She nodded, her eyes watering. “I just want it to be over. I don’t want to share anything that ties me to him,” she whispered.
Across from us, Gabriel cleared his throat. “You can take her.”
Nicole’s gaze tore from mine and flew to his. She didn’t speak, though.
“You can take her. It’s fine. I’m barely home anyway,” he said.
She blinked rapidly and cleared her throat before smiling. “Thank you.”
“Of course.”
I kept my face impassive, but couldn’t bear to look at the moment they were sharing any longer, so I looked back at Marvin.
“Cars,” he said.
“I want the Prius,” Nicole told me.
I looked at Gabriel, who nodded. Lewis spoke up. “Done.”
“And the Cayenne,” she added. Gabriel’s brows hitched, but he nodded.
“Done.”
“The house in Idaho?” Marvin prompted, looking at Nicole again.
“It’s his.”
“Done.”
“The condo in New York,” he said.
“My client and Gabriel came to an agreement on this,” I said, sliding over the contract they’d signed. Marvin picked it up and read it quickly.
“Objection. She didn’t uphold her end of the bargain,” Darryl said. I could tell he was having way too much fun with this.
“She went to two events with Mr. Lane, er, Rogers,” I said, unsure of which last name to use for somebody who evidentially acted like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. “The contract doesn’t state how many events she was to attend, so to the best of our knowledge she upheld her end of the bargain.”
“The best of your knowledge isn’t enough,” Darryl said, slamming a hand on the table. I shot Lewis a look. His face was so red, I thought he was going to explode right there.
“Please let me handle my client, Mr. Cusack,” Lewis said.
“Then do something about this, because she still needs to go to at least one more red carpet event with him after the scene she caused during their ice cream outing the other day.”
I grit my teeth together. I took a deep breath. I clasped my hands together on the table in front of me.
“My client needs to process and think about it before she makes a decision. Is that all?” I asked. My patience was running thin, so for Darryl’s sake it was best he kept his mouth shut.
“No, that’s not all.” But of course he didn’t know when to shut the fuck up. “She needs to attend this event with him and we need to schedule another candid appearance.”
I drummed my fingers on the table, and looked at Lewis again. He heaved out a heavy breath. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave, Mr. Cusack. We both want what’s best for our client, and what’s best for him right now is for you to wait outside.”
He huffed and puffed, but did as instructed.
“As far as the appearances go, I’ll speak to my client in private as well,” Lewis said.
Marvin nodded and stacked up the papers in front of him. “Well, I guess we just need to come to an agreement on this and we should be able to put it behind us.”
We stood with the condition that we’d figure it out by the end of the week. I shook Lewis’s hand, then Gabriel’s, and then stood off to the side with Marvin and Lewis as Gabriel and Nicole spoke. They were being very quiet, and I kept finding myself looking over to them frequently as Marv tried to set up a game of golf. Golf was a sport I didn’t even like, but had learned to play because many successful business meetings tended to happen over a game.
The last time I looked over, Gabriel had his hand on Nicole’s shoulder and she was nodding at something he said. A wave of jealousy crashed through me, and I didn’t even know why. They were getting a divorce. They’d been married. They had history together. Maybe that last bit was what bothered me. She had history with him. That, and to my horror I realized, I wanted her to only have eyes for me. I glanced at my watch and excused myself from the conversation. I had a meeting in my office scheduled in an hour and I still needed to take her home.
“Excuse me,” I said, walking up to where she stood with Gabriel. “I have a meeting scheduled soon.”
“Oh,” she said. “Oh. Crap. I’d forgotten we came in the same car. Will you be able to drop me off?”
“Sure, it’s on my way,” I said. It wasn’t on my way at all, but I didn’t want to give Gabriel the chance of offering.
“I can take you,” he said anyway.