The Worst Best Man(88)

Aiden remained impassive. “You earn those things by proving yourself. Not by having the right last name.”

“Fine. Then buy me out.” Elliot crossed his arms smugly. He named a figure that was far too precise to have come from thin air. “That’s the price to get me out of your hair.”

“That is not an option.” As much as Aiden would love to write the bastard a check right here and now, he’d promised his father a year. An entire year to give Elliot the chance to prove himself and fail.

“Then I’ll sell them to someone else.”

Aiden stared his brother down. “You’d better think long and hard before you do anything irreversible. Kilbourns hold the majority. If you sell off your percentage, that would no longer be the case. It would put the company at risk.”

Elliot shrugged, but Aiden saw the beads of sweat on his forehead. Elliot was many things, most of them terrible and offensive, but his desire to be recognized as a valuable Kilbourn came first at all times. If something had him scared enough to sell off his only piece of the pie, it must be quite the threat indeed. It made Aiden almost curious enough to start digging.

“If you want to continue to see a paycheck, you’re going to have to do something to earn it. I don’t care if that means you’re making coffee in the breakroom or you’re emptying trashcans in the conference room. You will contribute, or you won’t have a place here.”

“You’ve been dying to get rid of me since I was born,” Elliot whined. “Now’s your chance.”

“One year. You know where this company is going. What the future looks like. You’d be an idiot to sell now.”

“Some of us don’t have a choice,” Elliot hissed, he dropped his feet to the floor and leaned forward in his chair. “Some of us were never the favorite. Some of us had to settle for scraps. And some of us do what we have to in order to survive.”

“You’ve been handed everything you ever wanted,” Aiden pointed out.

“Not everything. And the rest was never enough. So you’re going to buy me out, or I’m going to that pretty little girlfriend of yours and tell her exactly why your friend Chip broke her best friend’s heart all those years ago.”

Aiden stilled in his seat. “What makes you think I had anything to do with that?”

Elliot sneered. “You’ve been ignoring my existence my entire life. I overheard a lot of things in that house.”

Aiden’s hand tightened on the pen, but he kept his face impassive, disinterested.

“Do you really think that information would have any effect on my relationship with Franchesca now? If you’ll recall, Chip and Pruitt are happily married now. No thanks to you.”

“Ah, but imagine how Franchesca would feel knowing that you were the reason her best friend in the whole world was nearly hospitalized? There were plenty of rumors back then about how hard she took the breakup. Chip didn’t know what you were doing, but I did. I recognize manipulation when I see it. How do you think he would feel knowing you orchestrated his breakup?”

“You have nothing. I’m offering you the chance to finally be a real part of this company.” Aiden kept his words clipped.

“You have a week to decide. Buy me out, or I’m spilling your dirty little secrets to Franchesca.” With that, Elliot stormed from Aiden’s office in a fit of temper.

And now Aiden’s headache was full blown. He glanced at the blinking voicemail indicator, at the dozens of new messages in his inbox, at the neat stack of contracts awaiting his signature and rose.

By the time he got there, Frankie would likely be getting home. He wanted her. Needed her. He called his car service. “We’re going to Brooklyn.”

--------

Aiden closed his eyes in the car and let the dark and the quiet relax him. By the time he got to Frankie’s front steps, it was ten, and he just wanted to lay down on that big bed, wrap his arms around her and sleep.

He pressed the buzzer for Frankie’s apartment and wasn’t surprised at the lack of response. He pressed the buzzer for Mrs. Gurgevich in 2A.

“Sorry to bother you so late, Mrs. Gurgevich,” Aiden said when she answered. The world was spinning in halos and nauseating visual disturbances around him.

“That girl hasn’t given you a key yet?” she grumbled.

“Not yet, ma’am.”

“Have you tried flowers?” she suggested through the crackle of the speaker.

“I’ll try that,” he agreed.

“I’ll keep my fingers crossed for you.” She buzzed him inside, and Aiden trudged up the three flights of stairs praying that his head didn’t fall from his shoulders. He’d just sit in the hallway and wait for her. He should have texted her, but part of him wanted to test her. Would she be happy to see him? Annoyed? He needed to know before he went any farther. He could feel himself getting pulled into her. And he needed to know exactly how far she was comfortable going before he could give any more pieces of himself.

The door across the hallway cracked open. “Oh, it’s you. I thought it was Mr. McMitchem down the hall stealing my paper,” Mrs. Chu said, glancing down to make sure her decoy newspaper was still there.

Aiden caught a glimpse of pink house coat and plush puppy slipper through the crack in the door.

“Sorry for startling you, Mrs. Chu. I’m just waiting for Franchesca—ah, Frankie—to get home.”