Page 21 of Tender Offer (Chance at Love #3)

Madison

I know a date when I see one.

Who in their right mind has a small table for two with restaurant-quality linens in their closet? Billionaire or not, Preston is not slick. He’s fine—and wearing the hell out of that fleece jogger and hoodie combo—but he’s not slick.

The rust-colored fabric is the perfect contrast against his warm honey skin. It was a surprise when he opened his penthouse door. I wasn’t expecting the casual look or the music with soft lighting. Preston swore it’s his way of unwinding after a long day.

With the Waiting to Exhale soundtrack.

Chanté Moore’s “Wey U” filters through his walk-in closet, the location for our business meeting that isn’t a date.

A man in an all-black outfit wheels in a silver cart with two matching domes. The closet is so big, it takes him a minute to navigate around the island and round ottoman.

Preston raises his hands when I cut my eyes to him. “Not a date. I figured dinner and business can coexist.”

“Dinner and business,” I mock.

His shoulder lifts. “It’s pretty common. Have you eaten?”

My stomach answers with a long gargle. “I could eat.”

He wets the lower lip that’s been taunting me since he caught me staring. “Sounds like it.” I roll my eyes at his deep chuckle.

The man, who I assume is a server, places a dome in front of me. “Sirloin tip roast with honey-roasted carrots and parsnips,” he says.

“Thank you” comes out in a moan at the buttery flavors wafting from the plate. My toes curl in the cotton slippers Preston gave me when I arrived.

He thinks of everything.

Including the candle the server sets between us and lights.

“Not a date?” I deadpan.

Preston’s mouth spreads into a dimpled smile. “Came with the meal.”

I can’t look at him or take what he says seriously. Between the candlelight shining on every line of his beautiful face and the woodsy musk permeating from the clothes in his closet, my kitty is purring.

“Is there anything stronger than water?” I tug at the collar of my sleeveless turtleneck. The server’s eyes slide to Preston for the okay, and the man leaves at his nod.

Alcohol is nonnegotiable. I’ll show my ass and every hole tonight if Preston runs his fingers through those dark curls again. He knows he’s fine and isn’t playing fair.

The closet is a gorgeous display of carpentry. Strips of lights travel across the top of walnut cabinets that showcase suit jackets, dress shirts, and pants perfectly organized by season and color.

“I remembered,” Preston says, pulling me in with the gentleness in his voice, “how you’d organize our wardrobe at the start of each month.”

A lump forms in my throat. The organizing trick is a simple tool to rotate clothes and maximize your closet.

I’ve given the recommendation to clients countless times, and it never once made the butterflies in my stomach take flight.

This gesture is more than an efficient way to hang fabrics.

It’s a declaration, standing proudly while daring me not to overlook its significance.

He kept a piece of us after all these years.

A reminder of a time when his custom suits and my Wet Seal outfits blended so effortlessly.

Preston is at least a foot away on the other side of the table on this non-date, but it feels like he’s deep in the recesses of my thoughts, soothing questions I spent years agonizing over.

Did our memory live on through the hurt and anger?

Do I still cross his mind during the songs we slow danced to in his living room?

I clear my throat and fight through the sting of tears.

“It’s a good system to maintain,” I declare, sawing into my steak, which melts like butter.

“Makes things easier to find.” I nod at the juiciness of the sirloin and force down images of Preston chasing me around our bedroom after he caught me moving his suits.

The server returns with two glasses of red wine. I gulp half of mine, unable to wash down the years of repressed emotions firing through my rib cage. Everything tastes bitter now. The rich Bordeaux we stocked in Paris, conveniently here on the table. This beautiful dinner.

It’s fitting, because that’s what I’ve become. Bitter.

I hate myself for wanting to be loved even a fraction of what Dominique and Justice enjoy. Worst of all, I hate myself for still holding pieces of Preston, turning them over in my hand and sniffing the memories when I need the high.

It’s pitiful to hold on, especially with how things ended.

How could I ever love a woman like you?

The sting from the words he tossed out before turning to walk out of my life emerges from the ashes. I planned to tell him everything that night. My real name. Why I pretended to be someone else. How desperately I wanted to make what we had work.

“There’s no going back.” My voice carries over the table in a troubled whisper.

Preston watches me with a tenderness that’s anchored in remorse. “I would apologize every day for the rest of my life if it were enough.” He sighs and bows his head. “I lost everything good when I let you go.”

“But you did let me go. How could you love a woman like me?” I parrot back to him with a newfound strength.

This conversation is fifteen years too late.

“You tossed me away without a second glance. What did you think would happen now? We’d fall back into old habits with your nostalgic wine and wardrobe confessions?

I made mistakes, but I didn’t deserve how you treated me. Not after what we shared. You hurt me.”

A dam bursts in an explosion of flash powder and lighter fluid. I want a fight with the man who was so cruel to me that night. I couldn’t save myself then, but I can now before I’m in too deep.

“I can’t erase the past, but I take responsibility for what I said. I regret that day, and each one after.” The sheen of Preston’s tears catches in the candlelight. “I am sorry.”

“Don’t.” My voice cracks, along with another piece of my armor. I wanted a battle, but I’m caught off guard by his surrender.

He’s bracing for my fury. His attentiveness and lack of will to strike back are disarming. It lifts a weight still shackled to my past from the center of my chest.

I’m sorry.

I’ve wanted those words—yearned for them—to know I was enough. I always was, but hearing him say it is a balm for the pain I’ve carried for too long.

“You deserved to know who I was, not who I pretended to be,” I say in a shaky confession. “I should’ve told you sooner, but I never expected for us…” To fall in love the way we did.

A summer fling was the ceiling we set. Life had other plans. It rerouted our initial attraction into a friendship that became the foundation for a love that burned bright until it exploded. I’m not sure we’ll ever heal, but I’ll own up to the part I played in our demise.

“That never should’ve mattered, Puff,” he says, reaching into my heart and soothing it with my nickname. “I allowed my emotions and external influences to cloud my judgment. It’s no excuse, but I own it.”

I never met anyone as repulsed by my presence as his father was. He sold his son a lie, that the woman he fell in love with was an opportunist who was lying to get his money. The sting didn’t come from the assumption. It came because Preston believed the lie so easily.

The darkness in his eyes that night matched his father’s glare. I’ve never been so humiliated in my life—and in public, no less. Enough time has passed for us to forgive each other, but where do we go from here?

“I have to go.” The same fight-or-flight instinct kicks in, forcing me to stand. I toss my napkin onto the table. It was a mistake to come here. I exposed more than I intended to show.

Preston reaches for me with a slight tremble in his hand. When it covers my wrist, the contact sends my pulse into a fury. Sadness tugs his thick brows together and deepens a frown on the face I once thought I’d spend a lifetime loving.

“Please don’t leave…out of my life for good.” Pain laces his plea. His stare tells me everything he feels. Sorrow for the time we lost. Hope for the future we could have.

My mind and heart clash in hard blows. My heart tells me he’s my person, the reason any relationship or attempt at love ends before it starts.

My mind reminds me of the aches and scrapes that came from getting too close.

Six months was all it took to experience a love I’d never felt before, a love that almost destroyed me.

“We owed it to each other to say goodbye. There was always a point when we’d have to let go,” I say, standing my ground and restraining the quiet part of me that screams in curse words to give this a chance.

Any more of his groveling, and I’ll cave.

“You paid me to do a job, and I intend to finish it. Given our history and my policy not to date clients, I think it’s best to keep our interactions professional. ”

Preston’s face softens. His brows unfurl with a dejected sigh. “I’ll see you out.” He gestures for me to go in front of him.

The walk back to the front door is silent. Kismet only happens in holiday romance movies, not in real life. A billionaire and a secret identity makes for a hell of a story, but who am I kidding? That’s not how this works. I was never the Hallmark girl. Lifetime, maybe.

Tonight, we put everything on the table for the closure we needed. I did the right thing, so why does it still feel like a mistake?

The door transforms into a solid chest when Preston spins me around. I stifle a gasp and suppress a shudder at the brush of his thumb on my chin and the gold flecks catching fire in his eyes.

A younger Preston might’ve ended things abruptly, but the mature version isn’t giving up so easily. Gone is the man who shed tears at the thought of me walking out of his life. In his place is the one who doesn’t lose, who takes what he wants at any cost.

The hairs of his goatee tickle my skin as he whispers into the shell of my ear, “I’m not letting you go this time. I can’t.”

Whatever fight-or-flight instinct I had bends the knee to the slow sweep of his tongue and the gravity of his stare.

I feel around for the anger that stretched and spiraled in the closet. It’s no longer here, just like the handle that somehow disappeared from the door my back is pinned against.

That’s the problem with a soul tie. It traps you if you aren’t careful.

Preston leans around me to grab the door handle, which is inches from my hand. The scent of his cologne and the soft cotton of his hoodie brush against my face. “See you soon, Puff.”

I’m out and down the hall to the elevator, speed walking in house slippers, my heels and coat be damned. Thank God I had half a sense and kept my phone and keys in my cargo pockets. Whatever I left can stay there another day. Possibly forever.

There’s no doubt in my mind that Preston will come for me with everything he’s got. My defenses aren’t ready, but they will be.