Building Her Throne Burying My Heart (Claire) novel Chapter 54

I tried to explain, but Claire just scoffed at me. “Lambert, do you even call yourself a man? The things you’ll come up with for money… You really expect me to believe Darleen is sick? You think I’m that gullible?”

She wasn’t interested in hearing another word. “You have one day. Be back here tomorrow. If I don’t see you, you know what’s going to happen.”

Before I could say anything else, she hung up.

Claire sat there, fuming, for a long time after the call. Eventually, she picked up her phone again and called Laird.

“Go find out where Lambert is. Make up an excuse if you need to, just figure out if that woman he’s talking about is really Darleen.”

Once she finished with Laird, he dialed my number right away.

“Lambert, where are you?”

I was surprised to hear from him. “I’m at the hospital.”

“Send me your address. I need to talk to you about something.”

He didn’t say what it was, just that it was important. I sent him the address.

But Laird didn’t come to meet me. Instead, he used his contacts to ask around at the hospital until he found out which room Darleen was in. I was just getting back to her room with the lunch I’d picked up for her when I saw him at the door. Once he saw us together, he stepped away and called Claire.

“Claire, Lambert was telling the truth. Darleen really is here in the hospital. I think he really needed that money for her, so…”

Trying to cover, Claire said, “Yeah, just some tricky problems. You know how intense the competition is.”

Garrison stepped closer, reaching out as if to give her a shoulder rub. “Don’t wear yourself out. Let me help you relax a bit, maybe rub your temples?”

For some reason, being close to him made her uncomfortable. She pulled away. “No, it’s alright. You must be tired too. Come sit down for a bit.”

With her turning him down, Garrison quietly dropped his hands. Ever since I showed up again, he felt like Claire was spending less and less time with him. That worried him. He wasn’t sure how she felt about him anymore.

“Claire,” he blurted out, “maybe we should move up the engagement party.”

Claire looked at him in surprise. “Why? We already sent out the invitations. Did something happen?”