Wife Wanted (A Billionaire Bad Boy Romance)(32)

 

She was listening to whoever was on the other end, eyes widening and tears welling within their depths. All the color from her face started to drain, and she looked like she was about to slump over on the bench. Riley reached out an arm and gently held her upright until the call ended, and, with shaky hands, she tucked her cell back in her purse.

 

“I…I have to go,” she whispered and tried to stand, but her legs gave out.

 

“Easy, Anna, just sit for a second. What’s wrong?”

 

“It’s ah…that was the hospital,” she said as tears fell from her eyes. “My mother, she was moved to intensive care. I have to go fill out the paperwork. I need to leave.”

 

“Your mother’s in the hospital?”

 

She nodded, then stood. “I need to find my date so he can take me. But I’ll see you for our date, right?”

 

“Course,” he said, walking with her a bit. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go with you?”

 

They reached the door to the ballroom, and she shook her head. “No, I’ll be fine. Thank you for this evening, by the way. It would’ve been boring as hell if you hadn’t shown up.” She squeezed his hand, then hurried through the doors to find her date.

 

Riley went inside, too, just so he could see this mystery date of hers who deserved a second chance. He watched her dress disappear through the crowd; moments later, it appeared near the front entrance with a man at her side. Riley ground his teeth. “Mitch Harper? That asshole?”

 

“Did your lady take off on you again, Ben?” the real Ben teased as he and Linda came up beside him. “Wait, is she with who I think she is?”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Riley muttered.

 

“She didn’t leave you for him?” Linda asked.

 

“No. Apparently, her mother is in the hospital, but she said she’d still see me Friday.”

 

Ben and Linda exchanged a glance, but Riley ignored it. Anna wouldn’t stand him up. He could tell by the look in her eyes how honest of a person she was, despite whatever she was hiding from him. Probably had to do with her mother. It was personal. And she’d still told him some of it. But at the same time, the suspicious businessman in him needed to know more about this woman, especially since he knew she worked for Yancey.

 

“Well, have we stayed long enough, boss?” Ben asked. “I’m sure you’d like to get out of here, too.”

 

“Let me talk to our board members before we leave, since I’ve been absent,” Riley said. “But you two can go ahead and leave since I always drag you here against your will,” he added with a wink. He headed over to talk to the men he really never trusted. His grandfather always said the board members were sheep who followed the market. Never trust them in any capacity to do what’s best for the company. All they cared about was lining their pockets.

 

And if Mitch Harper was here, that meant his board was planning on doing some new investing. He didn’t trust Harper’s company. They’d made some shady deals in the past, and his grandfather had always stayed away from them. So why the sudden turn to them now?

 

He told himself he would ask a few light questions and do some more investigating tomorrow. They greeted him with smiles and handshakes, six old men, all gone grey now. Riley knew they looked down on him in some respects. They thought he was too young to run a company as big as Cyber Vault, Inc., that his grandfather had been a fool to leave him in charge these past years. But Riley didn’t care what they thought. As long as the majority of the company stock was under his name, they couldn’t touch him.

 

Hence, the reason he had to keep Diane Chandler out of the picture.

 

Something was going on, and he really needed to figure it out before everything was pulled out from under him.

 

***

 

Charlotte was waiting for Phoebe when she rushed into the waiting room. “She’s upstairs. I can’t let you in to see her, though, but the Doc said I could take you to speak with him on how she’s doing,” she said as her friend tried to rush past.

 

“Why can’t I see her?”

 

“I mean, you can…just, you can’t be at her side. Come on, Phoebe, I’ll take you up.”

 

“Ok. Mitch? You can leave if you need to,” she said, turning back to her date.

 

But he sat down in a chair and grabbed a magazine. “Nope, I’ll be right here waiting for you. You’ll have to get home somehow, right? I’m just a few floors away if you need me.” He smiled gently, and she mouthed a thank you before letting Charlotte take her to the elevators.