Not Yet Yours

Chapter 24

Chapter Twenty-Four

Liam

Six months later

T he last six months have been an absolute whirlwind. Half of the time, I haven’t known which way was up, but it’s all been a good whirlwind. My offer for the hotel in Mexico was accepted and work commenced on the renovations that needed sprucing up immediately. There was very little to do, and I opted to keep all of the current staff in place, including Daniel, the manager who I met when Harriet and I went to visit the hotel, because they are definitely doing something right. Because that place needed so little work, I also bought another hotel closer to home, one that requires a fair bit of work, and it’s that one that has kept me so busy for the last few months. It seems to have been problem after problem, but I’m confident that in the end, it will all be worth it. Or at least I hope so. So far, it feels like for every problem the Mexican hotel doesn’t have that I was expecting it to have, the other one has two or three problems that I wasn’t expecting as well as the ones that I was expecting.

Assuming everything goes according to plan, all the work on both hotels will be finished within two or three weeks. The way this work has gone with all the issues springing up, I’ve allowed seven weeks before I expect it to be completed and open for business, although I see no reason why the one in Mexico won’t be opening up right on schedule. A week after the problem hotel was finally all fixed up and ready to go, I booked two weeks in the Maldives for Harriet and me in a beautiful five-star resort.

I think we both deserve it. I’ve worked my ass off on the new hotels and also on running the existing business and Harriet has worked her ass off at therapy and at growing her sculpting business. She started her therapy with three sessions a week, and then it went down to two sessions a week and now it’s only one session a week. In fact, today is her last session and that’s even more of a reason to celebrate and go and have this nice relaxing vacation together.

Obviously, sometimes things still crop up and Harriet needs me to reassure her that we’re good and everything is ok, of course, I happily do so, but for the most part, the therapy has worked wonders on her, and I know she now sees that all that stuff her father instilled in her was him projecting his own feelings and shortcomings onto her. I will never act on my feelings toward her father because she will see that as his prophecy coming true once more and her bringing misery into his life, but God I want to take hold of that man and seriously fucking hurt him for what he has put Harriet through. I want to choke the life out of him and then bring him back to life so I can do it again.

Only my love for Harriet is stopping me from doing it, but if he ever hurts her again, I’m not sure that I will be able to stop myself from doing it. She has decided to cut him out of her life for now and I guess I just have to hope she keeps it that way, although if she does change her mind, I will support her in whatever she wants to do. I will just have to remember that no matter how hard it might be for me, it will be a thousand times harder than that for Harriet and I have to be there for her and put her needs first before my need to get revenge.

Even thinking about her bastard of a father gets me all riled up and I force myself to think about something else. I go back to thinking about how well Harriet has done these last few months and how proud of her I am.

The extra work on the new hotel has meant that I’ve been working long ass days and oftentimes, I’m getting calls after hours and sometimes, I have to drop everything and go and see what needs fixing. Some days, so much shit has piled up that I’ve ended up giving up on getting home and just crashed in one of the rooms for a few hours between fighting fires.

Despite that, I think the timing of it all has worked out really well because with me being so busy I’ve had less spare time to spend with Harriet which I think helped her to stop feeling overwhelmed by me without her having to tell me she was feeling that way and asking me to back off a bit. Of course, I’ve missed her, but being apart a bit more has definitely made the time we do get to spend together that much more special.

I’m waiting for her to come over from her latest therapy session right now and I’m going to tell her about the surprise trip to the Maldives. She’s going to be so excited. I can’t wait to see her face. God, I love that woman and I love to make her happy and see her smile.