The Pretend Girlfriend (A Billionaire Love Story #1)(77)

"Well, I'm not exactly seeing your leverage to make any such demand..."

"You fancy yourself a good judge of character, don't you, Henry?" Gwen said.

Henry shrugged.

Gwen continued, "So you know that when I threaten to tell everyone about the girlfriend contract unless you accept my condition, I mean it."

That earned her a slightly raised eyebrow. "You will be in breach of a non-disclosure agreement if you do that. There will be consequences."

Gwen leaned forward to make sure that he got a good look at her eyes. "I don't care, Henry."

The elder Manning's eyes flicked back and forth between hers, analyzing them, testing them, searching for any sign of a bluff or lie. Their search found nothing. Henry leaned back in his plush black leather executive's chair.

"Didn't you just tell me that you wouldn't take my money?" Henry said.

"I'm glad you were listening when I said it," Gwen replied.

Spreading his hands, Henry said, "Then I fail to see what you could possibly want."

It all came down to money with Henry. Money and power: the bottom line. It was beyond him why someone could possibly want anything else, apparently. He projected onto everyone else, unable to see any other motive.

"My condition is that you leave your son alone. You stop sabotaging his efforts to make this company better, you stop trying to undermine his charity work, you stop trying to turn him into a younger version of you." Gwen needed to clasp her hands together to keep them from shaking. It took a Herculean effort of will to keep eye contact with Henry the whole time, but she managed. Neither of them blinked.

"That sounds like three conditions to me."

"Whatever. Take them and finish with this, or don't and deal with the fallout. I wonder how many points the stock will drop? I hear investors and speculators spook easily."

Was it going to work? For several lengthy heartbeats, it looked like Henry might just laugh her threat away. He didn't.

"I agree to your terms. I'll have the new agreement drafted and couriered to you this afternoon. And I also feel the need to say that you are mistaken about Aiden. You think he cares for you, but I can tell you that he doesn't. There are things about him you don't know and understand..."

Gwen was tired of listening to him, tired of standing in that office with its polished floors that made the soles of her feet ache, tired of everything about this, really. "Things like how you blame him for the death of his mother? Things like your dysfunctional relationship? Things like how the way you treat him tears him up on the inside? You don't even know your own son, Henry; you can't tell me that I don't, either."

Henry swallowed heavily. One hand strayed up, about to tug at the tight, perfect half-Windsor knot of his tie, but he stopped it. For the first time since she came in, he broke eye contact.

Gwen wanted to feel triumphant at being able to get to him, but couldn't. No, she only felt sorry for him. Here was a man who'd spent his whole life building up a huge, multi-national corporation to try and replace his wife, while simultaneously alienating his son, who was his wife's true legacy. And Gwen could see that, at some level, Henry recognized this, too. He'd just been doing things one way for so long that he didn't know how to do them any other.

Nothing ever went the way she expected it too, apparently. She actually got the urge to apologize for snapping at him like that, despite his deserving every word of it.

Henry reconstructed his facade of detached composure, steepling his fingers again, and said, "So we're in agreement regarding the terms of the new contract? You will sign it when the courier delivers it later today?"

Before Gwen could answer, the door to the office burst open behind her.

"Mr. Manning, I'm sorry, I couldn't stop him!" the secretary said, looking decidedly nonplussed at having to abandon her roost behind her desk.

However, Gwen's attention never really focused on the secretary. Aiden strode into the room in a crisp black suite and a red tie. He looked perfectly composed, as though nothing had happened the night before. Just seeing him made Gwen's body ache again.

He looked to her for a moment, their eyes meeting, before shifting his gaze to his father. "What are you trying to get her to do?"

Henry considered his son, then pushed back from his desk and stood up, the castors on his chair swishing against the floor. The tension mounted in the room as the two Mannings engaged in a brief stare down.

Henry relented first. "You may go," he told his secretary (who beat a hasty retreat). Turning to his son, he said, "I am not trying to get her to do anything. She came here of her own free will. Demanded it, from what I gather. I was merely... facilitating," he glanced at the opened contract on his desk, the shiny pen sitting beside it.

"Did you sign anything?" Aiden said, worry plain in his voice as he strode over to stand beside Gwen. He quickly scanned the contract, confirming for himself that she hadn’t yet signed it.

Gwen replied anyway, "No." Why was Aiden here? She hadn't told him she would be here. A sort of numbness pervaded her mind. Confusion. She was shell-shocked. She'd spent all morning convincing herself that this was the right thing to do, that it was what was best for the both of them. Couldn't he see that?

Aiden's hand on her elbow snapped her at least partially from her stupor. "We should go," he said, urging her away from the desk.