phone.

From across the room, they heard Mr. Waters snap at her for disturbing him again. She told him what happened in a clear, professional tone.

After a long pause, the nanny said, “All right,” and hung up.

When she turned back to the living room, she saw Sterling there, hovering beside the officer. Only then did she start to cry.

Everyone kept telling Sterling how brave he was. How he was such a big boy for not crying. If Sterling had a son, and if the same thing happened, he’d want the boy to cry, to feel. It was too easy for those muscles to go numb, and later, to die.

Tonight’s events proved they hadn’t died in Sterling.

But he could let them. It would be easy to. He’d say goodbye to Ben soon enough—the idea jabbed into him like a hot knife. He couldn’t feel those things again; he didn’t know if he could bear it. After that, he’d make excuses that he was too busy for another dog.

No pets. No family. He didn’t think he could marry Jenna. He couldn’t marry anyone. It looked like he wouldn’t be getting sole ownership of Bachmann Entertainment Group, after all. He’d climb; he’d drive. He’d get some new tattoos. He’d go to Africa. And he’d work.

When he died, all his billions would go to fifteen-hundred personally selected dog rescues throughout the United States.

Sterling wondered how his life would be different if the results of Cherise’s pregnancy test had been different.

She’d asked him a long time ago, when they first met, if he wanted kids. Back then, the answer was an emphatic no, but now, thinking about how close he’d come with Cherise, he started to have second thoughts.

He couldn’t imagine them with Jenna.

Sterling’s mind battled with itself. He could only imagine the feelings of loss he felt over Ambrosia would be dwarfed by losing a child. By losing a wife. And everyone dies—everyone abandons you, eventually.

Cherise opened her eyes in the chair and stretched. He hoped she hadn’t noticed that he’d been staring at her, lost in thought.

“How long have you been standing there?” she asked.

He looked at his watch. He didn’t know. It was almost four o’clock in the morning, though. He sighed and couldn’t remember ever feeling this low or broken.

“I should get you home.”

“Have Brad take me.”

“Nah, I’ll do it.”

“Are you okay to be alone?” she said.

“As in am I going to kill myself over my dog? No. I’m fine.”

Cherise laughed, a sarcastic bark of a laugh that didn’t mean good things. “You’re the farthest thing from fine I’ve ever seen.”

“I’m probably going to take a few days. Go hiking somewhere warm. Drop off the radar.”

“Okay.” She didn’t sound convinced. “You’re not going to do anything crazy or self-destructive?”

“Not unreasonably so.”

“What’s that mean?”

“It means I have too much work to do, and at the risk of sounding like a dick, I’m too important to get to wallow or do something really stupid.”

“You sound like a dick a lot of the time.”

Sterling laughed, and it surprised him. It snuck out of him, and then he clamped down on it and looked back out the window at the sleeping, snowy city. He didn’t want to laugh. Didn’t want to think good thoughts or happy thoughts in a world without Ambrosia, a world where he didn’t dare to open his heart to a human.

“Let’s get you home,” he said.

Part of him wanted her to argue—wanted her to suggest he shouldn’t be alone, that he needed her… Something. But she nodded and told him okay. She made it easier, at least.

They didn’t speak as they rode down the elevator together. He drove her home in his Hummer, and she kept her eyes on the snowy roads outside. He pulled up in front of her apartment building.

“You like it here?” he said.

“It’s all right,”

“Are you happy?”

“Sterling… Get some rest, okay?”

“I’ll try.”

She got out, and he watched her use her key to get inside. Not even a doorman.

He sat in the idling car, not sure what to do next. He couldn’t go home. At this hour, the whole place would be empty, and without Ambrosia… The idea clawed at him. He couldn’t go. He did a U-turn in the street and headed for the airport.

CHERISE

Cherise’s phone rang six times while she was working the next night, but she didn’t recognize the number, and the caller didn’t leave a message. When she’d finally gotten off her shift at ten, exhausted from not sleeping the night before, her phone rang a seventh time, and she picked it up.

“What?”

“Cherise?”

“Who is this?” She wasn’t in the mood for any kind of games or any kind of bullshit. She was tired and grumpy. Watching Sterling’s pain the night before left her feeling raw and overly sensitive. She’d screwed up a man’s tall skinny macchiato earlier and he’d shouted at her, and she’d almost cried in front of everyone.

“It’s Jenna.”

Ugh. Possibly the last person in the universe she wanted to deal with. She strapped on a happy voice and said, “Hey Jenna, what’s up?”

“Have you seen Sterling?”

Cherise thought about lying, but it wasn’t worth it. Had Sterling even talked to her today? Had they spoken yesterday when he made the decision about Ambrosia?

“I saw him last night. I went over to be with him while the vet was there.”

“Oh. I know he thought she might.”

Jesus, so he hadn’t talked to her? She never knew how to phrase it. “Ambrosia passed last night.”

“Oh.”

Had they even been talking? Cherise should tell Jenna about screwing Sterling. Should tell her about his inability to love anyone.

“His dog died, and now he’s vanished,” Jenna said. “Jayne called me at lunch asking if I’d seen him.”

“He told me he was going to go somewhere and go hiking, but I assumed he didn’t mean today.”

“Do you know where he went?”

“No idea.”

“Why did he tell you and not me?” She sounded wounded, like a petulant child.

“I think because he knew I was fond of Ambrosia.” The idea that she wouldn’t see Ambrosia again still hit her hard, a nasty stab in the chest.

Jenna let out a huff. “Well, if he talks to you, tell him Ben’s in the hospital. He certainly doesn’t seem to have any interest in talking to me.”

“Ben’s in the hospital?”

“They think it was a stroke. Jayne called me this evening. She hasn’t heard from Sterling either.”

“No one has. I guess he wanted off the grid.”

“Well, his selfish little trip may mean he doesn’t get to say goodbye to his mentor. I don’t know how you put up with him, and I understand now why you quit. He’s emotional and unpredictable.”

Emotional was hardly the word Cherise would use to describe him, and it certainly felt like the loss of his dog was a pretty appropriate time to become distraught.

“I don’t understand him.”

“He’ll be back. Just talk to him.”

“How?” Jenna was as emotionally dead as Sterling was.

“You guys will figure it out.” Cherise wanted the conversation to end immediately. “I gotta go. If I hear from him—which I totally don’t expect to—I’ll tell him to call you, okay?”

“Okay.”

“And be gentle with him about the dog. She was his whole world.”

Jenna made a displeased sound. “Well, I’m just glad you haven’t heard from him either.”

They said goodbye. Cherise went to the cabinet where she kept her paperwork and pulled out the folder Sterling gave her when she’d started working for him. His emergency cell phone number. The one he explicitly told her never, ever to call. She dialed it.

She knew it was just her imagination, but the ringing seemed farther away than usual. She imagined the call being transferred through satellites and across continents.

For all she knew, he was just in his apartment, not answering the line.

“Cherise?” He sounded someplace far off, his voice tinny and distant.

“Sterling, you have to come home.”

“I can’t. Not yet. I’m not ready.”

Cherise took a deep breath. “I heard from Jenna today. Ben’s in the hospital. I don’t know any more than that.”

The silence through the phone lines spoke volumes. “It’s going to be at least a day before I get back. I’m in Tanzania.”

She didn’t bother asking him what the hell he was doing in Tanzania. “You should probably call Jenna.”

Another pause. “I know. I don’t think I can keep seeing her. I think it’s over.”

Cherise reminded herself it wasn’t her problem. It was her job once, but she had quit. Now, her days involved making coffee and thinking about becoming a student again. Not her problem. She hated the way her pulse elevated, how the idea of it excited her.

“Will you come with me to see him?”

“Me?”

“He really likes you. He told me how smart he thinks you are. How much he respects you.”

She thought about her time in Dominica. She didn’t think she’d done much of anything to deserve Ben’s respect. She’d fucked both his protégé and his assistant within twenty-four hours.

“I’ll come.”

“Thank you.” The gratitude in his words flowed to her across the Atlantic.

“Get back as soon as you can. I didn’t get many details, but it sounds serious.”

“This was stupid of me.”

“How were you to know he’d get sick now? Take care of yourself, Sterling. Be kind. You’re allowed to make mistakes.”

“Too bad I’m not making mistakes. I’m just fucking up. I’ll call you when I get in tomorrow. Thank you for reaching out. I needed to know this. I can’t imagine what I would have done if you didn’t have this number. Coming home… Whenever I decided to… To find out he was sick. Or worse. Jesus. I’ll see you soon.”

Cherise was left staring at the phone. He was going to break up with Jenna. What did that mean for her? She paced the floor of her small apartment, mind racing. She chided herself for even thinking of such a thing. Selfish. Stupid.

She still wanted him. Still delighted in the sound of his voice, the memory of his hands on her skin.