Unwilling to ponder his feelings or thoughts any longer, she increased her pace toward the MAX station in the cold rain.
True to his word, Baz followed her but kept behind her, out of her line of sight. She did her best to ignore the sense of safety his presence gave her, or how wet and cold he must be getting while protecting her from the downpour.
When they reached the platform, she bought a ticket with her phone and then gasped in outrage when she noticed Baz doing the same thing.
“Seriously, Mr. Perez, you need to go away!”
“I’m not comfortable with you riding the train alone.”
“Don’t be such a control freak. I’m safer on the train than I was around your brother. Maybe even you.”
“What is that supposed to mean? I would never physically harm you.”
“You punched your own brother!”
“If you had not been there, I probably would have done more.” And Baz didn’t look in the least repentant about that fact. “He deserved a dose of his own temper.”
“Just like your family to resort to violence when things don’t go your way.” Guilt assailed her as the words left her mouth.
She didn’t believe them, and Baz had been defending her when he hit his brother. It wasn’t lost on her that Baz had meted out exactly what had been done to her by Carl Madison and his bodyguard.
“When you get to know me better, you will realize how untrue that statement is.”
“I’m not going to get to know you better.”
Baz didn’t reply, simply looked up as the train came into the station.
He took a seat behind her after giving the one beside her a considering look. Her glare must have told him what a bad idea sitting there would be.
She spent the ride trying to ignore his presence and swallow back the tears that just did not want to go away. She also called her sister to see if she or Andreas could pick Randi up from the MAX stop closest to her apartment. Otherwise, it would have been a couple-mile walk to her apartment from there, with no nearby buses that could shorten it.
Kayla said of course she’d be there and then asked what was wrong.
“I’ll tell you when you pick me up,” Randi promised, unwilling to get into it in front of Baz, much less all the strangers on the train.
* * *
Basilio watched Miranda climb into her sister’s car with frustration. He did not understand his own actions. Sí, he was still committed to protecting the young ones of his family, but following her onto the train?
He had used her safety as the excuse for doing so, but he’d known it was more. He could not stand to let Miranda walk away without another word, without trying to make her understand. Not that he’d gotten the chance to do that. And still, he’d been glad to sit behind her on the MAX, to simply stay near.
Cracks were forming in his formidable defenses around his innermost emotions. He did not like it, but if she called right that minute, he would have the driver turn the car around without hesitation to be with her.
If only Carlos had not screwed everything up so spectacularly.
His brother was truly the idiota Basilio had called him. Carlos’s impatience had cost them any chance of Miranda backing out of the interview and so he told the older man when he found him inside his penthouse when Basilio returned.
He’d called for a car with no shame. He’d been soaked through and had no intention of waiting around for a train to take him back to the stop he’d gotten on, only to be followed by another walk in the rain.
“How was I supposed to know you’d bring the little tar—” Carlos broke off at Basilio’s look. “That woman here?”
“Why would I not bring her here?” Basilio walked into his bedroom without waiting for an answer and stripped out of his wet clothes.
His brother yelled from the other room, “Because she’s the enemy!”
Basilio donned fresh slacks and a black cashmere turtleneck before rejoining his brother. “Miranda is not my enemy. She was as much a victim five years ago as Jamie. If anyone was at fault for that tragedy, it was Tiffany.” Basilio held up his hand to forestall his brother’s denial. “And now because of your impatience and lack of trust in me, millions of morning show viewers will learn that truth.”
Not to mention other facts that would stir up plenty of scandal for both the Madison and Perez names.
“You have to stop her!”
“How? She despises me now.” But didn’t quite hate him. That knowledge had shocked Basilio, but also given him some measure of hope.
“Threaten her, threaten her brother-in-law’s company.”
“You assume I have the power to do that?”
“You know you do.”
“But I have no desire to. Now that I know the truth of the circumstances, all threats toward Miranda and her family are off the table.”
“We’re still your family.”
“Only when it is convenient for you.” And the connection was becoming less and less advantageous to Basilio.
“Don’t whine.”
“I’m hardly doing that, simply pointing out that you can’t play the family card and expect me to ignore how often you forget I’m your brother.”
“Our father would expect you to help me.”
“Our father would be appalled to realize you remained married to a woman who put your son so firmly in harm’s way.”
“Just because the man doesn’t understand marital fidelity and commitment doesn’t mean I don’t. Tiffany is my wife and I love her.”
“While that sentiment is creditable, you know how little regard I have for that emotion as an excuse for inexcusable behavior.” He gave Carlos a long, unfriendly look his brother would do well to take heed of. “Be very careful how you speak of a man who is truly mi familia.”
“He divorced your mother, too.”
Basilio just stared at his brother until the older man squirmed in his seat. “Remember that your company owes a lot of its success to the connection you have with Perez Holdings. Respect those connections in every way, or lose them. In. Every. Way.”
He was done playing happy families with Carlos. The man might have done what he had in order to protect his own wife, but that did not change the fact that his behavior had been completely lacking in honor or integrity. It was one thing to do what needed to be done, another entirely to completely lose sight of one’s moral compass while doing so.
It was Basilio’s hope that once Miranda had calmed down, she would realize that while he might be ruthless, he was never without honor.
“You’re threatening me?” Carlos demanded with a sneer. “Armand would never let you withdraw support from your brother’s company.”
“Mi papá no longer owns even a nominal interest in the company.”
“But he’s still a director.”
“Because I will it to be so.”
“You took the family company from our father.”
“I took over the bankrupt company, yes, and I brought it forth new from the ashes of poor decisions and debt. Perez Holdings is my company and any decision I make stands as Papá and all of his ex-wives had learned.”
“You think you’re something so special, lording your billions over us.”
Billions that had been noth
ing but negative numbers when Basilio took the company over ten years earlier. “I think that if you make the mistake of making me your enemy, you will deeply regret it sooner rather than later. And to be clear, if you allow your PR people to continue to attack and spread lies about Miranda Smith, you will in de facto be making me your enemy.”
“You don’t mean that!”
“When have I ever said something I do not mean?” Basilio had not garnered his reputation bluffing.
Everyone who had done business with him, including his older brother, knew that Basilio never made empty threats. He followed through. Sometimes with overkill. Better to let people see one meant what one said than have them believing you harbored a weakness in one’s character.
“Listen closely, Carlos, for what I’m about to say, I will not repeat, nor will I give you a second time to screw up.”
“What the hell? Who do you think you are?”
“A man who could burn your company down to the ground if I so desire.”
Carlos paled, his belligerent expression suddenly morphing into something Basilio could work with. Fear. “You wouldn’t do that. It’s my stepfather’s company anyway.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“EVEN LESS REASON for me to care if it is destroyed.” And if Carlos did not comprehend that, he was an even bigger fool than Basilio already thought him.
Carlos blustered, “Our father would never do something so underhanded.”
“Our father would never have done what you have to Miranda, either. I think we can agree that we are both different from the man who sired us in some very important ways.”
“Say what you’re going to say.”
“You will call your PR dogs off Miranda. In fact, you will give them a new directive. It is your job to repair her reputation as much as it is possible to do.”
“That interview she’s going to do will take care of that.”
Basilio ignored his brother’s interruption. “You will craft a formal apology for your assault on her.”
“I pushed her. That’s not an assault.”
“I read the police report and the trial transcript. Both of which are public record. You hit her and your bodyguard pushed her down. If you don’t want that splashed across the news media with more furor than anything you could ever devise, you will listen.”