Lingering Shadows

All the color drained from Caleb's face, leaving him rooted to the spot and completely baffled about what he had done to provoke such hostility.

Without sparing Cleo so much as a passing look, Dominic strode right past them.

Caleb remained stiffly in place until Dominic and his companions had vanished from the lobby. Perspiration drenched the back of his shirt. Utterly mortified and rattled to the core, he didn't even bother offering Silas a parting word before practically bolting out the doors.

The rest of the group wasted no time scattering after him.

Outside, Cleo pulled the rear door of the car open for Silas.

After settling into the back seat, Silas looked over the newly signed agreement and remarked, "You handled yourself well back there. I half figured you'd snap and lose your temper."

His comment was clearly aimed at the situation with Caleb, whose intentions of getting her into bed had been obvious to everyone in the room.

Years ago, Cleo wouldn't have stood for that kind of behavior for a single second. Now, however, making ends meet meant stuffing her pride down and dealing with it, especially since her college degree offered zero practical leverage in the job market.

Drawing a slow breath, she met his gaze in the mirror and stated plainly, "Mr. Cross, I badly need money right now."

Silas tugged his knot loose and reclined against the seat. "What's the real story with you and Dominic?" he asked. Even a blind man could tell Dominic's reaction to her was far from indifferent.

"We're divorced."

"Well, that's certainly news to me. Three years ago, I got drunk enough to nearly kiss you. Dominic retaliated by cracking three of my ribs and kicking me out of the Vance Group. Do you have any idea how senior my position was? Getting rid of me took serious effort—even from him."

At that point in time, Dominic had been locked in a brutal tug-of-war with Conrad for control of the company.

Cleo pressed her foot down harder on the accelerator, her face completely unreadable. "Whatever his reasons were, it definitely wasn't over me."

Silas hadn't risen through the executive ranks at the Vance Group by being an idiot, and he could read Dominic's attachment to Cleo loud and clear.

Learning that lesson once the hard way had been plenty. He had zero intention of crossing the line with Cleo a second time, knowing full well Dominic would come after him without a shred of mercy.

Letting his eyelids droop shut, Silas gave her his home address before adding, "Be outside my house at 6:30 on the dot every morning. I like going over the day's itinerary before we head out.

"You pulled your weight tonight. It should've been obvious during your interview that this role relies on a pretty face, not a resume. Keeping your clothes on and dodging handsy clients is entirely up to your own street smarts."

Cleo had played Caleb like a fiddle earlier. Stroking a man's ego just enough to make him feel like a savior worked wonders, which was why watching her feign hesitation over the paperwork had prompted Caleb to sign his name without thinking twice.

Forty minutes later, the sedan rolled to a stop in front of Silas's residence. Collecting the folder, he climbed out of the back and paused by the window. "This is one of my extra cars. Drive it whenever you're off the clock—just hang on to the gas receipts for reimbursement."

Cleo gave a quiet nod, idling by the curb until his front door closed behind him before pulling back onto the road. Silas was actually a decent boss, she reflected, someone who drew a clean line between business and private matters.

Her phone rang just then, Maura's name flashing on the screen. "Cleo, look at the time. How come you're still out?" her sister asked.

Before Cleo could get a word out, Macon's sneering voice carried clearly from the other end of the room. "Why waste your breath checking up on her? She got kicked to the curb. Word is Mr. Vance already found himself a replacement. She spent all those years married to him and walked away without even a house to her name—what a joke."

Maura rushed to speak over him, her tone strained and apologetic. "Macon just had a stressful day at work. Don't pay any attention to him, alright?"

*****

Cleo drove straight over to Maura's apartment complex and rapped lightly on their front door.

Maura pulled it open, her brow creasing with worry the second she took in Cleo's exhausted face. "Are you coming down with something? You got completely soaked in that storm last night."

"I'm just stopping by to pick up my things," Cleo answered evenly. "I'm going to find my own apartment."

Maura's frown deepened. "Why the sudden rush? Leases around this area cost a fortune—and how are you going to pay for it? I thought you didn't have any savings left."

Cleo kept quiet. Silas had given her a three-thousand-dollar cash advance earlier that evening, which was more than enough to get a hotel room for the night before hunting for a rental in the morning.

Before Maura could press her further, Macon yanked the bedroom door shut with a loud bang and barked across the hallway, "I already told you my mother's visiting soon—there's no room for an extra person here."

Having almost no voice in her own household, Maura could only grab Cleo's hand in silent mortification, unable to find anything to say.

Offering her sister a small, reassuring smile, Cleo stepped around her and retrieved her rolling bag from the corner. It was the only piece of luggage she had carried over the previous night anyway.

Maura trailed behind her all the way down to the street, her steps dragging against the pavement. "Cleo, isn't there any way for you and Dominic to sit down and work this out?" she asked softly.

Lifting the suitcase into the trunk, Cleo gave a firm shake of her head. "There's nothing left for us to talk about. Anyway, Macon mentioned taking you to the clinic later this week. What's the checkup for?"

Maura pressed her palm flat against her lower abdomen, her shoulders slumping. "We've been trying for a baby for two whole years without any luck. I need to find out if something's wrong on my end."

With her mother-in-law constantly hounding them for a grandchild and her thirtieth birthday fast approaching, the window for conceiving was starting to feel terribly narrow.

Weighed down by the thought, Maura let out a long breath. "Cleo, things between you and Dominic would never have fallen apart like this if the two of you had just had a kid."

A bitter laugh nearly escaped Cleo's throat at the mere idea. How was she supposed to conceive a child when Dominic hadn't shared her bed in years and couldn't even stand the thought of touching her?

Smoothing her features into a polite smile, she said, "I should get going, Maura. Head back inside before it gets colder."

Slipping behind the wheel, Cleo glanced up at the rearview mirror to see her sister still standing alone on the curb, a heavy ache settling into her chest.

Her mind drifted back to the day they had bolted from their dead-end hometown—Maura barely fourteen, and Cleo just eleven. They had thrown themselves into the sprawling metropolis of Veridian, yet after all these years of scraping and fighting to survive, neither of them had managed to build a real life here.

Barely ten minutes down the highway, her phone buzzed again, the caller ID showing Dominic's grandmother, Martha.

"Cleo, where are you at this hour? It's getting terribly late. I've been sitting in your living room waiting for ages, and even Dominic made it home before you," Martha said warmly over the line.

Cleo's grip on the steering wheel trembled slightly. Out of the entire Vance clan, who had only taken her in years ago as a publicity stunt to salvage their public image, Martha was the sole person who had ever shown her genuine affection and pushed for her marriage to Dominic.

Years of chronic illness meant the elderly woman relied heavily on daily medication and had strict doctor's orders to avoid emotional distress. Knowing that, Cleo had specifically trained in therapeutic massage, making frequent trips to the family estate whenever her schedule allowed just to help ease Martha's aches.

A tight knot formed in Cleo's throat, rendering her completely speechless for several seconds.

Picking up on the heavy silence right away, Martha turned a sharp glare toward Dominic, who sat across the room flipping through a stack of business agreements, and barked, "Did you start another argument with Cleo? When on earth are you going to rein in that awful temper of yours, you stubborn boy?

"And another thing—if I catch wind that those stories about you fooling around with Daphne are actually true, I'll take a cane to your legs myself!"

Her voice rose sharply with agitation until a harsh bout of coughing cut her off mid-sentence.

Clearly, the gossip circulating around town had reached Martha's ears, prompting her late-night visit to see how things stood between the two of them firsthand.

Dominic's brows drew together as he set the papers down. "Take it easy, Grandma. There's nothing going on between Daphne and me."