All by Chance {Brollins}

/ Chapter 22 \

After the CPS debacle, life went quiet for both Rebecca and Colby. Months went by, and the two had a chance to focus on themselves and their relationship, along with continuing work and entertaining Danielle.

Rebecca has felt a sense of extra surety ever since getting everything off of her chest. Even though it wasn't a preferred situation and being forced to expose everything all for a fraud wasn't exactly how she thought she'd broach the topic again, it worked out the same way.

She got almost everything off of her chest once and for all, and the conversation with Colby afterwards cemented her feelings towards it. Rebecca felt more at peace than she had been since it happened, but something was still preventing her from putting the situation in the past and moving forward.

Meanwhile, Colby had everything he'd ever wanted. His relationship with Rebecca was the healthiest relationship he'd ever been in, which was no surprise to him at all. He didn't have the best track record with relationships, and Rebecca could easily confirm it.

Work, on the other hand, wasn't necessarily moving in his favour as of late. Job sites were piling up, and he just couldn't seem to stay afloat. Presentations, and expectations, were all drowning him.

His parents weren't a help either, and he knew getting into the family business was a big step. They had been prepping him ever since he was a kid, but he still felt like he wasn't ready.

"Colby, we have to be gone in five minutes. What are you doing?" Rebecca called out from his kitchen while he was doing God knows what.

"I'm getting files, woman!" He yelled back, making her laugh with a shake of the head.

He rushed down, looking for what seemed like something extremely important, opening cabinets and drawers, rushing around. When he tried to slide past Rebecca on the slick tiles, she grabbed his arm.

"Take a deep breath. It's just a pitch meeting." She stroked her thumb against his arm back and forth. "I'll go look upstairs by your actual file cabinets, and you take your baby girl and wait in the car."

He shook his head when Rebecca passed him, Danielle. "Rebecca-"

"I know what you're looking for, and you're too frazzled to find it right now." She insisted, "Even if it were in front of you, at this point, you'd miss it."

A look full of self-doubt filled Colby's face, "I'm not that-"

"I'm not criticizing you." Rebecca stopped him, placing a hand on his chest. "Let me help you. You know I love you. It's nothing more."

She could tell there was a shift in his mindset, Rebecca just couldn't figure out why. When he opened his mouth, she shook her head. "Go."

She ushered him out, quickly making her way upstairs, knowing they'd be late for sure. Rebecca skimmed through his filing cabinets by his desk, flipping through files that were already on the table.

She found the file and made sure everything was in it, when she turned, however, she ended up knocking a different one off of the desk.

"Shit." She rolled her eyes, quickly trying to organize the splayed-out paper everywhere.

She was just about done when she noticed a few papers with Danielle's medical records stapled together. It wasn't the papers themselves that caught her attention, but the information within.

Rebecca skimmed through it and her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. She bounced between looking further into the files or leaving them, eventually slipping them into her briefcase.

She rushed down to the car and hopped in. "Okay, let's go."

"You got it?" He looked down and saw a file in her hand.

She gestured towards the file, "Right here."

They made their way into the building hastily, leaving Danielle with Holly, who was on a business call. They made their way into the conference room with an unimpressed Ron staring at them. Rebecca handed Colby the file as they both stood at the head of the table.

Colby was in charge of the meeting, but Rebecca found herself having to take over most of it, after five minutes of Colby brutally stumbling along with his words. "When looking at the quarter length-"

"The half-length." Rebecca cut him off again swiftly. When she took over, it wasn't obvious that she wasn't supposed to. But Ron knew everything that was supposed to be done, and when Colby looked over at his father, he could read the confusion in his brows.

Rebecca could give the pitch, but she couldn't give the numbers. That was his research, and they were on spreadsheets he made. He felt Rebecca nudge him to start, and he struggled to find his way.

Rebecca subtly moved her hand over to his. The stand they were behind provided them with enough coverage, so nobody else would see. Talking in front of people was her thing, while statistics were his, but he didn't expect to avoid presentations forever.

Rebecca knew he had practiced, she had been there to hear him repeat his points over and over again. But him getting this frazzled was out of the ordinary. She knew he was balancing a lot of projects, so she was hoping Ron would be lenient.

When they were done, Rebecca urged him out of the room quickly. The second he didn't have to act professionally, he went on a tangent. "How the hell does someone manage to screw a pitch meeting up that bad?"

She had to weave him around the halls as he continued, "I managed to mess up two completely different sites."

"Everyone has off days, Colby." Rebecca stopped when they reached a secluded area. "It's perfectly normal."

His hands instinctively dropped to her waist, "You never mess up."

"Yes, I do." She laughed, placing her hands over his chest.

"No... you don't." He shook his head and pressed his lips to hers. "You're goddamn perfect."