Dispute Resolution

Chapter Twenty-Three

Gray hated waiting. He'd been assured by the nurse that the doctor wouldn't be too long, especially since he was Grayson Holloway. But ten minutes later he was still waiting. He knew, in reality, ten minutes was not that long, but he was pissed just the same. He ruffled his other hand through his hair just as a doctor entered the room. Good, he needed to get out of here. He needed to find Quinn. Otherwise, he'd lost everything.

It had been a long couple of days. He needed to sleep, but he had things to do first. Finally, an hour later and after being told he only had a bruised hand, he was on his way back home. He wanted to go straight to Quinn's apartment, but it was late and he decided it was probably best he left things until the morning. As soon as he was home, he retrieved his laptop which was still on the patio. He looked at the sun lounge where he and Quinn had been lazing about idly just hours before. How could things have fucked up so badly in between?

He tried to wake up his laptop but it had run out of charge. He found a charger in his study and tried to put it in the socket but Gray struggled to put the plug it in. Of course, he had to smash up his right hand, the one he always used. He switched over and tried the left hand. But he was too clumsy and it slipped straight out of the socket. He picked it up and threw it across the room. It smashed against the wall of his home office, maybe if he'd thrown the plug instead of a punch the last time he'd gotten angry, he wouldn't be in this position in the first place. Or maybe if he just learnt to control his anger...

"Mr Holloway," came Curtis's voice.

"Yes, Curtis," he said, annoyed by the interruption.

"Your sister is here to see you," he said as he poked his head through the door of his office. "Shall I send her in to see you?"

Gray immediately softened. "That's okay. I'll come out." He glanced at his watch. Seven p.m. "And Curtis, you can sign off."

Curtis only nodded and left the room as he rounded the corner a second later to see Evie standing in his living room, although he almost didn't recognise her. Curtis shut the door behind them and left. He looked back to his sister. Her eyes were huge, sad. Fuck it. He hadn't thought about how this latest family drama would affect her. He couldn't, he'd been too busy trying to save his own arse.

"Come and take a seat," he told her as they moved toward his lounges. "Do you want a coffee, tea?"

"Glass of wine?" she asked and Gray frowned at her.

"Really?" he asked.

"I was just joking."

Gray blew out a silent breath of relief. He didn't want to see his sister go down that destructive path again and with everything that had happened in the past day or so, he had to keep an eye on her.

"What have you done to your hair?"

"Decided to go blonde. What have you done to your hand?"

He held it up, looking it over. "Just some bad bruising. It will be fine in a week or two," he told her evasively. He didn't feel like explaining the whole thing.

"How did you do it?"

"I punched the wall."

Evie shook her head. "Patience was never your strong point."

"You know me too well."

"I take it your busted hand had something to do with Dad and Dylan."

"Close. Is that what you came here to talk about?"

"Yes, and this."

Evie opened up her enormous handbag and pulled out a copy of a newspaper- The Metro. Carefully she unfolded it and placed it in front of him on the coffee table. Gray leant in to look, his eyes widening at the headline- 'Grayson Holloway's love interest revealed,' with the same rehashed photo of himself with Quinn at the football game. He skimmed through the rest of the article. There was a lot of stuff about Quinn and the article she wrote last year. It painted her in a very bad light- a home wrecker, a liar, a woman without morals. And now she was rubbing salt into the wound by seducing one of the Holloway's.