Prescription for Romance / Love and the Single Dad: Prescription for Romance / Love and the Single Dad

The demands for payments were relentless. And the threats, the threats frightened him most of all. Not just against his life, but against his parents and the institute, as well.

The threats hadn’t been in so many words, but when he was late with his third payment, a payment that had become swollen out of proportion because the interest that had been slapped on it grew at a prodigious rate, his “benefactor”—as the man had referred to himself at first—quietly slipped him a news clipping. The clipping was from a West Coast newspaper from approximately six months ago. The photograph that was at the top of the article showed a once-famous hotel going up in flames.

“The owner of that piece of property didn’t think he had to pay on time, either,” was all the man said to him in that raspy voice that came across like a poor imitation of Marlon Brando in The Godfather.

Derek never asked who the benefactor was referring to. He didn’t want to know. The lesson was crystal clear. If he didn’t continue to pay off his loan on time, the institute would be burned to the ground.

He sold everything he owned and still, it wasn’t enough. Having nothing left, immersed in maintaining a facade, Derek was left with only one source of money to tap. He handled the institute’s finances. So he set aside his conscience and did what he had to do.

It was either that or watch the institute burn.

He refused to think of the consequences of his actions, but he knew they were coming.

And soon.

In the meantime, he would continue to burn the candle at both ends, trying to stay alive one more day. Hoping that, at the end of the day, there would be some kind of miracle that could save him. It was the only way he could go on. Searching for a miracle. And praying that his luck had changed.

Chapter Eight

Paul had to admit that the press release looked even better in newsprint than it had on the antiseptic white pages that Ramona had handed him to read several days ago.