Free Razor Edge: Razor Trilogy Three (Razor Thriller Romance Novella Book 3) by Nadine Doolittle Page B

the
international flight to Switzerland.
    Marlene, the receptionist who used to work
with Charlotte at Razor Industries told me that Charlotte Dawson was leaving
the country. She didn’t need her old job back because Charlotte was going to
become a classical violinist. “Did you know she played the violin, Mr. Razor?”
    Yes, I knew.
    I assume she got the money from her lawyer,
Phil. Or from some other investor. She got the money
somehow. She was never going to stay, no matter what I once believed. Or hoped.
    Her dark hair is bound up with a ribbon. Her
luggage has already been checked. She’s clutching her boarding pass and
identification in her right hand like someone is going to take it away from her.
Once she’s through the gate, I can’t call her back. I’ll never see her again. The
best thing is to just let her go. I have nothing to offer Charlotte.
    I must be watching her too hard because she
glances over her shoulder. Her eyes are curious and wary. I take a step
forward, unwilling, but somehow wanting to force her to make a decision. I
wonder if she’ll acknowledge me, or does she feel as I do—that this is a clean
ending.
    No matter what my brain tells me, I stand
rooted to the spot, my hands deep in my pockets against the cool, damp San
Francisco morning. I have everything money could buy and nothing I want. It’s
funny thinking back to that conversation she and I had at dinner. She said I didn’t
know what it was like to want something and not get it. I do now.
    I could tell her. It might change things
for us.
    I wait for her to make the decision for
both of us. I wait for her to turn back. And it hurts like hell, waiting because
I let myself believe that when she sees me, she’ll leave the line, come back to
me, take my hand and this pain will stop.
    Charlotte looks in my direction. Looks right at me. She sees me.
    And then she squeezes her eyes shut as
though trying not to cry.
    She’s not coming back. She’s getting on the
plane.
    The pain slams into my chest and I have
trouble breathing for a second. Then I turn away as fast as I can, before I
change my mind and walk rapidly out of the airport. The limousine is waiting
for me at the curb. Jackson is waiting to drive me home. Razor mansion will be lit
up for the party tonight and filled with overnight guests from New York. I’m
hosting a reprise engagement party to apologize to our friends. Marshall will
greet me at the door with his usual gravity. Anastasia is radiant now that both
Joel and Charlotte are gone. My fiancée is almost a girl I could love one day.
    I tell myself it doesn’t have to be a
tragedy. My life doesn’t have to be lonely. Charlotte Dawson was just a girl,
not my first girl. Maybe not my last if I can’t be faithful to Tash . I’m going to try.
    And there were other positives that came
out of this. The takeover bid for Tallulah Cement was killed and the bridges
and buildings that were built with the product are being examined and
overhauled. Razor Industries is thriving with our shares jumping in value when the
story broke. Carsten’s body was found.
    The negatives.
    Joel’s body was never recovered. And I’ll
never be the same.
    I used to have a purpose in life. My
purpose was my brother, Joel. There’s no way back from that failure. My death
wish has finally caught up with me, only not with my death. A life lived on the
edge, a life of recklessness and extraordinary good fortune....
    All I have now is the image of Joel pushing
himself off the Golden Gate Bridge.
    As it did with my father before me, Daniel
Razor’s luck has finally run out.

 
    the end.

 

About the Author

 
    Nadine Doolittle was born in 1960 in Comox , British Columbia, the
third daughter of an RCAF mechanic and his Scottish wife. A graduate of
Vancouver’s prestigious Studio 58 Theatre Program, her career detoured from
acting to casting for film and television with Toronto’s Alliance Films, and
finally to writing for the award-winning