Page 29 of Bargain With The Boss (Crescent Cove: The Moguls #2)

Sydney

The lake blurred as I practically ran around the path past the food trucks to the more secluded portion of the lake. I just needed a spot to hide.

I hated to cry, but in front of those three men—absolutely not.

Or the unsuspecting people who wanted a damn taco.

I took a left off the path into the grove of sugar maples where a few benches were hidden in the shade.

“Sydney!”

God, couldn’t he just let it be?

I wasn’t sure which was worse—my brother or Xavier.

When I heard my name again, my shoulders hunched. My brother.

All week, I’d been dreading the turn of each day.

The countdown to another loss of my team made my stomach churn.

That my inability to break my brother’s heart was going to take away the livelihood of people that counted on me all because my mother couldn’t stand the idea of Jude being happy without her.

I put my head between my knees as my empty stomach burned.

Jude’s voice got closer.

I should get up and go deeper into the trees. Maybe he wouldn’t find me.

Maybe he wouldn’t find out just how awful I was.

“Sydney.” His voice was shaky. “God, are you okay?” He crouched next to me.

“I’m fine,” I said into my skirt.

“You don’t look fine.”

“I am. My stomach is just—off.”

Because everything I tried to eat turned into an acid bath in my stomach.

“Let me go get my car.”

“No.” I sat up. “I don’t need an urgent care.”

“Then what’s going on?” He sat next to me on the bench. “We really do need you, Syd. FHK has been so organized since you started helping out. I knew having you here would take the pressure off while we get to know Nessa.”

Of course he needed me for work. It was what I did best.

“But I need you here.”

“You don’t need me.” I swallowed down the knot in my throat.

“Okay, I want you here. I want you to be Aunt Sydee to my kids. I want you to have a life and not work all the time. Maybe to find someone you love.”

“That’s not for me, Jude.” But Xavier’s face instantly came to mind. Even though I ruined it all.

“It could be.”

Not after what I did.

“I know I’ve been wrapped up in Maddie, but I’ll do better. I promise.”

“Jude—”

“No, listen. I totally fucked up. I can’t believe Xavier of all people had to make me see that. But I just expected you to come here and do everything for me. That was so selfish of me. Just like our fucking mother.”

The lump in my throat seemed to get bigger. “Jude?—”

“I don’t want to be her. That everythingis all about her and she can’t see anything but what benefits her. Even to our detriment. I came out here to get away from her and she probably made your life hell.”

That wasn’t even the half of it.

“She never cared about me—it was always about you, Jude.” My voice was shattered glass.

“Oh, Sydney that’s not true.”

“It is.” I reached for his hand. “She sent me here to...”

God, it was so hard to say. The lies and the stress of her plan sat in my chest like an icy boulder.

He sighed. “I know she wants me back. I’m not going, Syd. I can’t.”

“I know.” My voice was little more than a whisper. “But you have to.”

“There’s no way in hell.”

“The merger is going to fail if you don’t.”

“Fuck the merger. She doesn’t need to be any bigger than she is.”

I laughed and could hear how crazy it was. “Tell that to the board of directors.”

“Then let her have my shares. I don’t want them.”

“Jude, you can’t do that. You need your shares to help cover the cost of the business. You still have to pour money into building Lakeview Terrace.”

“Then I’ll sell her my shares. All she sees is the business.”

“She’s going to fire all my people.” The tears spilled over my cheeks and I could feel how hot they were. The fear and the guilt made my stomach churn even more. “Dammit, I hate crying. There’s no crying in business.”

“Pretty sure it’s baseball.”

The laugh that bubbled up ended in a sob.

“Hey.” Jude gathered me into his arms. “What’s this about your people?”

“Mother threatened to fire my entire team if I didn’t get you back to Seattle. She wanted me to sabotage your relationship or your business—whatever it took to get you back home.”

He pushed me back and stood. “What the actual fuck?”

I buried my face in my hands. “I couldn’t do it. I didn’t want to, but coming here…I couldn’t. Not when I truly saw how beautiful this place was. Your family—even though you don’t need me here, I couldn’t do that to you.”

“Syd, it’s your family too.” He pulled my hands away with a sigh and crouched in front of me. “Owen lights up when he sees you. Maddie loves you. I love you. And I know you’d love Oliver and Seth if you gave them a chance.”

I stiffened at the name of my half-brothers. I wish they’d just stayed secret. Never ruined everything in my life.

My eyes burned.

“I know Seth and Oliver are a sore subject. I got really lucky that they wanted to get to know me. They have such huge hearts—I know they’d be the same with you.”

I swallowed down the lump. “Everything changed when you found out about them.”

He gripped my hands harder. “You’d rather we never knew? That I never came here?”

“Yes!” At his stricken face, I crumbled. “No. No, I really don’t,” I whispered. “It’s just been hard.”

“And I didn’t see it.” He hauled me into his chest. The familiar scent of him only made me feel worse. It really had been me and Jude against the world for so long and now it was just me.

How could I wish away his happiness?

I tried to wiggle away, but he held on. “I’m sorry, Syd.”

“Oh, God. Don’t apologize to me. Not when I?—”

“You what? Felt alone.” He set me back.

I sagged, my shoulders heavy with the secret. With knowing our mother cared more about her own needs than mine or Jude’s. And I’d been in the middle of it all.

Her tool.

Always.

The sob fought its way out of my chest and he just held me.

The pain and loneliness was like a root-bound plant. I’d been slowly packing everything down to just get through the day for so damn long. The team relied on me, my own wants and needs pushed further and further away to take care of everyone except me.

“Ah, Syd. I’m so sorry that I didn’t see how much you were struggling.”

My head pounded, but the torrent abated to a few sniffles. “Coming here made it so much worse. From Seattle I could almost believe that bringing you home would solve everything, but it wouldn’t.” I eased away from him and dabbed at my eyes. “She’s delusional.”

“Why sabotage?”

“There’s no other way to get you to leave—even I know that. She didn’t care as long as I got you back to Seattle. The people from Sophisticated Spaces only want A Home You Love because of the family aspect. Mother?—”

“Mother made her bed a long damn time ago. Her lies were the final nail in the coffin for me. I don’t really care.”

The root-bound ball in my chest tightened all the more. “If I fail—everyone on my team loses their jobs. She’s going to blacklist them. I can’t let them lose everything. She already fired Pete.”

“Is she insane? The entire distribution department will fall apart without Pete.” He stood, dragging me to my feet. “What exactly did she think this would accomplish? She’s doing this to twist you up. She won’t actually fire all the people that hold her precious business together.”

“Oh, you don’t know how she’s been since you moved to New York.

She’s unhinged lately. When the board came to her about the merger she’s been—” I cut myself off and sat back down on the bench.

“It sounds so ridiculous, but it’s been hideous.

No matter what I do, she isn’t happy. All I wanted was a chance to show the board that my idea for A Garden You Love was worthy of discussion, but she took it and warped it. ”

“Syd”—he grabbed my hand—“you can’t give that to her. You’ve had that idea forever.”

I shook my head. “It’s too late. I put the proposal in. It was how this whole thing got so ugly and out of control. My team—Leah, Lynn, Pete, and Jared to start will all be out of a job because they helped me with the idea.”

He stood and cracked his knuckles as he paced. “She’ll take the garden center.”

“I know.” The details of the meeting before I came to Crescent Cove poured out. “She had the audacity to tell me she’d put my proposal to the board after she made some modifications.”

“Enough that it would become hers and not yours.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Oh, it does.”

“I didn’t want to?—”

“You should have come to me.”

“I know,” I whispered.

He sat by me again. “But I didn’t make you think you could and that’s on me.” He wound his arm around my shoulders and pulled me into a hug.

Iheld on tighter. “I’m sorry, Jude.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for. You actually came and helped my company. Very much the opposite of sabotage. You’re the reason we have that cornerstone, you know.”

I shook my head. “It was all you guys.”

They’d actually built something to add to the community, and it felt good to help them. Far better than anything to do with our mother’s company lately.

And I’d been here to ruin it.

“I have to go back home.”

“I won’t go with you.”

“I know,” I whispered. “You’re so much stronger than I am.”

“Not in this lifetime. You are the one holding all of us together whether you believe it or not.”

“Well, now I have to face her and protect my people. Will you be okay if I’m not here to help out the business?”

He nodded. “We’ll get by.” He gripped my hands. “I do want you here. You’re my family, too.”

“You don’t need me here.”

“Not sure how to get that into your head, but I do.”

“First, I need to face her. Maybe if I work a little harder I can figure out a way to prove to the board they don’t need you there in Seattle to make this work.”

“It’s not on you, Sydney. Not by any stretch of the imagination. It was her lies that caused me to leave. It’s not on you to correct that.”

“Tell that to the people who count on me.”

“Honestly, I can transfer my shares to you. You’d have a bigger stake to protect your people.”

My eyes stung again. “If it comes to that, we’ll look into it. For now, you need that for FHK and your family.”

“Okay.” He stood then helped me to my feet. “Nessa is so little, I just can’t go with you.”

“And you shouldn’t. You have a life here. Michelle Keller will just have to face that fact.”

I just wasn’t sure how I was going to handle it.

But it was time to face her head-on.