Ruby Red 3 - A Romance for All Time (Complete)

Chapter 36

Jack's office hadn't changed much in the two years since she'd last been here.

Granted, there wasn't a half-naked blonde currently strewn across his desk, which was an improvement. In fact, all traces of that woman had disappeared. Ali didn't recognize the brunette who'd shown her into the office. She wondered if Jack had made a pass at the new girl yet, then laughed at her own folly. If the assistant had been here more than a day, of course, he had. This was Jack, after all.

"Can I get you anything? Coffee?"

She'd made coffee at her mother's house this morning, but that had been hours ago. The time change from New York meant she was up early. "That'd be great." Sam hadn't returned to California with her this time. The plan was for him to fly in the day of the board meeting. He insisted on being there when she presented her pitch to become CEO of Stinson Studios. To support her.

A part of Ali was glad Sam hadn't come back with her. The night Penelope and Leif broke the news about Jack meddling in their lives, orchestrating false news stories, she knew it was time to confront Jack head-on. Her ex-husband suggested meeting at his office when she'd reached out to him, asking to talk. Letting Jack think he had a home-court advantage was all part of Ali's plan. Make him think he had the upper hand, butter him up before she made her own play.

The man himself was also absent from the office. Lateness a power play for sure. They'd both used it in the past. It didn't bother Ali. Or the location. The painful memories of the ultimate demise of her marriage which took place in this sparsely decorated space had faded so thin she could barely recall them. Replaced by blazing passion and genuine love with a green-eyed blond who was more a partner than the dream of Jack had ever been.

Ali surveyed his desk, the closed laptop gleaming in the late morning light from the floor-to-ceiling windows comprising two walls. Not one photo. Nothing personal. No multi-coloured stress ball like Sam had in his office at the Harrington Foundation. No colour at all. The entire office was devoid of it, awash instead in hues of darkest black to gunmetal grey to stark white. Not even a potted plant to give the illusion of life.

"Alexandria." Jack drew out her full name. Another power play. He knew she hated it. "It surprised me to get your call. But happy you've come to your senses."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh no, tell me you aren't here to gloat. Did you marry that blondie of yours? Just to save the company? I'd think you'd had enough of bailing out dear ole dad by now."

Ali opened her mouth to retort. Then closed it. Jack's last words sinking in. Instead, she asked a question. "What do you mean bailing out?"

With the care of a man who has nothing to lose, Jack plopped himself down in his chair and propped his feet on his almost barren desk. "Do you really not know?"

"Know what?" As the words left her, Ali felt a cold pool of dread form at the bottom of her spine. Did she want to know the answer? This could be another game of Jack's. Spinning facts to form the world he wanted to see. Jack and her father were her past. Still, curiosity leaked in.

"You always were so naive when it came to family." Jack steepled his hands and tapped his index fingers to his lips. "Your father used you to save the company."

This confused her. "Used me how? I wasn't even allowed to be involved in the business."

"It's funny, I always thought you were in on it." Jack's face softened for a moment before returning to its usual smirk.

"Oh, what Jack. Spit it out." She was so tired of his games.

Feet swung off the desk and Jack leaned forward as if about to impart gossip to a reporter. "Where did you think the money came from? To bail out the company?"

"I... I," but she couldn't finish that sentence. She'd no idea, never inquired, simply accepted her father had made some kind of deal to get an influx of cash. Then the reality of that thought hit her. The payments she found the day she reviewed Stinson Studio's finances. The three lump sums. Her father had made a deal. With the Blackhorne family's personal company. "The money from International Consultants."

Jack nodded.

"My father got the money from you?"

"Well, my uncle at first. He negotiated the original deal."

Ali forced herself to keep calm, despite the hot anger prickling at the base of her neck. "Deal?"

"Essentially, it boiled down to a transfer of funds in exchange for you. Your father saved the company, and I got a wife with the right credentials to further Blackhorne Industries. Our marriage, the merger of two influential families," Jack was watching her intently. "A simple transaction, a win-win for everyone."

Except me, thought Ali. "And you knew this? From the beginning?"

The smirk left Jack's face as he got up and moved to stand before the window, his back to her. "My uncle...," he crossed his arms. "I was... given a choice of potential wives. When I saw you at your parent's country club I..." Jack turned towards her, sunlight silhouetting his face and uncrossed his arms, "I desired you."

Over the years together, Ali had slowly learned to discern the difference between Jack's schmoozing, lying, cajoling voice he used to convince people to do his bidding and the rare but sincere tone of honesty. His last statement had been pure honesty.

"Is that supposed to be some sort of compliment?" Ali shot out of her chair. "Am I to be... grateful... that you... the great Jack Blackhorne chose me out of the lot of... women your uncle deemed worthy?"

"It is a compliment. He was very picky."

Jack's uncle, his only living relative and the man who was responsible for raising Jack after his parents died when Jack was only five, had been a power-hungry womanizer who would have made a convincing villain in a James Bond movie. If there had been anything on Jack's desk, she would have flung it at him. "You ruined my life."

"A tad dramatic, Alexandria."

A mirthless chuckle erupted from deep inside her. How dare Jack call her dramatic. When he made everything an act. Their whole marriage had been a theatre staged by his uncle and her father. Jack playing the leading role, scene after scene acted for his amusement.

"If our marriage was a business agreement, a transaction as you call it, then why did you kill it?"

"Me? I didn't end our marriage. You did."

His words were like a slap in the face. "I'm pretty sure shoving your cock in your secretary is a violation of the marriage contract."

Jack waved his hand at her. "You made sure our marriage was over long before then."

"Me? I tried everything in my power to please you. To keep you... satisfied." No matter how much it hurt her in the process. Given parts of herself to Jack it had taken months of therapy to realize she'd lost. Parts she was still working on getting back.

"Really. Satisfy me. That's ironic."

For months she'd yelled at Jack in imaginary conversations as she tried to work out why she'd continued in their marriage. Why she hadn't left him of her own accord, long before the cheating became so obvious, she couldn't deny it any longer. Why she'd allowed the mental and emotional abuse to happen in the first place. Now the words burst from her. "You were a brute."

"You let me be one," retorted Jack.