Resisting Mr. Rich (The Men Series Book 8)

I LET HIS CALL go to voicemail again. I’ve avoided him for two days. It’s cowardly, I know. I’ve been staying with Chloe. Her housemate is on holiday with her boyfriend, so I’ve been using her room to lie low. Logan will only turn up at my apartment trying to talk otherwise. I can’t let him. I can’t let him talk me into something that will ruin him. He isn’t looking at the bigger picture. I need to do that. He at least deserves that much from me after everything I’ve done.

My shoulders drop as I read through my article about Logan. Eve wanted scandal. She knew the way I felt about Logan. Maybe she even had an inkling about his father’s business difficulties when she asked me to write it. Perhaps she expected me to write it like this. I’ll never know.

A new email lands in my inbox and I close the document and open it.

“More book fairy love?” Chloe says as she appears behind me, leaning over my shoulder and reading the words on the screen.

“Yeah.” I lean my chin in my hand as I read the email from a reader.

I usually gift people something from their wish list. But this girl commented on one of the videos I made. I’m not sure what it was about her comment, but she sounded like she needed something that would help lift her. Something that would give her hope that love can come again, even after tragedy. It’s why I sent her one of my favorite romance stories where the heroine is a widow.

“Wow. You really changed things for her,” Chloe says. “She says you’ve given her hope.”

I read the email again. She says she was crying as she typed it.

“I didn’t.” I smile softly. “The story did.”

Despite my heart feeling like a heavy weight since I last saw Logan, it lifts a little. The magic of words has brought something much needed to another person yet again.

Chloe shoves me on the shoulder. “Give yourself more credit.”

“No.” But I still smile at her as I say it because regardless of if I didn’t do much, someone is still feeling better because of it. And that’s worth smiling about.

“Fine.” Chloe rolls her eyes dramatically. “Did you send it to Eve yet?”

“Just did.” My smile falters.

Chloe’s eyes widen. “How do you feel?”

“Like it’s over now.”

Chloe bends and wraps her arms around me in a hug. “In that case, lunch is on me. And I think we can even say that wine is acceptable today.”

“I don’t know,” I groan.

Her face softens. She knows everything that’s happened. It’s all she’s heard me speak about. She knows how fucked up my life is and how my sanity is holding on by a thread.

“Come on. You need it. You deserve it.”

I let her pull me from my chair and link arms with me.

We go to one of our favorite bars across the road from the office and order paninis and a glass of Moscato each.

“You ever think there’s something wrong with us?” Chloe muses after our wine arrives, lifting the glass to her lips to take a sip.

“All the time.”

She laughs.

“Oh, you meant something specific?” I smile.

“Yes.” She grins. “I mean, look at us. We’re out for lunch and we’ve chosen to sit looking at the office.”

I follow her gaze through the window. She’s right. We have a prime location to see the office’s main entrance from here.

“Can we pretend we’re looking at the florist instead? Or is it too late to save ourselves from being pathetic losers?”

“It’s too late.” Chloe laughs.

We both gaze at the building across the street. In-Sync has one floor. The other floors house various companies, some are other publications run by the main corporation that owns the magazine, and others are independent. But the street level of the building has a florist in, Cygnature Blooms. They have the most incredible flowers. Not that I’ve ever been sent any from there.

“I think we need to own it,” Chloe says.

She holds her fingers up in an ‘L’ shape against her forehead. I snort out a giggle and take a sip of my wine before looking around the inside of the bar at the rest of the London lunch crowd.

“You expecting a visitor?” Chloe asks, drawing my attention back to across the street.

“No.” I frown as Logan walks out of Cygnature Blooms; his entire torso obscured by the giant bouquet of calla lilies in his arms.

An army of butterflies spring into action in my stomach and I place my wine glass down before I drop it. Logan pulls his phone from his suit pants and answers a call with a smile. He juggles the lilies in one arm as he speaks. I desperately wish I could lip read to see who he’s talking to. To see who’s got him smiling like that.

“They’ll be for Gabrielle.”

Chloe glances at me, her face turning sympathetic. “You don’t know that.”

I force my eyes away, studying my fork instead. “I hope that they are.”

“Maddy—”

“They need to be.” I press my lips together into a firm line. “I told him to marry her. Maybe he’s finally started listening to me.”

“I know you did, but…” Chloe sighs.

“I wish you’d stop looking at me like I’m losing my mind. This is the right decision. It’s probably the most right decision I’ve ever made in my life,” I huff. I might have told Logan we can never happen, but I still don’t want to watch him happen with someone else in front of me.

“If it’s so right, then why are you sleeping at my place and feeling like shit?”

“Who said I feel like shit?”

Chloe lifts her brows and takes another sip of wine. I exhale and move my attention back to my fork. Calla lilies. Like the Italian wedding we saw in Milan. That feels like a lifetime ago now.

“Has he gone yet?” I mutter.

“Not yet.” Chloe’s eyes narrow as she keeps her gaze fixed on a spot outside.

“Well, tell me when he does.”

“Why?” she asks without turning her head.

“Just… Please.”

“You should look at him, Maddy. He looks great.”

“Not helping,” I groan.

“I mean…” Chloe’s eyes light up. “He looks really good, if a little stressed.”

“I can’t believe he’s going through so much. I wish there was something I could do.”

“Find an extra fifteen million?” Chloe suggests.

“Oh yeah. I’ll just dig around the back of the couch. Get it in no time. Has he left yet?”

“No.”

I’m tempted to look and see what’s taking him so long, but the thought of seeing his face again is too hard. How can I look at him and not race across the street? Not run to him and beg him not to do it? Not to marry Gabrielle? Not to save his family business? How can I do that? After years of hating him and being so hurtful, how can I turn around and tell him to do something that will cause him pain?

I can’t.

“Do you think Eve will give you another piece in the next issue? You’ve done Logan’s story and Nate’s interview now. You’re on a roll.”

I shrug as Chloe glances at me. But she quickly looks back out of the window again. Whatever Logan’s doing must be interesting.

“I don’t know. I hope so. The second interview at dinner the other night meant I was able to ask him some more personal questions in addition to the ones I asked at the hotel.”

I chew on my bottom lip. Logan turned up in both places with Gabrielle when I was interviewing Nate. It’s the universes fucked up way of making sure I saw him with Gabrielle and saw how perfect they could be together. Made sure that I do what’s right for him now.

Nate called and asked for a second interview over dinner because he felt bad about cutting the first short. The thought that I used to lust over his voice seems ludicrous now. But maybe Logan needed to see me with Nate to make him give up on us. I didn’t fight hard to correct him when he thought we were on a date.

But then he came to my place and said he would erase any other kisses I’d ever had with his own.

I throw back the rest of my wine before I can get lost in self-pity at how messed up everything is. When I hated him, everything was simpler.

“You’re safe now. He’s gone.” Chloe finally breaks her gaze from the street and looks at me cradling my empty wine glass in one hand and my phone in the other. “How is that any different than looking at the real thing?” she asks, her brow creasing as she looks at the screen and the picture of Logan and his dad that’s on the news page I’ve brought up.

Shit. I didn’t even realize what I was doing.

“I…” I look at the screen, reading the headline about their business and how it’s rumored to be on the brink of collapse. My eyes blur and sickness coils in my stomach. I quickly bring up an image of Gabrielle from her LinkedIn profile and turn the screen toward Chloe.

“That’s her?”

“Yeah.”

“She’s beautiful.”

“Yeah.”

“And thin.”

I snort. “I know.”

“But he told you he doesn’t love her.” Chloe sighs. “Fuck, girl. Why are you doing this to yourself?”

“I have to. I’ve spent so many years hating him and wishing he’d drop off the planet and leave me alone. I’ve been awful to him. And it wasn’t even his fault.”

“So… what? You punishing yourself is penance?”

“No.” I close the browser and drop my phone into my purse. “He deserves better than someone who has unfairly blamed him. You get that, don’t you?”

Chloe smiles at me sadly. “I get that you think that. But I don’t agree.” She lifts her shoulders when I shake my head at her. “I’m sorry, but I don’t. I think you need to listen to what Logan wants.”

“He’ll lose everything,” I whisper.

“Maybe he doesn’t see it like that.”

“I’ve never done anything good for him. Not once.” My gut coils at the thought of the article on my laptop. “Not a single thing.”

“You know what you need to do?”

“What?”

“Find fifteen million down the back of your sofa.”

I try to smile. But all it does is make my jaw hurt.

We eat lunch, not talking about Logan again the entire time. Instead, Chloe talks about the piece she’s working on, and I tell her about how Drew thinks Mum’s going to forgive Dad. She’s not confronted him about the affair and refuses to talk to either of us about it. She wants to ignore it. I can’t blame her. I haven’t confronted Dad about sending Drew away to the juvenile detention center either. Drew told me not to. He said it’s not worth it.

I pay for lunch, despite Chloe’s protests, and we head back to the office. The giant mound of white on my desk glows like a beacon the moment we step inside.

Chloe gives me a smug grin as she walks away toward her own desk. “Catch you later.”

I drop into my seat and stare at the beautiful flowers, their scent filling the air with sweet perfume.

“These shouldn’t be for me,” I whisper as I reach for the envelope amongst the petals and pluck it free.

I take the thick manila card out and read the words.

You made me see the beauty of the story. Ours isn’t over. Talk to me. L x

I blink back the burning in my eyes as I glance around the office. People are still at lunch. My chest relaxes knowing no one is close enough to see the air leaving my lungs as I read his words.

The sentimental asshole will make me cry at my desk. Chloe catches my eye from her desk, but I shake my head and give her a small smile, suggesting that I’m okay. Now I understand why Logan was taking so long. He was bringing these flowers up for me. For me. The wrong person.

I need him to let me go. To let us go.

I drop my head into my hands, rubbing at my temples.

“Maddy?” Eve calls from her office doorway. “Can I have a moment with you?”

“Sure.” I follow her into her office, closing the door behind me.

I’m not even in my seat before she beams at me.

“The article you sent me is fantastic. Your best work yet. So raw. You didn’t hold back. It digs deep into who he is. What he’s going through. The way it reads is very personal.”

Nausea swirls in my gut. “I’ve known Logan a long time. Writing about him and his family…” I drop my head, searching for the right words. “It’s the story he wouldn’t have expected me to tell. I hope he understands why I did.”

“Well, it’s certainly going to grab attention. Well done.”

“Thank you.”

To her, it’s a story.

But to me, it’s the final part of hating Logan Rich.

Now it’s time to let go.