Page 46 of Maid for My Billionaire Boss
I stepped forward. “Here, let me try.”
Her brow was furrowed but even through her anger, she looked stunning. “No, you can’t help me. I’m trying to kick you out of my house!” she whisper-screamed.
“I can see what you are trying to do, but it’s not working. I can help.”
She relented, stepping back, letting her arms cross in front of her. I pressed on the door as hard as possible before turning the knob until I felt a release, and the door swung wide-open. I stood in the center of the threshold—one foot inside the house and the other foot on the porch. “It looks like the house shifted and you should get a new hole drilled. One that aligns with the knob. I could do it for you if you have a drill.”
She glared at me.
“Or . . . you could say thank you for opening your door,” I joked, but her nostrils flared, indicating she wasn’t in the mood for jokes.
“You need to leave.”
Right. We were fighting. I had hoped my impressive handyman skills would have made her forget about that. I lowered my voice and spoke softly, “I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t even know about you. It was business.”
“Business?” Her voice squeaked. “Really?”
“My accountants told me I needed to free up capital and recoup assets.”
“Recoup assets? That’s what you call it? That’s hilarious,” she mused with an angry scowl. “Because I call it being a heartless jerk.”
“Let me explain—”
She cut me off, saying in a rush of words, “How about I explain to you how it felt to sell the house Damion and I built together. The house we brought Josiah home from the hospital to. The home we made!” There was a fire in her eyes as she held them in communion with mine. “Or how about I tell you how it felt to have to empty out my dead husband’s art studio and hand it over to real estate developers. He spent a whole summer painting a mural on the outside brick wall, and in one second everything was leveled. Or the worst part, trying to explain to my son he can’t go back to school or see his friends again because we had everything taken from us.” She flung her hand wildly and went on. “Lucky for us, we had inherited this house and Damion hadn’t had time to move it into his name yet, or you would have claimed that too. So, no, you don’t get to explain!”
I wanted to die. This wasn’t supposed to be like this. I hated myself for what I did. I couldn’t walk away without telling her everything. It was the only way. “Atalie,” I started, still unsure how I would explain my actions in a way that she understood because I agreed I was scum. “I promise you, I had no idea. Damion had unpaid loans from my company. He had needed money for the expansion, and the banks didn’t want to finance him, so I gave him the money. He insisted on making it a loan, though, and I didn’t care if I ever got the money back because he was my friend, but he was the one who insisted we have papers on the loan. I ensured he had a great deal and charged him zero interest.”
“Oh.” Atalie snorted through a fake laugh. “I’m sure you gave him a deal, all right.”
“But his business was slow, and he didn’t want to tell you, so instead of paying them back, he kept borrowing more money and before long, he had exceeded the worth of that building, so he put up both businesses as collateral. It got worse every year and his loan got out of hand. He never wanted you to worry. I honestly didn’t care because I had the money to share. It’s the truth when I say my accountants suggested I call in the unpaid loans. I had no idea his name was on the list. I never saw the list and I never thought to check.” I motioned to the house before me. “This is all a shock to me right now. I thought it was people I didn’t know, and—”
“Oh, let’s feel sorry for the billionaire,” she said sarcastically, letting her eyes dig into mine.
“Atalie, I had no idea you had to sell your home,” I whispered.
“How could you not know? You took my businesses from me, so I had no way to pay for my house.” She flung her hand toward me in an angry gesture. “For what? Gas for your private jet to fly around with Tonya?”
“It wasn’t like that!” Fear was fueling my words now, and my voice ticked up a notch. "I was at a crossroads where I was looking at laying off a hundred of my best employees, and it made sense to call in money owed to me.”
She sarcastically snapped her fingers right in my face. “Just like that.”
“No, not like that.”
“I don’t understand. You said Damion was your friend. How could you not want to help his family?”
“After Damion died, I was a wreck,” I started to pour my heart out in desperation to make her understand. “Forty-year-olds aren’t supposed to have heart attacks. I couldn’t fathom he was gone. I actually started to reach out to you many times to see if I could help, but I always froze because I was so broken. I didn't think you'd needed to hear me cry when you had suffered a bigger loss. I had no idea you were dealing with money issues, or I would have immediately." I shook my head as these memories burned, but she needed them, so I kept going, "I stopped caring about everything. I stopped going to work. Tonya and I started fighting all the time, and my business crashed. I was letting my team run my company for me, and I didn’t double-check what loans were on the list and . . . I’m a jerk.”
“You got the last part right.”
“I’ll fix it. I’ll get your house back.Pleaselet me make this better.”
“I think you’ve done enough.” She glared through scary eye slits, looking like she wanted to spit hot tar at me. “And to think I had actually started tolikeyou, you stupid piece of garbage. No, you’re just another billionaire who doesn’t care about the little guy. I’m glad I quit today, or I would’ve never found this out. Could you imagine what would have happened if I didn’t know this?”
It didn’texactlysound like a term of endearment the way she whispered-screamed at me, but there was something braided into her words that hinted she might have been considering . . .something,and that was what I clung to. “What would have happened?”
“Get lost!”
My heart released rapid-fire bullets that stung on impact, each getting lodged into my throat.She felt it too.“Atalie, what would have happened?”
