Rhett
What had started as the perfect day rapidly turned into a nightmare. I returned from my morning run, a paper bag of flaky croissants in hand, to find Victoria standing in my kitchen, helping herself to coffee and looking smug. Worse than that, Chloe had gone, and I had no idea what Victoria had said to her, but it couldn’t have been nice because the woman didn’t have it in her.
I couldn’t find Chloe, despite driving along the stretch of road where she’d disappeared, and guessed she’d taken the bus back to town.
“Why would you possibly think you’d be welcome here? I thought I’d made myself clear the other night at the club. I’m not interested in rekindling things with you,” I snapped at Victoria.
I needed to shower and get to the club and find her. Last night was special. I needed Chloe like I needed air to breathe. I couldn’t live without her, and that was that.
“Oh, please, I get that banging your cleaner can be fun and all—”
“She’s not my cleaner. She’s a summer lifeguard at Hill Crest and my fiancée,” I told Victoria, who had the cheek to laugh at my words.
“You, the great and mighty Rhett Sutton, are going to marry a lifeguard half your age? Society would eat her alive,” she sneered.
“And since when have I cared about what society wants? If you believe that, Victoria, you know me even less than I thought you did.” I turned on my heel and headed out of the kitchen. “You know where the door is.”
I dressed and hightailed it to Hill Crest as fast as I could. I was parking the car when Evan rushed out of the management office.
“Rhett! Someone is here to see you. It’s important,” he panted.
I shook my head. “Sorry. I’m afraid I have urgent personal business to attend to first.”
“It’s your father!” Evan called, stopping me in my tracks.
Emotions surged in my chest. The rejection and desperate need for approval rose and fell inside me. I turned toward Evan. “Okay, I’m coming. Can you do me a favor? I want to let everyone know about the change in ownership. Call a meeting in half an hour and ask Chloe to come to the office. Thanks, Evan,” I said, clapping him on the shoulder.
He clutched my hand, stopping. “It’s me that has to thank you, Rhett. You’re changing my life.”
“And you’re going to change everyone's life here. I’m leaving them in your care, remember? Follow your instincts. You’re a great businessman.”
With that, I turned toward my office and my own personal dragon, my father. Today, I would finally slay the specter of the past who had hung over me every day and be free. Chloe had made me strong enough to do that. Today, I would meet my father as one man to another and not as a desperate to please man-child. I was ready.
My heart knocked against my ribs as I walked into the small, cramped office I was using and saw my father sitting in front of the desk. He looked old. Arthur Sutton had been a powerhouse for so long that I’d never imagined the day he’d look like a regular eighty-year-old man. Yet, here it was. His skin was sagging and spotted with age, and his white hair stuck up in a ring around his balding crown. He had a walking stick gripped in one gnarled hand. But his eyes were still the same old sharp Arthur.
“Father, this is unexpected,” I said as I lowered myself into the chair on the other side of the desk.
He narrowed his eyes at me. At that moment, I realized it wasn’t that Arthur had suddenly become old and less intimidating. He hadn’t changed—not the fire in his eyes nor the disdain he spilled across every one of my life’s choices.
It was me who had changed. I didn’t care what he thought anymore. I was about to make a huge change to my life, with speed and impulsivity that would seem crazy to anyone outside my head, but I’d never been surer of anything.
“But not unwelcome, I hope?” Arthur said in a tone that dared me to disagree.
“Not unwelcome at all. I’m glad you’re here. I meant to look you up while I was in town, and now, I have a pressing reason to do so.”
Arthur raised an eyebrow at me, and I knew it was an expression I employed a lot. Maybe we weren’t so different, my father and me. “And what would that be?”
I leaned my elbows on the desk and gave him a grin. “I wanted to invite you to a wedding. My wedding.”