Page 251 of The Grand Duel
I gesture towards Emily. “Is the test something you’d like to do, or would you rather wait?”
She darts her eyes to Jack.
“Don’t look at him. Don’t even make the decision now. Take your time, speak to your family.” I stand and button my jacket. “If you need anything at all, you call me, okay?”
She nods, looking utterly terrified.
I walk from the room, waiting until I’m in the confinements of the lift to let my mask slip.
Lissie
I’m waiting in the reception area at The Montwell when Elliot and Mason finish up their meeting. They both spot me at the same time and quickly see off the group of people they left the room with. Elliot is the first to greet me, pulling me into a hug the second I’m standing.
“Hi, Elliot. Finally home, I see.”
“We had the honeymoon of our lives,” he tells me, letting me go. His face settles. “How is he?”
“He’s okay. Better.”
“Good,” Elliot says, moving to the side.
“Lissie. I won’t be long, and we’ll head out,” Mason tells me.
“No rush.”
He walks into his office and then reappears not even five minutes later. Elliot is still in the reception, chatting to me andGeorge about the manta rays he saw whilst away. “Mahoosive things, they are. Luce was terrified.”
Mason looks at me and shakes his head. He holds out a bouquet of flowers to me. “Nina.”
I chuckle and take them, lifting them to my nose.
He tips his chin towards the lift to leave, Elliot still talking to anyone who will listen.
I wait at the doors with Mason, wondering how Charles’s meeting with Emily might be going.
I never met “Cass.” She’d already left when I started at the club, but I’ve heard from Christian that she’s a very quiet, kind girl. She’s not nasty or mean, and she likely wouldn’t have tried to get pregnant in her final year of her optometry degree.
“What about you?” Mason says from across the space, pulling me from my thoughts.
“Sorry?” I ask, feeling like I’ve missed something.
He cocks his head. “He’s okay. You told Elliot before. But what about you? How are you?”
How am I?
“I’m…” I’m fine. Good. Okay. Trying my hardest to put one foot in front of the other and keep a semblance of a smile on my face to keep the guilt from Charlie.
“Nina said she messaged you, but you never replied.”
“I’ve just been busy.”
He looks at me as if he knows I’m lying and drops it, riding the lift to the ground floor and then driving me home to the cottage with the conversation as far from Charlie and our current mess as possible.
Mason takes the flowers as I climb from of his car, handing them to me once I’m out. He looks at me for a moment, maybe unsure if he should say whatever it is he’s about to.
“You know, there’s not many women who could do what you did in the car that day. The way you put aside what youwere feeling like that…” He works his jaw. “He’s never had what you’re giving him, Lissie. I just wanted you to know that. That he’s a different man because ofyou.”
I look down at the flowers, wondering what I supposed to say.