Page 2 of The CEO

About ten minutes later, a knock sounded.

The captain stood and walked to the door.

Adam rushed past the captain to Bree.

She lost it and buried her face in his chest, her arms around his waist, as tears rolled down her face and she bawled.

Adam picked her up in his arms and sat her on his lap.

He buried his face in her hair.

She felt rather than heard his sobs. He and Brad had been best friends since kindergarten. He was hurting as much as she was. They had both lost their best friend.

“May I leave you here, sir, to care for Miss Taylor?” asked Captain O’Reilly.

Bree lifted her head and spoke to the captain. “Adam will stay. You don’t have to worry about me. I’ll be fine.” Though she said the words, she knew they were a lie. She would never be fine again.

Driving the Lamborghini,Adam raced to Bree’s, breaking every speed limit to get to her side. He’d left Valerie home, but it didn’t matter. They were divorcing anyway, and Bree needed him. He knew she would be a mess. Heck,hewas a mess. Brad. Gone. He couldn’t wrap his mind around it.

After Adam finished his stint with the Navy SEALs, he’d tried to get Brad to join him when he started Kincaid Holdings. It would have been Kincaid and Anderson Holdings then. Brad would have been a richer man now, if he had. But he’d wanted to be a Marine since second grade, when one came to talk to the class. He’d decided then and there that he would wear that uniform and carry a sword. And he’d done it.

Joined right out of high school. He’d worked his way up to captain in the fourteen years he’d been in.

Adam was proud of him.

Brad was happy, and then he met Bree, and together they were his best friends and the happiest couple he’d ever seen.

That made him even bitterer about his own marriage, which was ending in divorce. He wondered now if he’d ever loved Valerie. He’d always put Bree’s needs before hers. He realizednow that he always would. Bree was his best friend, along with Brad. Now, his only best friend.

Pushing that out of his mind, he focused on Bree as he knocked on her door.

When the captain answered, Adam rushed to Bree on the sofa. She just looked at him and tears ran from her eyes down her sweet cheeks. He hated seeing her like this, but knew she needed to get the immediate grieving process started. As did he.

He held her and when he sat her on his lap; she buried her head in his chest.

Adam couldn’t hold his tears any longer and leaned his forehead against the top of her head and let them flow.

The captain asked if Adam would stay and take care of Bree.

She’d answered for him and said he’d stay.

And he would, for as long as she needed him. He would cancel everything else to be with Bree and help her get past this.

He needed her as much as she needed him at this moment in time. He would keep his promise to Brad to take care of Bree if anything happened to him. Brad was no one’s fool. He had his business in order before he took off. That meant his will and his financial records and accounts were all in order and ready for Adam to give them to Bree.

Brad had never let on, but he was a wealthy man because of his stock holdings, most of which were in Kincaid. He hadn’t been ready to go to work for the company, but he wasn’t about to pass up a great opportunity. So he put as much as he could into the company stock.

For now, though, Adam was content to hold Bree, and she was content to be held while they shared their grief. After the funeral was soon enough to deal with Brad’s will.

CHAPTER 1

Mid July, three years later

Kincaid Holding’s headquarters, Adam Kincaid’s office

“Mr. Kincaid. You have a visitor.”Emily Simmons, Adam’s assistant, stood in the office doorway. She wasn’t very tall and the door to his office was massive. She looked like a child standing there. Only the laugh lines around her mouth and crinkles at the corners of her eyes gave her away.

His office, a large conference room, and the reception area where Emily worked were the only things on this floor. His office was the largest room. It boasted two leather Queen Anne chairs in front of his desk, which was piled high with reports on a company he was thinking of acquiring. The laptop on the right side of the desk was open to a spreadsheet.