Page 24 of Love by Design (Club Rapture: Risk Aware #1)

SILAS

T he bruises from my first night with Marshall were finally starting to fade and the intensity of their pain lessened.

No matter how hard I shifted my weight in my office chair, I wasn’t met with any more than the occasional bite of remembrance.

It hadn’t been long but felt like an eternity since our first scene at his house and a lifetime since our most important negotiation, but we were still working to find a routine that worked with both of our schedules.

I’d gotten tested, as he required, and we were both now in receipt of my negative test results.

We just hadn’t had an opportunity to get together.

He saw his brothers often, but every Friday night was spoken for, which didn’t bother me at all because that meant I could promise Friday dinners to Lincoln, which he loved.

He was nervous about the development of my relationship with Marshall, mostly because of not wanting things to change between us.

When I told him they didn’t have to, the relief was palpable and he’d jumped onto my lap and kissed me on the mouth.

It was nice to still have that with Lincoln .

Nice for Marshall to understand the difference between romantic love and platonic love and to not be threatened by it.

I’d spent a Tuesday and Wednesday with Marshall but had finally caved and told him I didn’t want to overdo it.

I wanted to dive headfirst into things with him, but I also didn’t want to appear too young or too eager.

Like, I didn’t ask to come over; I waited for him to invite me.

Honestly, that was probably part self-preservation and part submission.

There was meant to be a natural order about things between us and throttling my desire to be with him twenty-four hours a day seemed to align with the latter.

A knock on the conference room door had me looking up from the blank screen on my laptop and into my dad’s tired eyes.

He had on brown slacks and a white button-up, which I’d always thought was overkill considering he was so rarely client-facing, but it was practically his uniform.

I remembered him wearing a tie when I was younger but hadn’t seen one around his neck in years.

“Silas,” he said, mouth pulled into a tight line.

“Hey, Dad. What’s up?” I closed the lid on my laptop and leaned back in the old chair, hoping the creaks meant it was strong enough to hold my weight and not on its way to collapsing.

“I wanted to see when you’d have that updated bid for me.”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “I haven’t started it.”

His eyes went wide, his expression morphing into a mask of horror. He tried to school his reaction, but it was such a big feeling he couldn’t get it all under control.

“Why not? It’s due this week.”

“We both know you weren’t going to use my draft.” I rolled my eyes at him, annoyed that he’d given me busy work for no good reason like I was a ten-year-old trailing behind him into the office again on spring break or summer vacation .

“Do we?”

“You don’t take me seriously,” I reminded him. “You didn’t even congratulate me after getting my article published.”

“Of course I did.”

“You threw it in the trash. Marshall is the one who congratulated me.” My voice hitched at the use of Marshall’s name, my throat not quite used to saying it at a normal cadence and not a moan anymore.

“I need your bid, Silas.”

I shrugged. “I don’t have it.”

My dad worked his jaw back and forth and cursed under his breath.

His entire body swayed, like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay in the doorway, come in, or go out.

The clock on the wall ticked closer to five, and I scratched the back of my neck, waiting for him to decide so I could pack my things up and leave.

“You don’t understand what you’ve done,” my dad muttered, shaking his head.

“If the answer is that I didn’t waste my time on a fruitless endeavor, I know exactly what I did.”

“I was going to use your bid, Silas.”

He was so quiet, I barely heard him.

“Sorry, what?”

“I was going to submit yours for the final.” He cracked his knuckles, shoved his hands into his pockets. “You were going to win us the job.”

“You were going to submit mine?” I scoffed, pushing up out of my seat and grabbing my laptop. “You’ve done nothing but talk down to me about my design ideas since I graduated. You weren’t going to use mine.”

“Yours is the only design that will beat Covington.” Marshall’s last name rolled out of his mouth with a surprising bite of animosity. “We had to beat him. ”

“I can’t decide if you’re being real with me right now or not.”

“Of course I’m being real .” It was almost a sneer, and I reeled back, putting more space between us.

“Be so fucking for real right now.”

“Language.”

“Language,” I snapped back at him. “You refused to accept any of my ideas through the whole design process, and you submitted your work for the initial review period. Your design is the one that got us into the final round. Why would you change it to use mine at the last minute?”

“Because I wanted to win.”

“You wanted to win.” I sighed, tucking my laptop under my arm and trying to ignore the way my fingers trembled.

“A month ago, I would have been so excited that you wanted to listen to my ideas finally, but now…now I just want to know what Marshall did to make you hate him so much that you’d even entertain the idea of listening to my ideas. ”

“It’s not about him.”

“Well, it’s not about the project.” I wanted to get out of the room, but my father was still in the doorway and the door was the only escape.

“Or you would have collaborated with me in the first place. You would have read the article. You would have at least pretended to be proud of me instead of throwing my work into the literal garbage.”

Marshall was proud of me. He’d offered me a job. And with the way this conversation was going with my dad, I might have to take him up on it after all.

“You really didn’t put anything together?” he asked, scratching the side of his neck.

“I really didn’t put anything together.”

“You’ve just put us out of business.”

A laugh gurgled up out of somewhere inside of me, terribly loud and horribly ill-timed. I tried to slap my free hand over my mouth to cover it but was half a second too late.

“You’re laughing,” he said.

“This is just the most ridiculous conve?—”

“You’re fired.”

The laugh died in my throat, and I looked at my dad. Maybe I saw him for the first time…like really saw him.

“I’m fired?”

He nodded.

He shook his head.

“Okay,” I conceded, gesturing toward the door he was blocking. “I’ll go pack up my things.”

He squared his shoulders, trying to fill the doorway. “That’s it?”

“You’re giving me whiplash, Dad. Do you want to fire me or not?”

“Do you even care that I’m firing you?” he shot back.

“If you took me seriously as an architectural designer, I might.” I managed a tired shrug. “But you don’t. And at the end of the day, you and I don’t see eye to eye on design, so maybe it’s better that we don’t work together. Maybe it’s…maybe it’s time.”

I left off the other part, that maybe it would be better if we didn't work together because whenever he found out I was involved with Marshall, things were going to get really hairy between us, and he would definitely fire me over that. He might even disown me.

He’d also ignored my question about why he hated Marshall so much.

I knew they’d been in school at the same time, my dad being an adjunct professor when Marshall was a student, but I didn’t understand the basis of the issues.

A clash of personality seemed not enough to warrant the dislike my father carried.

Whatever the problem, though, it wasn’t for me, but it would sure help shed some light on why my dad had finally decided taking Marshall down was an adequate use of my talents.

“We can’t lose this bid, Silas,” he said.

I finally took a step around the side of the table, heading for the door while being terribly uncertain if my legs would get me there.

I’d never stood up to my dad before, and I was scared out of my mind.

Walking out of the door was the same as walking off a cliff, and I’d wanted to enjoy the start of my relationship with Marshall, not put it to the test.

“We didn’t,” I said sharply, pointing at his chest. “You did.”

That seemed to catch him off-guard, and he wobbled on his feet just enough for me to slide past him.

I went to my office and tucked my laptop into my bag, grabbed a framed photo of me and Lincoln off my desk, then checked my pockets for my wallet, phone, and keys, and walked toward the door.

I stopped before getting it open, shifting everything around to get to my keys.

There wasn’t much on the ring. A key to my apartment, my car key, the key to the office…

I twisted the last one off of the ring and walked back into the office.

My dad was still half in the conference room, facing the table like we were still in conversation.

I set the key on top of his desk and stared at his back for a minute.

“I’m sorry, Dad.”

He didn’t look at me, and he didn’t offer me an apology in return. Not like it would have done any good. I knew in my bones that it wouldn’t be enough to keep me there with him, and it was too late for me to do the work he wanted anyway.

Walking to my car, I tried to convince myself it wasn’t my fault if the business went under.

My dad was the owner and the boss, the failure and the loss would be his, just like any wins had always also been his.

It wasn’t my fault if Marshall won the Cahuenga job.

It wasn’t my fault if my dad lost his entire livelihood because of me …

The words all felt like lies, though, and by the time I got to my car, I was a sniffling and inconsolable mess.

Before, I would have called Lincoln. He would know what to do.

He would know what to say. But now I went back and forth between him and Marshall.

Not wanting to ruin my friendship with Lincoln the same way I’d ruined the relationship with my dad, but also feeling desperate to be grounded in a way that only Marshall could offer.

Snorting up as much tears and snot as I could manage, I swiped through my contacts until I got to Marshall, and then I hit the phone button. It rang through and went to voicemail. I hung up and called Lincoln instead. He answered on the second ring.

“Are you off work?” he said instead of hello. “Do you want to get a drink?”

I cried.

“More than one drink then,” he said. “What’s wrong, Si?”

“My dad fired me.”

The only sound was the wetness of my crying until Lincoln cleared his throat. “I know that feels bad right now, but it’s the best thing to ever happen to you.”

“How can—” I got cut off by a beep and a flash on the screen. Marshall was calling me back. “I’ve got to go.”

“You can’t just hang up on me after dropping that bomb.”

“Marshall is calling,” I said through a fresh wave of tears.

Lincoln made a knowing sound that made me cry harder. “Kay. Text me later.”

“I’m sorry.”

The phone beeped again.

“It’s fine, Silas. It’s normal,” he said. “I love you, and you’ll be fine.”

“I love you.” Another beep, and I accepted the call, hiccupping a sob into the receiver. “Hello?”

“Sorry I miss—” He cut himself off, like he had it all rehearsed but realized something was off. “Are you okay, Silas? What’s wrong?”

“Yes, I think. No, maybe. A lot is wrong.”

“Are you hurt?”

“No.”

“Are you in danger?” he asked.

“No.” I laughed and choked on my own snot. “My dad.”

“Is he hurt?”

“No, he’s…he’s alive,” I said, forcing a breath. “He fired me.”

Marshall was as quiet as Lincoln had been, but then he asked me again, “Are you all right, Silas?”

“He’s mad I didn’t write the bid. He said it’s my fault he’s going to close.” I choked on a sob. “It’s a lot.”

“Yeah, I imagine it is.” His tone was as soft as his mouth when he’d almost kissed me for the very first time. “Where are you?”

“In my car at the office.”

“I’ll be home in twenty minutes. Meet me there.”

I’d never been more thankful for an order in my life.

“Yes, Sir,” I whimpered, wiping my nose with the back of my hand.

It was embarrassing to be so upset over something I wanted, something I needed.

My tears were creeping toward hysterical, and I didn’t think Marshall would ever cry this hard about anything in his whole life.

My reaction was unstoppable, but every time I choked on my own tears, my body curled in on itself.

I felt like an overly emotional child, and for as much as I didn’t want Marshall to see me like this, there was no place else I wanted to be.