Unperfect

Max

“No, I don’t have an appointment,” I said through gritted teeth to the lady at reception. If I was honest, I could understand her hesitation – I hadn’t shaved in a day or so and I was in jeans and a ribbed thermal (quite the opposite of the slick business attire of everyone else in Nate’s building). But I wasn’t giving up. Not until I saw him. “But I’m the main architect on a number of projects this company is funding. I’ve been here before. It’s urgent I see him today.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I … sir! You can’t just go through there. He’s in a meeting. Sir!”

I strode past the reception desk. I’d been waiting for two fucking days and I couldn’t just stand around in some swanky office with only a couple of doors separating me from that dickhead. After making my way through a glass door then down a corridor I pushed open a set of double doors into the large room. A bunch of suits were sitting around the long table. The bald chap who’d been midsentence as I pushed open the door broke off when I slammed into the room and rounded the table in a few long strides.

“Mr Hardcastle,” Nathanial Banks’ smooth, unaffected voice said into the silence. “Always a pleasure, but we are in the middle of a fairly–” I slammed my hand down on the table in front of him and even his next-level urban sophistication slipped enough for him to flinch.

“Where is she?” I growled.

He pushed away from the table and stood up with the chair between us. Not so brave with someone more his size it seemed.

“I don’t know what you’re –”

‘Your wife,” I said, pushing the chair out of the way with a flick of my wrist. There was another crack in Banks’ smooth exterior when he flinched again as it shot back on its wheels and slammed against the wall. “Where is Mia?”

Banks took a step back and let out a small laugh.

“Now, see here, young man,” one of the old duffers Nate had been talking to stood up and scowled across at me. “We’re in an important meeting. I don’t think this behaviour has any place among civilised–”

“It’s okay, Jeff,” Banks said, giving the man a smooth, unruffled smile then turning back to me. “Amelia, my wife, is at home and she’s perfectly fine. Now if I could ask you to –”

“Was she perfectly fine when you beat her so badly that she broke several of her ribs?” I asked, eliciting a few sharp intakes of air from around table. Jeff’s annoyed expression morphed to shock and he sat back down heavily into his chair. “Or when you yanked her around so hard that you dislocated her shoulder?” Banks’ face flushed red with anger and his hands curled into fists at his side.

“Ladies and gentleman,” he said, his unruffled manner sounding forced now. “This is, of course, all a misunderstanding, but for the moment I think it best we end the meeting there. Molly at reception will be happy reschedule.” There was some shuffling of papers and stowing of laptops before everyone filed out through the double doors. Low murmurs were exchanged and some frowning looks directed at Banks, but they left without confronting either of us – a mark of Banks’ power and a reminder of how impossible Mia’s situation had been.

“Tell me where she is and I won’t smash your annoying face in – at least not today.”

Banks’ colour had receded and his expression was back to the carefully blank one from earlier. A subtle twitch in his left eyelid was the only evidence that he was at all affected. He cleared his throat.

“Why don’t you take a seat?” he said. Moving to the opposite side of the table from me to sit down, and then gesturing for me to do the same. I squeezed the back of the chair in front of me until my knuckles turned white as I stared at him.

“I don’t want to take a fucking seat,” I said, my voice still coming out with an undercurrent of growl. “I want to see Mia.”

Banks leaned forward in his chair, resting his forearms on the conference table and linking his hands together as if we were engaged in some sort of goddamn business negotiation.

“You can bark orders as much as you like, Mr Hardcastle,” he told me smoothly. “But it if anyone has the advantage here, it’s me. I hold the fate of your company in the palm of my hand. For you to come storming into my place of business like a bull in china shop is the height of stupidity. I can’t think that you would–”

“You didn’t think I would challenge it, did you?” I asked, my eyebrows going up in shock. “You didn’t think that I’d come after her, not when I found out who she was married to. You thought I’d just let her go.”

Banks stared at me, his expression stayed the same but there was a subtle flare behind his eyes that told me I’d hit the nail on the head. There was no way he thought I confront him like this.

“I’ll admit you have … surprised me. Not many people surprise me, Mr Hardcastle.”

I snorted. “You mean most of the people you know are amoral wankers like you.”

He shrugged. “In my experience it is unusual for a man to risk his business, for any reason.”

“All I want is Mia. My business will survive losing your poxy contracts. With the amount of corners you want to cut, I doubt I’d want my name put to them anyway.”

He shrugged, but a small smile played across his mouth. “You can bluff all you like, Max, but if you could afford to walk away, you would have done it by now. I know exactly how close to the edge most architecture firms are financially. Even you, with your Dream Homes reruns bolstering business every few months, your awards and your Royal endorsements. Even you feel the pinch. Losing my business would be catastrophic for you.”

“I don’t care about–”

“And, let me ask you this: do you really know the woman you’re risking it all for? Do you know what poor, defenceless Mia is capable of?”

“Whatever you–”

“Would you like me to show you?” A horrible smile spread across his face as he unbuttoned his suit jacket and lifted his shirt, revealing long scar, which traversed from his chest down to his stomach. With another short wound next to it.

Suddenly all of Mia’s worries made sense. You don’t know what I’ve done, she’d whispered.

“She left me for dead,” he said through a smile. “Did you know she was capable of that? Of leaving a man to bleed to death?”

I looked up from his scars and narrowed my eyes at him. “I know the results of what you did that day. She still can’t use her right arm properly. You beat her to a bloody pulp. You’re twice her size. If I had been her, I wouldn’t have stopped stabbing you until I could see the life leave your eyes for myself. If you think this will stop her pressing charges you’re wrong. Once the police see all the evidence you’ll be completely fucked. Do you think a jury is going to convict a woman for giving you a little scrape on your side –”

“It’s hardly ‘a little scrape’,” he spluttered, his composure slipping. “That bitch stabbed me. Twice!”

“You nearly killed her!” I said, my voice rising. Banks flicked a wary glance towards the door.

“Can you please keep your voice –”

“Anybody looking between you and Mia, with the knowledge that you beat her badly enough to break three ribs and fracture-dislocate her shoulder, is not going hesitate to convict you. No matter what she did in self defence.”

The corner of his left eye twitched again, before he pushed back from the table and stood up.

“Whether or not a jury would convict me is a non-issue,” he said, his hand pushing up his shirtsleeve so he could check his expensive watch. “I won’t be going to court as Amelia won’t be going to the police. And if you’ve got any sense you’ll lose interest in the situation.” He placed both hands on the table and leaned forward towards me, his eyes locked with mine and lit with a fierce determination. “Forget about her, Max. Don’t throw away everything you’ve built for a woman that doesn’t even want you anymore – for someone who would walk away from you at the slightest provocation. Don’t go down that rabbit hole – believe me, I know how badly it can end.”

I stood up and opened my mouth to speak, but the door to the conference room opened. Two large security guards made their way inside, flanked me and looked towards Banks for further instructions.

“Gentlemen,” Banks said, smooth as silk. “Mr Hardcastle and I have concluded our business for today. If you could show him the way out of the building I would appreciate it.”

One of the men reached for my arm but I threw him and murderous look and he dropped his hand.

“This isn’t over,” I snapped across the table at Banks. “You can’t keep her from me forever.”

“On the contrary, Mr Hardcastle, I’ve found in my life that I can largely do what I want … and I keep what’s mine.”